Page 39 of Clear Your Mind

Idon’t have an issue with doing what needs to be done. Apparently, I do have an issue with what Krystal thinks of me doing it.

My mind isn’t on the body we just disposed of, hopefully to never resurface again. It’s on my past. My first cold-blooded kill. What will she think of me when I tell her? And I will tell her. She’s my ol’ lady, after all, that is, if she accepts the designation. Not sure how she’ll handle a property designation after looking her past in the eye.

Her reluctance and wariness of me and my club make sense.

“So you claimed her.”

It wasn’t a question from Kilt but a statement of fact. I don’t do touchy-feely and I especially don’t do hand-holding, touchy-feely share time singing “Kumbaya.”

The voice that I’ve tuned out for years decides now is a good time to remind me that I used to do touchy-feely emotions. Not to mention that tendency resurfaced since meeting Krystal.

Maybe I could share more with my brothers. It’s what Morningstar had wanted for me. Hell, what he sent me halfway across the country to find. “I draw the line at holding hands.”

“What’s that, veep?” Shit, I’d spoken aloud. I tossed a look over my shoulder at Ripper. Hood in place, he sat in the back corner of the van, not paying attention to us. The music is fairly loud in the back and the hood keeps him from knowing where we dispose of our trash.

“Yeah.”

“How’s she feel about it? I mean after.” He kinda waves toward the back of the van where Jeff, or rather Caddy’s body, had been just an hour earlier.

“Not sure. Seeing your man kill someone isn’t exactly up there with poetry, flowers, and chocolates.”

Kilt barks a laugh. “First, she doesn’t strike me as the poetry and chocolates type. Flowers, maybe if they’re like dandelions or wildflowers or some shit you can pick on the side of the road. Besides, since he was a piece of shit, she might be grateful.”

“He was worse than we realized.” I thought to leave it at that, but I pushed through my discomfort with feelings. I need another point of view. “They gang-raped and brutalized a club girl and made her watch. Did it to punish her, but I think what he did to her after, before she ran away, was just as bad.”

Kilt’s grip tightens on the steering wheel. I watch his knuckles go white. “Good thing he’s dead then because I would cut his balls off and shove ’em in his mouth after I gave him a smile.”

“Still, before we left, she asked me not to shoot Ripper. Not for him, but for me. Said she didn’t want it on my soul.”

My soul is already doomed to the hottest corner of hell, but I would keep that far away from her if I could.

“It does leave a mark,” Kilt states flatly. “But some marks are necessary for those we love. I believe we carry those marks differently.”

“It’s not the first time,” I blurt out before I realize what I’m doing.

Kilt laughs again, but this time it’s hollow. “None of us are virgins in that aspect, brother. My advice, drink until you can’t remember. Then when you sober up, never forget it. Wear it like armor, but not like a yoke.”

First off, who the fuck is the guy who looks like Kilt but doesn’t sound like him? Second, when did he get so deep?

“I wasn’t protecting anyone…the first time. They were already dead. He didn’t deserve to draw breath when they couldn’t.”

“Did I forget to add that?” His tone went from philosophical to jesting so fast I got whiplash. “I amend, some are necessary for those we love and those who fucking deserve it.”

“Who are you, and what did you do with the club enforcer?”

Kilt slams on the brakes and I cut him a glare when the seat belt chokes me and not in a sexy way.

“The club whositwhatnow?”

“Fuck.” Dude is going to skin me alive. We’d only recently decided to make him such and I just spilled the beans. “Don’t tell Dude, that’s an order.”

“Last I checked, prez is up here, and veep is here.” He demonstrates our respective positions with his hands as he accelerates back to speed.

“Okay, I order you not to tell unless your prez gives an order that trumps that, satisfied?”

Kilt makes an overexaggerated thinking face and I find myself enjoying this kind of comradery I haven’t allowed myself to indulge in before.

“That works for me.”

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