Page 61 of Tater
Eagle nodded. “You think he knows she’s on the move?”
“He knows everything,” Tater said. “That’s the problem.”
Eagle shifted. “So, what now?”
Tater folded the note, tucked it into his cut. “Now we stop reacting.”
He stood, crossed to the map, and pointed. “He’s using the depots like arteries. We hit two, we choke three. But not yet. Not until Ren calls in. I want her eyes before I move.”
Eagle’s brow furrowed. “And if she doesn’t?”
“She will.”
He said it with the kind of faith that hurt.
When Eagle left, the room went still again. Tater lit a cigarette, watched the smoke twist toward the ceiling. For a moment, he saw her face in it — wild eyes, blood on her cheek,that ghost of a smile she only gave when she was about to do something reckless.
He exhaled hard, rubbing a hand over his face.
The dragon wasn’t the only fire he had to worry about.
Outside, Brick and Eagle were already rolling another barrel into place. The rest of the club moved like a machine that had learned how to keep going even when pieces were missing.
Tater stepped out onto the porch, squinting into the morning sun. The air smelled like rain and road dust. Somewhere far down that road, Ren was still riding.
He reached into his pocket; thumb brushed the empty space where the chain used to sit. For the first time in a long while, he felt something like peace in that absence.
“She’s got it,” he murmured. “That’s enough.”
Then he turned back toward the clubhouse, toward maps and plans and the next long day of waiting.
The war wasn’t coming anymore.
It was already here.
CHAPTER 37
The Truck Stop Gospel
The place was the kind of nowhere that bred stories.
A single flickering neon sign—UCK STOP—buzzed against the night.
The parking lot held three rigs, a mud-stained pickup, and a rust-bitten Coke machine that hadn’t worked in years.
Ren parked close to the windows, back tire angled toward the exit. Always ready to leave.
The dragon inside her went still, waiting.
It understood places like this—thin places, where trouble wore a human face.
She stepped inside. Bells on the door rattled tiredly.
The diner smelled of coffee burned twice and bacon that had died for the wrong cause. Vinyl booths cracked at the seams; a jukebox hummed a song from twenty years back. The waitress behind the counter looked up once, eyes glazed with the kind of disinterest that meant she’d seen worse than a woman in leathers.
Ren took the corner booth, back to the wall, view of the door. Old habits.
A trucker two tables over glanced her way, then back to his pie. Another—older, with a beard that looked carved from asphalt—kept looking. Not leering, just studying.
