I haven’t forgotten the words that formed in my sleep-drugged head and inadvertently slipped from my mouth the first night he was home. The shock of hearing myself say them had kept me awake half that night. I’d been apprehensive going down in the morning, but finding Mom chatting with Trunk at the kitchen table when I walked in with River, and the casual good morning kiss he pulled me into had gone a long way to settling the nerves in my stomach.
The subject never came up, thank God, but these words hit me as deeply as the return sentiment would have.
I feel his lips against my forehead as his hand slides down my pants again. He seems to like the feel of my chunky ass. But just as his long fingers slip down my crease, a familiar cry sounds from upstairs.
“Mah!”
“Gonna have to talk to that boy about timing,” Trunk mutters, pulling his hand free. “Was just about to give his mama her turn on the kitchen counter.” A bone-deep shiver courses through my body at the thought. “You like that,” he concludes accurately.
“Mmmm. Can’t think of that though, duty calls,” I mumble, as he bends his head to press a hard kiss on my lips.
“Tonight. Your bed. You sitting on my face.”
I unwittingly squeeze my thighs together. “Deal,” I croak, before slipping from his arms and darting upstairs.
By the time I come down, River babbling a mile a minute in my arms, Mom is sitting at the kitchen table watching Trunk at the stove. Her eyes bulge at me and I snicker.
“Trunk is cooking breakfast,” she clarifies unnecessarily.
“I see that, Mom. Good morning.”
Breakfast is a hearty omelet with vegetables and lots of cheese. River eats some, but spits out the mushrooms. He’s a good little eater, but I guess we can’t have it all.
“I need to get to the clubhouse today,” Trunk says when we’re done. “I’ll get one of the brothers to pick me up.”
“Sure you’re up to it?” I want to know, and he looks at me with an eyebrow raised.
“I’m up for anything this morning.” The double entendre is not lost on me and I feel myself blush.
“In that case, why don’t I drive you? I’m getting a little cabin-fevered here.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Do you mind, Mom?”
Mom is already shaking her head when Trunk suggests, “We can take the boy. I’m sure Momma would like to meet him. Gives your mom a chance to do whatever she doesn’t get a chance to with his little butt underfoot.”
“Fine by me. I can get started on some laundry and make a few phone calls I’ve been putting off,” she readily agrees.
We take off after lunch. River is secure in the child seat in the back, and Trunk grumbles about having to get in the passenger side of my CRV. Clearly he’s not used to being chauffeured, because we haven’t even left the street before he’s already pointing out the flaws in my driving.
“One more word and you’re walking,” I finally snap when he points out the red light I’m already braking for.
“I’m buying a new truck tomorrow,” he grumbles.
“Perfect,” I fire back. “And while you’re at it, you can figure out how you’ll drive by yourself to Moab one-handed.”
“Shee-it.”
River, who’s been babbling along in the back seat, his volume rising along with ours, suddenly yells, “Sheet, Unk!”
“That’s right, Little Man. Shee-it.”
I glare over Trunk who starts laughing. “You teach him cusswords, you’re gonna pay for it, mister.”
My heart isn’t really in it, because he’s so damn gorgeous when he laughs. Dimples and white teeth showing and all. The last bit of anger dissipates when he grabs my hand and presses a kiss in my palm.
“Don’t be mad, Little Mama. I’ll check it.”
“Just make sure you do,” I add primly.
It doesn’t stop Trunk from chuckling all the way up the mountain.
At least he’s leaving my driving alone.
Trunk
Momma is on River the second she spots us walking in.
“Gimme that baby.”
Jaimie barely has a chance to put the seat on the closest table when Momma unclips his harness and plucks the boy from his confines.
River, who seems to love everyone who pays him any attention, immediately grabs for her pendant. The silver arrowhead the club had commissioned for her seventieth birthday last December. I haven’t seen her without it since.
