Page 11 of Taming Bull

My family expected me to come home, but Shiner, Texas held too many memories of the life I’d lost. I couldn’t face Amber’s parents any more than I could face my own. Hell, even my conversations with Mom and Dad were nothing but surface bullshit as we talked about the weather and news, dancing around the giant fucking elephant in the room between us like it was our goddamn job.

I couldn’t go home.

Branded as a loose cannon with a dishonorable discharge, opportunities weren’t exactly beating down my door.

My Grandpa had met Link’s dad, Jake, the former president of the club, during his stint in the Army. When I had nowhere to go, Gramps reached out to Jake and secured a place for me in a veteran only motorcycle club in fucking Seattle, Washington. I thought Gramps was off his rocker when the plane ticket showed up in my email, but it turned out he knew exactly what he was doing. The biker lifestyle was just the culture shock I needed, and their acts of community service helped me to see that even a dishonored sailor with a dead future could still do some good in the world.

Here, I had people, and a goddamn purpose I could get behind.

And, I had Lily. Or, at least I’d had Lily before she’d told me off and stormed out of the Copper Penny. Tugging my phone from my pocket, I opened my messaging app and reread our last conversation.

Lily: Is it just me, or is the word asleep really weird? No other word in the English language adds an a to the beginning of a verb to turn it into an adjective. I mean, you’re not ‘anap’ or ‘aeat.’

Me: I was ‘anap’ before you sent me this bizarre text. Where do you come up with this shit?

Lily: What can I say, I’m a thinker. We still on for tonight?

She was always sending me shit like that, and I kept every last message. We usually texted multiple times a day, but my phone had been quiet since Thursday. I wished I could go back in time and cancel our get-together. Then things between us could go back to the way they were before.

Lily was my closest friend, and I missed her random, crazy ass so damn much.

“Any other old business?” Link asked from the front of the room where he was seated with the rest of the board.

When nobody spoke, our president nodded. “The floor’s open for new business.”

I’d been sitting by the back door, waiting for this very moment. As if I needed an additional cue, Wasp, the club’s vice president, grinned, and waved at me. Being the observant bastard he was, Link picked right up on our unspoken communication. I could feel the president’s gaze burning up my back as I headed out into the hall to retrieve the loaded dolly Wasp had hidden in the janitor’s closet. I returned just in time to catch the tail end of whatever other new business the club had coming up.

“Morse will be updating our website with the information later this week for individual donations,” Link said, standing at the end of the executive table like he always did when he had something important to share. “Eagle’s starting a list of volunteers who can make the rounds to local businesses to pick up donations. If you’ve got time to help, get your name on that fuckin’ list. I know I don’t have to tell you all this, but when we make deliveries, I want all hands on deck. It’s good for the community to see your ugly mugs and know not every motherfucker on a sled is a goddamn degenerate.”

He was talking about our annual toy drive. It was one of several community driven events we took part in every year. The biker stereotype was real, and we fought tooth and nail to break it. When I first became a prospect, I asked Link why he led a motorcycle club if he didn’t want to be typecast as a one-percenter. He looked at me like I was a special breed of moron and explained that riding was in his DNA. Running guns and drugs wasn’t. The two weren’t mutually exclusive.

I didn’t understand what he meant until I made my first club ride up to Canada to visit an ally club. There was nothing in the world like the wind in your face and the open road under your tires, surrounded by brothers who had your back no matter what. I’d never felt so goddamn alive and accepted in my life.

Being a biker wasn’t about breaking laws, it was about freedom and family.

After the months I’d spent locked up in the Naval Consolidated Brig, I never thought I’d feel those gifts again. I sure as hell wasn’t worthy of them.

“What else we got for new business?” Link asked, giving me and Wasp the side-eye. Wasp was always trying to get a rise out of the prez, and the sheet-covered package in my possession looked hella suspicious.

“Oh, I got something for you, brother,” Wasp replied, making his words sound all levels of threatening. He stood and gestured me forward, grinning like the ringmaster of his own personal circus. Not sure what that made me. Probably a fucking trained monkey for helping him with this crazy idea. “Come on, Bull, what are you waiting for? Bring it up here.”

Everyone turned and watched as I rolled my covered offering up the aisle between the packed benches. Whispers and the occasional chuckle drifted around the room as people speculated about what Wasp was up to now. The left wheel squeaked loudly, and I winced.

“Jesus, Wasp,” Eagle, the club’s secretary swore. “You’d think our head bike mechanic could figure out how to grease a fuckin’ wheel.”

“Just adds to the anticipation,” Wasp replied with a wink.

By the time I reached the board table, Link had his arms folded, and was scowling at Wasp. “This better not be another fuckin’ waste of club time.”

Wasp considered it his personal duty to keep the prez grounded and humble, and he didn’t give a shit whose time he wasted in doing it. Hoping I wasn’t about to get my ass kicked for my role in the VP’s latest antics, I rolled the dolly to a stop beside him and got the hell out of there, putting as much distance between myself and the prez as possible. As I sat, Wasp grabbed the sheet and tugged, dramatically revealing his surprise.

It was a wooden podium. Wasp had found it on some used furniture site. It had been beaten to hell and ready for the recycle bin, but the wood was sturdy. Wasp had tasked me with the project, and I’d tightened a few screws, sanded, stained, and sealed the distressed pine, and banded it with a steel frame to cover the dents and cracks of old age. Now it was a beautiful piece of furniture, complete with an angled top, electrical chase, and two interior shelves.

I’d never considered furniture restoration to be in my wheelhouse, but I felt nothing but pride as I looked over my work.

Link’s eyes were full of appreciation and apprehension as he eyed the piece. “A preacher’s podium?” He arched an eyebrow at Wasp. “It’s beautiful, but what the fuck is it for?”

Wasp grinned. “Figured since you like preaching at us so much, you should have your own pulpit, Prez.”

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