It had been one of his work buddies about a year later who told him he wasn't here legally anymore, that he was just as at-risk as the rest of them, that he would have to go back, then try to gain entrance by himself, something he knew would never happen since he didn't have the skills that his father had to get to the States.
So, he told me that he'd done the risky thing. He'd stayed. And tried to fly under the radar.
I'd told him about my seven siblings, all of us from five different fathers, about my mother's obsession with finding a daddy for all of us which only ever left her with more kids, more responsibilities, more stress. And each of us with less and less attention, supervision, space, and resources.
We'd been the shoes-two-sizes-too-small kind of poor, wondering if we would have enough food to get through the weekends kind of poor, soup kitchens all summer because we didn't have any school lunches kind of poor.
And all I wanted as I worked two jobs all through high school—one on the books, one under the table—was to get enough money to get away from it all.
I'd gotten interested in racing when my high school boyfriend brought me onto the scene. And I'd watched him win several hundreds of dollars for a couple seconds of driving.
For a guy like him, growing up on the very comfortable side of middle class, it hadn't been a big deal. It was just fun money, pot money, beer money.
For a girl like me, I'd seen it as life-changing money. I saw it as a way out.
So when his parents gifted him a new car for getting into college, I'd begged him to let me buy his old one off of him. I'd skipped too many days of school to work extra hours to be able to get him that money.
Once I had it, I'd dumped his three-time-cheating ass, and decided to try to train myself to race.
And that was where Che came in.
"So, you pulled it off?" Huck asked.
"Yeah."
"And then what?" Harmon asked.
"And then... nothing for a while. We were just married. Che was helping me with my car."
"And then?" Huck prompted.
"And then you," I said, looking at him.
"What about me? He would have been working for me for a while then."
"Yeah, but you told him you didn't want him to race anymore, that he had to lay low, keep his nose out of trouble."
"That's true," Huck agreed. "So, what, you just never saw each other again?"
To that, I shrugged. "I got good eventually. And then no one around Miami wanted to race me. So I decided to go on the road, find some other scenes, take them for all they were worth. I've been in and out of the area ever since."
"Alright," Huck said, nodding at me, then turning to look at Che. "So I guess my question now is... why the fuck wouldn't you tell me?"
To that, Che stayed oddly silent.
"I imagine it didn't matter," I said. "And wouldn't have fit your lifestyle. Who wants to hang out with the old, married guy?"
"But if it was just for a green card..."
"No one could know that," I said, rolling my eyes. "That was something only the two of us knew. Anyone else was a liability. Loose lips, and all that."
Even this cynical MC president had to understand. The existence of his club relied upon a certain level of secrecy, flying under the radar, having most normal people not know what you were up to.
The more people who knew, the more that could say something to the wrong person, and send it all toppling down.
"I fucking stressed about your ass getting deported all the time," Huck growled.
Again, Che said nothing.
I didn't understand what was going on with him.
Back when I'd known him, he'd been very talkative, very open. He seemed to be all guards now.
It shouldn't have mattered, but I couldn't help but wonder what life had handed him over the past several years to make him change so much.
Or, maybe, he was just not happy to see me, not happy to owe me anything.
Well, that was just too damn bad, wasn't it?
He didn't have to like it; he just had to do it.
"Anyway," I said, slicing through the tension in the room. I didn't have time for their petty in-fighting. I needed to know if they were going to help me. If not, I needed to get the hell out of the area as soon as possible. "That's the story. I need to talk to Che in private."
Huck's gaze slid to me, assessing.
"About what? Is this personal shit, or shit that could blow back on my club?"
"I need Che's help. I don't need anything from you."
"You need Che from me," he corrected, raking a hand down his face as he let out a sigh. "Alright. I guess I don't really have a choice here, do I? You're his old lady, whether or not you two fuck. So, I have to let him help you. If he can. If it's not too serious. We got enough of our own problems. We don't need some chick dragging us into some huge thing. So go ahead," he said, looking at Che. "Talk to her. But you come talk to me after, before you make any decisions."
To that, Che just gave his boss a tight nod, jerking his head toward the kitchen once again, then turning and going in that direction without me.
My gaze slid automatically to Harmon, the only other woman around, seeing her confusion as well. So maybe it wasn't just how Che was now. It was just how Che was now with regard to me.
With a sigh, I followed him toward the kitchen, finding him making himself a cup of coffee, his back to me.
"Are you going to speak to me, or what?" I snapped. You could say that patience had never been a strong suit of mine. That's probably why fast cars appealed to me so much.
A slow, deep breath made Che's back widen for a second before he released it, turning to face me, mug in hand as he leaned back against the counter.
"You look like hell, Sass," he told me, shaking his head.
"Gee, thanks. How sweet of you to notice. It must be all the stress and heat and exhaustion and hunger," I said, giving him a hard look.
"When's the last time you slept?"
"Aside from the thirty seconds at a red light? I don't know. Two days," I said, shrugging.
"When's the last time you ate?"
"Does a snack bag of Doritos from a gas station count?" I asked.
"No."
"A day, I guess. I don't know. It doesn't matter. Where are you going?" I asked as he put down his cup with a muted clink, making his way toward the back door.
"We're going to go get you something to eat," he said, disappearing out the door, again leaving me with little to do but follow.
"I don't have time to eat right now, Che. I need to talk to you to see if you can help me or not."
"You can talk and eat," he told me, grabbing a helmet off one of the other bikes as he made his way to his own. "Put this on," he demanded, dropping the helmet into my hands as he put his own on. "Ever been on a bike?"
"They're deathtraps."
"Says a woman who once hit one-eighty when I was in the car with her."
"Yes, well, at least if I crashed in my car, they wouldn't need to scrape me off of the blacktop," I grumbled, but put on the helmet.
"You're driving that deathtrap," he said, waving toward the stolen car as he got on his bike, "and you're worried about my bike?"