BUTCHER: Wolves MC (Riding With Wolves Book 3) (14 page)

Three DAYS Later

~ Butcher ~

“I need a favor,” I said into my phone.

For a brief moment, I heard nothing but silence.

“I don’t do favors,” Crete finally replied. “But if there’s something you need me to do, I’ll do it—if I can… Just tell me what it is.”

Crete was the Wolves’ boss—and just as we weren’t your typical gang, he wasn’t your typical gang boss. He was calm, well mannered, intelligent, and enlightened, and he dealt with the rest of us not as subordinates, but as peers.

“I need you find someone for me,” I said, getting to the point.

“Who?” Crete asked.

“A girl I’ve been dating,” I answered. “Her name is Alexis Windsor, but she goes by Lexi. She’s a reporter with the
L.A. Crier
, writing under the name A. Windsor. I haven’t seen or heard from her in a couple days now, and I’m really worried.”

I waited for Crete to say, or ask, something. And when he didn’t, I continued.

“I must have called her a hundred times,” I said. “But her phone keeps going straight to voicemail, and she hasn’t returned any of my messages. So I stopped by her building earlier today. But she wasn’t there, and all the lights were out in her apartment. I even tried yelling and making a scene outside of her window, just in case. But… nothing. I don’t know what else—”

“Take a deep breath, Butcher,” Crete instructed, providing a much-needed interruption to my rambling. “Let’s take this one step at a time.”

“Okay, boss,” I responded, before sucking up a big gulp of air and puffing it back out. “Sorry about all that.”

“When and where—
exactly
—did you see this girl last?” Crete asked, passing over my apology.

“Saturday night, at her apartment,” I answered. It was Tuesday now, which explained both the reason for my call and the panic in my voice.

“I left a little after eleven thirty,” I explained. “But I talked to her on the phone the next day—Sunday—around noon, and haven’t heard from her since.”

Crete asked me a few more questions about that night, then went on to collect some of Lexi’s basic info from me—including her age, address, distinguishing features, and general physical description, among other things.

“And how much does she know about your work with the Wolves?” he asked, rounding out the interrogation.

“Not very much at all,” I responded. “She knows I’m a Wolf, and she understands the general nature of our agenda. But I haven’t told her
anything
specific about what I do.”

“Good,” Crete assured me. “Very good.” I knew that Crete wasn’t praising my ability to keep our secrets, but celebrating the fact that Lexi’s ignorance meant that there was once less target on her head.

Crete hummed for a moment, then spoke again.

“I’ll start looking into this right away,” he said. “And I’ll get back to you as soon as I can… In the meantime, I suggest you try to keep your mind off of Lexi. Spend some time with that daughter of yours. Focus on
her
instead. Just because one person you care about is missing from your life, that doesn’t mean you should turn your back on others who need you. Take care of them, and take care of you. This matter is my hands now.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“No need to,” Crete replied. “Just doing my job.”

I hung up the phone and glanced at the screen as I set it down on the counter in front of me. It was 9:37 p.m., and even though
I
wasn’t tired at all, it was already past someone else’s bedtime. But that someone else wasn’t sleeping yet. She was still awake, watching
Sponge Bob Square Pants
in the living room—and as my boss had just suggested, I decided to go join her, instead of mulling over another problem I could not solve.

“Shouldn’t you be asleep?” I asked teasingly, as I walked into the living room and positioned myself between Sonja and the TV.

“Dadddd-yyyy,” Sonja whined, looking up at me from the sofa with big, round puppy dog eyes. “My show just started.”

“Oh yeah?” I asked, raising my eyebrow and turning to look at the screen. “Can I watch it with you?”

“Yeah, yeah, Daddy,” Sonja replied with a huge grin. “Come watch SpunBer with me!” (She couldn’t pronounce “Sponge Bob” correctly, so the little yellow guy’s name was “SpunBer” as far as we were concerned.)

I went over to the couch and sat down next to Sonja, and she immediately snuggled up next to me and put her head on my chest. I wrapped my arm around her and dotingly stroked her shoulder, careful not to touch the black-and-blue mark that still lingered on her forearm from her short stay in the hospital last month.

