I can see her biting back words and am half expecting her to tell me I could leave the Satan’s Devils, jumping at the perfect excuse I’ve given her. But when she ends up asking simply, “You’ll come back?” I wonder whether she’s got some inkling it is her, and wants to skirt away from the truth as much as I.
“Uh huh,” I lie again.
She pulls back and stares into my face. “How long, Beef?”
“I don’t know, Sal. Until my head’s screwed on right.”
“I’ll still see you. When I come to the club?”
“Of course.”
“Okay. As long as I know I can call on you.”
Her tears dry, but she hovers, checking how much I’m packing. In the end, it’s not much, just the bare necessities to keep me going. It leaves her satisfied, but I’ll have to come back.
All Drummer knows is that I bring a duffle of clothes and move into the suite he’s made available. I don’t fess up and tell him I haven’t broken things off with Sally. Unfortunately, it isn’t long before he gets the first hint, as all my brothers do.
“Beef. The bathroom tap is dripping, can you come fix it?”
“Beef, the timer on the cooker is wrong, can you reset it for me?”
Beef this, Beef that.
Sally’s friendship with Tash and the other women is used as an excuse, so, acting out of character, she’s at the club almost every day. Just as often it seems, I’m back at the house with odd jobs to do.
My concentration is fucked. Culminating in me forgetting to tighten the nuts properly when I put a wheel on a bike. Luckily Slick noticed the wobble before he hit speed.
I deserved his fist in my face.
As well as the dressing down that’s now to come from Drummer.
I approach the prez’s office, pausing for a moment outside, wiping my hands down my face. Two weeks ago, he told me to end it with Sally. Sure, I’m staying most nights at the clubhouse, but as for her getting the message? No fucking chance.
Inside, I open my mouth to apologise.
He raises his hand. “Called you here for a reason, Beef.” To give me shit about Slick’s bike. Of course you did. I wait for it.
“Need you to do something for me.”
“Yeah, I… what?” His opening gambit has floored me. “Er, yeah. Whatever you need, Prez.”
He chuckles. “Like that, Brother. But I think you best hear me out before agreeing off the top of your head. Might be something you don’t want to do.”
I like that it sounds like I’m going to be useful to him. Rather do Drummer a favour any day of the week than have him tear me off a strip for making a rookie mistake. “What’s up?”
“Colorado.”
Whatever I expected him to say, it wasn’t that. “Prez?”
“You were there with us a few weeks back, Beef. You must have noticed Demon’s new to wearing the prez’s patch. I expected Hellfire would back him up more, stand up by his side, but it hasn’t worked out like I thought. Hell’s all but into his retirement now, just wants a comfortable life. Demon’s VP, Thunder, only took the job on temporarily, as he reminds him and anyone else who’ll listen, all the time.”
I nod. “Heard him say that myself.” Hellfire was the ex-prez who’d stepped down to allow his VP, and son, Demon, to move into the top spot. Problem is, that’s left a hole in the officer ranks which, as Drummer has pointed out, is for the meantime, being filled reluctantly by the sergeant-at-arms.
“I want someone to go and check things out. Report back to me how the club’s running, and whether I need to step in.”
“And you want that to be me?” I’m stunned. Not that I don’t think I could do what he’s asking, I didn’t expect to be his first choice.
“Yeah. Trust you Beef. You and I have ridden together a long time. Most of the men here are now family men, haven’t got much choice in who to send. Road? Hyde? Jekyll? Not been patched in that long. Drifter? He’s even newer than the others. Marvel? He can be too much of a joker, and Dollar I need here. Don’t have much choice out of the men unencumbered by ol’ ladies.”
“There’s Sally,” I remind him. I’m not exactly a free man myself.
There’s the stare. The one that sees deep inside you. “Yeah.” If possible his eyes sharpen. “We gonna talk about that?”
I raise and lower my shoulders. “She’s weak, Drum. I tell her I’m walking out for good? I just don’t know how she’d cope. She relies on me. She needs me.”
“And you need to be needed. But there comes a limit, Brother.”
