Page 39 of Atlas

I shake my head, which only makes Tyrant’s easy smile grow. Despite the danger we’ve found ourselves in and all the duties and responsibilities that lay heavy on his shoulders, he never loses his magnetic smile.

“She wants to go lob grenades in her field when this is all over.”

“Bullet could show her how to do it safely.”

“That’s not a good idea! She’s a granny!”

Tyrant scoffs. “No one is going to be able to tell that lady anything. If she wants to play with grenades, she’s going to do just that. I’d rather she do it safely.”

“I’m sure there are more than a few guys here who would sign up for an afternoon of setting up a safe shelter just to be able to watch her do it. It seems a little like those guys that take an oldwasher and throw a brick into it until it detonates. Incredibly. Unsafe.”

“And vastly entertaining. If I send men out with her to do it, I’m sure they’ll keep her safe and maybe this whole thing will go from being the worst experience of her life, to the highlight.”

“I need to make sure she doesn’t blow limbs off,” I grumble, hating that anyone thinks this is amusing. Agatha could blow herself up for fuck’s sake. Or someone else. I was in that house today. I shielded Willa and that was my only concern in the moment. I didn’t give a shit about my own life, but that could have been serious.

Willa could have beenhurt.

That makes me sick to my stomach. It causes a violent shiver to rip me apart, the truth sinking hooked talons into my stomach and barbs into the meat of me.

All that aside, there’s another reason to keep Agatha safe other than the obvious. “Willa’s starting to see her as a grandma figure. I can tell.” It’s Willa’s safety I care about, but also her happiness. “She never had one in her life. Agatha might be all bluster, but she’s lonely too.”

“Everything will work out.” Tyrant has this way of saying those words that makes them sound true, even though he can’tknowthat. “We left the number in the trunk. Wizard is monitoring the burner phone. We have a plan in place for where to meet and how to do it. Whenever that call comes in, we’re ready.”

“Thank you for having our back in this.”

“It concerned the club as well.” He doesn’t need to say that even if it didn’t, he and the rest of the guys would have beenthere just the same. “It concerns our city and that means our families and our homes.”

A bead of sweat trickles down the back of my neck and I reach up to scratch it. I’ve never questioned my Prez. Never put forward a suggestion or an idea. I’ve never demanded information. “I had this thought…” I break off, too unsure of myself to continue, but Tyrant just looks at me with those soft eyes, encouraging me to go on. “Wizard’s getting increasingly busy. He takes on so much. I thought that- I think that someone should help him out. I wouldn’t suggest it and not volunteer my time, but I know nothing about tech.”

As I thought, such an obvious gap in the club hasn’t escaped our Prez. “I’m on it. We haven’t brought it forward in church yet, but it’s been on our minds as a collective. I just don’t know whether it’s going to be a situation where the person we want can prospect for the club, or if it would be a contract situation.”

It’s extremely clear from that phrasing that he has someone in mind already. If Tyrant hasn’t approached whoever this man is and asked him to prospect, it’s because he has his doubts that he’d be a good fit. There’s a misconception about biker clubs that they’ll take anyone. That may be true very few times, and it would never be true for us. We’re a family because Tyrant and the rest of the officers are careful about who prospects. If someone very clearly won’t fit with us, or with Hart as a whole, then they’re not going to be able to join.

“Contracting out is risky.” I find myself voicing that instead of just thinking it. “Someone else would know club business and have they wouldn’t always be obligated to keep it a secret.”

We went through this with Harold Jacobs, the club’s old lawyer. He went AWOL and tried to shake the club down for money, and when that didn’t work, he kidnapped Lynette. His plan wasn’t well thought out. He and his son are both serving jail time. Tyrant let the law have them, like he let the law deal with his father after Zale tried to kill him and take over this club, but that’s not always going to be an option.

There are men far more dangerous than Harold out there.

“We’d have to take them at their word and their professionalism.”

“Honor amongst thieves and mercenaries is an almost absurd concept.” It’s not lost on me that people might say that same thing about me, and if not, then for sure about my club brothers.

“Some people would say that we have no honor,” Tyrant says, but it’s like he’s in line with my unspoken thoughts. “But then, some people are judgmental assholes.”

I wait for him to continue, not pressing. Even still, I’m astounded when he goes on. I’m not in the kind of position where he offers up club business. I used to be so intimidated, or maybe awestruck, by him and Raiden, despite the fact they weren’t that much older than me, that I could barely utter two words in their presence.

“The guy I have in mind is rogue. Ex-military. He has friends who are involved with other clubs, so he knows the world, but isn’t a part of it. He probably has good reason to skirt around the fringes. It would be a hard sell for him, more so than it would be for us, but I think that we can trust him. I’ve been asking around for over six months, and this was the best lead I had.”

Six months? He’s been on this all that time? I don’t know why that should take me aback. Tyrant’s grandfather started this club. His dad was Prez for years. He’s lived for the club his whole life. It’s in his blood.

“He knows how to play the field. He’s rough, mind and body. He’d scare the women senseless. There’s the kind of man we’d allow to patch in and then there’s the kind who we wouldn’t be able to sleep at night knowing they walk amongst us.”

“We do have a few of those,” I deadpan. “He might fit right in.”

“I’m talking way beyond the level of anyone here.”

“Morally black. I get it.”

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