“Who’s that pink guy again?” I inquired, referring to Sponge Bob’s oafish starfish friend.

“That’s Patry, Daddy,” Sonja told me, matter of fact. “You know him.”

“Ah, that’s right,” I sighed. Indeed, I
was
familiar with the one and only “Patrick Star,” aka “Patry” in the Crane house.

“And what about—?” I began. But before I could finish asking about the squirrel in the astronaut’s suit, Sonja cut me off.

“Daddy, shhhh,” she whispered. “I wanna watch SpunBer.”

When a gal tells John “The Butcher” Crane what she wants, John “The Butcher” Crane does his best to oblige!

I shut my mouth, held my daughter, and watched that silly sponge chase jellyfish, flip patties, and irritate the hell out of his neighbor until I drifted off to sleep.

When I woke up again, sometime later, Sonja was fast asleep on my lap, and SpunBer was still on the TV. He and Patry were doing a festive dance—and for some reason, I heard Zeppelin playing in the background, even though, so far as I knew, their music had never been featured on the show.

I groggily tried to make sense of it, as SpunBer continued to do his jig. But as soon as I heard the same riffs repeated, I realized my mistake. The sound of Zeppelin wasn’t coming from the TV. It was coming from the kitchen—from my phone. I was so used to having it on silent since I started dating Lexi that I’d nearly forgotten that I’d set
Immigrant Song
as my ringtone.

I gently lifted Sonja from my lap and moved her onto the couch cushion, then quietly scurried off to the kitchen to get my phone and return the missed call.

My phone was still on the counter where I’d placed it after ending my conversation with Crete—and Crete’s phone number was still at the top of my call log. It was he who’d called only seconds earlier, at 12:43 a.m… which could mean only
one
thing.

I picked up my phone and pressed “send,” anxious to hear what Crete had found out about Lexi in the mere three hours since last we talked.

“She’s alright,” Crete said, by way of a greeting, as soon as he answered his phone.

I was relieved to hear the news and glad that he’d started by getting straight to the point.

“Where is she?” I asked, eager to learn more.

“She’s at Cedars-Sinai,” Crete answered. “She’s in the intensive care unit, recovering from surgery.”

“What?” I shouted. I immediately lowered my voice, cognizant of my sleeping daughter, and went on. “She’s in the hospital? What happened? What kind of surgery? Why’s she in the ICU?”

“Butcher, slow down,” Crete said soothingly. He waited until my breathing was audibly slower, then explained.

“Lexi was in an altercation on Sunday night,” he told me. “She was taken to Cedars-Sinai by ambulance, and they’ve performed two surgeries on her to repair the damages caused by the incident.”

“What?” I repeated, making sure I didn’t shout again. “What kind of altercation? What happened to her?”

“She was stabbed,” Crete responded.

“What?” I repeated, for a third time, and this time, I definitely shouted—even louder than before. “She was
stabbed
? By
whom
?”

“I don’t know,” Crete answered. “The police are at the hospital right now, waiting to talk to Lexi and ask her the same thing. She was in no position to talk to them when she first arrived, and she’s been in critical care since then. She only got out of her second surgery a few hours ago, and she hasn’t completely woken up just yet.”

It was my turn to speak, but I couldn’t. I didn’t know what to say.

“I have to ask you, one more time, Butcher,” Crete said, breaking the silence and shifting gears. “How much does she know about your work with the Wolves?”

I could understand why he was asking me the same question again, and I thought carefully for a moment before I replied.

“She doesn’t really know anything,” I said, reiterating what I’d said earlier. “She knows I’m a Wolf; she knows we’re a vigilante group targeting the drug scene; and she knows about how we helped Carrie, from Tellie’s, a few years ago and saved her from Tony Ink.

“But that’s all I told her. I never said anything about what I’m up to
now
, or about our other current events. The only shit she knows about those things is what’s been in the papers over the last several months.”

“Hm,” Crete hummed. My answer was thorough and honest, but it obviously wasn’t helpful in any way.

“I need to see her,” I said, taking my turn to shift the gears.