He’s right about that. I’d reached mine long ago.
“Which brings me back to my suggestion. Thought getting you to the club would provide the break you needed but underestimated the depth of Sally’s claws. So, Colorado. That enough space?”
My mind loops back to his proposal. “Effectively she’d be kicking me out of my home, out of Tucson.” I live for this club. Ire starts to burn inside me at the thought I’m the one who has to go. Yeah, but I’m the one who’s running from hurting a woman.
“You tell me you don’t want to do this? My choice might not be my first one, but I’ll find someone else. I got a need, Beef, and decided you can fill it. The fact that my need provides you with a solution is just happy coincidence.”
Morosely I stare down at my hands. “Sally won’t do well on her own.”
“Vulnerable and helpless, yeah? That’s why you’re giving into her every demand. She’s got you all twisted up. You say how you really feel, and she’ll pull out every sympathy card going. Am I right?”
That and then some. I don’t bother using words. Just raise my chin.
“So you heading up to Pueblo for a few weeks, this gives her a chance to learn how to cope. If she prefers, she can go back to her family. There’s no longer a problem now that her ex, Lawson, has been jailed.”
“She likes being independent, Prez. Doesn’t want to go back.”
Drummer exasperatedly shakes his head. “But she’s not being independent. Not when you’re at her beck and call.”
I think over what he’s just said. Then I come to a decision. “I’ll go.” My initial impulse to refuse had, as Drummer rightly surmised, been guilt about Sally. If he thinks this is the right way to force a break, then I’ll do it. It’s the thought of leaving my brothers behind that’s fucking hard to take. I patched into Tucson many years ago, never thought about transferring to a different chapter. Living with the Satan’s Devils has been the only home I’ve known since I left the army. Now my main concern isn’t about leaving Sally, but my friends here. “How long, Prez?”
“As long as it takes. I need to know I’ve a man there who I’ve complete faith in. Want you to be my eyes and ears, maybe see if you can push Demon into appointing a second.”
“Is he going to like that, Prez?” My brows knit together at the thought of the kind of welcome I’d get. A nobody like me turning up and telling a president how to run his own club.
I underestimated Drummer. “Don’t see anyone would question you wanting to visit with Pal and Jayden?” His eyebrow rises.
I catch up with him fast. “Under the circumstances, yeah. I can play it that way if you want, Prez.” I narrow my eyes. “You’ve spoken to Demon? How much have you told him? Has he any idea why I’m really going?”
“Nah. Just told him I had a member who needed some time to get his head on straight. What you tell him when you get there, well, I’ll leave that to you. You’ll be on the ground, you make the calls. I did tell him you put in a request to go nomad.”
I sit up straight, that puts a different perspective on matters. “Lose my fuckin’ Tucson rocker?” I rapidly shake my head. Don’t like that. Don’t like that at all.
“It makes sense, and it’s the role I’m asking you to play. The mother chapter’s representative checking out the other chapters.”
“Chapters?” I thought a few weeks away and then I’d be back. This is a more serious decision than I expected.
“We can revisit when you’ve sorted out Colorado.” He shrugs.
Nomad. A biker, on his own. Essentially Drummer’s traveling enforcer. It’s not that I can’t do it. It’s the thought of the loss of the rocker denoting me without a permanent chapter that concerns me. Tucson’s my home, I’m not ready to say goodbye to it.
“Makes it easier for your brothers to accept, Beef.” Drummer’s tone is persuasive. “A request from you to go nomad, without having to explain your personal circumstances. Someone has to do it. No pressure. Your choice.”
“I can come back, Prez. Can’t I?” If my voice has a hint of desperation in it, I can’t help it.
Drummer suddenly snarls, “Be fuckin’ hard to see you go, Brother. Believe that. But I need someone in Colorado, you need some distance from your life here. Of course, you can fuckin’ return when you’re ready, and when Demon’s got his top team sorted.”
