Humming, he watched the three guys Maddie had asked about earlier. “What do you think of Burbank, Darwin, and Triton?”
Looking at him blankly, I gave him as honest an answer as I could. “I don’t.”
“Don’t what? Like them or want them to join?”
“No, I don’t think about them.”
Dropping his head back, he groaned. “Why are you so difficult?”
Shrugging, I took a mouthful of my water. “If you wanted a different answer, you need to learn to be more specific.”
“Fine,” he bit out. “Do you think they should join the club?”
This surprised me. It’d been almost seven years since I’d joined, and Wes and I had become good friends without a doubt, but he had Z and some of the other guys who were the closest to him that he asked questions like this to. That’s not to say it never happened, he just didn’t do it often.
“I don’t see why not.”
Shooting me a glare, he went back to watching them. “Burbank has an ex-wife that he shares custody of his little boy with. His brother was killed while he was deployed, and he comes across as being a bit lost.”
My answer was immediate. “Let him in. The guy needs brothers behind him, and he seems like a nice guy who’d take our backs.”
When he turned so that he was facing me again, I noticed half his mouth was turned up in a smile. He’d gotten what he wanted.
“Next. Darwin’s a scientist who was a child prodigy. His parents homeschooled him and never let him socialize with other kids. Then, when he was at college, they bought a house five minutes away from his dorms so that they could check in on him every day—”
“Where the hell do you find this shit?” I asked incredulously.
Instead of answering, he just tapped his nose. “As I was saying, they’ve smothered him his whole life. A high-profile pharmaceutical company headhunted him after he graduated, but when he found out they up to something illegal, he went to the authorities. His parents were pissed and said he should have just ignored it all and focused on his job.”
“They sound awesome. What kind of parents would say that?”
“According to them, with a brain like his, he was only there to work and earn money. The incident snapped the chains that’d been holding him back, and now he’s out living his life how he wants to.”
“Let him in, too. He needs to learn to kick back and relax, live a little. We can do that and also support him when shit gets hard. Were there any repercussions for what he did?”
Wes was slow to answer, like he was thinking through how much to divulge. “Not yet. But I want you to hold onto the word yet because it might still happen.”
“Then we can take his back if it happens. What about Triton?”
“Total opposite of Darwin. He was a wild teenager who turned into a wild young man once he left school. He fucked up and paid the price, and now he wants to start over and give something back to the world.”
“And he thinks The Broken Eagles can do that for him?”
Raising an eyebrow at the question, he said slowly, “And you don’t?”
“No. I know we can. I just don’t know why he’s so sure we can.”
“Remember that blind girl we helped raise funds for to get a dog six months ago?” When I nodded, he raised his eyebrows at me. “That’s his little sister.”
Damn, that was tough. The girl had been in an accident on her bicycle and hit her head off a tree with no helmet on because she couldn’t afford one.
The doctors had said there was nothing they could do to repair the damage, and she’d had to adjust from being a sixteen-year-old who loved life to one who was relearning how to live life. The dog went a long way to helping her have some independence, seeing as how her parents weren’t that interested in helping out, so we’d worked hard to get one of the best dogs for her.
Tapping my fingers on the table, I watched Triton smile at something Burbank was saying. There was no way you’d know what was going on in his life outside of this moment in time.
“How does he factor into it all, though? He’s got some regrets, and we helped his little sister, so suddenly he wants to do a one-eighty and change? Join the club and help Sage and Jax out with their shit?”
“He did eight months inside for burglary. A week before he got out, he found out his little sister was in hospital in a coma. Yes, she woke up four days later, but he learned just after he got out that she was blind, and he’s been busting his ass to make life as easy as possible for her since.”