they wanted and you're givin' it to them. This bullshit stops now ."
He paused to make sure his point hit its target and waited until a round of nods passed around the table.
"Fact of the matter is," Marcus pushed on, "I think we can all agree none of these girls gets a free pass. I don't care how long they've been around or whether or not they're knocked up because we need to do a little recon of our own because they sure as shit have been diggin'. We need to know what their weak spots are and we need to know if those weak spots are anything we need to be concerned about."
"Cut 'em loose tonight and see where they land," Heath suggested heavily. That was his own daughter-in-law he was casting suspicion over, too, and the weariness attached to the act wore deep into the lines already etched into the old man's grizzled face. "If they've got anything to hide, anything that needs coverin' up, they're gonna take care of their business as soon as possible to keep us from catchin' wind of it."
Dom shot him a livid glare. "That sounds like you're sayin' you wanna set-up my wife."
Heath just shrugged. "It ain't a set-up if she's got nothin' to hide. You know I love Lex like a daughter, but that don't mean she wouldn't crack if they put pressure on her in all the right places."
"So, you three talk to your women as soon as we're done here, find out exactly what the ATF said to them, send them home with an escort, and then their escort will stick around, if you will," Marcus waved a hand like he was discussing just regular old business, "when and if there's anything that needs reporting. Eli, I think you should run a scan on the girls, see what pops up. Heath'll keep an eye on ya to make sure you don't decide to leave anything out. Casey, you stay on Becca. ZZ take Isabelle. And Doc, you stay with Lex. Everyone else parks it here for the rest of the night until we get a report. Is that clear?"
His eyes swept to me in a hard glare and I nodded tightly. Then he shifted that glare to Dom and Eli, waiting until he got the same reaction from them before calling church to an end.
I didn't like this at all. I didn't like the idea of anyone, myself included, casting any sort of shadow of doubt over the person I'd never been more sure of in my life. I didn't doubt for one second all ZZ would report tonight was that Isabelle went home, worked on a project or watched some TV, and then went to bed. My club putting a tail on my old lady was as unsettling as it was infuriating. Part of me just couldn't believe we were actually in this position, that we were investigating our own women like none of the commitments Dom and I had made to our respective old ladies mattered. Like we couldn't be trusted enough to attach ourselves to women who were loyal and trustworthy every step of the way.
The idiocy of the whole thing was unnerving. Being part of something that could cast this kind of suspicion on Isabelle, with what the repercussions of that suspicion could mean...the rest of that thought just couldn't take shape in my mind.
Marcus' words at Dom and Lex's wedding filled my mind now: you gotta figure out if she's gonna be an asset or a weakness because she can't be both.
She was absolutely an asset, but I'd just be lying to myself if I said my trigger-finger didn't get a little itchy, as Marcus had so aptly put it, when it came to her either. I had a very short, very thin fuse where Isabelle was concerned. Brandon Davis could attest to that.
Still, I was positive that by the time this night was over, all the club's doubt and all the club's suspicion would lie right where it belonged: squarely on Becca's shoulders. My mom's intuition rarely missed the mark and she'd said Becca was shifty. She'd said she didn't trust Becca as far as she could throw her. That was good enough for me.
It was that thought that carried me out of church and onto the clubhouse's main floor to find Isabelle, who still sat stiffly at one of the tables in the middle of
He paused to make sure his point hit its target and waited until a round of nods passed around the table.
"Fact of the matter is," Marcus pushed on, "I think we can all agree none of these girls gets a free pass. I don't care how long they've been around or whether or not they're knocked up because we need to do a little recon of our own because they sure as shit have been diggin'. We need to know what their weak spots are and we need to know if those weak spots are anything we need to be concerned about."
"Cut 'em loose tonight and see where they land," Heath suggested heavily. That was his own daughter-in-law he was casting suspicion over, too, and the weariness attached to the act wore deep into the lines already etched into the old man's grizzled face. "If they've got anything to hide, anything that needs coverin' up, they're gonna take care of their business as soon as possible to keep us from catchin' wind of it."
Dom shot him a livid glare. "That sounds like you're sayin' you wanna set-up my wife."
Heath just shrugged. "It ain't a set-up if she's got nothin' to hide. You know I love Lex like a daughter, but that don't mean she wouldn't crack if they put pressure on her in all the right places."
"So, you three talk to your women as soon as we're done here, find out exactly what the ATF said to them, send them home with an escort, and then their escort will stick around, if you will," Marcus waved a hand like he was discussing just regular old business, "when and if there's anything that needs reporting. Eli, I think you should run a scan on the girls, see what pops up. Heath'll keep an eye on ya to make sure you don't decide to leave anything out. Casey, you stay on Becca. ZZ take Isabelle. And Doc, you stay with Lex. Everyone else parks it here for the rest of the night until we get a report. Is that clear?"
His eyes swept to me in a hard glare and I nodded tightly. Then he shifted that glare to Dom and Eli, waiting until he got the same reaction from them before calling church to an end.
I didn't like this at all. I didn't like the idea of anyone, myself included, casting any sort of shadow of doubt over the person I'd never been more sure of in my life. I didn't doubt for one second all ZZ would report tonight was that Isabelle went home, worked on a project or watched some TV, and then went to bed. My club putting a tail on my old lady was as unsettling as it was infuriating. Part of me just couldn't believe we were actually in this position, that we were investigating our own women like none of the commitments Dom and I had made to our respective old ladies mattered. Like we couldn't be trusted enough to attach ourselves to women who were loyal and trustworthy every step of the way.
The idiocy of the whole thing was unnerving. Being part of something that could cast this kind of suspicion on Isabelle, with what the repercussions of that suspicion could mean...the rest of that thought just couldn't take shape in my mind.
Marcus' words at Dom and Lex's wedding filled my mind now: you gotta figure out if she's gonna be an asset or a weakness because she can't be both.
She was absolutely an asset, but I'd just be lying to myself if I said my trigger-finger didn't get a little itchy, as Marcus had so aptly put it, when it came to her either. I had a very short, very thin fuse where Isabelle was concerned. Brandon Davis could attest to that.
Still, I was positive that by the time this night was over, all the club's doubt and all the club's suspicion would lie right where it belonged: squarely on Becca's shoulders. My mom's intuition rarely missed the mark and she'd said Becca was shifty. She'd said she didn't trust Becca as far as she could throw her. That was good enough for me.
It was that thought that carried me out of church and onto the clubhouse's main floor to find Isabelle, who still sat stiffly at one of the tables in the middle of
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