Total pages in book: 144
Estimated words: 130761 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 654(@200wpm)___ 523(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130761 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 654(@200wpm)___ 523(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
Fuck.
It took him a second to see me. But when I stood, looking right into his eyes, I saw his brief confusion come clear. And I fucking saw the recognition hit home. He was tall, like me, and for a fifteen-year-old, fairly stacked. But it was his fucking eyes that I couldn’t get past. Because looking back at me was Dev. My brother was looking at me through his kid.
His backpack hit the ground, and he stood dead still. “Uncle X?” he said, and it sliced right through me. His voice that I once knew as belonging to a kid had dropped.
He sounded just like Dev now too.
“Hey, kid.” I stepped forward. But I stopped when I saw his eyes close and his head drop. I panicked, panicked that he didn’t want me here after all. But when a low sound came from his mouth and he launched forward up the steps to the porch and wrapped his arms around me, I fucking broke.
The kid was crying. Fucking holding me so damn hard that I fucking broke too. I held on tight to my nephew and wasn’t sure I could ever let go. Last time he was in my arms like this he was little and thin. Now he was anything but, but it still felt the same. My chest still felt as fucking big.
“I’ve missed you,” he said and I clenched my eyes shut.
“Missed you too, kid,” I said hoarsely.
Zane pulled back his head and searched my face. “I don’t blame you,” he said. I had to turn my head from his gaze. “I know he was sick from the war. But I don’t blame you for anything you did. You tried to help him.”
“Fuck, kid.” I wiped my eyes with my forearm.
Zane stepped back, and I saw him looking at my cut. His watery eyes widened. “You’re in the Hangmen?” His eyes lit up.
“Yeah,” I replied, confused how he even knew who the fuck we were.
You’d think I’d just told the kid I was Jesus fucking Christ by his reaction. “I see them all the time riding through downtown.” He focused on my cut. “AK,” he read. “That’s your road name?”
I nodded, a smirk on my lips. “You like bikes?”
Zane put his hands in his pockets and nodded. He looked over his shoulder at my bike. “That’s yours?”
“Yeah.”
“Aunt Claire?” Zane asked. “Can I show Uncle X the garage?”
“Sure,” she said, smiling. I caught Phebe watching, her fucking heart breaking. I held out my hand and pulled her in to my side. “Zane, Phebe. Phebe, Zane. Phebe’s my old lady,” I said to my nephew.
Phebe shook his hand. “Very nice to meet you, Zane,” she said. “I have heard so much about you.”
“You have?” he asked in shock.
“Yes.” She smiled. “And I have seen many of your pictures too.”
I saw the kid about to fall apart again, so I put my hand on his shoulder. “The garage?”
Zane exhaled deeply, then led me around the back of the house. He opened the garage and flicked on a light. I didn’t make it through the doorway. I didn’t move a damn step when I recognized the bike that sat in the middle of the garage floor.
“Is that . . .?”
“Dad’s? Yeah,” Zane said. The word “Dad” hit me like a blow to the chest. He moved beside the old Harley Davidson Low Rider, more rust than anything now. Zane crouched down beside it and ran his hand gently over the seat. “Dad never cared much for it when he came back from Iraq. After they . . . died, Aunt Claire put it in storage with all their other stuff. She couldn’t look at anything until a year ago, and that’s when I saw it.” He stood. “She let me bring it home and work on it.”
“You work on bikes?” I asked, suddenly feeling Dev’s presence beside me. His kid liked bikes too. It was always the plan. Serve our country, drink beers and just fucking ride when we were home from tour. I always imagined Zane doing the same one day.
I wasn’t too far wrong.
“I love them.” He came over all shy. “I ain’t too good at them yet. Learning mostly off YouTube and shit like that, but I’m getting better . . . I think.”
“YouTube?” I shook my head. Zane laughed at my horrified reaction.
I stepped further into the garage and ran my hand over the bars of the bike, remembering Dev riding beside me, fucking free with the wind.
A good memory for once.
“You wanna learn from real mechanics? Bikers who know what the fuck they’re doing?”
Zane’s mouth dropped open. “You serious?”
“As a heart attack. My brothers know a thing or two about this shit.” I winked at him, and he burst out laughing.
“Yeah,” he answered quickly. He paused. “At the Hangmen compound?”