[Gemma's House — September 27, 2008, 2:00 PM]
She wouldn't speak.
Two days since the hospital. Gemma had been discharged, returned to her home, and sealed herself inside a silence that nothing could penetrate.
I watched from across the street as Clay helped her from the car. She moved slowly, carefully, like someone who'd learned that sudden movements brought pain. Her face was still bruised, makeup doing nothing to hide the damage.
She didn't look at anyone. Didn't speak. Just walked into the house and disappeared.
Clay stood in the driveway for a long moment, staring at the closed door. Then he got back in his car and drove away.
She's protecting them. That's what Gemma does—she protects her family, even when protection means silence.
The irony was bitter. By not speaking, she was tearing them apart.
---
[Teller-Morrow Automotive — September 28, 2008, 4:30 PM]
Jax was spiraling.
I found him in the garage, staring at a motorcycle he hadn't touched in hours. His hand was bandaged from the wall incident, his eyes hollow with the particular exhaustion of a man who hadn't slept in days.
"She still won't talk to me." His voice was flat. "I sit with her for hours. Ask her what happened. She just stares at the wall and says she's fine."
"She's not fine."
"I know she's not fine. Everyone knows she's not fine. But she won't—" He stopped, jaw clenching. "I can't help her if she won't let me."
"Maybe she's not ready."
"Ready?" The word came out sharp. "Someone hurt my mother, Cole. Someone broke her. And I'm supposed to wait until she's ready to tell me who so I can kill them?"
"I'm not saying that."
"Then what are you saying?"
I'm saying I know who did it. I know exactly who to kill. But I can't tell you without explaining how I know, and that explanation would destroy everything.
"I'm saying grief has its own timeline. You can't force it."
Jax turned away, hands gripping the workbench.
"I feel like I'm going crazy. Sitting here, doing nothing, while the people who did this are still breathing. Still walking around like they didn't—" His voice cracked. "I should be out there hunting them. But I don't know where to start."
"We'll find them."
"How?"
Because I've been watching them for months. Because I have a file full of faces and locations and patterns that will lead us right to them.
"Because we always do."
---
[Charming Streets — September 29, 2008, 11:00 PM]
Unser's cruiser pulled alongside my bike at a red light.
"Pull over." His voice through the window was tired. "We need to talk."
I followed him to an empty parking lot behind the hardware store. The same lot where I'd had conversations with him before—back when I was just a prospect, fishing for intel about Stahl's plans.
Now everything was different.
"Off the record," he said, leaning against his car. "We found evidence at the scene."
"What kind of evidence?"
"AB calling cards. Nazi imagery. The kind of markers that point at exactly who you'd expect." He rubbed his face. "But Gemma won't file charges. Won't testify. Without her cooperation, I can't touch them."
"You know who did it."
"I know who probably did it. That's not the same as proving it in court." He looked at me. "I know you've been watching them. The cigar shop people. I've seen your bike parked on their street at odd hours."
"I was concerned."
"You were right to be concerned." He pushed off the car, stepped closer. "I'm going to tell you something I shouldn't. And then I'm going to pretend this conversation never happened."
"I'm listening."
"The physical evidence points at AJ Weston. Fingerprints, boot prints, DNA that won't hold up without a complainant but tells me everything I need to know." His voice hardened. "Weston did this. Probably not alone, but he was there."
Confirmation. Not that I needed it.
"What are you saying, Chief?"
"I'm saying that officially, my hands are tied. Unofficially..." He met my eyes. "Be smart about what comes next. Don't leave trails I have to follow."
He got back in his cruiser and drove away.
I sat on my bike in the dark parking lot, processing.
Weston. The name I've been circling for weeks. The monster I couldn't stop because I wasn't there.
But I'm here now.
---
[Cole's Apartment — September 30, 2008, 2:15 AM]
The wall was covered in faces.
Zobelle in the center, smile cold and calculating. Weston to his left, dead eyes staring out from the photo. The soldiers arranged around them—every face I'd documented during weeks of surveillance.
I added new photos. Updated information. Marked locations, schedules, patterns.
Then I circled Weston's face in red.
This one dies first.
Sarah was asleep in the bedroom. She'd stopped asking about the wall—accepted that some things I couldn't explain, some darknesses I had to navigate alone.
I stared at Weston's face until the image burned into my memory.
You hurt her. You broke something precious and irreplaceable. And now you're going to pay.
The guilt hadn't faded. If anything, it had crystallized into something harder—a cold anger that replaced the raw grief.
You couldn't prevent it. But you can avenge it.
Tomorrow, I'd bring everything to church. Lay out the intelligence I'd been building for months. Give the club what they needed to wage war.
And then the hunt would begin.
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