Chapter 6 No Retaliation #2
“I have no chance she has promised me,” I said. “The injunction stands whether she divorces me tomorrow or never speaks to me again.”
His mouth hardened. “You would let Saints laugh at us for a woman who threw you out.”
Mace's chair moved, but I lifted one hand without looking away from Switch.
“Maren did not do this to me.”
The room went quiet.
“I cheated,” I said. “I sent the report. I let Northline put her in that hearing with no warning. The table stripped my rank because of what I did, not because she exposed me. Do not make her boundary the insult you avenge.”
Switch shoved me.
My back hit the wall.
Nolan moved, but Mace said, “Hold.”
Switch's face was inches from mine. “You sound weak.”
“Maybe.”
The answer unsettled him more than resistance would have.
He struck me once.
His fist caught the left side of my mouth. Pain flashed across my jaw, followed by the metallic taste of blood. I kept my hands at my sides.
Not because I was afraid to hit him. Because I knew exactly what would follow. One punch returned, then chairs moving, men choosing sides, and the club doing Northline's work inside its own chapel.
Switch grabbed the front of my shirt. “Fight back.”
“No.”
“You think taking a beating makes you noble?”
“No.”
“Then why are you standing there?”
“Because you are angry at the man who opened the gate. Hit him if you need to. You still do not ride south.”
His grip tightened.
Mace rose. “Enough.”
Switch released me with a final shove.
Blood ran from the corner of my mouth. I wiped it with my thumb and did not look at the mark it left.
Mace addressed the room. “No ride. No colors, no private crews, no contact with Red Creek. Nolan sets twenty-four-hour yard security using cameras, lights, and paired shifts. Every vehicle gets tamper seals and a signed pre-trip inspection. We send the evidence to state police and counsel.”
A murmur of objection started.
Mace slammed his palm on the table.
“This is not surrender. It is command. The Saints chose a trap. We do not enter it because pride is loud.”
Switch stared at him. “That your decision or his?”
“Mine.”
The road captain looked toward me. “Convenient.”
“No,” Mace said. “Necessary. Rook has no authority in this room. That does not make every fact from his mouth false.”
Switch took his helmet from the table and walked out.
Several men followed more slowly. I listened for engines. None started.
Mace waited until the chapel cleared.
“You could have stepped away from the punch,” he said.
“I could have.”
“You let him hit you.”
“I did not let him do anything. He made a choice. I made mine.”
Mace studied me. “Do not turn restraint into another performance.”
The warning mattered because men like me knew how to make suffering look useful.
I could stand still for a punch, surrender keys, sign papers, and quietly begin expecting those acts to purchase a future.
Maren had not offered a price. There was no agreed number of consequences after which she had to reconsider.
If I changed only while she might witness it, then I was still shaping myself around reward instead of truth.
“I won't.”
“You already did once, with the rocker.”
The criticism found a place to land. I had believed surrendering rank proved I was no longer avoiding consequence. It had also let me act first, before the table could take something from me. Even accountability could become control if I used it to manage how the loss happened.
“I hear you,” I said.
“Good. Then take the east fence shift from midnight to four. You work under Nolan. You do not direct the other man. You see anything, you report it. You do not pursue.”
“Understood.”
Nolan closed the folder. “Before you leave, counsel forwarded something.”
He slid a printed email across the table.
The sender was an attorney in Harrisburg. The subject line read Request for Protected Testimony and Limited Use Agreement .
I read the first paragraph.
The attorney represented Leah Sutter. She was prepared to provide sworn testimony concerning Northline Freight's acquisition strategy, the public filing, internal handling of the traffic report, and communications involving Gideon Pike.
She would appear only under a court-approved protective order and after receiving written terms limiting use of her testimony in certain proceedings.
My pulse changed.
“Why now?” I asked.
“Her Northline credentials were disabled yesterday,” Nolan said. “Company counsel sent her a preservation demand and a notice placing her on administrative leave. According to this, she believes Pike intends to make her solely responsible for obtaining and circulating the report.”
“She did obtain it.”
“So did he, apparently.”
I read the email again.
Leah had spent six weeks telling me Gideon trusted her, that Northline's leadership saw her as someone who could move difficult people. She liked access, status, and the private knowledge that made powerful men depend on her. I had liked being one of those men.
Now Pike had used our messages, destroyed Maren's hearing, and cut Leah loose.
None of that made Leah innocent. None of it made me less responsible.
It did make her dangerous to Northline.
“Who will take the deposition?” I asked.
“Greyhaven Works counsel requested it,” Nolan said. “Maren has to approve the conditions.”
The thought of Maren sitting across from Leah tightened every muscle in my body.
I wanted to prevent it. I wanted to tell Evelyn Shaw what questions to ask, what lies Leah used, how she shifted blame when cornered.
I wanted to spare Maren the sound of another woman describing places where I had betrayed her.
Every want pointed toward interference.
I placed the email back on the table.
“Does counsel need anything from me before it happens?”
“Not yet.”
“Then I will not contact either of them.”
Nolan watched me with the same measured suspicion he had shown before the vote.
“Upload your route logs,” he said.
“Already done.”
I left the clubhouse through the rear door. The staged motorcycles remained in the bay, engines cold. Switch sat alone on the bench beyond them, elbows on his knees, staring at the wet pavement.
He did not look up when I passed.
At my truck, I checked the secure portal.
No new request waited. Before closing it, I opened the copy of the voting agreement stored in my account.
The signature blocks looked smaller on the phone, but the restriction was the same.
I could not vote, direct, threaten, or bargain.
For once, the limits around me had been written by people I could not overrule.
I did not search Leah's number, though I still knew it by memory. I did not message Maren to warn her, apologize, or ask to be present.
Her silence remained hers.
By morning, she would decide whether to enter a room with the woman who helped me destroy our marriage.
For the first time since the hearing, the next move belonged entirely to Maren, and I understood that respecting her choice might require me to stand outside every door that mattered.