by Dahlia West
“I think about it,” Chris half-whispered.
In the quiet of the trailer, the words of betrayal stung almost as badly as being told Scratch was dead.
“I don’t want this,” Chris declared. “I don’t want this life. And I sure as fuck don’t want to die like that, like our fathers.” He stood up suddenly and Jack snatched the gun back behind himself, hiding it behind his thigh.
Chris threw on jeans and a ratty T-shirt, then turned around, eyes red-rimmed. “Come with me, Jack.”
Jack stared at him. “And go…where?”
“I don’t care! Who the fuck cares?! Let’s just get on our bikes and go.”
“But…the club.” Jack felt ridiculous, like he was arguing about something that had already been decided. And maybe it already had been.
“Fuck the club!” Chris shouted and it echoed off the canyons beyond them. “Fuck it all, Jack! If we stay here, we’re going to end up just like them. Shivved in a cage, bleeding out while the guards watch.”
Jack numbly watched as Chris shouldered past him and toward the front door of the trailer. His cut was hanging on the back of the kitchen chair, untouched.
“I’m done with this,” he declared, hand on the doorknob. “I am so done.”
* * *
Chris had been wrong that day. Scratch hadn’t died in the riot alongside Hap. But in the chaos, Jack’s old man had been loaded into an ambulance and taken to the nearest hospital while incorrect reports of his body being among several others in the prison yard had been circulated.
In the here and now, Chris disconnected another call—not one telling him someone was dead, Jack suspected, more like someone was back from it.
Chris’ hair was shorter now. He’d never grown it back out from his Army days. Jack remembered him swearing he’d never cut it. He wondered off-handedly if Chris ever missed their time together. In truth, he’d probably never given Jack a second thought at all through these years, and that pissed Jack off something fierce, though he’d never show it.
“Chris,” said Jack slowly.
He’d never been able to call him “Shooter,” really. Chris had earned that nickname in the A, when Jack hadn’t been with him. Jack had used it occasionally, in public, but it had never quite rolled off the tongue right. Chris had never had a club nickname. Frankly, Chris Sullivan hadn’t done enough for the club to earn one in those days.
Jack had carried Chris, for more than a few years, and then had watched him walk away from it all for a new life—a life that didn’t include him, but that was a small matter.
There they stood, Preacher and Shooter, two men whose pasts were so twisted and tangled together that no matter how much time and distance they put between them, they might never be free from each other—not completely.
Chapter Sixty-One
‡
Jack watched as Chris slid the phone into his pocket, probably to keep his hands free. Jack had to admit that he’d thought about this moment a lot over the years, getting Chris alone.
In some variations, Jack beat Chris’ ass, for leaving him, for pussing out and enlisting instead of helping Jack take over the Buzzards. Jack could even picture the large man now, broken, bleeding, lying on the ground and apologizing all over himself, though in reality, the fight would be awfully close. Closer than Jack was comfortable with.
In other versions, Jack forgave him.
In one version, the one that kept him up most nights because Jack never did understand it, Chris forgave him.
But that was impossible. Because Chris had never known the truth about how his father had died. He still didn’t know.
“Chris,” Jack said again, finally meeting the man’s gaze.
“What are you doing here?” Chris snapped.
Jack scowled, not ready to answer that just yet. Now that he was finally here, standing in front of his only best friend, Jack ached with the need to tell the truth, to finally get the last of the poison out. “Chris,” he began again. “About…about the riot…”
But Chris shook his head. “What? I don’t care.”
Jack raised his eyebrows. “You don’t?”
“No. Not at all.”
Jack was surprised to hear it. Family was family and Jack would have wanted to know the truth, no matter what it was. “You sure?”
“I’ve got a family, Jack. A real family. A wife, a little girl. Anything that happened back then, anything I did in those days, none of that matters anymore. This is what’s real,” he told Jack, then he gestured to the house behind him. “They’re what’s real. And I won’t let even the tiniest speck of filth touch them. Not ever.”
