Chapter Three
Twister
Sunlight bled through the busted blinds like a goddamn interrogation lamp.
I rolled off the mattress I’d thrown on the floor of one of the upstairs rooms and stretched as my bones cracked in protest. The room smelled like old paint, sweat, and fresh sawdust in a comforting, weird, broken kind of way. Like the start of something dangerous and real, but it was mine.
This was ours now. Time to make it feel like it.
Downstairs, the sound of boots, hammering, and the occasional curse echoed through the floorboards. They were good sounds. The boys were already at it. I pulled on my cut, ran a hand through my hair, and headed down.
The clubhouse was still a mess, but less of one than yesterday.
The main floor was wide open, brick walls on two sides, scarred hardwood floors, and that long, battered bar we’d all agreed to keep. It had character. The kind of bar that soaked in secrets.
Behind the bar was a doorway that led into a narrow galley kitchen that ran the length of the bar. We’d found ancient pots, three toasters, and something growing in the back of the fridge we still hadn’t identified.
To the left of the bar, a hallway stretched toward the back and led to a small office and three other rooms. They’d once been God knows what—storage? Gambling dens? Hell rooms? —but we were turning them into six by busting and rebuilding the walls. Every brother deserved his own space, except the prospects. They could bunk up like summer camp.
“Watch your damn swing, Sully!”
Magnum barked from down the hall, holding a pry bar and looking half-feral with sawdust in his beard.
“I was aiming at the wall, not your foot!”
Sully yelled back, shirtless and sweating, with a sledgehammer propped against his shoulder.
“Same difference with your aim,”
Nugget chimed in and ducked out of the office doorway with drywall dust coating his eyebrows.
Swift was at the far end of the hall, using a chalk line and a stud finder to measure where the new walls would be placed.
I stepped into the hallway and nodded.
“Looking good. Any surprises?”
“Wiring’s a little sketch in the far room,”
Swift said.
“But nothing Hodge can’t handle.”
“Where is Hodge?”
“Down the hall, stripping out old closet doors with Wheels. Gramps is making a map of who gets what room.”
I snorted.
“Gramps deciding who goes where? Seems like something I should be doing.”
“He doesn’t trust you to remember,”
Swift said with a smirk.
“He knows you’ll stick him in the room farthest from the bathroom, or maybe even the attic.”
Fair.
Gramps and I got along pretty well, but he sometimes struggled with being older than I was. He would forget that I was the one in charge and not him.
I walked back through the main area and hopped over a couple planks someone had laid across a sticky patch of stripped floor. Behind the bar, Cord and Plug were scrubbing the shelves like their patch depended on it. Which it kinda did.
“You two enjoying your bonding time?” I asked.
Cord looked up, flushed and sweating.
“Yes, sir.”
Plug didn’t say a word, just kept scrubbing.
“I want that kitchen gutted by dinner. We’re not running a diner, but I don’t want salmonella every time we make coffee.”
“Yes, sir,”
Plug mumbled.
I grabbed a rag and wiped down the end of the bar, pretending to care about the dust, but my mind wasn’t really on the clubhouse.
It was three doors down on the corner of State Street and our street.
Tempi.
She’d gotten under my skin faster than I liked. Fire in her voice. Steel in her spine. And eyes that looked straight through bullshit without blinking. I hadn’t expected her. Hell, I hadn’t expected any of this. I thought we’d roll in, claim the city, and plant the flag.
Tempi? Didn’t expect her at all.
She was a wild card.
I didn’t trust wild cards.
Still… the way she’d leaned on the bar, calm and unshaken while calling me out without flinching? I’d replayed it more than once. Which was bullshit because I had more important things to think about than a bar owner with a sharp tongue and legs that made it hard to focus.
“Boss?”
Rev’s voice pulled me out of my thoughts.
“Yeah?”
“Wanna come check the upstairs? We’re gonna start patching the north side and sealing off the back staircase.”
“Be right there.”
Upstairs, the seven rooms were mostly intact—dusty, old, with cracked paint and warped doors—but livable. Each one had a small closet, a window, and just enough space for a bed, dresser, and maybe a chair. Better than most crash pads we’d seen.
Wheels and Hodge were prying off closet doors with crowbars and yelling at each other about hinges.
“I said lift it, not rip it!”
“Same damn result!”
Gramps sat on an overturned bucket in the hallway with a clipboard in hand.
“You assigning rooms or writing a manifesto?” I asked.
He held up a floor plan.
“You’re in the back room, Swift gets the one above the office, Hodge and Wheels take the east wall. Rest are first-come, first-claimed. Prospects get the closet.”
“There’s no closet,”
I pointed out.
“Exactly.”
I chuckled and kept walking to check every room with a quick glance.
This place would shape up. It had the bones.
We just had to break a few first.
By sundown, the noise had tapered off, and the air stank of sweat, wood glue, and victory.
I sat on a barstool with a beer and looked around at the chaos.
Dust everywhere. Tools piled up. Nails scattered. But it was ours.
“Someone say dinner?”
Nugget called out and stretched his back.
“We got anything in the kitchen?”
Sully asked.
“Unless you want expired ramen and mystery mustard, no,”
Plug replied and rubbed his shoulder.
“Let’s head out,”
Swift said and tossed a towel over his shoulder.
“Find a bar. Eat something. Be seen.”
“Agreed,”
I said and stood.
“Let’s stretch our legs. See what Madison has to offer us.”
We locked up and stepped out onto the street as a crew. Twelve patched, two prospects, and all wearing cuts that still smelled fresh from the road.
We walked in a loose line, not trying to look threatening, just existing.
That was enough.
People moved aside. A few locals glanced up, paused, and kept walking. The city wasn’t used to us yet. They would be.
We hit the end of the block, and someone pointed.
“There’s a bar.”
We all saw the sign: The Badger’s Den.
Three doors down from the clubhouse. Lit up. Alive. Music pumping through the glass. Laughter spilling into the street.
A woman stood out front smoking and saw us coming. She narrowed her eyes before flicking the cigarette away.
We filed in, one after another, and stepped into warm light and noise. The kind of place that made you feel like a regular even if it was your first time.
The guys spread out between the bar and the pool tables.
I stepped through last, letting the door close behind me.
The music dipped for a second. People noticed us.
But I wasn’t looking at them.
My eyes went straight to the bar.
She was there.
Tempi.
Behind the counter, she was pouring a drink and laughing at something a customer said. Her hair pulled up, neck exposed, and sleeves rolled to her elbows like she was ready for a fight or a long night, maybe both.
And then she looked up.
Her gaze hit mine and was sharp as a blade.
She didn’t flinch.
Neither did I.