Saving Axe (Motorcycle Club Romance, Cowboy, Military) (Inferno Motorcycle Club) (8 page)

"Can we get them back with your mother-in-law?"

“Yeah,” he said.  “That’s how we had planned it anyway.  Should we get them set up?”

"Let's wait, see what intel we can get," I said.  "If they think we're dead, at least right now, we may be able to buy some time, get in touch with Blaze."

"You think we should get in touch with Benicio?"

"No
t Benicio," I said.  "Blaze might know him, but I don't."

“If shit goes down, th
is isn’t the place to be,” Crunch said.

"I don't know about that," I said.  "This town's full of ranchers, armed to the teeth.  But yeah, I don't
want anything coming down on my old man."

“Well, now, Joe Holder.”
 April put her hands on her hips.  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look as hot as you do right now.  You look good enough to eat.”  April’s hair was pulled back in a ponytail, an apron tied around her waist, and she brandished a whisk in her hand.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you wear an apron,” Crunch said.
 “Are you cooking?”

“I’m being all domestic,” she said, a wide grin plastered across her face.
 “Don’t worry, I’m not burning the place down.”

"
April can’t be trusted near the stove, Stan,” Crunch said.  He walked up the stairs and slid his arm around her waist.  “Don’t you go burning down this nice man’s house, now.”

April giggled as she leaned against him.
 “Just as long as you don’t expect any gourmet meals from me at home.”

Crunch leaned in and kissed her neck beneath her ear.
 “Honey, you know I lowered my expectations when I married you.”

“Ass
h - I mean, jerk,” she said, laughing as she pulled away from him and punched him on the arm.

“I heard that!” Mac yelled from the side of the porch where she was sprawled out, looking at a book.
 “Mommy said a bad word!”

“Nope, no bad words came out of mommy’s mouth,” April said.
 “Right, daddy?”

“Your wife is a quick learner.”
 My father interrupted, standing in the doorway, oven mitts over his hands.  “I’ve been showing her how to make your mother’s apple pie recipe.”

I looked at Crunch.
 “My mother’s apple pies were famous.  She won the West Bend Baking Contest four years in a row.  Before - who was it, dad?”

“Before Martha Barnes took the title,” my father said.
 “Lord, your mother was upset.  I had to hear about Martha Barnes for months after that.”

I grinned.
 “I remember that,” I said.  “Mom was convinced she had somehow stolen her recipe.  Remember?  She said it was the ultimate betrayal.”

Dad laughed.
 “I remember.  I listened to it non-stop.”

Mom
had only been gone a few years, but it was hard talking about her, even if it was a good memory.  Her death was tainted by the fact that, to the end, she thought I was someone I was not.  She still thought I was a good person.

“You two look like you made some real progress out there on the fencing,”
my dad said, interrupting me before I could sink lower into my own shitty self-pity.

“Yeah,” I said.
 “It should hold up for another couple years or so, as long as you can keep the elk from running through it again.”

I wanted to ask whether he was having trouble keeping up with the place.  Of course, my dad would have a coronary if I even implied he needed help.  He had
always been the epitome of a cowboy.  Strong, silent, tough.

My senior year in high school, just before I’d left for boot camp, my dad had a heart attack.
 We were at the end of a week long trip, pushing cattle.  I looked at his face as we were riding back, his grey pallor unsettling.  It was only when we were a couple hours away from home he admitted he'd been having having chest pain and numbness in his arm for the last half a day.  When I suggested he get to the doctor, he’d told me he’d be just fine.  It was my mother who’d insisted he go to the hospital when we got back.  The doctor told him he was having a heart attack, and he’d told the doctor the heart attack would just have to wait.

The fact that he didn’t die only reinforced what I’d grown up believing about my dad
- that he was invincible.  Part of me believed the man would never die, which was probably what made it easier to leave West Bend when I did, and the way I did.  I figured there would always be time to make amends.

"Alright, now," my father said.
 "I need to send someone to town for a couple things before dinner, and I'd like to take a look at your work on the fence, Cade, see if you remember your fence building skills."  The edges of his mouth turned up.

"That's f
unny, Pop," I said.  "I think I remember how to build a fence."

"Can I go to the store?" MacKenzie asked, throwing herself against April.
 "Can I get some finger paints?"

"I don't know t
hat there's a toy store here, baby," April said.  She turned to Crunch.  "Do you think we can go into town?  There's a couple of things I want to get, too, actually."

Crunch looked at me.
 "What do you think, Axe?  You think it's safe?"

"I thi
nk it's probably okay," I said.

MacKenzie squealed.
 "He said I could get a new stuffed animal!"  She spun in circles on the deck.

"Wait, wait," April said.
 "No one said you could get a new anything.  Uncle Axe only said we could go into town."

"That means toys
!"

"Wait -" I said, turning toward Crunch and April.
 "Lie low, in and out of the store.  This is just a vacation, spending time with my father.  That's it."

Crunch nodded.
 "Yeah, it's no problem, man."  He kissed April on the cheek.  "Let me clean up here and we'll go."

"Oh, and Crunch?"
 I asked.

