Vice and Void (The Savage Wolves Brotherhood #1)

6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Callum

S team poured from the small hole atop the coffee’s plastic lid as Duke set the cup on the desk. Callum's gaze roved through the office window and over the open bays. Vehicles were hoisted into the air, a row of oil drums lined the opposite end of the shop, and grease cloths piled at Ace’s feet as he leaned over the open hood of a car.

When Duke flicked the door shut, the shrill blast of power drills still managed to worm its way over the half-muffled bass from the music.

Callum’s father, Tex, opened the shop when he was barely in his twenties, and Callum inherited it the day Tex died. Luckily, Joanna and Kane knew just enough about the business to keep it running until Callum was released, thanks to Ace’s extraordinary knowledge as a mechanic. While Ace wasn't one for book learning, no one could hold a candle to his ability to hotwire an engine, except perhaps over-eager Logan, who was willing to do anything to prove himself.

Callum smelled more like gasoline, metal, and sweat at the end of the day, but the manual labor kept him occupied and out of trouble. And in the last few days, it kept his mind from wandering to Dakota Montgomery. The awareness that she was back in town and within a fifteen-minute motorcycle ride away was a realization that was extremely fucking unwelcome. While her sudden reappearance made him want to summon the strength to throw a car from the bay with his bare hands, the thoughts that actually barreled forward were filled with grief, devastation, and, unbelievably, longing .

They had always been drawn toward one another—though he assumed, more like hoped, those feelings had long been quashed. He was disarmed the moment he was in her presence, choked by a thousand memories that rose within him. Fuck if he wanted to rip apart whatever kept them tethered together now.

“Why are we meeting here?” the man seated opposite the desk asked as he lifted a trembling hand to pick up the coffee cup. “I thought you owned a clubhouse on the outskirts of town.”

Duke sank into the oil-stained office chair, the hinges squeaking as he relaxed. “Don’t shit where you eat, and don’t eat where you shit.”

“Classy,” Callum said, hooking one ankle over the other to lean against the window. He glanced over to the man. “Business is done here.”

The man took a tentative sip of the coffee and swallowed back a disgusted face before setting the cup back down.

Callum smirked. “Not up to your standards, Max? Sorry, we’re fresh out of Penham's Blue Mountain. Our personal barista quit the other day, and we haven’t been able to find a new one yet.”

Duke chuckled as Max’s face flushed with an embarrassed heat. “No, no, the coffee's great—“

“The coffee’s shit. It’s the cheapest one we can get in bulk,” Duke interjected as he threaded his hands behind his neck to brace his head. “What did you call us for?”

A sheen of sweat broke out at Max’s hairline. “It’s about Rosie. We need to buy some distills from you. Healing and Blood Replenishing.”

Callum and Duke exchanged wary looks. “What happened to Rosie?” Callum asked as he folded his arms over his chest.

“Her boyfriend,” Max answered. He reached forward to grab the coffee cup and took another gulp that bobbed his Adam’s apple. “He beat her the other night and left her for dead in a cornfield. He—“ He took another large swallow and coughed. It took him a few minutes to calm his breathing, but when he did, he added, “We can’t get the Rangers involved. They’ll take her to the Guildhall and test her. We all know what will happen there.”

“She’ll be carted to the Fieldhouse before you can say Vital,” Callum said.

“We’ve been good to you for six years now,” Max went on. He leaned forward to place his forearms on the edge of the desk. “Thank the gods, Rosie hasn’t been tested, and thank the gods, her mother noticed the mark before anyone else did. ”

“Thank the gods you have enough influence in the city to know what the Guildhall is doing behind closed doors,” Callum bit out. “Rosie’s mark is in a bad spot.”

The skin-toned, patchy appearance of her Vital mark, attributed by the Fieldhouse to be closely linked to Kynetos, the God of the Body, had taken up residence square on the back of her neck.

Max paled. “I’ve done everything you’ve required of us. I’ve passed on every scrap of information I could find—“

Duke waved a hand, an unimpressed expression passing over his features. “We’re gonna help your daughter, Max. Take a breath.”

Max waited, lips pressed tightly together and body perched on the edge of his seat. Callum studied him. The wrinkling of his brow, the bounce of his expensive leather dress shoes against the dirty tiled floor, the gaze that flitted around the room as though he were afraid that someone very important would soon spot him sitting there. Alleviating those worries was something that Callum and the Brotherhood were known for, something the Iron Guard had come knocking on their door about a time or two.

