Clear (Storm's Soldiers MC Book 3) (6 page)

“Not literal trouble. But I could use you as an escort.”

“Escort to where?”

“Ummm, a white supremacist rally?”

“What?!”

“I know
someone
who’s going to be there.”

“I…oh, really?”

“Yeah.”

“That bitch ass motherfucker.”

“Maybe.”

I gave him the time and details. He agreed to meet in the park. This would only be the second time he was seeing Vaughn, but if it was destined to be the last, then I wanted Darryl to be around to help me see things straight.

I finished getting ready and paused in the foyer, checking to see if I’d forgotten anything. After all, this was my first white nationalist rally - I couldn’t be too prepared. Nope, I was dressed proper. I had my brother and my friend on their way for company. I had a commitment to see things clearly.

Good to go.

The drive downtown stretched out forever. Finding parking was rough. Was this rally really that big? Then I remembered it was also just a nice Saturday morning.

I texted with Darryl and Faith as I crossed Centennial Park. The place was vast and kind of desolate in the winter, but today it blossomed with life. The line to the Coca Cola museum in the middle was bustling.

Everywhere I looked I saw people of all colors smiling and bustling and sometimes yelling at each other. Even the sidewalk water fountains were on. Little kids in puffy jackets walked up as close as they dared, squealing and running off once they got their first touch of ice chill water.

I wanted to just sit on one of the stone benches around the fountains and watch them, they were so damn cute. But on the green further away, I could see a raised platform facing the center street. I could see police barriers and cars forming a line. A row of gleaming black and silver bikes leaned in on each other out on the road. A crowd swarmed around the stage.

I drew towards it. Someone came running my way, but it took me a second to even notice that it was Aubrey.

“Meagan!” she yelled, wrapping around me.

“What’s got you so excited?” I asked.

“This rally,” she said, her blond little head just bouncing with excitement. “It’s so fucking messed up!”

Psychologists did love messed up brains more than normal ones. Still, I squeezed her hand. I was happy to have her. We walked towards the podium and crowd. They’d set up not far off from the CNN building. Good planning, I had to admit.

I couldn’t see who was on stage as we came up the back, but speakers were booming someone’s muffled voice. I could barely make out words in his mumble. Hitler, this guy was not. As we came around the back board, I saw the crowd. A sizable throng of mixed faces swelled in the back. They were barred off by metal partitions interspersed with a few uniformed officers who had their back to the stage.

Behind that, was a line of bikers. There were about two dozen of them and they were just as I had imagined: shaved, wearing mirrored shades and faces wrinkled with rage. They all had on that same jacket with the logo that Vaughn wore.

These were his brothers. I didn’t see him, but I didn’t look too hard.

Past the bikers was a much smaller crowd, but these were silent white faces, all turned up at an old man speaking on stage. He had on a tweed jacket, khakis and glasses, but I saw the resemblance immediately. This was Vaughn’s dad. A few other white people sat on chairs further back on the dais.

I returned to the biker line for the sight I most feared. Before I could find it, I was tackled by another hug.

“Hey, girl,” Darryl’s voice poured over. “Thanks so much for the invite.”

He peeled off and I looked up at this earnest hard-edged face. It wore a smile. “Thanks for coming,” I said. “I really appreciate it.”

“Oh, no, this is great,” he said. “Best comedy show I’ve been to in years. They just got a new fan.”

Aubrey jutted her hand in between us. “Hey,” she said. “I’m Aubrey, Meagan’s friend from school.”

“Pleasure,” Darryl said, giving a firm shake before turning back to the stage.

Aubrey’s saucer eyes were still on him though. I’d seen that look before.

“He’s not into white girls,” I whispered into her ear.

“I see,” she said. “That’s just gonna make this more fun.”

I rolled my eyes. This was turning into quite the day for introductions.

The speakers rattled with applause somewhere behind us. The crowd started to boo and I came back to what I was doing here. I looked at the Vaughn’s father on stage. He seemed calm against the rage aimed at him

“White brothers and sisters,” he said. “These words may be hard to hear. Places like this fortress of lies behind me and other news stations have buried the truth for decades. They have tried to make you forget the beauty of what we can be. Look around you and ask who forged this glorious city.”

“Slaves, you prick!” someone yelled at him. It wasn’t exactly true. Atlanta had burned as part of the Civil War, but the crowd started to cheer.

“Oh shit,” Darryl said. I could almost hear him tense up.

“You see him?”

I got on my tiptoes and followed his gaze, but it wasn’t anywhere near the barricade line. My heart stopped. It was Rico. He was dressed in green scrubs, and was watching the stage, but somehow he must have sensed me, because he turned and smiled.

“Oh, I see him.” Darryl started plunging through the crowd like the tip of a sword.

“Darryl, no.” I wrapped my arms around one his massive ones and dug my heels to the dirt. It was enough to catch his attention. Darryl growled over his shoulder.

“I ain’t gonna hit him, but I’ve got words.”

“Forget it. Leave him. He’s not bothering me anymore. Just let it be.”

“The past’s injustices do not warrant the present impurification of our nation,” Vaughn’s father went on. “We must restore our glory. We can restore our glory by coming together as a white race. A white family, once more.”

I crinkled my eyes at the stage. Vaughn’s father’s face didn’t scream glory or revolution, but whispered sadness. The truth dawned in my head. This guy was a fan of history, but not the country’s. He was talking about his own. The white family was the one he’d lost when his wife had been murdered.

Suddenly he wasn’t a professor of hate, but a grieving old man on stage, unable to leave the moment his life had been fractured. Were all his followers in the crowd stuck in their own minor tragedies? I’d been there. I’d found my way out. These people hadn’t.

