Wounded (Dogs of War MC Book One) (13 page)

“Why the fuck is he calling you? Why didn’t he call one of us?” Rock demanded.

Squirt just shrugged.

“Whatever, I’ll go, and I hope he wants to party,” Rock started to walk towards the door.

“Wait,” Red put his hand up to stop him. “Let’s think about this for a minute.”

Going by numbers, they were fine. They had twelve guys still hanging around the club and that didn’t count Squirt and Squint, so they could take them no trouble. But something was bothering Red, a little nudge at the edge of his mind telling him something just wasn’t right. Could it be an ambush, or some other kind of trick? He didn’t know but he didn’t want to risk all the guys to find out.

“Why don’t we open the window and ask him what he wants? That way if he’s got fifty guys hiding behind that fence waiting to jump on us, he won’t get that chance. “

“But I want to eat his face. They killed Saint Nick.” Rock and Nick had been tight, and Rock wasn’t one to let something like that go very easily.

“I know, and maybe you can eat his face later. Let’s just make sure he doesn’t get a chance to eat ours first.”

Rock nodded, “Alright man, Moose, open the window and see what this fucker wants.”

They wall waited as Moose shouted out, demanding to know what they were doing there.

“I came to settle this shit once and for all.”

With seven guys? Something wasn’t adding up.

“And how is that?” Moose asked.

“We pick a fighter and you pick a fighter, whoever walks away is the winner.”

This isn’t the way things were done. Red pushed Moose out of the way and called out, “You mean if our guy loses you get to move into to town with all your meth and your coked out Russian brides.”

“No, it means when our guy wins we get to take over town and you sorry mutts get the hell out.”

It was too much to risk on one fight. All the people who lived there and depended on them, not only for protection but for everything else under the sun, they’d be subjected to living under the rule of the Hellhounds. Red just couldn’t see how the risk could be justified. They had really good odds of taking them out as a group, they’d already killed more than he could remember. The Hellhounds had to be on the verge of extinction if they didn’t pull out of town and find a better place to base their seedy operation.

“No thanks man, I can see how that’d work out for you, when you’re down so many fighting bodies, but it’s not something we’re interested in. Why don’t y’all just leave nice and quiet? We’ll forget this ever happened.”

The men sitting on their bikes grumbled, arguing amongst themselves but Red couldn’t quite make out what they were saying.

“Shut the window Moose, we’re done with these clowns.”

“Don’t you need to ask Big Dog before you go making decisions for the whole club man? Or are you the new Big Dog now?” Moose halted closing the window midway as the voice rang out.

“Get Big Dog on the phone and see what he has to say,” Red looked in Squint and Squirts direction, “Now! What are you waiting for?”

“I just thought…”Squirt looked uncomfortable being the one to make the call, “That one of you guys might want to do it.”

“Nope, he called you last so you get to call him. Now. No more talking, call him.”

They all stood watching Squirt as he dialed the number, “Hey… I know… I’m sorry… don’t hang up, wait.” Squirt looked up at Red.

“Call him back.”

The nervous prospect dialed the number and rushed the words out of his mouth as soon as he heard Big Dog pick up, “Lynardisoutsideandhewantsoneofourguystofightoneofhisguysforcontrolofthewholetown.”

“WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU SAY?” They all heard Big Dogs response as it was yelled into Squirts ear.

Squirt repeated his message, this time taking breaths at appropriate intervals, “And they’re still outside waiting for an answer… No. Ok. Ok. I’ll tell them.” He pressed the end button on the phone and looked up at all the faces standing around staring at him.

“Well… what’d he say dumbass?” Rock smacked his shoulder, trying to prod the words out of him.

“He said it sounded like a fair deal. We didn’t want any more of our guys getting killed.”

“Are you shitting me right now?” Red grabbed him by the front of his shirt and pulled him close, “That’s what Big Dog said?”

“But we’ve only lost one guy, sorry Rock, and they’ve lost like… what twenty five? We can take them without this bullshit.” Moose said.

The other guys agreed.

Rock nodded along with everyone else, “And who would we choose to fight for us anyway, I mean I personally…”

“We know, want to eat their faces off.” Moose rolled his eyes.

“Big Dog said Red.” All eyes turned back to Squirt, “He said we’d put up Red in the fight.” 

Sidney covered her mouth. She’d heard everything that had happened from her hiding place in the kitchen, the door slightly ajar.

Why would they choose Red? He wasn’t the biggest guy there. Moose and Trainz and even Donny-O were all bigger, surely they were better fighters too. They just couldn’t do this. If she had understood correctly it was a fight to the death. And as barbaric as that would have sounded to her a week ago, somehow it didn’t surprise her. What else should werewolves do but fight each other to the death over territory. It was in both their human and wolf natures to do so.

But it didn’t have to be Red.

She hadn’t had enough time yet. She barely even knew him, as a human at least, and she realized she
wanted
to know him. She wanted to find out about this man. He was so strange and alien to everything she’d ever known, not just because he was a shifter, even his human life was different than anything she’d experienced. And they had a connection, a strong connection if the sex was any indication. Maybe it was like that for Red all the time, but for her it had been the first time she’d felt anything on that level.

