Chapter 11
?
— Dutch —
The mattress was heavier than I’d expected.
The fabric snagged on the doorframe, and the smell of stale sweat and cheap perfume hit me as I wrestled it through.
Three months since I’d walked away from this place to get my head straight, and this was the first thing I wanted to do now that I was back.
After leaving Florida, I hadn’t been ready to come home. So I’d taken the long way back.
A week in Savannah with the Devil’s Sons chapter, helping them sort out a territorial dispute with a rival club.
A week in Asheville smoothing things over with the Mountain Ghosts after the disaster of a meeting I’d shown up to half-drunk back in October.
Another week riding solo through the Blue Ridge, sleeping in roadside motels and small-town bars, thinking about the man I’d been and the man I wanted to become.
Then two more weeks in Atlanta, handling some business deals that had been neglected while I was falling apart.
The rest of the time I spent on the road between stops, riding until my ass was numb and my head was finally quiet.
Three months of putting myself back together, one mile at a time.
I dropped the mattress in the middle of the parking lot with a thud that echoed off the surrounding buildings.
“What the fuck are you doing, Prez?” Handful called out from the clubhouse steps, where he and Holden had been sharing a morning beer.
“Burning the past,” I said, pulling out my lighter and touching the flame to the corner of the mattress. “Should have done this months ago.”
The fabric caught quickly, orange flames licking up the sides. Within minutes, the whole thing was engulfed, sending a black plume of smoke into the clear morning sky.
“Jesus, Dutch,” Holden said, jogging over. “You could have just put it in the dumpster.”
“Nah.” I stepped back from the heat, watching the flames consume everything. “This needed to burn.”
The mattress where I’d fucked countless club girls. Where I’d betrayed Indira without even thinking about it. Where I’d acted like the worst kind of man because that’s what I thought being a man meant.
“That where you used to take Crystal?” Handful asked, and I could hear the nervous edge in his voice.
“Crystal. Candy. Tiffany. Whoever.” I shrugged. “I’m done with all that.”
“Done?” Holden’s eyebrows shot up. “Since when?”
“Since I grew the fuck up,” I said.
More brothers had gathered now, drawn by the smoke and the spectacle of their president committing arson in broad daylight.
Colt stood with his arms crossed, a small smile playing at his lips like he understood exactly what this was about.
Glitch looked concerned, probably calculating the fire hazard and potential legal ramifications while monitoring police and fire scanner frequencies on his phone in case someone called it in.
“So what’s the plan now?” Holden asked. “You getting a new mattress and moving back into the clubhouse?”
“Hell no.” I watched the last of the mattress collapse into ash. “I’ve got a house for a reason.”
The house I’d built thinking about a future with a woman who deserved better than sharing me with club girls. The house where Indira had packed her things and walked out of my life because I’d been too stupid to realize what I was throwing away.
“Now that I’m back,” I said, turning to face my brothers, “we need to have church. Things are going to be different around here.”
An hour later, I banged the gavel with more authority than I’d felt in months as the brothers gathered.
“Church is in session.” I looked around at the faces of men who’d watched me fall apart and somehow still welcomed me back. “First order of business—territory expansion. We’ve been talking about the Montana routes for months. Time to make a move.”
“The gun routes through there are solid,” Holden said, consulting his notes. “Good access to I-90, minimal law enforcement presence.”
“The Wolves have been sniffing around that territory too,” Colt added. “We wait much longer, we might have competition.”
I nodded, but noticed Colt seemed distracted, checking his phone and glancing toward the window. “You got somewhere else to be, brother?”
“Nah, just...” He shrugged. “Thought I saw someone I recognized earlier. Probably nothing.”
Glitch looked up from his laptop. “The financial projections for expansion look good. Security contracts in that area could cover the initial investment within six months.”
“Good. Put it to a vote. All in favor?”
Every hand went up. The Montana expansion was a go.
“Second order of business,” I said, my voice getting heavier. “Club policy changes.”
