Chapter 7 Silver
SILVER
“Thanks for having us,” Logan says, standing on my doorstep. “I figured this was news best delivered in person.”
“Any time. You know you two are always welcome.”
I step aside and let him and Teysha through. Logan strides in holding four-month-old baby Chloe while Teysha clutches two large Tupperware containers—she’s made it a point to bring me food since she found out I’ve been surviving off turkey sandwiches since the divorce.
“Catfish and mac and cheese,” she announces over her shoulder. “I brought you extra to last a few days.”
I chuckle, looking over at Logan and baby Chloe cooing in his arms. “Have I told you lately how good you’ve got it?”
“Don’t need to tell me. I already know. Right, baby?” he asks the infant.
Teysha comes up to his side and gently takes her from him, walking over to the sofa and settling down with Chloe on her lap. The infant immediately starts grabbing for everything within reach—the remote, a framed photo of Tabby and Jack, my ring of keys on the end table.
“Ba ba ba!” Chloe declares, making another grab for the remote. Teysha giggles and catches her chubby fist just in time.
Logan looks on proudly. “That’s my girl. Thinking her club moniker will be Grabby.”
“We’ll have to get her a cut,” I say, laughing.
Four months, and I still haven’t gotten used to seeing these two with a baby. But damn if they aren’t good parents.
I’ve never seen a guy at the club take to fatherhood like Logan has.
“So what’s the news you thought I had to hear in person?” I ask, hands on my waist.
“Got a release notification yesterday,” he starts, then pauses as if questioning the news himself. “From the Texas State Penitentiary. My father’s finally been granted parole. He’ll be out in a week.”
The news is met with silence on both ends. Logan goes quiet, and I’m processing what I’ve just been told.
It’s finally happened. Tom’s been granted parole. He’ll be returning in a week after how many years…
I’ve known him since we were boys. We’ve spent most of our lives as best friends. We were inducted into the Steel Kings together, the only two prospects who survived the crazy tests we were put through that summer.
For a long time, I considered him my brother in everything but blood.
This should be news I welcome. News I celebrate.
“A week,” I repeat seconds later. “You’re sure?”
“Yeah. A week. Mace received the same notification.”
Behind Logan, Chloe’s managed to snatch the remote despite Teysha’s efforts, gnawing on it with satisfied little grunts. She leaves it slick with her saliva by the time Teysha steals it back and shoots me an apologetic smile.
But I don’t give a damn. Logan and Teysha are as good as family and so is their little one. Besides, I’m too distracted by the topic at hand.
“Well…” I say slowly. “He’s gonna want the gavel back.”
Logan nods, jaw tight. “Yeah, he will. The club was his life. Knowing it was waiting for him on the other end was the only thing that kept him going all these years. His words, not mine.”
“It’s his to have,” I admit. “He is the president on paper. He’s officially in charge. I’m just the fill-in.”
“You’ve been more than that. Everybody knows it. It’s gonna be… the whole situation’s complex.”
Complex doesn’t begin to cover it.
Tom earned that president patch through blood and grit, taking over from hardasses like Skull and Pistol from our early days.
He steered the ship through many storms and saw us through one of the most prosperous, profitable periods the club’s ever seen.
That was ultimately the problem—we caught the attention of the law, and they wound up pinning him down with a solid enough case.
This club belongs to him and is his rightful possession to take back.
But as many years as it’s been, things change. The club’s a different beast than when he went away. I’ve made calls he might not’ve made, taken us in directions he probably wouldn’t have chosen, gotten involved in battles that could come back to haunt us again any day now.
We’re no longer the bloodthirsty, devil-may-care outlaws we were in the past. We’ve had to adapt, find ways to go covert under the noses of the law, grow beyond simple bully tactics we once used when ruling over the town.
“Him and Mace still aren’t speaking,” Logan continues. “Hell, I’m barely speaking to him myself. He hasn’t exactly been the best father.”
I nod, scrubbing my jaw. “Fatherhood was never Cutty’s thing. He regularly admitted that himself.”
“Yeah, me and Mace heard it from the horse’s mouth. He told us plenty of times too.”
“Wheels is on the run after what happened with Ozzie and Asa Boone. Now Cutty’s getting let out. Who would’ve had this on their bingo card?”
“It does seem like old faces are making new appearances,” Logan admits.
“While we’re on the topic, there’s something else that’ll be an issue as he returns,” I explain with a deep sigh. “The club’s got money troubles. Bad ones.”
His brows draw closer. “How bad?”
“Bad enough we’ve had to try renegotiating our deal with the Penas. It didn’t go so well.”
“Mace mentioned something about that.” Logan runs a hand through his hair, long on the top, short on the sides, looking more like his father than he’d probably want to know. “So I take it we’re no longer on good terms.”
“It was always a shaky arrangement. Even more than when we were dealing with the Barreras.”
“They won’t be letting any bad blood go. They hold grudges.”
“Yeah, I got that. Big Ed said the same.”
Chloe chooses this moment to shriek with joy, having discovered the remote makes the TV respond. The screen flickers on, volume blasting some kids’ show Jack must’ve been watching last time he was over before Teysha manages to wrestle the remote away.
