One Step Too Close - Coffin Nails MC Louisiana (Gay Biker Stepbrother Romance) (Sex & Mayhem Book 6) (12 page)

Jed couldn’t believe
this shit. “Nobody steals from the Coffin Nails!” He clenched his fists, ready
for mayhem.

Ryder

Little more than twenty-four
hours after he got out of jail, Ryder already knew there were more than a few
screws loose in the club that he called his family. He would be the one to
tighten them, even if it cost him dearly. It didn’t take long to rev the guys
up for the raid. Honor and pride were essential to all of them, and none of the
men would take piss in the face, especially from a junkie like Hank the Dog.

Drunk or sober, all the
men rode out of town, on the short drive to the lone cabin that Hank called
home, and Ryder only then realized just how much he’d missed the wind in his
hair, the low roar of many engines moving like a swarm, men ready to sting with
knives and bullets.

When they drove between
the trees, Ryder felt whole with his brothers around. It was nothing like jail,
where he had some guys be friendly with the Nails as associates, but they
weren’t real friends the way his club was. Sure, Dark was a pain in the ass,
Axe liked to party too much, and Jed was too sexy for his own good, but they
were family.

When they all stopped in
front of the shabby cabin Hank called home, they were a force to be reckoned
with.

Ryder gestured at Axe
and Brain, and told them to go in from the back as the rest of them walked
straight at the narrow porch at the front of the house. Ryder was surprised
Hank wasn’t running yet, but he couldn’t hear any noise that even remotely
resembled the rapid footsteps of a hunted man.

Mikey went first and
charged at the door, which gave in under his weight, breaking in the middle
like a wafer.

“Hey, Hank, I heard
you’ve got something of ours,” yelled Wolver, storming through the narrow
doorway.

Ryder scowled when the
stench of rotting food and stale piss hit his nostrils, but he followed his
father inside, into the dim living room furnished with two sofas that must had
been taken from a dumpster.

Hank was there, slowly
getting up from the tangle of blankets on the floor and squinting his eyes at
them. Judging by the syringes and other paraphernalia on the table, him and the
three other people in the room were too drugged out of their minds to hear the
bikes approaching, much less connect the dots and run.

“Ryder,” Hank mumbled,
stumbling over his own feet, and overturning a bottle of vodka on the floor.
Their
vodka. “I can explain…”

Anette, his girlfriend,
got to her feet as well, wheezing, and tearing up. Her makeup was so wrecked
that no crying would hurt it. “It wasn’t my fault... I told him it wasn’t a
good idea...”

Ryder looked around and
saw all the stolen alcohol in plain sight at the back of the room. Those idiots
didn’t even try to hide it anywhere. Anette screamed when the door at the back
burst open, and the two remaining members stormed in, blocking the way of
another woman Ryder knew from their parties.

“You bitch! You wanted
the booze just as much as everyone else!” screamed Hank, charging at Anette,
but Dark got him on the way to her and sent the bastard down to the coffee
table, which fell over, rolling Hank to the wooden floor.

Anette looked at Ryder
and got to her knees. “I didn’t! I didn’t! I was so afraid!”

A dirty looking young
guy Ryder didn’t know started laughing like a mad man, sweat beading on his
forehead. “It was a prank! We were gonna give it back on April Fool’s!”

Ryder stepped over
Anette’s crawling body and pulled the chain off his neck. The madman’s smile
faltered, but Ryder wouldn’t wait for him to sober up. He looped the chain
around the bastard’s neck and pulled him off the sofa. With eyes wide as
saucers, the junkie tried to get up, but Ryder kicked him to the floor. “You’ll
be walking like a dog. Your place’s on the damn floor,” he said, leading him
toward the door. There was no way they could just let this go. The club was
losing respect, and he knew just the way to amend that.

Jed smirked at Ryder as
he pulled the man all the way out of the house, and seeing the appreciation in
Jed’s eyes only spurred Ryder on. He didn’t even have to suggest it, the other
Nails were already forcing the rest of the residents out, and Axe was
transporting the beer kegs to the pickup along with Mikey and Grease.

