Chapter 7

What do you like? I like romantic walks down the gun aisle.

-Jessie to Big Papa

Jessie

“Oh, my God,” I grunted and hung up the phone. “This is a fuckin’ nightmare.”

I placed my hands on my head and leaned both elbows on my knees as I tried to get my mind to wrap around what I’d just heard.

“What is?” Linc asked as he came in the room.

I looked up and studied my son.

He was tucking his crisp white dress shirt into his jeans, but his eyes were on me.

This was making me sick.

Margot had showed up in my life—and Linc’s—like she always did. Only this time, I couldn’t shield him from her. She’d gotten to him first, and hooked him in with her lies and promises.

Now he was adamant on spending time with her, and I had no choice but to let him, or I’d look like the bad guy.

“I’m going to tell you this as nicely as I can, but your mother just asked me if I would send some money with you because she can’t pay rent.”

Linc opened his mouth to reply, but I held up my hand, halting what I knew was about to come out of his mouth.

“When you were a year and a half, she borrowed money from her mother, and by borrowed, I mean she stole her mother’s jewelry, hocked it at a pawn shop, and then bought coke with the money.”

His mouth snapped shut.

“Twelve years ago, your mother called me to ask me for money so she could pay off her car note. I sent it to her because I felt sorry for her,” I continued. “I followed her, though, because she pocketed the money and was so fucking jittery that I knew that she wasn’t going to put that money on her car note. I watched her walk into a drug dealer’s house, make a deal with him, and then drive off without once even noticing I was watching her. But before she drove away, she shot up in the car.”

He sighed. “What do you want me to tell her?”

“What I want for you to do is to not go there at all. I’d rather you didn’t associate with the woman who’s just going to try to use you to get back at me. I wish you’d use common sense, open your eyes and see that your mother is not the kind of mom you want her to be.”

Linc’s lips thinned.

“She’s not a good person, but all I can do at this point is let you figure that out for yourself,” I grunted as I came to my feet. Everything hurt. Everything always hurt. “When she asks you for the money that she asked me for, just tell her that I didn’t have it. Don’t tell her anymore or any less than that. Also,” I held out my hand. “Give me your wallet.”

His brows rose.

“Trust me. I know your mother,” I told him. “Just give it to me.”

He held out his wallet, which was nearly identical to mine. It even had a chain that hooked it to his pants exactly like mine did.

My kid was my kid, through and through. He wanted to be just like me, and sometimes that was scary shit.

Why he would want to do that was beyond me. I wasn’t a bad person, but I wasn’t the best guy either. I’d done things in my life I wasn’t proud of. Made bad decisions that came back to haunt me later on. And, if I was being honest, I wanted better for my son than I had. I wanted him to go to college. I wanted him to play professional football. I wanted things for him that I never got the chance to even dream of when I was his age.

I took Linc’s wallet and extracted his credit card, debit card and all of the money except for a twenty-dollar bill.

“She tries to make you pay, say that you only have twenty dollars. Pull it out, hand it to her, and put the wallet back into your pocket,” I told him. “Don’t leave it on the table. Don’t fall for the ‘oh, what’s that?’ as she points in the opposite direction so she can check your wallet before she throws it on the floor. Also, as a precaution, give me your keys. You can take my old truck today.”

Linc’s eyes widened.

“But…you never let me drive that!”

That was true.

My truck was old. It was fast. And it was mine.

Linc had his own car, a 2014 Dodge Challenger. I’d begged, cheated, scraped the bottom of my barrel, and cajoled the dealership into selling me that car on my shit credit. And one bank had given me the loan, thank fuck.

It didn’t matter that I had money now. It mattered that, over the last seven years, I’d come to a point where I couldn’t pay my mortgage for four months, six different times. That I was late on credit card bills, and had some that were getting paid off, but were still a long ways away from having a zero balance.

It’d taken me quite some time to realize that credit cards weren’t the answer. Unfortunately for me, that was a little too late to make a difference on my credit score.

“Why?” he asked as I handed him over my keys.

“Because it looks like a piece of shit, even if it isn’t. Your mom would see dollar signs if she saw your car,” I told him. “She doesn’t need to know that it has a few miles on it. She will only see a cash cow, and she’ll try everything to get you to give it to her. When you refuse, she’ll try to steal your keys. And when she can’t do that, she’ll come over at night.” I hesitated. “Probably should start putting it in the garage. Make sure you clean out the clutter this weekend and start doing that.”

Linc’s lips started to lift in a sardonic smile.

“You know her well, don’t you?” he asked.

I shrugged. “Been there, done that, got the t-shirt, didn’t like it, tried to return it, but they wouldn’t take it back.”

Linc’s lips quirked. “Well, I’ll be going then. I’ll call you and let you know when I’m home.”

I clapped him on the back as I walked him outside, nearly laughing my ass off when he clapped his hands in glee as he walked up to my old truck.

“You could always take your old bike, too. It’d serve the same purpose.”

Linc tossed an ‘are you kidding me?’ look over his shoulder and yanked open the door.

The outside was nothing special.

Outwardly, the 1978 Chevy C-10 appeared to be old, beaten up, and on its last leg.

It was the inside that counted.

