Leave a Trail (Signal Bend #7)(62)
Adrienne chuckled. “I think that’s the right attitude.”
“I’d like it if you were here when they come—if you can be. You’re the only person who was with me the first time I did this. Is that a terrible thing to ask?”
Tears had flooded her eyes at Shannon’s request. Now, she sniffed and shook her head. “No, it’s not.
I’d like that.” With a little laugh, she added, “I can help soothe the beast.”
“He has a lot of worry, my man. He takes on too much. I tell him that some day all that weight is going to cripple him, but he takes it on anyway. It’s one of the things I love best about him, and one of the things that makes me craziest.”
“You want me to see if he’s fit to come back in yet?”
“In a minute. I want to talk about what happened before I became such a drama queen today. That was a hard thing.”
Adrienne didn’t want to talk about it. “I’m okay. I just…have to get used to it. I will, though. I have you guys. I have Badge. I’m okay.”
Shannon stared hard at her. “Yeah, you do. You’re not alone. I lost my folks when I made a choice they didn’t like. You know that. I spent a long time after that being alone. Making myself alone because I didn’t feel like I deserved not to be. I didn’t even know I was doing it. I don’t want you ever to do that. You’re not alone. You know it now, and I’m glad. Don’t forget. You’re never alone. That’s something wonderful about the life you chose—the Horde. A lot of us have had hard losses. We’ve all felt alone. But we never will be again. That and the love of a man like Show, or Badger—that’s worth everything. I promise.”
Adrienne nodded, her throat too tight to answer in words. And then she just gave up. She laid her head on Shannon’s shoulder and cried.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
On their way home from the latest weed run, the Horde stopped in St. Louis to see a dying friend.
It was Badger’s first time on this run since he’d been busted for being a junkie four months ago. He’d had to prove he was solid, that he was trustworthy, before they’d let him on the run again. And he was pretty solid now. The need wasn’t on him nearly like it had been. Now, only in times of stress did he think about it, and then, usually, he only missed it. He didn’t need it. He thought he was truly through the other side.
He had his brothers to thank for that. And Adrienne. His family. He wasn’t sure if forgetting who had his back made room for the Oxy to take him over, or if the Oxy had made him forget who had his back, but either way, he had himself under control again. He remembered.
Isaac, Len, and Tommy had ridden the run with him, and they’d all watched him. He’d felt it, but he hadn’t resented it as he would have before. He understood it was the price he had to pay. He’d been f*cked up on this run a couple times, and that had put them all at risk.
He knew he’d been brought on earlier than Isaac would have normally agreed because Show was at County with Shannon. She was still pregnant, but from what Show had told them, her condition was beginning to deteriorate a little. They were trying to keep the pregnancy going for another week or so at least. Show hadn’t left the hospital in days and no one expected him to. So Badger was called up, and he was glad. Scared—he f*cking hated this run and everything that had anything to do with the Perros—but glad for the chance to prove once and for all that he was through his shit.
Len was glad for other reasons. Worried about the future of the Horde if they lost both Isaac and Show, he didn’t like the President and Vice-President to be on the same job, away from home, at the same time.
But there’d been little other choice after Badger had let everybody down. With Havoc dead and Badger sidelined, there hadn’t been enough experienced Horde to ride the weed run and also keep a leader in town.
Since March, the run had been Isaac, Show, Len, and Tommy—the entire club leadership and both enforcers. Had the run blown up, the Horde would have been thoroughly gutted, with only Dom, Zeke, and Badger left.
Today’s run was not much better in that regard. Show was in Springfield, and probably safe. But in Signal Bend, only Dom, Zeke, Double A, and the Prospects were left. If there was trouble in town, Horde resources were limited. Zeke, though, had a lot of experience, and Isaac trusted him to handle trouble if it arose.
Kellen Frey had joined Thumper in the Prospect ranks. Despite their best intentions to bring older men up in the club, the only likely candidates continued to be young men. Badger didn’t worry about the youth of the club the way the older patches did. They cited his own experience as their reasons for wanting older Prospects—they all thought he was too young to have dealt with what he’d dealt with. But he was beginning to see it differently—maybe there was resilience in youth. Isaac, Show, and Len talked a lot about the way things used to be. And Badger remembered the way things used to be. But he didn’t remember those days as fondly as they did. He didn’t look backward the way they did.
He’d been through some dark f*cking times, and he knew he was changed because of them. He knew they’d almost broken him—or they had broken him, but he’d found a way to put himself together. He knew that quiet times were safer. But like he’d told Nolan, those times felt false to him in some way. The life they were in now, that felt true. He didn’t want to get back to the way things were. He wanted to get through to the next thing.