I dragged a deep breath of that sweet fuckin’ clean and salty air through my mouth and then expelled it in a gusty sigh, bracin’ for what might happen next.
Because I’d found an answer to my question of what price I was willin’ to pay to stave off war.
And like any good leader, I’d chosen to fall on my sword rather than slip in the blood of my Fallen brothers and our families.
When I turned to finally face Danner, it was with my hands wrapped steadily around the cold weight of a gun.
He stepped back, eyes blown wide with shock, hands up in benediction. “Whoa, whoa, son, no need for the gun.”
One of the reasons I’d asked Wrath to come with me.
The man was always carryin’ concealed weapons, even to my fuckin’ wedding.
“There’s a need,” I said calmly as Danner held up a staying hand to Officer Ormand and the lingering Ventura goons. “You’ve been holdin’ a gun to my head and the head of the club for years. Wanted you to see how it felt.”
“You used to be a good kid. I’m learning that there is no escaping criminal genes, though. You’ve got anarchist written in your blood.”
“I have Garro blood and, yeah, a little chaos in my heart, but I’m a rebel with a cause. And right now? That cause is gettin’ you to back the fuck off from my family.”
There was a thin line between sacrifice and sheer martyrdom, but I hoped this was it, drawn in black beneath my feet. At that moment, I understood Joan of Arc and Socrates, Dumbledore from Harry Potter and Winston from 1984.
I understood that there was nothing in death so fearsome as the thought of livin’ without those you loved because fear and love were two sides of the coin of every man’s existence. And the chance I was taking, the choice I was making, was love over fear.
So I held my gun steady even when Danner whipped his Glock out from the holster and took a threatening step toward me.
“Drop the gun, King, and let’s talk about this like civilized men.”
“You put my father in prison out of sheer fuckin’ hatred, so I think the time for talking is done.”
“There’s a way out of this for you. I came today to make a deal. You and three of your crew confess to charges of racketeering, money laundering, and drug possession and distribution, while the rest of you disband your criminal enterprises, and we don’t have to do this anymore.”
“Why the fuck would I agree to that?” I asked, steppin’ a little closer to the edge of the cliff at my back.
“Because it’s the right thing to do. Because you know you’re putting your family at risk, running that club the way you have. You don’t want to see your new wife put away for being associated with your crimes, do you? You don’t want to see anything bad happen to Loulou Garro or her babies because you got tangled up in the wrong crime syndicate.”
“Not turnin’ my back on my family the way you have, Harold,” I told him, voice like an open trap. I needed his anger, needed him foolish and reckless and filled with so much hatred for me that he wouldn’t care about the witnesses at his back. “Susan’s mind is deterioratin’, and you still treat her like shit. Lion Danner’s the most decent copper I know, and you still spent his entire life beratin’ him.”
“I love Susan,” he barked, his gun rising up, trained right on my chest. “I loved her, and she left me because she’s got a soft heart, and she couldn’t take my passion for justice, for my carer anymore.”
“This is not justice. What you got is a vendetta that’s corroded you to your core. You don’t even see the man behind the cut now; you just see a demon straight outta hell.”
“Maybe I should send you back where you came from?” he suggested, takin’ another step toward me, just a handful of yards between us.
I laughed. “Be my guest. I’d rather die on my feet fighting you than live on my knees in fear of you.”
There was a distant rumble like the roll of thunder before a storm. Harleys were comin’.
Danner looked over his shoulder at the tree obscurin’ the road and then cursed. “Jesus Christ, King, drop the fuckin’ gun.”
“Not gonna drop it, Danner, unless you confess you murdered Riley Gibson. How’d it happen? I know he was goin’ to the station to make a call down to Van PD about corruption in the force here…Did you catch him? Seize an opportunity when you saw it to kill a cop who wanted you locked up and also put away the man you’ve hated for decades for that very crime?”
“Shut. Up.” Danner grounded out; his eyes wet, dark pools in the low light under the bright super moon.