“Sorry,” Teysha says, bouncing Chloe on her lap.
Logan turns back to me, determination in his eyes—Tom’s natural grit and refusal to quit. “We can figure out other ways to generate profit. We’ve done it before, we’ll do it again. Don’t need to go back to the dirty shit.”
“Figured the same at first. But I’ve crunched the numbers. The garage barely covers costs. The bar’s keeping us afloat but just barely.”
“So we get creative.”
“We’ll have to get more creative than ever before. We’ll hash it out next club meeting.”
“And if the Penas got a problem with us? Fuck ’em!” Logan goes on. “We’ve survived the Hellrazors, the Road Rebels, the Barreras. We can handle the Penas if it comes to it.”
I chuckle. “You know you and your younger brother are more alike than you realize.”
“Don’t tell him that. He swears we’re nothing alike. Anyway, catch you later, Silver. We stay any longer, Chloe’ll slobber down everything in your place.”
Teysha stands, hoisting the infant higher on her hip. She immediately grabs for Logan’s face, trying to get a hold on his facial hair.
“Argh, baby girl. That’s attached,” he laughs, carefully extracting her tiny fingers.
“Enjoy the catfish,” Teysha reminds as they head for the door.
“Believe me, I always do.”
Logan pauses at the threshold, his expression serious again for a moment. “Silver... when my father comes back… things are gonna change.”
“Yeah,” I sigh. “They are.”
“You’ve held this club together. Don’t let him forget that. Don’t let yourself forget it either.”
The house feels too quiet once they’re gone.
I pop the tab on a beer and take a seat in the armchair in the living room, letting the news Logan delivered really sink in.
Tom, out in a week. My best friend, my brother in steel, the man I once worked alongside as president and vice.
The thing is, Tom and I haven’t been right for years now. Even before he went away, there was distance. Growing suspicion.
Those last few months before the Feds grabbed him, he kept looking at me different. Making comments. Suggesting that maybe he wouldn’t have taken the fall if somebody hadn’t set him up.
That maybe someone close to him had rolled.
The accusations never came direct—Tom’s too smart for that.
But they hung between us like smoke, poisoning every conversation. As if I’d ever betray him. As if over thirty years of brotherhood meant nothing. I stuck by his side in the line of fire. Buried bodies for him.
Kept his club breathing while he served his time, and still he questions my loyalty.
My phone buzzes, Rachel’s name lighting up the screen.
“You available?” she asks without preamble. “The new babysitter’s here for dinner, and you should meet her.”
“Rachel, I’ve got club business—”
“You always have club business,” she cuts in accusatorially. “But your children are important too, right, Jack? Didn’t you agree you’d help me sort this situation out?”
That’s not exactly how it went down.
I said I’d talk to Tabby, which I have. I never explicitly agreed to Jack having some new babysitter, but Rachel’s insisted.
Still, the guilt lands squarely on my chest, exactly what she hopes for. She’s got a gift for that, finding the soft spots and pressing ’til you fold.
“What time?”
“Now. Dinner’s almost ready.”
“I’ll be there in twenty.”
The drive to Rachel’s gives me too much time to think. About Tom coming home. The Penas possibly planning their next move. How I’m supposed to hold everything together when it’s pulling apart at the seams.
Rachel’s house—the house I once paid the mortgage on—sits in one of Pulsboro’s nicer neighborhoods. Not rich, but respectable and safe.
I bought it for that purpose. I always wanted my family far away from anything club related. For them to be able to exist like any other family, not surrounded by club culture at all times.
Rachel opens the door before I even knock, dressed in another long cardigan and skirt, her tangerine hair hanging over her shoulders.
“They’re in the dining room. Try to be pleasant.”
“I’m always pleasant.”
She gives me a look that says otherwise, but I let it slide.
Jack’s laughter tumbles out from the other room. Tabby’s voice joins in. At least they’re happy.
Whoever’s in there with them, it seems they like her.
“I thought having her over for dinner would be good,” Rachel says, leading me down the hallway. “You can get a feel for whether she’s the right fit. She seems very sweet and dependable, and god knows we need someone reliable with your schedule being what it is.”
“My schedule pays for—”
“I’m not fighting about this now,” she cuts me off. “Just... try to make a good impression. The kids really need consistency.”
Another dig, another reminder I’m the reason our family fractured. I’m the one who filed for divorce, not her.
All while she conveniently ignores why I did in the first place.
I bite back the venomous response and save it for another time. The kids are within earshot, and I’ve promised myself I wouldn’t take her bait, at least not when they’re around.
“Jack, this is—”
I stop dead in the doorway.
Seated at the dinner table with Jack and Tabby is none other than Solana.
Big Eddie’s niece Solana.
The distressed young woman whose early morning call I’d answered Solana. The same young woman I’ve thought about countless times this past week, wondering just what it was that had her so distressed, so upset.
Her eyes go wide when she sees me, recognition flashing across her face before she can censor herself.
“This is Solana,” Rachel continues, oblivious to the sudden tension cranked up to eleven. “Solana, this is Jack, the kid’s father.”