“You think you can do
this kind of bullshit after an invitation to a party with free booze?” Jed
asked Hank and punched him right in the side of his face so hard the man fell
over.

“Guys, leave the vodka
in,” called out Ryder, meeting Wolver’s eyes for a split second. They
understood one another without words.

The women got quickly
cuffed to one another, back to back, but the men wouldn’t be let off so easily.
Ryder let Dark and Mikey handle most of the obligatory trashing, and ventured
back inside, looking for valuables they could forage. He opened the drawers of
a cupboard by the kitchen but found nothing of interest. Just documents, bills,
chewing gum, and even used underwear, which he certainly wasn’t interested in.

“Found the motherload!”
Jed yelled from another room.

“Yeah? What is it?”
asked Ryder, pulling out a few bills of cash from a mug with tits, which was
pushed deep into the shelf. “I’ve got some money.”

Jed came into the room
waving a zip lock bag full of pills. “They’re going cold turkey.”

Ryder reached out for
them. He would not have Jed keeping them on his first day sober. “Great. They
should be worth a few bucks.”

Jed pulled his hand away
though. “It’s fine. I know where to sell them.”

“No, give them here.
We’ll collect everything and then decide what to do with all that we get out of
this shack.”

Ryder didn’t like the
reluctance with which Jed handed over the pills, or the wistful look he gave
the bag. Nor did he like the way Jed turned around without a word and stomped
off.

“Fuck,” muttered Ryder
as he pushed the pills into his pocket, along with the money. He approached the
boxes of vodka and took out two bottles. He unscrewed them both and walked
outside, watching his friends taunt the stealing scum. That was definitely
something Ryder was behind. He whistled, gradually getting everyone’s
attention.

Hank’s eyes were so
swollen Ryder doubted he could see much, but with everyone else ready for the
spectacle, he rapidly turned around and threw one of the bottles at the house.
It broke apart on its wall, spraying the clear liquor everywhere, like an
expression of Ryder’s anger. “I think we’ve been too kind to people who don’t
deserve it, right Hank?”

“I’m sorry,” Hank whined
through his bloodied teeth. “It was the drugs…”

Jed kicked Hank’s side,
and Ryder was pretty sure the kick came with a dosage of annoyance from getting
drugs taken away from him. “We don’t care!”

“Guys, if this
continues, we’re gonna have the cops riding us like pigs within a few months,”
said Ryder, scowling as he paced in front of the house with the intact bottle
still in hand. “I think we should get the message across that no one. Fucks.
With. The Coffin Nails. Who’s with me?”

“Fuck yes!” Jed
instantly backed him, and it gave Ryder a buzz to see his pretty face red
without getting smashed.

“You don’t have to
sacrifice the booze though.” Dark groaned and crossed his arms on his chest.

“Yes, we do,” said Ryder
and nodded at Wolver who stepped forward and turned around to face his men.

“We’ve been having way
too much fun recently. This is business. If we don’t step up, we’ll be the
laughing stock of the next national run.”

Dark sneered, but the
other men nodded, so he shut up. It was Jed who spoke up unexpectedly.

“We’re outlaws. You
can’t expect us not to drink.”

It was like a punch in
the gut, and Ryder struggled to keep his face blank as he transferred his gaze
to him. “Drinking got you where you were yesterday night. Enough said.”

Their eyes met for a
split second, and Jed shut up. He pushed his hands down the pockets of his
jeans and stared at the ground. If only Ryder could enter his head and
straighten things up in there.

Wolver took a deep
breath. “Of course, we will drink and do whatever the fuck we want. But we can
only do that once business is dealt with. None of you will be drinking much or
partying if you end up in prison. Unless anyone’s up for sucking cock for drugs
behind bars. No? That’s what I thought.”

Jed shifted
uncomfortably, and Ryder’s imagination went wild with the vision of him on his
knees, opening his mouth wide, and asking for more with those big blue eyes.
He’d do everything he could to keep Jed out of harm’s way, even if he’d end up
with Jed hating his guts.

