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Angel’s Rebellion MC: #3
Casper
 Copyright © 2020 by Jeneveir Evans, JenEvansPublishing, LLC
All rights reserved.
No part of this eBook or book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical
means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the
author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

License: This book is available exclusively on Amazon.com. If you found this book for free or
from a site other than Amazon.com country specific website, it means the author was not compensated
and you have likely obtained the book through an unapproved distribution channel.

Disclaimer: This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, events, brands and
incidents are products of the author’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be
construed as real. The southern United States locale and speech dialect used in this book are
representative of the area. Some of the places named in this book are actual locales found in
Arkansas. Any resemblance to people, living or dead, actual events, organizations or locales is
entirely coincidental. This is not meant to be an exact depiction of life in a motorcycle club, but rather
a work of fiction meant to entertain.

Warning: This work of fiction is intended for mature audiences of 18 years of age or older only.
All consensual sexually active characters portrayed in this book are eighteen years of age or older.
This book could mention or contain scenes of strong sexual situations, violence, explicit language,
rape, and death.

Acknowledgements:
Cover Art: Copyright Adam Hensley Photography & Design
Colors (Logo): Copyright Adam Hensley Photography & Design
Editor/Proofreader: Grand Editing
 Contents
Author’s Acknowledgements
Dedication
List of Characters
Author’s Note
Casper’s Note

Chapter 1 - Casper
Chapter 2 - Slade
Chapter 3 - Slade
Chapter 4 - Slade
Chapter 5 - Mad Dog
Chapter 6 - Mad Dog
Chapter 7 - Audrey
Chapter 8 - Clair
Chapter 9 - Audrey
Chapter 10 - Boomer
Chapter 11 - Brenna
Chapter 12 - Viper
Chapter 13 - Viper
Chapter 14 - Slade
Chapter 15 - Zane
Chapter 16 - Slade

Afterword
Sneak Peek of Next Book
Excerpt from Boomer
Coming Soon
Other Books by Jeneveir Evans
Music Note
Playlist
About the Author
Contact the Author
Thank You
 Author’s Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Ginny. From my first book, you’ve been here. You have been my staunchest
supporter, cheerleader, adopted aunt, and worst nightmare all wrapped up into one. Without you I
truly believe these books would have never gotten finished. I had no idea when I first spoke to you
how much you would rock my world. You’ve pushed me past my boundaries, then pushed a little
more, and sometimes even further than that. I needed it. I will always need it. There will never be
enough words to tell you how much you mean to me, nor enough flowers.

Brea Cagle Trundle, you’ve been with me from the first. It’s like you know when I’m down,
because you send me little notes of encouraging words or videos of your insane dog posse. You’ve
given me your opinions on book covers, helped me out with fonts and told me your ideas for ways to
expand the Angel’s Rebellion MC name. You’ve become a good friend, one I’m thankful to have in
my life.

To my original beta team: Virginia H., Brea T., Heather H., Angie R., Tracy S., Patricia C., Jayne
R., Joanna Z., Sharon R., Diane S., Michelle M. and Amanda D. I want each of you to know how
much I truly appreciate everything that you’ve contributed to my dream. Thank you for the endless
reads, suggestions, catching mistakes and the encouraging words that y’all have given me.

Adam Hensley, I will never have enough words to tell you how much I appreciate all the help
you’ve given to me. I gave you my ideas for book covers, then you worked magic. Then I’d change my
mind a little, so you worked more, until we both finally agreed we loved the end product. Thanks for
doing all the investigative work that is needed to figure out all the things that need to be done in order
to publish, then for doing the majority of that work while I wrote, edited, rewrote and edited more.
I’ve put a big load on your shoulders and all I can say is thank goodness your shoulders are wide
enough to handle it all. Pretty sure I couldn’t handle all this alone, thanks for having my back.

Last but never least, I want to thank my own biker, who traded in his bike for a bass boat. Babe,
thanks for encouraging me and allowing me to spend the majority of my time writing. You always told
me I could do this, but I think I clipped my own wings, until one day you told me I needed to fly. You
helped me unfurl those wings and have allowed me to soar. You’re my forever and always. My ride
or die. I love you, J.
 Dedication
This book is dedicated to those who have suffered childhood indignities heaped upon you by your
parents. Adults should treat childhood with reverence. As a time for innocence. A time for laughter. A
time of freedom. A time of wonder. A time to be carefree. Children remain the greatest blessing that
God bestows on the world. He entrusts us to lovingly nurture them.

Too many are not allowed to have those experiences. For some, childhood might have started out
with gentle care but sadly disintegrated into neglect or plummeted into abuse. For others, they never
had a childhood at all.

For those of you who experienced parents who were divorced or estranged, who witnessed the
ugliness of warring adults who pushed you aside, left you feeling unloved or an unwanted burden, this
is for you.

For those of you who lost your parents because of drugs, physical abuse, mental abuse or neglect,
this is for you.

For those of you whose parents just gave up on life, then gave up on you, this is for you.

And for the most important of all, for those of you whose parents threw you away. This book is
for you.

Dennis Rodman said, “I spent my whole childhood looking for an escape.”

Such a sad statement but so true for too many. Even sadder is that many never find that escape,
always searching, only to be left in a void.

Helen Keller said, “Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience
of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.”

Believe her words. Use your own experiences, all the pain, all the heartache, all the suffering, and
turn it into a life lesson of what not to do. Let those things make you stronger, more compassionate,
more responsible, more loving, and more caring.

“The past explains how I got here, but the future is up to me - and I live life at full throttle.” ~
Janice Dickinson

My wish for you is to reach out and grasp life in both your hands, push away the past where it
belongs and live life at full throttle.
 List of Characters
Angel’s Rebellion MC Brotherhood
Arkansas
Officers:
President: Mad Dog
Old Lady – Beth (d.)
Children - Beau
Old Lady - Ava
Vice President: Viper
Old Ladies - Mia and Jennie
Children with Mia - Predator, Jace, Jemma
Children with Jennie - Colten, Caleb,
Jennie - Rebel (oldest son by Devil)
Secretary: Seer (Founder)
Treasurer: Tater (Founder)
Ex-girlfriend - Helen
Children with Helen - Logan, Hailey, Levi
Sergeant-At-Arms/Lead Enforcer: Blood
Enforcer: Slaughter
Road Captain: Karma
Ex-girlfriend - Mother of his children - Jade
Children with Jade - Chloe, Zoey, Noah
Tail Gunner: Trooper
Old Lady – Rey
Children - Kyrie, Darby, Luke

Patched Members:
Sergeant: (Founder, former President)
Old Lady – Lori
Children - Mad Dog, Hoss, Laura, Shadow
Gunny: (Founder)
Old Lady – Julie
Children - Beth (d.), Brett, Lacy
Cueball: (Founder)
Old Lady – Lillie
Children - Tarrin, Karma, Maul
Hogan: (Founder)
Old Lady – Sammi
Children - Brute, Doom
Possum (Founder, former Vice President)
Old Lady – Sara
Children - Trooper, Slaughter, Cora
KJ -
Ex-wife – Ann
Children with Ann - Nickel, Kyle, Kace
Hoss -
Old Lady – Jessie
Children - Axel, Streak, Sloane
Shadow
Ranger
Maul -
Old Lady – Tessa
Children - Reese, Wyatt, Ryan, Allie
Brute
Doom
Eagle
Bane
Beau
Nickel
Rebel
Predator

Prospects
Axel
Streak
Jace
Creed
Brick
Casper
Ghost

Patched-Over Members
Rogue -
Old Lady - Lizzie
Children - Justin, Scott, Remi
Slade -
Mother - Audrey
Hatchet -
Mother - Stacy
Sister - Kim
Screw -
Mother - Emily
BamBam
Cotton

Deceased:
Undertaker: (Founder)
Old Lady – Pennie (d.)
Children - Blood, Briar, Brax
 For Reference Only
Prior to Mid February 1998

Spawns of Satan MC Brotherhood

Kentucky - Major Characters

Officers
President: Devil
Children - Rebel, Spawn, Acid
Vice President: Viper
Old Ladies - Mia and Jennie
Children with Mia - Predator, Jace, Jemma
Children with Jennie - Colten, Caleb
Jennie - Rebel (oldest son by Devil)

Patched Members
Rogue -
Old Lady - Lizzie
Children - Justin, Scott, Remi
Slade -
Mother - Audrey
Hatchet -
Mother - Stacy
Sister - Kim
Screw -
Mother - Emily
BamBam
Cotton

Prospects/Patched Members (It's complicated)

Rebel
Predator

Deceased Members
Satan: Founder and former President
Children - Devil
Serpent: Founder and former Vice President
Old Lady – Lorna
Children - Viper, Cindy
 Author's Note
The books of Dillin Trilogy are not a typical MC story. The Trilogy books cannot be read as
standalones. They are continuations, not cliffhangers. They must be read in order to follow the story
as it unfolds. The three books follow the journey of the Slade Dillin family over the time frame of a
year and a half, with the majority of the story being told across 4 months. While there are four Dillin
men and the reader will be introduced to all, each complete with their backstories, only three are
spotlighted now.

The Trilogy originally started as a single book about Slade Cooper’s life and his journey during
his mother’s illness. But as I was writing the book, each man of the family wanted to be heard. None
of these books concentrate solely upon only one man at a time. Instead, it is a mini saga of how four
months can change lives forever.

While the story of three of the men is told, equal time is not devoted to each character. Some
spoke louder and had more to say to me. And, yes, for those of you who read these books and wonder,
one day all of the men will have their stories written.

Caution to readers: The Trilogy is an emotional read, with triggers that could affect the reader.
 Casper's Note
My name is Gage Aaron Dillin, but just call me Casper or Cas for short. I had plans for a military
career, but one mission changed all that. All my long range goals went up in smoke. My buddy Ghost
and I traveled the States on the back of our bikes for six months after leaving the Army, fighting our
demons and hunting for a place to call home.

We missed the brotherhood of our Delta team. A call from our former team leader, Shadow, led us
to the state of Arkansas and the Angel's Rebellion MC. There we finally found what we were
searching for, brotherhood and a home.

One night while tending the bar and putting in time for my prospecting duties, I saw a man who
was a dead ringer for my younger brother, Zane. After a brief talk with the man, Slade, the foundation
of my world was rocked, but in a good way. I found family and learned news that would change my
family’s lives forever.

It's funny how one day can change a man's life. It did mine. It brought me two women who would
give me the love I had unconsciously been seeking. Love that I never knew I needed, much less
wanted. It brought the love of a mom and a good woman into my life. This is a continuation of my
family's story, of the Dillin men and the women they love.
 Chapter 1
When you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of
your life to start as soon as possible.

~Nora Ephron~

Casper

September 2nd, 1998

Looking around the room I shared with Sophie the last couple of nights, I stood there undecided
about what I should do. Should I move my things into the room beside this one that shared the
bathroom, move to the one across the hall, or did she want me to stay with her? Then Sophie walked
through the doorway.

“Hey,” I murmured. We still hadn’t gotten around to talking much other than just general things in
passing.

“Hey,” she replied back just as quietly.

“Sophie, I know you asked me to stay with you the first night and I didn’t really give you a chance
to let you decide last night since you were asleep, do you want me to keep staying in the room with
you? Or would you rather I move into my own room now?”

I fucking hoped she said stay in here with her. I’d slept better the last two nights than I had in
months. I hadn’t had my recurring nightmare either night. Hell, maybe I did need to have my own
room, it was bound to happen, and I didn’t want to scare her with my reactions to the dream.

Even though I knew she was told to give herself a couple days to recoup from the injuries and the
terror of escaping from her ex-boyfriend, she hadn’t. Instead, after talking with Mom yesterday, she’d
gone ahead and started helping Mom with her exercises. Being in her nursing mode seemed to bring
about a confident woman, a woman I believed she had once been. Once out of that mode, she seemed
to revert back to that scared, fragile girl. A girl who was broken and terrified, one that I had been
sleeping with the past couple of nights.

I watched as she lowered her gaze to the floor, her hands went to her shirt and she started twisting
it.

“Soph, I don’t mind sleeping with you if it helps.”

And I didn’t, it was hell on my dick, but I could control him. At least I hoped. There just might be
a lot of cold showers or jacking off, one or the other happening, or both.

She lifted her eyes to meet mine. I could tell she was trying to read my expression to see if I was
telling her the truth or not.

“You really don’t mind?” she questioned me hesitantly.

“No, I don’t. You’ve been through a lot and I didn’t know if having a man in your bed would make
things worse on you or not.”

She started biting her lip and I held back a groan. I swear I don’t think women knew what that did
to a man. It drew our eyes to their lips and thoughts of sex would come up, and sometimes a certain
other thing would come up as well.

“Cas, I’m not sure why, I just feel really safe with you,” she said as she once again started
chewing on her plump bottom lip. God, she was gonna kill me if she kept doing that. “You are so
totally different than he is. You’ve gone out of your way to make sure I’m okay and to let me know that
you will protect me.” She paused a moment. “Even though I dated him over a year before we moved
in together and lived with him an additional eight months, he never made me feel the way you do.”

Damn, her words made me sound like I hung the moon and was Superman all at one time.

“I take it that means you want me to keep sharing the room with you for now?”

“Yes, please.”

I sighed. I wasn’t sure this was a good idea. I didn’t know when I might have a dream. As far as I
knew, I only mumbled in my sleep, which turned into yelling if someone didn’t wake me up. Other
than Sophie, I hadn’t spent the entire night with a woman since the mission.

Yeah, I’d fucked. Once with Ree, my demons had been riding me hard so I’d fucked her six ways
from Sunday and we’d been so worn out, we’d fallen asleep. She’d woken me up a couple hours later
because I had started yelling. Other than that one time, I always made the girls leave the room
afterward. Yeah, that made me sound like a bastard. I wasn’t. I just wanted to make sure the girls
were safe in case I went nuts.

“If you don’t want to, you don’t have to,” her words were spoken barely above a whisper.

“Nah, it’s not that, Sophie. It’s just,” I paused a second trying to decide how much I needed to
reveal to her. “I sometimes have pretty bad nightmares. Other than the last two nights with you, I
haven’t slept the whole night with a woman in a long time. There’s not been any indication I would
hurt you, I usually just wake up yelling.”

Her eyes widened slightly and I watched the scared woman leave and the one who was sure of
herself reappear.

“You have PTSD.”

I tilted my head at her. “Yeah, saw some shit that, well, still haunts me.”
 “I’m willing to take the chance if you are. As far as I know, you haven’t had one the past two
nights.”

“You’re right. I haven’t. I’ve actually slept the best I have in a long while.”

“If you’re willing to try it, I am too.”

“Yeah, okay. I’m willing.”

My cock was shouting yes, and my brain was screaming at me, you idiot. While I wanted to
explore things with this woman, my cock was only thinking one word, pussy, while my brain was
thinking, you need to get to know her before you jump her bones, dumbass. She might not want a
relationship with you, especially so soon after what she has just gone through. Those thoughts could
very well be true. She might not want a relationship for a very long time, if ever, and there was
nothing to say she would want one with me.

