Ash barreled down Highway 99 as the anger boiled deep inside of him, all the way to his core. It was hot, like the lava that oozed out of an active volcano, and he could actually feel it churning in his insides. Ash had felt angry before, many times, but this was different. This rage consumed him, and it even frightened him somewhat. He knew, on some level, that it was too much for him to handle. It was in control, but more frightening than that was that he wanted it that way. As long as the anger was in control, his head couldn’t interfere with a million stupid reasons why he shouldn’t or couldn’t be on his way to Oakland at that moment, to seek out Ogre and the brothers of the Impalers MC.

He didn’t want anyone or anything to convince him that doing this was wrong. They’d beaten Tex. They shot Sledge. They killed Smoke. The last thought brought the sting of tears to the corners of his eyes and that made him angrier than anything else. He hadn’t cried since he was a little boy...how dare these fuckers push him to the brink of tears? How dare they shoot his friend in the back? He drove like a bat out of hell, letting the darkness consume him...swallow him whole. He could feel it flowing through his veins as well...flooding his system with nothing but black. Deep, thick blackness, where you could do anything without fear of retribution or regret.

He could feel the phone in his pocket vibrating. It would vibrate, stop, vibrate again...he knew it had to be Wolf or one of the other guys...but he wasn’t stopping to answer it. His handgun was tucked into the back of his jeans and he had taken Smoke’s gun off him before the police arrived. He had Sledge’s too...and plenty of ammo in his saddlebags. Ogre and his crew were either going to tell him who was pissed off enough at them to want to set them up with the Skulls...or they were going to admit it had been them all along...one way or another, someone was going to pay for Smoke’s life, and pay dearly.

He rode for over an hour straight before he was forced to stop, and extremely pissed off about it. His gas gauge was almost on empty. He found a station, got off the highway, and pulled the bike up next to the gas pumps. For at least the dozenth time, he wiped his hands on his jeans as he stepped off his bike. The blood that was left on them was more of a stain than anything, but he could still feel it. It was Smoke’s blood. He’d held his dead friend until the ambulance got there...but they couldn’t help him. He was already gone. He wiped his hands off one more time and slid his credit card into the card reader, pumped his gas, and then went inside.

“Bathroom?” he asked the girl at the counter.

She used her head to gesture to the back. He made his way back to it and was glad to find it was a single stall. He locked the door behind him and for the next fifteen minutes, he stared at his guilty reflection in the mirror and scrubbed his hands until they were almost raw. Smoke is dead. He should have been with him. Instead, he was in the bar, fist-fighting like an adolescent while Smoke was taking a bullet in the back. Suddenly he had to turn toward the toilet and relieve himself of anything and everything he’d eaten or drunk for the past twenty-four hours. Another good five minutes were spent washing out his mouth and scrubbing his hands again. Another glance in the mirror told him that he’d have to scrub a lot harder to relieve himself of the overwhelming responsibility he felt for not being there when his friend needed him most...a man who had saved his own life on more than one occasion. Smoke was dead...and it dawned on him once again that he was wasting time. He had to find the piece of shit who did this.

He started out of the bathroom when his phone buzzed again. “Fuck!” He pulled it out with the intention of turning it off. It was Wolf calling. He waited for it to stop ringing and suddenly seven text messages and ten missed calls popped up on his screen. He read only the most recent one. It was from Bruf and it said:

“We know who did this. Don’t do something fucking stupid, man! Call me. Now.”

Ash read it again. “We know who did this.” With a shaky hand he pressed Bruf’s number and made his way back out of the gas station and toward his bike.

“Where the fuck are you?” Bruf growled.

“Merced.”

“Fuck. What the hell are you thinking?”

“Don’t fucking bark at me, Bruf. You’re not my president and you weren’t fucking there today. You didn’t fucking see Smoke dead in a puddle of blood!”

“You want to talk to your president? You think he’ll bark any less than me? If so, you’re a fucking moron. We don’t do shit like this and you fucking know it. We’re a team...a family. You going off like the Lone fucking Ranger...it’s going to do nothing but bring trouble down on all of us.”

Ash knew he was right. He knew his head wasn’t working the way it should be. Smoke was still fucking dead, though...and it was still his fault. “Who did this, Bruf?”

“Huh-uh. Get your ass back to Madera. We’ll meet you there. I’m texting you an address. Whether or not you get to be a part of taking these sonsabitches down will be up to ‘your’ president.”

