Ride Steady(56)

“You gotta find a way to set it free.”

“How?”

“God’s honest truth?” Tack asked.

“Absolutely,” Joker answered.

“If your brothers haven’t brought you to that revelation, then you gotta sink your cock in cute, sweet, wet, butterfly *.”

Joker leaned back.

“I’m not shittin’ you, man,” Tack told him.

Joker again said nothing.

Tack studied him before he remarked, “You think I’m whipped.”

Joker made no reply. He wouldn’t disrespect a brother like that, especially not Tack.

But he did think that.

Absolutely.

Tack grinned and took a pull from his beer.

After he dropped it, he said reflectively, still grinning, “Maybe I am. Though, the way I am and the woman holds that whip, it’s a good thing to be.”

“Right,” Joker started and got his brother’s gaze back. “I go there, she’s got a kid. Her ex f*cks with her, and he’ll f*ck with her, man, and I lose it, then where will she be?”

Tack’s face drained of amusement. “That right there is what you need to get.”

“What?”

“She is what I think she is, all you’ll need to do is take one look at her, and it’ll check.”

“It’ll check?”

“Do you think I’d do f*ckin’ anything to harm my woman?”

Joker felt heat hit his throat.

“My kids?” Tack pushed.

“No,” Joker forced out.

“She is what I think she is, it’ll check.”

“What if it doesn’t?”

“Then she isn’t what I think she is.”

“She is,” Joker stated inflexibly and Tack stared at him a beat before he burst out laughing.

Joker did not laugh.

Then again, he never did.

But at that moment, he didn’t think f*ck-all was funny.

Still chuckling, Tack said, “Jesus, Joke, you already know your path.”

“I also know hers, and it isn’t the road to bein’ a biker’s old lady. Fuck, Tack, she was a cheerleader.”

Tack again lost his hilarity and speared Joker with his eyes.

“Now, brother, if you don’t think you’re good enough, the life you lead is good enough, the family you can give her is good enough, then we got a much bigger problem.”

“Don’t read that shit into it, because you know it isn’t there. You also get me. There are women built for the life. There are women who take it on. But she deserves a white picket fence, Tack.”

“Then give her one. No law says a biker can’t live behind a white picket fence.”

Jesus.

Shit.

Shit.

He felt that burn in his throat too. So bad he had to suck back a long pull to douse the flame.

Tack lifted up from the bar and turned fully to Joker.

Then he laid it out.

“That motherf*cker, he taught you to think you were garbage. You took that on. You were a kid. You had no f*ckin’ choice. But he was wrong, Joke. And the only person who doesn’t get that shit is you. Get it. Get over it. Get your head outta your ass. And find what you deserve. Find some f*ckin’ happy. If it isn’t this girl, it isn’t. But whatever it is, I want it for you. Your brothers want it for you. Their old ladies want it for you. The only one who isn’t lookin’ for that for you is you.”

Joker turned away, lifted his beer, and took another tug.

“Your call not to let that sink in,” Tack said, and Joker felt him move to drain his beer and slide off his stool

But he wasn’t done, and he left his kill shot for last.

“Now, not many people on this earth I would rather sit and have a beer with. But, see, my woman is up the mountain with my sons. And you got my love, Joke, I got all the time in the world for you. But straight up, I’d rather be up the mountain watchin’ my kids tear my house apart and my woman struttin’ around thinkin’ that shit’s cute when it’s not than down here with you, watchin’ you wallow in shit that’s history. You know how I feel about my Club. Think about that.”

Kane Allen was a wise man and a strong one, so Joker thought about it.

And Joker thought about Rider and Cutter and the fact that Tack was not lying. Those boys were hoodlums and neither of them had reached double digits yet.