Pigpen starts to turn and I shove at his chest. “Stay back.”
“Fucking cute, but that’s my brother.”
“And that’s my father. We agreed to a plan. Trust the club, remember?”
Pigpen practically snarls at me, but he retakes his seat on top of the picnic table. “I liked you better rogue.”
“No, you didn’t.” My attention flickers between Pigpen and Dad. The guy about my age walks up to the bench and Dad scoots over. Pigpen’s brother sits.
“Stupid kid,” Pigpen mutters. “Didn’t check his six before he sat down. I like you better true to the club, but in this moment, it sucks.”
Convinced Pigpen isn’t going to rush his blood brother, I settle back beside him. “Guessing you didn’t know he was the defector?” Which suggests Pigpen’s brother didn’t reach out to him, but to another member of the Terror.
“I also liked you better mute,” he mumbles.
Even though Pigpen’s stinging, I can’t help the slight tilt of my lips. “No, you don’t.”
“No, I don’t,” he repeats. “Our club won’t take him if he patched in to the Riot.”
I may be expressing myself more, but there are times when a man talks that he needs people to be silent. This is one of those times. After a few minutes of watching Pigpen’s brother talk and watching my father listen, I attempt to be the man Breanna brought out in me. “Maybe he hasn’t patched in yet. Maybe he’s seeking asylum with us before he gets that far.”
Pigpen works his jaw like my attempt at hope is fruitless, but he says, “Maybe.”
His brother offers my dad his hand and, after two beats of glaring him down, Dad accepts. The tension leaves my body when Pigpen’s brother strides across the street. At least that didn’t collapse into an ambush and then an all-out dogfight.
Dad switches his attention to us, and when he locks eyes with me, he jerks his head for me to join him. With one are-you-going-to-live glance at Pigpen, he rolls his eyes, and I sit with Dad on the bench.
He says nothing as the two of us check out the passing traffic. Two red lights and a near collision of a minivan with a pickup later, Dad speaks. “Three o’clock might interest you.”
The detective who snowballed this entire saga with the club observes us from his car to our right. He notices me staring. “What’s he doing here?”
“I called him,” Dad says.
Wasn’t expecting to hear that. “Why?”
Dad rubs his hands together as he leans forward. “When your mom died...” He sucks in a breath like it hurts for him to talk. “I left town.”
This part, I remember. Nothing like burying your mother, then spending night after night looking out a window wondering if your father was going to be next.
“I came here, to Louisville. Eli and Oz’s dad were with me. At times Cyrus rode along. I was determined to find who ran your mom off the road...to hunt down who was responsible.”
Nerves cause me to shift. I thought I wanted this answer, but there’s an unsettling in my soul. After pushing and pulling Kyle off that bridge, the thought of being the man pursuing justice by taking a life tastes sour in my mouth. “And?”
“And I found him. Sat outside his house. Waited to make him pay, and when the moment presented itself, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t put a bullet in his head.”
I close my eyes. Half relieved. Half feeling like I’m losing Mom again.
“He had a son,” Dad continues. “Your age, and when I saw that kid running out to greet that damn bastard...I couldn’t do it. So I improvised.”
My eyebrows rise and Dad bitterly chuckles. “More like I bluffed. I didn’t have hard proof of what they had done, but I told the Riot I did. The deal was made that the Riot would back off us and I would make sure that the evidence I said I had would disappear.”
Growing up, I’m not sure I could have accepted that, but now I can.
“What’s this have to do with the guy you talked to?” In case Dad had no idea it was Pigpen’s brother, because that’s info he should drop, not me. “With the detective?”
Dad circles the wedding ring that he still wears on his left hand. “Thought about how you felt about us lying to you. In fact, the entire board has. What do you think about nailing the bastard that killed your mom? Finding the evidence that can put him away?”
I collapse back against the bench. “What about the peace between our clubs?”
“It’s something we’ll have to consider, but for the first time since she died, the possibility of hard-core evidence exists.”
The pieces click in place. Pigpen’s brother might be volunteering to rat. “I don’t know.”
“Neither do I, but it’s worth at least thinking about.”
We both regard the traffic again and it’s like doors I thought were closed open, but I’m not sure if they should be walked through. “Do I have time to think about this?”
“You have some.”
I nod and Dad twirls his wedding band again. “I’m in love with Jill.”
He is. I’ve had dinner with them twice. Dad looks at her like he used to with Mom. Jill makes him laugh, makes him think. Challenges him, I guess. A lot like Breanna challenged me. It’s acid and a Band-Aid at the same time. “Are you going to marry her?”
“I’d like to.”
I wish I could talk to Breanna. “Then you should.” And I meet his eyes to let him know the words rolling off my lips are sincere.