Defiance (23 page)

“Know I will. And this brand means I know what side you’re on,” Caspar said. “Means anyone who looks at you knows where you’ve pledged yourself.”

The silence around them was heavy. Some of the men had to have suspected what Lance was doing or maybe they just weren’t surprised. But they saw a future with Caspar leading the club, a position that would fall rightly to him.

In the bylaws, it stated that the son of a president killed in cold blood by another MC member would take the presidency. Caspar didn’t have to fight for his rightful position, but he would. And he’d goddamned win.

He motioned to the men to start coming forward to Mathias and Bishop to get their brand. One by one, the men took their brands. A sign of solidarity for their Enforcer.

As the line continued to stretch out, Caspar didn’t bother to hide the pride he felt.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Caspar stayed with her that night, but was gone when Tru woke. Rebel was outside the house, as usual. Caspar told her she only needed to go into the tube when the weather necessitated it.

But as the day passed and she didn’t see him, she started to get agitated, and she wasn’t exactly sure why. Finally, when Mathias brought her dinner, she asked, “Have you seen him today?”

Mathias held out a package in a brown paper bag to her that he’d stuck under his arm
.
From Caspar.

She took it. It felt like a book—a heavy, hardcover book.

He said not to let anyone see it.
Said he’ll be by later.

She nodded. When she looked back up, Mathias had disappeared silently.

She reached into the bag and pulled out a leather-bound book...a journal, with the initials ALG.

Abel Louis Gray.

She put it back into the bag, tucked it under her arm the way Mathias had and made her way carefully up to the roof, with Rebel worrying at her the entire way up. She settled in and surveyed the compound from her vantage point. Spotlights were on for the weekly fight, music blared. This was Caspar’s domain.

Yours too.
You were born into this.

She’d always known that coming back and staying was a commitment. But Caspar had already committed to her. He branded himself for her. He’d told her everything. And he was still waiting for her to be sure she could stay in Defiance with him.

She ran when things got tough. Either that, or she stuck her head in the sand. And as much as she liked the idea of Caspar being strong enough to hold her here, for the most part, she needed to be okay with staying here on her own. With not running.

Giving her this journal was like giving her a look into his soul—it was part reassurance and part promise to her.

It was also his version of an ultimatum.

The journal was thick leather—a single volume, an eight by ten book that contained Abel’s thoughts from the time he was seventeen until just before his death.

Her hands shook when she opened the cover, traced a finger along the careful print.

Lance probably knew nothing about this. If he had, he’d have burned it a long time ago, because it contained things that certainly shed an unflattering light on him. It also voiced Abel’s suspicions that he was truly worried about Lance trying to kill him. She could feel the despair in his words.

He’d been twenty-five when he died—only a few years older than Caspar was now. And he’d never gotten a chance to see what his son had turned into.

“You’d be so goddamned proud, Abel,” she whispered into the night. Pictured the stars glittering and swore she saw one shoot through the sky.

Maybe she’d wanted to see it so badly she’d imagined it, or maybe wishing on something could really make it come true. Either way, she made a wish on that star, the way her mom had taught her to do when she’d been little, and wasted her wishes on foolish things.

Marrying Caspar was marrying Defiance. There was no separating the two. She knew that now. Looked back on the long stretch of sacrifices he’d made in order to take back his family’s legacy.

Abel had written a love letter to Cara —while it wasn’t long, it was poignant.

I’m sitting here at the edge of the Defiance compound, watching the gates go up and thinking about how you and I fit together. I know you’re worried that this club’s going to change me, that being in charge of it might be too much for you.

I know you, Cara. If you can handle me, you can handle this club.

War’s war. Doesn’t matter who’s doing the fighting. You’re the one at home, waiting for me. You’re the one in danger because of me. I know you chose me long before any of this.

Okay, I know I chased you, and you put up a hell of a fight. You were too good for me. You still are, Cara. I know that. You went against your family for me, put up with a lot of shit until I pulled you out of your house, put you on the back of my bike and rode you into Virginia, where I’d enlisted.

You married me, knowing I was in the Navy, that I was prepared to give my life for my country. You stayed with me when I came out, and I had crazy ideas about keeping my family safe.

My family. You’re giving me a family—a baby. And I’m giving you my promise that I’m going to make Defiance the best place to raise a family.

