“Yes now.”
I rounded on him, grabbing his cut, shaking him as I shouted. “Why the fuck weren’t you here! I needed you, and you weren’t here!”
“I’m here now.” Ghost did nothing as I continued to shout and get angry. That was one of the things I loved about the man. He was a rock when needed, never saying a word. Taking a deep breath, I whispered, “It’s too late, anyway.”
“It’s never too late.”
“What the fuck do you want? Don’t you have someplace you’d rather be?”
“My journey led me back here. What I’ve learned will rock this club. I’m here now. So, what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, you better think of something fast because I just drove here from San Francisco. Your sister is missing.”
“What?” I turned on my best friend and V.P. “She was yours to protect! What the fuck!”
Though it wasn’t known to everyone, it didn’t take a genius to see how Ghost felt around my baby sister Mia. I knew that Ghost would never do anything while she was a minor, and he honestly believed that was why he left all those years ago, that it was becoming too much for him. I understood, I really did, and that’s why I never said anything. Yet, knowing what I did know, the thought of Ghost losing the one thing he cared for seemed odd, which was why her disappearance was a shock.
“She never made it home. After we talked, I thought I’d head down there to make sure she stayed out of trouble, but she’d already headed for home. I backtracked and made it to your Mom's, but she hadn’t seen Mia. Then I received this.” Ghost said, handing me his phone.
UNKNOWN SENDER:You have my hard-drive, and now I have something of yours. Give me what’s mine, and I will give you what’s yours.
“What the fuck is this?”
“It’s from Sergio Pavlov. For the last several years, he’s a Russian arms dealer who has helped the Collector traffic women and children. That’s why I was in Montana with Farmer and Doolittle. Their woman is Pavlov’s sister. She had the drive and gave it to me. I’ve been searching for him since.”
“Why am I hearing about him now?”
“Because your Pops swore me to secrecy,” Ghost admitted, then added. “Pavlov was the one who ordered the hit on your pops, Max. He was the one who killed him, and I wasn’t able to stop it.”
“My dad was killed at a drop gone wrong, not the Collector.”
“I’m sorry, man, but that isn’t true. That’s what we told you. Your Pops was particular about how he wanted things to go down after his death. I just followed his instructions, so did Hellhound. As for Pavlov, he’s a middleman for the collector. It was a hit. Your pops got word that something bigger was going down. He went to investigate and was murdered. I found out too late.”
“Where is the hard-drive?”
“In a safe place.”
“This fucker has Mia, Ghost.”
“I know, and I will get her back, but there is so much more going on that you don’t even know. That’s why I’ve been gone for so long. I promised your dad I would keep you from this mess, but I can’t anymore. It’s all intertwined. You need my help, and I need yours. I’m home, brother, for good.”
I looked at the man who had been my best friend since birth, and though I was happy to hear Ghost say those words, something told me they were a little too late.
Instead, I nodded, reaching for my phone. It didn’t take me a long time to send out the mass text, knowing that soon all my brothers would be coming home.
FIFTEEN
REAPER
The time for secrecy was at an end. This whole fucked up mess was bigger than I thought, and now the vultures were at our door. It was time to come clean with the club and let the chips fall where they lay. Talk about a gut punch, though. I believed my Pops died in a drop gone wrong for several years, only to find out from my closest friend and V.P. that it was the fucking piece of shit that hurt Remi all along. Well, one of his lackeys. Some jag-off named Sergio Pavlov. Not that their names mattered anyway. They were dead-souls walking, and I planned on collecting those souls soon.
I was still having a hard time wrapping my head around that Ghost kept something this big from for so long. Guess it was easier for him since he bolted right after my Pops funeral, the fucking bastard. I knew I shouldn’t be angry at him. I mean, he was following my Pops orders, but fuck it. I was pissed.
Ghost was my best friend. We did everything together and for him to keep something like this from me felt like a betrayal. Then there was Remi to consider. What was I going to do with her while I was figuring out all this shit? I wanted so badly to hop on my bike and go to her, to make sure she was safe, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t leave my brothers to fix this mess when I didn’t even know where to start. I didn’t know who to trust, who to kill, who to believe in. It almost felt as if the last several years were a fucking lie, and to add more salt into that wound, I was apart of it.
The information was all there. Ghost spent the last two hours going over everything he had with me behind closed doors. I knew my brothers were all out in the common room, waiting for anything, but looking at everything before me, I didn’t know where to start. This whole fucked up mess was bigger and more organized than I could even comprehend, and I was part of it.