Slam (The Brazen Bulls MC #3)

by Susan Fanetti

Where they were—a roadside tavern next to a cheap motel off I-45, about halfway between Galveston and Dallas. Now that the truck was empty, the guns delivered and the cash at the laundry, they could ease back and take a load off. They’d ridden clear of the scene and stopped for the night.

  The tavern was crowded and loud, and it was unlikely anyone had overheard their conversation, but Maverick understood Rad’s caution. He also understood Isaac’s worry.

  He had to say something, despite Rad’s directive to shut up about it. “If they’re working for somebody else, that’s no better. They’d only work for somebody badder than them.”

  “Badder or richer,” Gunner put in.

  “These guys are about power, not money,” Mav countered.

  Gunner leaned in. “Money is power, bro. You think Irina is where she is because she’s a badass old grandma? No. She throws bags of money at assholes in her way, and they do what she wants.”

  “Assholes like us?”

  Rad slapped his hand on the table, and everybody’s drink sloshed. “You all need to shut the fuck up. We had a job. We did the job. End of goddamn story. You got a problem with that, then you bring it up in church. Not here.”

  Everybody sat back, and no one said more. They sat in silence, staring at the beers arrayed over the table.

  “Bud’s not gonna cut it tonight,” Mav said and stood up. “I’m getting a bottle of Jack. Takers?”

  Everybody nodded. “Make it two,” Isaac said.

  ~oOo~

  “Are you home today?”

  Jenny laughed. “Well, that’s where you called me. So...yeah. Right here.”

  Maverick returned her laugh. “I mean are you home for the whole day, or are you going to the bar later?”

  “No bar today. I was thinking I’d take Kelsey to a movie after school. Hercules is playing at the second-run place. She loves that movie. Hey—are you back in town? You want to go with us?”

  God yes, he did. “I’m back. Jenny—I want to come over now. I’ll bring the Cherokee, and we can pick her up together and go to McDonald’s before the movie.”

  She didn’t like him just showing up, so he always called first now. Sometimes she said no, which was why he preferred to just show up. But he was changing his overbearing ways, so he sat with his eyes closed and silently willed her to say yes.

  “Sure. That sounds good.” She paused, and Maverick listened to Patsy Cline singing in the background. “Mav—you okay? You sound weird.”

  Not until his family was together would he truly be okay. But that wasn’t what she heard in his voice. He’d woken that morning in Texas with a murderous hangover and a conviction that time was up. No more waiting, no more going slowly. Time was up. He needed his family living in the house he was buying for them, and there was only one gate left between him and what he needed.

  If the Bulls were in bed with Irina Volkov and the rogue’s gallery she brought with her, then he meant to get some fucking good out of it.

  He’d decided that it wasn’t his money that would pay for Earl Wagner’s care. It was Irina’s. And that bitch owed him. If he thought of it that way, he could do it.

  “I’m okay. I’m good. Just want to talk, babe.”

  Another hesitation, this one heavy with wariness. “Okay...”

  “I’ll be there in ten. I love you, Jenny.”

  “That’s one. I love you, too.”

  One more thing to deal with, and there would be nothing left in their way. “That’s one.”

  ~oOo~

  Jenny was in the front yard, putting fake spider webs and plastic spiders over the overgrown juniper bushes. Maverick smiled; she’d always enjoyed decorating for the holidays—all of them, not merely Halloween and Christmas. At the least, she’d hung a new wreath on their apartment door, but she really liked to do lights and garlands and the whole deal. She hadn’t gotten a lot of good holidays growing up. Even the holidays he’d spent at the group home had been better.

  She turned when she heard him pull up to the curb, and she came down the front walk to meet him on the sidewalk.

  He pulled her into his arms and kissed her, feeling the glad relief he always felt now, with her hesitation and resistance to their relationship over. She melded to him and opened her mouth against his, purring a tiny moan when his tongue found hers.

  She wanted him like he wanted her. Her reservations were all about logistics now, and he would handle them all. Today. Now.