Women always suffer for their men’s decisions. It’s a delicate balance, being with an MC man, but I promise you, there are rewards.

All my love always, Abel.

With those words firmly etched into her consciousness, she called down and asked Rebel for a paper and pen and he came up and handed them to her.

Because she couldn’t find her own words, she borrowed them from a source Caspar was sure to understand. She borrowed Abel’s words because that was the best kind of honor she could give the man and his wife, who’d suffered so much. And who’d given her everything in the form of their son.

She copied Abel’s letter to Cara painstakingly, on paper, in script. Words that spoke of protection and turned the gender tables, coming from a woman to a man.

When she was finished, she folded the pages, smoothed them with her hand and waited.

She wasn’t sure when Caspar joined her, didn’t hear him, but she felt his presence as surely as the air.

“Do you really think you can follow Abel’s vision?”

“I want to try.” He paused. “Abel wasn’t an angel. He had violence in him. I’m no angel either.”

“I know that.”

“Know that there’s shit goin’ down here.”

“I noticed.”

“It’s gonna get worse. There are things you need to prepare for if things don’t go the way I’m hopin’ they will.”

She stared at him. “Don’t say it, okay. I know what you’re trying to tell me, but just don’t say out loud.”

He was warning her that he could be killed in the fallout of the war he was about to fight.

He respected her on that, but he did continue, telling her, “If you want out, you can go, babe. You can go right now.”

“Are you saying that so I’ll leave and be safe?”

“You stayin’ means you’re takin’ the same risks I am. It’ll fuckin’ kill me if you say you want to leave, but I’ll understand. And I’ll want to get you out of here safely before things happen here. I’ve got you covered. This is your last chance, Tru.”

“You made plans for me...in case I didn’t agree to stay?” she asked quietly. “You made plans to make sure I’d be safe, even if I broke your heart?”

He stared up at the sky instead of her and nodded.

* * *

It was an awesome responsibility for Caspar to even think about taking over the helm of Defiance. But responsibility was something MC members learned at an early age.

He and Tru were both young enough to remember what their growing up in this club was like. They both knew how to make it better.

But if you fail
...

You never fail
,
means you never tried.
One of his old CO’s favorite sayings.

Caspar had spent years leading up to this. And he’d damned well take back this club or die tryin’. But Tru had every right to know that.

“I made my decision, Cas. I did it before I read Abel’s journal, but that helped, more than you could know.” She held out the folded papers to him. “I didn’t have the words. So I borrowed them. I hope that’s okay. I didn’t think he’d mind.”

He frowned as he took the papers from her. He pulled the papers out with a hand that shook and he cursed that she could bring out so much feeling in him.

He unfolded the papers carefully and began to read, words so familiar and now, completely brand new since Tru was telling them to him, instead of Abel to Cara.

Tru had turned Abel’s words into her love letter to him. “You’re stayin’.”

“I’m staying, with you. For you. It’s all the same.” She paused. “I love you, Cas. I can’t explain why I always have, but it’s been there long enough that I know I always will.”

He sighed with relief. She reached out and held his hands and it didn’t goddamned feel real. But the papers he held in his hand, the look in Tru’s eyes, that shit was all real. “Love you, babe. Never lettin’ you go now.”

“Good.”

“Should never play poker—I know you got more to say.”

She blurted out, “I don’t know anything about leading people. I’m not like Trixie.”

“Thank the good lord for that shit,” he told her. “Not askin’ you to be in charge of Defiance. Askin’ you to stand by me. I can run shit, Tru. Always knew I could. Just need you to believe in me. And to help me do what you’re asking—keep the women safe. Think you can work with that?”

* * *

Tru nodded, because she could work with that. For her mother, for the girls coming up after her...most of all, for Tru herself, she deserved this.

A weight came off her shoulders. Although she knew it wasn’t as simple as her not running things, the fact that he didn’t expect her to become Trixie made her future in Defiance seem far brighter than it had moments before. “Abel didn’t expect your mom to, either. I didn’t realize that.”

“Trixie took it on herself because that’s who she was. Fucked Lance over in some ways. Helped him in some. The MC doesn’t rise and fall on my old lady...but I need her to be happy. It’s the only way I can be, yeah?”

“Yeah,” she echoed.

“What’s still weighin’ on you?”

“I don’t know what changed Hugh or Lance. I don’t know if killing Abel started to weigh on them, or if it was the responsibility of club life.”

