Gypsy king

That made her pause. Bryce was no pushover. She was tough and dynamic. Unique. She saw through bullshit like a pro, and the truth was, I trusted her. Why? I couldn’t articulate it. But I trusted her.

Never, not once, had I told a woman I needed help. Yet here I was, offering that to her.

I kicked the stand on my bike and sat on the seat to face her. I couldn’t go to Dad for information; he was hiding too much. Having Bryce’s fresh eyes might be the only chance for his freedom.

That meant it was time to lay it all out there. To be real with her. To try and win her trust. So she knew what she was getting into with me.

“Let’s talk. No bullshit. No ulterior motives. Just talk.”

She leaned against her door. “Everything you say is fair game for my paper.”

“Not everything.”

“Then we’re done here.” She reached for the door’s handle.

“It could ruin the lives of people who deserve a second chance. You want to destroy me when this is all over? Fine. But for them, I can’t let that happen.”

Emmett and Leo had risked their lives to stand beside us when we’d closed down the club. They were building good lives. Honest lives. I’d give mine up, but I wouldn’t betray them.

Bryce planted her hands on her hips. “So where does that put us?”

“I’ll answer your questions. Some things are on the record. Some are off.”

“And I’m just supposed to believe you?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“How can I know you’ll be honest?”

“Because I feel like shit,” I admitted. “Not many people can get under my skin, but you have. And I feel guilty. For what I said last night. For calling the cops today. This is me saying I fucked up. Asking for one more chance.”

She cast me a wary glance. “You have to know that I think this is all crap. Just another one of your tricks.”

“I get it.” I sighed. “Ask me your questions anyway. Just don’t print the stuff that will hurt other people. Agreed?”

The offer hung in the air, until finally, she gave me a single nod. “Agreed. I want to know why you closed down your club.”

“On the record, our members decided to go different directions. Dad and I stayed in Clifton Forge with Emmett and Leo. Most of the other Gypsies moved away.” When she frowned, I held up my hands. “I know you probably think of it as this big event, but it wasn’t. It happened slowly. One guy would leave for one reason or another. We wouldn’t bring on anyone new.”

“Attrition. You’re saying you shut down your club because of attrition?”

“It’s the truth.”

Jet had prospected the club the same year as I had. He’d moved to Las Vegas after he’d met his girlfriend there and now ran his own garage. Gu

The others had scattered to the wind. Some had even left to join other clubs. Those had stung, but we didn’t fault the men who wanted to keep living the club life.

“The club changed,” I told Bryce. “We all made that choice together. Unanimously.” I’d always been proud to put on my leather cut with the Tin Gypsy patch on the back. Then one day, I pulled on that vest and there was no pride. That was the day I began to question everything. “What it was, what kind of men we’d become, didn’t hold the same appeal.”

“And what was it? What kind of men were you?”

“Men who did whatever the fuck we wanted.” If someone pissed me off, I’d knock out some of their teeth. If someone hurt a member of our family, they paid with their life. “We were fearless. Intimidating. Didn’t care much about the law. And we had money.”

“How’d you make your money?”

“The garage.”

She frowned. “Don’t forget who you’re talking to. Fifteen years ago, it was rumored you had at least thirty members. Your garage might be nice, but it wasn’t supporting that many people.”

No surprise Bryce had done her research. The woman who’d completely thrown me off guard, who’d seized my attention, was sharper than the knife tucked into my boot.

We’d actually had more like forty members back then. About fifteen had been guys Dad’s age and nearly all of them were dead now. Life expectancy with the club didn’t exactly fit a standard bell curve.

Even though we’d been small compared to other clubs around the nation, we’d been powerful. Dad had wanted to grow and expand all the way through the Northwest. He would have done it had we not decided to disband. But his ambition had made us targets.

Made our families targets.

“Off the record?” I waited for her to nod before I continued. “Money came from drug protection. Sometimes we smuggled the drugs ourselves, but mostly we made sure mules made it to their destination safely. Kept trucks from getting hijacked from either the cops or another dealer.”

“What kind of drugs?”

“Meth mostly. We ran whatever the suppliers cooked in Canada. Some pot. Some cocaine and heroin. I don’t know what else there was, but does it matter?”

“No.” The disappointment in her eyes made my stomach fall. “I guess it doesn’t.”

For her, I wanted to be better. Do better. Why? It was the question I’d wrestled with since the begi

“That was how we made most of our money,” I said. “It was easier years ago before border patrol started cracking down. We could slip through the cracks because Montana has a big border and they can’t watch it all.”

“So you worked for drug dealers?”

I nodded. “Among other things.”

“What other things? Be specific.”

“Protection. A business in town could hire us and we made sure they didn’t have any trouble. We made sure their competitors did. We had an underground fight circuit too. Got to be pretty big. We’d have fighters come from all over the Northwest. We’d organize it, some of us would fight, and the club would take a rake off all the bets. Made damn good money too.”

Had Emmett and I had our way against Dad, we’d still be ru

“It doesn’t make sense. If you made good money, why quit?”

“Can’t spend money in prison, Bryce. And turns out, we make damn good money on custom cars too.”

She studied my face. “That’s it?”

“That’s it. Sorry to disappoint you, but we closed down the club for noble reasons. It wasn’t worth putting members or their families in danger anymore.”

“In danger from whom?”

“Rival clubs. Old enemies. And my guess is one of those enemies is Amina’s murderer.”