A pause.
Crow continued. “Don’t remember how it started, or who I killed. Nothing. I was blackout. Conscious and operating, but I don’t remember jack shit about it. As far as I know, some asshole picked a fight with me and I snapped. Him and his buddies beat the shit out of me, but not before I smashed the poor fucker’s head in. They fuckin’…they nearly killed me. I remember wishing they had. Spent a week in the hospital under armed guard. Then I got transferred to county lockup and got arraigned, tried for manslaughter, convicted, even though I didn’t remember shit. I’d done it, so I was still liable whether I remembered it or not. The club hired a good defense attorney, and got me a reduced sentence seeing as my blood alcohol level was inhumanly high, and I’d just lost my girlfriend and a baby. Mitigating circumstances or some shit. Even so, I still got two years at a maximum-security pen, because of how violent the fight was. I mean, it was ugly as fuck, apparently.”
“You said you don’t remember it?” I asked.
He took a swig of liquor. Swallowed, hissed. Refused to look at me. “Want the truth? I wish I could forget. It’s like watching a movie. I had absolutely no control. His face is nothing but a blur. Some big asshole, and six of his big asshole friends. Seems like the guy’s face was familiar, but shit, I don’t fuckin’ know. The memory I have is vague and just flashes and fragments. Some assholes talking shit, calling me little Indian boy. Just picking a fight. I don’t know. I just know I remember seeing…black. Black rage. Berserk, uncontrollable rage. Like all the hate and evil and pain in all of hell was inside me, and…that dumb asshole triggered it.”
“He wasn’t himself. There was no Crow in him left.” Myles stared at his friend. “I saw him in the hospital, and he was just…gone. Someone else. Nothing. His eyes were dead and unfocused. He wanted to die.”
“Tried. But they made sure I couldn’t.” Crow bit the words out.
I swallowed. Ached. “Crow…”
“Those two years in the pen saved me,” Crow said. “My cellmate saved me. Not gonna say much about my time in the pen, but it was boredom and exercise, reading, working in the shop. Talking to my cellmate. He got me to the point that I understood I was responsible for what I had done, that the life I’d chosen was how I’d gotten where I was. He’d found Jesus, my cellmate. Tried to convert me, but I couldn’t get there. Got to the point that I understood my culpability in all the shit that had gone down. Mark, my cellmate, told me the day I got let out that I had a chance to start over. Make different choices.”
Myles moved to sit beside Crow. They shared the bottle, passing it between them, swig after swig in an old, easy pattern. They finished the bottle. “You got out, and Tran sent Yank to get you. You told Yank you wanted him to bring you to me.” A look between them, speaking of years of brotherhood. “You showed up at my apartment at two in the afternoon, in the same bloodstained clothes they’d arrested you in. Told me you couldn’t go back to the club. Wanted to go on the road with me.”
“You made it seem like I was doing you a favor,” Crow said.
“You were!” Myles said, laughing. “I’d done precisely dick in the two years you were locked up. Local shows in the Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona bar circuit. Same as my dad, same as Gramps. I was drinking my proceeds, had no music, was stuck doing covers and the same dozen or songs you and I had written together before you got locked up.”
“That was your grind, man,” Crow said. “Your ten thousand hours. Learning to tour, to play, to perform. You weren’t doing dick, you were learning.”
“But I got nowhere without you. You showed up that day, and we wrote, what, fifty songs together in the next two months? We wrote about everything. You poured your soul into those songs. All the shit you’d been through.
“You took over managing me, got me bigger gigs, better pay. Kept me from drinking all the profits so we had some money to put into better gear, and a van to travel in. Then we played in that bar, opened for that act that later blew up. Got seen by some exec, recorded a demo, and off we went.”
Crow eyed me. “So. There you go. I was a criminal, an enforcer for an outlaw motorcycle gang. Lost my girlfriend and baby in a shooting, killed a guy in a drunken bar brawl, spent two years in a federal maximum-security penitentiary for manslaughter.” He waited. “Now you know. You want to know more? Might as well know everything. The years I worked for Tran as an enforcer, I was a monster. I was angry about Mom and Dad. Started to feel invincible. I beat people to a pulp for crossing the club. Did evil shit for the club. Pulled the trigger for the club more than once.”
