Chapter Three
The chapel smelled like old leather and cigarette smoke, the way it always did when the brothers gathered for church.
Cottonmouth stood at the head of the scarred oak table, watching his men file in and take their seats.
Outlaw on his right, Crossroad on his left.
Hollow settling into his chair with that empty-eyed silence that made prospects nervous.
Levee's massive frame filling the doorway before he squeezed through.
Burial bringing up the rear, closing the heavy doors behind him with a finality that said whatever happened in this room stayed in this room.
Six men. His inner circle. The brothers who'd been with him since the beginning, when the Destroyers were nothing but a handful of hard men with bikes and a refusal to let the world forget they existed.
"We've got a problem," Cottonmouth said.
No preamble. No buildup. His brothers didn't need their hands held.
"Victor Ruiz." He laid a photograph on the table—surveillance shot from six months back, Memphis businessman in a pressed shirt and clean boots.
"Former Gulf cartel middleman, went independent five years ago.
Built a distribution network pushing meth and pills south from Memphis along the Highway 61 corridor. "
Hollow picked up the photo, studied it with the flat assessment of a man calculating how hard someone would be to kill. Passed it to Levee without comment.
"He's been acquiring crossroads locations for months," Cottonmouth continued. "Bars, gas stations, any property that can serve as a waypoint for his product. The ones that won't sell get burned. The owners disappear."
"Leland," Crossroad said. "Hollandale. I heard rumors, but I thought it was insurance fraud."
"It wasn't." Cottonmouth pulled out a map, unfolded it across the table.
Red X marks dotted the highway from Memphis to Greenville—a constellation of dead businesses and missing people.
"The corridor's half-built. He's got everything from Memphis to Clarksdale locked down. Everything south of us is still open."
"And the Crooked Porch?" Outlaw's voice was quiet, thoughtful.
"Last holdout on this stretch of highway.
Ruiz sent two men to make an offer last night.
They broke the place up, put hands on the owner.
" Cottonmouth felt his jaw tighten at the memory—Jolene's split lip, the fury in her eyes, the way she'd stood there with a baseball bat ready to fight men who would have killed her without blinking. "I put them down."
A ripple went around the table. Not surprise—his brothers knew what he was capable of—but recognition. Their president had drawn a line.
"So we're at war," Hollow said. Not a question.
"We're at war the moment Ruiz's people touched Destroyer territory.
" Cottonmouth planted his hands on the table, leaning forward.
"This isn't about one bar or one woman. If we let a Memphis crew set up distribution in our backyard without answering it, every juke joint and one-stoplight town under our protection is next.
Every family that counts on us to keep the vultures away.
Every piece of ground we've spent twenty years defending. "
"How many men does Ruiz have?" Levee asked.
"Forty-plus between Memphis and Greenville.
Ex-cons, street muscle, and a handful of professionals.
" Cottonmouth straightened. "He's got three lieutenants running different pieces of the operation.
The one handling acquisitions down here is named Mace Durkin—six feet of mean muscle who enjoys his work.
He's the face Ruiz sends when he wants fear, not negotiation. "
"Durkin." Burial spoke for the first time, his soft voice cutting through the room. "I've heard that name. Used to bounce clubs in Memphis before he graduated to breaking bones for money."
"That's our primary target. Cut off the head of the acquisition operation, we slow down the whole corridor.
" Cottonmouth looked around the table, meeting each man's eyes in turn.
"But this isn't a quick strike. Ruiz has resources, connections, and a proven system for grinding down resistance.
We go in half-cocked, we lose brothers."
"So what's the play?" Crossroad asked.
"Defense first. I want security rotations at the Crooked Porch around the clock—two brothers minimum, armed and ready.
Ruiz's people come back, they meet resistance they're not expecting.
" Cottonmouth tapped the map. "Meanwhile, I want intelligence.
Outlaw, you've got contacts on the river—find out how Ruiz is moving product.
Crossroad, map every back road between here and Memphis.
When we hit them, we hit them on ground we know better than they do. "
"And the woman?" Hollow's empty eyes found Cottonmouth's. "Jolene Mayes. What's her status?"
The question shouldn't have made his chest tighten. She was a civilian under protection, nothing more. A stubborn, sharp-tongued woman who'd rather fight alone than accept help from anyone.
A woman he couldn't stop thinking about.
"She's under my protection," Cottonmouth said. "Personal protection. Anyone has a problem with that, speak now."
Silence around the table. His brothers knew him well enough to hear what he wasn't saying.
Outlaw's mouth twitched. "Personal protection. That what we're calling it?"
"That's what I'm calling it." Cottonmouth's voice carried an edge that shut down any further commentary.
"The Crooked Porch is Destroyer territory now.
Jolene Mayes is off-limits to anyone who isn't wearing our patch.
And Victor Ruiz is going to learn what happens when you come for something that belongs to us. "
He let that settle. Watched his brothers absorb the weight of what he was committing them to—not just a territorial dispute, but a war against an organization with deeper pockets and more guns than they'd faced in years.
"Vote," he said. "We go to war with Victor Ruiz. Protect the Crooked Porch. Send a message that the Highway 61 corridor ends at Clarksdale."
Outlaw raised his hand first. Then Crossroad. Hollow. Levee. Burial.
Unanimous.
"That's church." Cottonmouth folded the map, tucked it into his cut. "Security rotation starts tonight. Hollow, you and Levee take first shift. Crossroad, I want those back roads mapped by tomorrow. Outlaw, reach out to your river contacts."
