Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 117494 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 587(@200wpm)___ 470(@250wpm)___ 392(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117494 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 587(@200wpm)___ 470(@250wpm)___ 392(@300wpm)
It was a small town, barely a town at all—population of three hundred and seventy two residents. The school was gone. The local post office had one worker. Two diners. One gas station. Two bars. A small nursing home. Some volunteers made up the local fire station, and there were no cops. The neighboring towns had those, but they were a decent distance away. That’s where the nearest hospital was too.
We were twenty miles off of a major interstate that connected California to Oregon, to Washington, and all the way to the border. On the other side, we were another ten miles from a second major highway that ran east, all the way through Colorado and on to the east coast. It went right through middle America, and Max had been right. This was a prime location.
Tonight the party was in the back, gated off by two giant walls of chain, steel, and wood—pallets, to be more specific. Open that gate up, and on the other side you’d find thirty motorcycles, two RV campers, an auto repair warehouse, and the backside of The Bonfire, which lived up to its name. A big fire ring had been set up in the middle of the whole shebang, and the guys were having a good ol’ cookout, complete with beer, women, and blow.
All that was a bit noisy for my call, so I moved through The Bonfire’s interior, giving a nod to those who greeted me, and stepped outside to the front along Frisco’s main road. A line of bikes was parked out here, along with two prospects watching them. Both said hello, but saw I was on the phone and moved away to give me privacy.
It didn’t matter. I wasn’t planning to stay there. I was restless, and I didn’t know why.
No. That wasn’t true. I did know why, but there was nothing I could do about it. Not yet.
Moving past The Bonfire, I went over and sat on a bench outside Mama’s Diner. It was closed, and no one was around. It was an older building with giant windows and white paint that was half stripped off, but it had the small town charm to it. It’d become a popular eating place with the guys, and I could understand why—good-sized helpings and cheap prices, especially for California. And since there were barely any locals, it was almost like our own diner. Mama herself didn’t have any objections. She was doing real well these last couple weeks. The guys enjoyed the high school-aged servers too. There was a lot of flirting and giggling going on.
“I want to send Wraith out there,” Max told me.
“Prez…” I stopped myself, though. Respect was everything in our club. But he was wrong here. Dead fucking wrong. I took a beat. “You sent me to help with this charter. I’m here. I’m doing it. They haven’t balked too much. They enjoy the partying mostly, but I cannot help this charter get where you want us to go with your nephew coming. He’s good. He’s smart, but I can’t risk it. That could lead to unnecessary death, and then we got police involved, outside police.”
“What about Stripes?”
“He’s smart, wily. It’s an asset to have him here.”
I liked Stripes. He got the road name Stripes from inside Potomahmen and it stuck. He’d come clean about what he had to do in order to get a reduced sentence for the reason he was in. That hadn’t sat well with some of the guys, but he struck a deal after. He gave us some vital intel and since then swore his loyalty to us. We’d kept a good eye on him, but there was always a little hesitancy about him, though what he helped us with really helped the club. It was the kind of favor that saved our hides from going and being in a cell next to him. He was also young and he had a daughter. He talked about her a lot, which wasn’t a problem, but his daughter was in Florida. He’d gone to see her a few times, though it wasn’t enough. A lot of the guys understood, having kids of their own.
“That’s good. We got a charter in Florida, but I’m hoping he stays with us. I’ve been thinking about the Bennett situation. When you think you could do a meet?”
Jesus. One, it was news to me that he did want us to do a meet. And two, he wanted us to get right to it. That shit didn’t happen, not just like that. Maxwell Raith was the most intelligent and ruthless man I’d ever met, but he also tried to be fair. I respected him, but this wasn’t how things worked.
The local charter had thirteen members, and I’d showed up with twelve of us. If I moved forward too fast, they could protest. They were the charter nearest to where the Bennetts had their headquarters. We didn’t have a charter in Oregon or Washington. If I made the approach and it went bad, their charter would be the one first impacted.