Brawn

 

I finally spoke to Maria after I’d shown up at the clubhouse. After talking to her, I walked back into the main room downstairs. It was like a party. Everyone was sitting around drinking, playing pool or darts, or watching TV, or just shooting the shit at the bar. It was the exact opposite of the worry in my head and my gut.

 

“You need a drink,” Shift said, grabbing my shoulders and pulling me over to the bar. I could smell the whiskey on his breath already.

 

“No, I don’t,” I told him. “I need to keep a straight head for this.”

 

What happened next came out of nowhere.

 

“What is the problem, little brother?” he asked, looking at me like I’d just slapped him. “It’s like you don’t even want to have anything to do with the MC. We’ve got your back on this shit with Maria and her dad, and you’re trying to tell me you can’t have a drink with us?”

 

Luckily, the other guys in the room were too distracted to notice that we were having a little talk right there. I didn’t want to draw their attention to the fact that my brother was right. Plain and simple, he was right. I would defend the MC because they were family. I wouldn’t let people run The Twisted Ghosts’ name through the mud. But I had never been a very active member.

 

“I guess that makes sense,” Shift kept on. “You didn’t want my help to get the shop off the ground. You even argued that you were going to make it happen on your own. But, you took help from Lucas Kelly’s daughter without hesitation. I bet she was the one who convinced you to accept my help.” He narrowed his eyes at me while he talked.

 

I was going to need a drink, regardless, if he kept it up. I didn’t know if I could deal with him sober, not the way he was acting.

 

“She’s setting us up, isn’t she? And you’re in on it. You’re going to put us in harm’s way for a piece of ass. I knew it.”

 

“Whoa, Shift, where the fuck is this coming from?” I asked him. “Seriously, where do you get off accusing me of being in with Kelly?”

 

“You better hope you’re not,” he said ominously. “If it turns out you are, I’m kicking your ass, and we’re removing you from the MC.” He walked up to the bar, ordered another shot, and slammed it back before walking off.

 

“What was that all about?” Chip asked from behind the bar.

 

“I don’t know, brother. He’s been drinking. I turned down a shot because I want to keep my head on straight in case shit goes wrong tonight,” I told him.

 

“Oh, talking about your old lady?” he asked.

 

I shot him a look, and he stepped back, raising his hands like he didn’t want a fight. Chip had long brown hair, a thick beard, and tattoos covering every inch of his body from his neck down. He showed them off by only wearing jeans and his kutte. He never wore a shirt. It didn’t even matter how cold it got during the winter; that boy was always in just his kutte.

 

“I only know what they tell me, Brawn, and everyone says that’s your old lady.”

 

“Give me a drink,” I told him. “You assholes are going to make me drink.”

 

“Scotch?” he asked.

 

“Yeah, make it a double.”

 

“Here you go, brother,” he said, sliding the glass over to me.

 

“Thanks, man.” I reached for it, but he stopped me.

 

“Hold up, let me drink with ya.” He poured a shot of tequila for himself.

 

“I don’t see how you do it, man, drinking tequila like it’s water,” I said.

 

“You get used to it. Anyway, here’s to brothers. Cheers, fucker.”

 

We tipped our glasses back, both of us downing essentially two shots a piece. We slammed our glasses back down at about the same time.

 

“That’s a tie. You gotta go again,” James said, walking up.

 

The scotch was already relaxing me and unraveling my nerves. Still, I shook my head, declining. “Gotta keep a clear head tonight,” I said, checking my phone. I expected to hear back from Maria pretty quickly.

 

“You say that, but you’re drinking with Chip here,” James argued, laughing his hoarse old laugh. He talked like all he wanted to do was party and drink, but I could hear the miles he’d put on his body in his voice. He’d driven himself like an old hog for decades, and he didn’t seem to be slowing down one bit. He’d only cut back on the violence and business we conducted. He oversaw all of it, of course, but he stayed back, appointing other members to handle the dirty work.

 

I often wondered what happened to him to make him cut back the way he had. It might have been as simple as letting the other guys prepare for taking over his spot one day.

 

“I sent your brother off to cool down,” he said to me without looking away from the Jack and Coke Chip had just made for him. “He’s pretty upset, says he thinks you’re a traitor.”

 

“James, come on, man, you know better. The Twisted Ghosts are my family.”

 

“I know, but what’s been bothering everyone is that you’re mixed up with a rival family right now, the Kellys.” He took a sip of his drink and winced as it went down.

 

“That’s just business. Maria was trying to get away from her dad, and so was I. We just happened to do it at the same time. We wound up working out this plan together,” I insisted. What the hell was going on? I thought everyone had been accepting of my business and my partnership with Maria. Shift had even told me as much, and we’d done what we could to get the MC involved more in the business by bringing a couple of the old ladies into the office and a few junior members into the business as apprentices.

