Page 81 of Biker's Tribute: Property of Bear

"Riding the bike all the way out west?" Hog asks. "Shit."

Magnum fumbles around his jacket for a small pistol, answering Reed as he loads her up.

"No. Packing her up on the back of the truck," he responds. "But I need to get going. We have the club meeting in a few weeks and Southpaw insists I attend."

I nod along with his reminder about the club meeting because I'm looking forward to a few days of getting piss drunk and getting into trouble. I'm no Shaw, but I don't mind a bit of gambling.

"Newbies getting patched in," Reed says agreeably. "Well. Better head upstairs and see if Ethan's dead or not."

Magnum smiles. Reed has a dark sense of humor. Most of us do. We grew up living rough with a strong sense of family, but a stronger sense of independence and freedom.

It's a good sign that Magnum doesn't seem worried.

"Bear's smart. I trust he's found a way to hold them off."

"Only one way to find out," I point out. We enter the building, three giants standing in the landing of an old Boston condominium building with hardwood flooring stained a deep mahogany and plush red carpet on the steps.

It's so quiet, you could hear a bullet drop into a chamber from three floors up. Eerie. Blood rushes past my ears and every sense heightens. I wish I could pretend to hate the thrill of the hunt.

The army changes you. That much is true. It's hard to explain exactly how much to civilians. I wouldn't even bother trying.

"Which condo?" Hog whispers, scanning the foyer for clues. I find the list of mailboxes and scan the names. Magnum and I say the answer together, but I don't know how his drunk ass figured it out without checking.

"Second."

"They'll hear us coming," Reed whispers.

"Good," Magnum says. "I want this over with. Quickly..."

The three of us storm up the stairs together, preparing for a bloodbath. If not a bloodbath, at the very least a mess to clean up.

* * *

Zebulon is a name from the Bible.

Thirty

Amanda

Mallory and I exchange glances. The men in the room are all intently focused on the card game. Vito deals the cards. Ethan gambles my best friend’s life away and I question my talents as a therapist for the first time. It’s quiet, except for the noise that just made me and Mallory exchange glances. The men don’t notice.

I don’t know if that noise means more help, or more problems. I fixate on the game in front of me and sadly… on Ethan. Once the cards flip, he doesn’t look away from them once. I don’t know if this is guilt, or his addiction fully on display. He asked me to trust him, but how can I do that when he just offered to essentially sell my best friend to some random men alleging to be her family.

Alleging.

Who am I kidding? The second the tall one walked through the door, I saw the resemblance. Mallory has these clear blue, downturned eyes and her brother has the same ones. He was born after she left her family. He’s her relative, I can tell that much. But I can’t tell how much danger she’s in from these men. They claim they have orders not to hurt her but… I still want to know why she ran away and more importantly, why they want Mallory back and why they need her backnowon such an urgent timeline..

And as for Ethan… My best friend isn’t an object that I want this man to wager.

After this much time clean from gambling and finding purpose in his life… I thought he would have learned some type of ethics by now. Will he ever have any ethics?

The dealer deals two cards face up to both Ethan & Dario. They both get two cards face up and the way I remember it, each of them will have the choice to hit or stand. Whoever wins two out of the three hands will win the entire game. Simple, yet I don’t want to do the actual math on the odds here. I just want to trust Ethan and hope that he’s doing this to buy time.

“Hit or stand,” Vito, the dealer, asks while visibly impatient. “We can end this quickly the faster you choose.”

Mallory reaches for the wine bottle and when no one stops her, she tips the rest of her wine down her throat. I agree with her sentiment about being way too sober for this. I suck back the two sips of wine lingering at the bottom of my glass.

Ethan hits. Because of course he does. Based on the dealt cards in front of him, he’s not even close to 21 yet. The dealer slides him a card face down, and Ethan grins when he takes a look.

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