“What are you after?” Callum finally asked, garnering Duke’s attention. Max’s eyes flashed up to Callum. “If we find Rosie’s boyfriend, what do you want us to do with him?”

“I want justice,” Max spat without hesitation, a disdain to his tone that Callum hadn’t heard in the six years they had been protecting Rosie. “And I want him out of the picture.”

Duke quirked an amused smile. “Callum knows all about bitter daddies, don’t you?”

“Funny.”

Duke stood from the seat, grabbed the empty coffee cup, and popped the lid from the rim with his thumb. Max's gaze tracked the lid as it clattered to the desk. Duke weaved over to the pot and poured the dark liquid into the cup. Steam billowed from within, the scent of overly heated coffee heavy in the small office. The casual movements and the light diversion from the topic were all meant to intimidate. From Max’s rapid blinking and how he kept wringing his hands in his lap, the tactic had worked.

“Let’s talk payment,” Duke said as he set the cup back down in front of Max, who eyed both the Lead of the Brotherhood and the coffee with distaste.

“Payment?”

“Payment,” Callum repeated. He pushed off the window and stalked around the desk, coming to a halt next to Max's chair. “You know…when someone does a service for you in exchange for money.”

Max bristled. “I know the definition of payment. I just thought—“

"That we would do your dirty work for free?” Duke interjected. He sauntered to Max’s other side to lean a hip against the edge of the desk. Max’s head comically swung back and forth in an attempt to gauge both Duke and Callum at the same time.

“We don’t take requests like this lightly. The monthly blood is so we don’t turn Rosie into the Iron Guard,” Callum said. “Anything outside of that requires a monetary donation to the Brotherhood.”

“I th-thought you were here to p-protect the community,” Max managed to sputter.

“And we do,” Duke responded. “We’ll take care of Rosie’s boyfriend and make sure it doesn’t turn back on us. Or you.”

Max was quiet for a long minute, and Ace’s loud singing battered through the window panes as he passed by with a car alternator in his hand. With a huff, Max swallowed and sagged against the back of the chair. “How much are we talking?”

“Depends how you want him taken care of,” Callum said. A callous smirk grew on Callum's face at Max’s flushed skin. “Permanently, I take it.”

“Yes, permanently,” Max snapped. “I don’t want to give that bastard another chance.”

“Fifty thousand marks. No wiring, hard cash.” Duke glanced at Callum, giving him a curt nod that bricked up all emotions behind a shield.

Gone was the bitter man secretly struggling with self-loathing and regret. The Vice of the Brotherhood had taken control, and he felt that resentment harden into satisfactory indifference as he steeled those fractured, complicated layers back into place. Dakota Montgomery had won once already. He wouldn't allow her to win again.

“Van is parked out front,” Ace said, shoving his arms through his leather motorcycle cut. “Yanked the keys from the shop after we closed. Blood is gonna be a bitch to get out of that fabric, so long as we don't…”

Callum shook his head. “Nah, we won’t get blood in it. According to Max, Rosie’s boyfriend drinks at a dive bar on our side of town. Shouldn’t be too hard to grab him.” He holstered his gun to his hip.

Ace’s unsettling grin sparked his empty eyes. The promise of violence was the only way Callum could spot a shred of Ace’s old self these days. “Throw him in the van and, what? Dump him in the woods near The Boundary?”

Rocco and Logan entered the clubhouse, and a sliver of moonlight momentarily lit the front hallway.

“That’s the idea,” Callum started but was drowned out by a loud groan from Ace when he spotted Logan lingering in the doorway.

“What the fuck, man?” Ace said, pointing to Logan with a thumb over his shoulder. “What the fuck is the kid doing here?” Logan didn't muscle his blanch into neutral fast enough, and Ace leaped on the mistake. “Look at him! One word from me, and this kid is gonna piss his fucking jeans.”

“You have to stop being so welcoming,” Rocco said as he clapped Ace on the shoulder while walking by. “Besides, Callum asked for him. And what the Vice wants, the Vice gets.”

“What could you possibly want from this flat fucking tire?” Ace went on incredulously.

“I’ve got a special job for him.”

