I’d originally planned to get kicked out of the club; but after being thrown into the fray right off the bat, I discovered that I wanted to earn my patch and be a member of the club. I found another family—something I’d only had in Gramps since I lost my parents. The Blackwings quickly became my brothers, my family, and my home. But, there was another reason why I wanted to become a patched member.
After the first thirty days of prospecting for the MC, I started earning money for my assignments. It wasn’t close to what the patched members made, and nowhere near what the officers got, but it was more than I was making working as an electrical assistant, which meant it was more money I could spend on Officer Parker’s children.
Gramps and my lawyer forbade me from contacting the family, so I found other ways to make sure they were okay—or as okay as they could be. For two years, I gave them as much as I could. And even though everything I did was for them, it ended up helping me, too, by giving me a purpose.
Until the day I found out they were gone.
2
Savior
Ididn’t realize how I’d changed since they disappeared until it was brought to my attention one afternoon.
“Savior, Phoenix wants to see you in his office,” Badger said.
Being called to the President’s office out of the blue was the adult equivalent of being called to the principal’s office in the middle of class.
“Have a seat,” Phoenix said from behind his desk. “You’ve probably heard by now that Coal is transferring to the Devil Springs Chapter. He’s going up at the end of this week, and you’re going with him.”
“Excuse me?” I asked in complete surprise.
“You heard me,” he said and leaned back in his chair. “You’re a good brother, and I hate to lose you. You take any assignment I give you, and you do it well, but your heart isn’t in anything you do, and I think you need to get out of Croftridge. You’re merely existing here. As the President of this club, it’s my job to know everything about my members, but I didn’t feel the need to share your past with Copper. I’ll leave that up to you to decide when the time is right.”
I sat in stunned silence for several minutes. “I can’t leave Gramps,” I blurted.
“Bullshit. Your Gramps is perfectly capable of taking care of himself. You’ve already moved out once, and he was fine.”
I wanted to argue with him, but he was right. After my parents died, I lived with Gramps until I was nineteen. I moved out for a few years before moving back in with him. I didn’t intend to stay as long as I did, but it turned out living with him as an adult was very different than it was when I was growing up, and it worked well for both of us.
“Listen, Savior, I’m not going to pretend to know what you’re going through right now, but I think this is the best thing for you, and your grandfather agrees. Go to Devil Springs and give it an honest shot. If you do that and it doesn’t work out, you can come back here.”
“I just don’t see how things will be different there than they are here. My physical location doesn’t change anything.”
“Well, then, there you have it. Nothing changes. So, Devil Springs shouldn’t be an issue,” he said, effectively dismissing me.
* * *
A few days later,Coal and I trailered our bikes, loaded my truck, and headed to Devil Springs. The club had a rental house for us, but it wasn’t going to be available for a few weeks. So, Copper worked out a short-term lease agreement with a nearby apartment complex. Thankfully, both the rental house and the apartment were fully furnished. The minimal amount of belongings Coal and I had between the two of us fell somewhere between comical and pathetic.
The club welcomed us with a party, but Copper didn’t waste any time putting us to work. He wanted me and Coal to hang around the bar owned by the club to see if we could catch anyone running drugs through there. Not a bad assignment, per se. Just a little odd considering Coal wasn’t old enough to drink, and I refused to put any alcohol in my body if I was going to be driving.
“You want to play some pool?” Coal asked.
I shrugged. “Might as well. We gotta be here for a few hours, and it’s not like there’s anything else to do.”
There were three pool tables at the back of the bar, and they were positioned perfectly to give us a view of the entire bar, with the exception of the hall leading to the bathrooms.
As I expected, the bar was dead as hell. Regardless of what they did on the other six days of the week, most people in small southern towns didn’t go out drinking on Sunday night.
It was much the same for the next two nights. Things picked up on Wednesday and Thursday, but not enough to make the time pass any faster. But Friday night was a different story.
Precious Metals went from having five customers to being packed in a matter of an hour. It didn’t take long for the bartenders to become overwhelmed.
“Think one of us should go help them?” I asked Coal.
“No. Copper doesn’t want anyone knowing we’re associated with the club.”
“I feel like an asshole just sitting here when I could be helping,” I grumbled.