She takes him to sit on the couch and Jaimie stays close. Matt, who is doing schoolwork at the dining room table nearby, seems so fascinated with the baby; Momma has to remind him to finish his math.
“Good to see you up and about,” Paco says, walking in from the hallway at the back.
“Doin’ better. Day started off good.”
I glance over at Jaimie, who caught that, and her eyes are almost bulging from her head. Fuck, I love it when she’s rattled. All that fire is a definite turn-on.
Who the fuck am I kidding? Everything about her is a turn-on.
“Beer?” Paco asks.
“Water is fine.”
He comes walking from behind the bar, carrying four bottles of beer and handing the water to me. “You coming?”
I follow him to Ouray’s office, where he, Kaga, and a guy with a full beard and a do-rag tied around his head, sit around the large table.
Paco hands out the beers and takes a seat.
“Good to see you, brother,” Ouray says, while Kaga lifts his fist for a bump. “This is Brick. He’s Kaga’s mechanic buddy from Grand Junction. Brick, meet Trunk, our resident shrink.”
When the guy gets up I see he’s a bit shorter, maybe six feet, if that. Good firm handshake and calm gray eyes. He’s probably not much younger than I am.
“Your president tells me you had some ideas about me setting up shop here. I’d like to hear them.”
“Chief,” Paco corrects him. “We do things a little different here than most clubs. Ouray’s our chief, and we call our prospects cubs.”
“Good to know,” Brick acknowledges before turning back to me. “So your ideas?”
I take a seat across from him and outline my thoughts for an after-school program for the boys, and broach the possibility of apprenticeships.
“So what do you think?” Ouray asks him.
“Sounds interesting. You certainly have the space for it, but how are you gonna get customers up here? You’re quite a bit outta town.”
“We run a number of legit businesses in town,” Kaga explains. “One is a boxing gym where half the male population of Durango hangs out at one point or another during any given week. Grapevine is pretty well established there. We also have the gun range, which reopens for the season in a few weeks, which draws a lot of folks up here.”
“I talked to my wife, she works with the La Plata County FBI office,” Ouray continues. “She mentioned their current fleet maintenance contract is up in May.”
“Then there’s the club. All the brothers have at least one, if not two, vehicles,” I add. “Although, right now, all I have is my bike. Thank fuck I kept it here, but I won’t be able to ride it for a while.”
“I was gonna tell you,” Ouray interrupts. “The insurance company called yesterday. They’re cutting a check for the truck.”
Since my vehicles are insured through the club, he’d handled things with the insurance adjuster. My house insurance is a little more complicated as I’ve found out this past week. They’re holding off until they have the full fire and police reports. Since it’s an ongoing investigation, I’m pretty sure I won’t see that money for a while.
“What kinda truck was it?” Brick wants to know.
“2019 GMC Sierra 1500 SLE. Bought it less than a year ago.”
“Nice. I can look around for ya. I usually hit up a few auctions around Grand Junction. Can see if I can find something similar, give or take a year.”
“Ain’t gonna say no to that. But not some sissy color:
I’ll take black or gray.”
Brick chuckles behind his beard. “Like that wasn’t obvious already.”
After exchanging phone numbers, Kaga takes him for a tour of the clubhouse and garage, leaving me with Paco and Ouray. I’m always surprised how these two seem so tight, but Kaga is his official right-hand man. The story is Paco never had the drive to take charge, but from what I’ve seen this past year, he’s pretty hands-on.
“Talked to Chains a few days ago,” Ouray volunteers.
“How did that go?”
He shrugs. “Just about as well as could be expected. Wasn’t happy to hear we wouldn’t be able to take him up on his offer.”
“Downright hostile, if you ask me,” Paco contributes.
“Yeah, he wasn’t particularly receptive, but when I explained the FBI would be moving some of their parkour training to the club grounds and had eyes on the empty warehouse for an indoor shooting course, he backed down a little.”
“You think that’s the end of it?”
“Fuck no—that much was clear—but at least this way it wasn’t an all-out declaration of war on our part. More a case of our-hands-are-tied.”