“Don’t think that weighs on me?” he asked. “Wonderin’ if Abel would’ve ended up like Lance?”

“I don’t think you ever could.”

“Hope not. Not the way I’d ever want to be. Like to think mom wouldn’t’ve let that happen.”

Cara had been Abel’s strength, and Caspar’s too. “Would she have sent you in here if she hadn’t been sick?”

“Yeah. Maybe not so young, but she told me this was in my blood—my legacy. Abel would never have forgiven her if she didn’t send me.”

She collected Cas in her arms. After a minute, he lay down, head in her lap. She stroked a hand through his hair.

“Fireworks,” he said sleepily.

“What?”

“Lil’jon’s gonna shoot off fireworks.”

“Why?”

There was a smile in his voice when he said, “Because he can.”

Minutes later, a brilliant display flooded the sky. They watched and she noted the other roofs close to them were dotted with people now. Others formed groups on the ground. Kids ran and played and yelled.

Maybe it had been the Chaos’s job to wash away the bad and renew. Maybe you did have to suffer to find happiness. “I know what tattoo I want for the brand.”

He didn’t look at her when he said, “The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.”

“How’d you know?” she asked quietly, not sure if he could hear her.

In response, he glanced up at her. “It’s the one I’d want.”

After she smiled, he stood, helped her down from the roof and brought her to bed. That night, there were promises made when he took her, and even afterward, when they were both sated, he didn’t stop kissing her. Those kisses devastated her, and he did so until she was dizzy, until they were nearly falling asleep with their mouths against each other.

“Want to do this every night,” he murmured sleepily.

“Plan on it.”

Mathias

“Caspar, I need you to make the run tonight.”

I looked up at Lance, who’d entered the clubhouse with the slam of a door. He had half a cigar he puffed on and he looked calm and in control.

“Thought Roan did those jobs?” Caspar asked without turning around from the gun he was reassembling.

“He’s busy.”

Caspar stared at Lance. “Told you, don’t want to get involved in that shit.”

“That shit’s necessary. The guns we buy help defend us against the war you started.”

“How’re we payin’ for them?”

“I’ll worry about that,” Lance told him. “The drop’s in half an hour by the cove. Why don’t you take these two with you?”

He pointed at me and Bishop and thankfully he turned away before he saw Bishop give him the finger. Bish’s teeth were bared and yeah, the man didn’t do well with father figures of any kind.

Caspar watched the exchange with humor. When Lance walked away, he stayed silent, finished cleaning his gun calmly before saying, “Guess we need to get moving.”

I followed him out to the van—he climbed in the passenger’s side and Bish the back, while I drove where Caspar directed me.

The cove was ten minutes away. When we got close, Caspar made me pull over and get into the back with him, while Bish drove. As the van started moving again, I signed,
You knew.

Caspar nodded.

Fuck me.
I
didn’t know.

“Surprised at you.”

Not as suspicious as Bish is.

“That a good thing?”

I shrugged.
TBD.

“Looks like three Kill Devils and our friendly neighborhood cops,” Bish told us.

We going to take out the Kill Devils?

“They’ll scatter,” Caspar said before he opened the back of the van and got out, weapon pointed at the cops.

The cops went for theirs and found themselves surrounded by the Kill Devils.

“Drop your shit,” Caspar called and one of the Kill Devils slammed Sal on the side of the head for good measure. Finally, reluctantly, the cops put their weapons down. The Kill Devils picked them up, one of them saying, “All yours, Cas,” before they got on their bikes and left.

“Bish, get the guns from the trunk,” Caspar said. Because, good man, we’d still get guns from the deal.

“Son of a bitch. Not getting away with this,” Sal told Caspar.

“You made a deal with Lance, yeah?” Caspar asked.

“He came to us,” Tony said defensively. “Said he’d bring us the damned girl. That’s who we want.”

“Never should’ve agreed to my deal then,” Caspar said as Bishop carried the heavy bundle past us and put it into the back of the van. “Bish, take out the radio.”

Bishop did, taking great pleasure in ripping out the cops’ only means of communication. “Now what?” he asked.

Caspar spoke to Bish without taking his eyes off Sal and Tony. “Now you can kill them.”

“And then we’re burning the bones,” Bish told me, right before he yanked out his favorite knife and cut Sal’s throat before the man knew what happened to him.