Page 19 of Colt’s Betrayal

“Bad enough that you were right.”

Her shoulders loosen slightly, though I can tell that isn't what she's really asking.

“They believe me?”

“They believe Blackwater exists where you said it does, and they're checking everything else.”

Jayne nods and I sit beside her.

“That's all you're getting from them tonight.”

“I didn't expect more.” There is no bitterness in it, which somehow makes me want to defend her more than if there were.

I take her hand. “You shouldn't have had to do any of this.”

“My father shouldn't have brought Raze into my house.”

“No.”

“And he shouldn't know enough about you and me to use it as entertainment for his new friends.”

That one lands harder and I look at our joined hands.

“Chains told him about us because Raze wanted something that would make him feel bigger than me.”

“I know.”

Jayne leans her shoulder against mine. For a while we sit there without talking, and I let the quiet stay quiet instead of trying to fill it. Tomorrow there will be Blackwater, Chains, Raze and whatever Cyrus thinks he's started. Tonight Jayne is beside me. For once, that's enough.

CHAPTER 5

JAYNE

By late afternoon the compound feels both exactly as I remember it and nothing like the place where I grew up. The clubhouse still smells faintly of coffee, leather and whatever somebody cooked hours ago. Motorcycles come and go beyond the windows, and men I've known most of my life cross the yard in cuts that used to make me feel as though I belonged somewhere simply because my father did.

Now conversations lower when I come near. Nobody is rude. Nobody tells me to leave a room or acts as though I might steal something if they look away, but I notice the pauses. I notice men waiting until I pass before continuing a conversation, and the meeting-room door closing while Kane, Judge and Colt are inside. I understand every bit of it, but that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt.

My father did this. He spent thirty years teaching these men that brotherhood meant something, then used everything he knew about them to take Wilder's wife through their own gate and deliver her to the enemy. Now every memory I have in this place comes with his name attached to it, and I'm the one standing here carrying that name whether I want it or not.

I pour coffee I don't particularly want and turn from the bar. Griz is sitting at the nearest table. For a moment I consider taking the cup back to Colt's room, but that feels too much like hiding, so I stay where I am.

“Mind if I sit?”

His eyes lift to mine. “Free country.” It isn't warm, but it isn't a rejection either, so I sit opposite him.

Griz looks older than he did the last time I saw him. There's more gray in his beard and deeper lines beside his eyes, but I can still see the man who taught me to shuffle cards when I was eight and slipped me fifty dollars on my sixteenth birthday to get tickets to a band I wanted to see.

“You called me Uncle Griz yesterday,” he says while looking down into his mug.

“I've always called you Uncle Griz.”

His thumb moves once around the handle of his mug. “Been a while since I heard it.”

“I know.”

The quiet that follows isn't comfortable, but I don't try to fill it with an apology for something I didn't do. Eventually I say, “I didn't know what Dad was doing.” Griz's gaze finally meets mine. “I know.” The answer catches me off guard.

“You do?”