  When he pulled back, her cheeks were pink, and she was smiling. Strands of dark hair had escaped her braid; they brushed over her face in the autumn breeze.

  “Well, hi there.” She smoothed her hand over his cheek.

  “Hi. Love you.”

  “That’s two.” Her smile grew, but concern creased her eyes. “You sure you’re okay?”

  “Like I said, just need to talk. There a place we can be private?”

  She stepped back, and concern quickly overtook the pleasure of their greeting. “Carlena has my dad in the back yard. Kelse is at school. The house is empty. You’re scaring me, though.”

  He pushed his fingers between hers and lifted her hand to his lips. “It’s good. I think it’s good. Don’t be scared.”

  “Okay.” She studied their linked hands. “Come inside.”

  ~oOo~

  Jenny led him into the living room, and they sat together on the sofa. “What is it?”

  Maverick had a fine line to walk: he wanted to persuade her—he needed to persuade her—but if she felt bullied, the whole thing would blow up. He decided to simply be as upfront as he could be. “I have an idea, and I want to try to convince you that it’s good, but I don’t want to push too hard. I don’t know how to do it without pissing you off.”

  That earned him a smile, which was a pretty good start. “We each get to finish our sentences, and we stay focused and deal with the issues we bring up. We don’t shut each other down. That’s how. Mav, what’s this about?”

  “Do you love me?”

  “Yes. You know I do.”

  He grinned. “Good. That’s two. Do you want to be together? Really together—you and me and Kelsey living in the house I’m buying?”

  Her guards went visibly up, and he saw how easy it would be to blow this chance. “You know there are other things to think about.”

  It had been nearly painful to let her finish that sentence. “I know. You didn’t answer my question, though. We’re supposed to be staying focused on the issues we each bring up, remember?”

  Now she smiled, and she tipped her head down, abashed and adorable.

  “Jenny, do you want it? What I want?”

  “Yes.” No hesitation at all this time.

  “Is there anything besides your dad keeping you from making the move?”

  She blinked, surprised, and Maverick saw that she’d been doing her thing where she didn’t think hard enough about important problems that needed solutions. Her brain just shut off when she got stressed out. Frustration began to churn in his gut. How she’d managed to keep things going while he’d been inside, he could not say. This was the kind of shit that made him need to take over.

  But then she let out a sharp breath and said, “Kelsey. We haven’t talked about how we’ll parent her together. We haven’t talked about rules and routines and discipline. There’s the bar and this house and what to do with them. There’s us and what our relationship will be like. Have we figured that out yet? I don’t think so, and I can’t just jump in and hope, not with Kelsey to think about. And my dad is not just one issue—he can’t live with us, and I can’t afford to place him anywhere good. Even if I could, there are people who are employed to take care of him, people I care about, and I don’t want them to lose their jobs. I don’t have an answer for any of that.”

  That was a lot more than Maverick had realized—and it was clear that she had, in fact, been thinking about it.

  “Okay. Can I take them point by point?”

  A tilt of her head was the only
sign that she was willing to hear him, but it was enough.

  “Okay. Kelsey. You’re a great mom, and you’ve been doing it on your own for four years. She has rules she knows and a routine that works. I’m not looking to change that. As for discipline, I’m not laying a hand on her, and I hope you don’t, either. Time outs and shit like that work. You know I don’t yell. Anyway, I’m going to follow your lead, at least for a while. If we disagree about something, we talk—like this. Just the two of us, listening to each other and working it out. Okay?”

  Jenny stared so hard at him that Maverick had the feeling she was trying to see straight through him. “Okay,” she said at last. “That...that works.”

  “As for you and me—babe, we’re good. We were always good, but now we’re better. I know you can feel it. These past weeks, I see you. The woman you are now. And you are fucking amazing.”

  “I’m not, Mav. Turning me into an ideal isn’t going to fix us.”

  “I didn’t say you were ideal. I said you were amazing—and it’s true. You amaze me.” He picked up her hand. “I see you trying. Do you see me trying?”

