The first twenty minutes flew by. I was tense and ready to get this confrontation over with. I hoped Storm’s plan worked but I had a sneaking feeling that Viper was not going to accept us just choosing our third favor opportunity. It didn’t matter what Viper wanted at this point. Doing it his way was just going to pull us deeper into whatever game he was hell bent on playing out in this region.
As the minutes ticked by, twenty minutes turned into thirty as we held position. All thirty of us kept to the shadows with our voices down. The club officers huddled again, and snippets of the conversation reached my ears. They were saying that one of the bikes breaking down might have caused a delay.
When the thirty minutes became forty, I said what everyone else was thinking. “They’re late. Even later than Bran thought they’d be.”
Teeny called out from the end of the line, sounding louder because we’d all been keeping quiet. “Or we’re in the wrong place.”
“We’re not in the wrong place,” Celt shouted, no longer caring about the quiet part. “I mapped it myself.” No one questioned our road captain again. Celt had never led us astray, so it didn’t make sense to doubt him now.
Storm looked ahead steadily, his eyes narrowing. “Bran said they’d be here.”
Thunder backed him up. “Storm’s right. It could be something that held them up,” Thunder snapped. “We need to pipe the fuck down and wait this shit out.”
When forty minutes became an hour, everyone was restless and wondering if this was still even going to happen. Storm had gone very still and tried to call Bran twice. He wasn’tpicking up and it went to voicemail. He called the other two club presidents, and they were still in position.
As I stood in the dark, listening to my club brothers all talking quietly with one another, their voices merged into so much background noise. I had the worst gut feeling that something was very wrong, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
Chapter 15
Winter
The clubhouse always felt different when the brothers were out. The prospects were still milling about, doing their various security assignments, so it wasn’t a matter of feeling unsafe so much as it just being quieter.
The club girls were all sitting around bored out of their minds. They tended to drink too much when left to their own devices, which led to them getting catty with each other. I wasn’t bothered because I was still feeling the warm glow of the fine whiskey Fuse shared with me. And then there were the things he said to me, about supporting whatever decision I made with my life, even leaving him.
Thankfully, Rosie stayed at the clubhouse so she could welcome Thunder home after missions. More of the old ladies always came to meet their men as the night wore on. I’d gotten to know a few of them. They seemed like good people. I still couldn’t believe Storm was married to the lady who runs the blog that talks about local crime and corruption. She was famous locally for her hard-hitting news stories. And she’s downright personable. So far, the brothers and their old ladies have all been nice.
Since things were duller than dull, I pulled out my journal and started writing, mostly about what Fuse said earlier. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face for anything. When I was finished with that, I slid my journal into the cash register under the cash tray. It was my secret hidey hole to keep it safe from prying eyes.
Then I just leaned on the bar between pours, watching the door and praying that Fuse would come through it safe and sound.
Rosie caught me and climbed onto the barstool in front of me. “They’re grown men on motorcycles,” she said. “You don’t have anything to worry about. They’ve been doing this for years.”
“I know,” I told her, feeling embarrassed.
“Then stop staring at the door like it will make them come home sooner. It won’t. Ask me how I know.”
The twinkle in her eye told me she knew how I felt. “You used to stare at the door when you first got with Thunder?”
“Yes, I did it for a long time. Then one day, I realized that he always comes back to me whether I stare at the door or not.”
“I guess you’re right,” I said with a laugh.
Even in the quiet absence of the brothers, this clubhouse felt like home. The space behind the bar felt like it belonged to me. So I finished washing the glasses, restocked the alcohol, and then checked on the kittens. As Fuse was away, I didn’t want to leave them in our room, so they were in the walk-in closet we used to store the cases of beer. They were having the best fun ever, jumping on the boxes and playing with the cat toys we got them. Well, they were actually fighting over them. I shut the door and left them to it and headed out to wipe down some tables.
That’s when the front gate alarm went off. It was a shrill tone that couldn’t be mistaken for anything else. I froze in place as it sunk in that that was the signal the prospects used to let us know there were incoming riders. Maybe the brothers were back, I thought excitedly. The alarm was just a heads up that the gate was about to open.
One of the club girls perked up. “Is that them? Are they back already?”
“Maybe,” Rosie said, reaching for the radio to check with the gate prospect. She didn’t get an answer, which was strange because they always answer. Then we heard three shots. Two of them close together, and then a third.
The prospect nearest the front window moved forward and looked out before jerking back. “That ain’t the Slayers,” he shouted, already moving towards the weapons cabinet. “Get away from the windows. Now.”
Rosie had the radio in her hand. “What’s happening at the gate?”
Static. Then a voice, strained and short, came over the radio. It was Rigs’ son, Evan. Savage Legion had brought a couple of their prospects with them—sons of two of the members—and they’d volunteered to stay behind and man the gates while the Slayers and Legion went to confront Viper. “Gate’s been breached. It’s Viper and his men. Levi’s down and I’ve been hit. I can’t reach him…”
When the radio dissolved into static again the women began to panic.
