“Burn, he dug into it.” My words came out hard, clipped with the bitter sting of our reality. I hated saying them, hated what they meant.
Burn was our enforcer, the man who knew how to dig graves or find secrets depending on the job. His contacts went deeper than the roots of this town, and he’d uncovered the kind of shit that didn’t leave much room for fixing. But I couldn’t tell GJ all of it. Couldn’t let him sink under that weight. He needed some form of hope, even if it was paper-thin.
“Always follow the money,” GJ interrupted, parroting back the advice I’d given him since he was old enough to start sniffing out trouble. His lips twisted, his jaw tight. “Money ain’t shit where I sit, Dad. Word inside here is the powers that be have pockets lined deep. There has to be something out there.”
“I know, GJ.” My throat was tight. “But I can’t knock the fuckin’ walls down and drag you outta here. Even though I want to.”
His mouth pressed flat, his face hollowed out with a pain I couldn’t touch. “Devyn told Mom they’re pushin’ shit through too fast. Said maybe I got a shot on appeal, once we get out of this district.” He shook his head, let out a bitter laugh. “Fuckin’ should’ve paid better attention in government. Or history. I don’t even know what the fuck a district is. Or how many appeals I get. All I know is I’m lookin’ at life, no parole, unless I somehow get twenty-two years in because of some loophole that does allow non-parolees a chance if they serve over twenty years without one infraction. How am I supposed to survive without getting an infraction when I gotta watch my own back? Tell me, Dad, how am I supposed to do this shit?”
Every syllable dug knives into me.
“I know the sentence you’re looking at, GJ,” I rasped. My fists tightened on the table in front of me until my knuckles burned. “I’m doin’ every fucking thing I can. You hear me? Every fucking thing. Just… keep your head down. Hang on.”
He slammed his palm against the Plexiglass so hard I flinched. His voice cracked as he yelled, “Keep my fuckin’ head down? Fuck, Dad! I gotta keep my head on a fuckin’ swivel.” He eased back into his seat calming his breathing, but barely. “The men in here are monsters.”
The sound of his voice, broken and raw, was worse than any bullet wound I’d ever taken.
It was his mother’s worst fear come true. Her son, the one she raised with Sunday dinners and clean sheets, the boy she fought to keep untainted by my world, now surrounded by the predators of society. The wolves, the snakes, the ones who thrived on blood. How long could a kid raised on integrity survive among the lowest of the low?
I forced my voice steady. “Shanks is workin’ on protection inside. Waverly’s keepin’ you here in county as long as she can. Keepin’ you off the yard.”
He laughed, bitter and hollow. “Don’t know if I can do this, Dad. Feel like the walls close in more every day.”
My chest caved. I looked my boy in his eyes, the same eyes that used to light up when I tossed him a baseball, the same eyes that had stared up at me from his crib when I swore I’d never let this world touch him. Now those eyes were broken glass, sharp and jagged, threatening to cut both of us open.
“GJ,” I said, my voice a growl of desperation, “don’t you give up. Don’t you fucking give up on me. Don’t you give up on the club.”
He nodded, slow, reluctant. But the pain didn’t leave his face. Couldn’t.
The memory hit me like a freight train. The day he came screaming into the world, slick with blood, barely breathing. Eight pounds, six ounces of fight. I’d held him, whispered to him, promised him I’d keep him safe. Always.
I meant that promise then. I meant it now.
I needed him to hold on. Needed him to believe. Because I wasn’t stopping until I leveled this playing field.
I had a grudge now.
And every motherfucker who had laid a finger on this—who had orchestrated this frame-up, who had shackled my boy in chains—was going to pay.
My son was a saint.
Me? I was a fucking outlaw.
And I would cross every line, break every law, burn every dream to ash if that’s what it took.
GJ would see freedom again.
Everyone else be damned.
The guard banged on the door, breaking the moment. “Time!”
I wanted to tear the steel door off its hinges. Wanted to buy just one more minute to tell my son something that would put the fight back in his bones. But the system wasn’t built for fathers like me. It was built to strip men down, keep them powerless.
Break them.
I stood, my palms flat against the Plexiglass one last time. GJ mirrored me, but his touch trembled.
“Stay alive,” I told him.
