Page 61 of Pumpkin
In typical Tally fashion, she just smiled and waved at them, even though no one spoke or did anything to let her know they were looking at her.
The club twisted back to face Jenna’s phone. “He’s,” she stammered, confused. “Someone let him into the jail cell?”
“I doubt it,” Bulldog groused. “Asshole’s just sitting on the bench next to Steel.”
Pumpkin’s phone dinged alongside everyone else’s. He pulled it out to see a message from Ghost. It was a picture of Steel and Scar sitting side by side, but not touching, on a metal bench in a concrete room with jailhouse bars and a small window with frosted glass.
As one, the entire club turned back towards Tally. She just shrugged. Ever the Scar-translator, she explained, “Scar knows what it’s like to be imprisoned. He didn’t want Steel to have to sit through that alone.”
No one really knew what to say to that. So, of course, Bear had to make a smart-ass comment. “I think Scar just wanted to get out of the bachelor auction.”
It took some convincing,and some pleading on Ollie’s part, but Jenna finally agreed to remain at her house that night. The other ol’ ladies joined her, including Cage. The plans for the festival were the same, with the exception that Jenna still planned on spending the day at the station with Steel instead of running the event. Louisa and the other church ladies who had helped Jenna put the event on for the last eight years were stepping up to cover for her.
The small consolation was that Jenna said she would return home to sleep.
From the outside looking in, the festival was running smoothly. Kids were running around, everyone seemed in high spirits, and there’d only been one incident involving an altercation between two men. This was Pumpkin’s seventh time attending the festival. The club put smiles on and worked their asses off to ensure that everything was running like the well-oiled machine Jenna had honed it to be over the years.
Inside, though? Inside they wereallseething. Their President was sitting in a fucking jail cell and they were expected to stand up on a stage to be auctioned off like prized studs.
Dosia gripped his hand. “What’s wrong?”
Pumpkin hadn’t told her anything about Steel or that the club suspected he was being framed. The fact that Angel confirmed only a select number of snipers in the world could have made that shot due to the wind reports, distance, and trajectory did not bode well for Steel. Angel could have made the shot, as could Phoenix from theNon CrasMC, but no one else in the club’s inner circle. Which begged the question, who would set Steel up? And why?
A bigger question was if this was a vendetta against Steel or the club as a whole?
Keys had discovered that Dixie Gilbert and Fang, the Black Python’s former SAA, had been feeding the DEA information that pointed to theVia Daemoniarunning a local drug ring. A report from Fang stated that the VDMC had attacked the Black Pythons to take control of their illegal trades. Since there was no proof that it was the VDMC who wiped out the Black Pythons, it was still unclear how Fang had been able to convince the DEA of that. Keys was looking into it.
Based on what Keys found, and some guesswork, the club believed that Dixie Gilbert had been wired when she’d shown up weeks ago at the club’s gate. It was likely that her intentions were never to see Ollie, and only use him as an excuse to search the clubhouse for the evidence the DEA needed.Orpossibly even plant evidence. There was no way to know for sure since she’d been denied entry.
Keys found proof that Fang had been in and out of Mount Grove several times over the past year. There was a good chance that he’d spotted Ollie and that was how Dixie Gilbert had learned where he was. Ollie, Bree, and Aaron had sworn they would keep what they knew to themselves. As close an eye as the club was keeping on Jenna, they were also watching Ollie, but so far, the teen was not showing any signs of grief.
Jenna and Lucky had conferenced her adult children from Steel’s office to inform them, as well as call Steel’s sister, Lilly. Pumpkin felt slightly better when he discovered he wasn’t the only one in the club who hadn’t known Steel evenhada sister.
As for Scotty, Lila, and the rest of the club kids, all they were told was that Uncle Steel was away on “club business”. It was a simple white lie, but a statement the kids had heard before and wouldn’t consider to be strange. The club was being very careful to deflect any questions regarding Steel’s arrest from the nosier of the townspeople who had the balls to question one of them about it.
Pumpkin squeezed her hand. “Not really, but now is not the time or the place to talk about it.”
Dosia frowned. She had one hand on SJ’s stroller and the other in Pumpkin’s grip. They were watching JJ being led around on a pony. SJ was taking a much-needed nap. While Pumpkin hadn’t told the club about Dosia yet, they were all busy enough with their own families and assigned activities that they hadn’t run into anyone other than Demo, who already knew about Dosia, and Paige. Their two boys had been getting off the ponies as JJ had gotten into line to get on one.
Demo had given Pumpkin a thumb’s up behind Dosia’s back, to which Pumpkin had flipped his best friend the bird by scratching his nose with his middle finger.
“Auction’s in an hour,” Dosia pressed. “I know you aren’t looking forward to it.”
Pumpkin tried not to make a face. “Truth?”
“Always,” Dosia answered immediately.
“A year ago, I wouldn’t have minded. Hell, it would have been fun. Starbucks and some of the others are making bets as to who could win the highest bid. I would have been right alongside them.”
Dosia stared straight ahead. As JJ circled close again, both of them lifted their free hands to wave. This was JJ’s third time circling, so she had one more to go. The number of pictures on both their phones of the kids today was excessive. “Is it because of me?” she asked quietly.
Pumpkin’s head shot down at her. “What?”
“Me?” she repeated, glancing up at him before looking forward again. “You aren’t excited about the auction because of me?”
“Fuck no,” Pumpkin snapped, not caring who was around to hear his answer. He turned, shifting Dosia so she was facing him too. Hetook her cheeks between his hands. “Baby, you are theonly thingmaking today survivable.”
Dosia’s big eyes stared innocently up at him. “Really?”
