a filing cabinet.
The Führer had dozens of Brigands pictures around the house, including a few of Dante’s dad, Scotty. But this one was different, because Dante’s whole family was there. Everything but a few baby photos had been lost when the Führer burned out Dante’s house and now he recognised faces he hadn’t seen for nearly five years.
Dante recalled the day it was taken outside the old clubhouse. It was the Brigands summer barbecue. Scotty stood proudly alongside the man who would kill him a year later, with the Brigands all around him. Wives stood at the edge of the framed picture, while the kids knelt or stood in front of their fathers.
Holly was a few months old, a bald head buried in her mother’s arms. Dante stood beside Joe, best friends. Dante’s older brother Jordan puffed out his cheeks to ruin the picture and his sister Lizzie squatted on one knee with the expression she always had when she didn’t want to be somewhere.
Dante had seen the expression a thousand times, but he’d forgotten it. He felt like he’d betrayed his family by forgetting so much about them.
‘Are you OK, John?’ Anna asked. ‘Did I do something?’
Dante remembered that he was John and quickly smeared out the tear forming in his eye. ‘It’s the beer,’ he said weakly. ‘You’re pressing down on my bladder or something, I need to pee again.’
Anna hopped off and Dante rushed down the hallway to the Führer’s bedroom, where he bolted himself in the en-suite bathroom and fought off his tears.
*
James had been back at the Brigands compound for an hour, downing more warm beer as he helped to unload firewood and bundles of newspaper from one of the coaches to make a huge bonfire in the centre of camp. It wasn’t necessary for warmth, but the various clubs had a friendly rivalry that would turn Outlaw Hill into a series of giant pyres once it got dark.
Less friendly rivalries put menace in the air and as James hauled wood and newspaper he tried to decipher the rumours. The easiest to understand was the Vengeful Bastards wanting revenge after their surprise assault at the service station had ended in defeat. Some said they were planning a second attack. There weren’t enough Vengefuls to confront the Brigands, but they had allies and rumours swirled that several gangs were planning to raid the Brigands compound during the night.
It had also emerged that the London Brigand stabbed in the Flesh Tent had been seriously wounded by a member of a gang called Satan’s Prodigy. The London chapter and some northern Brigands regarded Satan’s Prodigy as enemies, but confusingly South Devon and Cardiff did business with them and wanted the whole thing smoothed over.
Outlaw Hill was a web of shifting alliances and the only conclusion James reached by the time the fire was lit was that it looked set to be a long and violent night. As the flames took hold, James wandered drunkenly through the twilight towards his tent. It was the first time he’d seen Will, Minted and Shampoo Jr since leaving the Flesh Tent more than four hours earlier.
‘Where’d you disappear to?’ Shampoo Jr asked as James lay back on the grass outside his tent and pulled off his trainers.
‘Nowhere,’ James said, as he caught a whiff of his own feet. His hands were black with newsprint and his deodorant had been overpowered inside his motorcycle leathers somewhere before Bristol. ‘I stink like a dog.’
‘This is nothing,’ Minted smiled. ‘You should have been here last year when it was raining. Outlaw Hill was solid mud. Head to toe, covered in filth and we had to walk the bikes through it.’
‘I’m still trying to get to the bottom of our friend’s little adventure,’ Will said. ‘So we saw you come out the Flesh Tent with the chick wearing your T-shirt.’
James shrugged. ‘Yeah, I had to walk to her van so she could get a top and give me my Ramones shirt back.’
‘And that’s it?’ Will said suspiciously. ‘Why were you gone for so long?’
‘Had to get these,’ James explained, as he opened his tent flaps and showed them a newly purchased set of riding gloves. ‘The others were all gashed up where I hit that dude with the chain and the Führer told me to burn ’em.’
‘Really?’ Shampoo Jr said. ‘So how come you’ve got lipstick all over your cheek?’
‘Have I?’ James said, rubbing the cleanest part of his hand against his face.
‘No you haven’t,’ Shampoo