Whizz (3 page)

“I just wanted it to stop.”

Dalton touched her face, forcing her to look at him. “If you take your life and I’m not there in time to save you, I’ll follow you.”

She gasped. “What?”

“You heard me. If I can’t save you then I’ll join you.”

Lacey shook her head. “You wouldn’t.”

“I would. I’m not going to live this life without you. I carried you to the hospital. I helped bring you back. I’m responsible for you, and I’m not going to turn my back on you.”

****

Pulling out of the memory, Lacey collapsed to her knees on the floor. She couldn’t do it if it was reversed. Lacey was weak as she didn’t want to die enough to join the man who’d saved her at every turn. At thirty years old, there was no one she loved, yet she craved the touch of a man who’d taken it all away. She covered her face, shame consuming her, and she curled up in a ball in the hope of keeping all the bad memories away.

Chapter One

Whizz entered the kitchen to find Angel standing at the stove with Eva working around her. Six children sat at the large table throwing food at each other. He ducked as a maple syrup covered pancake was launched past his head.

“Tabitha, stop it,” Eva said, going red in the face.

Miles started laughing, as did Anthony. Simon, Tate’s son, was avidly watching the chaos unfolding.

“You said they’d eat the pancakes,” Angel said, looking guilty.

“I thought they would.”

“Simon!” Tabitha screamed the name.

“What’s going on?” Whizz said.

Michael, Alex’s son, was sitting in the corner eating his pancakes. The little guy looked so sad. Alex sat beside his son trying to talk to him. No one answered Whizz’s question. Seconds passed with the noise getting louder than ever. Whizz was just about to leave when Michael scraping back his chair brought the noise to a stop.

“I hate you!” he yelled at Alex before storming off. The rest of the kids finally decided to be quiet as Eva glared at all of them. Alex slumped down in his seat, looking defeated.

“What was that about?” Whizz asked, deciding to stay away from the kids and frazzled women.

“Not a lot.” Alex was staring at the door the boy had vacated.

“You’re telling me that attitude is because of nothing?” Whizz took a seat beside the other man. Alex had become a father unexpectedly a year ago. None of the club knew that he’d been with a woman until Cheryl started dating Butch. Alex hadn’t claimed her, but he’d become a father to Michael. In some strange way their dynamic worked. Whizz didn’t know how it was working with Butch in hospital recovering from his wounds.

“He wants to visit Butch. I don’t want him anywhere near Butch. Cheryl and I aren’t talking right now. She blames me for everything that went down.” He ran fingers through his hair. Alex suddenly looked old. The other man had a part within the club even though he’d been in Vegas for a great deal of time running a casino. Since finding out about his son, Alex had turned the casino over to a guy he trusted who ran the main bulk of their affairs. Alex did everything he could from Fort Wills.

“Why won’t you let him?” Whizz asked. Butch was still a stepfather to the kid and been in his life a little longer than Alex.

“Look, it was my idea him working for Gonzalez, okay? Tiny and I agreed it would help us. I didn’t tell him to start feeding information to the Savage Brothers. I thought they were fucking dead, wiped out by Gonzalez’s old man.” Alex leaned back in his chair, staring across the room at the other kids. “I don’t want him around Butch. How can we fucking trust him?”

Before Whizz could respond Cheryl charged into the room. She didn’t stop until she was in front of Alex. “How fucking dare you tell Michael he can’t see Butch?” She raised her hand and landed a slap across Alex’s face.

Whizz stood as Alex got to his feet. He’d never seen Alex lose it, but the way he was shooting fire at Cheryl, he looked ready to snap. The tension left from Gonzalez was still in the air.

“Alex, cool it. She’s Butch’s.” Whizz tried to warn the man.

“Butch nearly got us all fucking killed because he was too fucking stupid. He kept shit to himself when he should have told us. I don’t want my son mixed up with him.”

Cheryl stepped closer, glaring at Alex. “Butch is more of a father to my son than you are. You’re just a fucking sperm donor. Butch did what he had to because you asked him. He got dragged into this shit because of the club. The only person to blame for all of this crap is you. Don’t you dare tell
my son
who he can visit or not.”

Alex grabbed her arm as she made to walk off.

“I’m not a sperm donor.”

