“You were four when Dad died,” Markus replied. “How the fuck d’you know what he wanted?”

  I bristled, and then nodded. “Fair enough. But from what you told me, he never wanted a normal life.”

  “He was an outlaw like us, it’s true. But whoever said that sons have to live as shadows of their fathers?”

  “I think the Bible has some words on that.”

  “So you’re religious now?” Markus shook his head, pouring another glass of whisky. “I’m not talking about what Dad wanted. I’m talking about what I want. I want a girl who isn’t just a bit of fun for a night. I want a son or a daughter I can protect and care for. I want a house I can call my own and a car and maybe even a normal job.”

  “You’re president of the Motor Saints. You’d really give that up?”

  “You’re not hearing me,” he said. He leaned across the table. Suddenly he looked as serious as cancer; his smile vanished. “This life isn’t the end of the world, Dante. It isn’t our fate. We don’t have to walk down this road for the rest of our lives just because we started down it when we were kids. There’s a whole world out there. There’s more to this life than running and gunning and whoring.”

  “Maybe,” I said. “But I don’t want to see it. No offense, big brother, but if you want to go skipping into the sunset to the land of daises and dreams then don’t let me stop you, but don’t expect me to come along for the ride. I’m happy with our lot. I happen to enjoy running and gunning and whoring.”

  “Well, I’m the older one so I know best.”

  “Fuck you, old man.” I punched him in the arm. “I’ll break your dentures over your balding head.”

  Markus self-consciously touched his hair. “Dammit, that better not be true.”

  I’m jolted from the memory as Lion pulls up beside me. He gestures at me to pull up to the side of the road. I follow him, reflecting. I haven’t thought about that conversation with Markus in ages. When I think of my big brother he’s always the wild man shooting and drinking. It’s all too easy to forget that he was going to leave the life and get married and betray me: betray me, because that’s how it felt at the time, the brother I’d always relied upon telling me to go fuck myself. I could let my mind drift to other memories, memories where I roar at him and call him wicked names. But I don’t let myself. I need to stay focused.

  Lion pulls off his helmet. “It’s just down there.” He points off into the dusty cacti-filled land. “About three miles. A straight shot, according to Slug.”

  “All right, then.”

  “Boss.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Am I okay?” I laugh gruffly. “We’re working. Since when does okay and not okay come into it?”

  “I’m just making sure.” Lion watches me too closely. It’s like he’s trying to hear words I ain’t saying. “This girl must mean a helluva lot to you. I’ve never seen you like this before.”

  “You keep talking like you’re gonna sprout a pussy.” I rev my bike and ride toward the nearest cactus. “Get your head in the game.”

  Our convoy turns off I-10, kicking up yellow dust now instead of grey.

  I’m getting angry now, ready to go to war. Sometimes I get this feeling like I want to kill everybody around me, like I want to fly into a rage so blinding that when I wake up my face will be coated in blood and I’ll wander for days through a field of corpses. Sometimes I get so damn angry that I wish I could just go to war someplace and die riddled with bullets. But usually I can hold back that anger with my better instinct. Markus showed me how a man can channel his anger instead of letting it use him. But now, as I picture Selena alone and scared, the rage is impossible to contain. I’m going to kill every single Chosen Wraith. All of them—dead. And if there are any survivors, I’ll hunt them down and kill them too.

  But when the warehouse rises out of the mist on the horizon, the killer instinct inside me dies. We’ve been tricked. I curse myself. We’ve been fucking tricked! I pull to a stop and hold up my arm, causing the entire convoy to stop behind me. We’re atop a small hill looking down at the warehouse. Cops surround it, setting up tape and walking around on their phones or walkie talkies. I feel a pulsing in my head. Rage is bad enough, but there’s nothing worse than impotent rage. I climb from my bike and pace up and down, glancing at the warehouse every so often.

  “Boss,” Lion says.

  “You’ve got a girl, haven’t you, my friend?” I ask. I know I sound half-mad, but I can’t stop.

  “I’m married, boss. You were my best man.”

