Part 25 (1/2)

A small smile appeared on Henry's lips, but not in his eyes. ”Not from her, no. If there's one of us cursed, it's me for having lost her.” He looked up at Maggie. ”Your mother felt like she set everything on fire, too. And she did, in a way. She wasn't from this world, you know, where she ended up. Next to me. But she burned her way into it anyway.”

Maggie knew her face looked angry, but her eyes filled with tears. She couldn't remember ever hearing her father talk this way about Sara. ”What are you saying, Henry?”

After being lost in his thoughts for a few moments, Henry waved a dismissive hand. ”I'm just saying some people burn bright, and it's not always a bad thing. It's not a curse. You just have to find hands that can handle you.”

Maggie fell silent, staring at her father. She couldn't remember the last time he had ever made even a pa.s.sing acknowledgment at her as anything more than an obstacle in his way. She almost felt overwhelmed.

He cleared his throat. ”And anyway, this particular fire, it's not your fault. This d.i.c.khead ex of yours could have let you go and stayed in Eagleton, but he didn't. Don't ever say you're cursed.”

She could only nod with her gaze on the ground.

”Things will smooth out. I'll make sure of it,” he said, putting a hand on her shoulder. ”Now, could you do me a favor and send Jase in here?”

At this point, all Maggie could do was let out a soft, sardonic chuckle. I thought you said I wasn't cursed. ”Yeah. I'll go get him.” Without another word, she opened the conference room door and headed down the stairs. Jase had not moved from his place with Will beside the jukebox, and he seemed startled when she walked up to him.

”Hi,” said Jase, as if on impulse.

”Hi,” said Maggie. She couldn't look him in the face. Her gaze only made it as high as his broad shoulders-and even then, all she could imagine was the sight of them naked and moving over her. She cleared her throat and thumbed behind her. ”Henry wants to see you.”

Jase seemed grateful, like he thought she was going to rip into a private talk right here, in front of Will and everybody. He put his coffee mug down on a table and brushed past her on the way up to the conference. She felt a jolt run through her heart when they touched.

”Have you fixed that, yet?”

Maggie turned at the soft sound of Will's voice behind her. He shot a gaze up to Jase on the stairs and back down at her.

Words got stuck in Maggie's throat. Did she trust Will enough to talk to him about this? She was splitting at the seams, holding the weight of this stress inside. ”If by 'fixed', you mean 'firebombed', then yeah.”

Will gave her a lopsided smile, almost a laugh. ”You can't blow up what's going on here. I think it's bigger than that.”

”Yeah, well, not for lack of trying...”

”Why would you try to ruin it?”

She looked up and gave Will a sarcastic expression. ”C'mon Will, you were there before I left.”

”That doesn't mean I saw what you saw,” said Will.

Maggie huffed and crossed her arms. ”Well, what I saw was how quick things started to fall apart for everyone as soon as Jase and I became more than friends. Henry kept getting so mad at him, kept making sure he was always on jobs for the MC. Life at home was h.e.l.l. It was like the only quiet times were when Jase and I could take off on his bike and go somewhere away from all of it,” said Maggie. She leaned against the jukebox, suddenly filled with sadness. ”He loves this G.o.dd.a.m.n club so much. He tried so hard to make Henry and me happy at the same time. It wasn't fair to him.”

”It sounds like he did make you happy.”

Maggie couldn't answer that. She paused, then said, ”What did Henry think was gonna happen, anyway, you know? I'm not saying he shouldn't have saved Jase and his mom the way he did. And I was glad to have other people, other kids around to connect with when he always seemed so far. But did Henry think our friends.h.i.+p was just going to... go away as we got older? After a decade of being each other's best friend?”

Will leaned a little closer, speaking quieter. ”I don't think Henry ever gave any serious thought to you growing up at all, Maggie. I think he's been in denial about that since you were born.”

”So you think he's a self-absorbed a.s.shole, too, huh?”

Will smiled. ”I think he's doing the best he can without your mom's help. The thing about Henry is, he loves both you and Jase. Truly. But you both inhabit different worlds for him, worlds he wants to keep apart. For him, you two finding happiness in each other is the final end of that separation.”

Maggie listened intently. Will's words made a deep sort of sense and she felt a calm slipping through her veins.

”You should find your happiness and trust your dad will follow,” said Will with a gentle squeeze of her shoulder. ”Just don't tell him that I'm the one who suggested it.”

When she laughed, he winked at her and moved through the growing crowd back towards the bar. Jase and Henry had emerged a few minutes before and come down to join the group and the president was handing out orders for the day and updating them on the hunt. Maggie faded in and out of attention on the speech, until he was speaking to her.

”Maggie, you'll be here today, and you're not to leave for anything. No exceptions. Don't even go out front with a smoke; have Tommy take you out back. We'll return before sundown.”

