Page 48 of Moonshine Lullabies

She nodded and hefted the frayed and hole-filled pack onto her narrow shoulder.

She went with me back to her kid’s room and helped me pack his shit anyway, her face impassive and shuttered as we did it together.

When we went out into the living room, Cy had a bag of his own and Hex and Saint were standing with him.

“Where’s Tate?” she demanded, alarmed.

“Out with our parents,” Cy declared.

“Goddammit, J.P.,” she muttered with consternation and she went out the front door, her shoulders dropping with relief when Tate’s voice filtered in past her calling out, “Mom!”

She’d been right to be annoyed. I guess her mamma’d been up Tate’s ass to go home with her and his papaw.

Her mother was extra, clawin’ at Tate and puttin’ up a hell of a fuss but Jessie-Lou ain’t back down.

“He’s comin’ with me tonight, Ma, and that’s final! He’ll be at your place come Sunday night so he can go to school on Monday, but I ain’t bein’ separated from my son over the whole damn weekend and I ain’t stayin’ with you!”

“Watch how you talk to your mother!” her daddy shouted at her and then the whole family broke out screamin’ at each other in Cajun French, Cy comin’ out the door to wade into the fray and get everybody separated into their respective corners.

Jessie-Lou won her way, but I could tell it wasn’t without a cost. She looked exhausted and frayed as she and Tate piled into the back seat of Hex’s truck.

I went over to my bike to load it up and snorted out a disgusted noise.

“The matter?” Saint called.

“It’s all shot to fuckin’ shit, too!” I called back. “Ain’t sure I should turn her over.”

Cy threw the keys to his truck to Saint and said, “You guys take my truck, load the bike onto the dolly. We’ll get it back to the club and sort it all out from there.” Saint gave a nod and he and I both went jogging out to the garage.

“What was he doin’ here without you here?” I heard his mother demand, and I heard Cy let out an exasperated noise. Saint and I traded a smirk and a grin but hurried the fuck up, getting things situated.

Jessie and Tate watched from the truck, Tate having moved to the front seat for a better view, Hex sitting behind the wheel as we loaded my bike onto the trailer.

“Damn it to hell,” I muttered at the rich smell of gas wafting off the bike as we rolled it up onto the dolly.

Cy had finally gotten his parents to fuck off, and sat on his bike nearby, his headlight trained on us along with Hex’s truck lights so that we could see what the fuck we were doing in the dark.

It took us a while, but the bike got loaded and some of the Sheriff’s men, in deference to Jessie, helped us board up the house. Cy and I kept our cool in front of the cops. We would be settling it later, but for now, there was a bunch of shit to be done.

By the time Saint and I were on the road, following Cy on his bike, I was tired and we were both surprised and not surprised the cops let me take the bike.

“You know they ain’t gonna do shit about this,” Saint declared and I nodded.

“That’s crystal fuckin’ clear,” I said, lookin’ out the back window of the truck at the gleam of the chrome of my bike in the red taillights.

“At least they weren’t assholes about me takin’ her with me.”

“Fuck of a silver lining there, brother.”

I snorted.

No, that was in Hex’s truck, far ahead of me, finally realizing she had someone in her corner. That was therealsilver lining out of this whole clusterfuck of events.

We pulled through the gate at the club around an hour or so later. The boys were almost all here, piling out of the lit doorway of one of the garage bay doors to look at my bike and help bring it in to where we could assess the damage and likely could start tearing it apart for its rebuild.

For once, I had something more important than my bike to worry about. I got out of the truck and immediately called to Hex, “Where’d you stash my girl?”

He pointed up and across the street and I followed his pointing finger.

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