Otis Read Free Page A

jeopardize.
    Taking the risk to even meet a woman was difficult for me. Meeting a woman would potentially cause me to want to naturally know more about her. Knowing more would require more exposure. More exposure equaled more risk, and the risk grew with everything she learned about me. In time, if I found out she either couldn’t be trusted or she wasn’t what I was looking for, the damage, so to speak, was already done. The life of a 1%er was a difficult one, and many outsiders didn’t understand what they perceived as arrogance or conceit within the ranks of outlaw bikers when in fact it was nothing more than a façade used to preserve what it was we believed in.
    Freedom.
    When I was young, long before I became a Sinner, life was different. In high school, and for several years following my graduation, there was a woman in my life; a woman I loved dearly. She was everything I needed, almost everything I wanted, and we fit each other perfectly. One thing kept me from spending the rest of my life with her.
    My selfishness.
    She wanted a family, and I yearned for freedom. At the time, I perceived children as an annoyance and an obstacle between me and a world which was otherwise free of confinement and restriction. We separated when I was twenty-one years old, and I had spent a lifetime regretting it. Since then, I had been with very few women, but each one I met reminded me of the same thing – just how extraordinary Sam was.
    After having experienced the love she and I shared, attempting to accept someone else as anywhere close to her equal was to admit I had a special procedure for shoving a square peg into a round hole. There would never be a soul on earth to completely fill the hole she left inside of me, and admitting it allowed me to accept a life of solitude as being not only what I needed, but without a doubt what I deserved.
    Living in my self-imposed womanless hell had some benefits. The freedom I once yearned for was now well within my grasp. My life had no restrictions and very few regulations I was required to adhere to. I had the ability to do whatever I wanted, whenever I pleased, without answering to anyone.
    Well, almost anyone.
    As my mother bent down and opened the oven, she turned her head to the side and widened her eyes slightly, “They’re saying on the news the police were threatened by some of the motorcycle clubs, Steve. They threatened those poor officers with retaliation. I don’t like that at all. People are supposed to respect law enforcement officers. For heaven’s sake, your father was a police officer.”
    “Ma, they’re full of shit, no one threatened the cops. If for some reason one of those clubs wanted to do something, they’d just do it, they damned sure wouldn’t announce it or warn the cops. And it’s pretty tough for me to respect some city cop when every time I turn around they’re shooting another unarmed citizen for having a taillight that doesn’t work or for arguing with them about a traffic ticket. Serve and protect . That’s their job. It’s damned sure not what we get from them anymore, is it?” I shrugged.
    “They said they recovered a hundred and fifty weapons, it’s pretty obvious to me those men came with killing on their minds. It makes me nervous having you and your friends out there riding anywhere near those thugs,” she said over her shoulder as she situated the casserole dish on the countertop.
    “They’re not thugs, ma. And it was in Texas. Everyone is armed in Texas. They’re trying to make it sound like it was an all-out war, but it was nothing more than a bar fight and the cops came and shot everyone up. Hell, if you went to Wal-Mart in Texas and rounded up everyone in it and searched them, I’d be willing to bet more than seventy-five percent of them would be armed . I’m tired of talking about it,” I complained.
    She turned to face me and placed her hands on her hips, “Well, it makes me nervous. I don’t want you or any of your