Frisco

Epilogue

EPILOGUE

KALI

K atie was okay.

The random men were okay.

I found out where Harper and Justin had been the whole time, and they were more than okay.

But me, I wasn’t okay.

That day when I shot Marco Estrada, I got him. I know I did, but we didn’t have his body.

Shane had driven in, guns blazing and he drew attention from me. It’s the whole reason I was even able to shoot Estrada. Thinking back on it, I realized that I would’ve been killed the moment I pulled that gun. The guy with Marco Estrada had been that good. He wasn’t like the other imbeciles who worked for him.

He ran in, grabbing Marco’s body at the same time that Shane ran in and scooped me up.

They were like two opponents having a ceasefire for a moment as they each got their partner to safety. Shane had come alone, his other men were back at the other ‘battle.’ So in a way, I still blamed myself for why Marco got away, if he did indeed get away. I put it that way because it’s been a whole year later and no one’s heard a word about him or from him.

His cartel didn’t fall. After all that planning, there was no chaos in Mexico. But there wasn't an all-out war either. It was like one side went silent, and our side… just continued living.

The Red Demons were free.

And my brother, he went through with what he promised. He killed those four men, and then another surprise happened after. Instead of getting a call informing me about his death in prison, I got a call saying that my brother had escaped prison. It was kept very hush-hush. No media covered his disappearance. I never once had law enforcement knocking on my door, asking about him or looking for him. To my knowledge, my brother literally vanished from prison.

I had no idea where he went, and when I asked Shane about it, he would say the same thing.

He made a call to the one person he trusted in law enforcement.

He never thought it would pan out.

And he had no idea where my brother went.

But, no news of my brother’s death was very good news to me. I liked to think, like on days like this, as I was standing on our front porch in our house just outside of Frisco, that everything was a happily ever after.

Aly and Brandon got married.

Brandon didn’t quite ‘hate’ the Red Demons anymore, but he didn’t necessarily like us. What he did was thaw toward Shane and me specifically. That meant Aly and I got to hang out. I helped plan her wedding. I helped plan her bachelorette party and her baby shower. I also got to know her in-laws more, and while I enjoyed her sister-in-law, I was always uneasy around her too.

But we weren’t the only ones here.

Harper and Justin did indeed get married. They decided to leave Manny’s that night, and instead of going out the ‘back back’ as Harper put it, because it was ‘creepy,’ they went to the front. They enjoyed the show of machismo going on between Shane and Brandon, but they went and ‘had it out,’ also as Harper put it, in their hotel room. After a few hours of yelling and crying, the make-up sex had been Hot (also as Harper spelled it,) and after that, he had an epiphany.

“What the fuck was I fighting him for?” he explained to us. “I mean, like duh. I was being so dumb and being so scared of not wanting to get hurt, that all I was doing was hurting myself. I realized that Justin was actually going to go, and he would find a great guy and I would’ve lost him forever.” He started tearing up, his voice went hoarse. “I couldn’t do that, so you know, Vegas.”

They went to Vegas, got married, and turned their phones off to the world.

They didn’t turn their phones back on until a rather mammoth-size man showed up at their hotel room and informed them if they didn’t call their friends back, he’d shoot them right then and there.

Justin says the guy didn’t actually say that threat, but that’s what Harper stands by.

As for me and Shane–“Hey, hooker.”

I grinned at the same time I rolled my eyes. “Claudia.”

She grinned, ruefully, at me. “Hi.”

Machete was right behind her, his arms full of equipment. He gave me a grin. “Where do you want this?”

I pointed to the back. “My dad’s already here. He’s set up.”

He paused. “Grill Master?”

“Grill Master.”

Claudia frowned.

He said, with a small grin, “Cool. This will be awesome.”

A second later, the air filled with beats from Tag Team. The Sugar Hill Gang would be on deck, and there were a ton others right after. I lifted up a thumb, heading down the porch to Claudia. “That music won’t be stopping till late tonight. Hope you’re okay with it.”

She gave me a look. “This is not the first family cookout I’ve been to.” She gave me a hug, wrapping her arms around me.

“We got a DJ.”

“What? Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, it’s my cousin Trevor, but he DJs as a side-gig. Also, are you ready to eat, because there’s going to be a lot of eating. A lot. There’s going to be dancing all night too. Karaoke. You do know the rule?”

Her smile was wiped clean.

“What? No. What is it?”

“You gotta dance as if no one’s watching. That’s the whole point. And definitely you have to dance if someone points to you. No matter who it is. My niece? Dance. My cousin–”

“You have like thirty-eight cousins! What do you mean if one of them points to me?”

“Dance.” I wasn’t done. “And if my great-grandmother points at you, you really dance. You hearing me? I only got one left. All the others are gone, so Great Grandma Martha is kinda like a goddess to us. I’m not joking.”

