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brand."
    "Most real warriors understand that their head's worth more than their hairdo."
    "Think of it as a show of respect for the fallen."
    "We've got a couple of funerals of our own tomorrow." Tim bobbed his head, wearing an appropriately thoughtful expression. "I'll tell you what--I'll let you guys do your funeral run without helmets."
    "I want it in writing. I don't want a boatload of bullshit when we pull out of here."
    "I'll get you a municipal permission."
    Bear shot Tim an unveiled look of angry incredulity.
    "Yeah, well, I'll believe it when I see it." Uncle Pete studied Tim, then Bear's quite genuine reaction, and the distrust faded gradually from his face. "Maybe you got some class after all, Trouble. We're not bad guys. We're just tired of all the bullshit. We never get anything but the rules--nothin' like a little raping and pillaging to stir things up."
    Still burned by Tim's concession, Bear said, "Like the hitchhiker you gang-raped through August? And September? And October?"
    "Shit fool, that ain't gang rape. That's training. The boys downstairs are havin' a group splash with Wristwatch Annie. You don't hear her complaining."
    "That's because her mouth's full," Tim said.
    Uncle Pete laughed. "See, there it is. A little humor never hurt no one. Plus, if we gang-raped that broad, where's the charges? Well? Shit, we did her a favor. Opened her up some. Know what I think? I think you citizens are jealous. Drivin' around in your cages, you never get the gurgle in your groin, the wind off your face. And you cops? Shit, you get paid to watch us have fun. I got my slags here all day long. And when I get home, I still knock a few out with my main deed."
    "Christ," Bear said. "Don't you have a TV?"
    Uncle Pete cocked his head, deciding whether to laugh. "We have our own world, we make our own rules, and we live and die by them. Just like you. Except you live and die by other people's rules."
    "And your rules involve pissing on each other's jackets and collecting wing patches for going down on dead women," Bear said. "Where do I sign up?"
    "Yeah, we do that shit now and then, just to freak the citizens. P fuckin' R. Don't underestimate the power of intimidation." Pete ruffled the poodle's topknot. "But we stopped making pledges get fucked by Hound Dog here, though."
    "Well, that's an institutional advance," Tim said.
    "We make the pledges do useful shit now."
    Tim thought of Guerrera's claim that Sinners had to kill someone to join the club and wondered if that was the "useful shit" Uncle Pete was referring to.
    "The name of the game now is class. I got a house on the hill. I only bike on runs and funerals anymore. Got me a blue onyx pearl Lexus coupe with cruise control, Paris rims, ivory interior--hell, it's even got a sat-nav system. Thing practically drives for me. We don't hang up in the small time. Fuck the white-power shit. We're color-blind. All we see is green." He offered Guerrera an accommodating grin. "That's how we cut in on the other outlaw gangs. We're younger and meaner. We don't believe in shit but the backs of our jackets and cold, hard cash."
    "That how you cut in on the Cholos?"
    "The Cholos, shit, they're not a blip on our radar. Those motherfuckers are all show and no go."
    "Chooch Millan, too? I heard he's no show and no go now."
    The poodle came up on all fours, and Uncle Pete scratched his belly until he hunched and phantom-scratched with a hind leg. "We're done now. You want more, you go get that warrant and I call my lawyer and we do the dance."
    Tim walked over and turned off the digital recorder on the bureau. He picked up the Z-shaped piece of metal and approached Uncle Pete. Bear and Guerrera looked tense, unsure. The poodle bared its teeth at Tim, but--standard or not--it was still a poodle.
    "We both know that the weapon used on the prison break and to kill Chooch Millan was an AR-15. We both know that this"--Tim flipped the piece of metal and caught it--"is an illegal drop-in autosear