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  “It’s a club,” I said dismissively.

  “Club?” He burst into a laughing fit. “A club?”

  “They prefer you call it a club.”

  “Who? His thirty-two friends? That makes sense, now, by the way.”

  “The men in a motorcycle club,” I explained. “As far as they’re concerned, it’s not a gang. It’s a club.”

  He laughed. “The group that jumps into the freezing water in their swimsuits each winter? The Coney Island Polar Bear Club, or whatever they’re called? That’s a club. The Lions Club? That’s a club. Or, the debate club? Those are clubs. Calling Price McNealy and his thirty-two-motorcycle riding brethren a club is like calling the Sonora Drug Cartel a club. Or the Crips, Bloods, or MS-13. They’re not clubs, and neither is Price’s bunch. They’re a gang, no matter what you call them.”

  “Gang, club, whatever,” I said with a flippant wave of my hand. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “It does matter.”

  He grabbed his fresh beer and took a drink. Several long seconds of silence followed. After a few more sips of beer, he looked up. “Why did you and your father have all the problems when we were in school?”

  “That’s different.”

  “It’s not,” he reasoned. “You like men like Price for the very same reason you detest your father. Neither you nor your mother could please him, so you now seek—”

  “Enough, Freud.” I turned my palms to face him. “I don’t need the father complex speech.”

  “There’s no way this will work,” he said. “You know that, right?”

  I was well aware that all relationships eventually dissolved. Thinking mine would be any different was ludicrous. “I don’t care if it works,” I said. “I’m only after his dick. It’s magical.”

  He scowled. “His bare dick?”

  “I’ll make sure he wraps it next time.”

  He gave me a side-eyed look. “If there’s time.”

  Price may have thought he was in charge, but I had news for him. He wasn’t. The next time we had sex, he was going to do two things whether he liked it or not.

  One, he was going to wear a condom; and two, he was going to kiss me.

  10

  Price

  Brisco and Keto were eyeing me like they wanted to fight. Surprised by their presence, but more so by their demeanor, I pushed myself away from the desk and alternated glances between the two men. “I don’t have any idea what you two pricks have planned, but if it’s anything other than a civil conversation, I suggest you turn around and beat feet.”

  I suspected Brisco wanted to talk about Gray. He was convinced she was a spy for the Hells Angels, and that her father was going to organize an ambush based on information she provided. The suggestion was absurd.

  Keto was the club’s resident meathead, and Brisco’s first choice for a partner when it came time to start a fight. The fact that the two of them were together suggested their motives were other than favorable. Keto claimed to be of Polynesian descent, at least partially. His family migrated to Hawaii prior to it becoming part of the United States, and then moved to the mainland a generation later. Although his family lived along the California coast, somehow, he came to rest in the Tucson area.

  He wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he was willing to stand up against any foe who presented themselves as a potential antagonist—or anyone that Brisco pointed a finger toward.

  “There’s a big problem, Boss.” Brisco put his hands on his hips. “We need to fix it.”

  “We, being you and me?” I asked. “Or we, being the three of us?”

  Brisco looked at me like I’d asked him to solve an algebraic equation. “Huh?”

  “There’s no ‘we’ in this deal, Brisco. I said I was going to talk to the Bandidos. I’ll either get it resolved, or it will become a concern. If the latter happens, you’ll be the first to know.” I glared at Keto. “Why the fuck are you here?”

  “Brisco asked me.”

  “He knows who she is,” Brisco warned.

  “How the fuck can he know who she is?” I asked. “You sure as fuck don’t.”

  “I do.” Brisco gestured toward the street. “Her showing up here tonight and spying on us during the meeting was the last straw.”

  I coughed out a laugh. “Spying?”

  “God damned right,” he said. “From across the street.”

  I stood. “What do you suppose she hoped to gain from being over there? Was she listening to us with a parabolic device? Taking pictures with a telephoto lens? Getting plate numbers off our bikes? Drawing a detailed map of the complex? You’re out of your fucking mind, Brisco.”

  He tapped the tip of his index finger against his temple. “I’m thinking with my big head.”

  “It’s big, alright. Big, and full of rocks.” I walked around the edge of the desk and crossed my arms. I gave Keto a dismissive glance and then looked at Brisco. “You know one thing about her. One. Based on that one simple fact, you’re poised and ready to pounce.”

  “It’s my job to be poised and ready to bounce.”

