Page 7 of Ridin’ Dirty

“We’re gonna get back to the part where you explain your anti-birthday attitude and this crisis you seem to be having over the big three-oh—still love the haircut, by the way—after I remind you that of course you wanna come to the clubhouse tonight because all your friends are going to be there.”

It didn’t happen on purpose, as in—I didn’t exactly plan to move back to Missoula and link myself to the northern Wild Stallions—but after landing my job, it was kind of inevitable.

Route 66 was neutral ground. Viv insisted upon it. Every paying customer was welcome into her establishment to enjoy the food and atmosphere she worked so hard to cultivate. That said, it was a stone’s throw away from the compound and technically resided in Stallion territory, which meant the men who made up the Missoula chapter of the familiar club were around often. When my co-workers wanted to hang out after hours, that usually meant a trip to the clubhouse.

So, she was right—if something was happening that night at the clubhouse, all my friends would be there.

I pinched my eyebrows together. “Tell me you didn’t plan something.”

She frowned, dropping her shoulders dramatically. “No, I didn’t. Would have if I thought I could get away with it, but this isn’t exactly about you.” Her facial expression morphed into an apologetic smile, and I couldn’t help but to laugh.

“So, are you going to tell me what’s going on or not?”

Maxine opened her mouth to reply just as the bell jingled above the front door. I saw as her eyes shifted to catch a glimpse of our latest guest, then watched as her expression sobered. Her eyes found mine again before she jerked her chin, signaling me to look myself.

I knew before I glanced over my shoulder who I’d find.

Growing up, everyone knew him as Gibbs.

Now, the kutte he wore identified him as Hotshot.

To me, he was always Carmy.

Maxine gave my arm a squeeze, but I didn’t look back at her before I heard her walk away. Route 66 was neutral ground—but that didn’t mean when a Copper King walked through the door everyone was happy about it.

Max, who got along with everybody, wasn’t particularly fond of them. She especially hated it when Carmine showed up, which was saying something. He’d been a chick-magnet since he hit puberty. They didn’t call him Hotshot for nothing. For Maxine to be so utterly repelled by him she couldn’t even appreciate the view spoke volumes.

Not that I could blame her.

He made his way toward me. Slowly. Deliberately. The clunk of his boots against the tiled floor the soundtrack behind his otherwise silent greeting. When he came to a stop in front of me, I had to tilt my head back a little to see his face.

I met his eyes, the blue of his irises the same as mine. His dark, thick, overgrown hair was tussled from his ride, but he swept it away from his face; and, like always, he sported just enough stubble to let the world know he could grow a beard if he wanted to, he just didn’t want to.

Yet, while he looked the same as the last time we spoke, I looked different than I did three or four weeks ago. I could tell he was taking in the new cut. I didn’t flinch when he reached up and flipped his fingers through the ends of my hair.

I chopped a good twelve inches, this style shorter than any I’d tried in all my life. My hair hung a little past my chin, hovering over my shoulders in a super cute bob. I even got bangs. I was still getting used to it myself, but there was a freedom in the weightlessness of it I loved. A freedom I craved.

“Well? Do you like it?” I asked when he continued to stare.

He dropped his hand and offered me a lazy shrug. “Don’t hate it.”

It was all he said before he glanced at the empty booth to my right and took a seat.

I nodded, understanding that was as close to a compliment as I was going to get.

There was a time in our lives when I would have dragged my big brother with me to the salon after I decided to chop off a foot of hair just to have him there for moral support; a time when such a change wouldn’t have been a surprise, but something he listened to me deliberate over for days, maybe even weeks or months; a time when, after it was all said and done, ‘I don’t hate it’ might have sounded more like—'you look great, sis.’

A time before he was inked a Copper King.

Now, he was mostly an asshole.

But he was still my brother, and it was my birthday, and I couldn’t help but hope this drop in wasn’t random.

“Are you eating or⁠—”

“I’ll have a coke,” he interrupted, casting his gaze out the window.

I folded my arms across my chest and stared at him. I hated when he did this. Him, dropping by my job, occupying a booth and ordering a coke was the equivalent of a dog passing by, lifting his leg, and pissing on a tree. It didn’t matter that I was now a thirty-year-old woman. It didn’t matter that I’d fucked more than my fair share of bikers. So long as he and I resided in the same city, he considered it his business who was allowed between my legs.