“Smart.”
“We’ll see,” he returns. “I’m hoping there are still some guys left with common sense in that club. Guys who don’t want to take the risk messing with the feds, even indirectly.”
“You’re assuming Chains would put anything to a vote. He may not,” Paco contributes.
He’s got a point, from what I’ve seen of the piece of shit, he doesn’t care too much about the rules of brotherhood. After all, he disrespected my woman in front of me.
Talking about my woman, it’s about time I go check to see how she’s holding up with Momma.
“What time are you riding out tomorrow?”
“Eight. We stop at the Hesperus cutoff to Farmington, wait for a few riders from Cortez to join, and get on the road from there at nine. Should roll up to the Mesa’s clubhouse mid-afternoon, you still hoping to be there?”
“Possibly. I’d like to stop off in Monticello to see how Ezrah’s doing. Haven’t talked to him in almost two weeks. I’ll shoot you a text.”
I go to find Jaimie, who has moved to one of the small tables with Momma. The two seem to be deep in conversation. I look around to see where River is and find him sitting on Matt’s lap on the couch. I still know too little about that kid, so I don’t particularly trust him with the baby. Hell, I don’t think I’d trust any of the kids with River. I aim straight for them.
The baby sees me coming and almost launches himself at me. I just manage to catch him one-armed and prop him up in the crook of my elbow.
“Unk!”
“Miss me, kid? I wasn’t that long. Whatta you say we go see what your mama is up to?”
CHAPTER 21
Jaimie
I HAVE TO give it to him; he hasn’t said a word about my driving since we left home.
Not that I’ve given him much of a chance, I’ve fired off a million and one questions about Ezrah—who we’re on our way to see—and about the party at the Mesa Riders this afternoon. He wasn’t much help on the latter, since he’s never been at one, but he had plenty to say about Ezrah.
It’s clear he’s worried about the boy. More so after he spoke with his foster mother yesterday, who is concerned he doesn’t seem to be making any progress. In fact, she said he seems to be doing worse: hides out in his room, refusing to go outside. He doesn’t interact with her two kids, seems scared of her husband, and barely eats. Trunk was upstairs in my office on the phone for a while last night, talking to someone at Child Protective Services.
“So let me get this straight, CPS is suggesting he be institutionalized?” If I sound incredulous, it’s because I am.
“He’s not thriving with his foster family, James. He’s not thriving, period. The boy needs more.”
“He’s a scared little boy. How is sticking him in a place with more unfamiliar faces gonna help that? Why can’t the club take him in?”
“Shit, Little Mama, the club is not exactly a stable environment right now. Also, it’s full of white men, who do you think carved that mark on his body? Sure wasn’t anyone black.”
“I know that,” I argue. “But trying to isolate him from what he fears is only going to make that fear stronger. He needs to see not everyone who happens to have a different skin color from his is like those cowards who did that to him.”
“Appreciate what you’re saying, but you don’t understand. You don’t live on his side of the coin.”
I take a deep breath and consider my words carefully. “You’re right, I don’t. I can’t pretend to know what it’s like to grow up having people judge you simply for the color of your skin. But giving an eight-year-old boy a chance to maybe see the other side of that coin, to recognize not everyone is the enemy, to take some of the weight of centuries of oppression from his small shoulders, may give him the confidence and the belief he has every right to claim his own place in this world and help move it forward.”
It’s silent for a long time after my statement and I eventually chance a glance at him. His face is stony and his eyes are focused on the road in front of us. I can’t help wonder if I’ve overstepped, but I haven’t said anything I don’t mean.
“Trunk?” I finally cave, unable to stand the heavy silence in the vehicle.
“I’m here,” he rumbles. “I’m thinking.”
“Did I make you mad?”
“Fuck, no. I’m just sitting here, thinkin’ about the point you’re making. Wondering how much of the baggage I haul is mine, and how much was cultivated in me.” He falls silent again and I wait him out. “Hard to tell,” he continues eventually. “I like the idea it could be different for the boy—better.”
