“I’ll smack him around later,” Deeks said with a chuckle, taking the beer meant for Kenny and handing it to me. He swiped the warm one from my hand and trashed it. “When you gonna give the boy his bike back?”
“No beating around the bush then?” I snorted.
“It’s been days.”
“I told him two weeks. I can move it if—”
“Don’t get your feelings hurt, sweetheart. I just hate seeing that kid mope. Since… well, he’s had a hard time of it. Weall have.”
“And he’s gotten away with it for too long. Did he tell you why I confiscated his bike?”
Deeks looked at me, his ruddy cheeks pinking. Yeah, Tate had told him.
“Did he tell you he’s been suspended for a few games, which will be reinstated at the beginning of next season? That he’s on academic probation?”
“Point made.”
I smiled. “Just trying to imply some consequences.”
“Rightly so.” Deeks looked across to where Rubin, Tate, and Kenny were locked in conversation before he yelled out to them. “Tater Tot, you failed to mention the game suspensions, kid. I got money on that homecoming game.”
The song on the jukebox was suddenly the only sound in the place. Tate looked around and met my eyes. Apparently, Deeks wasn’t the only one with a bet on the Bulldogs’ games.
I started to laugh. I couldn’t help myself. Tate had fucked himself over in a way I could never have.
“You know what, Deeks? I may give him his bike back after all.”
“Why’d you go an’ do that?”
“He’s going to have to get away from y’all’s grumbling somehow.”
“He can wash my bike for a month.”
“With a toothbrush,” Moose added.
I started laughing again.
These were the times I loved most being in The Hut; when the guys I’d come to love surrounded me. These guys were a large part of my world. They were my family, and they were being threatened by one of their own. I couldn’tallow that on my watch. This was my life now, and I would do anything to protect it and the people in it. Even from one of their own.
Chapter Thirty-Two
DREW
Sunday was turning into the longest day of my sorry fucking life. I had a headache on top of my headache, and I knew that would only go away the moment I took Owen’s last breath from his slimy little body. Pete was dead. Harry, too. Clint, a man I’d not known but was mourning anyway, had lost his life because of the club—because of Owen.
Who next? Me? Sutton?
“Ayda,” the word fell from my lips in a breath as we walked up the steps of the porch to the safe house. I hadn’t realized I’d said it aloud until I felt her pause on the steps, her eyes meeting mine with a look of concern that I brushed off with a shake of the head.
“You guys ready?” I asked Eric, Ayda, and Sutton. The only one to respond was Sutton, and he didn’t seem all that thrilled about having to be here with us or the fact that he was now on the wrong side of the law again.
“Lord help me in my next life,” he muttered.
“You’ll need his help in this life now,” Eric said smugly.
I pushed the door open and led them inside. Helen was sitting upright on her bed, her face passive and unconcerned as she watched me walk in, followed by Ayda, Eric, and lastly,the chief.
She was about to look back down into her lap when she did a double take at Sutton, her eyes widening and her mouth falling open.