by Cat Porter
Their set ended, and we applauded. The Dwellers signed off for a break.
“They’re good,” Lock said.
“Very good,” I agreed.
Tricky leaned into me. “Hey, I’ve got next weekend off from the shop. There’s nothing else going on with the club, so I thought maybe we could get away together.”
“Get away?”
“I know this place in Wyoming—”
“I’m not up for camping, Trick. Never was a favorite of mine.”
“No, babe, it’s not camping. My cousin owns these cabins and he rents ’em out, and I thought...”
“Oh. I’m not sure.”
“Yeah.” He clenched his jaw together, his eyes hard. “You’re never sure. You always have a meeting or a business thing or a whatever the hell it is thing. Just say you don’t want to go. Just say it already.”
My hand slid over his thigh. “Can you calm down?”
“No.”
I took my hand back. “Then you should go.”
“It’s so easy for you, isn’t it?” His voice seethed. “Keeping things between us on a leash.”
“I like things the way they are. Whenever I don’t want to change them, you get mad.”
“I get mad because I don’t get it, I don’t get you.”
“You don’t need to get me,” I said sharply.
Tricky pulled back as if I’d slapped him. He took in a tight breath and leaned in close to me, his eyes stabbing me with anger. “Any woman would be real excited to get away for the weekend with the man she’s sleeping with. But you? It’s like your skin starts crawling.”
I crossed my legs, averting my gaze. I’d tried to convince myself that I could take things with Tricky a little extra further, like him staying over the whole weekend and not just one or two nights a week. But that asphyxiated feeling would come over me. Last week he’d insisted I attend a club function with him, and I’d refused. We’d argued.
“You’re exaggerating. We discussed this from the beginning. I wasn’t supposed to be your girlfriend or your old lady.”
“Supposed to be, supposed to be. Why can’t it just progress into whatever it could be? What the hell? You hit the brakes at every turn.”
“Maybe you should be with someone who wants a full relationship. A woman who could give you a family one day.”
“I don’t give a shit about all that.”
“You should. You say that now, but a little bit down the road that will probably change for you. You’re at the age when you need to take into account your future. Not just think about what you want now.”
“I see the bigger picture, and it has you in it. I don’t care about kids and stuff,” Tricky spit out. “Jesus, Lenore. Every time I take a few steps forward, you automatically pull back. It’s pissing me off.”
“That’s a problem. I’m sorry, but I can’t give what you want.”
“Shit, woman! Why can’t you just go with it?”
Done.
I pushed my chair back. “I’m leaving.”
“No, stay.” He gripped my arm.
I shoved him off me.
“I don’t want to fight with you, Lenore. I really don’t.”
“You could’ve fooled me.”
The waitress came over with another round for our table. Jill shot me a concerned look as Lock, Grace, and Boner talked with Allen who’d come to our table.
“Let’s have another drink and relax,” Tricky said, grabbing two bottles of beer, sliding them in front of us.
“Okay.”
He let out a breath. “Okay.”
But I didn’t drink. I stared at the bottle. I stared beyond the bottle, across the table, and admired Grace and Jill’s relaxed faces, their laughter. They deserved to be happy. Lock and Boner deserved to be happy. Tricky, definitely.
I’d had my taste of deep happiness a long time ago, but it was over, and I was okay with that. I was good with what I had now. Over the years, I’d trained myself to be content and it showed on the outside. Chained my hunger, caged the wildcat. But that wildcat was restless, unsatisfied. Starving. Hungry for the one thing she could never have again.
Provoke her, she’d bite.
46
“Put the gun down,” I said.
Catch lowered the Python revolver he aimed at Butler and Boner.
I stood in the doorway of our clubhouse great room at the side of the two Jacks. Both of them eased back slightly like wolves straining to launch at their prey, my presence, the sound of my stern voice the only things holding them back.
I’d just gotten in from a quick trip to southern Nebraska, and found Boner accusing Catch of stealing the Python from their clubhouse. Just as I suspected he would, Catch was taunting the One-Eyed Jacks in return for getting a beating, and as a follow up to his bitterness over Jill moving on with Boner. The gun Catch had stolen from them had belonged to Dig, a gun they considered to be a club treasure.
When was he going to learn?
I folded my arms across my chest. “I’m gone two days, and you managed to bust out your balls again, bro?”
“Did what needed to be done,” muttered Catch.
“Not with that gun,” I said. “I admire your play, but this? This isn’t right.” My eyes went to Boner, a lean, hardened man with long dark hair and gleaming eyes. He’d been Dig’s best friend. “It’s disrespect to a man I knew and admired.”
Boner raised his chin.
Catch only raked a hand through his hair, considering, stalling.
“Catch,” I warned.
Sulking, his dramatic tactic being cut short, he stuck out the revolver.
“Come give it to me,” Boner said on a snarl, his distinctive green eyes shining.
Catch moved forward, got in his face, and dropped the revolver. Boner’s hand snapped out and caught it just in time.
“Party’s over,” said Catch. “I’d invite y’all to stay, but I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Ah, no thanks,” Boner replied. “I’ve heard the beds around here suck.”
