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“Yeah, he did. Are we really just going to roll over for this guy?”
Jules shakes his bald head. I see that his prison tattoos have faded along the sides. He’s been out for twenty years and never considered redoing them. He wore each symbol as a badge of honor, proof that he survived in one of the worst places on earth.
“I am not rolling over,” he says. But I’ll talk to my guys—the few I know who might be in, at least. Half my club is behind the VP, mind you. It’s the other half I’m hoping to reach.”
“Any man you can spare, we’d be most grateful,” I reply. “Colton will come for the warehouse and the clubhouse.”
The old geezer snorts a dry chuckle. “You bet your ass.”
“Don’t tell anyone outside your tightest circle,” Kai warns him. “If Colton has your VP’s ear, you can’t risk it.”
“Nah, we’ll keep it on the down-low,” Jules says, then looks at me. “Don’t expect a miracle. They might choose not to get involved. They might leave the club altogether. Some of these guys have families, and doing business with the likes of Colton has a few of them thinking about crossing state lines altogether.”
“I can’t blame them,” Drake mutters.
Wherever we look, there’s nothing but hesitation and uncertainty. We’ve reached out to every club, including our fiercest rivals. We’ve sent offers of peace and collaboration and promised cuts and shares from future business. Hell, we’ve been mounting a campaign against Colton and the Black Devils, yet his words still haunt me: Give up or die. That was the conclusion of a rather short conversation. His way or the tomb. There’s no middle ground, no other path to walk.
I can’t have that; neither can Kai or Drake. Paddy will go down swinging if he has to. Hell, my dad will come out of retirement and burn the clubhouse to the ground before Colton can get to it.
There’s honor among us, a heritage that we cannot besmirch, a history that Colton cannot and will not taint. Besides, the guys and I have poured all of our strength and resources into the MC. We have plans for the future, plans that include Nadia, too.
If we let Colton win, it will all disappear in a pool of blood and ashes.
Once we’re back at the clubhouse, Drake, Kai, and I settle into our regular booth over a bottle of blended malt whiskey while the kitchen gets busy with a late lunch. I’m starving. I didn’t even realize it until I sat down and caught a whiff of food being cooked for other customers.
It’s relatively quiet here in the afternoon. Our members try to stay out of sight, sticking to the corner booths and the upstairs rooms. There are a few regulars drinking beer and watching a rerun of last night’s game on the large TV. Music plays somewhere in the background. It looks normal and peaceful enough, yet there’s an underlying dread that we can all feel. It’s been this way since Colton first walked in.
“Hammer and Paddy are taking turns at the hospital,” Drake says once he’s off the phone. “Paddy’s got the night shift, and Hammer will be back there in the morning, plus two prospects. Sean and the guys’ families are also there, and the sheriff left a deputy on duty, just in case.”
“I doubt Colton’s boys will be dumb enough to go to the hospital,” Kai says. “He did what he wanted to do. His message was received, loud and clear.”
“What are our options?” Drake asks me.
For the first time in a long time, my best friends seem lost. They each have their own thoughts and ideas on how to proceed, but they still look to me in these dire moments. It should fill me with confidence, but honestly, it doesn’t.
Regardless of which way we go, someone will get hurt, and people will eventually die. We just need to make sure to keep the casualties to a minimum and not lose our own souls in the process. There will be no coming back from that.
“I have some ideas,” I tell them, “but I’d like to know what’s on your minds first. We got in this together, and we’re going to get through it together.”
Kai scratches his growing, greying stubble. Judging by the dark shadows under his eyes, he hasn’t slept much either. It’s been hard to put our heads down at night—not just because of the club issues but because of our tensions with Nadia. We haven’t seen or spoken to her in a couple of days, and we now know that we could’ve handled that gas station conversation better.
“I say we take the war to Colton. We gather our troops, give them a quick training on weapons and combat, and we hit the Black Devils hard when they least expect it,” he says.
Silence falls heavily between us.
That’s not because it’s an outrageous suggestion; we’ve all been thinking about it for a while. It’s because we’re still hoping it doesn’t have to come to that. Drake shakes his head slowly. “It could end badly for us, too,” he replies. “The Feds already have their eyes on Orange County; the sheriff said so himself.”
“It’s our only shot at winning before we lose half the club trying to defend it,” Kai insists. “Colton is out for blood. Everything he’s done up to this point was meant to rattle us—”
“And he has succeeded if we’ll consider war our only option,” Drake says, cutting him off.
There’s tension building between us. It was bound to happen. I lean forward just as I hear the clubhouse doors open. I steal a quick glance and notice Carla coming in, looking as tired and eager as always. She is wearing a short denim dress wrapped tightly around her waspy waist, and there’s a fresh layer of tanning spray covering her muscular thighs. Gold bangles jingle around her bony wrists while she licks her pink lips at the sight of me. Shit. I’m not in the mood for this today.
“What if we collaborate with the Feds?” I ask Drake and Kai in a low voice.
“They’ll throw us in prison and lose the key,” Kai replies. “Are you insane?”
“Hold on, it’s not that cut and dry,” I say. “Think about it: We’ve got friends in the Bureau. People who can facilitate a conversation off the record at first. It might be just enough to get us through the door and test the waters. We might be able to offer them a good deal.”
