Chapter 2 The Fight
Lola's POV
Emilio ripped his arm out of my hand before I could stop him and crossed the space between us in two strides. His fist caught Octavio across the mouth hard enough to send the plastic cup flying into the dirt, whiskey splashing down the front of his black suit as he stumbled backward beside the road.
“Emilio!” I shouted, but he was already going after him again.
Max caught the back of his cut and hauled him away before the second punch landed. “Enough.”
“He wants to talk about her like that, he can fucking say it to me.”
Octavio wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, looked at the blood smeared across his skin, and laughed. “You always need some man fighting for you, Dolores?”
I stepped between them before Emilio could get loose again. “No. I needed you to keep your mouth shut for ten minutes at my mother’s funeral.”
“Your mother was my wife.”
“And you treated her like shit.”
Behind him, the flowers covering Mama’s grave were still bright against the fresh dirt. Aunt Rosa stood several yards away, staring at us while half the people who had been walking toward their cars suddenly seemed to have nowhere else to be.
Octavio stepped toward me, and Emilio jerked against Max’s grip. “Take another fucking step.”
Octavio looked past me at him. “You don’t scare me.”
“Then you’re drunker than you look.”
“Emilio, shut up.”
“He’s coming toward you.”
“I can see him.”
“Lola—”
“I said shut up.”
His mouth closed, although the way he stared at Octavio made it pretty clear he wasn’t happy about it.
Octavio dragged his thumb over his split lip and looked me up and down. “You really think these people are your family?”
“They are.”
“They pay you to take your clothes off.”
“The club pays me to work.”
“For men to stare at your tits.”
I held his gaze. “You seemed pretty fucking interested in where my clothes were eight years ago.”
Nobody said a word.
Octavio’s face changed first. “You always did like twisting shit around.”
“My shirt tore itself?”
“You were fighting me.”
“Because you had your hands on me.”
“You cracked my fucking head open.”
“I should’ve hit you twice.”
Leather creaked behind me, but I didn’t turn around. I didn’t have to.
Octavio looked over my shoulder instead. “Been telling your biker boyfriend lies about me?”
“I don’t talk about you.”
That wiped some of the smugness off his face. His eyes shifted past me and settled on Max. “Torres.”
Max released Emilio but stayed close enough to grab him again if he needed to. “You know me?”
Octavio smiled through the blood on his mouth. “I know who runs the Son’s of Doom.”
“A lot of people know my name.”
“I’m not from around here.”
“No. You’re from El Paso.”
Octavio’s smile disappeared.
I looked at Max, but he kept his eyes on Octavio. Before I could ask anything, Octavio scoffed and said, “You think because you wear those patches nobody knows your business?”
“I think you need to leave,” I said.
“I buried my wife today.”
I looked past him at the mound of dirt again. “She was my mother.”
“She knew what you were.”
Emilio moved before I could answer. Max got an arm across his chest and shoved him back.
“Don’t.”
“You heard what he fucking said.”
“Yeah.” Max looked at me instead. “So did she.”
Emilio’s eyes met mine, and I looked away first.
Max didn’t ask what Emilio wanted to do to him. He asked me, “What do you want?”
“I want him gone.”
Max nodded toward the road. “You heard her.”
Octavio laughed under his breath. “This your town now, Torres?”
“Today it’s her mother’s cemetery, and she told you to leave.”
Octavio stared at him for a long second. “You should be careful involving yourself in shit you don’t understand.”
“You threatening me?”
“I’m giving you advice.”
“Keep it.”
Octavio’s gaze dropped to Emilio’s cut and stopped on the Vice President patch. “VP.”
Emilio didn’t answer.
Octavio looked back at me. “Guess you moved up in the world. Used to bust your ass for tips in El Paso. Now you’ve got an MC vice president throwing punches over you.”
“Go home.”
“Maybe I will.”
“Good.”
He leaned toward me just enough for Emilio to swear behind me. “You should ask your president how much he really knows about El Paso before you start thinking these bikers can protect you from everything.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“There’s that mouth.”
“Answer me.”
Instead, he looked over my shoulder at Max. “Tell Torres to stay on his side of the state line.”
Max stepped forward. “My side goes wherever I fucking ride.”
Octavio smiled. “Yeah. I’ve heard that.”
Then he turned and walked away.
I watched him cross the road toward an older black Cadillac parked beneath the trees. When he opened the driver’s door, I caught sight of a man already sitting in the passenger seat. Dark hair. Sunglasses. White shirt. He turned away before I could get a better look, and the Cadillac pulled out a few seconds later.
“Who was that?” I asked.
Max kept watching the road. “No idea.”
“He wasn’t at the funeral.”
“I know.”
Behind me, Emilio rubbed his knuckles against his jeans.
I spun around. “What the fuck were you thinking?”
“He called you a whore.”
“I heard him.”
“Then you know why I hit him.”
“I also told you not to.”
His jaw flexed. “I know.”
“But you did it anyway.”
“Yeah.”
“You don’t get to decide when I need saving.”
“I wasn’t trying to save you.”
“Bullshit.”
“He deserved it.”
“That isn’t the fucking point.”
“Then what is?”
“I said no.”
For once, Emilio had nothing to say.
I turned and headed toward Max’s truck. Natalie caught up with me beside the passenger door and said quietly, “He did deserve it.”
I looked at her. “Not helping.”
“I know.”
“You’re supposed to be reasonable.”