“I need to take a shower, you want the bathroom first or second?” I asked her, hoping she wanted
to use it first. The last two nights holding her in my arms and not being able to make her mine had
damn near killed me,

“Yeah, I’ll go first.”

I watched as she gathered her night things and went over to open the door to the bathroom. She
immediately screamed, slammed the door shut, threw her hand over her heart and leaned back against
the door.

“What the fuck?” I exclaimed as I looked at her.

Her face was turning a bright red and she was breathing like she had just run a marathon. A knock
sounded from inside the bathroom door and I raised an eyebrow at her. She slowly moved from the
door and opened it, hiding behind it as she did. On the other side of the door stood Zane with a towel
wrapped around his waist.

“Fuck, bro. You trying to get every woman in the house?” I asked him.

“Damn, Cas. I’m sorry. I thought I had locked the door before I got into the shower.” His eyes
narrowed as he looked at me then gazed around the room looking for Sophie.

“Who’s the chick in here with you?”

“You haven’t met Sophie yet?”

He shook his head. “Why’s she in your room?” he continued with his questions.

“It’s her room. Well, I guess it’s our room since you’re in my room.”

“Slade told me I could take that one.”

 I nodded at him as I said, “Yeah, it’s fine. I’m staying in here for now anyway.”

“Sophie,” I called to her. “C’mere.”

I barely heard her utter, “No.”

“What’s wrong?” My question was met with total silence.

Zane started chuckling. “Bro, I wasn’t wearing the towel when she opened the door.”

I rolled my eyes at my brother, of course he wasn’t.

“Babe, come over here and let me introduce you.”

My request was met with dead silence. If I didn’t know any better, I wouldn’t even know she was
in the room much less behind the door.

“Sophie, the naked imbecile you saw in all his glory is my little brother, Zane. Zane, the woman
you scared the fuck out of is Sophie.”

“Be nice if I could see her, bro.”

“C’mon on over here, Soph, I promise he’s not gonna bite you.”

“Never can tell about me, I just might.”

“Dammit, Zane. You’re not helping matters.”

“My bad. Sorry, Sophie.”

I sighed deeply. I didn’t really think she was scared of Zane, just completely embarrassed by
walking in on him standing buck naked in the bathroom.

“Soph, you’re a nurse, you’ve seen naked bodies before.”

“I’m not at work now, Cas.”

“Technically, babe, you are.”

She groaned, Zane and I laughed.

“C’mon, babe. C’mere.”

In a flurry of movement, she was across the room and behind my back in the blink of an eye.

“Damn,” Zane muttered. “She can haul ass.”

A grin sat on my face as I reached behind me and tugged Sophie to my side, wrapping my arm
around her waist. She buried her face into my chest and whispered loudly, “I’m so embarrassed.”

I laughed. “Why, babe?”

She didn’t answer, instead she raised an arm out and waved it up and down toward where Zane
was standing.

“Again, babe. I’m sure you’ve seen naked men before.”

“Not that looks like that,” she murmured.

I winced.

“Damn, bro. That had to hurt. Have you let your body go since you got out?”

I raised my hand and flipped him off.

This time it was Zane who chuckled.

Sophie raised her head and looked at me. A frown was on her face. I saw the bad ass woman
come out as she turned to look at my little brother.

“Not that it’s any of your business, but I haven’t seen Cas’s naked body. He’s been a gentleman
and has slept in a t-shirt and his sweats. I’m sure if I had seen his body, it would make yours look like
a child’s.”

Boom. Damn. She told him. I looked at him and smirked. She saw Zane frowning at me and
looked up at me again.

“Don’t make me regret my words. Don’t be an ass,” she remarked.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I mumbled, however, my smirk stayed on my face as I looked at Zane.

She looked back and forth between the two of us, stepped away from me, walked over to the
bathroom door, pushed Zane out of the way and as it was slamming shut, we heard her grumble, “Men
are such assholes.”

“Well, fuck,” Zane exclaimed. I arched an eyebrow at him.

“Problems, bro?”

“Yeah, my fucking clothes are in there.”

I laughed again, walked over to the bedroom door and opened it. “It’s your lucky day. As you
walk out of the door, take a right then another right and you’re in a room where more of your clothes
are.”
 He actually growled this time, “You are such a smartass.”

“Takes one to know one,” I spouted back.

He walked toward the door until he was beside me, then stopped. His eyes met mine and I could
see his were swirling with emotion.

“It’s damn good to be here with you, Cas. I’ve missed you like hell.”

“Same, brother.”

He continued studying me, I know he was trying to figure out what my state of mind was.

“I’m doing okay, Zane. For now. I wasn’t for a while, but I’m starting to get better, at least I think I
am.”

“Thank fuck. Cas, you know I’m here…”

“I know, Zane. I appreciate it.”

“So, that’s Sophie?” he asked.

“Yeah. Did Slade and Dad tell you about her?”

“Yeah, they did, bro. That’s some twisted shit there. Anything you need, let me know. I’ve got
your back.”

“Thanks, Zane. I know you do.” I paused briefly thinking about what I was about to ask. It wasn’t
really my place to request this, yet if anyone could find anything to help Sophie out, it would be him.
I’d just have to cop to Dog and Viper that I asked him to look. “If you could work your magic, it might
help.”

“Get me a list of names and I’ll look into it.” He paused a second. “Will this get you into trouble,
Cas? Is your Prez gonna get mad you asked me to do this?”

“He might.” I shrugged. “I’ll let him know I asked you. He would do the same if it was Ava.”

When he didn’t ask me who Ava was, I knew then that he had already looked into ARMC. I should
have thought of that from the get-go. I bet as soon as I told him I was prospecting here, he’d started
digging deep.

“You got anything good yet?” I asked, letting him know that I knew what he’d been doing.

He sighed. “I fucked that up. I should have asked who Ava was.”

I didn’t say a word, just kept looking at him.

 “I’ve got some, not enough. Nothing on the men who were involved with what happened to her. I
do need you to get me their names, bro.”

“Will do.” I opened my mouth to ask him what he did have when I heard the bathroom door
opening. “Night, Zane.”

“Night, Cas.”

I shut the door and turned around to face Sophie. She was in one of my t-shirts and it hung to
midthigh on her. I almost swallowed my tongue when I saw her nipples protruding out against the
fabric.

“It’s all yours,” she said as she walked toward me to what was ‘her’ side of the bed.

I grabbed a pair of boxers and my sweats, then made my escape.

As I stood under the showerhead letting the water flow over my body, I couldn’t get the vision out
of my mind of Sophie in my shirt with her nipples poking outward. Damn, I had wanted to walk over
to her, slid my hands under my shirt to her hot, curvy body and slowly raise it until I could see if her
tits looked like what I imagined they did. Were her nipples pink, rosy red, or a light chocolate color?
I didn’t have a preference, all I know was I wanted my mouth on them.

I know I should be ashamed that I was thinking about her this way when she had just been through
a terrifying ordeal, yet I couldn’t make myself stop. From the moment I saw her walk into Dog’s
office, every molecule in my body had sat up and taken notice.

I knew I was getting ahead of myself, but damn, I could even see her belly big and round as she’s
carrying my child. I swore long ago I didn’t want kids, yet meeting her has changed all that for me. I
want it with her. I want it all.

The vision of my child sucking on her nipple flashed through my mind and my already hard cock
jumped. I clenched my jaw to hold in a groan as I slid my hand down the ripples of my abdomen and
palmed myself, my fingers wrapping tightly around my swollen dick. I put one hand against the
shower wall and let my head drop forward as I stroked my enlarged length. I ran my thumb across my
engorged head, feeling the silky texture of my precum oozing out of my slit. The image of Sophie
biting her succulent bottom lip flashed into my thoughts and a low groan managed to escape as I
imagined her lips wrapped around the head of my cock, licking my essence off of it.

I gripped my hand hard on my rod at the same time I pumped into it. Fuck, I wanted to be inside
her so bad. Painted on the back of my eyelids was a picture of her waiting for me in the bed we
shared, her nipples peaked hard as a rock under my t-shirt. The image caused my hips to thrust
forward slamming myself firmly into the circular opening that my fingers and palm made. As I
tightened my hold on my cock making it harder to force my way in and out of it, I could imagine it
being Sophie’s tight, hot pussy wrapped around my dick as I plunged into her repeatedly.

It didn’t take long before it felt like my blood was boiling, my balls started tightening up, my rod
became like steel as I thrust forcibly into the palm of my fist. I drove myself powerfully one more
time then squeezed my cock tight against the base of it. I felt the swelling increase as my member
became even larger. Tingles started radiating from the base of my spine. I was so damn close. I
loosened my hold and the blood rushed to the tip of my dick making me lightheaded.

I immediately began to thrust savagely into my hand, once, twice, a third time, my vision grew
dim, a fourth time, I heard a roaring in my ears, a fifth time and I locked my legs as cum shot out of me
with such force that my entire body shook. Lights flashed behind my eyes exploding in my brain. I
leaned forward until my head was pressed against the tiled shower wall. My shaking hand still moved
back and forth as my semen continued to spurt out of me.

Finally, I was through, my body so weak I knew I couldn’t move or I’d collapse. I had never come
that hard jacking myself off before. The feeling had been incredibly intense, completely out of this
world. If being inside Sophie was better than this, I might very well die in her arms a fucking happy
man.

After doing my nightly routine, I stepped into my boxers then my sweats. As I opened the door to
the bedroom, it hit me that I had texted Ghost after dinner and promised him that I would go down to
the Clubhouse and talk to him. I looked down at my sweats, then shrugged. I wasn’t planning on
staying long so I’d put on a t-shirt and tennis shoes and head down there. I glanced toward the bed
figuring Sophie was already asleep. That wasn’t the case.

Her eyes were locked on my chest and she was licking her lips. The sight made my cock twitch.
Well, the fucker could just untwitch because he had gotten all the action he was getting tonight.

“Umm, Soph?” I murmured.

“Hmm?”

“I forgot that I promised Ghost I’d go talk to him. I’m gonna run down to the Clubhouse for about
thirty minutes. Might not even be that long.”

Her gaze was now looking at the juncture of my thighs. I glanced down to see that my dick was
hanging low under my sweats. Fuck, maybe I needed to put on jeans after all, then as soon as that
thought hit, I realized every one of the girls in the Clubhouse had seen my Johnson before. I walked
over to get a shirt and pair of socks out of my bag, only to see it was empty.

“While you were in the shower, I put your clothes in the second and third drawers,” Sophie
voiced huskily.

“Thanks for putting my things away,” I said as I stepped over to the dresser.

“You’re welcome,” she stated breathlessly.

After getting the things I needed out of the drawers, I grabbed my running shoes and sat on the bed
to put on my socks and shoes. I stood and pulled my shirt over my head and saw that Soph’s eyes
were watching every move I made. I deliberately caught my shirt, slowing it from falling down my
torso. Instead, I eased it downward by dragging my hand down my abs. Sophie’s eyes had a glazed
look to them. Hell yeah, I was getting to her as much as she was getting to me.

“Soph,” I drawled out, my voice coming out earthy and low.

“Yeah?” she asked throatily as her eyes once again locked on my cock. Seeing her stare hungrily
at me, caused my dick to jump, which in turn led her to biting her fucking lip again.

“I’ll be back soon, okay?”

She forced herself to meet my gaze and the hunger in hers was readily apparent.

“Yeah, it’s fine. I’m sure I’m cramping your style,” she said as she wrenched her eyes off my face.
Her face quickly lost the look of want and need.

“Hey?”

“Hmm?”

“Soph, look at me.”

She shook her head. I sat down on the bed, leaned over and turned her face toward me.

“Soph, fucking look at me.”

Reluctantly she raised her eyes to mine. I kept my gaze locked to hers. “I’m not going down to the
club to fuck. I have to talk to Ghost. If I didn’t have to do that, I wouldn’t be going.”

She shrugged. “You’re free to do whatever you want to do.”

“You mean that?” I asked her and watched as she chewed on her bottom lip again.

Jesus. If she didn’t quit doing that shit, I was going to end up fucking her senseless. “Are you
telling me you don’t care if I go down to the club and fuck one or two of the women tonight and then
come back to your bed?”

She lowered her gaze and stressed softly, “No, I don’t care.”

“Maybe you don’t want me in your bed after all.”

Her eyes flew to mine. “No, I want you here,” her voice came out shaky. “Please come back when
you’re done.”

“Soph, I’m not gonna go fuck another woman and then come back and get into bed with you.”

Her eyes lowered again. “Okay, I understand.”

 “What do you understand, Sophie?”

“That you’re not coming back tonight.”

“Dammit. Did I say that?”

“No,” her voice sounded clogged, like she was fighting back tears.

“Sophie, baby. Look at me please.”

Once again, she slowly raised her eyes to meet mine.

“Sophie, as long as I am sleeping in bed with you, whether we do anything or not, I will not go to
another woman just to fuck. While I might go insane with need, I will not do that to you.”

“Really?” she asked me breathily, the tears she was holding back making her eyes shine with
silver sparkles dancing in them.

“Yeah, really.”

“What if you, umm, need a release?”

I grimaced. “Then I’ll do what I did tonight.”

She looked at me puzzled. Seriously, was I gonna have to spell it out to her?

“Fuck, Sophie. I jacked off in the shower picturing your tight little nipples pressing against my
shirt,” I growled out, not meaning to let all that spew out of my mouth.

“Oh,” she muttered. “Oh!” This time her eyes widened and she bit her lip a-fucking-gain. I
groaned. I couldn’t stop myself this time.

“You’ve got to quit fucking doing that, Sophie. You’re driving me insane with need.”

“Doing what?” she asked me breathlessly, her face flushed as a red stain of color spread over it.
Her teeth went right back to her bottom lip.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I groaned out. “This right here.”

I used my thumb to pull her lip out from under her teeth, then I leaned down and took her lower lip
into my mouth, running my tongue back and forth across it before I sucked on it softly. My lips sealed
over hers as I eased my tongue into her mouth and lazily let it slide back and forth against hers. I was
forcing myself to be gentle, I didn’t want to push her too fast and scare her. I almost lost it when her
tongue started dueling with mine in the age-old rhythm of sex.

Reluctantly, I pulled back. I knew if I didn’t, I’d be between her legs in the next few minutes. She
licked her lips as she stared at mine.
 “Fuck, Soph,” I muttered as I stood up.

Her eyes went to my sweats where my cock was tenting them. I reached down and pulled my dick
straight up and put the band of my boxers and sweats on it in an attempt to keep it from being obscene.
Her eyes widened and she licked her lips again. I glanced down to see the head of it sticking above
my waistbands with liquid sitting on the top of it. Fuck. She was going to be the death of me, I thought
as I yanked my shirt down.

“Jesus. I gotta get out of here.”

I turned quick, opened the door and rushed out of the house like it was on fire. I made my way
through the trees toward the Clubhouse. I stopped walking while I was still about fifteen feet inside
the wood line. I tried to focus on getting my damn dick under control, no matter what I did, he was
refusing to go down. He fucking wanted me to go back to the bedroom and let Sophie wrap her lips
around him and suck him dry.