“You will,” Crete replied. “I’ve arranged for Z.Z. and his wife to be at your house in the morning, so that you can go to the hospital.”

“But—” I started.

“But
what
, Butcher?” Crete interjected. “There are no buts here. There’s nothing you can do tonight. Lexi is still in recovery, and the police are waiting to speak with her. And
you
have a young daughter at home who needs to be looked after… Z.Z. and Claire will be there in the morning, and you will go see Lexi then. Understood?”

“Yes, sir,” I answered. Crete treated us like equals, but he didn’t fuck around when it came to talking sense into us and setting us straight.

“Very well,” Crete replied. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow then. Rest well, and try to get some sleep.”

Crete hung up the phone, and I held mine by my ear for a few seconds longer. I was still in shock from all I’d heard, and my body was two steps behind my mind.

I finally set my phone back down on the counter, then I leaned down over it and buried my head in my hands. I couldn’t understand how a girl like Lexi could end up getting stabbed, and I started to wonder if it was, somehow, my fault.

Lexi had been reluctant to date a gang member, remember. And the potential for “incidents” such as this were a large part of the reason why. If I’d let her go with her initial instinct—if I hadn’t tried to convince her how good and different the Wolves were—maybe whatever happened to her wouldn’t have happened, and maybe she wouldn’t have wound up in a hospital bed. Maybe she’d…

“Daddy?” I heard Sonja inquire meekly.

I lifted my head from my hands and saw her tiny little body just a few feet away.

“Hey, baby,” I said, twisting my worried face into a smile. “Was I too loud? Did I wake you up?”

“No, no,” Sonja said, shaking her head. Her bottom lip started trembling, and tears slowly fell from her eyes.

“What’s wrong, honey?” I asked, walking over to her. I bent down, lowered my body to the floor, and looked at my daughter face to face.

“I pee-peed my pants again,” Sonja replied, crying. “I’m sorry.”

I reached both arms out, pulled Sonja toward me, and gave her a big hug.

“You don’t have to say you’re sorry,” I reminded her. “Accidents happen, especially when you’re sick.”

“But I don’t wanna have accidents, Daddy,” Sonja sniveled. “And I don’t wanna be sick.”

I had to muster every ounce of strength and resolve I had so as not to burst out in tears.

“I know, baby,” I said. I pulled back and looked at Sonja with a smile. “It’s pretty late,” I added. “But we have to clean ya up. So if you wanna go upstairs and get a bubble bath—”

“Bubble bath!” Sonja joyously exclaimed. “Yay!”

“Alright,” I laughed, rising to my feet. I leaned down and put my hands under Sonja’s arms, preparing to pick her up.

“Wait, Daddy,” she said, stopping me. She looked down at her soiled pants. “I’m all wet with pee-pee.”

“So what?” I asked, picking her up nonetheless. “It’s just pee.” I hoisted her up and held her against my chest and side, supporting her from her bottom. “If you have pee-pee on you, who cares if I get some on me?”

“You’re funny, Daddy,” Sonja said, wrapping her arms around my neck and leaning into me. “I love you so much.”

“I love you so much, too,” I replied, holding onto her tightly as I made my way toward the stairs.

~ Butcher ~

“I’m here to see Alexis Windsor,” I told the pudgy man sitting behind the desk at the entry to the ICU. He typed something into his computer, then looked at me suspiciously.

“Windsor?” he asked.

“Yes,” I answered. “Alexis Windsor.”

“Hold on,” he said. He fiddled around with his computer a bit more, and I forced myself to look away so that I wouldn’t give him a dirty look. It was 8:35 in the morning. I’d left my house the very moment Z.Z. and Claire arrived, and I’d made it to Cedars-Sinai in record time. But now
this
joker’s incompetence was starting to slow me down.

“Here we go,” the fat guy said. “Alexis Windsor.” He looked at me suspiciously again.

“She’s on protective watch, you know,” he added.

“Okay,” I replied, waiting for him to say more.

“So, that means—” he started, narrowing his eyes until they looked like tiny slits in his big, bulbous head.

“Oh no,” a voice cried out from behind me, interrupting Fatso before he could go on. “Not
you
.” The words sounded critical, but the voice did not—though it
did
sound familiar.

