Cutter
The day had passed idly, with Liona and him riding the backroads near the clubhouse as he showed her their turf. He hadn't wanted to stray too far away, into town or on the main roads. He was fairly certain Wyland still didn't know where his ex-fiancée was hiding out, and he wanted to keep it that way. With that in mind, he stayed away from any place he was likely to encounter the cops on a random basis. The way things looked, they may very well have been working hand-in-hand with the assistant-DA.
Now, though, he'd settled outside in front of the clubhouse with a bottle of beer in an old lawn chair. He gazed up at the sky, tracking the celestial movements of the stars just like he had when he was younger and out tramping in the surrounding woods. Those had been good times, carefree. Of course, they'd only been that way because he was a young boy, and ignorant to the world around him and the problems in his home. Tomorrow was an early morning for the rest of his brothers, so they'd begun to turn in for the night. Smalls, keenly aware that Cutter probably wasn't getting as much sleep as usual because of his new roommate, had offered to keep taking the early shift. Farm to Fable wouldn't open itself, after all.
Recognizing it for the hand-up that it was, Cutter hadn't declined the offer. He needed the rest. And the time he was getting to spend with Liona was a godsend. Just the sound of her laugh was almost enough to rejuvenate him, to make him feel like he had a new lease on life, no matter how fleeting that life might be. He was still torn, though. Torn about where the Vanguard were going, this war with the law, and on his relationship with Liona. He still couldn't afford to lose focus on the club. He'd never be able to forgive himself if he did.
The door leading into the clubhouse opened and shut. Cutter glanced back, grunted at the newcomer in acknowledgment. “Howdy,” he said.
“Evening,” Smalls replied, heaving himself over and grabbing another folded lawn chair that leaned against the clubhouse's exterior wall. “Mind if I join you?”
“Free country, brother,” Cutter growled, but didn't take his eyes from the sky.
They'd talked about Jersey's state of affairs earlier in the day, and about the chances of Big Jack coming home. Everything seemed dark and grim on all fronts, and Michael Hunting hadn't exactly painted a pretty or optimistic picture for them.
“You holding up alright?” Smalls said as, beer in hand, he unfolded his chair and collapsed into it. “With this whole Jersey thing?”
Cutter shook his head. “Kills me, man. Us being out here, under the open sky, drinking a beer ...”
“While he's sitting in there,” Smalls said, finishing his thought. He took a big swig of beer and smacked his lips. “Yup. Kills me, too. Think he's gonna be safe?”
Cutter nodded. “One of the guys got the word out, talking to people. Don't worry.”
Smalls grunted in agreement. The unspoken subtext between them was that this needed to stay out of any discussion. The phrase ‘one of the guys’ meant it was in a different compartment, one that wasn't necessarily legal to be in the know on. This, though, was the first time they'd had a chance to really discuss the earlier bail hearing. He'd simply informed the MC about what had happened, not had a full meeting. Unfortunately, he'd made that decision for the worst reason possible: he'd wanted to spend time with his woman.
Smalls sucked down some of his brew. “How's the girl?”
Cutter nodded, took a drink of his own beer. “Good, I guess.”
“You're spending a lot of time with her.”
“Yep,” Cutter said, kicking a piece of gravel away from his boot. “Guess I am.”
“You care about her?” Smalls asked in a conversation tone.
That was uncharacteristically forward of him, though. Bikers didn't fit all the stereotypes out there. Cutter as chef at the Farm to Fable proved that. But the trope about the brotherhood and the guys playing things close to the chest when it came about their relationships, that generally held true.
To Cutter the question was completely out of the blue. He blinked his eyes and, with a half-smile, shook his head. He looked back up at the stars. “Yeah, I guess. I dunno, though. She burned me real bad, back in the day. Dunno if I can do that again.”
“We all get burned,” Smalls said, taking another drink of beer, “every once in a while.”
“And for some reason, we all keep playing with fucking matches, don't we?”
“Lemme ask you a question. A serious one, now.”
“Alright,” Cutter said, not sure what he was going to ask. “Shoot.”
“How many times you laid your bike out. Five, six times?”
“Well,” Cutter said, beginning to see his point, “maybe not that much. But, quite a bit, yeah.”
“And you got back on that fucking bike every single time, didn't you?”
He drained the last of his beer and picked up the next one from beside his chair. “Yep, suppose I did,” he said as he popped the cap off it.
“So, lemme ask you this, then,” Smalls said, his words more emphatic. “Why'd you do something so damn stupid, boy?”
He thought about Smalls's words before he replied. Really gave them some consideration. Why had he gotten back up on his bike afterward? What could have possessed him to be so stupid as to do climb back on his hog, even after it had almost put him in the hospital, or damn near killed him.
Simple. It was in his blood. He could still remember the first time he'd climbed on a bike, had felt the power virtually at his fingertips, felt the wind in his hair as he raced down the highway. The heat rolling off the exhaust, the sun beating down on his skin and coming up off the pavement as he and the rest of the guys rode under the afternoon sky. He'd felt alive for the first time, had felt as close to complete as he had since high school ... since he'd last seen Liona. Everything seemed to come together in that moment, like he'd been born to ride a bike. Cutter shook his head again. He didn't want to answer, because if he spoke the words they might be real. Especially the part about Liona.
Smalls, like the old codger he was, took the initiative and spoke them for him. “You got back on, man, because you're supposed to get back on. No matter how many times you fall down, you got it in your gut to get back on the damn thing. That's why you're who you are, now.”
“So, you're saying I should get back with her?”
“That ain't what I'm saying,” Smalls said. “What I'm saying is, if it's in your gut, go for it. Women like that, they don't come around every day. And you sure as hell don't find 'em on the side of the road more than once in a lifetime.”
Silently, Cutter nodded and took another drink of beer. He settled down deeper into the lawn chair, letting it swallow him up as much as it could, and gazed deeper into the field of stars that splayed out over the night sky. Beside him, Smalls kept drinking his beer in silence. They stayed that way for a little while longer until his second-in-command decided to call it a night. The room was dark when Cutter succumbed as well and returned to this dorm where he slipped beneath the cool sheets and pressed himself against Liona's warm body. It felt like a lover's embrace, this feeling of ease that settled over him as he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close against him.
“I got tired,” Liona mumbled, her voice heavy with exhaustion.
“It happens,” Cutter said and kissed the top of her head.
He tried to go sleep, but it didn't come for hours. His thoughts were too heavy with visions of Jersey shivering on a cold bunk, of Big Jack sleeping with one eye open. He had no right to be in the arms of this beautiful woman, stretched out on this comfortable bed.
Cutter would get them out. Come hell or high water, damnation or the end of days. He'd get his men out of jail, no matter what. That was his silent promise to them, just before exhaustion finally took him and he drifted off into his dark dreams.