“You motherfu—” Catch lunged at him. Two of my men dragged him back.
“How’re we going to get past this shit now? You want to tell me?” Butler’s voice thundered.
“I’m gonna need an apology,” Boner said, eyes going from Catch to me. “Then the Jacks are gonna require a sweet form of payback for this heavy transgression. But first, I wanna know how you did it, Catch. Who’d you use to get it? Are you that much smarter than I took you for?”
“Your woman did it for me. Didn’t take much to convince her either. Heart of flames, that one.”
“Son of a bitch!” Boner exploded, his hands clamping around Catch’s neck.
“Boner!” Butler yelled, pulled him off Catch.
“You lying piece of shit!” Boner said. “Jill would never—”
Catch choked and coughed, his face different shades of red, his hands shoving at Butler’s chest. “Yeah, Jill would never a hell of a lot of things, but with me, she sure as fuck did. Goes to show you.”
Shut the fuck up, boy.
Boner pounced on him, punching him in the face, and Catch fell back, grunting. Den lunged toward Boner, but I stopped him with a hand on his chest.
“Catch more than deserved that,” I said.
A loud ping sliced the air. Butler untucked his phone from a pocket and glanced at it. “Fuck.” He tapped the phone and put it to his ear. “What the hell’s going on?” His eyes flicked up at Boner. “You and Jill did what?”
Boner grabbed the phone from Butler and listened to whomever was on the line. His face darkened at what he heard, and he shoved the phone back at Butler, and approached Catch. “You been watching me? You knew about my ex, Mindy, and you got her to do your dirty work, you slick scumbag?”
&nb
sp; Catch let out a laugh. “Aw, you thought I was talking about Jill before, huh? Nah. This other girl, Mindy, she was more than willing. She wanted to stick it to you bad.”
Boner’s lips curled, nostrils flaring, his fierce, dark glare a thousand knives.
“Let’s get out of here,” Butler said to Boner and shot me a stony look. “Compensation needs to hit the table.”
The Jacks left.
Everyone stared at Catch.
“You got balls, bro. I like that, always have,” I said. “You took a stand, terrific. But not this. There’s history with that gun that you don’t get, and you need to respect it, respect them and not fuck with them anymore. The Jacks are important to me.”
“I know.”
“You know?” My voice got louder and Catch tensed. “Do you really?”
“Yes, yes, I know.”
“Right. You made your point. But you’re fucking with our plans now, plans you are aware of. That’s what pisses me off. You’re putting yourself and your sad ass ego before your club. You can’t go running off into the night on a tear and especially not against the Jacks. We need them friendly, but now you’ve pissed them off. Tugged on their heartstrings.”
“Yeah, I—”
“You hearing me?”
He scowled, his eyes darting everywhere, muscles fidgeting. He was the wild horse unwilling to take the saddle.
“Yes, I hear you,” he bit out.
“You still sore that Jill doesn’t want you no more? That she chose Boner?”
He winced at my words, skin reddening.
What a fucking soap opera. I took in a deep breath to keep my cool.
Catch wore his heart on his sleeve, and it twisted there and bled. He’d loved Jill, maybe he was only now realizing how much, or maybe his ego had snapped and filled the sudden void with all this bluster. Either way, he needed to see sense. And I had to show him the way.
He pressed his lips together into a firm line, his gaze glued to the floor, the muscle along his jaw ticking. The lit fuse hissed as it coiled and sparked. “I don’t want my kid growing up around another club. Becca’s my kid!”
“What else did you do? You threaten Jill?”
“I told her to give me full custody of Becca or I’d sic Mishap on Boner.”
Mishap was Rhys. He’d never wanted to be an official part of the Flames of Hell, preferring to remain under the radar and on his own, which was just as well. We liked it that way, and it worked for both of us. I gave him plenty of assignments and, through me, so did Turo. No one knew who “Mishap” was or who he worked for. Over the years he’d become a legend: assassination for hire and done with precision and accuracy. Clean and smooth. The unholy Velvet Reaper.
My nerves exploded.
“Who the hell do you think you are using Mishap’s name as a threat?” I yelled.
Catch jumped to his feet. “I’m Becca’s father! Me! Not some One-Eyed Jack!” His voice was raw with emotion.
I got into his face, gripping his colors. His eyes widened, and he shook in my hold. “Then you be her father. You be there for her. She’s only two hours away. Be responsible. Be consistent. Let her see that in you. Let her feel safe with you. Let her depend on you, and you deliver. And don’t lie to her. Not ever. That’s what she needs from you. Never forget that.” My lungs burned at the words erupting from the charred remains of “Kid.” I took in a deep breath to clear the fumes. “This bullshit high school behavior is not helping your case. With Jill or with me.”
Catch nodded stiffly and dropped his head, his eyes closed.
I wrapped a hand around his neck, and a noise unfurled in his throat at the contact. “Dammit, Catch. We got a lot of work to do, and I need you. Shit’s hitting the fan here.”
“I’m sorry. Sorry. You got me,” he whispered roughly. “You got me, Prez.”
Within the week, that shit hit the goddamn fan. And it was Jill who tipped us off.