I turned my head around and saw the face of the woman who’d just spoken to me. It, too, was familiar, and it made me smile, despite all else I had going on.

“Hey, Stacey,” I replied, swinging my body around to greet the kind-eyed, middle-aged nurse.

“Please don’t tell me that beautiful baby of yours is back again,” she said, shaking her head as she walked up beside me and set down a stack of medical charts.

“No,” I answered, slowly shaking my head. “She’s at home, probably still in bed.”

“Wish I was,” Stacey laughed. Her obese coworker cleared his throat and raised his eyebrows at her from behind the desk.

“He’s here to see Alexis Windsor,” he said.

“Oh,” Stacey sang out in a somewhat musical tone. She turned her attention away from her coworker and addressed me. “Come with me,” she said. “I’ll take you to her room.”

“Stacey,” the fat man roared, as he stood up. “Windsor is on protective watch.”

“
James
,” Stacey roared back, sarcastically, “I know.
And
I know this guy, so sit back down.”

James did as he’d been told, and the chair creaked when his rotund ass plopped down on it. He made a “hmpf” noise with his nostrils, then started clicking away at his computer again.

“Right this way,” Stacey said, ushering me away from the desk.

“So how
is
Sonja doing?” she asked, leading me to a set of double doors.

“The same,” I replied.

Stacey looked at me kindly and pursed her lips into a small, ambivalent smile.

“I pray for her every night,” she said, holding her ID up to the scanner on the wall.

“Thanks,” I answered, as the double doors clicked open.

“What are you doing down here anyway?” I asked, following Stacey through the opening. We turned to the right and started down a long corridor that was lined with open doors. “I thought you worked in the children’s unit,” I added, calling to mind the place Stacey and I first met. She was one of the nurses who helped care for Sonja, six months ago, when she got her diagnosis in this very hospital; and, she’d cared for her on several subsequent visits as well, including the most recent one we made last month.

“I have two kids in high school, honey,” Stacey scoffed. “I work on the children’s unit, the trauma unit, and the ICU. I work wherever they send me, so long as they send me home with a paycheck.”

I chuckled at Stacey’s sentiment and candor, and I ignored the urge I felt to pat her on the back.

“That’s her room,” Stacey said, as we neared the end of the corridor. “B-18.”

I glanced down at the room Stacey indicated and took a deep breath. “How is she?” I asked.

“My shift only started about an hour ago,” Stacey replied. “I had three transfers to take care of as soon as I got here, so I haven’t done my rounds yet, but from what I’ve heard and seen so far, she seems to be doing okay.

“She hasn’t come to, or fully woken up, from the surgery yet. But that’s okay in cases like this. Her vitals are stable, and her body is functioning as it should—so now, it’s just a matter of time until she wakes up.”

“So she’s in a coma?” I asked.

“It’s not a
coma
, per se,” Stacey answered, articulating with her hands. I could tell that she was trying to find a way to “dumb down” her professional opinion so that a layperson like me could understand it.

“It’s more like she’s in a suspended state of sleep,” Stacey went on. “She’s been through a lot—getting stabbed, losing so much blood, and having
two
surgeries—and her body needs time to calm down, recover, and repair itself.”

“Makes sense,” I said, still staring down the corridor.

Stacey looked like she was about to turn and leave, but I spoke again before she could.

“I don’t really even know what happened,” I said, lowering my voice. “I haven’t seen or talked to her in a couple days, and I just found out she was here late last night.”

“Well,” Stacey replied, just as quietly, “I can only tell you as much as I know—and it really isn’t a lot. But I guess it’s better than nothing right now.”

Stacey walked down the corridor a few more paces, then turned and motioned for me to follow.

“She came in by ambulance early Monday morning, maybe at two or three in the morning,” Stacey explained, standing just past the open doorway to room B-18. “She had a stab wound to the gut and was bleeding profusely. They rushed her into surgery to stop the bleeding and found out that her iliac artery had been perforated. That’s a major artery, so it was a pretty big deal—and a pretty big surgery.