  “Pounce, motherfucker, not bounce.” I shook my head. “It’s also your job to determine who needs pounced on and who doesn’t. Pouncing on the wrong person puts the club at a far greater risk than failing to eliminate a potential foe.”

  “She’s bad news, Boss.”

  “She brought me my wallet,” I argued. “She could have walked up here and interrupted our meeting. Being polite, she waited across the street for it to end.”

  Brisco looked at me like he’d caught me in a lie. “How’d did she end up with your wallet.”

  “I left it in her bar last night.”

  He snapped his fingers and then pointed at me. “I knew you were going in there.”

  I sat against the edge of my desk and exhaled a long breath. I looked at Keto. “When was the last time you got laid?”

  He seemed confused.

  “The last time you got laid, motherfucker,” I hissed. “When was it?”

  “Fucked that gal from the Circle K on Wednesday, why?”

  I looked at Brisco. “What about you?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Brisco snapped back. “When I get pussy is none of your—”

  “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?”<
br />
  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.

  Many men rode their motorcycles carefully, cautious of the inattentive drivers of “cages” who often crashed into them, completely unaware of their existence. Others rode them rebelliously, not caring who or what may be sharing the road.

  I rode mine without an ounce of concern whether I lived or died in the process.

  The motorcycle shot off the curb and landed in the middle of the outside lane with a crunch. The frame slammed against the concrete, sending a stream of sparks flying from beneath the motorcycle.

  With the throttle twisted back as far as it would go and my chest pressed against the gas tank, I shifted through the gears as quickly as I was able, exceeding a hundred miles an hour before I cleared the first block.

  Tucson, Arizona’s summer weather exceeded 100 degrees in May and stayed at or above 100 until September. The only exception was at night, when the temperature in the desert dropped to around 70 degrees. As brutal as the day temperatures were, the nights were quite comfortable.

  At just after midnight, the temperature was perfect.

  I didn’t have a mortgage on my home or the clubhouse, and I didn’t owe any money on my motorcycle. My only monthly bills were electricity and water, and taxes on the two pieces of property I owned were due once a year. I didn’t subscribe to cable television, and I didn’t partake in the social media craze.

  I was as free as any man could be.

  The only time I truly felt free, however, was when I was on my motorcycle. That feeling of freedom was exactly what prompted me to start the Hard Eights MC.

  I careened off the high edge of the ramp into the Tumbleweed’s parking lot and shot across the asphalt. My back tire screeched to a stop a few feet from the entrance, just beside the sidewalk.

  When Brisco pulled into the lot, I was sitting sideways on my motorcycle’s seat, leaning against the handlebars—like I was taking a nap.

  He rolled beside me and came an uneventful stop. “How long you been here?”

  I sat up and shrugged. “Five minutes.”

  “Hard keeping up with that ugly little fucker of yours,” he complained. “It might not be comfortable, but it’s fast as greased lightning.”

  My hardtail Harley was what most people considered a bar hopper—a motorcycle unsuitable for everyday riding. It wreaked havoc on my spine, was uncomfortable as fuck, and unreliable for anything but an all-out full throttle run.

  “It suits me just fine,” I said.

  “You deserve a new bike.” He looked my bike over as if disgusted with its presence. “When you gonna buy one? I know you can afford it.”

  “I don’t need a new bike.”

  “If anyone does, it’s you,” he said. “When you gonna stop punishing yourself?”

  It was a damn good question, but one I couldn’t accurately answer.

  “I don’t know,” I responded. “But I’m giving the matter some serious thought.”

  11

  Gray

  Things were much different in the bar. A steady stream of bikers—not all of which were members of the Hard Eights MC—were in and out during all hours of the day. In short, my daily revenue was almost twice what it was during the Rebel’s tenure.

  I hadn’t seen Price since the night I left him standing in front of the donut shop. Members of his MC, their friends—and even a few girlfriends—had been to the bar, but Price hadn’t shown up once in the six days that had passed since we last saw each other.

  I had no idea if he was mad about what I said, if he was busy, or if he simply didn’t get out as much as the rest of the men. I knew prying into his business wouldn’t be warmly welcomed by the other members of the club, so I didn’t ask any questions.

  Maybe being president of the MC was a much more demanding job than I expected. I tried to think of just what it was that he might have to do over the course of a normal day. Regardless of the time I invested thinking about it, I always came up with the same thing.

