Page 35 of Thug

“Pre-fucking-cisely,” I said. “And, when I get laid is none of your fucking business. Neither is who I’m fucking.”

“Unless who you’re fucking is a threat to the club.”

“She’s not a threat to the club.”

“She’s Pig Pen’s daughter,” Brisco replied in a stern tone. “That’s no coincidence.”

“It’s nothing but coincidence,” I said with a laugh. “She didn’t seek us out. We went into her bar. A bar she bought, stocked with beer, and marketed to the general public. The Rebels stumbled in there on their own. She did nothing but serve them beer. She didn’t know a damned thing about us, or that we were linked to the Rebels. By mere coincidence, the Rebels started selling fentanyl-laced dope, and that’s the place we went to go to find them. Not because it was the only place, but because it was in our territory, and we were going to claim it. You, mister know-it-all, are the one who recommended we go there and intercept them, remember? Coincidence, coincidence, coincidence.”

The look on Brisco’s face told the story that he wouldn’t likely admit. Through the course of my little speech, he came to the realization that I was right, and he was mistaken. He wasn’t wrong in wanting to protect the club from harm, but he was mistaken in who he perceived as being a threat.

It was clear he knew it.

I cocked my head to the side. “Well?”

“Since when do you leave your wallet in a bar?” he asked. “You check your pocket ten times a minute to make sure you’ve got that fucker.”

“Left it in there on purpose,” I said.

He grinned a shallow smile. “To see if you could trust her.”

“More or less.”

His brows raised in wonder. “She take anything?”

I shook my head. “She didn’t even look through it.”

“How do you know?”

“Believe me,” I said. “I know.”

Like most men, Brisco wasn’t eager to apologize unless he absolutely had to. The look on his face, however, said what he was unwilling to.

Brisco tilted his head toward the door. “C’mon, Keto, let’s go get a beer.”

“Where you headed?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Probably go to Maggie’s. No reason not to.”

“She closed early,” I said. “No business.”

“Tumbleweed?” he asked.

“Sounds good.”

The office was my place of refuge. The garage—and the building in general—was the club’s sanctuary, and it was the property of the men who comprised the MC. Our rule was “last man out locks the door.”

With a few of the men still mingling and drinking beers, we walked through the garage and into the parking lot. As we got on our bikes, Brisco glanced over his shoulder. “I feel like a fucking idiot.”

I started my motorcycle. “Don’t let it bother you,” I said, loud enough that he could hear me over the exhaust. “You’ve always got good intentions.”

He reached for his helmet. “Last one there buys the beers?”

Many states required the use of helmets when riding motorcycles. Arizona let the rider decide, provided his or her age was over eighteen years old. Brisco chose to wear a helmet at night. I opted not to wear one, ever.

“Sure,” I said.

While Brisco strapped his helmet in place and Keto tried to remember which end of his motorcycles was up, I twisted the throttle back and shot through the parking lot.