Simon stepped behind Deb and slid his arms around her waist. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. In plenty of time.” He kissed her bare shoulder, where an especially nasty bruise had finally faded to green from the vivid purple it had been the week before. “I’ll be here.”
She tipped her head to his. “I know. I’m okay. I’m just…the thought of being alone at all today feels extra lonely.”
Today, they would bury her father in the Grant cemetery. The town itself hadn’t survived the tornado that had brought Simon and Deb together almost two years earlier, but the place where they harbored their dead remained.
But before they did that, the Bulls had a sit-down that wouldn’t wait. Truce negotiations with the new Street Hounds leadership. The Bulls had won the war for Tulsa, but they hadn’t erased the Hounds from the map. The players in their backgrounds were too big to wipe out. Now, the Bulls and Hounds had to work out how to coexist.
A cease-fire was already in place, effected with the deaths of Booker Howard and his lieutenants. The Bulls has been able to open up the clubhouse and send everybody home.
Simon had brought Deb to his place; she had nowhere else to go, and he wouldn’t have wanted her to go anywhere else if she had. He wanted them together always now, so their relationship could really begin—and he wanted her close, where he could protect her. Putting her away hadn’t kept her out of harm’s reach; instead, it had crippled his ability to help her.
“You want me to call your brother, have him bring Leah over before the meet?”
“No. I just want you.”
“Sorry, baby. I have to do this. Today, all this bullshit ends for real, and we can breathe and put life back together.”
“I know. I’m glad.” But she sounded sad—and a little scared. It was the latter that worried him most. Getting a read on her emotions had proved difficult. He’d never realized how much feeling she shunted to the side. It made sense, in retrospect; they’d both done it, during their fuck-buddy stage, turning a blind eye to the way their feelings for each other had evolved and deepened. Deb had been more successful than he at ignoring love as it had seeded and grown. But he hadn’t understood that she dealt with most powerful feeling in the same way.
He’d noted, during his tour of her bedroom the night he’d spent there, that she looked like her mother. But in personality, she was the very image of her father: a deep ocean of still water.
He turned her around to face him and put his hands on her cheeks. The lingering bruises on her face, and the still-red tint to the white of her left eye, forced a blast of angry guilt every time he saw them, even as she healed. “I will be back as fast as I can, and I will be at your side all day, until you get sick of me and shove me away.”
She smiled. “Thank you.”
“I love you, Debra.” Before she could return the words, he bent his head and kissed her.
~oOo~
The Bulls and the Hounds met on neutral territory, in the back room of Iron Spike Tattoos, a Midtown studio that had long ago fashioned itself as Switzerland and sanctuary between the North and South side crews, doing business with everyone and demanding peaceful behavior from all.
All of the surviving Bulls, even Rad, had ridden together to the meet. Ox had ridden in second position; Delaney had offered him the VP flash, and, after he’d worked through his reluctance, he’d taken it. The club had never had any president but Delaney, or any VP but Dane. Those two men had founded the Brazen Bulls MC with three other friends. Now Delaney was the only founding member still alive.
Rad and Ox had been the club’s first prospects. Either would have been a good VP, but Rad got hot faster, and he wasn’t an agile strategic thinker. He was good at knowing whom to hurt and how, but not as good at knowing how not to need to do harm. Ox was quieter, more thoughtful. He’d still fuck somebody up and do it without a qualm, but he took that extra beat to make sure it was the right call.
He was a good choice for VP. But it was damn strange—and painful—to see him ride at Delaney’s flank.
Eleven Bulls met five Hounds in the Iron Spike back room. Delaney, Ox, and Rad sat at the rickety round table. Two Hounds faced them. The newly crowned head of the Tulsa Street Hounds was Gary Samms; his second was Ray Abbott. Both men were so new to leadership that they’d had to introduce themselves at this meet. And even then, Delaney’s furrowed expression hadn’t eased. He was probably older than both these guys combined.
Simon found that fascinating. It could only mean one thing: the Bulls, and the fallout from their attacks, had torn so far down the Hounds roster in this war that only scrubs and street dealers remained breathing and upright in Tulsa.