Simple, really. A chance to get out of Sally’s life, or rather, her out of mine. A break away from the love and perfect relationships I see all around me. Time to catch my breath and decide what I really want, without hankering after a woman called Becca. A task that Drummer thinks I’m up to. “Prez.” The determination in my voice has him grinning. “I’d like to put in a request to become nomad.”
“Bring it to the table,” Drummer replies, standing, his hand outstretched. I stand too and take it.
Chapter Three
Normally I’d include my best friend in any plans I’m making. This time, I keep my thoughts to myself. When I eventually tell my brothers my intentions, my decision doesn’t go unchallenged.
“You are fuckin’ jokin’.” Rock stares at me across the table. I’d waited until all other business had been sorted at Friday night’s church, then tabled my request. “You knew about this, Prez?”
Drummer eyes my best friend. “Of course I fuckin’ did. Beef has my blessin’.”
“You’re really walking out on us?” Peg’s shaking his head.
“Sergeant-at-arms,” Drummer snaps. “Beef’s request fits in with my plans. I need eyes and ears in Pueblo.”
“Yeah, but Beef?” Blade’s looking utterly shocked. “We need him here, Prez.”
“This have anything to do with the woman you’re shacking up with? She been putting pressure on you to move?”
Drummer was right. I really don’t want to air what a failure I’ve been at having an old lady at the table. My response to Rock is simply to tell him, “Nothing at all. She won’t be coming with me.”
“Christ, she’s going to love that. You told her?” Lady seems to have got her measure.
I just glare at him. The fact that I haven’t, yet, is none of his business. Got that pleasure to come.
“If you don’t want to agree to Beef removing his Tucson rocker, who else do you suggest? Who’s volunteering?” Drummer asks in a reasonable tone.
We’ve got the best clubhouse in the charter. Swimming pool, houses being built at the top of the compound for any couple who wants one, enough women snapping whips so the prospects keep the clubroom clean and tidy. Anyone would be a fool to want to leave. A wave of homesickness crashes over me, even though I haven’t yet packed my bags, and I remind myself, one word to Drummer and I’ll be back. I tell them that, too. “It’s not forever. Just until I’ve sorted business.”
“And after Colorado. Where will you send him then?” Dollar asks.
My eyes snap to Drum’s. Hoping he won’t say that I’ll be wandering clubhouse to clubhouse.
Prez gazes at me intently. “Wherever there’s a need.”
He means until Sally’s given up on me coming back, doesn’t he?
Rock’s stare is almost worse than that of the prez. “You un-claiming your ol’ lady?”
“I can’t take her with me, not that she’d want to go. Seems wrong to keep her tied down when my future’s uncertain. So, yeah, Brother.” It’s not like I’ve patched her yet. Since she’s not shown any inclination to be on my bike, nor party at the clubhouse, I haven’t given her a vest.
“Your mind’s set?” a voice sounds resigned.
I’ve an affinity with Road. After Rock met Becca, and before I had Sally, I’d taken to sharing women with him. You get a certain closeness when you feel another man’s cock as he’s sliding into their ass, and you’re in their cunt. Or vice versa.
I take a moment to look around this table, realising this is the last time for fuck knows how long. The table I first sat at when, like Drifter who’s keeping silent, I’d first got my patch. I’m gonna miss this. Miss every-fuckin’-one. I then focus on Road and raise my chin. “Yeah, it is.”
He stares back, then nods in resignation. “Then let me wish you good luck, Brother.”
There’s silence. A few eyes look toward Rock as though for guidance. It’s no secret that while we’d all give our lives for each other, Rock and I have a bond that’s stronger than most. I took a bullet while sheltering his injured body under my own, and had no problem doing it, knowing he would have done the same were the positions reversed.
I watch him dropping his head into his hands as he realises things will change. His friend who he’s relied on for so many years, who’s always had his back, will no longer be sitting opposite him. No longer will we high five each other across the table when we share a joke.
Everyone gives him the time he needs until finally he looks up and meets my eyes. “Will miss the fuck out of you, Beef, but you have to do what you need to.”