“Yeah?”
“Mmm. Still don’t think the club’s a good place for him now.”
“What about with us?”
From the corner of my eye, I see his head whipping around. Granted the words slipped out before I had a chance to really think them through, but I went with my gut.
“With us?”
“For now. For one thing, he’ll have you, and he’ll have two women and a baby to show him a different side of what he seems to fear. Less threatening maybe than a bunch of men.”
“You would do that?”
I shrug. “He’s a little lost boy, Trunk. There really isn’t a question if there’s a chance for us to help him.”
“Pull over.” I glance over at his barked order. “Now. Pull over, James.”
I scan the road ahead. We’re close to crossing over state lines into Utah and there isn’t much but fields on either side of the road, except for a rundown restaurant coming up on our side. I pull off into the empty parking lot. The moment I put the SUV in park and turn to face Trunk, he leans over the center console to cover my mouth with his in a hard, bruising kiss.
“Shee-it, woman,” he mumbles when he pulls back, leaving us both breathing hard. “Too fucking good to be true.”
I’m about to respond when he sits back in his seat, wrestles his phone from his pocket, and makes a call.
“Joyce….Yeah, on our way now. What would it take for us to take him? Us meaning my woman and me: nice home, family neighborhood. She’s got a little one, sixteen months old…”
As I listen to him outline our living arrangements, I smile when I realize he’s describing us as a family unit. One that includes him.
“Whatever you need signed, bring it. No use dragging this out if we’re here anyway. If you could give her a heads up? Right, see you soon.” He ends the call and quickly dials again.
“Where are you guys? Breaking for lunch?...Good. Listen, we won’t make it to Moab today. Something’s come up with Ezrah. Yeah, I’ll explain later.”
“Was that Ouray?” I ask when he hangs up.
“Yeah. Let’s move. Let’s go get Ezrah, baby.”
It only takes another twenty minutes to pull up to the modest ho
me. I’m suddenly nervous, wondering how the little boy is going to react to me.
“Thanks for coming,” the pretty young woman opening the door says, eyeing me curiously.
“Deandra, this is Jaimie. Jaimie, Deandra.”
“Nice to meet you.”
She smiles and nods, stepping to the side to let us in. “Have a seat. I’ll go get Ezrah.”
“Hold on a second,” Trunk stops her. “Did Joyce talk to you?”
“She did. I feel terrible we weren’t more help to him.”
“All we can do is try,” he reassures her. “There’s no saying how he’ll do anywhere else, but it’s worth a shot.”
She nods in reply before indicating his cast and the remainders of his attack still visible on his face. “What happened to you?”
“Someone didn’t like the way I look.”
Her eyes dart immediately to me, and the guilt I thought I had under control flares up. “Something you and he have in common then,” she concludes. “Who knows, maybe it’ll help. Let me go get him. I haven’t mentioned anything yet.”
“Why don’t you let me?” Trunk suggests.
“Be my guest,” she answers. “Second door to the left is his room.”
The woman seems a bit uncomfortable when Trunk’s broad back disappears up the stairs. “Can I get you something?”
“No thank you, I’m fine. But perhaps you wouldn’t mind giving me some pointers. Simple things, maybe foods you know he likes, does he watch TV?”
Trunk
I can hear the women talk when I walk up the stairs.
I’m surprised to find Ezrah’s door open and him sitting on his bed, a full grocery bag beside him.
“What happened to you?” is his first question, and I tell him the same thing I told Deandra and can see he’s drawing his own conclusions before I quickly change the subject.
“What’s in your bag?”
“My stuff.”
A life contained in one grocery bag is sad. Even if the life spans only eight years.
“You’re packed? Did Deandra talk to you?” His foster mother hadn’t let on she’d prepared him already.
He shakes his head. “Heard her on the phone.”
EDGE OF REASON Page 16