The garage door opened.
Uncle Jakey stepped in. He was one of the original members of the MC. The idea born out of saying fuck you to the force fed idea of the real world. Finding guys who were struggling, getting their ass kicked by the system, knowing there had to be a better way to survive and lick the wind of freedom. They started out by riding through town to be loud and annoying. To the point where crime started to go down. I’m not sure who secured the first deal but at some point the MC started protecting the town. Better than the police could ever imagine. They grew and bled into the city to do the same. In fact, they ended up getting so close with the police that if something needed to be done that would tarnish the good nature, fair justice bullshit of the authorities they’d turn to the MC for help.
It was a good thing.
Yeah, sometimes things got out of hand, but it never got too far.
Now it was way too fucking far.
Uncle Jakey walked forward. He paused at me, patting my shoulder. Then he went to the head of the table. The sight wasn’t good at all. It should’ve been the VP sitting there. Or better yet, a new vote. Call in all the charters and discuss what to do.
But Uncle Jakey took it all for himself. It was his way of trying to kill what he had helped to create.
“I stand today with a heavy heart,” Uncle Jakey said. “Our President, Hammer, is on the inside now. The rumors you all heard are true.”
That caused a little bit of a stir.
Everyone looked at me.
Yeah, yeah, I was now the abandoned guy. My mother split and was never heard from again. And now my old man was in prison.
“We have funds for lawyers, right?” one of the guys asked.
“We don’t have funds for electricity,” Uncle Jakey snapped. “It doesn’t matter. He took our votes and decided on his own path. There’s nothing we can do. If we insert ourselves, we become part of it. I talked to Devin and he agrees. Distance saves the rest of us. I know we don’t split on the cut, but look at us. Half of you don’t even wear the cut anymore. You’re all a bunch of grease monkey motherfuckers, running straight, paying your bills on time, fucking your wives twice a week, jerking off in the shower for the rest of the days. What do you want to do here? You want to stand up and fight this? He was caught up in a sting. It’s done. It’s over. The only option Hammer has now is to turn on the rest of us. That’s only if we’re active in the life. If he tries to turn now and the Feds want to come here, they’ll find a rundown garage and nothing else.”
“What’s the verdict, Uncle Jakey?” I finally asked.
“The verdict?” he said. “Hammer is in prison and will stay there for the rest of his goddamn life. The more they dig the more they find. On our own, we can survive. We can hold together the rules that kept this club moving forward. That’s all I can offer.”
Uncle Jakey got to smack the gavel one time in his life and it was right then.
The garage cleared out except for me and Uncle Jakey.
I was at one end of the table, he on the other.
We both stared at each other.
Here was a guy who bought me my first bicycle. Here was a guy who slipped me my first porno mag where I saw two chicks going down on each other and forever changed my life. Here was a guy who was not my uncle by blood or family, but by brotherhood. The loyalty was only as real as the patch on our leather cuts.
“I’m sorry about your old man, kid,” Uncle Jakey said. “He was always crazy. He always took it too far. But, shit, kid, that’s what got him the patch, you know? When we had that roll over and shook up the MC, he led the charge.”
“And now he’s going to rot in prison,” I said.
Uncle Jakey nodded. “Yeah, he is.”
I backed away from the table. “I bet he’ll still keep the club in his heart. I won’t give this up. Ever. I don’t give a shit what happens. This… this is all I have.”
I walked out of the garage, wearing my leather cut.
I’d keep the cut but would stop wearing it shortly after that.
We all still rode motorcycles but the pack thinned out a lot. It ended up as a handful of us that would still meet up, raise some hell, and earn when we had to do so.
That didn’t mean we stayed out of trouble.
One of us ended up in prison for murder. On death-fucking-row.
But that… that’s a whole other story.
This story, right now, is about me and Ana.
I thought she would be smart and move the fuck on from this town. From this bullshit.
But I was wrong.
She was still in town.
And things between me and her were about to get as wild as ever.
chapter five
(knox)
NOW