My gut twists because that’s how I feel about her silence, too, but Violet’s got too many people in her face hoping and praying she’ll return to normal. Each hour that passes, I’m beginning to realize they want her to act normal so they can start to feel better about what happened. It’s how people are also acting around me.

They smile too big. Pause for too long. Can’t seem to find easy conversation. It’s uncomfortable and it doesn’t help this strange sensation that I’ve had since leaving the hospital. Like the rest of the world is moving in fast-forward and I’m creeping along in slow motion.

Fucking sucks.

Razor turns and raises his arms. Rebecca finally cleared me to start exercising. It’s been driving me insane to do nothing but watch TV. The faster I can get back to football, the faster my life will return to normal.

I pull my arm back, then launch the ball into the air. A perfect spiral with a perfect arc. Razor catches it and I circle my shoulder. Every damn muscle in my body was bruised and due to the inactivity is now stiffer than roadkill.

“Looking good,” Oz says.

It’s not the throwing I’m concerned about. That’s not my job. It’s the running while plowing through a line of guys, all while catching. I hold my hands up and Razor fires it back. Like I asked, he threw it to the side and I jog the few feet. I’m able to easily catch it, holding it close to my chest.

Thanks to muscle memory, my feet automatically cut right as if I’m in a game and need to lose my defender. But I don’t do a full-on sprint. Instead, I throw the ball back to Razor and pause to stretch.

The deep grumbling of multiple motorcycle engines. Cyrus and Eli have been gone since I woke up here after my hospital stay and it pisses me off that nobody’s told me why they left or where they went. The group of six guys pull off to the side of the clubhouse and park. They cut their engines and the yard goes quiet.

After the last guy swings off his bike, the birds chirp again in the thick forest of trees surrounding Cyrus’s property and the clubhouse springs to life as the guys who were hanging out near the bar pile out into the yard. They offer quick hugs and fast pats.

Cyrus glances in my direction. Normally, I’m a patient guy. Would let Cyrus come to me when he’s ready to talk, but I must have left all my patience in that hellhole basement.

Most of the guys head into the clubhouse, but Cyrus stays behind. “Saw you as we drove up. You looked good making the catch.”

Not discussing football. “Where have you been? And don’t tell me on a run for the security business. We both know that would be bullshit.”

Cyrus strokes his long beard and he regards Violet on the porch. “She doing okay?”

No. “Cyrus.”

He settles his dark eyes on me. Cyrus is not only the head of this MC, but the head of this family. He’s a McKinley, Eli’s a McKinley and so am I. I don’t fool myself into thinking I won’t look just like Eli in twenty years and be a carbon copy of the man in front of me at fifty.

“We’ve been in Louisville, talking with the police.”

A muscle in my jaw twitches and Cyrus catches it.

“That’s it? You spent days away talking to the police? You’d think they’d want to talk to me and Violet instead of you.”

His expression darkens. I talked to the police the night we got back to Snowflake, but we haven’t been interviewed since. Pushing back, demanding information, that’s not like me, but I’m not an idiot. They may have met with the police, but they also met with the Riot. “Did you meet with Skull? Are they going to turn Fiend over?”

“We’re letting the police handle this,” Cyrus says.

A nonanswer. Because club business stays within its members and I’m not a member. Even if I was, there are things some members never know. For years, I watched Razor struggle with this, but accepting my place had never been an issue for me, until now.

“I would think letting myself be kidnapped so I could save Stone and then offering myself as a human shield for Violet would be enough to get me in the know.”

Cyrus places his hands on his hips, and right when I’m ready for him to try to deflect the conversation again, he tilts his head to the clubhouse. “Church. Now.”

He walks ahead, I follow. We enter the clubhouse and one by one the board members watch as we pass, then also fall into line. Cyrus’s hand slams on the door to the stairs and he jogs up. First door on the right and I walk into Church.

This room is a sacred place for the club, but it’s not a place of worship. It’s where decisions are made, problems are dissected. It’s a place where whatever is discussed stays. To be in here requires trust from one person to the next.

I’ve been in here before. Snuck in with Oz and Razor when we were kids, but I haven’t been in here in years. Cyrus tore our asses inside out when he caught us playing in here. He taught us then that we needed to respect this club and its ways.

If he couldn’t trust us, he said, how could we trust them? Brotherhood, family...it requires trust.

Place looks the same as it did then. Huge black Reign of Terror banner on the wall with the half skull and fire blazing out of the eyes and fire raining down around it. The long wooden boardroom-style table is in the middle with the chairs gathered around it.

Cyrus takes a seat at the head of the table and the rest of the board members drop into chairs. Razor’s dad, Hook, is in here and so is Oz’s dad, Man O’ War. Besides me, Pigpen is the youngest guy in here and then there’s Eli. Not officially a board member, but he is the most respected man in the club.