  “I remember. Of course I remember! If Brose was playing with your wife like he’s playing with my girl, what would you do?”

  “Kill him,” Lion says. “And we’re going to kill him.”

  “But he’s not in there.” I point to the warehouse. Cops everywhere, but no bikers in cuffs, nobody speaking on a megaphone telling them to come out, no gunfire. Nothing.

  “No,” Lion agrees.

  “Then what now?” I ask.

  “We have to find where they really are.”

  “They could be anywhere!” I snap. “Brose has played me for a fuckin’ fool. Do you know he made me call him sir? I said he put me on loudspeaker. That was when. Made me call him sir right in front of all his boys. Disrespected me.”

  “Brose is a fucking monster. You’ll get no arguments from me.”

  “All right. Let’s back up some so these cops don’t see us.”

  “Boss.”

  Lion leads the men away from the hill back the way we came. I’m about to follow when my cell rings. It’s Selena.

  “Brose,” I say, answering.

  “There’s no point trying to hide now,” he says, tittering. “They’ve seen you.”

  “But they’re not chasing us.”

  “I haven’t ordered them to chase you. Would you like me to?”

  “You’re a coward hiding behind the cops. It’s fuckin’ pathetic.”

  “Oh, yes, bravery. As I recall, your sweet big brother cared greatly about being brave, didn’t he? Do you remember how brave he was, the big strong man Markus? Do you remember how much everybody respected him? Nothing could hurt Markus. He was untouchable. Strange, isn’t it, how one so brave can be felled by one so cowardly?”

  “Just tell me where she is,” I say, hands shaking, lips trembling, everything aching with the urge to fight. “Just tell me where the fuck she is!”

  “You were supposed to come with all your cash and guns. Not tooled up and ready for war. What sort of businessman are you? I believe we had a deal. I’m sorely tempted to take out my frustration on your little angel. Maybe I’ll show her how a real man makes love.”

  “If you touch her ...”

  “I know, I know.” He sighs. “You’re so predictable sometimes, Dante. I expect more from you. I really do.”

  “Just tell me where the fuck she is!” I roar.

  “You’re a passionate man,” Brose says. “I can appreciate that. But I must warn you that passion may lead you to ruin if you’re not careful. Do you remember Kirk? I’m sure you do. He was my man and got a little too passionate one night, spoke out of line, you understand. You know what happened to him.”

  I know: he cut him into pieces and fed him to wild dogs.

  “How do I get her back?” I say, feeling defeated. And yet ... it’s crazy, but a plan is formulating.

  “That’s more like it,” Brose says. “That’s what I like to hear! I want you to bring five-hundred thousand dollars and two duffle bags—no, make that five—five duffle bags of guns and ammo to the location I’ll text to your phone. You’ll laugh when you see it. It’s almost identical to the warehouse you’re looking at now, except ten miles in the opposite direction.”

  “I need to speak to Selena,” I say. “Or we’re not doing this.”

  “You and this girl ... Do you really think I’ve only been watching your apartment since last night? I’ve had men posted on it for weeks, and not once have they seen you with a lady friend. And now—poof—you’ve fallen head over boots for this lady. Anybody would think you were going soft.”

  “Just let me speak to her,” I say. “I’m not agreeing to shit without that.”

  He sighs, and then says, “Fine, wait.”

  A couple of minutes pass and then Selena is breathing heavily down the phone. “Dante?” Her voice is tight and full of fear. But there’s strength in there, too.

  “I’m sorry,” I say right away. “This is all my fault.”

  “No,” she says.

  “I’m guessing they’re right there watching you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Am I on loudspeaker?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right, just know that I’m working on getting you out of there.”

  “Please hurry,” she says, voice breaking a little.

  A couple more minutes pass and then Brose is back on the line. “That was really touching,” he says. “It warmed the cockles of my heart, I have to say. Who knew you were capable of such love?”

  “Cut the shit. I’ll bring the money and the weapons. Just text me the directions and I’ll bring them, all right? But it might take a few hours to get it all sorted. I need to go back to Sun Town and collect everything.”