“If that’s what you want,” Jack told him and slid the strap of the duffel off his shoulder. He laid it on the ground between himself and Chris.
Chris stared at it, then looked up at Jack. “What is this?” he demanded.
Jack frowned. Never one to ask for favors or help, it was awkward to have to do it now. And asking Chris Sullivan, of all people, made it that much more difficult. “I need a favor,” he told Chris.
Chris’ eyes widened in shock. It was clear he was also thinking that he was the last person Jack Prior should come to for help. It was also clear by Chris’ expression that he was going to say no. “I just said I don’t want any of this shit to touch my family,” he growled. “And why the fuck would you come to me? I don’t—”
Jack sighed. “I need this done,” he interrupted. “And I need someone I can trust to do it.” He squared his shoulders and looked Chris in the eye. They were of equal height, and a year at Thunder Ridge had honed Jack’s muscles so that they rivaled Chris’ in terms of strength and power. “This town is crawling with shitheels, Chris. And you know it. If there’s one honorable man left in this city, I’m looking right at him.”
Chris’ jaw flexed. Compliments weren’t going to sway him. “Jack—”
“It’s for a woman,” Jack told him.
That got Chris’ attention.
“She’s…a good woman,” Jack declared. “A clean woman, like yours,” he added, glancing up at the house.
The look on Chris’ face said he very much doubted that, but wisely the man kept his mouth shut on that score.
“I can’t do anything for her,” said Jack. “I can’t be the man she needs me to be. But this,” he said, kicking the bag, “this’ll be the next best thing.” He sighed heavily and looked up at the clouds. Thunder rumbled somewhere in the distance and the wind kicked up, shimmying the trees that surrounded them. “Hell,” Jack bit out, “this is the best thing. She doesn’t need a man like me.”
Chris lowered himself and tugged at the bag’s zipper, keeping one eye trained on Jack as he did. When he finally had the bag open, he risked a glance down to inspect its contents.
Jack heard a sharp intake of breath.
“Jesus fucking Christ, Jack!” Chris hissed.
Jack merely shrugged.
“Jack!”
“It’s dirty,” Jack admitted. “Down to the last bill. Not gonna lie about that. Not to you, anyway. But it’s untraceable. It’ll never come back on her. And she’s pretty smart, my woman—” Jack had to admit, if only to himself, that he still liked the way that rolled off his tongue. My woman. “She’ll know not to bank it or spend it all at once, but you’ll still help her, yeah? Help her manage it? Quietly. Tell her what to do with it.”
Chris looked up at him, reeling from it all. “Is…” He seemed to struggle to find the words for a moment. “Jack, is this…is this…everything?”
Jack nodded solemnly. “It’s all I have in the world,” he told his ex-best friend. “Not even a dollar left in my own pocket for myself. Not that I’ll be needing it. Not where I’m going. She gets it all.” He chuckled. “And she’ll fight you, Chris. No doubt about it. She won’t want to take it. She doesn’t…she doesn’t know me…who I am. I never told her. But, like I said, she’s not stupid. She’ll guess it’s dirty money. And she’s clean, just like I told you. It’l
l weigh heavily on her to accept it. But she needs it. She has to have it. She deserves it.”
“So…so you’re not here to…take back the club?”
Jack shook his head and fingered the leather of the jacket he was wearing. “Nah. I’m done with all that. I’m just wearing this, well, for old time’s sake, I guess. Because it seems…fitting.”
He looked at Chris, narrowing his eyes at the man who—had things been different, had everything been different—would have stood beside him and never, ever betrayed him. “I’m burning it down,” he declared. “Tonight.”
Chris stared at him. “Jack, there’s nothing left. The DEA took it all apart. Hook’s in prison. The Buzzards are gone.”
Jack smirked at his old friend and shook his head. “You’ve been out of the game too long, son. But that’s okay. I can understand it now,” he said, nodding up to the house. “No, Chris. There are still a few rats left on this sinking ship. And they don’t know it yet, but they’re already dead.”