She’d called Krystal, asking if she could see me.
“She sounded upset,” said Krystal. “And real determined. She said it’s life and death. I know that girl wouldn’t ask if—”
“Tell her yes,” I said.
Jill came racing down from South Dakota with her daughter. Krystal brought her to my office, and she told me Boner was missing. She suspected he’d gone to see Alejandro Calderón on his own. Turns out Boner used to be part of Calderón’s Denver gang over twenty years ago, and Calderón was after him for some old vendetta.
“Maybe my coming here is wrong and against the rules,” said Jill, her face flushed, “and I’ll get punished for it by the Jacks and you, but I had to try. I had to. I love Boner, he’s a good man. I know, from the years I spent with the Flames, that if anyone could do something to save him, it would be you.”
Calderón was gunning for the Broken Blades, and now he was using Boner as some sort of sacrifice to his vengeful gods to get the winds of war blowing? Did he think that would make us all shudder in our boots as he marched into the Broken Blades’s territory like some usurping fascist swallowing more and more territory?
Fuck no. Not on my watch.
It was time to blow this shit sky high and shut it down. Now with their brother in danger, the Jacks would appreciate any move I’d make, and that would tie them to me for a long time to come. I needed that. I wanted that.
Jill said that Butler and the Jacks were on the hunt for Boner. She also assured me she and Catch were over their crap and she’d taken his previous threats with a grain of salt.
“Finger, I brought my daughter here today to see her dad and her other family as a show of good faith. I want to believe that all the bullshit can be wiped clean. I want to believe that we can start fresh and be fair, for all our sakes and for the good of our clubs.”
Sitting stiffly on the other side of my desk, she waited for my response. Any response. She was worried. She’d come all the way here on her own and taken a chance on me listening to her for the good of our clubs.
“I owe Boner one,” I said.
Her eyes lit up, her back straightened. “You do?”
“That shit with the Python.”
“Right.” She licked her lips. “Well, maybe Mishap could be given a new target?”
Ah, Boner was a lucky man.
A hard knock and Catch stood in the doorway. “Finger, two of Calderón’s men followed Jill here from Meager.”
I would make my move in a memorable way. Blunt, definitive. But oblique.
Over the years, Turo had introduced me to a number of white collar men in high places—not only in his world, but in the finer stratospheres of politics and law and order. I didn’t use these contacts often, only when absolutely appropriate and absolutely necessary. I would do it now for the preservation of my territory, my trade, and most importantly, the brotherhood.
I pressed my back into my thick leather chair. “I got calls to make.”
Jill shot up from her seat, her knot of strawberry blonde hair bobbing on her head. “Thank you for seeing me.” She darted out of my office.
I stared after her. The girl had taken a risk coming here, back to her hostile ex and his club in order to protect her new old man from a common enemy. She’d smelled danger and did something about it.
Holding Becca in one arm, Krystal put her other arm around Jill and led her into the clubroom, Catch at their side.
Loyalty. Family. Flames to the end.
The end had come for Calderón and Notch. I picked up my phone and dialed, my pulse buzzing.
Laying the fuses.
Setting my prairie on fire.
47
Beck was eighteen going on thirty, I loved to tease him. He was extremely passionate about music and extremely focused. Beck had done really well at his arts high school, and made a variety of contacts there and at the clubs he and his
friends frequented, and of course through his dad. He made the most of the possibilities before him. He filled in for different bands and played at recording sessions as both a guitarist and a drummer. He wrote music with friends, and mentored to an award-winning songwriter who worked with country as well as a number of alternative rock musicians. He hung with a few kids of famous rock and rollers. Now Beck fronted his own band, Freefall, and was determined to do well. My boy was high on life, and I was high on that. So high.
This time, I’d stayed longer than expected in California. Freefall was playing a number of small venues and a couple of music festivals as well. Their release of two digital singles had been very popular. Their social media presence was proving to be a huge success, and they’d attracted a promoter who was barely twenty-one years old himself, a savvy publicist with plenty of crazy yet right on the money ideas. The music scene was a whole new ballgame from Eric’s day.
Beck was making some money now, and his dad helped set him up in his own place which freaked me out a little, but also made me insanely proud. I stayed with him at his new small house for almost two months, helping him choose furniture, decorating, organizing, meeting his friends and bandmates. I kept busy. A very attractive record producer friend of Eric’s asked me out, and we went out on a couple of drink and dinner dates. I took the time to meet up with a number of old clients and, with Kelly’s help, got a few new ones for custom orders. Kelly and I hung out and brainstormed together on my makeup line idea.
Saying goodbye to my son at the crowded security checkpoint at LAX yet again was hell.
“I love you, honey.” I kissed and hugged him, sniffing in the warm scent of his tanned skin and the mango coconut shampoo I’d created for him, which he loved and used religiously on his thick dark blond hair. I squeezed him harder. I didn’t want to let go. Couldn’t. Not yet. “Love you so much.”
I took in a deep breath and finally released him. Released him out into the world.
My own blue green eyes smiled back at me. “Love you too, Ma.” He held my hands. “I love what you did with my place. I love that we spent so much time together. That I got to take you out and show you off.”