I groaned. For the second time that day, in less than an hour, I jacked off thinking about Sophie’s
lips on me. I couldn’t believe I’d let my fucking dick make a liar out of me. For the moment, however,
he’d proven he was getting more action tonight after all.

Once I was through, I made my way into the Clubhouse and went straight to a restroom to wash
up. Then I made my way into the Great Room and grabbed a beer at the bar on the way to where
Ghost was sitting.

“Took you long enough. Seriously, Brother. I could have already been in a room with one of our
fine girls. But no, here I sit waiting on your ass,” Ghost informed me as I sat down, then he looked me
up and down and smirked.

“What the fuck you smirking at?”

“You’re dressed real nice.”

“Fuck you. I took a shower and realized at the last minute I promised your sorry ass I’d come
down and talk to you. Besides,” I said, smirking right back at him. “Women love men in sweats.”

“The fuck they do,” he exclaimed, then his eyebrows lowered as Ree and Mel walked toward our
table.

Ree straddled my lap while Mel got behind me and ran her fingers down my chest. Ree ran her
hands up and down my dick, he didn’t even twitch. They knew better than to sit on a Brother or
Prospect without permission, yet I’d never said anything to them about it before because I hadn’t
cared. Now I did. Still I wouldn’t be an ass about it.

“Wanna play, lover?” Mel purred into my ear. “Ree and I would love for you to come back to one
of our rooms.” Ree was nodding her head in affirmative at Mel’s words.

I tugged Ree’s hands off my cock and gently lifted her off of me. “Not tonight, ladies. I’m not
staying long.”

Both of them thrust their bottom lip out, pouting.

“You sure?” Ree asked me.

“Yeah, doll. I’m sure.”

They both sighed. “Well if you change your mind, you know where to find us.”

“That I do.”

When they realized I wasn’t going to change my mind, they drifted back across the room. I looked
at Ghost and grinned.

“Told ya.”

“I’ll be fucked.”

“If you come down in sweatpants you will be.”

He barked out a laugh at me, then his expression sobered up. “Tell me what all is going on.”

I glanced around the room to make sure that no one was close enough to overhear us, then for the
next twenty minutes, I went over everything about Sophie, then with my dad and brothers. I probably
wasn’t supposed to say anything about Sophie’s situation, yet I’d trust Ghost with any aspect of my
life. He’d saved my ass more than once, just like I had his. He was as close to me as Zane was, and
hopefully soon, Slade would be.

He whistled. “Damn, Cas. That’s some heavy shit.”

“Yeah, bro. It is.”

“Zane gonna help out?”

I casually looked around to double check that no one was within hearing range before I spoke.

“Yeah. Gonna get names for him. You know Zane, he’s gonna look regardless.”

“Yep, that I do. I bet he’s already vetted the club and knows any secrets that they might have.”

I tilted the bottle up and swallowed the last drink of my beer, “Yeah, what he has I don’t know. If
it was something bad, you know we’d already know about it.”

Ghost lifted his chin at me. He looked surprised when I stood up.

“You already going?”

 “Yeah, Brother. Gonna get back.”

“So it’s true.”

“What?”

I knew what he was about to say but decided to play dumb till the last minute.

“You and Sophie.”

“Well, there’s not an us for right now, however, if she will let me, I’m planning on changing that.”

“Is that what you really want, Cas?”

“Ghost, five days ago I’d have laughed in your face if you said I would be thinking about wanting
to be with a woman permanently. Now,” I shrugged, “she’s all I think about. I know it’s fast, I’ll just
have to take it slow with her. Hell, she may not want it.”

I paused a moment as my thoughts turned inward. I knew I could be facing some pain if she
decided she didn’t want any type of a relationship with me. While I wasn’t deeply in love with her
yet, I wasn’t far from it. I’d have to be careful with her and not try to force something she wasn’t
ready for.

“Brother, I’d regret it for the rest of my life if I don’t at least try. She tugs at something deep inside
me. I don’t know if I can explain it better than that.”

“You don’t have to, Cas. I know what you’re talking about.”

And I knew he did. He’d left his woman to join the military and he’d regretted the decision ever
since. He hadn’t thought it was fair to the girl to stay in the relationship when he knew he had plans on
becoming Delta. Ghost knew that with his specialized training he’d be putting himself in dangerous
situations where he could end up KIA, and he hadn’t wanted to leave a wife and possibly kids behind.
He’d felt that would be selfish to do. We both had planned to make the Army a career, however, the
result of one of our missions had changed that for us.

“Later, Brother,” I said to Ghost as I held my fist out to him.

“Later,” he replied as his fist tapped mine.

I made quick time getting back to the house. I was ready to hold Sophie in my arms all night again.
Once in the room, I laid down on the bed and pulled her body over to me. At first she snuggled into
me, then she breathed deeply and her body went rigid. She started scooting back across the bed.

“Sophie?”

“So much for not fucking one of the girls,” she spit at me.
 “What the fuck do you mean?”

“I’m sure you can’t smell it, yet you’re definitely wearing a woman’s perfume.”

I sighed. Fuck.

“Sophie. I’m not a man who likes having to explain himself. I told you I wasn’t going down there
to fuck a woman and I didn’t. Since you still don’t know me that well, I’ll tell you what happened this
time. After I sat down at the table with Ghost, Ree and Mel came over to me. Ree straddled my lap
and Mel went behind me, leaned over me and was running her hands down me. They asked me back
to their room and I told them no. You can go ask anyone down at the club and they will tell you the
same thing.”

I felt her body loosening up as she settled back down into the mattress. I reached across to pull
her back to me and she muttered, “No.”

I growled, “Fuck, why not?”

“Because you still smell like them.”

I sighed. Dammit. I wouldn’t want to hold her close to me with another man’s scent on her, so for
the second time today I took a shower. This time though, I didn’t jack off. Although I was tempted,
because knowing I was about to be in bed with Sophie had me rock hard again.

I’d forgotten to get any clothes so I opened the door and walked buck naked into the room. I heard
her gasp.

“Sorry, Soph. I forgot to grab any boxers,” I uttered huskily as my cock throbbed and bounced.

Her gaze on me was doing a number on my dick. It’s like he knew she was staring at him and he
wanted to show off. I reached into my drawer, pulled out a pair of boxers and put them on. I started to
reach for a pair of sweats and a tee, then thought, fuck it. If I had to suffer all night, then so should she.

Instead, I turned off the bathroom light, shut the door, then crawled into bed whereupon I dragged
Sophie’s ass back against me. As my body spooned hers, she rested her head on my arm then wiggled
her ass back into my cock. I groaned, and I swore I felt the bed shake like she was laughing at me.
Little witch. I’d show her. I slid my hand around her waist and cupped her breast in my hand and
rubbed my thumb back and forth across her nipple. I heard her breath catch.

“Everything okay?” I whispered as I tugged her ass tighter against my crotch.

“Yeah,” her voice came out strangled.

“Night, Sophie,” I murmured roughly.

“Night, Cas,” her whispered reply floated out breathily.

 I lay and held her close to me with my dick throbbing and my balls aching. As I listened to her
breathing slow down as she slipped into sleep, I realized despite the ache that was low in my groin,
there wasn’t anywhere else I’d rather be. I synced my breathing to hers and soon I joined her in the
land of nod.

~***~
 Chapter 2
The glory of friendship is not the outstretched hand, not the kindly smile, nor the joy of
companionship; it is the spiritual inspiration that comes to one when you discover that someone
else believes in you and is willing to trust you with a friendship.

~Ralph Waldo Emerson~

Slade

September 3rd, 1998

After I finished eating brunch, as Mom said I should call it because I usually didn’t get up until
around eleven, I walked outside on the porch to where Dad was sitting. Mom had started doing
exercises with Sophie around this time every day to build up her strength and Dad tried to make
himself scarce in order not to distract Mom or be in the way.

Sophie had become a godsend to us in more ways than one. Because of a fall that had left Mom
lying helpless on the floor a few days ago, we’d decided we needed someone with training to help
Mom out, and God answered our prayers by way of Sophie. Doc had called Viper asking for
protection for her cousin whose ex was being abusive toward her. Helping Sophie out ended up being
a two-fold solution, we’d needed a nurse and Sophie was a trained RN, and she’d needed a place to
lay low until things could be worked out concerning matters with her ex.

I looked at Dad thinking he was probably bored as fuck, yet I really didn’t know what he could
do.

“Hey, Dad.”

“Morning, Slade. How was work last night?”

“Good. How were things here?”

“Good. Drey is managing to put on a little weight and she says that she feels like she’s getting
stronger.” He sighed deeply. “She told me we weren’t getting married till she could walk down the
aisle. Said she didn’t want to be carried, nor does she want anyone holding her up while we say our
vows. I gave her till next Saturday. We’re getting married then, I don’t care if we both sit down in
damn chairs, it’s happening.”

I laughed at him. “She’s stubborn. I know she wants to marry you as much as you do her, so she’ll
make next week work.”

“Wanted to talk to you about something.”

I raised an eyebrow while looking at him inquiringly.

 “I have everything ready to get your revised birth certificate. I would like to ride down and get it
in person. I don’t want to have to wait the six weeks to two months they say it will take if we mail it
in. Your mom is really wanting this, so I want to get it done for her and for you as fast as possible.
You are the one who will legally have to go down and get it since you are an adult. I was wondering
if you feel up for a ride to Little Rock tomorrow?”

I mentally thought of everything I would need to get done today in order to make that happen and
realized that it wouldn’t be that hard to switch a couple things around. I’d already planned on taking
part of the evening off tomorrow. We had Church anyway and I’d decided to stay a little while for the
party afterward before I went back to the bar.

“Yeah, it won’t be a problem, I just need to shift a couple things around. Zane and Cas gonna ride
with us?”

“Zane said he would and Cas is gonna check to see if he can get out of his prospect duties for the
day.”

I nodded. “I wanted to ask you to do something for me.”

“What’s that?”

“Church starts at six and we are usually through by seven. The club has a party every Friday night
after Church, and I’m told it can get a little X rated, but supposedly that part usually doesn’t start until
nine or after. I wanted to sing a song to Mom. I haven’t ever done anything like this and I’m a little
nervous thinking about it. I was wondering if you could get her down there for me. I could do it
here…” I shrugged. “I dunno, I just feel like it will truly show her how much she means to me if I sing
it to her in front of our family and friends.”

“I’ll get her there one way or the other. Can I drive your truck to get her to the Clubhouse?”

“Let me see if you can borrow one of the Mules. That would be easier on everyone. You could
pull it close to the steps here, then you’ll be able to take it right up to the back door at the Clubhouse.
That way if Mom wants to walk, it won’t be as far for her.”

“That works.”

“Dad, are you doing okay?”

“What do you mean, Slade?”

“Well, I know you’re used to being busy all the time. Are you going stir crazy here? Should I try to
find you something to do? Or hey, we could work out while Mom is doing her exercises if you want.”

“Son, I would sit in one spot all damn day just to be able to spend an hour with your mom.”

Hearing his words caused me to choke up. It was so fruitless to want something that you know is
not possible. However, it damn well didn’t stop me wishing that my parents had been together my
entire life.

I cleared my throat, “That, umm, yeah.” I took a deep breath. “I’m gonna go over to Brenna’s.
We’re gonna practice together for a while. Seriously think about working out with me. The gym
should be fairly empty at this time of day.”

I stood up and started to turn toward the door to go grab my guitar when Dad spoke up, “Slade,
soon I want to spend time with you. I want us to get to know each other better. I know I’m being
selfish just wanting to spend time with Drey, but son, I need all the time with her I can get.”

I looked at him, really looked, and could see the toll this was taking on him. His love for Mom
was readily apparent by the love shining out of his eyes and when he spoke about her. His grief was
behind that love, hidden in shadows that he tried hard to hide. It humbled me that even though they had
only spent one week together, he still loved her as much as he did. Not many men would walk into a
situation like this and be there for a woman he hadn’t seen in almost thirty years.

Even though we’d only had a few days, I already knew he loved me. That too showed in his face
when he looked at me. I saw how he was with my new-found brothers Cas and Zane and knew one
day we’d have the same type of relationship. I wasn’t going to be a dumbass and force him away just
because he hadn’t always been here for me. It wasn’t his fault that he hadn’t been here anymore than it
was Mom’s. It was just an unfortunate fluke of nature that had forced us all to live without each other.
We were being given a second chance and I was going to take it and run with it.

“I know, Dad. And I understand. It’s not our time now and I pray it won’t be for a long time.”

“You and me both, son.”

~*~

September 4th, 1998

Once everyone heard we were riding to Little Rock, we ended up with an impromptu run with the
whole MC riding with us. The roundtrip was a little over 427 miles. That would be a nice ride for us,
especially since it had been awhile since we had gone out on a club run. We left a little after six in the
morning, which for a few of us was a challenge. When your job called for late nights, early morning
was like a mythical thing. You had heard about it but didn’t really believe it until you actually saw it
and experienced it.

We rode down I-49 until we reached Fort Smith, then we took I-40 to Little Rock. From there we
zigged to I-430 and zagged to I-630, we took the exit for the zoo and all the guys waited at the park by
it while Dad and I rode on to the Department of Health building. It was a good thing they did too
because the parking lot was tiny. I was thankful I was on my bike because the parking spaces looked
like they were made for toy cars.

We made our way into the vital records office, got our number and waited in the long ass line.
Once our number was called, we made our way to a cubicle where a worker proceeded to go over all
the paperwork. Thirty minutes and twenty-seven dollars later and I was officially Slade Wesley
Dillin, Jr. Yeah, I’d always had his entire name in mine, but wasn’t able to claim his last name and
now I could. It felt fucking surreal. All the years of wanting my dad’s last name and now it was mine.

I carefully put my new birth certificate in Dad’s saddlebags since my main bike didn’t have them.
I couldn’t wait to show Mom. We rode back to the park and, of course, I had to get it back out to show
my Brothers. After knuckle bumps and back slaps, we hit the interstate again. It was barely ten as we
traveled down I-40. We hit the exit at Ozark and traveled down AR 23 or as more notoriously called
the Pig Trail and traveled the back way toward the Clubhouse. The road was full of twists and turns
that ran in and out of the Boston and Ozark Mountains. It was one of those that tests a biker’s skill and
was exhilarating to navigate.

The Pig Trail turned left onto AR 16 when it intersected with AR 23, but we continued north
along AR 23 as it would eventually lead us to AR 127 which led back to our compound in the little
community of Elk. We rode in our normal formation with our Road Captain, Karma, in the lead.
Following him in pairs of two was the Prez and VP, Dog and Viper, our Enforcer and Sgt at Arms,
Blood and Slaughter, our Secretary and Treasurer, Seer and Tater, then our patched members, our
prospects, the hangarounds, Dad and Zane’s category, followed by our Tail Gunner, Trooper.