Jack looked up at the sky again and saw the thunderheads rolling in, obscuring the moon and the stars. “Better stay inside tonight,” he told Chris. “Storm’s coming.” He turned away from Chris Sullivan, toward the bike, and slid onto it.
“You’re going to get yourself killed!” Chris shouted after him.
Jack shook his head. “I’m already dead, too, remember? And besides, you can’t kill a ghost.”
Chapter Sixty-Two
‡
Buck knocked on the bedroom door but didn’t wait for her to tell him he could enter. He pushed it open and stood in the doorway, looking haggard, worried.
Seeing him angered Erin, just a living, breathing reminder that Buck was here because Jack wasn’t, that Jack had asked her father to stay, probably so he could feel better about abandoning her.
Erin didn’t want her father around, didn’t want him to see the disaster her life had become in a matter of minutes. She was about to tell him to leave when she heard the unmistakable sound of a truck rumbling down the driveway.
Duke lifted his head and growled but couldn’t stand up.
“No, no,” she whispered to the dog, pressing him back down onto his bed. “Stay. You stay.”
Erin pushed past Buck and bounded down the steps. She hoped to God it was Jack but if it wasn’t, she was spoiling for another fight anyway, furious at having been abandoned and afraid that she couldn’t shoulder all these burdens alone. She flew into the kitchen and snatched the shotgun off the table where Buck had left it.
She went to the window and peered out of it. Two vehicles she didn’t recognize—a large dark-blue Ford and a black Hummer—pulled up in front of the house.
From above her, Duke sent out a warning bark.
Erin’s heart ached that the dog had fought so hard to save her and gotten hurt in the process.
The front and side doors were locked, and Erin knew it wouldn’t stop anyone from coming in, but it would slow them down. She racked the Mossberg and moved to the front door. Through the glass, she could see several men getting out. Her heart leaped to her throat.
“Erin!” Buck said, lumbering down the stairs. “Erin, get away from the door!”
Curiously, though, a small woman was with them, in a sundress and sandals. Not exactly loaded for bear.
Erin watched as she started for the porch, but the man beside her pulled her back. They argued for a bit and the man finally rolled his eyes.
Something about the exchange was so heart-warming, so like Erin and Jack, that her hands wavered as she held the gun out in front of her.
Without stopping to think about it, Erin let go of the shotgun’s barrel and unlocked the front door.
“Erin!” Buck hissed. She heard his heavy boots coming up behind her.
She yanked open the door and stalked through it, raising the gun again. There were five men and two dark-haired women. The second woman was wearing jeans and a leather jacket. She did look like she’d come for trouble. Or could handle it if trouble showed up.
“What do you want?” Erin called out, raising the gun so they could see it. From her position on the porch, looking down at them, the barrel was at eye level, ready to take out the first person who tried to make it to the porch.
A sandy-haired blond man took a step forward. But only one. “We—”
“Hi,” said the smaller woman, peeking out from behind him. “I’m Sarah.” She skirted around the man, who tried to snatch at her and draw her back.
“Slick,” he hissed, “she’s got a shotgun.”
The woman’s nose wrinkled. “Yeah, but that’s just for bad guys. Hi,” she said again and stepped forward.
The man looked stricken. “Sarah. Sarah!”
“Jack asked us to come,” Sarah told Erin.
Erin wasn’t sure what to make of that. As far as she knew, Jack had no friends. He never talked about anyone, not in the entire year he’d been at Thunder Ridge. “Are…are you friends of his?” she demanded, lowering the weapon ever so slightly.
It felt odd to set her sights on a woman, so Erin inched the gun to the left, toward the largest man. He stood almost a head taller than anyone else and had a long black braid slung over his shoulder. He was Sioux, Erin could tell. And he didn’t look happy.
The woman frowned, too. “Well…no,” she replied. “Not exactly.”
Erin raised the gun again and notched it into her shoulder.
“That may not have been the right answer,” the blond man behind Sarah growled.
He reached out and grabbed the woman, finally hauling her back and placing her safely out of harm’s way.
