His street is a mixture of older folk like him and families, the latter’s kids running riot on an empty lot across the street and two doors down. He flinches every so often at the squeals they make, grumbling in the back of his throat before he takes a swig of his beer.
Yeah. Growing up with Mongrel was a real hoot.
“I’m here for a little insight,” I say, fidgeting with the pull tab on my can. “Got a couple of questions.”
“Like you’d listen to my answer anyway.”
“How did the war with the Blood Eagles start back in ’97?”
He pins me with a disparaging stare. “You know that.”
“I know they provoked it. I know there were several vehicles firebombed. That it was to do with them poaching turf to peddle their shit. But what made it escalate from a dispute to an all-out war?”
Mongrel stares at the road with a heavy sigh. “I thought you knew your history, boy. You get around that goddamn club with cotton in your ears?”
“I was a fucking child when it happened.” Blessedly young enough to still retain naive ignorance to the severity of the environment I was raised in.
“They ignored our warnings to stay the fuck away, so we set up a roadblock,” Mongrel grumbles. He hesitates, rolling his wrinkled lips together. “They ran straight through the darn thing. Didn’t slow down. Fuckin’ sped up if anything. Killed two of our men, and injured three others.”
I’d often heard about the brothers lost over the years, the ones who paid the ultimate sacrifice and gave their lives for the club. But the casualties of the turf war in the nineties were rolled into one roll call of names, forever honored on the wall of the clubhouse. It wasn’t often that the stories of their individual deaths came out, just that they died at the hands of the Blood Eagles before the Kings of Anarchy managed to regain control of the situation and drive them out.
“Why do you ask?” My father eyes me with suspicion.
I draw a deep breath. Do I tell him?Nope.Still prefer to keep him the fuck out of it for now. “No reason really.”
“You just thought you’d ride out here late one afternoon to ask me about a specific time in the club’s history, yeah?” He coughs, smacking his chest with a closed fist before reaching for his tobacco.
I can’t remember a lot of what he was like before Mom went missing, but I’ve always had the impression he was never much different. That it wasn’t her disappearance that changed him; he was always an asshole.
I sometimes think that if it weren’t for the club’s legacy, he never would have had kids. Never would have had me. Neverwould have had my sister. Not that he mourns the loss of either of us. Me, emotionally. Her, physically.
“It helps to understand the details,” I grumble.
“Are the Blood Eagles back?” He peeks at me in his periphery while he rolls a cigarette.
“Naw. We’re okay.”
“Then why ask about them?”
“Why not?”
His face sours, a rush of blood warming his cheeks as his anger rises. “I may not have my colors on now, boy, but I’m still twice the fucking King of Anarchy you’ll ever be.” He hastily finishes the cigarette, tobacco hanging out the tail. “Don’t you dare come to my fucking house and treat me like a civilian. I have more of a right to know what the fuck’s going on up there in Temperance than anyone.”
You can take the man out of the club, but you can’t take the enforcer out of the man.
“Nothing’s going on,” I assure him. “Yet.”
“But you prepare for something.”
We do, but I don’t want to say who with. Not when the Breed were always suspected of being the reason my mother vanished.
“We’ve got a club sniffing around the fence,” I say simply. “Just want to be sure my hunch about how far we can push things before it’s terminal is right.”
“The disrespect of death is the clearest line you’ll ever have.” He sparks his smoke. “Kick ’em while they’re down. Push them around. But as soon as you take a life, you’d best be ready to back up your choice with action. As long as you don’t shoot anyone, you’ll be fine.”
“That’s what I thought.”We’re fucked.
“What are the numbers now?” He eyes me through the trail of smoke.