“She made it through the surgery okay though, and things were looking good… until they did a routine ultrasound yesterday afternoon. They found a small amount of blood and fluid in her abdominal cavity and discovered that there was still a teeny, tiny leak in her artery—so they put her under again to fix it. And now, here she is—and here
we
are.”

Stacey stopped talking, and for the first time, I looked into Lexi’s room.

My heart ached at what I saw.

Lexi was laid out on the bed with tubes dangling from her nose, from her arms, and from under her sheets. She had bandages on her skin in a few spots, and several machines were attached to, and monitoring, her body.

“Poor thing,” I said, shaking my head and shaking off the tears.

I felt Stacey’s hand touch my arm and pat it gently.

“The police were in and out of here all day yesterday,” she said in an even more hushed tone, nearly whispering. “Guess they wanna know what happened, too.”

I turned to Stacey, and she gave me a telling look.

“They came in after her surgery last night and stuck around until three or so, waiting for her to wake up so that they could interview her,” she continued. “But I guess they got tired of wasting their time, and they left—and they left specific instructions that we were to call them as soon as she woke up.

“Now, I don’t know
when
she’s going to wake up—but when she does, whoever is on shift is gonna have to call them. I, personally, don’t like talking to the police so much. So if I’m the one on shift, I’d probably take my time before calling. But I can’t say the same for the other nurses.”

Stacey gave me another telling look, and I gave a knowing look in return.

“Thanks,” I said, nodding my head to let her know that I understood what she was saying, and that we were on the same page. She’d seen me in this hospital many times before, and though I’d never said anything to her about my “business” or involvement with the Wolves, she must’ve been able to somehow surmise who, or what, I was—and now, she was clearly doing something to help me.

“I’ll be in later to check on her,” Stacey said, turning to leave. “And I’m just down the hall if you need me.”

I smiled, nodded again and watched as Stacey made her way toward the nurses’ station. Then, I walked into B-18 and went over to Lexi’s bed.

Now that Stacey was gone, I wasn’t too proud to cry, and I let the tears flow from my eyes, down my face, and onto wherever they landed.

“I’m sorry, Lexi,” I said out loud, hoping she could hear me. “I know this is my fault somehow… and I’m sorry. I’m really, really fucking sorry.”

I put my hand on Lexi’s arm and leaned down to kiss her on her forehead. She felt warm, yet clammy, and I could smell that “medical” smell on her.

I looked around the room and saw a chair in the corner, which I retrieved and placed at Lexi’s bedside. I sat down on it, stared at Lexi for a moment, then closed my eyes and started praying. I asked God—Allah, Re, Buddha, and any other deity I could think of—to bless Lexi and see her through this, and I asked them to forgive me for my involvement in her predicament.

The sounds of the machines to which Lexi was attached were steady and regular, and they helped slow the whirlwind of thoughts in my head. Before I knew it, I was in a meditative state, or a trance of some kind, and it felt surprisingly calm and peaceful.

I must have sat like that for an hour or so before something finally roused me. I heard a noise that sounded much different than the artificial sounds coming from the machines and monitors. It sounded more organic than electronic, and it was irregular and unsteady.

What was that?
I asked myself.
A cough?

I heard the noise again, and slowly lifted my head and opened my eyes.

“Butcher?” Lexi feebly asked, as my eyes met with hers. “Is that really you?”

“Lexi,” I whimpered. “Thank God, you’re awake!” I threw my body at the bed and hovered over her body, hugging her and surrounding her like a human dome. “You’re in the hospital,” I said, sobbing. “You were stabbed.”

“I know,” Lexi replied, struggling to move her weak arms and touch me.

“Do you remember what happened?” I asked, trying to collect myself and pull away. I wanted more than anything to hold Lexi, but I had to keep in mind what Stacey had said about the police. Now that Lexi was awake, I only had so much time before someone called them in to talk to her, and I needed to get as much information from her as I could before they did.

“Yes,” Lexi answered. “I remember.”

“Well?” I asked, pressing for more details.

“I found her,” Lexi replied.

“Huh?” I inquired. “Found who?”

“D,” she said, shifting in her bed. “I found D.”