The Hounds had taken a lot from the Bulls, no question. But the Bulls had taken more from them. The only reason the Hounds had any turf left, or any man to stand on it, was Irina Volkov. She’d called the Bulls back when she’d truced with the Italians.
It was hard not to feel that the Bulls—and the Hounds, too—had been pawns in an East Coast game of mobster chess, and that the bloody, destructive turf war in Tulsa had been nothing more than a gambit, the real players sacrificing their pawns for better position on the board.
But that was the price they paid for partnering with East Coast mobsters and raking in the dough that partnership provided. The Bulls were small pieces on that chessboard. They were important to the Volkov gun routes, but they weren’t crucial. There were other routes she could make, other crews who could and would take on that work.
The same held true, no doubt, for the Hounds and their overlords. Simon found it interesting that the Street Hounds, a gang with a national profile, with powerful Mafia connections, had left scrubs to run its Tulsa charter. Were they shifting their organization and abandoning this area? Punishing them for their failures? Time would tell, he supposed.
Gary Samms seemed entirely unsure what he was supposed to do at this meet. He tried to look tough and confident, but when Delaney spoke up and started the talks, he jumped.
“Our terms are simple,” Delaney told him. “We want everything south of 244—Downtown and Midtown is ours now. Hounds territory stays the same.”
“That’s the neutral zone.” Ray Abbott spoke, while Samms blinked nervously. “We’re in Midtown now.”
“That’s right. No more neutral zone. We control everything from 244 south.”
“We got business needs to get done. That won’t fly.” Finally Samms had something to say. “We share the neutral zone. That’s always been the way. Right?” He glanced at Abbott, who nodded.
“That was the way with Dyson. Dyson had deep roots in Tulsa. The Hounds got no history here.” Delaney leaned forward and glared hard at the Hounds before him. “How many sit-downs have you been in on before today, Gary? How ‘bout you, Ray?” Neither answered, and Delaney went on. “You got nobody in your organization with any leadership experience, because we ran through you like a hot blade through butter. You are not strong enough to push back. As a favor to a friend, we didn’t fucking erase your crew. But let’s be clear. We beat your ass, and I’m willing to renege on my favor if I have to. So I will tell you my terms, and you will live with it.”
“There are other players than just us. We have to move product.” Samms sounded afraid now; he was pleading. Downtown and Midtown were big markets for coke, especially. Closing them off from that revenue would mean more than light pockets. It would mean unhappy partners and customers as well.
Delaney nodded. “I understand, son, and I can be reasonable. Tulsa had peace for a long time, and I’m interested in getting that back. So I’ll let you sell on our new turf—no farther south than 44, as you’ve been doing. I’ll just need a cut from your take. Twenty percent.”
All the Hounds’ mouths dropped open at once. “We can’t…” Samms cleared his throat and started again, with more iron in his tone. “No. I got people need to get paid.” He paused, his eyes finally landing and locking on Delaney. “Five percent.”
Delaney’s chuckle was that of a father hearing a pathetic excuse from an errant son. “You think you’re in a position to negotiate?”
“I think if you could renege on your favor to your friend easy, I’d be dead already.”
Simon stood behind Delaney, but he could tell the president was smiling. His posture had changed, relaxed. “Got some steel in your spine after all. I’ll give you some credit for that. Fifteen percent.”
Samms turned to Abbott, and they conferred with their eyes. Samms almost looked back to the three Hounds behind him, but thought better of it just in time. At a meet like this, a leader didn’t confer with his whole crew. There was a reason Delaney said ‘I’ and not ‘we’ when he spoke for the club: it was the stronger image. The Bulls were a democracy, but concentrated power garnered more respect on the outside.
“Ten percent,” Samms said.
A long silence as Delaney considered. “Ten percent off the top of your take. Payable monthly. I can do that.” Delaney held out his hand.
Samms stared at it. “Bulls don’t cross north of 244. Any does without a Hounds okay up front, he’s dead.”
“Same thing for Hounds, south of 44. And cool-headed respect between. That’s Bulls turf now, too.” He offered his hand again, with more emphasis. “We gonna shake on this, son, and put the blood and fire behind us?”
A long, unhappy sigh. “Yeah, guess so.” Samms shook Delaney’s hand.
And the war was over.
