Page 120 of Resilience

Eight cocked an eyebrow at them but didn’t remark on the exchange. He went on, “Previous votes were about a patch-over. Now we need to vote on whether we take the Nameless out. If the vote’s no, we gotta prepare to break with the Volkovs. That means lean times ahead, and maybe a beef with Niko, though I think he’ll just work on icing us out instead of making actual war. If we vote to keep to the plan, stick with him and move into Eureka, we got about a month or so to work out what that looks like. We move on the Nameless right after Christmas. Us and Laughlin both.” He sighed. “Let’s see a show of hands. All those still in favor of taking over the Nameless in Eureka, however we have to do it?”

It was Sam’s first serious vote as a Brazen Bull. He waited for his father to vote and voted the same way. The way he would have voted on his own.

The decision was unanimous.

Sam hoped they weren’t heading down a path darker than they could navigate.

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~oOo~

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“Are you worried?” Athena asked after she mounted Rollo, her buckskin Quarter Horse.

Sam was already astride Ragnar, his chestnut Tennessee Walker/Saddlebred cross. “Yes and no,” he answered. Then, because an actual explanation would take too long and be too hard in ASL while they were riding, he turned Raggy and nudged him toward the woods. Athena and Rollo followed. They could talk when they got where they were going.

The big meeting about Eureka had happened the day before. As it was Thanksgiving week, Athena was off work. He was free today as well. He’d been busy the night before, and they hadn’t had a chance to see each other. He really needed to talk shit out with her, and not on text or FaceTime. His brain was spinning so fast he could practically smell smoke.

The day had broken bright and clear and not especially cold, and Sam had helped Mom and Mason with the morning chores. While they’d been feeding the horses, Mom had mentioned that Sam rarely rode anymore, and suddenly he’d really missed it. He and Athena used to ride together all the time.

So he’d called her to come over. When he’d mentioned riding the horses, she’d done a little giddy clap that made him think he was the reason they hadn’t ridden in so long.

Ragnar, always a little on the ornery side, hadn’t been exactly thrilled to have a saddle on his back after so long, but he was also extremely food-motivated, so a few apples had convinced him. Rollo was basically a thousand-pound dog, so he was just happy to be with his people and getting lots of attention.

As always, to the delight of the horses as well as themselves, they crossed the biggest pasture at a full gallop. Raggy bucked and danced at first, feeling his oats, but then he saw that Athena and Rollo were flying ahead, and he made it a race. Already Sam was feeling calmer and more centered.

When they got to the main trail leading into the woods, Athena pulled Rollo up. She turned back and watched Sam and Ragnar charging at them. Her face was flushed with exertion and her grin was about as wide as it could be. Her eyes sparkled in the sun.

Christ, she was beautiful. Everything about her was perfect. It was so incredibly stupid of them not to see what they were together, everything they were together, from the start.

“Where are we going?” she asked. “To the creek? The clearing? The ruins?”

Their three main destinations when they rode through these woods. Grinning at her, Sam led Ragnar past Rollo and onto the trail in the lead. He turned back and told her, “You’ll just have to follow me.”

Athena knew these woods almost as well as he did, so she knew where they were going as soon as he passed one trail offshoot and took another. He was headed to the ruins.

That was a name they’d come up with for this area of the property. It wasn’t ruins, exactly, because no human construction had ever been built here. But some kind of blight had happened to the trees here long ago, and several had fallen like dominoes, apparently around the same time. They were big old oaks, and the way they’d fallen looked like the tumbled remnants of an ancient village.

If you squinted. They’d been in grade school when they’d found it, so it helped to have a childish imagination. To Sam’s older eyes, they looked like decaying fallen trees. But they would always be the ruins to him and his best friend.

The best part of this area was the cool web of branches from the top of the biggest fallen tree, which made something like a tent. As kids, they’d had room to create big fantasies under that crisscrossed dome, but as adults all they could really do was sit under there to talk—which was all they’d wanted to do once they weren’t kids anymore.

Now Sam couldn’t help but imagine new fun things they could do. When it was warmer. And he had a blanket or something to lay on the rocky ground.

They dismounted and let Rollo and Ragnar graze while they crouched low and scrambled into their hiding place.

“Talk to me, Samwise,” Athena said before she was even settled. “’Yes and no’ is where you left it, and that answer needs some development.”

“You know I can’t get into details, but yes, I’m worried because it’s a big move, and there are things that could make it dangerous.”

“Yeah, that makes me worried.”

“But it’s yes and no because, come on, Frosie. This is what our life has always been like. It was scary every time our dads rode off on a run, but it’s also ... I don’t know ... familiar. It feels like life. I’m not sure I’d know what to do in a normal life. I think that was what happened when I realized I wanted in. I didn’t feel right on the outside. The club feels like the way things should be. And yeah, something bad could happen. My dad went down for five years, kinda when I needed him most. Gun won’t walk again because he took two bullets saving my ass. Uncle Beck died.”

“You almost died,” Athena reminded him, her eyes round.

It was funny how little he thought about getting shot himself, unless he was thinking about Gunner saving him. “Yeah. A lot of guys’ve died. That’s all scary and sad. I don’t want to get hurt or killed. I want to be with you until we’re old and cranky and we die together in our bed when we’re like a hundred and ten. But I honestly feel like I’d die quicker if I was a cubicle guy wearing a tie. Like I’d just shrivel up and fall over, the way these trees did. So in that way I’m not worried about what happens in Eureka. No matter what happens there, it’ll happen in the right life.”

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