Have Gun, Will Travel (The Bare Bones MC #5)(5)
“Fuck it,” said Cassie, barely able to move her mouth. “I’ve got about ten grand I’ve been saving for retirement. This is more important.”
Rhetta counted the total on her fingers. “Twenty large. Should be enough to get a professional, don’t you think? Plus, once we tell the other girls, who knows how much they’ll be down for.”
I waggled a finger at Rhetta. “But keep this on the down low, away from Leo or any other club member. Leo’s obviously not willing to compromise his relationship with Tormenta to get revenge or even to ask the f*cker to stop beating us up.” I knew I wasn’t one of “us,” having never balled a single patch holder. But I included myself, as their friend. “Who is this uncle Sax guy Leo was so against? I’ve never heard of him before.” It had immediately struck me, listening to the two men argue, that if Leo was so against this Sax guy, he probably wasn’t so bad. I had never cared for Leo. Far too hardened by the life, and far too mean to his old lady and wife, Lulu. I’d seen him beat on her with his fists several times, and I wasn’t even that close to the club. But he’d never used a knife that I knew of.
Brenda had probably been a sweetbutt the longest. “I remember before Leo sent Sax into exile. He was hot, way hotter than Leo.”
“Maybe that’s why Leo hates him.” Cassie tried to grin, but winced.
“Could be,” said Brenda. “I don’t know what their beef was, but it must’ve been a big one, because Sax was Veep, before Panhead started doing all day and a night in Tucson.” The Bare Bones’ old Veep, Panhead, had suddenly been arrested by feds about three months ago. Next thing anyone knew, he was doing life in Tucson, no trial or anything. It was a RICO indictment case and had everyone on edge about who’d be next. It sure seemed being Veep of the Flagstaff chapter was a hazardous career. “He was so hot I’d climb him in a heartbeat.”
Brenda would climb anyone in a heartbeat, so I thought no more about Harte’s studmuffin uncle. Madison came to minister to Cassie, gave her a shot of morphine, and angrily added another ten grand to the pot. She loathed Tormenta, too. She said it was just too bad Roman was on his honeymoon in Barbados—she smartly didn’t want to disturb him with this news—because he would’ve done the deed for free.
Of course I didn’t know it yet, but that day was the start of the rest of my life. My redemption from my self-imposed hell. My loss of faith, my inability to believe in anything or anyone, my skepticism of anything larger than myself—all that would slowly be eroded until it was replaced with a new, wider, more all-seeing sort of faith. A faith in humanity itself.
I didn’t know it yet, but that was exactly what I needed.
CHAPTER TWO
SAX
He was torn in a thousand directions at once.
Zane “Sax” Saxonberg got the call from Harte while he was at a gem show in Tucson. It wasn’t the big annual gem and mineral show, but one where he knew almost all of the dealers and a good percentage of the buyers. Sax dealt in rare and exotic minerals, and had been known to dabble in diamonds and tanzanite. One plain and ugly exotic rock could sell for five thousand dollars or more. He was able to ride the country this way, a gritty, colorful and glamorous door-to-door salesman.
Things were predictable, the way he’d set up his life. It was like being on one constant fun charity run, only he rode alone, without the pack of his Bare Bones brothers. Sax had become accustomed to riding solo, a nomad without a home. He still had the house near Flagstaff that he’d bought fifteen years ago while Veep of The Bare Bones. But his younger brother banished him into the hinterlands of America, he’d only spent a couple of days a year there.
Harte needed him. He didn’t give details, just that a beloved sweetbutt had been cut and maimed by an associate who was dubious to begin with.
“Sax, I’m questioning my dad’s direction,” Harte had said. “I think he’s reaching out to the wrong people, these dangerous cats. I need you to come and talk some sense into him. I know you don’t like meeting face to face with him, but you’re the only one who can do it. You’re the only one he respects.”
Sax had scoffed. “Me? Harte, you might’ve been too young to remember, but Leo is the one who had me ‘out good’ a decade ago. He’s the reason I’m not Veep anymore. That’s not my wheelhouse, man. Nothing lands on my back anymore.”
But Harte had become impatient with his excuses. “This is serious, Sax. Bodies are going to start dropping because of this associate of my dad’s. You might not believe me that he respects you, but he does.”
Harte wouldn’t tell Sax who the associate was. Sax had only seen Harte a few times since going on the road, and he deeply craved to see his only flesh and blood again. Tucson was only a four-hour ride from Flag. And it would be good to see his old brothers again, whoever was left from the old school days—Woodstock, Dayton Navarro, Baron Funkhauser. From what he’d been hearing from Woodstock and Funkhauser, brothers had been dropping like flies up there. Panhead, who’d taken over as Veep from Sax, was suddenly doing Buck Rogers time on a federal drug running beef. That shit was RICO, and if Panhead started snitching, the club would be falling like snowflakes.
So curiosity got the better of Sax eventually, and he rode up to Flag. He was fortunate—or maybe he’d worked it out this way—that most of the minerals he sold were small, thumbnail-sized and could be kept in his saddlebags. He had several storage units and safe deposit boxes scattered across the nation, mostly close to world-class mines where he obtained product.