Page 10 of The Oath We Take

“I gotta go to church. Planning for Sturgis and some other shit.”

Dad rolls his eyes. “And to think you want me to hand this ranch over to you quickly.”

It pisses him off that we co-exist in two hierarchies. In the ranch, he’s higher than me. In the club, he isn’t. On both fronts, that means I go to Sturgis, and he doesn’t. I don’t think he really wants to go; he just wants to be mad at me that I do.

“You have no problem handing the work to me, so why not the land too?”

“Fuck you, Hudson. You want me to hand over this ranch to you sooner than I might like? Better get married and have some kids.”

And there it is. The threat. It’s always there, dangling over me like a carrot and stick. I might be thirty, but Dad is only sixty. There is no way he’s retiring or handing the ranch to me. I’ll have to tug it out of his cold, dead fingers after he’s milked every penny out of it. But he likes to pretend it’s to do with my lack of heirs.

I chew the mouthful of perfectly seasoned food. “If I thought for a millisecond that were true, I’d possibly do something about it.”

Like finally reconcile the complexity of my feelings for Ember. I’m always half a heartbeat away from her finding a man, getting engaged, being married, and expecting kids of her own with someone who isn’t me.

A thought which frequently makes it so hard to breathe, I feel like I’m dying. I can’t imagine her at any altar sayingI dounless it’s to me.

Who am I kidding?

Butcher would never agree to Ember and me.

Yet, she’s the reason I don’t have a woman or the kids I’d love so much because I don’t want it with any other woman but her. My happiest memories were when Gran was still alive, watching her and Grandpa dance and laugh on the porch at night. Unlike most of my club brothers, I believe in the idea of loving the same woman hard for the rest of my life.

“Maybe if I’d had a few more sons interested in being ranchers, it wouldn’t be a problem,” he mutters.

“Not sure the ranching was the problem.”

“What?” he asks.

“Nothing,” I mumble through a mouthful of food.

I’m the baby of the family. My eldest sister, Rowan, is a lawyer in Denver. Then there’s Alison. I’m not sure exactly what she does, but she’s the head nurse in charge of operating rooms or something. And finally, there’s Kelly, who is in Sonoma training to be a sommelier. I’m the youngest because my dad was determined to keep going with the babies until he had a boy, and he’s told my older sisters that the ranch is mine their entire lives.

It’s a wonder I have any relationship with them at all.

“I’ll get Luke and Wes on it.” Luke is our long-standing ranch foreman, and Wes is one of the best cowboys I’ve ever met. Has great sense when it comes to the ebb and flow of the herd across long distances.

I send them both a quick message with instructions, then finish my food. Once my dishes are rinsed, I head to the door. “Gotta get to church. You coming?”

“Maybe.”

He’s coming less and less. My grandpa has officially retired as a biker. With his old bones, he struggles to ride a horse or bike. I debate going to find him in his wing, but decide church is more important.

“Okay,”Butcher says at church an hour later. “Final thing. Let’s talk details for Sturgis.” He lights another cigarette and leans back in his chair. “Pay attention to Atom because if you fuck up your logistics, you get left behind.”

“We leave in three days,” I say, filling in for Smoke, our usual road captain who works as a smoke jumper in the summer. He’s currently in Boise operating out of the National Interagency Fire Center. “Spoke with Smoke this morning. He’s gonna be able to join us for two of the ten days due to his shift schedule. A local pilot he knows is going to fly him in. Figured the least we could do is pay for the fuel for him and take his bike in the van so he has it while we’re there.”

Wraith, the club’s sergeant at arms, nods. His thick blond curls are up in a man bun, and there’s a new tattoo of a black bird, a raven, no doubt, on the side of his neck. “I’ll make sure it happens. I’ve got the keys to his place, so I can go get it.”

“Get me the details of the person flying him in and I’ll make the transfer from club accounts,” Catfish says.

We put extra supplies in the van and ask two prospects to drive on up half a day ahead of us. It makes for an easier ride, and our tents will already be up on arrival. This year, we picked Caleb and Wynn, given they are the two closest to getting their patches.

“King’s blocked out a campground right on the edge of Sturgis just for the Outlaw chapters,” I say, referring to the national club president. “Will make security a breeze.”

Butcher nods. “Not sure where King got the cash for that, but I’m grateful.”

“They’ve certainly become generous of late,” Grudge says, “but I’m not gonna look a gift horse in the mouth. Let’s not be late leaving, though, yeah? And make sure the prospects don’t pitch our tents next to the toilet block. Gonna be some nasty smells as it is. Don’t want to sleep next to a ten-man shitter.”

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