Under the hood of that old truck sat a 454 big block that growled like a stalking panther. One slight touch of the gas pedal and you were going fifty miles an hour without even blinking. At stop lights, you had to put the beast into neutral to keep the motherfucker still. If you forgot what you were doing just for a second, it was trying to shoot you into oncoming traffic.

Linc had driven it all of three times, and each time I’d been in the truck with him to tell him what to do.

Now, he was sitting in the driver’s seat, petting the steering wheel like it was a cat.

“Stop feelin’ her up and get your ass into gear. I can tell you from experience that your mother’s a bitch to deal with when you’re late.”

I remembered that vividly, actually.

The one and only time I’d been late, due to Linc puking all over my lap when he was about a year old, she’d freaked out on me the moment I’d walked into the restaurant door.

She didn’t care that Linc had been running a slight fever. Didn’t care that I’d gotten there as fast as I could and had even called her to let her know I’d be late.

No, all she’d cared about was tearing me a new one for showing up late and humiliating her by standing her up.

“We’re just going to the Dairy Queen,” Linc said.

I didn’t laugh.

I just held up my thumb but didn’t tell him that we’d just been going to the Dairy Queen.

Let him realize his mom’s faults on his own time.

Big Papa’s words meant more than he knew.

If I could, I’d save my kid from all of his mother’s shit. I’d take him away, shield him and make sure he never realized what an asshole his mother was.

Linc hadn’t seen her in years, and the last time hadn’t been pleasant. But through the eyes of a kid, a parent can do no wrong, and unfortunately for me, Linc didn’t remember how bad those times he’d seen his mother had been.

But Linc was his own man now. He wanted to make his own decisions.

And even if they were wrong, I’d let him make the mistakes.

There was no other way to learn from your wrongs if you didn’t make any.

Linc started my truck up, and immediately started to laugh at the roar of the engine.

“Can you handle it?”

He grinned and nodded.

“I’m headed out with the club. If you need me at all, call me, okay?”

Another nod.

I ruffled his hair, causing him to curse, and me to smile.

There were, at least, a few things in life that were constant. My love for Linc, and my want for other things.

Things that included a certain brown-haired beauty that was never far from my mind.

***

An hour into our evening, shit hit the fan.

Ghost, one of the longest standing members of The Dixie Wardens MC- Alabama Chapter, was visibly distraught.

I didn’t know much about the man.

He wasn’t the easiest guy to get to know, and he had the most intimidating stare of all of the members.

I was able to get along with even Sean now, but Ghost was still a mystery to me.

He didn’t talk. Didn’t often attend parties, even the ones that were family-oriented. Didn’t even like being in the club as far as I could tell.

But I’d been in the club for a mere eight months. Likely, there was something more going on, and what I saw with my own eyes was clouding my judgment.

Even Big Papa had said that Ghost was acting weird.

But I’d never seen him like this.

“I need to ride somewhere, and I need all of you to go with me.”

Aaron, Truth, Tommy Tom, Fender, Sean, Big Papa and me all stared.

“Whatever you need, man. And we’re there,” Tommy Tom was the one who spoke.

“We’ll stay back with the ladies. You go ahead and do what you need to do,” Fender pointed to me.

My brows rose, but I realized that, due to my son seeing his mother, it was probably wise to stay back for the backlash that I knew was coming, despite my desire to go with them.

My eyes trailed over to Ellen, and my stomach clenched.

God, she was beautiful.

She was nothing like Margot.

Where Margot was blonde, blue-eyed and mean as a snake, Ellen was the exact opposite.

She had tanned skin, brown hair that looked like fire when she was in the sun, and hazel eyes that changed from the greenest green to the darkest brown, depending on the day and season. She dressed so cute and prissy, while Margot wouldn’t be caught dead without a midriff baring halter top—regardless of whether it was fifty fucking degrees out or not.

But what I loved the most about Ellen—yes, I fucking said loved, always have, always will—was the way she never stopped smiling. She never got down, even if everything in her life was turning to shit. By me—mostly. By her mom. By Margot. It didn’t matter what happened, Ellen never got down.

Except, apparently, for today.

She looked fucking tired. Like she was defeated and barely holding herself upright.

“That okay with you?”

I looked up to find Sean staring at me.

“Sure,” I said without even knowing what I’d just agreed to.

“Good. Take Tally’s Tahoe. Everyone should fit into it sans you two. Keep them at the clubhouse until we figure out what the fuck to do afterward.”

I nodded once.

Though, I knew for a fact that the ladies would only remain still for so long. They all had jobs. They all had lives. And most of them had kids who wouldn’t like being cooped up for more than a day.

Twenty minutes later, the ladies were all loaded.

Both in the physical sense, since they were in the Tahoe, and in the inebriated sense since they’d been drinking quite a bit tonight. Though none of them were completely sloshed, thank fucking God.

“Ready, Freddy!

Me, I’d be angry or discontent. Naomi? She just rolled with the punches.

Ellen, however, was a silent presence in the back seat and wouldn’t even look at me.

“You okay?”

That was only directed at one person, and she turned her head slowly to give me her eyes, and what I saw there was enough to steal my breath straight out of my lungs. Again.

“Yeah,” she lied. “Fine.”

I didn’t believe her for a second.

But did I say anything? No. I let her stew. And being left to stew, she became more and more mad, and I should’ve known that the pot would boil over.

Fuck.