”Wait, Tommy?” said Maggie before she could stop herself. She looked at Jase standing next to Henry, but Jase wouldn't look at her.

”Tommy and Ghost will be your detail today. They're staying here at the clubhouse,” said Henry as he gestured to them in the crowd. ”Let's move out, boys.” The meeting broke in a flurry of movement and conversation. Coffee cups clinked as they were stacked in messy rows on the bar.

Maggie stared at Jase as she digested her father's words. Jase had been removed from her protection. Had he requested it? Could he not stand the sight of her, after last night? She felt a pang in her gut and suddenly wished she hadn't waited to speak with him about it, like a coward. She shouldn't have even left the den without giving him an explanation. He had to be in so much pain.

Jase moved through the crowd following Henry. He didn't speak or even look at her. Maggie tried to think of something to say in that moment, some way to get an answer to what was going on, but all she could think about was the pain swirling in her chest like a building storm.

She followed to watch Jase and the rest of the departing boys head down the hallway and out the front door. And then he was gone, just another engine roaring down the drive.

~ Twelve ~

The s.e.x the night before had done wonders for clearing Jase's head. Part of him felt like a brand new man. The other part of him, however, felt like s.h.i.+t run over twice. Even though he couldn't bring himself to look at her, he knew Maggie was giving him that hang-dog expression once she realized he wasn't guarding her that day. He didn't get any joy out of knowing her feelings were hurt, but at least they were in the same boat, now.

Henry had been the one to remove him from Maggie's detail. The change in position filled Jase with shame. He didn't even have to wonder why it was happening; Henry had a roster of reasons to do it. He'd caught no clues on the shooting at Hot Tamales. Maggie was attacked in broad daylight and Jase couldn't do a d.a.m.n thing to stop it. And, even if Henry didn't know it, now Jase and Maggie had... well, compromised things. At least, that was how Jase felt: compromised. Vulnerable. Tied up to endure the worst of the wind. He hadn't argued, because part of him thought he deserved it, and the other part of him was glad to have a day away from Maggie.

Well, away from her body, at least, Jase thought, catching a whiff of himself as he followed Henry, Beck, and Drake into Dot's Diner. After Maggie had left him standing literally with his d.i.c.k out in the den, Jase had gotten dressed and spent the night hunkered over the bar, finis.h.i.+ng off what was left of the whiskey they had found. His heart was a wounded lion, bleeding out in the tall gra.s.s. For those few minutes on the pool table, in her arms, everything had been put back the way it was supposed to be. But after, he felt colder than he had ever been.

He must have dozed off at the bar at some point in the night. He woke up with a start when members started showing up for the briefing. After that, he didn't seem to have another free moment. Showering hadn't even been on the map. He could smell his own sweat, but worse than that, he could still smell Maggie. Her perfume hung around his s.h.i.+rt and cut like a delicate ghost.

Jase hung back to take a seat on the far end of the dining table where the boys took their places. They ordered coffee for themselves, and offered Ned Tunstall, the man they were there to meet with, whatever he wanted. Ned picked a giant breakfast combo with pancakes, sausage, hash browns, the works. Henry made light chat with him while they waited for the breakfast to arrive, knowing well that the waitress had shoved it to the front of cook's line. The MC's men took refills on coffee as Ned dug into his breakfast.

After he was halfway through, Henry got to the meat of the matter. ”Ned, I gotta ask you. Now, I know this is a delicate matter...” Jase sipped his coffee and listened to Henry work, ”but it's a very important, very personal matter which brings us here today. It's something I need your help on.”

Ned was a civilian. He owned a local mechanic's shop that the MC used sometimes in a pinch. He seemed a little wary of this lop-sided meeting, which is why Henry had insisted it be at Dot's. He wanted to intimidate Ned, but had no intention of hurting him, and a public meeting was the perfect way to bridge that divide. Still, he seemed to take a good long time chewing up his eggs before he answered. ”Is this about Hot Tamales?”

”We have it on good authority that you were there the night of the shooting,” said Henry with a nod.

Ned nodded. ”I was.” He shoved a bite of pancakes in his mouth, and then looked around suspiciously. ”But Gloria don't know that.”

”And she won't learn it from us.”

Ned ran his tongue over his teeth and nodded. ”I don't remember a whole lot, Henry, and what I did remember I already told to Sheriff Stewart.” Syrup ran down his chin in a tiny little river.

As Jase watched Ned eating, eyeballing the men like he thought they might rip away his breakfast, he thought of the old line Henry used to tell him: There are predators, and there are sheep, Jase. Some people never realize which one they are.

”Look, we're following a good lead trying to find these a.s.sholes,” said Henry. ”But we think they might be the same f.u.c.kers who shot up that house yesterday morning.”

”Oh, Christ...” said Ned with genuine shock. ”You really think?”