AllFreeNovel
Share Us
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
DORNAN
Dornan left Mariana with Jase and Juliette and approached John. He’d been planning this moment since John’s fist had connected with his face a few nights earlier. When he’d dared to question Dornan in front of their club. You didn’t question a brother. Ever.
John needed to be displaced.
‘Congratulations,’ John said, looking anything but congratulatory.
Dornan could empathise. He’d just gotten rid of his own ball-and-chain in the form of divorcing Celia, and John was still stuck with that whore Caroline, who was currently harassing a poor young waitress for more champagne.
‘Thanks, Johnny Boy,’ Dornan said, slapping John on the arm. He hadn’t used that name for his best friend in a long time. He didn’t pause before he delivered his next line.
‘Boys are waiting in the garage,’ he said. ‘We’re voting. Now.’
John’s eyes seemed to cloud over momentarily when he heard the words.We’re voting. John didn’t ask what they were voting on. Something told Dornan he already knew.
John quickly regained his composure, passing Dornan as he made his way to the large garage at the other end of the house. Dornan followed, watching the large, red and black Gypsy Brothers patch that sat in the middle of John’s back. Everyone else had black and white patches. Only the president got red.
They’d have to get someone to unravel all that thread. Dornan might be taking the patch, but he’d never take the jacket off a brother’s back.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
JOHN
The vote for prez went in Dornan’s favour. Overwhelmingly.
John understood. It was like a chain reaction. He stared at the faces of his brothers in arms as they sat around a makeshift table and cast their votes for the Gypsy Brothers presidency, men he would have laid down his life for – many that he actually had risked his life to protect. Yet, one by one, they voted against him. They were afraid, John realised, about halfway through the proceedings. Not Dornan’s sons, of course – the board was half made up of people somehow related to Dornan by marriage or blood, so it wasn’t surprising that his coup was so successful.
What was surprising was that John didn’t care. He just couldn’t muster a single fuck about what was happening. No, instead a nervous buzz began in the pit of his stomach and spread through his body. At first he didn’t understand what it was, and then he could have laughed when he figured it out.
He was excited. He was thrilled. He was getting out.
Then he remembered that Dornan and Mariana were married, and his brief elation was tempered by rage.
John sat back and watched as Dornan was sworn in as president. That buzz became an angry scream in his ears, as he imagined Mariana having to say the words ‘I do’ to this motherfucker. That was the sole reason for his violent need to kill Dornan in that moment. If it were just a matter of being usurped by the Gypsy Brothers, he would have gotten up on the table and done the fucking moonwalk.
After they voted Dornan in, it was time to decide on a new VP. Not surprisingly, almost half the men voted for John. Perhaps that was their way of trying to make amends for essentially betraying their president by overthrowing him and installing a madman as leader. But despite the votes, one person got more – Dornan’s oldest son Chad, who was possibly the least intelligent person John had ever encountered. Jacked up on a daily cocktail of roids and speed, Chad was a surprising choice.
It just showed how far things had gone.
It was only when Dornan was passing his VP patch to Chad that John realised he needed to give his patches to Dornan. He’d lived in this jacket for years, ever since the last one had been shredded by knife slashes when he’d been in a fight with a rival cartel member. The patches were originals, having survived the past several decades unmarred. Stained with engine oil and probably blood, but always with him.
John slid off his jacket, realising for the first time how heavy the thick leather was. The thing weighed a ton. No wonder his shoulders always felt like they bore the weight of the world on them. Was this how it felt to be free? To be a normal person?Just a thin shirt on your back, no traces of a club patch that acted as a homing beacon for violence?
John turned the jacket over, but before he started to tug at the thread holding the club insignia to the beat-up leather, he stopped. He held the jacket out to Dornan, who didn’t move.
‘I’m not taking your jacket, John,’ he said, and for a moment John could have sworn he saw shame flicker in Dornan’s eyes.
Undeterred, John dropped the jacket onto the table in front of Dornan. ‘I want you to have it,’ he said, stepping back. ‘I’ll get a new one.’I’ll trade you my fucking jacket for your wife.
Dornan regarded him gravely. ‘We gonna have trouble, brother?’
John smiled, reaching out and slapping Dornan on the shoulder. ‘No trouble, brother. My loyalty is to the club, whether I’m president or not.’
An awkward silence fell over the room. John let his eyes roam around once more, and then he turned and left the only friends he’d ever known.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