It was still too early for any seasonal changes to the leaves, once they turned, I’d have to bring
Brenna and ride back through the entire Pig Trail. The guys had laughed at me when I asked if we
needed to watch out for wild pigs during the ride. Apparently the University of Arkansas football
team was called the Razorbacks, and fans would make a day of driving to the games by taking the
back roads that lead to the football stadium, ergo the Pig Trail.

I hadn’t had time to really explore any of the country roads that surrounded the Clubhouse since
we patched over in February. Sadly, one day when Mom was gone I’d have the time to do that. I
wasn’t looking forward to that day at all.

We stopped for lunch at a little eatery called Tugboat’s Place outside of Huntsville. It was a red-
roofed little store and restaurant that was so small that there wasn’t enough seating inside for our
entire crew. Once we got our meals, we all went out and sat at picnic tables under the trees. For such
a little place they offered a variety of dishes, all of it was good Southern cooking ranging from fried
catfish, fries and hush puppies, chicken fried steak and gravy with mashed potatoes, real homemade
cheeseburgers, brown beans and cornbread, the list was endless and made me hungry as a horse.

I’d almost forgotten how enjoyable it was to sit and soak up the atmosphere of thirty plus Brothers
and Prospects who were laughing, joking and all around just having a good time. Sometimes there
was nothing quite like the comradery of good friends.

I took a moment to look around at each man who had wanted to ride and be there for something
that was a momentous occasion for me. My throat tightened a little as it hit me how lucky I was that
earlier this year I had truly found a home and family with ARMC. These men, my Brothers, would be
there with me through thick and thin no matter what might happen. I knew one day, I would probably
lean on them pretty heavily.
 After eating and making sure we left the area the way we found it, we took off in formation again.
For me and I’m sure all of my Brothers, there was just something about the freedom of riding a bike. I
don’t know if it was because I wasn’t caged in the enclosing walls of a vehicle, or if it was feeling
like I was a part of the world around me and one with nature, or if it was the wind blowing through
my hair. I’m sure it was a combination of all three, but for the brief time I was on the back of my bike,
all my troubles floated away and I was left feeling vividly alive. There were times I wished I could
just get on my bike, take off riding, and never stop.

Despite the slower riding of the back roads and our stop to eat, we made good time back to the
Clubhouse. It was barely two and, damned if I wasn’t ready to take a nap. As we pulled into the yard
and waited our turn to back our bikes in, I once again looked out over all the men that I had the
privilege of calling Brother. There wasn’t a single one that I wouldn’t hesitate to lay down my life
for. I honestly never thought I would feel this way about an MC. I genuinely liked every member of
our club and truly enjoyed being a part of it. I had hated with every fiber of my being, being a member
of SoSMC. I’m so fucking thankful those days are over.

As we all got off our bikes and everyone was milling around, I heard the laughs, the jokes, the
teasing, of men who loved the life they were living. Dad, Zane and Cas walked up to me observing
what I had been soaking up.

“For more than the obvious reasons, I’m glad you found this club, Cas,” Dad murmured as he
looked at Cas. “I haven’t met many of the members, but those I have, I’ve been damned impressed
with.”

“When Cas told me he was prospecting for an MC, I wasn’t sure it was a good idea. I’m slowly
starting to see it was the right decision for him. I’m with you, Dad,” Zane said. “It seems like a good
group of men.”

“They are a good group of men. Loyal, hardworking, honest, hell the list is endless. I myself am
very thankful that I am a part of ARMC. They’ve been here for me, offering everything I’ve needed
for Mom. Doing what they can to make things easier on me. They humble me. I’m fucking honored to
be a part of the MC,” I added my two cents to the conversation as I looked at my dad and two
brothers.

“I knew I wanted the brotherhood that an MC would give me. That was one of the reasons I
enjoyed being in the military,” Cas stated. “I honestly don’t think men were meant to live alone with
just a woman. I think having a group of Brothers who are behind you, who have your back, is how life
is meant to be lived. It’s one big family that actually likes being together, that likes knowing they have
family that will support them when times get rough. I mean what more could a man really want out of
life?”

“Damn Cas, you make it sound like a marriage,” Nickel piped up, “and I’m never getting
married.”

Laughter rang out at his comment.

 I glanced around to see that I hadn’t even noticed that the majority of the men were standing in a
circle around us.

“Nickel, think about it. The Brothers are here for each other through good times and bad, through
better or worse, through sickness and health. We forsake the outside world to an extent for our
Brothers. That’s the definition of a marriage. I for one hope like hell I get to wear the cut that is on
your back, because that’s one marriage I wouldn’t ever won’t out of.”

Yells of Hear! Hear! rang out across the yard. Then a voice hollered out, “Our own we protect!”
The rest of the Brothers in the yard responded with, “We protect our own!”

Nickel spun in a circle looking at all the Brothers surrounding him. “Well fuck, I guess I’m
married after all.”

Shouts of laughter filled the air as the men made their way into the Clubhouse.

As I watched the last of my Brothers enter the club, I knew one day I too would follow them
through the door, right now however, I’m going home to check on Mom. Oh, I knew Dad was going to
do that as well, but I had to see her for myself. I had to know that she was okay, because the day I was
able to follow them through that door would be the day Mom was no longer in this world.

~*~

Dad, Zane and I made our way to the house after the rest of the guys went into the Clubhouse. Cas
had some work to do that Viper had assigned him so he wasn’t able to join us.

We walked into the house to hear joyous sounds of mischievous laughter coming from the kitchen.
When we entered the room, it was to see Mom sitting at the table while Brenna attempted to paint her
fingernails and Sophie sitting on the floor trying to paint her toenails. Mom looked in our direction,
her face transforming into a crooked smile as she saw us.

“What’s going on here?” Dad voiced as he walked over to Mom.

“Welp, I just informed the girls that they were now my personal beauty care consints… no that's
not it… consults… nope, not that either... consultants,” she smiled proudly at us for finding the right
word, all her words sounded slurred. I was worried at first, hearing her speak. The first thing that
popped into my head was that she had a stroke.

Then Brenna looked at me and snorted. “That’s not xactly what she sazz,” her words weren’t any
clearer than Mom’s were.

“Shh, we’s women. You posed to agree wiffs me.”

I looked hard at Mom, if I didn’t know better I would swear she was a little tipsy. Dad glanced
over at me and grinned. I could tell he was thinking the same thing I was.

Mom tilted her head back and looked up at Dad. “Hey dere, sezzy, gives me a lil kizz.”
 Dad’s gaze shifted to her; his smile now aimed at her. “Have you been drinking?” he questioned
her.

I watched as Brenna and Sophie lowered their gaze to the floor as they started giggling. Evidently
Mom wasn’t the only one who might have taken a nip of something. I was amused looking at them. I
shifted my gaze to see Zane’s reaction. He had a huge smile on his face.

“Mayyyyyyyybbbbeeeeee,” Mom whisper-yelled. “I had de urge for a stawberry daqree and

Sophie kindly mazes us a pitcher of dem,” her words were even more slurred as she attempted to
answer Dad.

“Yeah,” Brenna said and hiccuped which set all three women off into gales of laughter. “An after
tat pitcher, she makes us a nutter one,” she stated as she held up three fingers. She looked hard at her
fingers then raised four fingers. She frowned, reached up with her other hand and forced down one
finger leaving three still up, then muttered, “See twos of dem.”

I heard Zane’s choked laughter as I shook my head while I watched three tipsy women acting like
schoolgirls. It was actually kinda nice to see Mom having a good time like this. I don’t think she’s had
this much fun since the day Viper put Hoss to shame. That day, I had heard her whooping and
hollering with the other women, encouraging Viper on.

“What you’re telling us is that you’re all three drunk,” I asked.

“Nope,” Sophie popped the P. “Tink we’re a lil twipsy.”

Brenna giggles grew at hearing Sophie words.

“That’s twit. We’re twispy, err twipsy, umm tissy, oh heck, we mights be a lil dunk,” Mom
commented through her laughter, then she snorted and once again the women lost it.

They missed the boat in attempting to tell us they were only tipsy, because it was apparent to all
of us guys that the women before us were drunker than skunks. I wished Cas was here to see this shit.
It was funny as hell.

“Mom,” I chided as I continued to look at Brenna.

She kept glancing up at me from the corners of her eyes, sending these little looks at me that made
my blood start humming. “Did you share your drinks with Brenna?”

“Yep. And wiff Sophie, toz,” Mom replied as she looked over at me. “She makes a better dink
than youse do, Slade.”

I raised my eyebrow at that. I made a pretty damn good daiquiri. It didn’t matter the type. Yet it
was obvious the women had enjoyed Sophie’s efforts very much.

“Umm, Mom. You do remember Brenna is a minor, right?”

 Mom started giggling along with her two partners in crime.

“Yesh, membered tat. Called Mia, asked her if she minded if Brenna dunk ones. She said yeppp.
So, all’z good.” Now it was Mom popping her P’s.

“So you’re all three feeling pretty good right now, huh?” I asked curiously, wondering if they
were gonna have a little bit of a hangover.

“Yep.”

“Uh huh.”

“So good.”

All three answered at once, vigorously nodding their heads at us. Dad, Zane and I lost it at their
response and started laughing. I wished I had this shit recorded. I knew all three of them would be
embarrassed as hell if they could see how they were acting. Then again, my mom did have her
moments. I looked at Dad to see him looking at Mom like he could devour her. My eyes widened and
I glanced at Zane to see he was looking at Dad too and I’m pretty sure his face was a reflection of the
look on my own.

“Drey,” Dad murmured huskily as he continued looking down at Mom as if he could eat her alive.

“Hmm,”

“Look at me.”

Mom raised her eyes back to Dad’s. Slowly her giggling stopped, her eyes lowered, and she bit
her lip. Dad raised his hands, cupped Mom’s face, lowered his head and proceeded to kiss Mom
silly. It was awkward as hell watching them and so very beautiful at the same time.

“Wow,” Sophie muttered. “That’s hot. Your dad totally knows what he’s doing.” That came out
clear as a bell.

Dad pulled his head back a little, laughing at her words. Mom’s face was flushed, her eyes were
now glazed with something besides alcohol.

“Yes, he does,” Mom whispered as she licked her lips.

I groaned. “Okay, on that note, I think I’m gonna go take a nap for a couple hours. I don’t think I
can take any more of my parents making out.”

“Same, brother,” Zane said as he turned toward the hallway. “There’s something really disturbing
about finding out your old man is a good kisser.”

Dad barked out a laugh at our comments.

 “What’s wrong, boys. Are your mom and I making you a little uncomfortable?”

“Yes!” Zane and I called back over our shoulders as we headed down the hall. Zane glanced over
at me. “You know, even though it’s weird seeing that, it’s really fucking good at the same time. I
haven’t seen Dad that happy in years.”

“Same. Mom’s so happy she’s glowing with it. Still, it’s damn awkward seeing them like that. No
kid wants to think of their parents and sex in the same thought, much less see them getting hot for each
other. We were all created through immaculate conception, right?”

Zane laughed, “Right!”

He and I parted ways when we got to our rooms. I walked into my room and decided to take my
shower now instead of rushing around doing it once I woke up from my nap. I dried off, slipped into
my boxers and walked into my room. I froze as I looked at my bed. Brenna was lying on it, sound
asleep.

Her cheeks were flushed a deep pink from the alcohol she had consumed. I walked over and
looked down at her wondering if I should try to wake her up. Truthfully, I didn’t want to, so I laid
down, reached over and drew her to me. I turned her to her side, slid an arm under her head and
pulled her body against mine. My last thought as my body spooned hers was that I could get used to
having her in my arms.

~***~
 Chapter 3
If man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different
drummer. Let him step to the music he hears, however measured or far away.

~Henry David Thoreau~

Slade

September 4th, 1998

As I walked into the kitchen of the Clubhouse, I heard the sound of music playing, the sharp clack
of a cue ball hitting its target, and a lot of laughter and conversation coming from the Great Room.
Clair, Ava and Mel were putting together trays of snacks that would be eaten after Church. The smell
of brownies drifted toward me and made my stomach growl. I hadn’t had the chance to eat anything
after we had gotten home. I’d had every intention of grabbing a snack before I laid down, yet after
observing the little impromptu drink fest, I’d completely forgotten about it.

Now though, my stomach was growling so I headed toward the pantry to get something quick to
snack on. I only had about fifteen minutes until Church started.

“Slade.”

The sound of Clair’s voice calling my name had me pulling up and turning toward her. In her
hands was a plate with a sandwich and chips on it. I think my eyes sent the message of what it was
seeing straight to my stomach because once again it growled loudly.

“You’re not the only one who came in hungry,” she stated as she brought the food to me.

“You’re a lifesaver,” I told her as I reached for the plate. I leaned over and kissed her gently on
the cheek. “Thank you for this.”

She reached up and patted my face. “You’re most welcome. Better go getcha a beer and get to
eating, you don’t have much time.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I smarted off as I turned to head out of the kitchen. Her hand slapped my ass as I
walked off and I smiled as I heard her saying, “he’s got a nice firm ass,” as I made my way into the
Great Room.

Jace looked at me from the other end of the bar as I sat down with my food. He held up a beer as I
took a big bite out of my sandwich. I nodded at him and he slid it down the bar top to me. I caught it
before it could hit my plate, twisted the top off and took a long draw of it. As I looked around the
room, my eyes rested on Cas. He was putting the finishing touches to a small stage that was against
one of the walls of the Great Room. The stage sat in front of an area that the girls used for dancing.
 I’d told Dog what I wanted to do tonight and had gotten his permission to do it. I’d had no idea he
was gonna have a small stage built. Now I was really nervous and thought about backing out. I hadn’t
ever sung in front of anyone other than Mom. I took a deep breath and thought to myself, ‘well there’s
a first time for everything’.

As Cas set a couple of stools on the platform, Beau carried in an amp, a couple of mic stands and
mics and placed them in front of the seats. I saw quite a few glances toward the guys as they set up the
equipment.

My eyebrows rose when I realized Beau had plugged the amp into a speaker port that I hadn’t
even realized was in the wall. He picked up each mic and tested it to make sure it worked, and it did,
loud and clear. Now I was starting to sweat bullets. Hell, I would probably get up there and forget the
damn words to the song.

Cas walked over and sat down beside me. “You’ll do fine,” he stated quietly as he chuckled at the
look of panic on my face.

“Bro, I’ve never sung in front of others like this before. I think I’m gonna get sick,” I muttered
feeling my sandwich sitting like a stone in my stomach.

“Nah, Slade. You’ll be okay. There won’t be anyone here except family and friends. People you
see almost every day.”

“That’s not helping, Cas.”

His chuckle turned into laughter as he took in how nervous I was. “You’ll be okay.” He paused a
second as he glanced around the Great Room. “You’re a Dillin, we don’t back down from anything.
When it’s time, just get up there and do your thing. It’ll all be good.”