Aubrey was scribbling notes frantically into her tablet. She might see something more, but it was enough for me.

“Hey, that your boy there?” Darryl asked.

I followed his outstretched arm and saw his finger squashing Vaughn’s lean rugged face out at the furthest end of the biker line. He wasn’t facing out at the crowd, but staring down, not quite at the grass. His brow lay wrinkled and I knew he was seeing something in his own mind.

His mother? Me? The truth of his father’s words? Or the sadness of them?

I couldn’t feel any hate or even irritation seeing him standing in line. I simply felt nothing. Maybe it was for the best.

He looked up, suddenly curious. He scanned the crowd one way, then the other way, searching.

And then, his eyes were on me. His brow cleared and we were just facing each other, as we had done so many times before.

His glare cleared up, his eyes crinkled and he turned away. I didn’t.

He wanted to hide, but that wasn’t how this worked.

Today, I could see everything.

CHAPTER SIX

Vaughn

I’d spent half the night worrying about her gaze meeting mine here. I had imagined her eyes bubble with grief. Or maybe burn with anger. I’d even pictured her just turning and walking off into the crowd - the last glance I ever got of her.

I hadn’t imagined this.

Her eyes lay fixed on me, unmoving. It was a constant force, weighing down like gravity. She hadn’t come for the rally, she had come for me. She was here to see me act, like I were an animal at the zoo.

I sure felt caged. At least a tiger could prowl and deliberate. I could only stand and sweat.

The speakers droned on above me. Pop had turned it over to a woman, someone to soften the image of his group. She was too soft though. No one could hear. The silent line of Soldiers held more power than her speech.

I forced myself to look back up, somewhere far away from Meagan. Rally days had always been long and boring, but I’d found fury in the crowd to fuel myself through them. Most people showed up to these things to get them shut down. I might not want to speak, but I damn well was going to make sure Pop said what he wanted to say. Good men had fought and died for that right.

The brown and dark faces out in the crowds had been alien back then. I’d seen the fury and the animal looks on them and been convinced it was at being called to task by folk like my family.

Now each of those faces held a story. Some were weathered and slack-jawed, others were clean-shaved and smooth, cracked only by confusion. Some looked like they’d been beaten to shit as kids. Others, like they’d never gone hungry in their lives. Some looked like lazy pieces of shit while others dressed like class presidents. I flicked from face to face, but possibilities kept pouring out, drowning my intentions. I could find no kindling for rage.

Of course these people were pissed. We come out here to tell em to fuck off? Well, they were bound to echo those same words back. Strange thing was, now that I couldn’t latch onto the really outraged people, I could see that most were just amused. The white folk who were watching, especially so. This might as well be a fucking play.

I could still sense Meagan looking, but she couldn’t read my mind and see how much was happening in here. I thought about mouthing a few words, but Asher was right next to me, growling at people under his breath. Any twitch of motion and he’d notice.

Besides, what was there to say?

Wish I wasn’t here?

I
was
here. And so was she.

I kept scanning far away from her, but I couldn’t hold anyone’s looks. I didn’t know them and I still couldn’t face them. What the hell was I ever going to say to Meagan, even after this was over?

Suddenly I found myself staring at another face I knew: Meagan’s ex.

My insides twisted and ignited like an oil rag. The prick was dressed up like a doctor. He must like how people looked at him in that outfit. It was almost as good as grabbing someone’s hand and keeping them facing you - just another type of manipulation.

I glanced at Meagan and back. She was a good deal away, plus Darryl was there. Her ex couldn’t make a move, must be why his attention was on the podium. Maybe he didn’t even know she was here. It might have nothing to do with hurting her.

Which was, upon reflection, more than could be said for me. I knew damn well the effect my presence had on my girl.

A small chitter of applause rippled through the crowd. It came mostly from the stage but there was a small pool of pale white people in the grass behind me. The drizzle got overrun by a wave of boos. It settled and Pop’s familiar throat-clearing ran through the speakers.

“Now, I’m proud to welcome a very special speaker. A piece of my own family. My son, Calix Black.”

Another rolling wave of cheers and swears. My brother’s speeches usually captured the brimstone and hellfire I’d gotten used to tuning out. Now, I listened.

“I am a Storm’s Soldier,” his voice boomed out. It was the loudest by far and even the audience hushed. “You have heard visions painted out before you of a world filled with purity. My father and his community have spoken of the high ideals that will be the foundation for this new white nation. But you should know that we are not all quiet thinkers and planners. I am a soldier. Every one of my brothers, suited up and standing before you is a soldier. Each is willing to fight to preserve our cause. Each of us is willing to die for it.”

Die for this cause? I wasn’t. None of us were. The Soldiers stood here, arms cross, growling, but this crowd might snuff us out like a wave crashing over sand if it weren’t for the thin line of blue. That’s what people respected, justice and peace, not might and purity.

“I would die for my world,” Calix repeated. “Do you feel as certain about this aberrant society you inhabit?”

My stomach twisted. Suddenly I wasn’t feeling certain about anything. This society had problems. Old white societies had had problems too. Who here could say a new white one wouldn’t? Besides, it wasn’t like I’d much dreamed of one. I’d been along for the ride, but now I could barely handle that.

A white society wouldn’t have the one thing in this world I truly desired.

“I know what I want,” Calix’s voice boomed. “I am here to try and make you see what I see.”

The words startled me. I looked back at my brother. His eyes weren’t even on the crowd. They were lidded, lost in some unseen world full of sunshine and clouds.

It was a fucking fantasy, and a cheap one at that. But it was Calix’s fantasy all the same. It was what he wanted.