The woman peered out from behind him anyway. “Chris wanted to wait until morning to come, because of the storm. But…” She grimaced and gave Erin a sheepish look. “Well…I’ve met Jack. And I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
Erin bristled. She hadn’t had time to take a look at herself in the mirror, but she knew it couldn’t be pretty. She felt that her eye was swollen and her lip had only just stopped bleeding. The woman’s words didn’t sit right with her, though. “Jack didn’t do this!” she insisted. Angry as she was at him, she couldn’t bear for anyone to think that Jack would ever lay a hand on her. “He would never do something like that!”
The woman wrinkled her nose, clearly not convinced. “Maybe we know a different side of him.”
“Jack wouldn’t—” Erin’s voice caught in her throat. He wouldn’t hurt her. He’d leave, though, apparently. And he had. That felt even worse in some ways.
And here she was facing down another set of strangers, twice in the same day. She wondered if it would ever end, now that it had started.
“Jack didn’t do this,” Erin repeated, more forcefully this time. “It was…someone else. I don’t know who they were.”
“I can guess,” said the blond man. “Motorcycles, leather jackets.”
Erin stared at him but then slowly shook her head. “I…I never saw any motorcycles.”
The Sioux grunted. “Probably parked them in the woods. Came in on foot. Tried to take you by surprise.”
Erin’s lower lip quivered a bit and she clamped down on it.
“But they were wearing jackets, right?” the blond-haired man pressed.
Erin didn’t want to lie, so she couldn’t answer.
“Where are they now?” one of the others asked.
Their de facto leader snorted. “Well, she’s still alive. My guess is…they aren’t.”
The largest one raised his eyebrows. “Three of them?”
The leader shrugged. “Jack could take out three men. If his head was right.”
Erin couldn’t believe they were discussing all this so casually. And she was angry that there were people in the world who knew so much more about the man she loved than she apparently did. Finally, she couldn’t take anymore. She had to know, no matter what the truth was, she needed to hear it. “Who were they? And who is Jack?”
The leader turned to her. “He di
dn’t tell you?”
Erin shook her head. “No. No, he…” She hated admitting it, hated the way the words turned to ashes on her tongue. “He left,” she whispered. “He wouldn’t say anything. He just…left.”
“Oh, sweetie,” Sarah said again. “We should go inside. You should sit down. Really. Come on. I’ll make you some coffee. Or tea. Whatever you like.”
She wrestled a bit with the man holding her and Erin realized she only had two choices, send them away or hear them out. Her desire to understand what the hell had happened today won out.
She lowered the gun. “Okay,” she said. “I suppose…” She thought for a moment about the destroyed kitchen, about the blood on the floor that she hadn’t had time to clean yet. “Um…”
“I’ll make you some tea,” the woman insisted.
The man finally let her go but was hot on her heels as she mounted the steps. He reached for the gun, but Erin pulled it out of his reach.
“Not on your life,” she told him.
He stood for a moment, gazing at her. Erin could feel the heavy weight of his assessment. He looked at Buck, standing uselessly in the doorway, then turned back to Erin. In a low, quiet voice, so reminiscent of Jack’s that Erin shivered, he said, “You do not point a gun at my wife.”
Erin shook her head slowly, heart thumping rapidly in her chest. “I won’t.” She followed Buck and Sarah into the kitchen where Sarah stopped short at the spattered blood on the floor.
The man took hold of her elbow and maneuvered her past it, to the other side of the room. He snatched one of the kitchen towels off the rack and laid it down to cover it.
The woman looked up at Erin, bottom lip quivering slightly. “Are…are you okay?” she whispered.
Erin felt terrible now at having held a gun on her moments before. She gripped the barrel and upended the gun, pushing it between the refrigerator and the wall, where it would be somewhat difficult for anyone to get at. “I’m okay,” she told Sarah. “I don’t know what they wanted or why they were here.”
Sarah nodded and Erin watched her take a deep breath. “We both need tea,” she declared.