"Don't you run any options off that formation?" Emo asked. His overdeveloped shoulders and muscular build made him look like a linebacker, but Shane knew he'd once played quarterback at Cerritos Junior College.

"Yeah." Chooch drew another play as he talked. "You can fake to the halfback, coming across like this; or do a naked rollout pass run option. We also have a pitch to the trailing back."

Emo leaned over and looked down at the diagram painted in water on the chipped cedar table. Then he added a play of his own.

"You should tell your coach to put in a Z-Option off the rollout. You throw back to the wingback on the far side." He drew the pass pattern and Chooch looked carefully at the play.

"Countermotion," he said, and Emo Rojas nodded.

Shane thought this was just about perfect. He and his son were making the important, but difficult, transition from parent and child to buddies.

They heard the four Harleys pull in, but nobody paid too much attention. Darren Zook went to the restroom to tap a kidney. Shane went to get another beer from the bar. He had just paid when he heard angry voices coming from the other room.

"Do I look like I give a fuck?" he heard somebody shout.

Shane moved out of the bar and stood in the threshold of the dining room. He saw four scruffy looking bikers leaning over the booth where Emo and Chooch sat. Shane knew at a glance these were outlaws. One-percenters. Chooch was trying to get to his feet, but one of the large thugs had his hand on the boy's shoulder holding him in place. Hard to do because Chooch, at eighteen, had grown into a six-foot-three, 225-pound college football prospect. These four outlaws were patched. When one of them moved, Shane saw the Mongol's colors riding his back like a dangerous insult.