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He slid his Ray Bans on before he opened the door, but the sun still punched him in the face. Overall, he liked Nevada weather—good chance he could ride every single day and wouldn’t need to replace the Tundra he’d sold in Tulsa—but the sun was something else. Like there was less sky here between it and the ground. It was a sadistic fucking sun. And right now it was gleefully dicing his eyeballs.
When he was more or less acclimated to the glare, he crossed the gravel that was his new front yard and opened the passenger door on the U-Haul’s cab.
Two things occurred to him in quick succession: one, he’d just walked up and opened the cab, ergo he hadn’t locked it last night; and two, his kutte was still draped over the passenger seat.
Jesus fucking Christ. He was suddenly and emphatically glad he’d been stubborn about doing all this himself. The last thing he needed was Ben or one of the others discovering that their president had left his kutte out for any asshole strolling by to swipe.
Cooper turned and leaned against the side of the passenger seat. What the fuck had happened last night? Yes, he occasionally jumped ahead of his sense when he was drunk, but he hadn’t been drinking, and come on. Caffeine couldn’t make him this stupid. Could it? Maybe it was just plain old fatigue? He’d done long rides before without a problem. Almost as long as this one. So ... what?
Maybe just the truck itself. Driving a cage was boring as fuck. There was a lot more active work involved in riding, a lot less opportunity to forget yourself. Maybe he’d just checked out last night?
After that near miss with Trooper Rudy, his brain had been spinning hard enough to smoke. He’d pissed on some sagebrush in Arizona, and he remembered feeling so wired he had trouble standing still enough not to spray himself in piss. Then he’d gotten back on the road and committed himself to finishing the ride in one piece and without any more confabs with local law.
Obviously, he had achieved those two goals. Here he was, at his new house in Nevada, in one piece. But as he sat here, he couldn’t really remember much about the drive after watering the sagebrush. His brain had spun itself into the stratosphere.
Was that normal?
Maybe he was alone too much lately. He was spending too much time in his head, and that was obviously not a good place for him to be. They really needed to get the clubhouse going. The remodel was done, the business was just about ready, but they needed more chicks and hangarounds. They needed to have their first party.
He needed a fucking social life.
He’d never had a close friendship, somebody he’d call a ‘best’ friend or even somebody he’d go out of his way to hang out with one-on-one. Nor had he had a girlfriend, not since high school—and he’d been with her just for the sex. Bonding like that wasn’t his way. He didn’t need a confidant or a lover, and he wouldn’t know how to get to that depth with somebody if he tried. However, he didn’t like being alone, either. He wanted noise and crowd and busyness. He wanted to laugh and drink and have a good time.
Somehow, though, in this move to Laughlin, he’d landed in Lonerville. Next stop, Loserville.
Part of it, maybe a big part, was losing Gargoyle so soon.
They hadn’t been especially close, but Gargo had been a little like him, at least socially. He’d had a close friend, Ben Haddon, but Ben lived here in Laughlin, and in Tulsa, Gargo hadn’t had a good friend, nor had he wanted one. He’d hung at the clubhouse and drunk with whomever was around. Like Cooper. So they’d hung together often enough without going out of their way to do it.
Now Gargoyle was dead, the only other Tulsa Bull who’d transferred to Laughlin was Zach Jessup, who’d dived in deep with Ben’s daughter before he’d even unpacked his bedroll. Ben was a crabby fuck who couldn’t have cared less about partying—and when he did, he hung out with Lonnie, also a crabby fuck. Kai, Geno, and Reed hung out together. He probably could hang with them; they weren’t that much younger than him and they usually went out to do some kind of sports thing. He was good at sports, too.
But he was the charter president. Asking if he could tag along with them to the batting cages would be really fucking pathetic.
Was it being president that set him off by himself? It was, wasn’t it? Fuck.
The ironic thing: he’d thrown his name on the table to be president of the new charter as ajoke. He’d never had any big ambition to be in charge of anything. Being a Bull fit him like a glove, but he’d been perfectly happy to be in the middle of the mix, not leading, not lagging, just doing his part.
He figured everybody had taken it for a joke at first, too. But then they’d started planning, and some things quickly became clear: first, they needed established patches to get the new charter running, and there weren’t that many Bulls who were willing to do it. Most of the Tulsa Bulls were family men, with old ladies and children, and while they would’ve gone temporarily if they’d had to, they didn’t want to be away from home for months at a minimum. Then everybody started looking at the men who weren’t attached, and of that group, Cooper and Gargoyle were the only ones who weren’t still green. Zach was a great patch with a good head on his shoulders, but he was twenty-fucking-five years old. He was young for his SAA flash; he’d have been way out of his depth at the head of the table. There had been only two options for president of the new charter, and of those two options, there had been only one, really. Gargo, God or whoever rest his soul, had been too damn weird to lead the club.
Once Cooper had seen that, once everyone had seen that, his ‘joke’ got serious. Once that happened, he’d started to want it. Now he had it, and he thought he was pretty okay at the work of being president. Overall. The seat at the head of the table fit his ass right, the President flash looked right on his kutte. He’d sure as shit been baptized in fire.
He simply hadn’t realized how much it would set him apart.
Now he was starting to think being mostly alone for the past few months was fucking with his head.
Reallyneeded to get people out to the clubhouse. He needed to party. And girls! They needed girls. That was the next order of business. The Nevada Bulls were going to be a party destination or he’d die in the effort.
For now, he grabbed his kutte, the Igloo with one lone Monster floating in water, and his holstered Beretta and headed back to the house.
When he came out again, ready to begin the task of unloading his belongings alone, there was a girl standing at the side of the truck.
Not Annie Oakley from last night. He couldn’t remember her real name. This girl was really a girl—young, like thirteen, fourteen, maybe. Long blonde hair with bangs. Dressed in jeans, cheap sneakers and a snuggish blue hoodie with LAUGHLIN COUGARS across the chest. Tiny tits-in-training. (He couldn’t help but notice. He was a boob man, after all.)
“Hey,” he said as he approached the truck. “You need somethin’?”
“You’re moving in,” she said. Real sharp tack, she was.
“Yep.”