I lifted my chin at him, feeling the tension ease out of me a little bit. I could hear the sound of men
coming down from their quarters upstairs and I glanced at the clock behind the bar. It was already a
few minutes past time for Church, but seeing as how Dog was one of the men coming down the stairs,
I wasn’t worried about being late for our meeting. Dog was usually already in Church before
everyone else.

I looked at Cas to see him looking at every one of the Brothers a little enviously.

“Soon, brother. You’ll be wearing that cut before you know it,” I murmured low to him.

“I hope, Slade. It’s strange. I want this as much as I wanted to be Delta.”

“You’re working hard, you’ll get there. I have no doubt about that.” I stood up. “And remember,
you’re a Dillin. I bet everything you’ve worked hard for, you’ve gotten. No backing down. You’ll be a
Brother in no time.”

As the words left my mouth, Dog whistled, raised his hand in the air and made a circular motion
like we were going on a ride. In this instance, we were all headed to Church.
 Like every other time, we all left our phones in the basket on the wall as we walked into the
meeting room. I made my way to my seat just as everyone else was doing. As I looked around, I
realized everyone was here except KJ. As soon as everyone was settled, Dog started and had Seer
read the minutes of the previous meeting then had Tater go over finances. Once that was done it was
time to get into new items that needed to be addressed.

“Okay, got several things we need to get through and I don’t want to sit here all damn night. I want
to be through in an hour. First up, I want everyone to mark down in your little books the date of
October third. It’s the Toys for Tots Poker Run. It’s a mandatory ride. Need to talk with me if you
think you can’t make it.

“Next, KJ can’t make it tonight. He’s got some official business he is taking care of. I decided
we’re going to go ahead and form a task force of men who he can bounce thoughts off of. Also, I want
this group of men to be able to back him up if needed. Any thoughts on the matter?”

I could see several of the men wanted to say something, yet no one was speaking up.

“What the fuck is this? You’re all suddenly brainless?” Dog growled out as he looked over all of
us sitting around the table.

Finally, Ranger responded, “Prez, we need to be real careful about this. We can’t have KJ sneak
in here more than once a week and that is pushing it as it is. I think everyone is wondering where a
meeting like this would take place. I wouldn’t mind being on the team, I just don’t want anyone
realizing I’m meeting with KJ and I think all the guys feel the same way.

“It’s not that we don’t want to support him. It’s more in the line of needing to be cautious as hell
about this. We’ve always managed to keep it on the down low that we aren’t associated with him and
vice versa. He doesn’t need even a hint of anything getting out that he is meeting with us about law
business.”

“Agreed,” Dog stated.

“I think the meetings could be held in the back room of The Watering Hole,” I commented. “It
could be done at any time of the day or night.”

I saw heads nodding around the table.

“We could use that for one place to meet. We probably need to try to figure out a few different
spots for them to go to. If it’s always at the same place, it might eventually start attracting attention,”
Sarge added.

“Well, we can start with the Hole and go from there. Ranger says he wouldn’t mind being on the
team. Who else should we have?” Dog questioned.

I saw Reb, Pred and Beau look at each other and nod then turn toward Dog.

“Prez,” Beau called out. “Reb, Pred and I were talking about this the other day and we think we
have an idea on who should all be on the team.”

Dog inclined his head toward his son. “Okay, let’s hear what y’all think.”

“Well, investigative work is a lot like gathering military recon. A lot of critical thinking is used in
both. While the three of us have had training and, Lord knows, that Reb and Pred are good, we have
some men here who are even better and who are more experienced than the rest of us sitting in this
room.”

Reb took up the conversation, “We have Ranger, who was, well, a Ranger, Blood and Slaughter
are SEALS, however, we have two other men who are Delta, Casper and Ghost. Granted they aren’t
patched in, still those men know things that a lay person wouldn’t know. Seer and Viper are intense
critical thinkers. We just thought it should be men like them that would give KJ the best team to work
with.”

I glanced around to see the Brothers seriously thinking over Beau and Reb’s words. I could tell
some agreed and others didn’t look convinced.

Gunny added his input, “I think the boys are on the right track. The only problem with it is that
Blood, Slaughter and Viper are men that hold positions within the club. I don’t think any man on the
team should be one who holds an office. Hell yes, I agree that Seer is smart as a whip, still he’s too
damn old to be out at all hours of the night that these meetings might need to take place.

“Ranger would be a good fit. I believe Casper and Ghost would be as well. Sarge and I have had
a chance to talk to Shadow about these men and he said that they are two men who he trusted to have
his back even today. We all know that something went down that caused them to leave the military. In
my gut I know it wasn’t something those two men did wrong. I feel like we can trust them.”

Dog lifted his chin. “Once again, I concur with what’s being said, however, I wanted the men on
the team to be Brothers, not Prospects.”

Murmurs of agreement were heard from some of the men. I could understand the point that Prez
was making, yet it would be a waste of good men if those that had the skill set that was needed were
not used.

“I agree with Gunny,” Seer stated. “I’m too damn old for that type of shit anymore. I also agree it
shouldn’t be men that hold a position within the club and that it should be patched members. I have a
suggestion. It’s past time for Axel and Streak to be patched in. There’s nothing to say that we can’t
patch in Ghost and Casper early.”

Hatchet inserted into the discussion, “That could upset Jace, Brick and Creed. They’ve been here
longer.”

“Only by a week for Brick and Creed, Jace has been prospecting since February,” Screw
declared.
 “Jace needs the time prospecting, it won’t bother him,” Viper noted.

Dog voiced, “This is something for us to seriously think about. I was going to bring up Axel and
Streak in a little bit, since it’s already been spoken of…”

“I motion that Axel be patched,” Maul spoke before the Prez could even finish what he was
saying.

“Second,” Doom uttered.

The Prez was shaking his head as he said, “All those in favor give me a show of hands.” Every
man raised a hand. “Okay one down…”

“I motion that Streak be patched,” Karma words did the same as Maul’s had.

“Second,” Bane commented.

“You fuckers could let me finish.”

“You’re the one who said you wanted out of here by seven, Prez,” Nickel spoke up, only to
receive a glare from Dog.

“All those in favor give me a show of hands.”

Unanimous once again.

“Looks like we have two new Brothers. Now, Cas and Ghost have been here a little over three
months, pretty much the same as Creed and Brick and they’ve been in the military as well. What do
we want to do here, Brothers?”

“I’d like to inject something into this debate we seem to have going on,” Cueball said. “For one,
we need to decide how many men we need on the team. I think we’ve all agreed on Ranger. We’re
forgetting Rogue was in the Army, he might want to be on the team. And personally, I think some
young blood would be good as well. Reb and Pred have already proven themselves with the situation
concerning Zoey.”

Rogue stated, “Y’all don’t want me on a team. I’m dumber than a doorknob and the old lady
would kill me if I was coming and going at all hours of the night.” Chuckles were met at his comment.
“I do think Reb and Pred would be good and let’s not forget Beau was in the same unit with them.”

“Viper, you’ve been quiet this whole discussion, what’s your take?” Dog asked his Vip.

Viper had been listening to everything discussed. I knew the man pretty well, I bet he’d already
thought about everything we would be talking about in the capacity of KJ’s team.

“I agree that the men who hold a position within the MC don't need to be on the team. I think
Ranger, Reb, Pred, and Beau would work. It would do the younger men good to learn more critical
and strategic thinking skills. I believe we need more men who have been in the line of fire. Which
points to men like Casper and Ghost. Both of them are in their early thirties.

“Brick and Creed are roughly six to seven years younger than them and in the terms of their
military training, they are worlds apart.” He paused a moment and ran his hand through his hair. I’d
learned years ago he did this when he was thinking deeply on something. “Yes, it’s possible it might
bother Brick and Creed a little bit, yet we’re only talking the difference of a week in their prospecting
time.

“If it’s felt that we need to have a sit down with them and explain the reasoning behind what we
are doing, that can be done. However, this is a fucking 1%’er MC, if they’re gonna bitch and moan
and need their hands held, then they don’t need to be here anyway. Now don’t get me wrong, I like
both of the boys just fine and I believe that in a few months we’ll be bringing their names up to be
patched in. For what we are needing right now though, we have to consider that we need Cas and
Ghost patched in.”

Every head was nodding at his words.

Dog informed us, “Viper and I are in agreement on this. We’ve already talked about it. Plus, I too
have talked to Shadow about both men. He said he misses his motherfucking men and wished they
were still on his team. That they were naturals and it’s hard to find men of their caliber.

“I trust every man in this room. All comments are valid. My decision has not come completely
from Shadow’s assessment. I’ve watched just as Viper has, as I’m sure all of you have, and Ghost and
Cas have done everything that’s asked of them. If you’ve been paying attention, they’ve gone beyond
what’s been asked of them the majority of the time. They are definitely not slackers by any means.

“Here’s what this is gonna boil down to. We’re gonna vote for each man, if the vote isn’t
unanimous, they will not be out of the club, it will just mean they have to finish their allotted prospect
time. I’m asking each of you to seriously think about this. I know it’s short notice, truthfully though, all
of you should have already been thinking on this and pretty much have come to your own
conclusions.”

“I motion that Casper be patched,” Gunny stated.

“Second,” Seer added.

“All those in favor of Casper being patched give me a show of hands.”

Every man raised his hand.

“I motion that Ghost be patched,” Sarge uttered.

“Second,” Slaughter remarked.

“All those in favor of Ghost being patched give me a show of hands.”

 Unanimous.

“That’s settled. So we have a team of six men, Ranger, Beau, Reb, Pred, Casper and Ghost. At
this time, I think that is sufficient. We’ll wait for word from KJ, if he feels like this needs to be
changed or adjusted we’ll address it then.

“Now onto other areas. I have a few things that I want to bring up. We are growing and will
continue to grow and as we do that, we are going to have more men that are going to need houses. I
think we need to build two or three smaller homes that can be used for Brothers as they take an Old
Lady. Then they can take their time deciding if they want to live on the compound or off of it.

“Because of this, I feel like we need to buy Possum’s land directly to the north of us since that is
the direction we need to expand the housing. I want there to remain sufficient land between the houses
and our fence line. This is one thing I want you to be thinking on for next week. Also, I know I said
that I didn’t want to add on to the Clubhouse, that has since changed. Ava and I have talked and
neither of us want to live in a house, at least not yet. Still, there isn’t any way we can raise a child in
one room.

“I would like to add an addition past the President and VP room’s that will parallel the road to the
houses. For the second level, I’d like that to be an apartment for the President. I’ll be honest with you
all, I don’t know if Ava and I will ever want to live in a house again. I think we can raise any kids that
we have in the Clubhouse. I like being available at all times if I’m needed. The bottom floor can be
open for suggestions. We can add rooms for more girls or build another apartment there. This is also
something that I want you all to think about. This will be brought up again at the next meeting.”

“How big of an addition are you thinking, Dog?” Hoss inquired.

Dog shrugged. “I have no way of knowing if one child is all we’ll ever have. I’d like to have
more, so would like to plan for that. I’m thinking maybe eighteen hundred to two thousand square feet.
We’ll have to have a small kitchen, nothing major because for the most part we will continue taking
our meals with everyone who eats at the Clubhouse.”

“I say we go ahead and approve the addition, that way I can get men started on breaking ground,
pouring the footing, running the plumbing, and pouring the slab. We should be able to have that done
by next Church. In the meantime, I don’t give a fuck how you want it laid out. If you really think
anyone else does then you can wait for the meeting, yet as far as I’m concerned, you and Ava can
discuss that. You can draw up rough plans, I don’t need an official blueprint, we don’t have to have it
inspected anyway,” Hoss said, voicing his opinion.

Murmurs of agreement with Hoss’s statement could be heard.

“I motion that we go ahead and let Hoss start on the footing as soon as a viable blueprint is
available for him,” Karma stated.

“Second,” Eagle added.

 Once again I saw Dog shake his head, this time it was because he knew all the men wanted him to
know we had his back in what would be best for him and his Old Lady.

“All those in favor…”

Every hand raised.

He swallowed and nodded at us. “Is there anything else?”

“Yeah, Prez. I don’t think it’s necessary to wait on a vote to buy Dad’s land. I agree with you as
I’m sure everyone else here does as well. I make a motion that we buy Dad’s land,” Slaughter
remarked.

“Second,” Sarge called out.

Dog sighed. “All those in favor of the club buying Possum’s land, show a raise of hands.”

Every hand rose.

“Now, anything else?” Dog asked again.

“Yeah, we’re gonna need a couple more prospects,” Viper commented.

“That we are, so y’all be thinking and if you know of anyone we’ll discuss them next week. If
that’s it,” he paused to give anyone a chance to speak, “oh hell wait, I have something else.”

Chuckles were heard around the room.

“Seer, can you have the cuts ready for a patch-in party tomorrow?” I asked as I looked over at
him.

“Yep, can do,” he replied, inclining his head at me.

“Okay, I want each of you to hear me. We will be having a couple guests at the party tonight.
Slade’s dad Boomer and his brother Zane will be here. I’ll be truthful with all of you, I’m hoping
there is some way of convincing both of these men to join the club. I don’t want anyone to put
pressure on them. You all know that Slade’s mom has cancer. Unfortunately, it’s getting worse.

“Slade asked if he could sing a song for her tonight and I granted his request. If you’re staying for
the party, I do not want it worse than R rated until after Audrey is gone. There will be Old Ladies
there, of course, but they know the score. However, I don’t think it’s appropriate for Audrey to have
to put up with some of your sexual escapades. Understood? If not, go to your damn room and do
whatever it is you want to do there. Now we’re adjourned.”

~*~

We’d run about thirty minutes past seven and I needed to check to make sure Mom wasn’t still
tipsy, plus I was worried that she might already be getting tired. I could tell her workouts with Sophie
were allowing her to regain a little strength, although she still got tired pretty quick. While I was
afraid she was pushing it too hard, I couldn’t fault her for wanting to stand on her own two feet next
Saturday when she and Dad tied the knot. Another dream of hers, and mine as well, would come true
that night. She’d always wanted to marry Dad and I’d always wanted my parents together.

I looked around the Great Room and saw that two tables had been pushed together. Mom and Dad
were sitting with Ava, Mia, Jennie, Doc, and Sophie. The women seemed to be involved in an intense
discussion. Although there was a smile on Dad’s face, I could have sworn I saw him rolling his eyes
at something that was just said. If I had to make a guess, I would bet the women were talking about
Mom and Dad’s wedding. I walked over to the table, leaned over and gave Mom a kiss. She sent me a
smile in return.

“You doing okay? Not too tipsy? I’m sorry we ran late. If you’re too tired you can come listen to
us another time,” I quietly uttered to her.

Dad had to tell her that Brenna and I were going to be singing for the club tonight to get her to
come down because she was still a little under the weather. She didn’t know that I had anything
planned for her.

“I’m fine, Slade. The girls and I have been talking about what we can do for the wedding next
week.”

Bingo.

“Did you tell them it needs to be inside?”

This time it was Mom rolling her eyes. “Yes, Dad,” she smarted off sarcastically.

I narrowed my eyes at her. “Dad, you need to get a handle on your woman,” I muttered.

