Page 82 of Daddy Issues

Ivan, sun shining on his bald head making it an angry red color, pulled out a pistol-grip shotgun similar to the one that hung over my back door.

When they looked back at me, I held up the Uzi the kid had. “If I have to use it, y’all better eat sand before I pull the trigger.”

“Brother, I’ll be flopping around like a fucking Gila monster.” Ivan’s toothy smile made me grin. Plus, if he kept it up today, his sunburned head and black leather cut would make him a dead ringer for the lizard.

“You guys have way more fun than we do.” Romeo whistled, taking the Gunnar approved rifle Drop Top handed to him.

“He’s new.” Gunnar and Ivan exchanged an amused look before piling ammo on his chest.

The younger guy balanced the lot and the unloaded rifle with an unperturbed expression. He was still young enough to find this shit fun.

Nah, it wasn’t about age. Pork Chop and Ivan were both amped up and damn near giddy. But Cam was getting serious now, lighting a cigarette and shrugging off his cut to hang in the clubhouse. Not long ago, he’d blown Preacher’s brains all over a gravel driveway without blinking. And he hadn’t been laughing when he’d given the order that had secured my first-class ticket straight to hell.

I stowed my weapon in the van and followed Cam with my cut, hanging it on the peg near his. We would all ride in the back of the van, Drop Top driving…he’d never even waddle out of the driver’s seat.

“You good?” Cam asked me, taking a drag from his cigarette.

“Yeah.” I lifted a shoulder. “Rather be royally fucking shit up than on a roof with Merc watching Jester steal a van.”

“That’s what I like to hear.” The grin he sported as we walked out made me wonder if I was wrong about how much he got off on this shit.

***

On the outskirts of the Bends, small simple houses popped up in rows. We stopped before turning onto a dead-end street where three of those sandy colored houses with rusting tin roofs stood away from the rest.

A dilapidated chain-link fence surrounded all three. In places, the top rail was completely missing and the fence itself sunken or fallen over. Entry wouldn’t be a problem.

By the house farthest from the shared driveway was an old pull-behind RV with the windows blacked out with cardboard and duct tape. It sat on blocks far enough away that if it blew up, the house itself would probably be okay.

Any farther and it would be outside the fence.

A barrel chested, squat pit-bull, chained to a thin tree, watched us lazily.

It wasn’t quite ten am yet, which meant most of the residents weren’t awake yet. So far, we were unseen.

“That shit why you had this idea?” I pointed across the street where the bulldozers were building up a lot for new construction.

“Yup, they won’t even realize we’re coming until we’re there.” Cam lit a cigarette and climbed from the van.

I followed and opened up the back door so the rest of the guys could climb out. The sound of Gunnar’s descent off the trailer in the dozer was absorbed by the construction site noise.

Cam lifted his eyebrows and grinned around his cigarette as we checked out weapons. With everything loaded and ready to go, he climbed into the cab of the dozer to give Gunnar final directions and then we followed him in, over the busted fence, crushing it completely.

Romeo moved the big truck, mostly blocking the view from across the street. Though not even the construction workers batted an eye. The cops wouldn’t come, anyway.

We were the Desert Kings. We ran this county.

Our positions were already planned. Romeo, between the dog on the chain and the big truck, rifle trained on the other two houses. Cam in front of the main house. Drop Top and Chop around back but to the side and out of Cam’s line of fire, and me behind it all with the Uzi resting somewhere between the main house and that fucked up camper.

Ivan, the slighter built of all of us, ran up near the house, ducking beneath windows, banged on the front door like a SWAT take down, then jogged to flank Cam.

The rumble of the dozer made it hard to hear, but I was sure the occupants were buzzing about and dumping whatever they could. Sure enough, several seconds later a few guys burst from the back door, blew by Top and Chop and took off over the fence and into the desert.

Didn’t even take the time to see who was knocking.Pussies.

Gunnar dropped the scoop front of the dozer until it rested on the roof of the black Challenger.

When the front door opened, a skinny woman with greasy brown hair in only her panties and a white tank top stood in the doorway. Fear, real and almost painful to see, spread out over her expression, and she visibly trembled when she saw Cam and the machine gun.

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