Page 74 of Givin' Me Fitz!
“Dude, I expected you to make me breakfast.” Hobie whined at me as he ripped the foil package open and took a huge bite of cinnamon-brown-sugar goodness.
“I’m taking Fitz and TJ out for breakfast when I go pick them up at Sparky’s house. Any thoughts on what I told you last night?” I still had no idea whether Hobie was on my father’s side, and it broke my heart to consider that he might be.
“We need to have church, man, but I want to know who you think might have crossed the line aside from Ricky and your old man. How do you think Abner talked a federal agent into turning?” Hobie stared at me, waiting for an answer I didn’t have.
He cocked his eyebrow, which had a black barbell through it that I hadn’t noticed before. Since I had no idea how my father got Ricky Marlow to abandon the DEA and join the club, I decided to address his new piercing.
“Where’d you get the new hardware?” I pointed to it before I opened my pastry package.
“Oh, a couple of weeks ago, I met this guy who does tats over on Main Street in the Arts District. We were in a bar over there, and I noticed his sleeve. It’s fucking amazing. Anyway, I dropped by the other afternoon when I was uh… I was running an errand. The chick who does piercings had time, so I got it. Barely felt it at all. You should come with me to check it out next time.” He moved his hand to the piercing and turned the bar.
“Are you a traitor to the Cowboys?”There!I’d said it.
I expected Hobie to storm out of the place after he beat the fuck out of me, and I’d let him because I couldn’t imagine my best friend turning on me or the club. I’d rather take a bullet than consider it true.
Hobie exhaled and took a sip of his coffee before he adjusted himself in the chair and stared at me. “If I didn’t love you more than I love my biological brothers, I’d knock your ass out of that chair and stomp you into this linoleum. You know I have respect for Abner, but now, he’s a traitor to me. I wouldn’t piss on him if he was on fire.
“I patched into the Pahrump Steel Cowboys because my old man had been a Cowboy. I didn’t think there was anything better than being a Cowboy, so I prospected while you were in the Army, and when my dad… well, you know what happened. The club got me through it, or I wouldn’t have survived.”
Hobie’s childhood was fucked-up. His old man was a junkie and a son of a bitch, and he treated Hobie like shit. My friend—brother—deserved better, and I felt ashamed for questioning him, but…
“I get it, but that didn’t answer my question, Hobie. Are you still with the Cowboys, or will you be trading your cowboy-hat-wearing skeleton for an arachnid?” I stared at him, waiting for an answer.
“Arachnid? Listen to you! Did Fitz buy you a word-of-the-day calendar?” Hobie chuckled.
“You’re still not answering me. Which side are you on? Am I fighting this alone?” I hoped he had enough respect for our friendship to be honest with me. It was time for all of us to choose a side.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Fitz
I sat at Sparky’s kitchen table having coffee while Monty gave the kid a good look to be sure there was nothing life-threatening. Like Sawyer, Monty had received some medical training from his time in the Marines, and I hoped to hell he could tell if the kid had internal bleeding. I was pretty sure there were a couple of fractured ribs, based on the bruising on his torso.
“You think that kid is in any shape to fight? God, he looks like he should be in the hospital.” Sparky swirled his coffee mug as he stared at me.
“I’m not pushing him to fight, I promise you. Fuck, I agree with you. He should be in the hospital. Problem is, he’s over eighteen and he has his own mind.”
Sparky nodded. “Yeah, it’s a pain in the ass, ain’t it.”
“On our jog over here, he said he owes that fight to the club. They hired him at Cowpokes, and he claims it kept him off the streets. He has a place to sleep, food to eat, and medical care, plus he has his own money. He says having to be drug tested every week, along with all the other tests the workers undergo, kept him from the same damn addiction that killed his parents. Sawyer’s rule is one shot—one bad test of any drugs in his system, and he’s out. He wants to repay a debt he believes he owes. How do I stop him?”
I wasn’t bullshitting. I was serious when I asked the question. With everything going on, I was sure I only knew about ten percent of the bullshit TJ had suffered in his young life, and I was looking for someone, anyone, who had some advice on how to help the kid.
Sparky sipped his coffee as he glanced outside where Monty was sitting on a chair talking to TJ as he soaked in the freezing bath of ice. Monty was an amazing guy. He and Sparky just fit together like a beautiful puzzle.
I was jealous because they had a bond I wanted to have with Sawyer. With this bullshit happening between him and Keller, I was at a loss of what to do to make it better.
Sparky sat back and sighed. “It’s hard to make anyone learn from our mistakes, isn’t it? I walk a fine line with my son. I want to keep him from doing some of the same stupid shit I did over my life, but Monty tells me I can’t keep Hardy from making his own mistakes. That’s the only way he’ll learn. I think that applies to TJ.”
“If this fight goes off the rails, I’m not sure what Sawyer might do, Sparky. I love him and I don’t want this club rivalry to wreck the future I believe we could have.”
Monty stepped inside. “Babe, I forgot a towel. Do you mind?” Sparky grinned and walked out of the kitchen.
“How’s he doing? Will this fight kill him?” I damn well didn’t want anything to happen to the kid.
“Leave him with me for a little while. I boxed when I was in the Marines. Not anything official. Underground shit from base to base, but I had to be ready to be deployed at any moment, and my chain of command had no desire for me to say I was in too much pain to leave because I’d had a fight the night before. Let me help him. What time is the fight tomorrow night?” Monty was obviously waiting for my answer, but it was ultimately up to TJ.
“I’m not sure. You’ll have to ask him. Sawyer has tried to keep me out of this shit, but I’m stubborn.” That wasn’t a lie.