Logan took a confident yet somehow still tentative step forward. “I’m ready, boss. Whatever you need from me, I’ll do it. Drive the van, move the bikes—“

“Dig a hole in the woods,” Callum said. He reached down to grab the shovel he had tossed onto the couch cushions before crossing the room to shove it into Logan’s surprised grasp. “A big one.”

Logan glanced at his hands wrapped around the handle. “Won’t that take forever?” he asked nervously.

“Whatever you need from him, right, Logan?” Rocco drawled.

Logan’s eyes shifted from Callum to Rocco, and his chest thrust forward as though someone had taken a rod and rammed it down his spine. “I’ve got it covered, Vice. I’ll just grab my motorcycle from out back and—“

“Oh, that won’t be necessary,” Callum interrupted with a shit-eating smirk. Logan’s brow furrowed as Callum shouted a quick, “Kane!”

Kane entered the communal space through the hallway connecting the back bedrooms, an identical shit-eating grin splitting his mouth. He was hunched over something, and though the flickering ceiling lights were dim, Callum felt an intense wave of joy as he watched Logan’s confidence slide from his shoulders.

Callum had taken approximately one hundred marks from the fifty thousand Max supplied and pressed them into Kane’s hand with one simple instruction—buy a bicycle. Kane took that simple instruction and had fun with it. The bicycle was small enough for an eight-year-old girl, the frame a glittering pink that sparkled even in the minimal light. Silver streamers hung from the end of each handlebar, and the never-used tires were a startling shade of white against the grimy backdrop of the clubhouse.

Rocco gaped at the bicycle, and Ace stared at Logan. Silence fell, the clock's tick counting down the seconds until they needed to leave. Then, Rocco howled with laughter. Ace followed suit, doubling over to grab his knees when tears gathered in his eyes.

“Callum, you can’t be—I can’t fit on that.”

“What are you afraid of?” Callum asked innocently. “You’ll be fine. From what I heard, you’ve got the whole force of the Brotherhood behind you.” He echoed the words Logan said to Dakota, ultimately learning of the interaction after days of hounding Lyra until she cracked out of pure annoyance.

“I swear to the gods, Vice, I didn’t know she was your old lady! I wouldn’t have—I would never—“

“And you won’t again,” Callum said, ignoring his sudden need to overanalyze the decision to dismiss the misunderstanding. Dakota wasn't his— she sure as fuck couldn't be Logan's either. “But you should get going. We don’t have all night.”

Grumbling, Logan hitched the shovel onto his shoulder, grabbed the bicycle handlebars, and wheeled it toward the clubhouse’s front door. When Logan passed by, Ace fell to the floor, clutching his stomach as he roared with laughter.

Callum parked the van outside the alley where the dive bar’s door was nestled. He looked past haphazardly stacked crates, the water stains evident beneath the blue glow of the neon sign. The door swung open, banging against the brick exterior, and a couple staggered into the shadows. Their lips collided as the woman’s heel sank into a puddle of liquid dripping from a rust-pitted dumpster.

Ace leaned forward, bracing his forearm against Callum’s headrest. “What do you think? Do we go in and get him?”

The bar's door swung open again. Curses and shouts echoed through the alley as a bouncer tossed a man out by the collar of his shirt before pulling the door shut. Callum lifted his hips to reach into the pocket of his jeans, retrieving a small vial of Euphoric lifted off Kane.

Ace’s gaze flashed dangerously at the sight of it.

“This isn’t for you,” Callum warned as he dropped the vial into Ace’s upturned palm. “Max said that Rosie’s boyfriend likes the taste. Persuade him out.”

Ace scoffed but nodded. Reaching his hand forward, he yanked the sliding door open, introducing the alley’s stench of rotting garbage, cigarette smoke, and vomit into the vehicle. Callum wrinkled his nose in disgust as he adjusted the cap's bill on his forehead. Once Ace clambered out, after swearing loudly as he hopped into a greasy puddle, he slid the door shut behind him.

“Do you think he should go in there alone with it?” Rocco asked, glancing over from the passenger seat. “He’s more likely to end up in the bathroom with that distill than looking for our guy.”

Callum let out an aggravated sigh as he lightly bounced his fist off the top of the steering wheel in thought. “Fuck, you’re right. I’ll follow him and make sure he doesn’t sneak a few drops. If he hasn’t already, that is.”