“I thought you said you’d never held a gun?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Yeah, well, I lied. I don’t carry a gun, haven’t since I got out of jail. I hate guns now and I did then too, but when Tran gave me an order, I followed it. Tran’s a good guy, but don’t get in the way of his business, and don’t cross him. He’s my second dad, but I had to stay clear of him when I got out of the pen. I knew I’d end up right back where I’d been—enforcing, going down that violent path. I wanted something different. I wanted to live, and if I went back to the club, even though Tran had cleaned up the club, gotten rid of the nastier drugs like meth and quit running the prostitution circles, it was still an outlaw club, still ran pot in serious amounts, as well as really top-tier pure Columbian blow. I wanted none of it.”
I was confused. “I thought once you joined a gang like that you couldn’t leave.”
He laughed. “Call it a gang in front of Tran and he’d be pissed. It’s a club. Different.” He sighed. “It’s not simple, no. You’re in for life. Especially when you’re deep in the elements that put it outside the law, like I was. But I’m Coyote’s boy, and Dad had saved Tran’s ass more than once and most significantly, the day of the big shootout, and he’d half raised me himself. So Tran let me go my own way on what we say is an ‘out good’ basis, meaning I’m not part of daily operations, but I’m still a full patch member of the club in good standing. I wear the cut, ride a bike, and if I need anything, I call the club. I’m still a proud member of the AzTex. I just don’t live the life. Can’t. If any those guys ever showed up needing me, I’d be there for them no matter what, but they know I’ve got a good life, teching for Myles, so they don’t involve me.”
I locked eyes with him. “Which is why you called Tran, after what happened.”
He nodded. “Tran knows people everywhere. Has connections in the Denver PD specifically. But more than that, he’s the president of my club. One of the few men I truly trust, outside of Myles.”
“And you’re out of the life, as you say, but you’re never really, truly ever going to fully leave the club.” I had to get my mind around this.
He shrugged. “I was born into the club. My father and uncle founded it. My mom was part of it. I lived my entire life, with the exception of a few months here and there, in the club, on the compound near El Paso. It was my whole world. The guys are my family, but I’ve just chosen a different path.” He held my gaze. “This is who I am, Charlie. I have a violent past. Blood on my hands. I can’t change that. When I’m faced with trouble, I’m not gonna back down. I use my fists to solve shit when I have to. I ain’t ever gonna be some tame-ass bank clerk. I don’t even have a high school diploma, much less some fancy-ass college degree.”
He held out his arms, guitar in one hand, a now-empty bottle of Johnnie in the other; his face was bruised, he still had the T-shirt duct taped to his ribs, the white shirt now red with blood; his knuckles were bloody, and blood was crusted on his nose, mouth, jaw, and chest.
“This is me, babe,” he said. “Take me or leave me, but I ain’t ever gonna be anything but what you see.”
My heart ached. He’d seen so much pain, so much turmoil. He was kind. He was gentle with me.
The sex had been…out of this world.
His kisses were a drug.
His touch was addictive.
But…he’d killed men with his bare hands. He was frightening
ly capable of extreme violence.
And I just…I wasn’t sure I could get past that.
What did I want for my life? To live on a tour bus with him? Never have a home? How could I remake my career if I was on the road with him? I couldn’t. I wanted him, the man he was. I wanted the man he was when it was just him and me, alone, in bed, talking. But I wasn’t sure I was ready for the man he was out in the world—handling problems with his fists and asking questions later.
His past was past, but there would always be the specter of Yak in my mind, on the ground. Motionless. Blood seeping from his nose and a deep bloody dent in his temple, eyes open and glassy. I would never forget the men on the ground, moaning, grown men crying in agony, limbs and skulls and bones destroyed.
I couldn’t unsee all that.
I swallowed. My eyes watered. “Crow, I…”
He nodded. “Yeah. I know. I saw it the moment you looked at me when that fight was over.” He set the empty bottle aside, stood up—wobbled a little, and it was oddly reassuring to know he was mortal enough to feel a whole bottle of whiskey. His eyes were lucid, searing. “An angel like you don’t belong in the life of a man like me, Charlie.”
