Reign was missing.
The club was in chaos.
Tensions were high.
And every spare moment—and brain cell—should have been focused on finding our president, getting him home, taking revenge on those who had taken him. Because, at this point, we were almost certain that was what had happened.
Otherwise, there would have been a sign of him by now.
The problem was, the Henchmen were famous in our circle. We had old contacts. We had an endless supply chain. If someone wanted to move in—and move in on a big scale right away—targeting us would be a great way to do that.
So that was what my mind should have been on.
And it was.
But Eva slipped in between those thoughts, sometimes connected with them.
Things such as "How can I explain all of this to her?" mingled with thoughts of the hell we would need to raise on Reign's behalf.
At West's words, I could hear the rumble of the bikes making their way down the street, pausing, then coming into the grounds after the gates were opened.
The cavalry had arrived.
Our brothers from Florida had finally made it.
It was an eighteen-hour-drive with no stops, but, of course, they needed to stop. And they had to obey speed limits if they were showing up armed. And there was no way that they weren't.
"Gus is going to have my balls for not telling her about this," West added, looking guilty as the engines cut as the men—including Gus's brother, Huck—made their way to the door.
"She'll forgive you under the circumstances," I told him, though I was talking out of my ass since I didn't know shit about women anymore.
"You haven't met Gus, have you?" West asked, smiling, shaking his head. "Heya, Huc—" he started when the door opened and the towering form of Huck moved in, cutting off when he got a look at his old friend's face. "What the fuck happened to you?" West asked, taking in the nearly swollen-shut eye, the purple smattering of bruises across his eye socket and cheekbone, the red cut deep into his hairline.
"Oh this," Huck said, waving it off. "Turns out starting a new criminal enterprise in a town full of established enterprises is stickier than we expected," he said, moving in fully so his other men could step inside as well.
I didn't know any of them personally. I hadn't been able to make any of the trips down to Florida like some of the other guys had, to meet the new crew, to make sure everything was going well.
But from the stories I had been told, I could recognize the players as they came into view.
Huck, the new president of the Florida chapter—tall, widely built, dark blond-haired, square-jawed.
Then there was McCoy—dark-skinned, loc'd hair, wide, strong body.
Following him, Che with his model good looks, dark hair, olive skin, and carefully cultivated beard.
Finally, there was Remy with his blonde hair with darker roots coming in, his impressive tattoos, his charming smile, even though I knew there was a crazy bastard underneath the charm he wore on his sleeve.
All these men, though, seemed worse for the wear.
Huck with his busted eye and cut that would leave a nice scar, McCoy with a nasty wound on his throat, Che with a slowly-healing split lip, and a slightly hunched-over posture that suggested he might have been favoring his ribs which would have made the ride up a real bitch, and, finally, Remy with his busted knuckles, each one of them split open and raw.
They'd been through it.
But they'd still hopped on their bikes, drove a grueling two and a half days, and come here to help us.
Maybe when all of this was over, I could leave Jelena with her Uncle Thad, and take a trip down to Florida to really get to know these guys.
"Where's Teddy?" West asked. "And that kid? Seeley?"
"Teddy doesn't do the bikes," Huck explained, and I figured that made sense. Teddy, being a little person, would have needed to have one built custom for himself. And, from the sound of things, he was rich enough to do so, but he seemed to enjoy his association with the club more than actually being a member of it. "And we needed to leave someone to deal with the club, so since Seeley isn't patched-in, we left him. Do we have any updates?" Huck asked, all business, not even taking five minutes to recover from being on the road, wanting to jump in and help out in any way possible.
The thing was, we really didn't know how they could help. We'd hoped, at this point, to at least have narrowed down the list of threats. But no matter how many different directions we sent men in, no matter what methods they used to extract answers—and judging by the bloody mess Pagan came into the club each night, those methods were often physical—we were getting nowhere.