That’s all everyone needs. They go from suspicious to full one-hundred percent support. My eyes water. This is my family, and I’m leaving them. Not forever. But being nomad is dangerous, riding without a brother at your back. There’s always the chance, however much I want to, I won’t be sat around this table ever again.
A thought Peg seems to echo. “Prez, we’re leeching members instead of trying to build up the club. Aren’t you worried about that? Dart went to San Diego, and now Beef’s going off to Colorado. And Truck…”
“Truck will be back,” Drummer says firmly.
“You think?” Blade challenges. “Man refuses to see us, or his fellow firefighters. All we know is that he’s fucked up. Might not be able to take his place around this table even if he wanted to.”
There’s a moment of silence as we all think about the new member. Patched him in on the eve of his transfer to a hotshot wildfire fighting team in California. He’s didn’t die, but that’s as far as anyone knows.
“If you do get to see him,” I offer into the quiet, “give him my best.”
“A message from Satan?”
I snort. A reference to us both having come far too close to Hell’s door.
Chapter Four
Telling my brothers I was going nomad ended up being easy, compared with trying to explain my absence to Sally.
“What will I do while you’re gone, Beef?” She pauses, dabbing her eyes with a tissue, then loudly blowing her nose. “What will the kids do?”
I hate seeing a woman cry. My reaction is always to stop their tears, and if that means saying what they want to hear, that’s what I normally do. Where a woman’s concerned, I’m the ultimate peacemaker. If it had been just me, I’d back down, tell her I’ll stay, that I won’t walk out the door. But Drummer’s relying on me.
It wasn’t garbage he’d spouted, wasn’t an excuse he’d made up. I’d been in Pueblo with him. While I respect the hell out of Demon, he’s been thrust into the role of president and needs a good strong number two. Thunder, his sergeant-at-arms, is wearing the VP hat reluctantly. No one else in the chapter wants to step up, and remembering what I’d seen of them, while I respect them all as members, there’s no one I could point to and say they’d be right in that spot.
I’m far from VP material myself—I only have to look at Wraith to know that. But maybe I can advise someone else, build them up, so they are capable of being at Demon’s side. Or, even, suggest a transfer in from another chapter. Dart, who used to b
e a member in Tucson, is now Lost’s VP in San Diego, and by all accounts, is doing very well too.
Drummer’s right to identify the weakness in Colorado. So I’m not going off on a fool’s errand, I’ve got a job to do. The fact Sally can’t understand how the club comes first is another sign she’d never make it as an old lady.
“Why Beef, why? Can’t one of the single men go?”
I don’t explain that deep down I still view myself as single, though I don’t the freedom which comes with that. I haven’t told her much about why I’m leaving, that’s club business. But I’ve said what I can. Now I repeat it again. “Sally, my president has asked me to do a job. I can’t refuse. I’m a member of the club. He says I’ve got the right tools, and I go where he needs me.”
“If he doesn’t need you here, why don’t you leave the club? You must be able to do something else. You’re a vet…”
She breaks off as my eyes roll. Has she any idea how many vets are homeless with no work to do? What skills do we return with? Oh yeah, how to kill a man with our bare hands. Skills only something like an MC find useful. Leave the club? Never. I’ll die a member.
“Can I talk to him? Tell him how much I, and the kids, need you?”
My eyes roll again and widen. I clamp my mouth shut. It’s not like I’m a kid at school needing her to go to bat on my behalf with the teacher.
“Sally, we’ve only been together a few months. For years it was just you and the kids. They like me, I like them, but I haven’t been around long enough for them to see me as a substitute father.”
“Can we come with you?”
“We’ve been through this, Sal. I’m expected to live on the compound. It’s not like Tucson at all. It’s a converted steel factory. Not suitable for kids.”
“We could rent a house.”
“No, Sally. Just, no. I’m leaving, and that’s final.” My words in a tone I’ve not used with her before echo around the room. The irrevocability of my statement leaving her no room for a comeback. She’s tried all the weapons she has, persuasion, coercion; nothing has worked.
Satan's Devils MC Colorado Boxset 1 Books 1 - 3 Page 74