Mom gasped in disbelief. “Slade Wesley, how dare you say something like that!”

“Audrey Faith, it was easy,” I smarted back.

“You are such a smart ass,” Mom mumbled.

“I learned from the best.” I smirked at her.

“Touché’,” Mom replied then we busted out laughing.

We’d always played our ‘smart ass’ game as Mom liked to call it. She had a wicked sense of
humor, one that I inherited, and from as far back as I can remember she had always bemoaned the fact
that I took after her in that regard. She’d always said that one smart ass in a family was enough. When
you had two in a two-person family, it made for some lively conversations. She was right.

I glanced at Dad to see he was watching our exchange avidly and was highly amused at the
interaction between Mom and me.

“I think I have a handle on your mom just fine,” Dad quipped as he grinned wickedly at Mom.

“You can handle me anyway you want,” Mom breathed out in a sexy voice.

“Welp, that’s my cue to leave. Can’t handle hearing my parents talk like that.”

Laughter followed me as I crossed the Great Room to the small stage. Brenna was already there
tuning another acoustic guitar.

“You feeling okay?” I questioned Brenna.

She grimaced. “Yeah, little headache, not bad. Remind me not to drink that much again.”

I laughed.

“Who’s guitar?” I asked as I stood beside her, listening as she strummed the strings listening for
the correct sounding notes and chords.

“Cas’s.”

“Didn’t know he played,” I murmured as I continued to watch her. She looked sexy sitting on the
stool plucking at the strings.

“Neither did I until he asked me when I came in earlier if I wanted to play with you. I told him I
did, only problem was, we had to share one guitar. He said he had one, then went and got it for me.”
Brenna smiled up at me.

Damn her smile did things to my insides. Hell, everything about her did things to my insides. Most
were things I knew I needed to keep my thoughts off of right now, especially if I didn’t want the room
to see me sporting a hard on.

“You close to having it tuned?”

In answer to my question, she started softly playing, “Landslide” by Stevie Nicks. She was damn
good on the guitar.

“Sing it to us,” Jennie shouted. Brenna sent a smile toward her. “Seriously, sing it to us,” Jennie’s
voice rang out again. Brenna looked at me.

“Should I?”

“Yeah, maybe if you sing it might make it easier for me.”

I leaned forward, adjusted one of the mics for her, then grabbed my guitar, wrapped the strap
around me, buttoned it at the neck heel and stepped up on the stage. I then adjusted the second mic to
where I needed it and sat down. I glanced around the Great Room to see that the Brothers who had
Old Ladies were sitting with them and some of the Brothers who were single had been lucky enough
to have snagged a club girl or a hang around.

“You take lead guitar and I’ll back you up on it for this song. Vocals are all you,” I said as I
smiled at her.

She nodded at me and softly started singing. Beau came over and adjusted the volume of the mics
up a little bit. The room quickly became quiet as the sweet lyrics flowed from Brenna.

The words of the 70’s song poured out of Brenna’s mouth. It was a tender melody that wondered
what love was and I think everyone of us at one time or another wondered that. It spoke of changing
as we grow older and reflecting on the past. I think everyone reflects on life as we get older and
wonder if we are living it like we should or wonder if we have missed out on anything because of
being afraid to change. I guess that’s the nature of the beast. Because we are only human, and humans
had a tendency of second guessing themselves at times. And the hell of it is, most times we never
really know the answer to whether we’ve missed out on anything or not.

I looked around the room and as far as I could tell everyone was listening to the lilting notes that
Brenna made sound so effortless. Old Ladies were now sitting in their men’s laps, most of the club
girls and hang arounds were wrapped in the arms of a Brother, their backs against the men’s fronts.
The women were swaying side to side as their gazes stayed on Brenna wanting to hear every word
that came out of her sweet lips.

When she finished, hollers and whistles were heard among the clapping that was thundering
around the room. I looked over at Brenna to see her cheeks were a fiery red.

“Awesome job, babe,” I told her. “They fucking loved you.”

The smile she cast my way could have easily outshone the sun. She loved music and it was shown
with every chord she played and every note she sang. My girl was damned talented.

As the crowd quieted down, someone shouted, “Sing more.” “Yeah, we want to hear more,” was
yelled out. I spoke into the mic, “I only came to sing one song tonight and you’ve already gotten to
hear more than planned, it’s up to the Prez if we can do a couple more.”

Chants of “more, more, more” rang out across the room. I looked over at Dog to see he had a
wide smile on his face. Hell, I think he was enjoying hearing his family excited about something. His
gaze found mine and he lifted his chin.

“Well, the Boss Man says it’s okay. Only problem is I’d only practiced one song to sing. Brenna
and I might be able to play some older songs…”

I broke off as Gunny walked up to me and leaned in and whispered into my ear, “Think you can
sing “Always on My Mind” by Willie Nelson?”
 I beckoned Brenna to me and whispered the name of the song to her, she leaned back and nodded,
indicating she knew the song.

“Looks like we’ll give it a go, Gunny,” I said as I smiled at him.

He returned my smile and walked toward his Old Lady Julie. As we played the first chords, he
beckoned to her. She stood and walked toward him. He slid his arm around her as I sang the first
words to the song and they started slow dancing. I watched as Viper led Jennie to the floor, followed
by Pred with Mia. Since Cas was behind the bar tonight, Zane managed to get Sophie to the floor with
him. Hell, even Ava had convinced Dog to dance. Soon the floor became crowded with even more
couples, the one that held my attention though was my mom and dad.

I knew Mom loved this song and she had managed to get Dad to dance to it despite her not having
the strength. I watched as he moved slowly to the music, halfway through the song I could tell Mom
couldn’t continue, I watched as Dad lifted her up and she wrapped her legs around his waist. Mom
had her face buried into his neck as Dad kept dancing like what he was doing was completely normal.

My voice broke briefly as I saw the tears that were streaming down his face. He was singing the
song to Mom as he held her in his arms. I watched him close his eyes as the words ‘always on my
mind’ crossed his lips. Life is made up of bittersweet moments and watching my parents dance was
one of those moments and it was breaking my heart.

I didn’t even quit playing. Instead, I went right into another slow song. I wanted to give Mom the
gift of being held as Dad danced with her in his arms. The words to “Loving Her Was Easier,” by
Kris Kristofferson flowed out of my mouth. Dad never slowed down and he sang every word that I
sang. I saw Mom’s body shake and knew she was crying. Dad unashamedly kept dancing, letting the
tears continue to fall down his face as he crooned how loving his woman was the easiest thing he had
ever done. He wasn’t just singing the lyrics, he was letting Mom know that his love for her was
reflected in the words of the song.

I saw a movement to the side of the dance floor and glanced that way. Cas and Zane were
watching our parents, love was on their faces, as were tears. I felt a drop of water hit my arm and I
realized they weren’t the only ones with tears falling. I looked back at Dad and he caught my gaze and
held up one finger. I knew he was wanting me to sing one more song so he could continue dancing
with Mom.

Once again, I went straight into the next song. It was like Brenna and I had played together for
years. As soon as I played the first few chords she seemed to know what the song was. The words to
“We’ve Got Tonight,” by Bob Segar rolled off my lips. The haunting words of a man begging his
lover to stay another night with him flowed from my mouth. I poured as much emotion into the song as
I could.

Not one couple left the floor. As I looked around, I realized that some of the tables had actually
been pushed back to allow more room for those wanting to dance. There wasn’t a woman in the room
that wasn’t out on the floor being held in a man’s arms as they swayed to the rhythm of the music.
 Viper was now dancing with Mia, Pred was dancing with Sophie and Reb was holding Jennie
close as they swayed to the music. As I sang the last words ‘why don’t you stay’, I saw Dad’s arms
tighten around Mom and I about lost it. Hell. I still needed to sing my song and I was a fucking
emotional mess. As the last chords faded out, the room erupted in clapping and cheers.

As everyone walked back to their tables, Cas brought me a beer and Brenna a water.

“Hang in there, lil bro. You got this.”

I nodded at him and took a long drink of beer. More than ever I needed some liquid courage,
although I’d probably need about ten bottles to make it through the song.

I looked over at Brenna and she winked at me and said quietly, “You’ve got this. I’ll be by your
side the whole time, Slade. I’m not leaving you.” Hearing her supportive words went straight to the
very core of my being.

I took another drink and looked toward where Mom was sitting in Dad’s lap. Mom was peppering
kisses in the wake of Dad’s tears.

“Brother,” Zane murmured. “You mind if Cas and I sing the chorus with you. That way we’ll be
here if we’re needed.”

I glanced toward the bar and saw that Ghost was behind it now.

Then I looked into the eyes of my brothers and realized they knew how very difficult this song
was going to be for me to sing. I swallowed hard knowing that I would have these men in my life from
here on out. It was a gift I had been given that I hoped I never took for granted.

“I’d be honored,” I told them hoarsely.

I gazed back out over the crowd and saw that Mom and Dad were looking at me. Dad inclined his
head toward me letting me know that Mom was getting tired. It was now or never.

I cleared my throat and spoke into the mic, “I asked Dog if I could sing a song for my mom tonight.
Mom has been my rock my entire life. When I was younger we didn’t have much money for a lot of
things. I never realized that because I always had what I needed. She was always taking me on these
great adventures, we’d go hiking, to a museum, to watch the airplanes taking off, swimming, you name
it, we did it. I felt like I was the luckiest boy in the whole world.

“Now I know I wasn’t just the luckiest boy, I’m the luckiest man to be graced with such a
wonderful mom. I didn’t realize until I was older that the majority of our escapades happened using
very little money, yet I always had the time of my life no matter what we did. Mom’s the one who
taught me to play the guitar and she gave me a love of music. There was one song she always sang to
me. She said it was her song to me. I’ve done the best that I can to live by the words and I’d like to
sing it for Mom tonight.”

My eyes met Mom’s across the room. Tears were sliding down her face again. “I love you, Mom,”
Exploring the Variety of Random
Documents with Different Content
the audacity to name this sluggish, dull-brown stream the "Wad-al-
Gkebir," the "Great River!" Yet, after all, things are great or small
merely by comparison. To a people accustomed only to such trickles
of water as had thus far crossed my path in the peninsula no doubt
this over-grown brook, bursting suddenly on their desert eyes, had
seemed worthy the appellation. But many streams wandering by
behind the barn of an American farmer and furnishing the old
swimming-hole are far greater than the Guadalquivir.
I crossed it toward three of the afternoon by an ancient stone
bridge of many arches that seemed fitted to its work as a giant
would be in embroidering doilies. Beyond lay Andújar, a hard-baked,
crumbling town of long ago, swirling with sand; famous through all
Spain for its porous clay jars. In every street sounded the soft slap
of the potter; I peeped into a score of cobble-paved courts where
the newly baked jarras were heaped high or were being wound with
straw for shipment.
A long search failed to disclose a casa de comidas in all the
town. The open market overflowed with fruit, however, stocked with
which I strolled back across the river to await the midnight train. It
was packed with all the tribes of Spain, in every sleeping attitude.
Not until we had passed Córdoba at the break of day did I find space
to sit down and drowse for an hour before we rumbled into Seville.
I had exhibited my dust-swathed person in at least half a dozen
hotels and fled at announcement of their charges, when I drifted
into the narrow calle Rosario and entered the "Fonda de las Quatro
Naciones." There ensued a scene which was often to be repeated
during the summer. The landlord greeted me in the orange-scented
patio, noted my foreign accent, and jumped instantly to the
conclusion, as Spaniards will, that I knew no Castilian, in spite of the
fact that I was even then addressing him with unhesitating glibness.
Motioning to me to be seated, he raced away into the depths of the
fonda calling for "Pasquale." That youth soon appeared, in tuxedo
and dazzling expanse of shirt-front, extolling as he came the
uncounted virtues of his house, in a flowing, unblushing imitation of
French. Among those things that I had not come to Spain to hear
was Spanish mutilation of the Gaelic tongue. For a long minute I
gazed at the speaker with every possible evidence of astonishment.
Then turning to the landlord I inquired in most solemn Castilian.
"Está loco, señor? Is he insane that he jabbers such a jargon?"
"Cómo, señor!" gasped Pasquale in his own tongue. "You are
not then a Frenchman?"
"Frenchman, indeed!" I retorted. "Yo, señor, soy americano."
"Señor!" cried the landlord, bowing profoundly, "I ask your
pardon on bended knee. In your Castilian was that which led me to
believe it was not your native tongue. Now, of course, I note that it
has merely the little pequeñísimos peculiarities that make so
charming the pronunciation of our people across the ocean."
A half-hour later I was installed in a third-story room looking
down upon the quiet little calle Rosario, and destined to be my home
for a fortnight to come. During all that time Pasquale served me at
table without once inflicting upon me a non-Spanish word. Nor did
he once suspect what a hoax I had played on the "Four Nations" by
announcing my nationality without prefixing the qualification "norte."