 

“Your story doesn’t make sense,” James said nonchalantly, just as he would have said he didn’t like anchovies on his pizza. “Why would Lucas Kelly’s daughter suddenly want to jump into a business arrangement with a member of a local MC? And why would she suddenly want to take her father down? Why would she be interested in his mafia connections all of a sudden?”

 

“What the hell? Why didn’t you or Shift, or anyone else come to me with this shit earlier?” I asked. “Why now? Why wait until we’re in the thick of it?”

 

“Think about it. He had you arrested for kidnapping. He hired one of your boys to work for him instead. He’s trying to get you out of the way. He’s trying to get us out of the way. It’s obvious.”

 

“And that’s why I’m working with her to take him down first,” I argued against James.

 

“You better hope you’re right,” he warned.

 

“You sound just like my brother.” I pulled out my phone and checked it. Still no call from Maria. Either something was wrong, or everyone was right and she was setting me up.

 

James started to walk away with his glass, but I decided I’d had enough of everyone’s random shit all of a sudden. I grabbed him and turned him around. I knew I put myself in danger of being kicked out if I confronted our president, but I didn’t care anymore.

 

“If you were all so concerned about this being a setup, why the hell did you even agree to back me up on this?” I asked him.

 

“Because I’m not going to let one of my men go on a suicide mission alone. You may not want to admit it, but you’ve made her one of us, even if it’s just because she’s your business partner. We’re going to look after her the way we would look after any of the old ladies or your brother’s girls, for instance,” James rationalized.

 

“Whatever.” I looked down at my phone again. Still no call. “But if you are backing me up, you need to let the guys know we might be heading out soon. Something’s wrong. She should have called me by now. She was supposed to call when she got home.”

 

“You don’t think she’s trying to lure us into a trap?”

 

“If that was what she was doing, yes, this is a pretty good way to do it, but you’ve got to trust me, James, that’s not Maria. I can trust her. I do trust her.”

 

I knew if I had told them about how all this started with a stupid attempt at kidnapping her, it would have made sense to everyone else just like it did to me. But no one would have been happy to hear I’d done something so stupid on my own. Still, where in the hell was all this doubt coming from all of a sudden?

 

“She’s not trying to cross us, James, but I think something’s wrong. I think maybe her father set her up, and he was waiting for her when she got home,” I told my president.

 

I could see the doubt in his eyes. He doubted Maria was on our side.

 

“I’ll tell the guys to get ready. Regardless of which one is setting us up, her father’s going down,” he said.

 

“Thank you, James.”

 

“You can thank me by being right. You’ve kept us in the dark too long on this, Brawn. And now, suddenly, you’re bringing us in. I agreed to get everyone together because it meant protecting our own. I’m letting you call the shots on this one. You’re in the lead here. Don’t fuck us.” He turned and walked off.

 

I finally saw what my brother and Maria had both warned me about. By staying so distant, I had alienated the MC. I was seeing all the doubt Shift had told me about, all the questioning. And it seemed like he was in on it, too. They doubted my loyalty. They doubted my motives. And they doubted my partner, someone who’d been deeply devoted to the success of my business since the start. Hell, she was the reason for it.

 

Maria had been living with me. We spent almost every waking moment together since it all started. If there had been any reason to doubt her, I imagined I would have seen it. My thoughts weren’t making much sense. There was too much going on.

 

I tried Maria’s cell phone again. Nothing. I rang all the way through to the voicemail. I looked over and saw James talking to the guys who were going to be riding out with me when the time came.

 

I tried again. Still, no answer.

 

I knew if I didn’t get ahold of her soon, we were going to be forced to ride out without hearing from her. I was going to have to assume her father was at the house and we were riding into a hostile situation. I knew there was a detective working the case, and cops did not like it when we did their work for them. But if she didn’t answer her phone, we were going to be left with no choice. And once Lucas Kelly was out of the picture, we were going to have to deal with his connections.

 

“Any word from her?” James asked as he walked back by with his empty glass.

 

“Nothing. She’s not answering any of her calls,” I said.

 

“Then, it’s your call. I’ve told everyone what we’re doing. They’re waiting on you. You say the word, and we’re out of here. It’s on you, brother.”

 

He placed a hand on my shoulder, and I knew that no matter what happened, James had my back. The MC had my back. That didn’t mean I wouldn’t find myself in the doghouse for a while if things went wrong, but I would always have a home with The Twisted Ghosts. I’d been one most of my life already. There was no going back from that.