The room went dead quiet.
“From now on, no club girls in my office. No club girls in my house. No club girls in my bed.” I met each man’s eyes. “I’m done with that shit.”
“Dutch,” Handful started, “you sure about this? I mean, it’s been months. Maybe you just need to—”
“I’m sure.” I cut him off, my jaw tight. The room went quiet. I didn’t explain further.
Holden leaned forward. “What about the rest of us? This a new club rule, or just personal policy?”
“Personal policy. What you do is your business. But I’m done pretending that having a stable of club girls makes me some kind of alpha. All it made me was a cheating piece of shit.”
The silence stretched uncomfortably. Finally, Glitch spoke up.
“For what it’s worth, brother, I think you’re making the right call.”
“Thanks.” I cleared my throat. “Which brings me to the last thing.”
I got up and walked to the safe in the corner, spinning the combination I’d memorized years ago. Inside, beneath the emergency cash and important documents, was a box from Leather & Lace, the shop where we got all our club merchandise.
I pulled it out and set it on the table.
“What’s that?” Handful asked.
“Indira’s cut.” I looked around the room, eyeballing each of my brothers one by one.
“Last time we spoke, before I went to visit my mom and that piece of shit I call my father, some of you didn’t seem to think I was serious about Indira so I wanted to show you this.
I ordered it before...” I stopped, shook my head. “Before I fucked everything up.”
Holden’s expression softened. “Dutch, man...”
“I was going to give it to her at the Halloween party. Make it official.” I stared at the box like it might explode. “Had it all planned out. Thought I was being romantic, waiting for the right moment.”
“If she’s the one, why wait?” Colt asked quietly.
“Because I was a coward.” The admission came easier than I’d expected. “I wanted all the benefits of having an old lady without actually committing to being the kind of man who deserved one.”
The room was quiet for a moment. Then Holden leaned forward. “Why you showing us this, Prez? This ain’t exactly club business.”
I looked around the table at my brothers—men I’d led, fought beside, bled with. They deserved honesty.
“Because I want you to know how much she meant to me. That I wasn’t just fucking around with her.
I had her cut made. I was ready to make her my old lady.
” I ran a hand over the box. “And I want you to know I’m serious about being a different man.
Not just with the club girls—with everything.
The way I treated her, the person I let myself become. .. that’s done.”
I picked up the box and carried it back to the safe. “This stays here. Reminder of what I lost because I was too much of a fuckup to appreciate what I had.”
“Maybe you could—” Handful started.
“No.” I slammed the safe door shut and spun the lock. “She’s gone. She’s building a life without me, and she deserves to do that in peace.” I turned back to face them. “Just wanted you to know, brothers. That’s all.”
Church ended twenty minutes later with assignments for the Montana expansion. I was reviewing route maps with Holden when Glitch approached my desk.
“The Montana run tomorrow,” he said. “You sure you want to handle the supplier meeting personally? We could send someone else.”
“Why would I do that?”
Glitch shrugged. “No reason. You just got back. Thought you might want to ease back into things.”
But there was something in his expression that made me suspicious. Like he knew something I didn’t. “I’ll handle it,” I said firmly. “Time to get back to work.”
?
The next evening, I found myself in a dive bar called The Rusty Spur in Whitefish, Montana, waiting for our ammunition supplier to show up.
The place was exactly what I’d expected from a ski town watering hole—dim lighting, cheap beer, and walls covered in vintage ski equipment and taxidermied animal heads.
January in Montana meant the place was packed with tourists in expensive parkas and locals who could spot an outsider from a mile away.
I’d chosen a table in the back corner where I could see the whole room. Professional habit. Always know your exits, always watch the crowd.
Which is how I saw her the moment she walked in.
Indira.
My heart stopped. Actually fucking stopped, then started beating so hard I could hear it over the music.
She was with three other women, all of them flushed from the cold, unwrapping scarves and shaking snow out of their hair.