CHAPTER V
 THE TORERO AT HOME

Even though one deny the right of its inhabitants to pity the man
who must live and die elsewhere, even he who finds it panting and
simmering in the heat of summer, will still count it no punishment to
spend a fortnight in Seville. Tranquillity and that laggard humor so
befitting vacation days reign within its precincts; yet it is a real city,
never falling quite inert even at the hour of siesta, which is so like
the silence of the grave in other towns of Andalusia. In the slender
calle Rosario itself the stillness was never supreme, but tempered
always by the droning of a passing ajero with his necklace of garlic,
an itinerant baker, or a blind crone hobbling by with the fifth or the
tenth of a lottery ticket, crooning in mournful voice, "La lotería! El
numero trienta seis mil quinientos cincuenta y cinco-o-o. Who will
win a fortune in the lotería-a-a?" Then above all else the soft,
quarter-hourly booming of the cathedral bells to mark the passing of
the day, like mile-stones on a wandering highway.
Nor with all her languor is Seville slovenly. Outwardly, like all
that carries the ear-mark of the Moor, she is bare. In the first brief
survey one may fancy one's self in a city of dismal hovels. But this is
because the houses are turned wrong-side out; a glimpse into one of
the marble-paved patios, fragrant with orange-trees and cooled by
fountains throwing their waters high in the dry air, forever dispells
the illusion.
My first full day in Seville fell on a holiday dedicated to San
Pedro which, chancing also to be my birthday, it was easy to imagine
a personal festival. In truth, the celebration of the day was marked
by nothing other than a bit more indolence than usual. The real
fiesta began at night in the Alameda of Hercules. There, among a
hundred booths, the chief object of interest was a negro, the first of
his race, one might fancy, who ever invaded the city.
By day, indeed, there is little else to do in Seville than the royal
occupation of doing nothing, a stroll along the Sierpes in the
morning, a retreat toward noisy, glaring noonday to the cool and
silent cathedral or those other churches that rival it as museums of
art, there to wander undisturbed among masterpieces of Spain's top-
most century. The cathedral, by the way, houses the most recent
traveler in the calendar of saints. Saint Anthony of Padua, not many
years ago, released by the dexterous knife of an impulsive admirer,
struck out into the unknown and journeyed as far as our own New
York. But there repenting such conduct at his years or daring to
venture no further when his companion found a sojourn in the
Tombs imperative, he returned to his place, and resumed it so
exactly that only the sharpest eye can detect the evidence of his
unseemly excursion.
A city that styles her most important street that "of the
Serpents," even though it harbors no more of the outcasts of the
pavement than many another famous thoroughfare, may be
expected to abound in other strange names. Nor are they lacking.
How unworthy his lodging must the worldly Sevillian feel who
wanders uncertainly homeward in the small hours to his abode in
"Jesús del Gran Poder"--"Powerful Jesus street." Or with what face
can the merchant turn off after a day of fleecing his fellow-man
toward his dwelling in "Amor de Dios"? Top-heavy nomenclature is
not confined to the streets. There are many windows in which one
may read the announcement of a "Media Noche de Jamón." No, it is
not a new law by the cortes, but a "Middle of the Night of Ham," or,
succinctly, the over-worked ham sandwich. The uninstructed may be
led at sight of a building proclaiming itself an "Academia del Tiro al
Blanco" into the belief that Seville is overrun with institutions of
higher learning. Not so, distinctly not so. The "Academy of the Shot
at the White" is what less extravagant and imaginative peoples dub
a shooting gallery.
The man in the street is frequently no less colorful in his
language. Yet the crisp, trenchant word common to that personage
the world over is here, too, in full force, led by that never idle
explosive "hombre." Dictionarically speaking, "hombre" means
"man," and nothing more--which only proves how dismally the
dictionary has failed to keep up with the times. For child, woman, or
hen-pecked male answers to the expression as readily as to his own
name. A sevillano leading a pup at the end of a string may be
frequently observed to give a jerk at the leash and cry over his
shoulder, "Hombre! Vámonos!"--"Come along, man!"
Anent the man in the street, it may be asserted that the
Sevillian is usually there. Writers of Spanish romances have for
centuries sought to win our sympathy for their love-lorn heroes by
stationing them in the public way to whisper their pleadings through
the cold bars of a reja. The picture is true; the lover of flesh and
blood and of to-day still stands there. But so, for that matter, does
the butcher's boy, the ol'-clothes man, and even less reputable
persons. In Spanish newspapers the national wealth of phrase is too
often overshadowed--like the news columns--by the touching
assurance of personal announcements. Rare the page that is not half
taken up with a black-bordered inset conveying the information that:
 "Señor and Señora Perez have the honor to advise their
sorrowing friends and business associates that little Willie Perez,
aged six, went up to heaven at 7:32 last evening."
There is nothing like being exact and punctual in these little
matters.
Toward sunset, after the siesta, it is not merely à la mode but
good sense to stroll down to the banks of the Guadalquivir by the
Golden Tower and drift an hour or two back and forth along the
deep-shaded Alameda. There one will be in the best company in
Seville--and the worst; for all the city is there, lolling in its carriage
or pattering along the gravel in its hempen sandals.
But it is only at night that Seville is wholly and genuinely awake
and approaches somewhat to that fountain of joy her inhabitants
would have the world believe her. Then at last does she shake off
entirely the daytime lassitude. The noises of the day are all there,
the street-hawkers have gained a hundredfold in volume of lung, in
number, and in activity, the cathedral bells seem twice as loud.
Toward nine all the city and his wife and children and domestics are
gathered or gathering in the great focal point, the palm-fringed Plaza
San Fernando. The attractions are several. First of all is the
"cinematagrafo," a moving-picture machine throwing its mirth and
puerility on a sheet suspended in the center of the plaza. Second, a
military band, not a caterwauling of strange noises that one would
desire suppressed by fire or earthquake, but a company seriously
and professionally engaged in producing genuine music, which it
does from near nine till after midnight as continuously as any band
could be expected to until some invention makes it possible to blow
a trombone and smoke a cigarette at one and the same time. Third,
there is the excitement which the mingling together in crowds brings
every Latin people, and the supreme pleasure of strolling to and fro
admiring one another and themselves. Fourth, if so many excuses
are needed, there is fresh air and the nearest approach to coolness
that the city affords.
Yet with all Seville gathered the thousand roped-off chairs
around the curtain are rarely half filled; for to sit in one costs a "fat
dog," as the Spaniard facetiously dubs his Lacedemonian two-cent
piece. But what a multitude in the rest of the square! Out of doors
all Spain mixes freely and heartily. Hidalgos with the right to conceal
their premature baldness from Alfonso himself shudder not in the
least at being jostled by beggars; nay, even exchange with them at
times a few words of banter. Silly young fops, in misfit imitation of
Parisian style, a near-Panama set coquettishly over one ear, trip by
arm in arm, swinging their jaunty canes. Workingmen scorning such
priggishness stride slowly by in trim garments set off by bright red
fajas in which is stuck a great navaja, or clasp-knife of Albacete.
Rich-bosomed majas with their black masses of mane-like hair, in
crimson skirts or yellow--as yellow as the gown of Buddha--drift
languorously by with restless fan. No type is missing from the
strolling multitude. Strolling, too, it is, in spite of the congestion; for
the slow tide-like movement of the throng not only gives opportunity
but compels any lazy foreigner to walk whether he will or not.
Everyone is busy with gallantry and doing nothing--doing it only as
the Spaniard can who, thanks to temperament, climate, and training
knows that peerless art and follows it with pleasure, not with the air
of one who prefers or pretends to prefer to be working.
 The Sevillian is in many things, above all in his amusements, a
full-grown child. Groups of portly business men, Seville's very
captains of industry, sit hour by hour watching the unrolling of just
such films, as are shown in our "nickelodeons," shouting with glee
and clapping each other on the shoulder when a man on the screen
falls off a chair or a baker's boy deluges a passerby with flour. No
less hilarious are the priests, shaking their fat sides with merriment
at the pictured discomfiture of one of their guild in eager pursuit of
some frail beauty. As interested as the rest are the policemen--and
as little engaged in the fulfillment of their duties, whatever those
may be. A poor species, a distressingly unattractive breed are these
city policemen of Spain, in their uniform closely resembling
checkerboard pajamas, lacking even the Hibernian dignity of size,
stoop-shouldered and sunken-chested with lounging on their spines
and the inordinate sucking of cigarette smoke into their lungs. Of the
self-respect and pride of office characteristic of the national guardia
civil they have none whatever. I recall no evening in the Plaza San
Fernando that at least one pair of these wind-broken, emasculate
caricatures of manhood did not fall to quarreling, dancing in rage
and shrieking mutual curses in their smoke-ruined voices, while the
throng dogged them on.
Families gather early in the plaza. There ensues a moment or
two of idle thrumming--for father or brother is certain to bring his
guitar--then out bursts the sharp, luring fandango; the little girls in
snowy white squirm a moment on their seats, spring suddenly out
upon the gravel, and fall to dancing to the click of their castanets as
rhythmically as any professionals. They do not dance to "show off,"
they are indeed rarely conscious of attracting attention; they dance
because the fire in them compels, because they wish to--and what
the Andalusian wishes to do he does then and there, gloriously
indifferent to whoever may be looking on. Let him who can imagine
an American bringing his guitar to the public square of a large city
and, surrounded by thousands, play serenely on into the depths of
the night.
 A Sevillian street

The Andalusian is one of the most truly musical beings on earth,

in the sense that his music expresses his real emotions. Song is
almost his natural mode of expression, always spontaneous, with
none of the stiffness of learned music. He has no prelude, follows no
conscious rules, displays none of that preliminary affectation and
patent evidence of technic that so frequently makes our northern
music stilted and unenchanting. He plunges headlong into his song,
anywhere, at any time, as a countryman unsullied by pedantry
enters into conversation.
 The Plaza, San Fernando. "A'ua! A'ua
fresca! Quién quiere beber?"