  “You can have until midnight,” Brose says. It’s two o’clock now. “But don’t keep me waiting, Dante. I really don’t like waiting. Waiting makes me bored, and when I get bored I have to find something to entertain myself with. Do you understand?”

  Bastard, fucking bastard, talking to me like I’m your dog.

  “I said do you understand?”

  I swallow spit and pride in equal measure. “I understand. It won’t take longer than a day.”

  “Oh, and Dante?”

  “What?”

  “Aren’t you curious about how I knew to arrange it so that this particular warehouse was crawling with cops upon your arrival? I’m sure you must be.”

  I close my eyes, seeing red. “I think I know,” I whisper. “What I don’t know is why you’d tell me.”

  “Why not?” Brose laughs harshly. “He means nothing to me and he’s served his purpose. I have no use for a rat for sale. See you soon. Don’t take too long.”

  I hang up the phone and then stare down at it, waiting for the text. When it comes through, I forward it to my officers to make sure we don’t lose it, and then climb on my bike and ride back through the desert. I stop when Lion approaches me.

  “Boss,” he says.

  “We’re heading back to the city,” I tell him. “To the clubhouse. And Lion.”

  He leans forward. “Yeah?”

  “Keep a real close eye on Slug.”

  Lion’s eyes go hard. “Boss.”

  So we ride back the way we came, heading toward Sun Town. I feel a heavy sense of anticlimax as we get closer to the clubhouse. Now Selena has to spend more time being leered at by these pricks. Now she has to spend more time wondering if I’m going to save her.

  “Sometimes a man finds someone he really cares about,” Markus told me one day. “It hasn’t happened to me yet, but it happened to a friend of mine. He said it was like being struck by lightning, came out of nowhere and changed everything.”

  “I know what you meant,” I whisper under the sound of my growling engine.

  Chapter Nine

  Dante

  “Are we really giving them everything?” Timmy asks quietly.

  “We have to,” I say. “They’ll kill her otherwise.”

  “But ...” Timmy glanced to Lion, the only other person in the office, and then back to me. “I’m not sure if the men will go for that, boss. I know this is about respect and not taking your girl, but the men’ve got to feed their families and handing over our stash ...”

  “That’s what’s happening,” I say. “Now I reckon you should go and wait in the bar. I need to speak with Lion.”

  Timmy nods silently and then leaves the room. I wait for the door to close and then turn to Lion. “I need you to call Whisper.”

  “Whisper.” Lion squints at me. “The fuck we need that psycho for?”

  Whisper is an ex-Marine survivalist nut who lives in a cabin north of Austin and lives off berries and wild meat. “Because what I said to Timmy was true; I’m giving myself up, along with the guns and the cash, but we’re going to use some of Whisper’s fancy army tech to put trackers on the whole lot. We get Selena back, you follow the trackers, and then you get me back—along with our stash. It makes a damn sight more sense than just handing it all over.”

  “Then why not tell Timmy?” Lion asks.

  “Because I don’t know who the fuck we can trust anymore.”

  “Oh, come on, boss. Just because Slug is a—”

  “Slug is a slug, yeah,” I say. “And I don’t think anyone else is, either. But why take the risk? Goddamn, Lion. Hearing her on the phone like that ... she’s staying strong but I can tell she’s scared. I haven’t known her more than a day and I can tell that. Is this normal? How long after you met your wife did you start feeling ... well, feeling anything?”

  “I felt something right away,” Lion says. “And that’s the truth.”

  “So maybe I’m not crazy.”

  “You’re crazy, boss, just as crazy as every other man when he gets to liking a woman. I’ll call Whisper.”

  “And tell the men to start collecting the guns and the cash. Tell them if they don’t, I’ll come out there and hurry them up. And after that, choose a select few men—around five—who you trust completely. They’ll be the strike team who follow the trackers. Let them know the plan so they can get themselves ready.”

  “Boss.”

