I whistled. “That’s how you see it playing out?” A patch over was a hostile takeover, usually by a rival club, not a fucking nomad crew absorbing a founding chapter. This shit was insane, and the vacant haze that overtook Rocco’s gaze told me he was fucking reeling too.
Saint made room for me, standing so I could crouch in his place. “You had brothers with you when Alexei brought Gianni Sambini back from the dead. They know he killed Frank and Drummer. Can you trust them?”
Rocco nodded. “They’re loyal. Some got kids like me, and they don’t want no part in a fucking trafficking ring. Besides...” Rocco eyed Alexei. “They know how it went down and I reckon they’d rather take their chances with Butch.”
“They are not as stupid as your average Crow then.” Alexei spoke without humour, and from somewhere behind me. I hadn’t noticed him rising and joining Saint.
Rocco didn’t smile either. “They’re good men. I don’t want this to blow back on them.”
“How many?”
“Four.”
“I will need their names so I do not kill them by accident.”
“Okay. Just don’t mix it up with his list.” Rocco jerked his head at Saint before turning back to me. “What happens now?”
I shrugged. “You tell me.”
“I got nothing else, dude. I’ve purged my fucking soul.”
“For what, though? Embry aside, this is your problem now, not mine.”
The burn in my soul exposed the lie, but Rocco didn’t know that. And what the fuck was he even asking me to do for him? Rout his club of everyone he didn’t like so he could go back to being a royal pain in my arse?
Don’t be a cunt. He didn’t have to tell you Embry was at risk.
Rocco blew out a sigh, the energy he’d arrived with hitting the air and evaporating. He slumped forward, shoulders hunched. “Cam, I’ve been a Crow since I was sixteen. It’s been my whole fucking life, but I don’t care anymore. Wipe us off the map if you want. Just don’t make me go back to my kids knowing I’m gonna raise them in a world where this shit is the new dawn.”
“So, you’re asking me to help you take Butch down?”
“I’m asking you for help. I don’t know what for yet.”
It was in that moment that I knew for sure that he was telling the truth. That he’d come to us because he couldn’t live with doing anything else.
I gave him a nod and rose to my feet. “We’ll take it back to our table. Give you a decision in a few days. In the meantime, any fucker even thinks about coming for Embry, I wanna know about it before they’ve let go of their dick. You understand?”
Rocco dipped his chin and stood. He began to back up, then stopped, fixing me with a steady gaze. “Can I trust you, O’Brian?”
“Worried I’m gonna expose you as a fucking rat?”
“I’m worried about my kids.”
“Then do as you are told,” Alexei said. “It is not complicated.”
Rocco took that as my answer and turned away. Saint and Nash escorted him to the gate and returned his phone to him.
“You will need these too.” Alexei stepped forward and held out his hand. In his palm lay a collection of spark plugs. “I took them in case it was decided that you should not leave.”
“Er. Thanks, I think?”
“You are welcome.”
Rocco disappeared, Saint at a distance behind him.
I turned to Alexei, bile still burning my throat. “We don’t threaten kids.”
“Youdon’t.”