He nodded. “Yep, the field past the Wilkins’ house in an hour.”
Shit. One hour. That was all the time I had to mentally prepare myself to beat the crap out of some sad son of a bitch.
That’s what I did. Once a week without fail, I fought in amateur fights originally set up by my boys and the Allbrook Gang. Over the years, the fights had become bigger, any guy wanting to make some quick cash entered—even if he had no ties to either gang—and the stakes were higher. There was a lot more money to gain if you won and a lot more money to lose if you got your ass beat.
Ryder had been one of first guys to start fighting, but over the years he had resigned himself to a coaching position and I had taken over as his key player. There weren’t many fights I’d lost—in fact, only three in my entire amateur career. Lately, I was winning all of them. Guys would come from out of town just to fight me, but I handed them their ass on a platter and sent them packing.
For this reason, Ryder loved me. He loved me because, just like Tyson, I followed him without question. With the three of us as a unit, no one dared to try and stand up to us.
See, the thing was, we weren’t just in the Madden gang, we were Maddens. We were the three Madden brothers, and Ryder had been the one to start the gang. No one dared question him. He was the authority around these parts and I was his muscle. With me by his side, everyone gave Ryder the respect he demanded.
“C’mon, little bro, get your bike and let’s get the hell outta here. We don’t wanna be late.”
Tyson was already climbing onto his bike, and I nodded towards the garage that was a few feet away. “You go on. My bike’s in the shop. I’ll get it and follow you.”
Tyson folded his arms across his chest and shook his head. “Not happening, little bro. I’m under strict orders to guard you ‘til we get there.” He unfolded a hand and patted his back pocket as though to reassure me. That was where he kept his gun.
He’d started carrying it around with him everywhere ever since a bunch of the guys from the Allbrook gang had tried to knock me off before a fight. Since then, Ryder made sure that someone was always with me before every fight just in case anyone was stupid enough to try the same thing again.
See, the thing was, a lot of money was spent on bets. Since I was the key fighter and I rarely lost, the competition tried to play dirty and get rid of me before the fight even began. That way, I was a no-show and they won the money without even raising a fist. Amateur fights were a dirty business.
“Fine,” I said with a shrug, “wait here. I’ll be back.”
“Uh-huh,” Tyson said, inclining on the bike as he waited for me.
I walked past him and around the corner to where the garage stood next to some ugly ass warehouse building that was run-down. The garage was where me and my brothers worked during the day fixing up cars and bikes. We had to keep up some sort of façade that we worked respectable jobs. Like that was fooling anyone. Everyone knew who we were and what we really did. The Madden gang was synonymous with drug dealing, amateur fighting, and crime.
On the other side of the ugly ass warehouse building was the community center where I’d just met Estella.
Just the thought of her, sent this strange feeling shooting through me, like I’d just injected myself with adrenaline. I was a fucking moron. In my world, it was ‘bros before hos’. I had to stop thinking about some random girl and start focusing on the fight that was to come.
My bike was parked just outside the shop—a 1999 Suzuki Hayabusa. The Hayabusa was my baby. It was my life. All the money I made from fights had gone into buying it, then restoring it, and now maintaining it. The Hayabusa was my lifeline.
I climbed on and kick started the engine. The bike came to life beneath my hands and despite everything, I smiled. I smiled because this bike was just about the most important thing to me. Apart from Dylan.
There was a helmet hanging off the back of the bike, but I never wore it. Helmets were for pussies and I figured if I died then I died.
I drove around the corner and found Tyson exactly where I’d left him, except his bike was idling now and he was gearing up ready to go. He threw me a sly grin as I came up beside him and I knew what that look meant. He wanted to race.
Throttling the engine, I nodded my head at him and sped off. I could hear him coming up behind me but his bike didn’t sound as smooth as mine. I’d put a lot of love into my Haybusa and I knew she would never lose in a race.
There was a cold chill seeping through my body as the wind whipped past me, frigid and unyielding. I’d forgotten that I’d given my jacket to Estella, and now I was freezing my ass off.
Lesson learned: don’t ever get on a bike unless you have a jacket on, moron.
Tyson easily fell behind and once we were out of the town and heading down the lone, long road to the Wilkins’ farm, I shifted into fourth gear and sped up even more. The usual thirty minutes flew by and we reached the outer lying field within twenty minutes.
By the time I was pulling up beside the other bikes and cars parked along the side of the road, I could hear all the noise coming from somewhere in the field. That’s why the location of the fights changed every week. We weren’t afraid of law enforcement—I think they were more afraid of us—but we still didn’t want to take too many chances.
Tyson pulled up next to me and shot me a glare as he turned off the engine and got off his bike. “Not fair. Wait until I get this all redone. Bigger sprockets on the front, smaller ones on the back, and this baby will be whipping your ass, little bro.”
“Yeah, sure. I’ll believe it when I see it.” I rolled my eyes at him as we headed into the field. Tyson kept going on about his bike, but the conversation wasn’t enough to distract me from what I was about to do.
Have you ever been in a situation where you know what you’re doing isn’t right, but you’re so used to doing it that you don’t know anything else? Yeah, that was me. A big, tough Madden who couldn’t even break away from his shit hole of a life.
I wanted so badly to get away from all this, but we needed the money. That’s the only reason I did what I did, why I followed Ryder blindly, because at the end of the day this was how our family survived—from me beating up some guy to the verge of his life.
Sometimes I made myself sick. That’s why I tried not to think too much about what I was doing. That’s why I drowned my thoughts out with alcohol. But Estella had said something that had hit a nerve. She’d said that I’d chosen this life. If only she knew the reality of it; that I didn’t feel like I had a choice anymore—that I was just going through the motions to survive.
If only she knew that this life had chosen me.
We reached the clearing and found the source of the noise. There were over a hundred people here tonight. Some people had driven their bikes up here, denting the tall grass at various points.
Ryder was standing at the edge of the circle and caught my eye. A huge grin spread across his face, and I was once again reminded of how similar we looked. Tyson had similarities to us, but Ryder and I looked so alike, it was freaky.
Same height, same build, same features, same dark eyes. Fuck, we even had the same eye color—the brown was so dark that they looked black.
“Hey, little bro,” Ryder called out as he headed towards me. He was the one who’d started calling me that; Tyson just followed suit. “How’s my champ doin’? Ready to bust some balls for me?”
I nodded. It felt like there were thick clouds in my brain. I shook my head to clear them away.
Ryder frowned as he stopped in front of me, and shot Tyson an accusatory look. “You okay? Did something happen?”