“You’re sure as shit nothing else.” Cheryl shrugged his arm off.

Whizz was shocked yet impressed. Cheryl had always given off the impression of being a good little girl who wouldn’t cause any waves, yet she was proving there was a lot more to her than met the eye. The way she stood up to Alex was something to be admired.

“Fuck, I’m always getting it fucking wrong with her and with him.”

“Butch put his life on the line. I don’t agree with how he went about it with the Savage Brothers, but he did what he thought was best.” At the time Whizz had been so angry. In hindsight he’d seen it from Butch’s side. He’d only been trying to help The Skulls yet had felt his loyalty torn. The Savage Brothers were supposed to be dead, and all of a sudden Butch saw his past once again, living and breathing. Whizz couldn’t even begin to imagine what was going on in Butch’s head. He knew he’d be fucked. Whizz didn’t have another club. The Lions were all gone, and before that, his family was dead. He didn’t have any enemies or a past. Every part of his past had come through the time he spent at the club. His only real enemy was a full-figured woman with blue hair and guilt. Lacey was his enemy. She was the woman he couldn’t hurt.

Alex shook his head. “I’ve got to go.”

Eva started moving the kids out of the kitchen. “Will you clean this up?”

Angel nodded, looking sheepish.

Whizz stayed sat as he watched Angel start to clean away the mess the kids had made.

“They never fail to surprise me,” she said, smiling as she cleaned up the mess.

“You’re the first woman I know who can smile over maple syrup.” Whizz ran fingers through his hair in an attempt to push the length off his face.

“I like cleaning and cooking.” She wrung out the cloth and turned to him. “How is your, erm, your lady friend? Is she okay? Does she need more clothes?”

Whizz cursed. “I need to get some food otherwise she’s going to start thinking I forgot about her.”

“I’ll make her something.” Angel finished clearing away the mess and started looking in the cupboards. Out of all of the women Angel was the sweetest.

“Lacey’s doing fine,” Whizz said.

She stopped, holding a box of baking powder in her grip. Angel turned toward him. “Are you sure? She lost her whole club.”

Whizz frowned. “How do you know what happened?”

“Lash, he told me what happened. He usually doesn’t like talking about the club. With everything that happened, he wanted to talk about it. I was there as well, at the hospital when Lacey first arrived.” She offered a smile.

Angel’s sweetness was refreshing. The years she’d been within the club married to Lash hadn’t really changed her. She was innocence through and through, yet she could stick up for herself. Whizz saw she was no longer skittish around the club. If anything, the club looked more her domain than ever before.

“It’s okay. I don’t mind Lash talking about what happened. It was fucking strange.” Whizz looked past her shoulder as she started working. “She’s going to be fine. I’ve got to believe that even though she’s going through so much.”

“She lost her club. You’ve got to remember that.”

He’d never forget what she lost. He had been there and had helped her lose the club. Whizz had played his part in the scheme of things.

“How’s everyone doing?” Gash asked, entering the kitchen. On his arm was a little raven haired siren. She looked in her early twenties and had been at the club for the last couple of months. Whizz recalled her trying to get into his bed, but he really wasn’t interested. For the life of him he couldn’t remember her name.

“Good,” Angel said, keeping her back to them.

She started working up some pancakes for Lacey. Pancakes with bacon and maple syrup were Angel’s specialty. She really was a good cook, a fantastic cook. Whizz loved it when he found Angel in the kitchen. Whenever she was at the clubhouse everyone ate well.

Whizz nodded.

“Come on, Gash, I can make it worth your while.”

“I’m not interested, Raven,” Gash said. He took a seat at the table with the sweet-butt hanging on his arm. “Will you put some pancakes on for me?”

Angel glanced behind her and nodded.

“Why are you paying her attention and not me?” Raven asked, pouting.

Whizz looked at Angel then at Gash. There was nothing going on there. He recalled what the other brothers said about Raven. She was known for being jealous. Steven, one of the brothers who’d gotten voted in some years back, wouldn’t have anything to do with her because of her jealous streak. Whizz recalled Steven telling him about it late one night.

“Get the fuck out of here,” Gash said, glaring at Raven.

“I really don’t understand what the fuck she’s got. She’s fat, and no one else sees that but me.”

