Page 93 of Banshee
I watched as Johnny walked out the door with Grace. She didn’t know it yet, but she wasn’t going back home. Not until this fucking war was over. Not ever, if I had anything to say about it.
“What the fuck is this, King?”
“The Death Dogs,” I said, my voice as weary as my body was. “There are cameras at the front of the building. But they’ll be covered. You won’t see their faces or their cuts. Not if they’re smart.”
“Are they smart?”
“I don’t fucking know.”
I didn’t know anything anymore. Skinner didn’t strike me as being smart, but he’d managed to pull one over on Kronos and convince him to give up his daughter.
He’d convinced Steele to join forces. Though that one didn’t surprise me as much as it should have. Not after what Sypher had told me about the recording of him and his brother Stone bragging about killing their parents.
Titan was a good man. A good president. He was fair and just. Everything he did was to benefit the club and the men he led. He wasn’t selfish like Steele. I’d looked up to that son of a bitch until he killed my best friend. I was done then. I’d rallied the men I trusted, and we got the hell out.
Steele knew I blamed him for Chasm’s death. I hadn’t kept it a secret from him. Things changed after that day.
Little Rock, Arkansas, 2019,
“We’re doing it, brother,” I told Cash. “I want you to be VP.”
“Me? Are you sure?”
“No one else I’d rather have by my side, brother.”
Cash nodded. We both knew that wasn’t entirely the truth. Chasm should have been my VP. He would have been if Titan hadn’t died. It’d been four years, and I still missed the old man.
“Gunner?” Cash asked.
“Gunner, Jack, Blade, Colt, Jingles, Ghost, and Nav. And whoever else wants to go with us,” I told him.
“Where?”
“Blade wants to go to Nebraska. Says he has a line on some land in a small town a few hours from Denver. Place he grew up.”
I knew all about Blade’s life. His father had been in the Irish Mob, and because he’d narc’d on his boss, his family was in witness protection until the Mob found them and killed his parents, but left him alive.
It hadn’t come without consequences. Every six months, the boss called him to make sure he’d kept his mouth shut about his parents. I’d offered to talk to Dec. My brother was a cop; it would make his career to bring down the head of the Irish Mob. But Blade said no. He said the calls weren’t long and the guy mostly asked about his life. It was something I’d keep an eye on when I was officially president.
“Nebraska? Don’t they have tornadoes and fucking blizzards?”
“You’ll adapt,” I assured him. “It’s the price of freedom, brother.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“Blade wants us to take a trip up there, talk to the old woman that has the land.”
Blade, Jack, Gunner, Cash, and I took the trip to Diamond Creek, Nebraska. As soon as I saw the little map-dot town, I knew it was the right place for us.
A place to build our club.
Build the quiet life we deserved.
We met Willow Washington. She was a spitfire in her late sixties, and she agreed to sell us a piece of the land she and her husband had owned.
We walked around the town with our cuts on to get a feel for how we would be received. Not that it would stop us, but we were pleased to see the locals mostly accepted us.
Of course, we hadn’t moved to town yet. Once we built the clubhouse, then we’d know how they really felt. Not that it mattered. Diamond Creek was our new home.