Claudia had met my Great Grandma and a few of my cousins from Chicago, but not a ton. A few. And in small doses, but there was a whole event happening tomorrow and a ton of my family flew in to be a part of it. It was enough to make me cry and laugh at the same time.

Love. Laughter. Togetherness. Dancing. And eating. That’s what it was all about.

I patted Claudia on the back. “You’ll get it. Just wait till Great-Grandma Martha gets here.”

“Kali!”

I twisted around, Claudia’s arms still around me. My dad had an apron on, a t-shirt under that said Kali’s Dad , and giant-sized tongs in one hand. He held them up to me. “I don’t have enough spices. We are the spices. This is a big deal.” He barely blinked, waving his tongs. “Hi, Claudia.”

“Hi, James.”

“Your mother coming tonight?”

She nodded, her whole body stiff in my arms. “She and my dad got a divorce. Did you hear?”

He gave a nod, not showing a thing. “I heard. I hope she’s doing okay.”

She gave another nod. “Me too. I think she is. It was a long time ago, just making sure you knew.”

Again, he barely blinked. He was picking up what she was putting down. “Her bar doing good?”

“Yep. It’s doing real good, Mr. Michaels.”

“That’s good.” He flashed me a grin. “She as tight as she always was?”

I dropped my arms from around my sister. “Dad!”

Claudia laughed. “You know Ruby.”

“I do. Oh, boy, do I. Kali.” He waved his tongs back in the air. “I need the seasonings. This food takes hours to properly season!”

I had no idea what he was so stressed about, but then again, I was not a Grill Master.

I headed for him, pulling my phone out. “Okay. Tell me the seasonings you need.”

They were playing Catch Phrase when I walked by, hearing my Uncle Toby saying, “It’s a Southern word for pop .” I was pretty sure he was describing Coca-Cola.

A second later, I heard, “You can’t say soda!”

“I didn’t.”

“You did.”

“I said pop.”

“You said pop, and then you said soda.”

“It’s on the card!”

“Those are the words you can’t say.”

“Oh! Well, why isn’t that in the rules? Should be in the rules.”

“It’s in the rules. I’ve told you seven times.”

“Hey.”

An arm circled my waist later, when I was watching my dad and his dance crew on the dance floor. I was pulled back into the shadows. I knew whose arm that was, and I was already smiling, turning around to meet him. I reached up on my toes, pressing my mouth to his. “Hi.”

Shane smiled down at me. “Hi back.”

It’d been a year since I pulled that trigger.

Since then, he picked me up. Literally.

He carried me at times when I couldn’t walk.

He was there when we went back.

When we met Aly. When Brandon hadn’t been such a fan of Shane then.

When I called my father, told him what all happened, he had so severely not been happy. He refused to meet Shane until months later. Shane was with me at every step of the way back, and the way back was a long trip. But we were here, and I was feeling we’d finally arrived once more.

I killed Estrada, or I thought I had, and his club swarmed me. They covered me, but there’s been no investigation. Nothing. The most I saw was when I woke one morning and two cops were talking to Shane, Boise, and Machete in the driveway. They left and none of the guys ever said a word to me what that’d been about.

We came back.

We lived.

I got the call about my brother. I told Claudia about the call about our brother, and well, life went on.

It was a weird event.

We went to Texas for a while.

We went back to Indiana. When Aly called and asked if I could help make plans for sending her grandmother to California, I really got it. Aly was staying in Cali, and since she was there, and since I was kinda a nomad, that’s where Harper said he was going to settle down. Justin had family from California so it worked for them, but we helped get Aly’s grandma transferred out there.

And Shane asked me one night in bed, his arms around me, “Where do you want to be?”

I paused, my legs had been wound around his hips. “What?”

“Max is asking me. I still got stuff to handle in Cali, but if you don’t want to settle there, then we won’t. Where do you want to go?”

I told him instantly, no hesitation. California.

So here we were.

I called Rena when we arrived, knowing we’d be staying and I had a job at Fallen Crest not long after that. I didn’t know the specifics, but Shane was taking over the Frisco charter. But changes were happening. On my request, he was making a move to help rebuild the town. They moved their charter’s headquarters so it was more out of town, and put money into building whatever needed to be done.

The latest I heard was that the plans were approved to start rebuilding a school. A new development recently started too. The Red Demons had an investment into it, but it was happening. There were talks about setting up a small clinic too. Three other bars had popped up in and near town.

It was all good.

But we’d built our own house, a renovated horse barn. It was always my dream, and Shane had a whole shed for his bikes too on our land. Plus, that shed was added onto it so he was housing half of his new charter too.

I got it. I understood. I liked the guys.

They were family to me as well.