“It’s not that, Crow. I just…”
He took his guitar, holding it by the neck, and moved to the exit of the bus. “Rip the Band-Aid off fast, Charlie. Just go.”
And with that he was gone.
I looked at Lexie. “I need to get to Ketchikan,” I said. “I…I can’t be here anymore. Let’s go.”
Myles didn’t say anything, but his eyes widened as he turned to Lexie.
She swallowed. Hard. “Um. Charlie…I—I’m staying. With Myles.”
I felt a fist to my gut. “Lex, come on. You just met him.”
“I didn’t say I was marrying him, but I’m having fun. I like him. We’re good together.”
“Lex, I—what about the road trip?”
She winced. “I’m not ready for Alaska yet, Charlie.”
“What are you going to do, Alexandra?” I heard myself snapping, taking it out on her, unfairly, but I couldn’t seem to stop myself. “Drink and fuck with a rock star until he gets bored of you?” I glanced at Myles. “No offense, Myles, really.”
He lifted an eyebrow, irritation on his face. “I mean, I do take offense to that, Charlie. I’m not like that, with anyone, and I never have been. Plus, I genuinely like Lexie, a lot. And we do more than just drink and fuck. Not to fucking mention, what business is it of yours what we do together?”
“Lex, we had a plan. What about college? What about what happened? What is your plan?”
“Charlie, don’t.” She stood up and faced me, nose to nose. “This is what I want. I’m sorry that doesn’t fit into your plans for my life, but I don’t answer to you.”
“Maybe you should.”
“Because your judgment is working out so well for you,” she snapped.
“Girls, come on—” Myles said.
“Shut up, Myles,” Lexie and I snapped in unison.
I stared at Lexie. “After what happened back East, I think you’d—”
“You don’t know what happened back East, Charlotte!”
“Because you wouldn’t tell me!” I shouted. I glanced, saw Crow leaning in the doorway of the bus, watching. I ignored him.
“You want to know? Fine, I’ll tell you. Today must be the day we unburden ourselves of terrible secrets.” She stood tall, eyes proud, pain and anger on her face. “I got pregnant with Marcus’s baby. I took about a dozen tests, including a blood test at a hospital. I told him, and he…he—” Her face crumpled momentarily. “At first he didn’t believe me. When I showed him the results of the blood test, he accused me of doing it on purpose. To trap him into being with me. I left, and he showed up at my dorm. I wouldn’t see him. So then when I decided we had to talk, I went to his house. He…we…we ended up screwing again, what we both sort of knew was going to be the last time, and that was when his wife showed up. Caught us in the act.”
“Oh god, Lexie,” I breathed.
“His kids were there. They saw us too. Saw me fucking their daddy.” She blinked hard. “Want to know the real kicker, which I didn’t know until later? His wife was the school dean’s niece. She went to him. Got me kicked out of school. Revoked my scholarship. The dean himself called every other dean he knew and blacklisted me.” A sob. “And Marcus…told his wife I’d seduced him. Some brain-dead story that made it all my fault.”
“What an asshole,” I muttered.
“That asshole gave me three grand, told me I knew what to do, and that he never wanted to see me again.” She picked up the empty bottle of Johnnie, stared at it as if wishing it were full. “I took the money, and I did exactly what he expected me to do.”
I covered my mouth. “Alexandra, no.”
“Alexandra, yes.” She chewed on her lip. “What was I going to do, Charlotte? Run back to Mommy, knocked up at twenty-one by my university professor? I don’t think so.” Her eyes cut to mine. “So yeah, Charlotte, I had an abortion.”
I felt gutted. “Alone?”
“Yes, alone. Went in alone, went through it alone, came out and went home, alone. It was only later I went a little crazy and called you. When I realized I had to leave school, and that I had nowhere to go. I packed up the bulk of my shit and sent it to Alaska, to Mom. It’s already there. What’s in your car is everything I have with me.” She blinked back tears. “Well, it’s in Myles’s room, now. My stuff, I mean.”
