After that, Dare moved through a few other topics. He and Maverick briefed them on the relocation they’d just undertaken for one of their protective clients, and Phoenix shared a few new clients they were considering taking on. Slider’s father had ghosted on the family before Slider turned ten—Sam’s age, it killed him to realize—and his mom had been a drunk and a recreational drug user ever after. Even with all their failures, his parents had never taken a hand to him. But Slider had still been drawn to the club’s protective mission from the very start. It felt good to create a little hope in the midst of devastation.
Annnd he was thinking of Cora again. Wasn’t she doing that for him and his boys? Damn. Damn. His chest went tight at the thought.
Slider tuned back in from his thoughts just as Dare called a vote to make one of their two prospects, a young guy named Blake Green, a fully patched member. After his best friend, Jeb, had died defending the clubhouse a few months before, Blake had thrown himself into club business like a man on a mission—or, more likely, like a man trying to outrun his grief. Slider recognized that shit from a mile away, because pot, meet kettle. Either way, it was time for the club to reward Blake’s loyalty and commitment. And they did with a unanimous vote of support.
“Anything else?” Dare asked.
Slider sat forward. “Not club business, but I’ve got a question. Cora’s volunteering at the county animal shelter, and they’ve been having a problem with abused dogs being dumped off in the area. These animals are in bad shape, and the vet thinks the injuries are evidence of dogfighting.”
“Fuck,” Caine bit out. “If it’s who I think it is, she needs to steer clear.”
Slider’s gut did a slow plummet, because a warning like that from Caine’s mouth was like a siren in the night. “Who do you think it is?”
A few looks got traded around the table, and then Caine nailed him with a stare. “The 301 Crew.”
“Aw, hell. Fucking miscreant lowlifes,” Dare said.
Ice snaked down Slider’s spine. The 301 Crew operated forty minutes away in the far northeast of the county, a homegrown gang with white supremacist leanings that got its start decades ago as muscle for one of the East Coast’s most notorious crime syndicates, now largely out of business after a series of federal stings and arrests. Years ago, they’d proposed a business partnership with the Ravens around race betting and Doc had said hell no. Not just because the club ran its own under-the-table betting, but because the Crew was the lowest of the low, referring to themselves as Dead Men because the number of kills each member had determined their status and rank in the organization.
Given that they were into a little bit of everything, dogfighting sure wasn’t any stretch. “You got definitive intel that it’s them?” Slider asked, his gut a stew of dread. “Because I’ve never heard of them being into this before.” Frankly, it seemed almost too tame for the Crew.
“There’s been some rumbling the past few months,” Caine said. “Want me to dig?”
Slider nodded, and his voice was much more even-handed than he felt. “I’d appreciate it.” He needed Cora safe, and he wanted the peace of mind that she was.
Church broke up not long after that. Slider didn’t know what to think of this Crew bullshit, but his brothers helped chase some of his worry away by coming up to him one by one, some of them just saying hello, some wanting him to know they were glad he was back, some offering condolences for all he’d been through that were still hard to hear.
Dare hung back and waited until they were alone. “You being here tonight—really being here—was just about the only good thing in my whole fucking day.”
The two of them clasped hands. “I’m here. And I’m sorry as hell about Jagger,” Slider said. As the club’s president, Dare carried the responsibility for every single member like a weight on his shoulders, and the guilt and grief he felt for Jagger was apparent in the dark circles under the man’s eyes. “How did he seem? Did you get a chance to talk to him?”
“He’s tough,” Dare said. “Was more worried about how his sister was doing and how things were going at the track than about himself.”
“That’s Jagger for ya,” Slider said.
“Truer words.” Dare let out a troubled sigh. “You hanging around for a while?”
“I wish.” Slider said the words almost reflexively, but there was some truth behind them, and that surprised him. It’d been a long time since he’d wanted company or craved friendship. He almost didn’t know what to do with those feelings. “But I’m in the middle of a shift.”