Rocco said nothing as Callum shoved the door open with a shoulder and stepped from the van. The slow breath he let out unfurled like a mist in front of his lips. Walking through the parking lot, he twisted his father’s ring around his finger, not taking his eyes from the bar’s entrance. The blue neon sign was a bright gleam against the starless night sky, and Callum intently watched as it swung back and forth on its hinges.

Callum hated dive bars like this. Sticky floors and watered-down drinks, security who thought they were the Iron Guard. The crowd around the counter spilled onto the small dance floor, where a man on a poorly-made stage was mixing bone-pounding music that women treated like a summons. Bodies writhed, a blur of sweat and lights and sex that seeped into every crevice of the room.

Callum spotted Ace already sidled up to Rosie’s boyfriend. He was just a fucking kid—not much older than Rosie. His wiry, thin frame leaned against the wall where a dart board had been tacked, and he discretely inspected the vial of Euphoric at his hip. Thank fuck, the cork was still intact.

Ace’s eyes lifted toward his and nodded once before returning his attention to Rosie’s boyfriend, who had jutted his chin toward the bar’s back entrance. Good. Callum didn’t want to waste more time than he already had .

“Hi, baby.”

Callum glanced down, unsurprised that a woman had appeared at his elbow. Her large brown eyes stared up at him, pupils glinting in the strobe lights pulsing over the dance floor. He almost fucking groaned at the thin sheen of sweat making her skin glimmer. If it weren’t for Rosie’s boyfriend leading Ace to the back alley, he would have slammed her against the bathroom door, hiked the too-thin skirt around her waist, and impaled her on his cock. He didn't even need to know her name. If she were a decent lay, maybe he would keep her around awhile. An incessant distraction.

The woman lifted a hand to trace a light finger along the tattoo inked between his thumb and forefinger. “Dakota,” she shouted over the bass of the music. “I hope she isn’t in the picture.” By her flirtatious smile, Callum knew it was meant in jest.

He should have covered that fucking tattoo the moment he got out of prison and realized Dakota was long gone. He had tried a few times, too—had booked the appointments and everything. But when he approached the doors of the tattoo parlors, a fury kicked up inside him with such ferocity that it nearly made him sick.

Yet, here she was. Still fucking haunting him, even within the depths of a dark, soulless dive bar.

“Wait, where are you going?” The woman asked as he pushed past a man downing a beer. He needed out of this fucking garbage dump. The thumping bass and mingling scent of fruity cocktails were over-stimulating him in ways he didn’t think they could.

The cool air was welcome as he shoved the door to the back entrance open, but that feeling clenched to one of disbelief when he spotted Ace glowering down at Rosie’s unconscious boyfriend.

“What the fuck happened, man?” Callum asked. “I thought you were just gonna lead him out here.”

“I was,” Ace responded. When Callum got closer, he noticed Ace was sporting a new split lip. “This cocksucker tried to steal it from me. He got one good lick in before…” He trailed off, gesturing with a rough wave down to Rosie’s boyfriend, who was knocked out cold against the cement.

“Stay here. And, for the love of fuck, don’t kill him yet,” Callum ordered as he stepped over Rosie’s boyfriend to flag down Rocco. “I’ll get the van pulled up.”

“Wh-where am I?” Rosie’s boyfriend asked as Rocco yanked him around the pink glitter bike that lay forgotten against the forest floor. A shiver wracked his lean body, though Callum was sure it was from adrenaline rather than the humid cold that came during the late-summer nights. “Who are you guys?”

Rocco pressed a firm hand against the man’s chest, halting him in place. Thanks to the bandana tied tightly around his eyes, he had no clue that he was standing on the precipice of his own grave. Logan leaned against the nearest tree, his shoulders heaving and sweat dripping from his hairline. It cut a path down his dirty face, leaving streaks of mud along his skin.

Callum reached to his side and unholstered his gun, clicking the safety off. Ace ripped the bandana from around the kid's head, tossing it over a shoulder with a casual flick of his wrist. The kid blinked, bruised eyes narrowing to adjust to the gleam of Rocco's flashlight.

“You’re the Brotherhood,” Rosie’s boyfriend stammered, a chuckle threading his voice. “You—you deal in distills. Fuck, I thought some bad shit was about to go down.” He almost seemed relieved, but Callum didn’t give him the chance to speak that relief into existence.

Instead, Callum lifted his gun and, with a quick pull of the trigger, shot Rosie’s boyfriend square in the forehead.