Page 24 of Cole (Dirty Misfits MC 4)
Tanner sighed. “I mean, would that be such an issue if they aren’t re-establishing in our territory?”
We all slowly looked over at him in disbelief and he held up his hands.
“Just a thought,” he murmured.
Brooks shook his head. “If we wanted to, we could go straight to the Black Flags and force Chops out.”
Porter scoffed. “What? We just stroll up to their damn clubhouse and cat-call him until he comes out?”
I shrugged. “We could light their shit up. We have enough evidence to warrant that kind of a move anyway. We burn their shit down—”
Brooks cut me off again. “--and they come back and burn our shit down. Tit for tat. That’s how these assholes work.”
I held up my hands. “Hey, I’m just feeding off you guys.”
Then, Archer finally spoke up. “Are we basically in agreement that he’s the one leading the Black Flags in the first place?”
The room fell silent before Brooks nodded his head. “Yeah, that’s pretty much the theory.”
Archer slid his hands into his pockets. “So, we take him out and they don’t have a leader. Right?”
Brooks chuckled. “Until they vote another one in, sure.”
Archer narrowed his eyes. “But if they’re underground, that usually means they’re split up. Scattered to the wind. Unable to formulate much of a plan until the heat dies down, right?”
I cocked my head. “Whatcha thinking over there?”
Archer swallowed hard. “If we take Chops out while they’re still underground, it might rock them enough so that they tear each other apart.”
Brooks nodded slowly. “They tear themselves apart and it saves us the bullets.”
Porter rolled his eyes. “Or it will only cause us even more problems because then we’ll have to relearn the movements and habits of their new president, which we won’t have the delicate insight to already know.”
Brooks pointed at him. “He’s also got a point.”
I held up my hands. “Look, there isn’t an easy way to do this, but I actually agree with Archer. We have to take Chops out first, despite what the consequences might be. Then, we can deal with the whole of them without their leader, and it might show us a different side of them that we hadn’t considered before.”
Finn barked with laughter. “Are you saying that these assholes are only assholes because their President is an asshole?”
I shrugged. “I mean, he was leading us, right? And are we assholes?”
Brooks stared at me hard. “You really think there’s a better side to them?”
I licked my lips. “I think the only way of finding something like that out is to dive head-first into it. Either way, Chops is out of the way and we can deal with whatever comes without that slimy asshole knowing our secrets. Because you know damn good and well he’s feeding intel to his guys to use against us. We cut off their supply of information, we gain the upper hand.”
Archer pointed at me. “Bingo. He’s better than I am at speaking after midnight. That’s exactly what my mind told me.”
I nodded. “You know I got your back.”
He winked at me. “Thanks, beautiful.”
I grinned. “Anytime, gorgeous.”
Brooks chuckled. “It’s a well-thought-out plan, but it doesn’t take a lot of things into consideration. If we keep pursuing Chops and try to take him out, we could be dealing with everything from a brawl to a fire-fight to a have-no-mercy captive sort of scenario. Remember, some of us have families that are now wrapped up in this. That makes them vulnerable, so any false move could put them in danger.”
We all fell silent at his words before Brooks drew in a deep breath. We followed suit, taking a conglomerate breath to try and settle our minds.
But we still hadn’t come to any sort of a decision.
“All right,” Brooks said breathlessly, “here’s what we do: we take a couple of days to ourselves and do what we can. If you feel like you have a lead you can pursue, stick to the shadows and pursue it. And in a couple of days, we can meet back up and discuss what we’ve got, if anything. Got it?”
I nodded. “Got it.”
The guys all nodded in unison and offered up their versions of “got it” before Brooks clapped his hands. It was the universal signal for when a church session was over, and I couldn’t hurry out the damn door quickly enough. I had to get home and get some rest before my date in the morning with Molly. I sure as hell wasn’t going to be late, and I sure as fuck wasn’t going to call and postpone our plans.
So, I raced home and dove face-first into bed just shy of two in the morning, with an alarm set for eight-thirty. After all, I had to shower and piece myself together before I stopped and picked us up the coffee I had promised.