  “Yes. I really do. It’s beautiful.”

  “So that’s what our relationship will be—we’ll always try, and we’ll amaze each other. That’s what it already is.”

  “Mav...”

  “Yeah, babe?”

  “You’re painting a pretty picture, but it’s just a picture. It’s not real.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because being a parent is hard and stressful and exhausting. Knowing what to do and doing it are two different things, and knowing what to do only happens like a third of the time anyway. The rest of the time, I’ve got no idea what I should do, and I’m just flying blind, hoping I don’t break her. And us—you say we’ll amaze each other, but what about when we don’t? What about when we piss each other off?”

  Again, Maverick felt that dangerous territory under his feet. It would be so easy to sweep her doubts away as the silly distractions he believed them to be. Instead, he tried to hear the seed of substance in her worry. “I don’t think it’ll be easy. I think it’ll be easier when there’s two of us taking on the job. I think we can figure out what to do together, and maybe get it right more often. But even when we get it wrong, it’ll be together. And of course we’re gonna piss each other off sometimes. But it’s the amazing part that we’ll remember, and that’ll keep us from being dicks to each other. Jen, if we just always try, we’ll get through the bad shit.”

  Her quiet laugh heartened him. “Head down, shoulder to the day?”

  He offered her a good-natured shrug. “It’s a solid philosophy.”

  “You’ve thought this through.”

  “So have you. You see the cloud, and I see the sun behind it.”

  She smiled. “You always did. Like you think you can will the world to go your way.”

  Not quite. It was more that he had to believe that there was sun, or the cloud would swallow him up. Even before prison, that had been true. Now, after four years of devouring darkness, he was fucking desperate for the sun.

  “It’s the only way to get through. Keep going until you have what you want.”

  She smoothed her hand over his forearm, stopping where their hands were still joined. “That right there. It’s the thing I love best about you. It’s also the thing that makes me craziest. You don’t give up.”

  “Not when it’s important like this, no.” He gave their joined hands a brisk shake and got back on point. “That leaves your dad. Everything else seems attached to him. I have a solution.”

  “Okay. Let’s hear it.”

  “We use my club take to put him in a decent home and pay for the balance after his insurance. We sell this place—and the bar, if you want. His nurses work for a service, right?”

  She stared blankly at him, her mouth slack. His question went unanswered, but he knew that he was right. Darnell had already told him as much.

  “They won’t lose their jobs. They’ll be reassigned, and if you want to keep in touch as friends, then just exchange numbers.” He’d be secretly happy if she didn’t keep in touch with Darnell, but he’d accept it if she did. That twitch of jealousy was his own problem to work out.

  “You can’t pay for him.”

  He hadn’t expected her to fight that part, not if they were together. “Why not?”

  “You made him like he is.”

  “That’s not news, babe.”

  “You hate him. You’ll resent it. And me. If not now, then eventually.”

  “Jenny, listen to me. You’re right. I hate him. I wish I’d killed him that day. Sometimes I think about putting a pillow over his face one night and just being done with it. If he lived with us, yes, I’d probably resent the whole situation eventually. But money? Fuck that.” She didn’t need to know that he’d struggled with this very point. His struggle was over. “Money isn’t going to be the thing keeping us apart. I’m not gonna let that be true. Don’t you, either.”

  He pulled her hand close and clasped it to his chest. “I’m trying not to push too hard, but really listen to what I’m saying. Put your shoulder to that cloud of yours and see. That’s the solution. Sell this house, and use that money for his care, too. Sell the bar, too, if you want. You wanted to be a stay-at-home mom, and now you can. I’ll pick up the rest of his bills—we will, because what’s mine is yours. You have a place to live now. You have a real home. With me. You don’t have to live his life anymore.”

  “You’re making my head spin.” She did, in fact, looked dazed. “You’re twisting me all up again.”