He couldn’t go out there and do it, he couldn’t. She couldn’t let him.

“You can’t!” Sidney burst out of the kitchen door wearing one of his old tee-shirts and a pair of boxer shorts. All eyes turned towards her, still in shock from the news of Big Dog’s decision.

“I thought I told you to stay in my room?” Red tried to give her a stern look, but she was adorable and disheveled in a way that made him want to march her right back to bed.

She shrugged, “I’ve never been very good at following directions.” He bet that was a lie. She looked like the poster child for following directions.

“This isn’t your concern Sidney,” he nodded towards the other guys, “This is Club business.”

“But you can’t ‘fight to the death’ like some king in a bad historical romance novel. This is real life and in real life people don’t do this stuff.”

“In your version of real life people also don’t shift into wolves, do they?”

“… That’s different, that I can live with.” She bit her lip and Red wanted to take her in his arms and devour those pink lips himself,  “I can’t live with this, this is too… “

“What?”

“Inhuman, no one should be forced to fight for their life.”

“Honey, this is how it is. We fight to protect our community, and if I have to fight this asshole by myself to keep everyone else from having to live with them then that’s what I’ll do.”

“But…” he walked over and tipped her chin up so he could look into her eyes.

“I don’t expect you to understand or agree with everything I do, but you’ve got to learn to deal with it. This is just how things are for us, and it’s how it will always be.”

He watched as tears filled her eyes and she nodded.

But he’d just lied to her. This most definitely was not the way things were for them. This was an attempt to kill him in a way that would look legitimate. They’d never settled disputes this way before and to give up such a numbers advantage and take a chance on a one on one fight was ridiculous. They could easily push the Hellhound out of town, one more push would have been all it would have taken. But instead Big Dog, who just happened to be unable to get here, had chosen, the riskier option. The option that would, or so he thought, kill Red.

Red wondered what kind of plan Big Dog had with Lynard and the Hellhounds. They had to know that no matter what he’d promised, the Dogs of War would never give up control of Three Rivers. Or maybe they were too stupid to see through his plan like Red could. Big Dog had no intention of sticking to this little agreement. He’d let whatever brawler the Hellhounds chose to fight Red do his worst, probably through deceptive means and then when Red was dead he’d cry foul and unleash the vengeful club on what was left of the rival gang. He could see it crystal clear, but the best laid plans had ways of coming unhinged, and Red was going to make sure that this was one of them.

He stepped away from Sidney and looked at the rest of his brothers, “Ok, let’s do this.”

They looked unsure but with his head high and determined he stepped through the front doors of the place he’d always thought of as home and into the night. He was ready to meet whatever fate had in store, but he wasn’t going to go down without taking a few others with him. 

Gravel crunched under his shoe, the sound mingling with the blood rushing through his ears as he walked into the parking lot. He wasn’t a fool, he knew the odds weren’t in his favor, that whoever the Hellhounds chose to fight him would be hard to beat and in a fair fight, and he had no doubts that this would not be a fair fight.

Someone in the Club wanted him dead. Wanted him dead bad enough to risk their whole territory over it.

“Alright, I’m here,” Red looked at Lynard, hoping it’d be him who he’d have to face, but knowing that he’d pick one of his flunkies. He wouldn’t risk his own precious neck that way.

“You gonna fight for The Dogs? You look kinda scrawny to me, like an afternoon snack when we were hoping for a full meal.” The men perched on their bikes laughed at their president’s joke. Red just crossed his arms and waited. There was no use letting Lynard goad him into an argument, he needed a cool head and it was hard enough to keep one with the sting of betrayal so fresh.

Lynard shrugged, “Whatever man, it’s your death. Fight well and we’ll put up a statue of you in the town square when we run this shithole.” He turned in his seat and let out a whistle.

Red had been assuming that one of the guys who had turned up in the parking lot would be his opponent, but around the edge of the old cinderblock fence a shadow began to emerged, shifting as it turned the corner from wolf into human. The man, who must have weighed 300 pounds and be every inch of seven feet tall, kept walking towards him, muscles glinting in the orangey glow of the street lights.

“Do you want to fight as men or in our other forms?” the man asked, staring down at Red without emotion, his voice strange and soft. Not the deep grumble you would expect from someone who looked like him.

“That’s Tinker for you, always so considerate,” one of the Hellhounds called out. The man, Tinker, ignored them and continued looking to Red for an answer.

The size difference was too great as humans. Red stood a few inches over six foot and had always considered himself a large guy, but he wasn’t sure speed could make up for the size discrepancy in this fight. If he pinned him once he’d be done.

“Wolves,” Red answered. Tinker nodded at him and stepped back and Red saw the tell-tale shimmer of air over skin that always came before shifting. He looked around, the guys had gathered in a semi-circle behind him. There was no reason stall, it’d be better to get it over with one way or the other. He pulled off his cut and handed it off to Donny-O, along with the rest of his clothes, and began to shift.