  I grip the edge of my desk and take deep breaths, trying to calm myself. But every time I reach that cold calm place—the place a man like me needs to reach if he’s going to do his work properly—an image of Selena rises up in my mind. I see her being raped, tortured, cut, burnt, a thousand horrors living simultaneously in my head. And what I said to her was true. It really is my fault. As a thought experiment, I try and tell myself I don’t care about her, can’t care about her because she’s a stranger. But even if it makes logical sense, my chest don’t wanna accept it. It gets tight at the thought. Because I do care about her. I care about her a damn lot, even if it makes no sense. Maybe it never makes sense.

  I go into the bar and watch as the men gather their guns in the duffle bags, more men shoving cash into a briefcase and the officers overseeing it all. It looks for a moment like guards watching prisoners. I don’t like that idea, but when I look at Slug I know it’s necessary. He’s there with them, shoving a pistol into a duffle bag. He looks at me, smiling uncertainly. I look away and return to my office. It’ll be time to deal with him soon.

  Whisper is the most Marine-type man I have ever met. Every time I see him, he’s wearing combat fatigues with a beret on his cue-ball bald head. He’s army-fit, even if he’s pushing forty and has a flat nose and a scar across his forehead from where a bullet almost killed him. He’s called Whisper because overseas he was the quietest man in his troop; he actually talks damn loudly.

  He swaggers into the office, hefting a backpack. “Howdy there, Dante,” he says, tipping his beret with his free hand. “I don’t want to make you feel bad, but you interrupted some very important business of mine. Have you ever tried to farm, like really farm, get down in the dirt and try’n get something to grow?”

  “Can’t say that I have.”

  Lion enters behind him, closing the door.

  “Well, it ain’t easy. That’s the thing, though. Local farming. That’s what’ll battle away the end of the world.”

  “Right,” I say, hoping I’m not in store for one of Whisper’s speeches.

  “I can tell by that tone you want to get down to business.”

  “Might be an idea.”

  “Alrighty then.” Whisper unzips his backpack and tips the contents onto my desk. “Here we have some high-grade military equipment redistributed from Uncle Sam by yours truly.”

  “That’s an interesting word for it,” I say, looking down at the tech. It all looks the same to me, like the insides of a computer, circuit boards and wires.

  “These, sir, are high-quality tracking units.” He holds up a thumb-sized piece of plastic. “And these are the responder units.” He waves at the bigger circuit boards. “I’ve tinkered with them some to increase their accuracy and response time. Give me an hour and I’ll have them hooked into your computer.”

  “We just put these on the guns and we’ll know where they are?” Lion asks.

  “Well, lookee here,” Whisper says. “We have a genius in our midst.”

  “Fuck you, skinhead,” Lion replies.

  “Rather be a skinhead than a purty girl with locks of gorgeous blonde hair.”

  Lion laughed grimly. “I wish we knew another ex-Marine with access to this shit,” he says. “He’s been like this the whole ride other. Bastard never shuts up.”

  “Maybe I should shut up,” Whisper says. “Shut up my bag and take my contents elsewhere.”

  “How much?” I ask.

  “How much what?” Whisper squints at me.

  “Don’t play games with me. How much paper?”

  “Ten’ll do it, twelve with installation.”

  “So twelve then,” Lion says. “Since no one here knows how to work this stuff.”

  “Twelve is fine,” I say. “Get him the money.” I stand up and point to my computer. “And you start installing this stuff. I need you to show one of my men how to work it as soon as possible.”

  “Sir, yes, sir.”

  I move around the desk and Whisper takes my place, kneeling down and taking a rolled-up pouch of tools from his back pocket.

  “You’re not as funny as you usually are,” Whisper says as he works.

  “The last time I checked, I’m not a clown.”

  “We’re all clowns, Dante. Every single one of us. We take ourselves seriously and think our problems matter but in the end we’re all the pathetic painted-faced man at the party all the kids are scared of.”

  “How fucking poetic. Sorry to say, Whisper, but the problem I’ve got does matter. It matters a whole lot.”