  Maverick saw a field full of land mines in that single sentence, but he had no choice but to walk on. “I need to push here, Jen. If there’s a good reason to wait, I’ll back off. I’ll hear you, and I’ll wait. But I don’t know what we’re waiting for—him to die? Fuck that. I’m broken living like this, babe. We’re all broken. None of us is living the life we should be. Including Kelsey.”

  His words made her flinch. “We can’t go back, Mav. I keep saying—”

  “I don’t want to go back.” He’d cut her off, and she flinched again, but he pressed on, and she didn’t stop him. “I want us. You and me. Who we are now. We’re a family. All my life, since I can remember, I’ve wanted what we are. Please. Let’s give our daughter the life you and I never had. It’s right here. I’m holding it out and begging you to take it.”

  Her hand still trapped in his, Jenny stared at him. Tears filled her eyes and made them shimmer. He didn’t know what else to say, how else to beg. There was nothing between them now but her fear, and he didn’t know what else he could do to ease it.

  This moment, right now, felt like the pivot point. There was no more waiting in him. Not because he was impatient—though, yes, he was that as well—but because he was worn down. From the day of his eighteenth birthday, which had been celebrated at the boys’ home with a slice of Sara Lee chocolate cake, after which he’d been sent on his way alone in the world, life had worn him down to a nub. He’d wanted only one thing, since he was old enough to know it was possible: a family of his own. A woman. Children. A home to shelter them, kept warm with their love.

  He’d almost had it once, and he’d blown it. Now, it all sat right before him again. Right now. He waited for Jenny to speak and knew that if she didn’t give him the answer he needed, the world would have worn him down until there was nothing left.

  Nothing at all.

  September 1981

  “Hey, Rich. Come talk to me.”

  Rich turned, a sick feeling at the pit of his stomach, and faced Lester, the director of this boys’ home. He’d lived here since he was four years old, had never had anyone even consider adopting him, so he knew the score. Today was his eighteenth birthday. He was aging out of the system. And out of the only home he’d ever known.

  He hefted the black sack in his hands. “Taking the trash out, Lester.”

  “Good man. After that, then. I’ll be
in my office.”

  His office. Yeah. Well, it wasn’t a surprise. He’d hoped for a reprieve, but he hadn’t really expected one.

  So he went out back and tossed the bag in the dumpster, then went to meet his fate.

  ~oOo~

  Lester Darville wasn’t the only director the St. Ignatius Home for Boys had had in Rich’s nearly fourteen years as a resident, but he was one of the better ones. He didn’t try to be the boys’ buddy, and he didn’t act like a prison warden. He got a lot closer to ‘dad’ territory (as far as Rich could tell; he didn’t remember what having a father was actually like) than the others.

  They’d had a couple of shitty directors over the years, but those hadn’t lasted long, fortunately. For the most part, the people who worked at Iggy’s were decent. Some were priests or brothers or some other kind of Catholic thing, but others, like Lester, were what they called ‘lay staff.’ Despite the name of a saint on the building and the crucifixes on walls in every room, religion wasn’t shoved down the boys’ throats. They had grace at mealtimes and mandatory Mass on Sundays and holy days, but that wasn’t so bad.

  The bedrooms weren’t overcrowded, just two boys to each, and now there was MTV in the rec room. Some of the boys were assholes, but boys like Rich kept the assholes under control, for the most part. Overall, Iggy’s wasn’t a bad place to live. He knew it could be worse. From boys who’d come in from other places, group homes and family placements alike, Rich had heard that there was a lot worse out there.

  He’d known that the end was coming. As a ward of the state, he was only somebody else’s responsibility until the day of his eighteenth birthday or when he graduated high school, whichever came later. Because he lived in a home like this, with a waiting list, he was out the door that very day. He’d known that. But it still hurt to sit here in Lester’s office and literally be given his walking papers.

  Lester had pushed him to think about jobs or college, and had talked to him about how to find an apartment. Rich’s response had been to spend all his free time at the boxing gym, in the ring or hanging out with the older fighters. He had a little job there, barely part-time and only minimum wage, but it had been enough to keep him in tape and gloves, and the pros gave him pointers and sparred with him for free.