  Absolutely nothing.

  It troubled me that Price left such an impression with me, but I couldn’t seem to dismiss the way I felt about him. I hadn’t fallen in love—or even in lust for that matter—but being in Price’s presence made me feel like I was walking along a razor’s edge. I’d been with many alpha males, a handful of bikers, and a few criminals throughout my sexual endeavors, but no one had left me feeling the way Price did. In his absence, I yearned for the butterflies in my stomach, the irregular heartbeat, and the aching in my nether region.

  I slid a bucket of Budweiser to the center of Brisco’s table. “Here you go.”

  “Appreciate ya,” Brisco said.

  Keto wagged his index finger at me. “Ditto.”

  Carp did what he always did. He grinned a shallow—but quite mischievous—grin.

  I smiled in return. “Enjoy, gentlemen.”

  I catered to the rest of the men in the bar one table at a time, grateful that they chose not to drink the dollar drafts just because they were available. Their choices differed greatly from the Rebels—in addition to guzzling the wide range of craft beers I had in stock, they gobbled up the picked bar snacks like a bunch of wild animals.

  The income stream was nice, but I realized Price could turn off the faucet at any moment. The next time I pissed him off, I’d likely be scratching my head, contemplating where things may have gone wrong.

  “What about that kitchen,” Panzer asked, nodding his head toward the bar. “What’s it going to take to get it goin’?”

  “Just like everything else,” I said in passing. “Time and money.”

  “Slow down,” he said. “What’s the rush?”

  He was flirtier than the other men. He was tall, tattooed, and handsome, but he wasn’t Price. I wondered if he was present for the “she’s off-limits” speech Brisco gave on the first night the men were in the bar. So far, his remarks were harmless, but it seemed every time I walked past his table, he had something to say.

  “Just trying to keep everyone happy,” I said over my shoulder.

  “What’s wrong with it?” he asked.

  Holding a bucket of beer in each hand, I paused and turned around. “Plumbing’s junk, exhaust fan doesn’t work, and there’s some other stuff.” I turned away. “Like I said, time and money.”

  “Swag’s a plumber, the pr
ospect does concrete work, and I’m a half-assed electrician,” he said. “I’d bet we can get that fucker whipped into shape in no time.”

  According to the inspector, I needed an exhaust hood and fan, and to resolve several plumbing issues that wouldn’t pass a code inspection. My first—and only—bid to get the work done was in excess of fifteen thousand dollars. It just as well been a million. Paying my rent and keeping the lights on took creative financial measures.

  The buckets were getting heavy. I didn’t want to be rude, but I couldn’t stand and talk forever. “I need to get in a little better financial shape before I even think about doing that.”

  “Boss man said to patronize the establishment and do what we could to bring in business. Suppose that means looking at the kitchen, too.” He stood. “You mind?”

  “Patronize the estab—” I stammered. “What?”

  “Price said this place was our new club hangout,” he replied. “Can’t have a hangout that doesn’t have a good burger.”

  Maybe Price wasn’t so much of a prick, after all. “Sure, have a look,” I said with a smile. “It’s on the other side of the bar. You can’t miss it.”

  “C’mon, prospect,” he said to the guy seated at his side. “Let’s go look.”

  I delivered the beer to the far table while You Can’t Always Get What You Want by the Rolling Stones was playing. I laughed to myself at the irony. Maybe I was getting just what it was that I needed, and not so much what I wanted.

  With a little reluctance, I meandered to the kitchen to see what Panzer and his prospect thought of the situation. When I walked inside, Panzer was standing on the prospect’s shoulders with his head poked above an opening in the ceiling. Another man I didn’t recognize was on his knees, surveying the water lines. A fourth was inspecting the gas cooktop.

  “Sorry I don’t have a ladder,” I said.

  “No problem,” Panzer said in a muffled tone. “Brace my legs, prospect.”

  The prospect lowered him to the ground. After dusting himself off, Panzer pointed toward the 3-compartment sink. “Sink needs shit-canned, so does the ductwork above the ceiling. Insulation’s rotten. Needs an exhaust hood, fan, new ductwork, and all the plumbing redone. Somebody cobbled this shit together. We’ll have to cut the concrete, patch it back, and see about getting that gas grille going. Probably take a week or so to get it done. Maybe two, depending on how things go with the inspector. He’s a prick.”