“Then she deletes her texts and calls,” High told him.
“I hear you, High, but it’s the way she wants it done.”
“It’s the way you want it done, brother,” High returned quietly.
“She’s stickin’ her neck out for Chaos, We do it like she’s comfortable doin’ it.”
“You’re doin’ it ’cause she’s pretty, she smiles at you, and you’re into her.”
“It’s not that,” Snapper bit out.
High saw traffic moving around him, looked back to see the light was green, and moved his foot to the gas pedal, accelerating.
He did this speaking.
“Rule between brothers but that rule extends between bikers and you know it. Pussy’s claimed, pussy is claimed. You do not go there.”
“Told you it’s not about that,” Snapper replied.
“Got years on you, brother, and I’m not blind. Not sayin’ this shit to piss you off. Sayin’ it to save you a load of hurt. She’s into her man. She’s riskin’ a lot to get him clean. You’re not in that.”
“Straight up and no offense, High, but her man is weak,” Snap returned.
High’s jaw got hard at his words because they spoke to what Snap thought of High because back in the day High had once been like Rosalie’s boyfriend, riding that edge, going for the high, doing this with and without his Rosalie.
But fortunately, Snapper wasn’t done.
“The no offense part is the fact that the Bounties know Chaos history. They know the shit they’re gettin’ into is fucked up and they know just how that shit can fuck up a club because it did that to Chaos. And they’re gettin’ into it. I know a lot of those brothers don’t like it but they sit a table just like us. Gavel doesn’t drop until a decision is voted, so they’re votin’ that shit in. Rosalie doesn’t know how her man is voting. But he’s doin’ that shit and that says a lot.”
“Club goes a way, you’re a brother, you go that way,” High pointed out.
Snapper didn’t say anything and High knew why.
Because that was the straight-up truth.
High kept going.
“Tack wanted me in with you to take your back but more, to take Rosalie’s. That’s my focus. Keepin’ her safe while she does Chaos a good turn. You gotta be all in on that and you gotta be that for her. It isn’t about what she’s doin’ for the Club or what she makes you feel when you’re with her. It’s about her. And that’s the way of it, brother. She’s yours or she’s not, she’s a woman and you’re any kind of man, you look out for her every way you can.”
High turned on his signal and slowed to make a turn as Snapper kept silent.
He’d made the turn, they were cruising, and High said no more. His point had been made. Snap didn’t take it, for Rosalie, High would have no choice but to inform the brothers and Snapper would be removed from her detail.
“I’ll get a burner,” Snap muttered.
High drew in a breath and let it out slowly.
Then he just drove.
* * *
After High parked at the Compound, Snap didn’t waste time jumping from the truck and taking off.
High watched him as he angled out, but he looked toward the back of the store when he heard Hound call his name.
“Man inside lookin’ for you,” Hound said, raising a hand, thumb extended to indicate over his shoulder and into the store.
High lifted his chin, slammed his door, and hit the locks.
“Know him?” he asked.
“Nope,” Hound answered.
Hound headed to the garage.
High headed to the store.
He went in, turned right to head up an aisle to the cash register at the front but stopped two aisles in when he saw Dot’s husband, Alan, looking at the fan belts.
He sighed.
Then he moved down that aisle toward Millie’s brother-in-law. Alan caught sight of his movement and gave his attention to High, doing this turning full body to face him.
High stopped a few feet away.
“Alan,” he greeted.
He didn’t get a greeting back.
“Dot says you’re movin’ in to Millie’s,” he stated.
“Not doin’ it,” High told him. “Did it. I’m in.”
He watched Alan’s mouth get tight before he noted, “Movin’ real fuckin’ fast, man.”
“May seem that way to you. Me, waitin’ twenty years to have her back seems real fuckin’ slow,” High replied.
High watched as something changed about Alan and he watched it knowing he wasn’t going to like the change.
Then the man opened his mouth and proved High right.
“Pretty lucky for you, you walk away from your family, find yourself livin’ in an RV, you also find an ex who’s still hung up on you. An ex with a sweet crib. And you got her back a coupla days and your clothes are in her closet.”
High stood there, motionless except to take in a deep breath.
Then, quietly, he returned, “Could buy my girls a house, that bein’ all my girls, my two babies and Millie, layin’ cash down on somethin’ that’d make Millie’s pad look ghetto. Could do that, upgrade my truck, buy another bike, and, bud, I already got three, and do that in cash too. Do all that and take Millie on a five-star trip back to Paris, give her the luxury. Do all that and not even touch my girls’ college funds. You didn’t know any a’ that shit. I get that. Now you do.”
“You could buy your girls a pad, why’re you livin’ in an RV?” Alan shot back.