One of them was wearing a plastic tiara and a sash that read “brIDE TO BE.” Bachelorette party.
Of course. They claimed a table near the fireplace, ordering drinks and laughing about something that had happened on the slopes.
The slopes. Indira had been skiing? That caught me off guard. In all the time we’d been together, she’d never mentioned skiing. Never mentioned wanting to try it.
She was laughing at something one of her friends said, and the sound knocked the air right out of my lungs.
She looked... incredible. Different. She was wearing a cream-colored sweater that hugged her curves, her cheeks still pink from the cold, her dark hair tumbling over her shoulders.
But it was more than that. She moved differently.
Confident. Like she owned her space in a way she never had when she was with me.
She looked happy.
The rational part of my brain told me to leave. To finish my beer, text the supplier to reschedule, and get the fuck out before she noticed me. She was building a new life, and the last thing she needed was me showing up to complicate it.
But I couldn’t move. Couldn’t stop staring at the woman who’d once been mine and now so clearly wasn’t.
“Dutch. Well, I’ll be damned.”
I looked up to find two women standing beside my table. Blonde, early twenties, the kind of club groupies who hung around MC events hoping to catch a president’s attention.
“Ladies,” I said politely, not taking my eyes off Indira.
“Mind if we join you?” The taller one slid into the seat beside me without waiting for an answer. “I’m Ashley, and this is Trixie. We met you at the Asheville rally last summer.”
I had no memory of them, but that wasn’t unusual. I’d met a lot of women at rallies over the years.
“Actually, I’m waiting for someone,” I said, hoping they’d take the hint.
“Business meeting?” Ashley pressed closer, her hand landing on my thigh. “We could wait with you. Make it more fun.”
Trixie giggled and moved to my other side. “We know how to keep secrets, don’t we, Ash?”
Six months ago, I would have taken them up on the offer without a second thought. Would have had them both in my hotel room before the night was over, just because I could.
Now, the thought made my stomach turn. Crystal’s perfume. Indira’s face in the doorway. The look in her eyes.
“Thanks, but no.” I removed Ashley’s hand from my leg. “Not interested.”
“Come on,” she pouted. “Don’t be shy. We flew all the way from Denver when we heard Venom Riders would be in town.”
“Then you wasted a trip.” I stood up, pulling out my wallet. “Excuse me.”
I dropped twenty bucks on the table and headed for the bar, leaving both women staring after me in confusion. At the bar, I ordered another beer and tried to process what had just happened.
I’d turned down easy sex. Not because I was playing hard to get, not because I was trying to be strategic. Because I was choosing to be intentional about intimacy now. Because I’d learned the hard way that sex without meaning just left me feeling emptier than before.
When had that happened? When had I become the kind of man who could walk away from meaningless hookups because I was building something better in myself?
I glanced back toward Indira’s table and found her watching me. Our eyes locked, and for a moment, the rest of the world disappeared.
She’d seen the whole thing. Seen Ashley and Trixie throw themselves at me. Seen me walk away.
Her expression was unreadable, but she didn’t look away. We stared at each other for what felt like hours but was probably only seconds. Something flickered in her dark eyes—surprise, maybe. Confusion.
Then one of her friends said something that made her turn back to the group, and the moment was broken.
My supplier chose that moment to text me: Running late. 30 minutes, 60 max.
I should have left the bar. Should have waited outside or found another place to kill time. Instead, I stayed at the bar, nursing my beer and stealing glances at the woman who’d once been everything to me.
She never looked my way again. When her group got up to leave an hour later, she walked past my position at the bar without acknowledging my presence. Close enough that I could smell her perfume-something new, something I didn’t recognize.
But as she reached the door, she paused. Turned back. Our eyes met one more time, and this time I saw something that gave me hope.
She didn’t look angry. She didn’t look hurt.
She looked curious.
Then she was gone, disappearing into the snowy Montana night with her friends.