When Fergus and Tadhg’s dad moved his family, and the entire O’Carroll Mafia enterprise to Houston, Texas, my parents moved right along with them. I had just turned eight years old and did not want to leave my homeland, but because my pa was, and still is an enforcer for the family, I wasn’t given a choice.
Looking back, it was the right thing, but I was too young and dumb to know anything better. After I quit fighting the move, and began embracing what the changes would mean for me in the long run, I began to thrive. I wanted to learn everything I could about being part of the O’Carroll family and took every opportunity that I was given to climb the ladder. Not long after I turned twenty-one, and came home from a short three month stint in county lock up for protecting the boss’s eldest son, I was placed at his side for his protection. Ever since that day, there hasn’t been a day that Fergus has been out of my sight . . . and I wouldn’t change a thing about how it all happened.
Now, don’t take this the wrong way, but I haven’t been lonely while looking for my other half, but I also have been pickier about who I spend my very limited free time with.
Long gone are the days of easy one-night stands and going home with random women just because they are pretty and give be their alluring come-hither looks. I still occasionally dip my toes into the pond of less-loneliness when I find a woman who peaks my attention for more than five minutes. I mean, how else am I supposed to find her if I don’t go hunting amongst all the other ducks? But just like always, the fun very quickly fades when the sun rises the next day, and I’m back to being one of the lonely, single ducks in the pond full of all the other happy duck families.
Fuck!
When did I turn into such a fucking sap?
There's too much love and happiness and baby shit going around in this house.
It’s five o’clock somewhere, right? I need a fucking drink.
CHAPTER THREE
SAYLOR
Frenzy:When are you coming home?
Me:Not this again . . .
Frenzy:Dammit, Say! I’m worried bout you sis!
Frenzy:I get that you’re sad about the holidays. I am too.
Frenzy:But you gotta come back home. Dad wouldn’t want you to be alone during the holidays!
Oh, joy . . . the guilt trip has started. Leave it to my older brother to pull the dead father card when I am finally doing something for myself for the first time in my life. It’s not like he’s ever been alone a day in his ridiculously spoiled life. Between his biker buddies, and all the women that throw themselves at him every chance they get, I wonder if he even goes to the bathroom by himself at all. That clubhouse always has someone creeping around every corner, I don’t know how anyone ever has a moment of peace.
Me:I’ll call you after my shift is over.
After I left the clubhouse on Thanksgiving, which was two weeks ago now, I had no set plans. I drove home, parked my tush on the couch and just doomscrolled on my phone for a good hour before a random TikTok video inspired a crazy idea—I needed to go somewhere I had never been before. A spontaneous vacation they called it.
Now, I’m not much for just hopping on a plane and not knowing my destination until I get there like some people seem to like to do, but I liked the idea of going somewhere new on a whim. With a little help from the map app on my phone, I shut my eyesand poked my finger on the screen to see where fate was going to send me. I was open to anywhere in the continental United States that my SUV could drive me to.
Houston, Texas—here I am.
As soon as I had a city picked, I pulled up the vacation rentals website and searched for somewhere I could stay long-term. I found a really nice one bedroom condo on really high floor in a tall downtown building, which included parking and a pool, and booked it for a six month stay. At first, I didn’t know if I was really going to stay here that long, but now that I’ve been here for almost two weeks I am loving it.
While everyone was out going crazy and shopping on Black Friday, I was busy packing four large suitcases and two big totes full of everything I thought I would need for an extended stay in Texas. By the time Friday afternoon rolled around, I was calling my landlord to let him know I would be out of town for a while, and hitting the highway headed south. It wasn’t until I crossed the Mississippi River into Iowa, that I stopped to send my brother a text to tell him my plans for the next few months. Of course he called me less than a minute later, cussing up a blue streak about idiotic sisters and their stupid idiotic plans. He even threatened to call every Kings of Anarchy MC chapter that he knew of in a state I’d be driving through, with the intention of having them stop me on my journey and sending me back home.
After I threatened to never speak to him ever again, and run away at every chance I got, he gave up his idiotic idea and told me I was ‘allowed to’ continue on my journey. That brought up a whole new fight about how I am an adult and can do whateverthe hell I want, without his permission, and that he better start worrying about his own issues and let me work mine out on my own.
Frenzy . . . ugh, I hate calling him that. Stupid bikers and their stupid road names. I know he hates when I refer to him as Scott, but I can’t help it sometimes. He was Scott to me for the first sixteen years of my life and to call him something else is still weird.
Frenzy finally settled down almost two hours into out call and agreed to let me have some freedom, but only if I sent him a text every day to let him know I was okay and not lying dead in a ditch somewhere in the middle of Oklahoma. I agreed, because how hard is it to send a text, and hung up on him to continue my drive when he tried to guilt me again with the dead dad card. As if I could forget the root of the reason I was on this drive to begin with.
I rolled into Houston late Monday morning after splitting up my drive over a few days, stopping anywhere that looked interesting along the way. I had killer barbeque in Kansas City, won a couple thousand bucks playing blackjack at a casino just outside of Wichita, and then checking out some cool stores in Frisco near the Cowboys world headquarters.
Once I was settled in my rental, I spent the next couple days exploring downtown Houston and all that the area had to offer—but I got bored in less than three days. By Wednesday I was ready to pull out my hair and needed to find something to keep myself occupied. Apparently going on a trip with no plans at your destination, really isn’t as fun and relaxing as I had hoped.
I did the one thing most people would look at me and call me crazy for . . . I got a job!
That’s right, I found a bartending gig at a new nightclub that had recently opened and I am loving it already. I applied in person on Thursday morning, was interviewed by one of the managers on the spot, then got a call later that afternoon letting me I was hired and could start the next day if I wanted. And I wanted to! I’ve worked five shifts in the week since I started and love it.
FOUR hasn’t been open long, but you wouldn’t ever guess based on how smooth everything around here runs. Things happen at a much larger volume, a much faster pace, and the drink prices are much higher than back in the restaurant that I bartended back home, but I got the hook of all the adjustments super quick.