I couldn’t hold back tears. “Why didn’t you call me earlier?”
“And have you talk me out of it? I have plans for my life, Charlotte, and they don’t include kids at twenty-one, when I haven’t accomplished any of my life goals.”
“What are your life goals, Lex?”
“I don’t even know anymore!” She turned away, stared out the tinted privacy glass window. “You know what I wanted to be when I grew up, my whole childhood?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “A musician.”
I rocked back on my heels. “What?”
“You were busy with school and all your overachiever extracurricular activities, so you never saw, but you know where I was? In my room, alone, with my guitar and my ukulele, writing songs. I have a folder with hundreds of songs. CD recordings of myself. Videos of myself taken on Mom’s old phone, saved to a cloud drive.” She paused. “Then, when I was a junior, Dad sat me down and…and told me I was—that I wasn’t talented enough to make it as a musician, and that I should set my sights on a more realistic goal.”
I shook my head. “He didn’t.”
“He fucking did.” She was shaking. “That…it killed me. Destroyed me. I cried for days. I mean, he was my dad. I thought he…if he said that, it must be true. I didn’t know any better. He didn’t believe in me. Shut my dreams down. So that’s when I figured I’d just…” She shrugged. “Go to school. I’d planned on moving to Nashville and working my way up as a singer-songwriter, but when Dad said that to me, I just…I lost myself. Got accepted to U-Conn, and found something like a passion for life in feminist lit and all that.”
“Lex, I—”
“The point is, here, on this bus, this tour, Myles, the whole thing? It’s a chance to start over. To really find myself. College is gone, done. Never going back. I’ll never get a degree, which means those years are wasted.” She fixed her eyes on mine. “So what do I have, now? My guitar and my ukulele, and a man who thinks I’m pretty all right, as a person. Who doesn’t judge me for my stupid decisions. Is it love? Fuck if I know. I don’t think he does either. Maybe it’ll burn out. I don’t know. I just know I’m not going to Alaska…yet.” She held my gaze, shook her head. “You go. I’m staying here.”
Tears burned in my eyes. On my cheeks. In my mouth. “Lex, I—”
“We have different paths from here, Char-Char. That’s okay. You came and got me when I needed you, and I’m thankful. I love you. I don’t expect you to understand. But this is where I’m going, for ri
ght now. See this through, whatever it looks like.”
I hugged her. “Okay, okay.” I clung tight. “You should have called me sooner.”
“You’d have talked me out of it. Maybe it’s wrong, I don’t know, but it was what was right for me. I couldn’t have that man’s baby. Wouldn’t. It was all a mistake, I know that, but I wasn’t about to pay that price. I’ll probably burn in hell for it, but it’s done, and I had to do it alone.”
“Just…don’t get into the same situation with Myles,” I murmured.
“I won’t. We’re careful.” A squeeze. “Plus, he’s different.”
“Lex—”
“We’re good right now, Charlie,” she said. “Shut up so you don’t ruin it.”
I laughed. “Fine. Just be smart.”
She pulled away. “For the record, I think you walking away right now is a mistake.”
I frowned. “Now it’s your turn to shut up before you ruin things.”
She held out her hands. “All I’m saying. He’s a good man. And he’s good for you.” She hugged me, kissed my cheek. “But you do you, boo.”
“I will, Lex. I will.”
She nodded. “And that’s your right, as a person. Just like this is mine.”
I groaned. “I’m going. You have your stuff?”
“I brought it all on earlier.” She hugged me again. “You sure you’re okay?”
I nodded. Shook my head. Shrugged. “I don’t know. I just…I need to be in Alaska. I need to think.”
“Be safe, okay?” She shoved me away. “Go. Say hi to Mom and Cass for me.”
“I will. What should I tell them?”
“That I’m doing my own thing, and I’ll be along…whenever.” She sighed. “Tell them whatever you want. The truth, even.”
I shook my head. “No, that’s your story to tell, not mine.”
“You can’t lie for me, Charlie. You’re incapable of that.”
“I know. But I don’t have to say anything, either. I can just say what happened and what you’re doing is your business.”
She smiled. “Perfect. Love you, Char. Thank you.”