~oOo~
Sam Wesson had been born on the farm that the Hounds had destroyed. So had his father. And his grandfather. His own children were the first in the family to have been born in a hospital. Having never lived anywhere else but that small farming community, having attended school and church and town meetings regularly his whole life, he was well known and well-liked.
And he had friends in Tulsa, too. Family, really. Family who rode Harleys in formation to send one of theirs to his rest.
Mourners filled the sanctuary at the Wheaton Baptist Church. Deb had dragged Gunner with her to stand at the door and greet each one. Simon had stood back, but nearby, and watched, gaining fresh insights into his woman while he stood ready to be where she needed him, when she needed him.
When the service began, Deb sat between Simon and her brother, and the Bulls family took up the rest of the front pews. At first, the funeral service seemed like a regular church service, as far as Simon recalled. He hadn’t been in a church since he’d left home, and he’d thought about God less these days than he thought about his blood family. Both had disowned him, in their way.
Then, the minister called Deb up to give her father’s eulogy. Simon knew she’d worked on it, and she’d been worried about doing her father justice, but she hadn’t shared any of it with him. He’d hear it with everyone else.
She stood at the lectern, her hair blown straight and pushed back with a black and grey scarf, wearing a plain black dress in a silky fabric that hugged her slim body and gave Simon thoughts entirely inappropriate to the occasion. At first, she simply scanned the room. She cleared her throat and glanced his way. He sent her a smile for strength.
Her voice soft but steady, strong enough to carry all the way to the doors, she told the story of her father. Of her whole family, in fact. She spoke of a happy rural childhood, of her rambunctious twin brothers, of her father’s quiet love and mighty work ethic. She told of the night they’d lost their mother and Martin.
Simon checked on Gunner then. He sat, perfectly still, on the other side of the empty space Deb had vacated when the minister had called her up. His hand and Leah’s were woven together, so tightly that Leah’s fingers had gone red. She showed no sign of discomfort, just let her man hold onto her as tightly as he needed.
Simon returned his attention to Deb.
“For a long, long time, it was just the two of us, my dad and me. At first, he used to ask me all the time if I was sure I really wanted that life, me and him and nothing else. I always said yes, that that was the life I wanted because there wasn’t anything else. After a couple of years, he finally believed me and stopped asking. That life was everything to me. I know people talked about it—how odd it was that I’d packed up my life and lived with my dad, like some old-timey spinster. I heard all the rumors, I think, at one time or another. But the truth of it is real simple: I didn’t look for more. I didn’t want more. That life was enough. My dad was a good roommate. He was a good friend, too. My best friend.”
She darted a glance to the other side of the sanctuary. Simon turned to see Aly, smiling and crying—wetly, but quietly.
“I loved that life,” Deb continued, “taking care of our house, helping him with the business part of farming that he hated. I loved waking up to the sun and smells and sounds of our place every morning. I loved sitting with him on the back porch after supper and listening to the frogs at the pond. I loved talking with him. I loved sitting quietly with him. He was the best kind of man. He loved hard and forever, but he didn’t make a show of it. He took people as they came and kept his judgments to himself. And when I did fall in love and want that, he was happy. Even if it would have changed everything, even though it might have meant me moving away, he didn’t care about that. He wanted me to have what I wanted. I think he was always worried that I was missing out on love. Even when I didn’t miss it, I think he missed it for me. So I’m glad he got to stop worrying about that. I found love, and he got to see it.”
Her voice broke, and she stared down at the lectern. When she looked up again, Simon could see that her composure had begun to crumble. But she soldiered on. “Max and I have lost a lot. Just about everything. But we have each other, and we have people we love, and who love us, and Dad knew that. For a long time, our family was too small almost by half, but we filled it up again before he died. I take some comfort from that. We’re not alone. And he’s not, either. He’s with my mom, who he loved since he was thirteen, and Martin, his boy who didn’t get to finish growing up. They were taken from us way too soon, and something in Dad was always lonely after that. He finally gets what he wanted most—to be with the family he lost, and to know that the family who lost him will be okay.”
She let out a slow, quivering breath. “Okay. That’s…okay. I love you, Dad.”
Deb left the lectern and came down the couple of carpeted steps to the pews. Simon stood and lifted his hands to her. She nearly fell into his arms, and he pull her as close to his side as he could get her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders and tucking her head under his chin as he sat with her.