Bruf didn’t give Ash any more opportunity to argue. He ended the call and seconds later Ash got a text message with an address on Cleveland Avenue in Madera. He programmed it into his GPS. It was an area zoned for business...a strip mall or something. He scrolled through the rest of his messages quickly, paused on the two from Mack asking him to call her, wondered what the hell she wanted, and then put the phone away before getting back on his bike and heading toward Madera. He didn’t have room in his head for Mack today, and he knew he had to somehow calm himself down before he got to Madera. Wolf was probably ready to chew off his head as it was, as well he should be.

It took him almost forty minutes to get to Madera. He took the exit for Cleveland Avenue and followed it around to the right. The Harleys alerted him that he was at his destination when he’d gone less than half a mile up the road. He pulled into the parking lot and parked his bike next to Bruf’s. There were at least ten bikes in the lot. Ash recognized Bruf’s, Wolf’s, Manson’s, and he thought Ransom’s...the rest could have been any of the fifty-plus brothers that belonged to the club. He knew they would all want a piece of whoever did this.

He started toward the closest door and he was almost there when he heard the sound of glass shattering and hitting the sidewalk outside. He turned toward the noise and saw a big man, like the one that he’d been fighting with at the bar, fall backward out of the window and onto the pavement. Blood was gushing out of his nose and to Ash’s surprise, none other than Jacob Wright came through the window after him...only Jacob was on his feet. Ash started toward them, but he was stopped by a gesture from Bruf, who stepped out the door simultaneously.

Ash went toward Bruf instead, as soon as Jacob reached down and picked up the huge man by the collar of his shirt, with one big hand. Ash almost forgot his troubles for a few seconds as he watched in awe the fight...which was more like a choreographed performance...going on in front of him. Still holding onto the big guy, who looked dazed and was now bleeding in places all over from the shattered glass, Jacob pulled back his fist and clocked the guy in the side of the head once more. Then, still with one hand, he threw the guy backward, as if he were as light as a feather, straddled his chest, sat down on him, and slapped him across the face with his open palm.

“Where the fuck is he?” Jacob growled. The guy on the ground seemed to be trying to answer, but his words were garbled by his swollen lips and the blood running out of his nose and into his mouth.

“Who is he looking for?” Ash asked Bruf.

“The motherfucker who shot Smoke.”

“Who is?” Bruf didn’t answer. His attention was on Jacob, who had slapped the guy again.

“The next one isn’t openhanded, asshole, and trust me, it’ll do more than knock your ass out.”

In a wet gurgle the guy on the ground said, “He’s hiding out at his ex-girlfriend’s house.” Girlfriend came out sounding like “gurlfwiend” and house like “howze.”

“Where is that?”

“On 5^th Street...the Cabana Apartments...number 2.”

“Thanks, asshole,” Jacob said. As he stood up, he pulled the guy on the ground up about three feet, punched him again, this time knocking him out...and let him fall to the glass-strewn pavement. Without saying a word, Jacob headed toward the parking lot. The rest of the guys were coming out of the business and everyone was heading for their bikes. Ash was almost to his when he heard Wolf’s voice.

“Nice of you to join us. That hot head is going to get you into some deep shit one of these days.”

Ash stopped, took a deep breath, and turned toward Wolf. His president was glaring at him. “You’re right, Boss, and I’m sorry. I just lost it. I saw Smoke...I’m fucking sorry. I just lost it.”

Wolf continued his hard stare for a few seconds before saying, “You’re going to need to talk to the cops when you get back. That asshole you beat up in the bar gave them a description of you, so they know you were there. Hiding out won’t...”

“I’m not planning on hiding out. I thought Ogre did this...I wasn’t running away. Is that what you thought?”

“Absolutely not. I know what you were doing, and I know why you thought you needed to do it. I haven’t even wrapped my head around losing Smoke yet. But Ash...you have got to get it through your head that we’re a team...a family.”

Ash nodded. “I know. Again, Boss, I’m sorry.”

“Let’s go get this sonofabitch.”

“Who is he?” Ash asked, getting on his bike as Wolf was mounting his.

“The first guy that Jacob Wright ever whooped in the cage.”

“Okay...I know we don’t have all day to discuss this, but I’m confused. A beef with Jacob might explain them beating the tar out of poor Tex, but what happened today? And why the Impaler jackets?”

“You’re right. We don’t have time for this right now.” Wolf started his bike, and as he pulled out of the lot after the SUV that Jacob and three of his teammates had gotten into, Ash fell into line with the rest of the bikes, more confused than he was when he’d gotten there.