Ryder sighed and started
marching along the front of the house, spraying the wall with vodka from the
other bottle. “Gentlemen, I think we should celebrate and make a big bonfire
with all this booze. There’s still plenty of it inside, so gush it all out so
that we get a bright flame.”

Axe howled through a
tube of hands and rushed inside, his hair wild, a big grin on his face. “I hope
you have insurance, Hank!”

“No, please!” Hank
whined, begging on his knees. He was learning about where his place was pretty
quickly.

Jed walked up to him
with a scowl. “You and your friends are lucky to be alive. And that is
happening only so you can tell your junkie friends they shouldn’t try fucking
with the club.”

Not long after, the
members were going crazy with the vodka inside the house. For a brief moment,
Ryder caught Dark gulping down some of his liquid ammo, but he decided not to
stop him, as there was plenty more to spread around. Five minutes later, a few
matches did the trick, and the house went up in flames, to loud wails of its
owners. Ryder had no sympathy for them. The Nails were no Sunday bikers. They
were a club, and it was their life. Respect was everything.

When the fire was fully
ablaze, heating up their faces, and darkening the air with smoke, they released
their prisoners, so they wouldn’t burn alive by accident.

Wolver threw Hank a key
for the women’s cuffs. “And we’re taking the truck,” he said as Axe started
their pickup after his bike had been transferred to its bed.

Hank looked back at the
house with tears streaking his face like fluorescent paint, but he said
nothing, staying low on the ground as he should be. He didn’t even move away
when the whole club rode off, sending a cloud of dust straight into his face.

Even though it was Bert
who was the road captain, this time it was Wolver who lead the pack. After they’d
done their duty, they were all heading to Ripper’s place, and Ryder was pretty
sure what this would be about. Ripper needed to make some decisions about the
future of the club, and they all needed to be there.

He lived in a modest
suburban house with his wife and daughter, and since he was out of hospital he
apparently hadn’t moved from his home. Ryder sighed as he parked his bike close
to the garage entrance, to make space for his brothers in the short driveway.
They didn’t even have to knock before the door opened, revealing Louisa,
Ripper’s wife, who now looked much more tired than Ryder remembered her.

“Ripper will be so happy
to see you,” she said, opening the door for them. “Anyone want coffee? Tea?
I’ll get you all something nice and cool. He told me you were coming,” she
said, clearly happy to see everyone. From what Wolver had told Ryder, both she
and her husband now led a much lonelier existence. “Did you have a bonfire
party yesterday? You all still smell of it.”

Jed snorted. “Something
like that.”

They all followed her to
the living room where Ripper sat in a dark armchair and smiled at them, though
half his face barely moved. “Ryder…”

Ryder rushed over and gave
Ripper a firm hug. “Good to see you, old man. Shame you didn’t make it to the
party. It was quite colorful.”

One side of Ripper’s
face stretched into a smile, and he patted Ryder on the back with his good
hand. The other, Ryder noted, was hidden away underneath a plaid blanket and
trembled slightly, balled into a loose fist. “I was indisposed. Maybe next time
I’ll be fit enough to party with you lot.”

There was no joking
around from the guys behind Ryder this time. Only respect. Ripper had been in
the club for fifteen years. President for five. Even if he needed to step down
now, the club would take care of him. That’s what family did for each other.
Jed had told Ryder that the club paid for Ripper’s medical expenses. No wonder
the bank was empty.

“Sit down,” Ripper said.
“Louisa! Why don’t you and Susan take the dog for a walk, huh?”

His wife looked up from
over a large tray of glasses with a centerpiece pitcher of lemonade. “Of
course, love,” she said as she placed the tray on the coffee table. “Behave,
boys.”

“We promise,” said Ryder
with a smile. He sat in a wooden chair across from Ripper and watched the
others take all the seats available, with Grease ending up on the handrest of
Brain’s chair. But before he could make himself comfortable, Ripper told him to
take a hike. It was time to talk club business, and that was for patched
members only.