Page 57 of The Biker and the Loner
Truman snorts and Trent flips me the finger.
"We're expanding our services," Torin informs me. A subdivision for SAR."
"But not for lost puppies and runaway teens and shit, if you get the drift," Truman adds.
"Serious shit," Trent chimes.
"Dangerousshit," Tripp adds with a grin and jumping eyebrows.
This piques my interest, so I lean forward, arms on the table. "Commando?"
"Commando," Torin confirms with a nod. "There's an eight-week training program and a three-month probationary period, but the short of it all is that we think you'll be a great asset to the team."
Trent pitches in, "Goes without saying that you'll have to leave 'Scratch' behind. That is, the Den of Heathens."
The club’s a nonfactor in this. I've been putting in my time with them, stepping in when needed, going on road drops, faking it with the Club Cats… just waiting for the right time to pull the plug.
Leaning back, I brush my thumb back and forth across my bottom lip, pretending to think about it, letting them sweat it out.
"I’ll need a few days to think about it,” I say after a while. “Need to talk to my girl."
I've got nothing to think about. I already know my answer.
"The Latina?" Tripp asks, his eyes lit with curiosity. "Yeah, I wanted to ask, how'd you manage to land that one? She’s straight upthemost unattainable woman in Denver."
I’m dead serious when I warn, "And even more unattainable now that I'm her man, so I'd keep my eyes in my head if I were you."
"Hey now!" he backs off with a massive grin, hands up in surrender. "We're teammates now, c'mon."
"I haven't agreed to anything yet."
"We understand that you need to think about it," Torin says, ever somber. "But do you mind sparing us a few minutes to convince you why joining the Red Cage family will be worth it for you?"
Unnecessary, but...I jerk my chin. "Let's hear it."
~
"So, what, you'regonna trade in your leather cut for cargo pants?"
I shoot the asshole across from me a glare as he bites into his cheeseburger.
After my meeting with the Garza brothers, Grunt was the one person I wanted to hit up about this. The sonuvabitch might be four years younger than me, but I'm man enough to admit he's always been smarter, more driven, and a winner through and through. There's no one who's advice I value more than his. So I rode straight to his workplace and waited for his lunch hour. Jaunted to the nearest food joint and bought us lunch. But all he's been doing so far is stuffing his face and ribbing me. Dickwad.
"Enough with the death glare," he says, wiping his mouth with a napkin. "I'm just kneeing you. Obviously, I'm allforyou taking the offer with Red Cage."
"What about your beef with Tripp?"
"You mean the beef we had when I was fifteen over some bony bitch whose name I can’t even remember?" he asks with a hiked brow. "Don't know about Tripp, but I'm living my best life right now. If he's still beefing, it's with himself."
Crossing my arms, I challenge him, "Oh, yeah? What if we become 'bros'?"
Now it’s his turn to glare. "Go ahead, be a disloyal sonuvabitch. Just know that if we divorce, I'm getting Kenny. She rolls the best joints in Denver."
A few weeks ago, I would've fought him on that, but Leyana’s rolling my joints now. They might not be on par with Kendra’s yet, but she’s getting there. Not to mention the bonus of watching her roll them while wearing nothing but one of her sexy lace panties. Makes it even sweeter.
Grunt drops his napkin and leans back, sobering. "Take the offer. Leave the club. They’re never gonna go legit. They’re being swallowed up with each dumb alliance they make because of greed, and it's only a matter of time before they start two-timing and killing each other. Mark my words, DOH is gonna disintegrate from the inside out. You wanna be goingup, not down. Red Cage’s been going up, consistently. Those bastard brothers arewinners, straight up. DOH is going down. I’m giving them a year tops."
No lies spoken. I knew it before I left, and after getting back and seeing that things have only gotten worse instead of better, my sentiments remain the same.