Thus wanes the night in the Plaza San Fernando, marked by the
boom of the Giralda's bells, the bawling of vendors of lottery-tickets,
of titbits, of matches, of azucarillos, of naranjeros crying their
oranges, of boys carrying miniature roulette-wheels with a cone of
sherbet as prize, that the little children may be taught to gamble
early in life; and sharply above all else and most incessantly the
alpargata-shod water-seller, with his vessel like a powder-can slung
across one shoulder, his glasses clinking musically, crying, crying
always in his voluptuous, slovenly dialect:
"A'ua! A'ua fresca! A'ua fresca como la nieve! Quién quiere
beber?"
We have street calls in the United States, but he whose ear is
daily assaulted therewith would have difficulty in imagining how
musical these may be when filled, like the thrum of the guitar, the
street ballad, the "carol of the lusty muleteer," and the wail of the
railway announcer, with the inner soul of Andalusia.
There is to-day very little left of the national costume of Spain.
One may except the stiff, square-cut sombrero, the alpargata of
workman and beggar, the garb of the arriero, fitting and suiting him
as if it had grown on him, the blanket which the peasant wears
thrown over one shoulder, not because he realizes what a charm this
adds to his appearance, but because he often sleeps out of doors or
on the stone floor of public stables. Last, and least to be forgotten,
is the mantilla. Except for it the women of Spain have succumbed to
the ugly creations of Paris; may that day be centuries distant when
the abomination masquerading under the name of woman's hat
makes its way into the peninsula. Yet there is never among Spanish
women that gaudy affectation of style so frequent elsewhere. Give
her the merest strip of gay calico and the española will make it truly
ornamental; with a red flower to wear over one temple and a
mantilla draped across the back of her head she is more pleasingly
adorned than the best that Paris can offer.
There is something unfailingly coquettish about the mantilla. It
sets best, perhaps, with a touch of Arab blood; and in the Plaza San
Fernando this is seldom lacking. Everywhere are morisco faces
framed in the black mantilla and, as if in further reminder of
Mohammedan days, there still remains the instinctive habit of
holding a corner of the shawl across the chin. Thus accoutered only
the Castilian "ojear" can in any sense express the power given the
andaluza by her Oriental ancestry to do or say so much with a
glance of her black eye. With the fan, too, she is an adept. The
Japanese geisha is in comparison a bungler. The woman of Spain
has her fan in such fine training that it will carry on extended
conversations for her without a word from her lips, as Spanish
peasants can talk from two hilltops miles apart by the mere motions
of their arms.
But who of all the misinformers of humanity first set afoot the
rumor that the sevillana is beautiful? "Salada" she is, brimming over
with that "salt" for which she is so justly renowned; chic, too, at
times, with her tiny feet and hands and graceful carriage; and
always voluptuous. But one might wander long in the music-livened
Plaza San Fernando without espying a woman to whom could be
granted the unqualified adjective beautiful. On the other hand it is
rare that one meets a sevillana, unless she be deeply marked by the
finger of time, who is ugly; never, if my search was thorough, one
scrawny or angular. In Spain is never that blending and mixture of all
types as in our land of boundless migration; hence one may
generalize. Salada, graceful, full of languor, above all wholly free
from pose, is the sevillana in her mantilla. Of education in the
bookish sense she has little, of the striving after "culture" to the
divorce of common sense none whatever. She may--and probably
does--know nothing of the sciences, or the wrinkle-browed joys of
the afternoon club. But she is brimming with health and sound good
sense, above all she is incontestably charming; and is not this after
all--whisper it not in New England--the chief duty of her sex?
The Andalusian is primarily an out-door people; not merely in
the plain and physical sense, but in life and character. He lives his
life openly, frankly, setting his face in no mask of Puritanical
pretension when he sallies forth into the world, being himself
always, in public or in private. All in all among the sincerest, he is
also the most abstemious and healthiest of peoples; not yet spoiled
by luxury. His existence is reduced to simplicity; more exactly he has
never lost touch with eternal nature. He takes time to live and never
admits the philosophy that he must work before resting, but hinges
his conduct on the creed that he must live first, and do whatever of
work there is time left to do. In no sense is he lazy; rather in his
sound sanity he has a real appreciation of the value of life. To-day is
the great day to him. Live now is his motto, not put off living until he
has earned enough to live, only to find it too late to begin. One
would seek through Seville in vain for that strained, devil-chased air
so stamped on our own national physiognomy. Whatever his
vocation, or the hour of the day, the Spaniard has always time to
choose the shady side of the street, time to halt and talk with his
friends. As I watched him night by night in the Plaza San Fernando--
and this is largely typical of all Spain--there came the reflection that
the lands of continual striving, the lands where "culture" demands
the repression of every natural emotion and enthusiasm, are dreary
realms, indeed, compared with the Living Latin South. Here is not
merely animation, but life, real life everywhere, no mere feigned
living.
On my second Sunday in Seville I attended my second bullfight.
The first I had seen from the depths of the sombra, believing the
assertion that none but a man with Arabic blood in his veins could
endure the unshaded side of the arena. But my fear of sun-stroke
had melted away; moreover, the sun-side gate keeper is most easily
satisfied. I bought a ticket at a corner of las Sierpes and entered the
plaza as soon as the doors were opened.
Not a half-dozen had preceded me when I took a place on the
stone bank directly behind the red tablas. On my heels appeared a
rabble of ragged, joyful fellows, who quickly demonstrated that I had
not, as I supposed, chosen the foremost seat, by coming to roost
along the top of the barrier in front of me. One shudders to reflect
what would befall individuals in an American baseball crowd who
should conduct themselves as did these habitués of the Sevillian sol.
But to the mercurial andaluz, accustomed always and anywhere to
give his idiosyncrasies and enthusiasms full play, the wildest antics
seem quite in place.
If, as many reputed authorities will have us believe, the
Spaniard's love for "toros" is dying out, what must it have been
before the dissolution began? At any rate it has not yet sunk to that
point where the vast plaza of Seville will hold all who would come,
even to these novilladas in which the bulls are young and the
fighters not yet more famous than a member of the cortes. From a
dozen entries the spectators poured into the enclosure; in the
blazing semicircle bronzed peasants and workmen with wine-swollen
botas, across the shimmering sand richly attired señoritas in the
white mantilla of festival, attended by middle-aged duenas and, at
respectful distance, by caballeros of effeminate deportment. The
española is as ardent a lover of bulls as the men. One must not,
however, jump to the conclusion that she is cruel and inhuman. On
the contrary she is in many things exceedingly tender-hearted. Habit
and the accustomed way of thinking make vast differences, and the
fact that Spain was for seven hundred years in continual warfare
may account for a certain callousness to physical suffering.
The Spanish plaza de toros is the nearest modern prototype of
the Roman Coliseum; when it is filled one may easily form a mental
picture of the scene at a gladiatorial combat. By four-thirty the voice
of the circular multitude was like the rumble of some distant
Niagara. Howling vendors of thirst-quenching fruits climbed over our
blistering knees; between the barriers circulated hawkers of
everything that may be sold to the festive-humored. Spain may be
tardy in all else, but her bullfights begin sharply on time. At the first
stroke of five from the Giralda a bugle sounded, the barrier gates
swung open, and the game was on.
It would be not merely presumptuous, which is criminal, but
trite, which is worse, to attempt at this late day to picture a scene
that has been described a hundred times in every civilized tongue
and in all the gamut of styles from Byronic verse to commercial-
traveler's prose. But whereas every bullfight is the same in its
general features, no two were ever alike in the unexpected incidents
that make the sport of perennial interest to the aficionados. An
"aficionado," be it noted in passing, is a "fan," a being quite like our
own "rooter" except that, his infirmity being all but universal, he is
not looked down upon with such pity by his fellow-countrymen.
Seville is the acknowledged headquarters of the taurine art. In
our modern days of migratory mixture of races and carelessness of
social lines, toreros have arisen from all classes and in all provinces--
nay, even in foreign lands. One of Spain's famous matadores is a
Parisian, and one even more renowned bears the nickname of the
"Mexican Millionaire." But the majority of bullfighters are still sons of
peasants and small landholders of Andalusia in general and the
vicinity of Seville in particular. The torero touring "the provinces" is
as fond of announcing himself a sevillano as are our strolling players
of claiming "New Yawk" as home. Nowadays, too, the bulls are bred
in all parts of Spain and by various classes of persons. But the
ganaderías of Andalusia still supply most of the animals that die in
the plazas of Spain, and command the highest prices. Among the
principal raisers is the Duke of Veragua, who boasts himself--and
can, it is said, make good the boast--a lineal descendant of that
Christopher Columbus whose wandering ashes now repose in the
cathedral of Seville. The duke, however, takes second place to one
Eduardo Miúra, whose bulls are so noted for their fury that a
movement has for some time been on foot to demand double fees
for facing animals from his pastures.
The bulls of both my Sundays in Seville were "miúras," and fully
sustained the fame of their ganadero. Each córrida began with the
usual caparisoned parade, the throwing of the key, the fleeing of the
over-cautious alguaciles amid the jeering of the multitude. Is there
another case in history of a national sport conducted by the vested
authorities of government? Perhaps so, in Nero's little matinées in
the toasting of Christians. But here the rules of the game are altered
and to some extent framed by those authorities. Imagine the city
fathers of, let us say Boston, debating with fiery zeal whether a
batter should be allowed to run on the third strike! Then, too, the
mayor or his representative is the umpire, safely so, however, for he
is securely locked in his box high above the rabble and there is never
a losing team to lie in wait for him beyond the club-house.
It is the all but universal custom, I note in skimming through
the impressions of a half-hundred travelers in Spain, to decry
bullfighting in the strongest terms. Nay, almost without exception,
the chroniclers, who appear in most cases to be full-grown, able-
bodied men, relate how a sickness nigh unto death came upon them
at about the time the first bull was getting warmed up to his
business which forced them to flee the scene forever. One must, of
course, believe they are not posing before the gentle reader, but it
comes at times with difficulty. To be sure, the game has little in
common with croquet or dominoes; there are stages of it,
particularly the disemboweling of helpless hacks, that give the
newcomer more than one unpleasant quarter of an hour. Indeed, I
am inclined to think that had I a dictator's power I should abolish
bullfighting to-morrow, or next Monday at least; but so, for that
matter, I should auto races and country billboards, Salome dancers
and politicians, train-boys and ticket speculators. Unfortunately--
At any rate, I came out to this second córrida in Seville and left
it with the hope of seeing several more. Certainly there is no other
"sport" that can more quickly and fully efface from the mind of the
spectator his personal cares and problems; and is not this, after all,
the chief, if not the only raison d'être of professional sport? There is
an intensity in the moment of a matador standing with steeled eye
and bared sword before a bull panting in tired anger, head lowered,
a hush of expectancy in the vast audience, the chulos poised on
tiptoe at a little distance, an equine corpse or two tumbled on the
sand to give the scene reality, compared with which the third man,
third strike in the ninth inning of a 0-0 contest is as exciting as a
game of marbles. It is his hunger for such moments of frenetic
attention that makes the Spaniard a lover of the córrida, not the
sight of blood and the injuries to beast and man, which, in his
intoxication at the game itself, he entirely loses sight of.
The newcomer will long remember his first bull--certainly if, as
in my own case, the first bandarillero slips at the moment of
thrusting his barbed darts and is booted like a soccer football half
across the ring by the snorting animal. Still less shall I forget the
chill that shot through me when, with the fifth bull at the height of
his fury, a gaunt and awkward boy of fifteen sprang suddenly over
the barriers and shook his ragged blouse a dozen times in the
animal's face. As many times he escaped a goring by the closest
margin. The toreros did not for a moment lose their heads. Calmly
and dexterously they maneuvered until one of them drew the bull
off, when another caught the intruder by the arm and marched him
across the ring to the shade of the mayor's box. There the youth,
who had taken this means of gaining an audience, lifted up a
mournful voice and asked for food, asserting that he was starving--a
statement that seemed by no means improbable. The response was
thumbs down. But he gained his point, in a way, for he was given a
fortnight in prison. Incidents of the sort had grown so frequent of
late in the plaza of Seville as to make necessary a new law,
promulgated in large letters on that day's programme. Printed
words, in all probability, meant nothing to this neglected son of
Seville. Such occurrences are not always due to the same motive.
The impulsive andaluz is frequently not satisfied with being a mere
spectator at the national game. A score of times the tattered
aficionados about me pounced upon one of their fellows and
dragged him down just as he was on the point of bounding into the
ring. Indeed, as at any spectacle the world over, the audience was
as well worth attention as the performance itself. On the blistering
stone terraces of an Andalusian sol animation and comedy are never
lacking. In his excitement at a clever thrust the Sevillian often sees
fit to fall--quite literally--on the neck of a total stranger; friends and
foes alike embrace each other and dance about on the feet,
shoulders, or heads of their uncomplaining neighbors. There is a
striking similarity between the bantering of a famous torero by the
aficionados and the "joshing" of a favorite pitcher in an American
ball park, but the good day has yet to come when the recorder of a
home-run will be showered in his circuit of the bleachers with hats
and wine-skins, handfuls of copper coins, and tropical deluges of
cigars. Nor does the most inexcusable fumble call forth such a storm
of derision as descends upon a cowardly bull. The jibes have in them
often more of wit than vulgarity, as when an aficionado rises in his
place and solemnly offers the animal his seat in the shade. The
height of all insults is to call him a cow. Through it all, the leather
wine-bottles pass constantly from hand to hand. A dozen of these I
had thrust upon me during the fight, and tasted good wine each
time. The proceeding is so antiseptic as to warm the heart of the
most raving germ-theorist, for the bota is fitted with a tiny spout out
of which the drinker, holding the receptacle high above his head, lets
the wine trickle down his throat. The skins so swollen when the
córrida begins are limp and flaccid when it ends.
It seems the custom of travelers to charge that the apparent
bravery of the bullfighter is mere pseudo-courage. Of all the
detractors, however, not one records having strolled even once
across the arena while the fight was on. In truth, the torero's calling
is distinctly dangerous. The meanest bull that enters a Spanish ring,
one for whom the spectators would demand "banderillas de fuego"--
explosives,--is a more fearful brute than the king of a Texas ranch.
Their horns are long, spreading and needle-pointed; the empresa
that dared turn into the ring a bull with the merest tip of a horn
blunted or broken would be jeered into oblivion. Not a year passes
that scores of toreros are not sent to the hospital.
The Spanish espada is almost invariably "game" to the last. The
sixth bull of this Sunday's tournament was, as often happens, the
most ferocious. He killed six horses, wounded two picadores, tossed
a chulo as high as a one-story house and, at the first pass of
Vasquez, the matador, knocked him down and gored him in the
neck. A coward, one fancies, would have lost no time in
withdrawing. Vasquez, on the contrary, crawled to his feet and
swung half round the circle that all might see he was unafraid,
though blood was streaming down his bespangled breast. The
alguaciles between the barriers commanded him to retire, but it was
to be noted that not one of them showed the least hint of entering
the ring to enforce the order. The diestro advanced upon the defiant
brute, unfurled his red muleta, poised his sword--and swooned flat
on the sand. The bull walked slowly to him, sniffed at his motionless
form, and with an expression almost human of disdain, turned and
trotted away.
"Palmas al toro!" bawled a boisterous fellow at my elbow, and
the vast circle burst out in a thunder of hand-clapping and cries of
"Bravo, toro!" while the wounded espada still lay senseless in the
center of the ring.
He was carried off by his cuadrilla, and the sobresaliente, which
is to say the "jumper-over," or substitute, marched as boldly into the
ring as if accidents were unknown. Once begun a córrida knows no
intermission, even though a man is killed. The newcomer took
steady aim and drove the three-foot sword to the very hilt between
the heaving shoulders; then nonchalantly turned his back and
strolled away. The bull did not fall, but wabbled off into the shade to
lean up against the tablas as if he had suddenly grown disillusioned
and disgusted with life, and the spectators, no longer to be
restrained, swarmed head-long into the arena. I pushed toward the
animal with the rest and just as I paused a few feet from him he
dropped suddenly dead, his blood-smeared horns rattling down
along the barrier.
On rare occasions the matador, disobeying the unwritten law
that the animal must be despatched by a thrust down through the
body, places the point of his sword just behind the horns and with
the slightest of thrusts kills the bull so suddenly that his fall sounds
like the thump of a barrel dropped from a height. Then does the
spectator, the unseasoned at least, experience an indefinable
depression as if this striking of a great brute dead by a mere prick in
the back of the neck were a warning of how frail after all is the hold
of the most robust on life.
 As we poured out of the plaza, I halted in the long curving
chamber beneath the tribunes. Twenty-two horses, gaunt, mutilated
things, lay tumbled pellmell together in a vast heap. Brawny men in
sleeveless shirts were pawing them over. Whenever they brought to
light a mane or tail they slashed off the hair and stuffed it into
sacks; when they dragged forth a hoof the shoe was quickly added
to the heap of old iron in a corner. The bulls were treated with far
more deference. Each lay in his own space, and the group gathered
about him wore the respectful mien of soldiers viewing the last
remains of some formidable fallen enemy. On my heels arrived the
jingling mules with the last victim. Two butchers skinned, quartered,
and loaded this into a wagon from the central markets in exactly
eleven minutes, the vehicle rattled away, and the week's córrida was
over.
The Spanish torero is all but idolized by the rank and file, being
in this respect vastly above our professional ball players. There is
little society except the purely bluestocking to which he has not the
entrée; wherever and whenever he appears he is sure to be
surrounded or followed by admiring crowds. The famous, the
Bombita family, for example, which has given four renowned
matadores to the ring--and one to each of my Sevillian córridas--
Machaquito of Córdoba, and a half-dozen others of highest rank are
distinctly more popular and honored than the king. Nor is this
popularity, however clouded by a bad thrust, transient or fleeting.
Pepete, who departed this life with exceeding suddenness back in
the sixties because a bull bounded after him over the tablas and
nailed him to the inner barrier, is to this day almost a national hero.
 Of course every red-blooded Spanish boy dreams of becoming a
bullfighter and would not think of being unfamiliar with the features,
history, peculiarities, and batting av--I mean number of cogidas or
wounds of the principal fighters. Rare the boy who does not carry
about his person a pack of portraits of matadores such as are given
away with cigarettes. On the playground no other game at all rivals
"torero" in popularity. There is something distinctly redolent of the
baseball diamond in the dialogues one is sure to hear several times
on the way home after a córrida. A boy whom fate or the despotism
of the family woodpile has deprived of the joys of the afternoon,
greets his inhuman father outside the gates with a shout of, "Hóla!
Papa! Qué tal los toros?--How goes it with the bulls--what is the
score?" To which father, anxious now to regain his popularity,
answers jovially, "Bueno, chiquillo! Tres cogidas y dos al hospital.--
Fine, son! Three wounded and two in the hospital."
Having thus trod the very boards of the last act of "Carmen"
and passed a splendid setting for the third in my tramp through the
Sierra de Ronda, I decided to celebrate the otherwise unglorious
Fourth by visiting the scene of the third. The great government
Fábrica de Tabacos of Seville is one of the most massive buildings in
Spain, and furnishes well-nigh half the cigarettes and cigars smoked
in Andalusia. I passed through the outer offices and crossed the vast
patio without interference. When I attempted to enter the factory
itself, however, an official barred the way. I asked why permission
was denied and with a wink he answered:
"Sh! Hace calor. It is hot, and las cigarreras are not dressed to
receive visitors. Come in the autumn and I shall make it a pleasure
to show you through the fabrica."
 "But surely," I protested, "there are men among the employees
who have admittance to the workrooms even in summer?"
"Claro, hombre!" he replied, with another wink. "But that is one
of the privileges of our trade."
I strolled out around the building. Back of it, sure enough, was
a cavalry barracks, and any one of a score of young troopers sitting
astride chairs in the shade of the building might have passed for Don
José. Some of them were singing, too, in good clear voices; though
rather a sort of dreamy malagüeño than the vivacious music of Bizet.
But, alas! With Don Josés and to spare, when the factory gates
opened and the thousands of cigarreras so famed in song and
impropriety poured forth, not one was there who could by any
stretch of the imagination be cast for Carmencita. Sevillanas there
were of every age, from three-foot childhood upward; disheveled
gypsy girls from Triana across the river; fat, dumpy majas; hobbling
old witches; slatterns with an infant tucked under one arm; crippled
martyrs of modern invention; hollow-chested victims of tobacco
fumes; painted sinvergüenzas; above all, hundreds of hale, honest
women who looked as if they worked to help support their families
and lived life seriously and not wantonly. But not a face or even a
form that could have seduced any young recruit to betray his trust
and ruin his career. Fiction, frequently, is more picturesque than fact-
-and far less pleasing in its morality.

CHAPTER VI
TRAMPING NORTHWARD
To the man who will travel cheaply, interlarding his walking trips with
such journeys by train as may be necessary to cover the peninsula in
one summer, Spain offers the advantages of the "billete kilométrico."
The kilometer ticket is sold in all classes and for almost any distance,
and is valid on all but a few branch lines. One applies at a ticket
agency, leaves a small photograph of one's self, and comes back a
couple of days later to receive a sort of 16mo mileage-book
containing legal information sufficient to furnish reading matter for
spare moments for a week to come and adorned with the interesting
likeness already noted.
I made such application during my second week in Seville, and
received for my pains a book good for two thousand kilometers
(1280 miles) of third-class travel during the ensuing three months.
The cost thereof--besides the infelicity of sitting to a photographer in
a sadly mosquito-bitten condition--covering transportation,
government tax on the same, printing and the tax therefor, the
photograph and the tax for that privilege, and the government
stamp attesting that the government was satisfied it could tax no
more, footed up to seventy-five pesetas, or concisely, thirteen dollars
and thirty cents.
But--if there is anything in official Spain that has not a "but"
attached it should be preserved in a museum--but, I say, the
kilometer-coupons are printed in fives rather than in ones, and
however small the fraction of distance overlapping, it costs five
kilometers of ticket. Moreover--there is usually also a "moreover"
following the "but" clause in Spanish ordinances--moreover, there
are hardly two cities in Spain the railway distance between which
does not terminate in the figures one or six. It does not seem
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