Raven hadn’t seen Lash enter. Lash had obviously heard enough. Whizz watched as Lash grabbed the back of Raven’s neck and pulled her away from Gash.

“I don’t give a fuck what your mouth is doing when it’s serving other brothers, but you run your mouth against my wife then I’ve got a problem,” Lash said. He looked dangerous. Whizz only ever saw him like this when he was ready to hurt or kill. Raven had fucked up, and from the fear on her face, she knew it.

“Lash—”

Angel stepped closer, but Lash put his hand out, silencing her. “I don’t care what’s going on, Angel. No one, and I mean fucking no one, mouths off to you or calls you shit like that. I will not stand for it. I don’t want to listen to it. Get the fuck out of my sight, Raven. I hear anything else from those fucking lips other than slurping noises, I’m going to fucking hurt you.”

Raven scrambled away as Angel turned toward Lash, looking shocked.

“Why did you say that?” Angel said. “That was totally disgusting.”

“No one talks to you like that, baby. I won’t stand for it.” Lash reached out to touch her, but Angel jerked away. “Baby, what are you doing?”

“I don’t want you to touch me.”

“Angel, I’ll always take care of you. You understand that.”

She shook her head. “No, I can handle women like Raven. Tiny’s going to be giving you the club one day, and I’m going to need to handle myself. I can’t have you interfering like that. What you said was wrong, disgusting.”

Angel turned away from Lash. In all the years Whizz had known the couple, Lash had never said something like that in front of her before.

Whizz watched as Lash turned to Angel.

“What? I’m a little confused here,” he said.

“You can be so damn crude. There was no need to say something like that.” Angel’s face was scrunched up in disgust. “I don’t know who you’re turning into.” She shook her head. “There’s Lacey’s pancakes. You can fend for yourselves.”

She thrust a plate at Whizz, which he took, before fleeing the room.

“What the fuck did I do?” Lash asked.

The pancakes looked delicious. Seeing no pointing in helping Lash figure out his problem, Whizz took the pancakes upstairs to Lacey. Whizz had never seen Angel react like that before, least of all at Lash. She was sweetness, and she’d clearly seen a side to Lash she didn’t like.

****

Lacey listened to the rest of the clubhouse as it started to wake. She heard Murphy and Tate arguing about something across the hall. Murphy had finally got out of hospital even though he’d only suffered minimal damage from a gunshot to the shoulder. Their son Simon was repeating swear words as if they were a second nature to him. The tears had finally stopped, but Lacey couldn’t bring herself to get off the floor.

Keeping her face against the cold tile helped her to think.

“What are you going to do, Rose?”

She didn’t recognize the voice but knew it had to belong to Hardy. The information the Savage Brothers had gotten on The Skulls was accurate concerning all the people.

“I don’t want to talk about this. Please, leave it alone. There’s so much going on. We’ve not got time for this.”

Their voices faded. They were all talking loudly because of the hustle and bustle in the clubhouse. The silence in the room helped her to hear the rest of the club. This was something she’d never had with her own.

Wiping a hand down her face, she waited as silence took over. They were gone about their business. She couldn’t hear anything else that was going on downstairs.

Was this why Whizz liked being on this floor? He could hear everything?

Swallowing past the lump in her throat, Lacey looked opposite her. The tiles were pristine, not a speck of dust in sight.

The sound of his bedroom door unlocking didn’t ease the tension that had built up inside her.

She stared at the doorway into the bathroom. Within seconds Whizz stood over her, staring at her.

“I brought you some food. Angel cooked it. She’s worried about you and asked how you were.”

Lacey didn’t even know the woman and yet Angel was concerned about her. It made no sense to her for another woman who was younger than she was to be worried.

“I’m not hungry.” Her stomach chose that moment to protest.

“You’re hungry.”

“I don’t want anything you’ve brought me.”
You’re being petty, Lacey.

Whizz sighed. “I can’t trust any of the other women coming. Your threat this morning stops me. If something happens to Angel, Lash will kill you and castrate me.”

She looked up at him. “I wouldn’t hurt her.”

Lacey wouldn’t. She knew enough that Angel was the kind of woman you were friends with. Throughout the whole of her life, she hadn’t had a female friend. There was only ever Dalton.