Red’s nasally voice chimed in. “We’ll get someone in here to keep an eye on that jackass. Something looks a little too familiarabouthim.”
I threw my towel down. “Holt is in the back. With all of the guys that trickle through here on a nightly basis, I think we got thiscovered.”
Red shrugged. “Suit yourself, sweets.” He slammed the half-empty bottle down. “We need to headout,kid.”
“Yeah. It’s about that time.” Ryder looked up at me. “See youlater?”
I leaned over the bar to kiss him quickly. “You know whereI’llbe.”
They threw some money down and headed outthedoor.
5
Ryder
Itooka long swig of my beer, rocking back and forth on my front porch with Red next to me. “I figured Abel would have checked in with the addressbynow.”
Red slapped his bag of Red Man onto his leg and put a huge plug into the back of his jawline. Right then his nickname made way more sense. “We’ll hear from him once everything is squared away. Ain’t nothang,kid.”
Lighting my fifth cigarette, I tried to not show Red how nervous I was about this job that we were about to ride off into the night to complete. I knew it needed to be done. I wholeheartedly understood why Abel had asked me to do it, but that didn’t mean that I wasn’t fucking nervousasshit.
It wasn't the fact that I was probably going to have to kill someone. It wasn’t the fact that I could get hurt. I wasn't even worried about not coming home, because that wasn't an option. I was scared shitless of letting Abel and the rest of the club down. It was my first and only shot to prove to my brothers that I deserved to wear the cut; failure couldn't be in my vocabulary at thatpoint.
Red’s burner finally started vibrating on the wooden arm of hischair.
“Yeah?” He spit onto the frontporch.
“We got it.” He closed the phone andstoodup.
Looking down at me, he put his pouch of chew back into his front pocket. “Let’s go make a Sinner wish he had never crawled out of his bitch of amother’scunt.”
We threw our Kevlar vests on, secured our guns and extraclips.
Deep. Slow.Breaths.
My hands wouldn’t stopshaking.
Here goesnothing.
“Ready?” Red glanced over at me before descending the porchsteps.
“Fuck yeah. I’m ready to make thisfuckerpay.”
It was going to be a little under an hour’s ride through the back country, almost into Tennessee, and it was just going to be Red and me, which put all of my senses on high alert. The air was crisp and it was a clear, full moon night. We curved and weaved through the mountainsides until we got to the end of a long dirt road. Red signaled and we both pulled offtheroad.
“We’ll leave the bikes here. Apparently, he should be alone, but if he isn’t, I’ll cover you while you tie him up and we’ll get him out here innotime.”
“When’s the van showing up?” I had just assumed that once we had the scumbag, there would be a getawayvehicle.
Red shook his head. “It’s just us, kid. Just follow my lead, I’ll walk yathroughit.”
We hid our bikes in the unruly brush right off the road, then, as quietly as possible, we hoofed through the thicket. The front porch light blared bright, lighting up the front steps to a wraparound porch that graced an older-than-hell farmhouse with weeds and vines growing over mostofit.
I tapped Red on the shoulder. “I’m counting at least two mulling around in there.” The shadowed figures were posted up at a table in what looked like the kitchen. They were in a fucking fishbowl; it was going to be like shooting fish in abarrel.
He pulled our target’s picture out of his pocket. “This is your guy. Leave the other onetome.”
In unison, we checked our clips, took our safeties off, and got ready forbattle.