Harper didn’t quite understand. Neither did Aly, but they were supportive. Once Brandon got to know Shane, and he did that over many nights of rummy and drinking bourbon, but it happened. Brandon’s family was another thing. There was no gray meeting or compromise between his family and Shane or the club, but it was what it was. I didn’t care as long as I still got to have Aly, and she would’ve made sure that happened no matter what. After our night together, Aly was a changed woman with me or she’d just remembered who she was. I got it. I really did. There was real reason to be worried about the Red Demons, but I loved Shane. He was a Red.

That meant I was a Red.

Aly had a whole moment, but she said she loved me no matter what.

So in a way, that meant Aly was a Red.

I mean, not really, but we were still going with it.

It just meant I still had both of my best friends in my life, and I was Shane’s old lady, so I was happy. And now with my family being here, I was extra super happy.

Life was good. If you had people who loved you and were in your corner, life was damn good.

“You ready for tomorrow?”

I tipped my head back, feeling his arms around me, and I smiled up at him. “You mean when we get married?”

His smile deepened. “Yeah. That’s what I mean.”

I put my arms around him, raising up on my toes. “Yeah.” I moved so my head was right in front of his, a few inches separating us. I dropped my tone. “I am very ready.”

“Good.” He smiled at me.

I smiled back.

It was that night, after dancing and laughing for hours, when I was lying in his arms that I asked, “You told me you had a thing about masks.”

His arms tightened, just barely. “Yeah?”

I rolled so I was facing him more directly. “Why do you wear that hockey mask? I saw you.”

We were not conventional.

Our wedding tomorrow would not be conventional.

Because of that, or maybe despite all that, we were sleeping together the night before we got married.

Maybe I was having a moment where I wanted to know all the secrets. It’d been something on my mind because I hadn’t been able to get the image of him putting that mask on, wading into battle how he had both times. I wanted to understand the reason.

“It’s a symbol.”

I rolled to my back, looking at him. “A symbol for what?”

His face grew tight, but then he softened. “I’m their leader. In that moment, in that time, all the danger going on, it’s me. Every responsibility rides on my back. When we go into places where the guys wear masks for whatever reason, camouflage, gas masks, etc, my mask will stick out. Or that’s the hope. It’s twofold. It’s supposed to symbolize what we’re doing. Wreaking havoc. Justice. Fear. But mine should stick out the most. That’s the point. If someone is going to draw against us, I want them to point at me first. I’m the leader. I stand for my men, just as much as they stand for me. It’s me giving back to them. I protect them while they protect me. It’s a yin and yang balance. I’d be nothing without my men, whereas they would still be fine. They could get a new leader and they’d keep moving forward. So in a way it’s also my ode to them. I love them and I want to protect them, and it’s a way I might help them back as much as they’ve undoubtedly helped me already.”

I moved closer in his arms, touching his face, and cupping his cheek. “You send the message, but you are the message and you are standing for your men. All at the same time.”

“Yeah. Something like that.”

I got it. It was beautiful, but it wasn’t one-dimensional or even two-dimensional. It was a multi-layered answer and in some ways I felt like it could stand for so much more than it did. Then again, maybe it always did and that was the whole purpose.

The bottom line was, “You wear that mask to protect your men.”

“Yes.”

It was pure Shane, and another reason why I loved him, why I was marrying him tomorrow.

I moved up, touching my mouth to his.

My man.

My husband.

My other half.

It was later, after I kissed him, and he kissed me back, and he rolled on top of me.

It was after that when I told him, “You know I asked my mom today why she sent me after Claudia.” I lifted my head up, gazing at him. “She had to know Claudia would never leave. Claude does what she wants. It’s just how she is.”

“I know. It’s why we’re building a salon for her in Frisco.”

I smiled, another advance for the dying town.

“What’d she say when you asked her?”

I lay all the way back, making sure he could see me. “She told me she sent me after you.”

“Kali, honey. You stupid? I took one look at how you were looking at that man and I knew he was the one. I’m not a perfect mama. I know that much, but I do love you and I knew that man was yours. I just gave you the excuse to go get him.” She gave me a wink and moved in, pressing her mouth to my forehead. “I love you, baby girl.” Then she looked around. “Now, where’s your father because he’s single, ain’t he? Saw him earlier and he’s looking damn good. That dance crew is doing wonders for him.”

“Are you serious?” Shane was fighting back his laughter. His hand slid to my stomach and then moved down, resting between my legs.

“I am.” My smile got all secretive because he also knew the other secret I found out today, just from going to see Dr. Vioeri who was now my regular doctor. I had to ask, “Speaking of parents, what do you think?”

I moved in, touching my mouth to his, a kiss for a kiss because I loved him so much.

And I asked, “You think I’m having a boy or a girl?”