"Yeah, man."

"Try not to look like a biker," I said.  "Dress like a civilian."

Crunch laughed.
 "I'll try to look like an accountant."

My dad and I walked out along the edge of the property, following the fence line in the opposite directi
on from June's house.  The meadow rolled out for acres, the grass fallen in haphazard piles where we'd cut it earlier this morning, before dawn.  I tried to take it all in as we walked, imprint it on my brain so I could revisit it later, the way I'd always done with this place.  This place had always been my solace.

The hills swelled up on the edges of the property all
around us, the same hills I'd ride out on as a kid, for days at a time, where I'd just disappear to live off the land.  Back then, I'd felt free.  But that was before what happened with June's sister.  Before June's parents died.  Before June moved away and everything changed.

Joining the Marines was some kind of misguided attempt at penance.
 That hadn't worked out so well.

I walked slowly, my leisurely pace not consistent at all with the nervousness I felt about this time
alone with my dad.  We hadn't had a conversation about the details of what I was doing here yet, and I knew it was coming.

My dad was silent for a while
as we walked, leaning over to inspect the fence posts, first one, then another.  He grunted, but said nothing.  It threw me right back into feeling like a kid again, watching him, waiting to see if what I'd done passed muster.

I don't know why I still cared what my dad thought, especially about something like this.
 It was fixing a fence, for chrissakes.  Why I wanted his approval was beyond me.  Especially since I didn't have it anywhere else in my life.  At this point, what the hell difference did a fence make?

He bent over, turning toward me after examining the fourth post.
 "You boys did a nice job with this fence," he said.

"I still remember something you taught me."

He was silent, considering what I said.  "Not everything."

Fuck.
 Here we go,
I thought.  "What, dad?" I turned to face him.  "I can see you're itching to say something.  Why don't you go ahead and say it?"

"Alright," he said.
 "You, this motorcycle club?  What are you protecting that family from?  What are you involved in?"

I sighed.
 "It's complicated, dad."

"Not from where I stand.
 From where I stand it's pretty simple."

"For you it is."

"It should be just as clear to you," he said.  "Right is right, and wrong is wrong, Cade.  And you, this motorcycle gang, it's not right."

"What do you know about it, dad?" I asked
.  But I knew he was right, didn't I?  This shit with Mad Dog had just confirmed it.  "Have you ever tried to understand it?"

"I don't need to understand it," he said.
 "You've joined a gang, a bunch of criminals."

"That's not what it's about."
 I could feel my heart rate increasing, the blood pumping in my ears.  I was just being argumentative.

"Why don't you tell me what it's about, then?
 You tell me how you justify doing the things you've been doing."

"It's about having a family, dad.
 It's a brotherhood."  It sounded lame, even to my ears.  That's what it had been about, at first.  Until it wasn't anymore.  Until it was about greed, betrayal.  Darkness.

"Because your family
here, that wasn't good enough?"

"You're upset because I left West Bend?
 Because I left you and mom and went out on my own?"

"Of course not.  Don't
be an idiot."

"Then what
is it?" I asked.  "Because I didn't come back here and run the ranch?  Or is it that I just didn't live up to your expectations?"

"No, you didn't live u
p to my expectations," he said.  "We were proud of you, your mother and I.  You had a purpose, an honorable job in the Marines.  Now, you come home, dragging a family with you, running from God knows what, nothing good - and nothing legal, I'm sure - looking like hell, covered in tattoos, reeking of booze."  He paused, drawing a long breath.  "Hell, Cade, I'd say, you haven't lived up to your own expectations."

There it was.  The disappointment I'd been waiting for. 
"Honorable?"  I laughed bitterly.  "What exactly do you think I did in the Marines, Pop?  That's what I don't fucking get.  How do you think what I do now is all that different from what I did before?"

"You know there's a difference, Cade.
 I may not know what you're doing now, but I know it's not legal."

"Legal," I said, practically spitting out the word.
 "Legal?  That's all that matters?"

"No, it's not, son," he said.
 "You used to have more honor than this, Cade."

"Honor," I said. "You want to know what I do now?  Who I am?  I provide protection for the club.  You want to know why Crunch is here?  Because I was ordered to kill him.  And when the club finds out I didn't, they're going to come after us, and try to kill us."  My dad was silent, and I could feel myself gathering momentum, losing control of what I was saying.

"You think that's terrible, that I've somehow changed into someone else, someone I wasn't before.  You want to pretend I was some kind of hero Marine, just because I got a fucking award.  Do you understand what my job was in the Marines?  I was a sniper, dad.  My job, the one you think was about having principles, being a hero - I took people out.  It's the same thing I've done for the club."

I paused, only to catch my breath, watching my dad's expression.
 He was stony-faced, staring at me.  "You want to pretend there's some kind of good guy underneath this, some kind of hero that'll just come out if I get away from the MC?  There's nothing, dad.  There never was.  You think I'm doing something different, that the MC has changed me.  It's just a different fucking uniform I'm wearing.  Only this one isn't the one you're proud of showing to your friends.  But it's the same damn thing."