"And you?" Outlaw asked.
"I'm going back to the Crooked Porch." Cottonmouth headed for the door. "Someone needs to tell Jolene Mayes that she's got Destroyers in her bar for the foreseeable future."
"She's going to love that," Crossroad muttered.
Cottonmouth didn't smile, but something loosened in his chest at the thought of her reaction. The fury. The pushback. The way she'd tell him exactly what she thought of his high-handed decisions with that sharp tongue and those dark eyes blazing.
"Yeah," he said. "She probably will."
The Crooked Porch looked different in the afternoon light.
Brothers had already started on repairs—new glass in the windows, fresh boards replacing the ones Ruiz's men had damaged. The broken picture frames were gone, swept up and hauled away, leaving bare walls that looked wrong without forty years of blues history covering them.
Jolene stood behind the bar, exactly where he'd left her that morning.
She looked up when he walked in, and the expression on her face was not welcoming.
"You're back."
"Told you I would be." Cottonmouth crossed to the bar, aware of the way her eyes tracked him. Wary. Assessing. Like she was still trying to figure out whether he was a solution or a different kind of problem. "Security rotation starts tonight. Two brothers, around the clock, until Ruiz is handled."
"Around the clock." She repeated it flat, like she was testing how it tasted. "In my bar."
"In your bar. On your property. Making sure nobody comes through that door who shouldn't."
"And if I have customers who don't appreciate being watched by motorcycle gang members?"
"Club." The correction came out sharper than he intended. "Motorcycle club. And your customers will appreciate not getting firebombed more than they'll mind a few men in leather."
Her jaw tightened. He watched the anger flicker through her eyes—that same defiant fury he'd seen the night before, the stubbornness that had kept her fighting alone for twelve years.
"I agreed to protection," she said. "Not occupation."
"Same thing." He leaned against the bar, close enough to catch the scent of her—whiskey and cleaning solution and something underneath that was just her.
"Ruiz knows you turned him down. By now he knows his men didn't come back.
He's going to hit you again, harder, and when he does, you're going to be grateful there are Destroyers between you and whatever comes through that door. "
"Grateful." She laughed, harsh and humorless. "You want me to be grateful that I've traded one group of men who think they own my bar for another?"
"I don't think I own your bar." Cottonmouth held her gaze, let her see the steel underneath the calm.
"But I know I'm the only thing standing between you and Victor Ruiz.
So you can resent me all you want, Jolene.
You can curse my name and hate every second of having my brothers in your space.
But you're going to let us protect you, because the alternative is watching everything your grandmother built burn to the ground. "
She stared at him, and he watched the war play out across her face. Pride versus practicality. Independence versus survival.
"You're an arrogant son of a bitch," she said finally.
"I've been called worse."
"I'm sure you have." She grabbed a bottle from the shelf behind her and poured two fingers of whiskey, pushing the glass across the bar toward him.
"Fine. Your brothers can stay. But they drink what I pour, they don't cause trouble with my customers, and they answer to me when it comes to anything that happens inside these walls. "
Cottonmouth picked up the glass, held it without drinking. "They answer to me. But I'll make sure they respect your rules."
"Your word on that?"
"My word."
She studied him for a long moment, and he felt the weight of her assessment like a physical thing. This woman didn't trust easy—he'd known that from the moment he saw her stand up to Ruiz's enforcers with nothing but a baseball bat and a refusal to break.
But something in her expression shifted. Not trust, exactly. More like acknowledgment. A recognition that they were in this together now, whether she liked it or not.
"Hollow and Levee," she said. "Those are the ones coming tonight?"
"You've been paying attention."
"I pay attention to everything that happens in my bar." She poured a second glass and raised it toward him. "To protection, then. However long it lasts."
Cottonmouth touched his glass to hers. "However long it takes."
He drank, watching her over the rim. The afternoon light caught the bruise on her cheekbone, fading now but still visible. Still making his blood run hot every time he looked at it.
This woman was going to drive him crazy. He could already feel it—the pull of her, the challenge of her, the way she refused to back down even when every sensible instinct should have told her to run.
She was going to drive him crazy, and he was going to let her.
"I'll have brothers here by sunset," he said, setting down the empty glass. "First sign of trouble, you call me. Not them—me. Directly."
"Why you?"
Because you're mine, he thought. Because something broke open in my chest the moment I saw you standing there with blood on your face and fire in your eyes, and I'm not letting anything happen to you. Not now. Not ever.
"Because I'm the president," he said instead. "And you're under my protection."
The look she gave him said she wasn't buying it. Said she saw right through him, saw the thing he wasn't saying, and wasn't sure yet what to do with it.
"Fine." She picked up a rag and started wiping down the bar, a dismissal if he'd ever seen one. "I'll call you. Now get out of my bar so I can get ready to open."
Cottonmouth pushed off the bar and headed for the door. At the threshold, he paused and looked back.
She was watching him. Trying not to be obvious about it, but watching.
"This is going to work, Jolene."
"Is it?"
"Yeah." He held her gaze, let her see the certainty in his eyes. "Because I'm not letting it fail."
He walked out into the Mississippi afternoon, leaving her standing behind the bar with that look on her face—the one that said she was already regretting asking for help, already wishing she could take it all back.
Too late for that.
She was his to protect now.
And Cottonmouth didn't let go of anything that belonged to him.