RAZOR

Breanna: Apples. Your turn.

I DON’T KNOW why her answer causes my lips to curve up, but it does. It’s eleven at night. She texted to let me know she wasn’t making much progress on the code. I texted back that she should take a break. Now neither of us seems eager to end the conversation. Our texts took a turn toward random and we’ve been sharing favorite foods. Breanna’s moved us on to fruit.

Me: I don’t eat fruit.

Breanna: Liar.

I laugh. Maybe I am.

It’s been a few weeks since Breanna and I made our deal. She’s been working on my code and, with a few glares from me, Kyle Hewitt has gone mute about me and Breanna, which is what I wanted. He’s scared of me, yet with time passing, he’s relaxing. Tonight I step up my game to nail the bastard.

Breanna: Kyle’s paper is due soon.

The rare happy moment dies. Me: First step to getting K out of your life starts tonight.

Breanna: When are we going to shoot the rockets?

Classic Breanna. She switches the subject to school when she stresses out. Her brain operates so fast I’m not sure she’s aware of the defense mechanism. Me: Tomorrow? I know a place where we can shoot them off.

Breanna: Sounds good. I get off work at six. I don’t have a ride so can you pick me up?

My smile grows. Twenty dollars she has no idea what she asked for. Me: Yeah. Wear jeans and boots. It’s going to be a fast ride. I gotta go.

I pocket my cell and chuckle as it vibrates with her frantic responses. I suck down half my beer and consider grabbing another. People surround me. Over a hundred of them, but for a while I lived in a world where there wasn’t chaos, only me and Breanna.

Music pounds from speakers, there is beer on tap and two chicks are on top of the bar I’m leaning against—stripping for anyone who cares. I haven’t looked up once, even when a bra was tossed in my direction. My mind has been focused on Breanna and the meeting that’s about to take place tonight. Plus it doesn’t help that across the room is a picture of my mother.

The clubhouse is packed and it’s not just the mother chapter filling the place. Chapters from as far as California have made the pilgrimage.

It’s the annual remembrance party thrown for the members of the Terror and Terror Gypsies who have died. Some of the people we’re honoring are Eli’s blood brother and Chevy’s father, James, Violet’s father and, because life is cruel, Olivia and my mother.

A new beer with sweat running down the sides slides into view and Pigpen sidles up beside me grinning like a crazy man. “Everyone’s dying to know who you’re texting with. It’s like you’re a twelve-year-old girl chained to that damn cell. Have you started your period yet?”

“Fuck you.”

He punches me in the shoulder. “Seriously, who’s on the other end?”

I drink the beer while maintaining eye contact. He should know better than to ask questions he won’t get answers to. He motions to my cell. “I could hack it and find out.”

Proved he could this afternoon after the two of us hacked into emails of someone who’s been targeting a client. “You won’t.”

He tilts his head in annoyed agreement. A brother wouldn’t disrespect another brother like that. “Is it a girl? If so, tell me you’re being smart and covering up. This club has had enough teenage baby bullshit to last us a lifetime and the last one was born seventeen years ago.”

“I need something,” I say, ignoring his jab at Eli.

“Finally! Name it and it’s yours. That’s what we’ve been waiting for, brother. You to come to us.”

I shift to look at his reflection in the mirror on the wall beyond the bar. He appears too damn happy and that causes a wave of uneasiness.

Pigpen curses. “You’re asking me for something you don’t want the club to know about, aren’t you?”

I promised Breanna I wouldn’t drag the club into this, but if Pigpen agrees, I can solve her problems and keep my promise. I’m hoping he’ll help me as a friend.

He rests both of his elbows on the bar and has that expression that tells me he’s contemplating putting a bullet in my head. “You trust family and we are your family.”

“I’m trusting you,” I say.

“That’s not enough. Two voices can’t do shit, but together, this group, we’re fucking loud.” To prove his point, he shouts, “Reign of Terror.”

The answering roar causes my ears to ring. Pigpen stares at me, unblinking as the mantra is repeated three more times followed by over a hundred men howling into the night.

I sip my beer again. Point taken. When the room returns to normal chaos noise level, I say, “I gave my word I’d do this on the down low, but I need your help.”

I don’t give my word often, Pigpen knows this, and the confusion causes him to scratch his jaw as he surveys me. “What do you need?”

“A virus that will give me a back door. Something that can travel from a cell to a home computer if it’s hooked up. Nothing I’ve found will do the job and I need it to be undetectable.”

Anyone else my age making that type of request would have their parents grounding them for a month. Pigpen goes deep in thought, then nods his head that he has what I need. “I’ll send you the code tomorrow, but next time you have a favor or a problem, it’s time for you to man up and come to the club. I don’t care how many promises you made to other people. You got me?”

“Got it.” Pigpen hugs me and I hug him back. I’d be lost without him.