Chapter eleven:
1990
Jesse
Butch strutted through the room, proudly wearing his cut that now bore the colors of our club. Asshole was being a smug son of a bitch about it, too—not that he didn’t deserve it, of course.
Two bitches walked over to him, one standing on either side to drape themselves across him, and he reached down to grab their little asses in their tiny hot pants and squeeze painfully tight. They both squealed but leaned further into him, giggling even louder.
“All right, brothers,” Hardy called, coming to stand in the middle of the room. He pulled out his knife and tapped it against his bottle of beer. “Ring-a-ding-ding, fuckers!” he bellowed louder, until the room went silent, barring the pounding music, and everyone turned to look at him. “Let’s give a Highwaymen welcome to our latest fully patched-in brother, my boy—Butch.” He turned to look at Butch, an actual smile on his face—the first I’d seen in a long time. Shit, maybe ever.
The Highwaymen all cheered loudly, raising their beers to the air and calling Butch’s name, and I couldn’t help but find a smile and I raised my beer also. Butch was my brother and I loved him more than anyone else in the whole damn world—not that I’d tell the stupid fuck that, of course. He’d been working his ass off as a prospect for a long time to get this honor, and now it was his. He was a full member of the Devil’s Highwaymen. Not only that, but Hardy had made him Road Captain for the club since Eight-Ball had been sent down and wouldn’t be seeing the sun for a long fucking time. Poor bastard.
“I couldn’t be any prouder of you, boy,” Hardy continued, moving toward him.
The two bitches took a step to one side to allow Hardy to pull Butch into a hug that shocked all of us. When he pulled out he dragged a hand over Butch’s head and ruffled his hair like he was a little fucking kid. Shit was weird to watch, but Butch was basking in the attention, and rightly so. Hardy was a hard man and he never showed affection, of any sort. Bet the sorry son of a bitch was stony-faced even when he was fucking. Hadn’t when we were boys and it was unlikely he would now that we were men—except today.
“Let’s fucking party!” Hardy called, laughing and walked away from Butch, heading toward Silvie, his old lady.
The other brothers cheered, and then some dumbass put a thumb over the neck of his beer and shook it until it started to foam and spray and then he aimed it at Butch, covering both him and the two bitches that had sidled back up to him in frothy, warm beer.
The girls screamed and Butch rubbed the beer over their bodies before leaning into kiss one of them on the mouth. Dom, Butch’s best friend, was in a foul fucking mood and he stormed through the clubhouse and out the front door. I laughed and looked away, heading back to the bar to grab another beer. I downed what I had and set the bottle on the counter, and Rose handed me another one with a smile.
“He’s a good man,” Rose said, and I raised an eyebrow at her. “Butch,” she clarified, pouring herself a shot of tequila and throwing it to the back of her throat. “He’ll make a great old man for some lucky bitch one day.” She smiled and walked away.
I turned back around, leaning on the bar with my elbows, and watched as Butch dragged the two giggling bitches into the back room. Casa walked over to me, pulling up his zipper as he did. Hadn’t seen him all night, but I had no doubts on where he had been.
“Gimme a beer,” he called to Rose, and she obliged, giving her usual smile. Woman was a goddamned saint to put up with our shit. Beautiful, too. Casa leaned over and clinked his bottle against mine. “Cheers, brother.”
“Yeah,” I said, giving him a nod.
“Butch sure knows how to party,” he said, taking a long swallow of beer. “I swear some bitch almost sucked me dry back there—mouth like a vacuum! Thought she was going to swallow my balls whole at one point! Where the fuck does he even find them?” He laughed and nudged my elbow and I laughed with him.
“Everyone loves Butch.” I grinned. “Fucker could talk a nun into putting out. I remember him taking me out to a party up near Smoke Rise, and as soon as he walked in it was like the prime pussy was released from somewhere and the dried-up old bitches scattered like cockroaches,” I laughed. “Fucker had me join my first train that night.”
Casa laughed loudly. “Like I said, man knows how to party, that’s for damn sure.”
I grinned and nodded before taking a swig of my beer. We both looked up as the door to the clubhouse opened and Gauge walked in, followed closely by his daughter, Laney. Casa nudged me, almost making me fall over, and then he burst into laughter as I almost spilled my beer down myself. Goddamn fucking idiot.
“Pussy-whipped and you ain’t even got any yet.” He laughed harder.
“Fuck off.”
“Too many offers to fuck bitches to find time to fuck myself, brother,” he snorted.
“Offers from your mama!” I bit out.
Casa stopped laughing and scowled at me. “That shit’s just disrespectful.”
“That’s what your mama said, you pussy!” I flashed him a grin and strutted over to where Laney was. Pretty sure he called me something, but I drowned his voice out in favor of taking in Laney’s beautiful figure. She was wearing something different from her usual denim cutoffs and tee that night—a lacy, white, figure-hugging dress that skimmed her golden thighs. Course, she still wore her little black ankle boots. Her hair was up on top of her head in one of those weird knot things that women wore, and I had the urge to reach over and let it down. Not that the look didn’t suit her—it did, anything would fucking suit her—but there was something about the way her dark hair sashayed over her back that always turned me on.
“Keep an eye on her tonight, Jesse, she’s feelin’ particularly bitchy,” Gauge said, patting me on the shoulder.
“Go fuck a cow!” Laney snapped back.
“Cunt!”
“Limp dick!”