Her arm shifted, and Simon looked down to see her hand linked with her brother’s. Simon to Deb to Gunner to Leah, they made a chain of grief and comfort. They were a family, and no one was alone.
~oOo~
After the minister concluded the service, Gunner, Simon, Delaney, Ox, and two men Gunner introduced as Sam’s hired hands, Jock and Ben, carried Sam’s simple oak casket out of the church and to the hearse.
They rode in formation, Gunner ahead of the hearse, Deb and Leah with Rad and Willa right behind, and the rest of the Bulls behind them. The other mourners lined up in their pickups and station wagons, and they made a long, somber line down the road from Wheaton to what was left of Grant, where they would bury Sam Wesson beside his wife and son.
~oOo~
Griffin got no honor from the Brazen Bulls. He’d killed a Bull, wounded another, and had nearly killed their president. His kutte had been destroyed, and the club left his blood kin to bury him in their way.
No Bull had attended his funeral; Delaney had forbidden it.
Dane’s funeral, held several days after Sam’s, was everything a biker funeral was reputed to be and bore little resemblance to the quiet, polite service and wake that had sent Gunner and Deb’s father off.
As founding member and first Vice President of the Brazen Bulls MC, Dane Nielsen had friends and associates all over the Midwest and Great Plains and beyond. Whole clubs rode in to bid him farewell, including the Night Horde and the Great Plains Drifters. Others sent representatives. Irina Volkov didn’t attend, but she sent Alexei back to Tulsa in her stead.
The clubhouse walls fairly bulged with people and, as was their way, they partied the night before—sedately, by their standards, but after enough booze and bud, even sad people could get a little bit rowdy.
There was no traditional religious service; Dane had been a lifelong atheist. His casket sat on the Bulls’ table, and the Bulls opened their chapel for friends to pay their respects. It was the only circumstances in which people outside the club membership were allowed beyond the chapel door.
When it was time to take him to the cemetery, the Bulls entered the chapel alone and closed the door. With a shaking hand and shoulders slumped with sorrow, Delaney poured a shot of vodka, Dane’s preferred drink, and turned it out onto the floor. He filled eleven more shot glasses and passed them around. They all toasted their fallen brother. Then the club surrounded his casket—gleaming black with brushed silver fittings. Delaney, Ox, Rad, Becker, Maverick, and Eight Ball carried the casket. The rest walked, two by two, right behind.
The procession they made, with more than a hundred motorcycles, mostly Harleys, trailing behind, was louder and flashier than Sam’s, but no less somber.
Joanna, Dane’s wife for more than twenty years, stood at his grave, flanked by their daughters, Cecily and Clara, both barely out of their teens. Holding Deb’s hand, Simon found himself entranced by the naked, disparate emotions on the women’s faces. Joanna, sassy, brassy Joanna, stared out ahead, beyond the gravesite, her features so slack with weary loss she seemed twenty years older than her age.
Clara, the youngest daughter, who was about nineteen or twenty, wore a her grief like a tragedy mask. She’d been crying most of the day, tears that twisted her mouth and warped her brow.
Cecily, a couple of years older, was pure, fiery, redheaded rage. No one had been able to touch her since she’d come back to town—not even a hug from, or for, her mother or sister. Even now, as they stood together, Clara hung on her mother. Cecily stood with her arms crossed, glaring at her father’s casket.
They were three of the five stages of grief, exemplified. He turned his attention to Deb. He could never guess where she was in her own grief. On the surface, she seemed the same—strong, but needing to lean on him and take a break sometimes, too. Usually at night, in bed. He hadn’t seen at all in Deb that blazing fire that Cecily wore. She hadn’t broken down into abject grief like Clara’s since the first night in the clubhouse, and he hadn’t seen Joanna’s dumb shock since he’d found Deb in the tank.
Stoic. She was stoic, most of all, putting all of her attention, so far, toward the business of burying her father and sorting his affairs. But he’d heard the ravages of loss in her bittersweet eulogy for her father, and, when the petty problems of inheritance and insurance were resolved, Simon thought she might lose the focus that had been keeping her together.
He meant to be right beside her when that happened.