She rested one hand against the side of her stomach. “I’m eight months pregnant. Max ate my last pickle yesterday and I cried in the pantry.”
From behind us, Max said, “You told me you didn’t want it.”
Natalie turned around. “I said it looked gross.”
“That means you didn’t want it.”
“No, it means it looked gross.”
I opened the truck door. “I’m not getting involved in this.”
Natalie climbed in after me while Max stopped beside Emilio and pointed toward his bike. “You’re riding back.”
“I came with you.”
“And now you’re riding back.”
“I can drive Lola.”
“No, you fucking can’t,” I called through the open door.
His eyes came straight to me. “You’re pissed.”
“Congratulations.”
“Twenty minutes in a truck isn’t going to kill you.”
“One of us might end up walking.”
Max opened the driver’s door. “Get on your bike.”
Emilio looked at me for another second before I shut the door in his face.
Nobody talked on the drive home, which suited me just fine.
Marge had food spread across the kitchen counter before I was fully through the door. She started making me a plate and said, “You need to eat.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
“Marge.”
She looked at me, set the plate back down, and pointed toward the stairs. “Fine. Go upstairs and be hateful.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
Natalie followed me anyway. I stopped outside the guest room and looked at her. “Seriously?”
“I’m making sure you don’t climb out a window.”
“I’m on the second floor.”
“That has never stopped you from doing stupid shit.”
I stared at her until the corner of her mouth twitched. “I just need to get out of this dress.”
“Okay.”
She didn’t ask questions or try to hug me. She just turned around and went back downstairs.
I closed the door, fought with the zipper until I could yank the funeral dress over my head, then dropped it beside the bed. Black fabric pooled around my shoes, plain and boring and exactly the kind of thing Mama would have hated. She would have looked me up and down and asked why the hell I bothered wearing black if I wasn’t at least going to put rhinestones on it.
“Fuck.”
I grabbed an old Devil’s Den shirt and a pair of sleep shorts, scrubbed the makeup from my face until my skin felt raw, and climbed into bed.
The second I closed my eyes, I saw the casket.
I rolled onto my side and tried again.
Octavio’s bloody smile.
I opened my eyes, stared at the wall, then shut them one more time.
His hand twisted in my shirt eight years ago. Fabric ripping. My shoulder hitting the wall.
Then Emilio’s fist smashing into his mouth.
“Fuck this.”
I threw the blanket off and checked the clock. Almost two hours had passed, and I hadn’t slept for a minute.
The house was quiet when I went downstairs. I heard a chair scrape before I reached the kitchen and found Emilio sitting alone at the table with a mug in front of him.
Of course he was.
He looked over when I stepped off the last stair. “You going back upstairs?”
“I’m thinking about it.”
“I can leave.”
“You’re already here.”
He pushed the chair across from him out with his foot. I looked at it, then at his hand. His knuckles were swollen, and one was split open.
Idiot.
I sat down.
He slid the mug toward me.
I sniffed it. “Tea?”
“Marge made it.”
“That makes more sense.”
I took a sip. Honey. Of course.
Neither of us said anything for a while. I kept both hands around the mug while Emilio stared at his knuckles.
Finally he said, “I should’ve listened to you.”
I looked up. “That almost sounded like an apology.”
“Don’t ruin it.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“I’m not sorry I hit him.”
“There he is.”
“But I should’ve stopped when you told me to.”
My fingers stayed wrapped around the mug.
Emilio looked at me. “I know the difference.”
“Between what?”
“Wanting to break his fucking jaw and having the right to do it after you told me no.”
I looked down at the tea. “He deserved it.”
“I know.”
“That doesn’t make you right.”
“I know.”
I glanced at him. “You embarrassed me.”
“I know.”
“At her funeral.”
“I know.”
“Aunt Rosa is probably calling every person in El Paso right now telling them I brought a bunch of bikers to Mama’s funeral and one of them beat up her husband beside the grave.”
“He’s your stepfather.”
“Not the part she’ll focus on.”
His mouth twitched. “Still sounds kind of impressive.”
I glared at him.
“Sorry.”
“You’re terrible at apologizing.”
“I don’t get much practice.”
“No shit.”
His mouth moved again, and this time mine almost did too.
I stared into the mug instead. “He used to hit her.”
Emilio went still.
“Not all the time. Sometimes he’d go weeks acting normal. Flowers. Dinner. Expensive shit she didn’t ask for. Then he’d drink.”
He didn’t interrupt.
“She’d cover the bruises with makeup and have an excuse ready before I even asked. Work was bad. He drank too much. She made him mad.”
I set the mug down before I dropped it. “He always had a reason.”
Emilio’s hand closed around the edge of the table.
“And she always fucking believed him.”
“Did he hit you?”
I looked toward the dark window over the sink. “Sometimes.”
That was all I gave him.
His jaw tightened, but he didn’t ask the next question.
Good.
I stood. “I’m done talking about him.”
“Okay.”
No pushing. No asking me to sit back down.
I carried the mug to the sink and had just set it down when Max came out of his office with his phone in one hand.
“You two need to hear this.”
Emilio sat forward. “About Lopez?”
“Yeah.” Max walked into the kitchen. “I made a couple calls after the cemetery. Didn’t like the way he knew my name. Liked it even less when he started talking about state lines.”
I crossed my arms. “And?”
Max looked at me. “Octavio Lopez isn’t just some drunk asshole from El Paso.”
I waited.
“He’s been tied to a gang out there for years.”
