by Colbie Kay
“How am I supposed to hold on if we can’t touch?” She argues.
“I can be touched over clothing.” She breathes deeply a few times then gains the courage to put her hands on my shoulders to straddle my bike. Her arms slowly wrap around my waist. “Hold tighter.” Once she’s situated, I start my Harley and let the vibrating beast take over.
As we’re heading for the highway, I hear Jorga giggling, and it makes me smile. “Wooooo!” She screams in excitement. “This is awesome!”
I laugh, but that ache in my chest becomes a little stronger.
This is Chatty she’s the vice president’s wife. “Chatty, Jorga. Can you keep an eye on her while I talk to Hanger?”
She nods. “Sure, Tink.”
My eyes drop down to Jorga sitting on a barstool and looking awkward as hell as she fidgets with her fingers. Leaning closer, I whisper, “It’s okay. Relax. Chatty’s good people, and she won’t let anything happen to you while I’m busy.”
Her eyes search mine. “I trust you.” She doesn’t even hesitate. Hearing her admit that, has me sucking in my breath.
“Jorga…” Those three words want to fall out of my mouth, but now is definitely not the place or time for me to confess feelings that terrify the fuck outta me.
“Lucas?” Her brows slowly bunch as she waits for me to say something.
Cutting our connection, I slap my hand on the counter. “I’ll be back. Wait here.”
Once Hanger acknowledges my knock, I open the office door he’s been sharing with Snake and take a seat opposite of him.
“I wanted to talk to you before I call our brothers. You haven’t been around much because of Dancer’s roommate, but some shit’s come to light. You know there was talk about us having a rat within our club, one of our own?”
I nod. “Yeah. And I know you thought it was me, and that’s why Gunner interrogated me while I was healing.”
He runs a hand over his face. “I’m sorry we had to do that to you, but we had to know for sure it wasn’t you who talked.”
“I understand.”
His features drop and twist as if he’s in pain. “Drifter has found the rat and we have him chained in the shed outside. We’ve had him in there for a couple of weeks.”
My brow wrinkles as my eyes grow large. “Why are you just now telling me? Who is it?”
He breathes out and sits back in his chair. “I can’t believe I even have to say this. It’s Ghost. I didn’t tell you because I’ve been waiting for our brothers to return from Arizona. I didn’t want to take the chance of you killing him before we were all together to handle it or before I was ready for him to meet Satan himself.”
“Ghost?” I yell a little louder than intended. “He dies today?”
“He dies today,” He states matter of factly. “Apparently, he doesn’t like the way I run my club. I need to know if you are going to be okay sitting in while he’s taken care of.”
“I’ll be fine, but I want my time with him.”
“You got it. One more thing, the brothers and I discussed a while back about patching you and Pretty Boy in, and it was a unanimous vote, but with everything going on it was put on the back burner. Party will be tomorrow night. Depending how Drifter handles what happens today, he’ll be patched in in a few days.”
“Thanks, Hanger. I have Dancer’s roommate with me now.”
“Take her home. I’ll send another prospect to keep an eye on her.”
Standing, I stare down at my president. “I don’t want him in the house with her, and as soon as Ghost is dealt with, I’m gone.”
He studied me for a moment before smirking. “I’ll let him know. Should I let Chatty know we need a property cut?”
I grin. “No.”
“Please don’t leave,” Jorga begs as tears pool in her eyes. My fuckin’ gut rips open at the sight of her crying all because I’m leaving for a few hours. Why is she so upset?
Reaching my hands out, I try and touch her, but I drop my arms to my sides and clench my fists. “I don’t want to leave, but I have business with the club. There’s going to be a prospect right outside, and I promise I’ll be back in a few hours. You’re going to be safe.”
I open the door to step outside. “Lucas!” She screams after me. I close my eyes and breathe in. Maybe this shit between us is going too far?
I keep my back toward her. I can’t bear to look at her right now. “I can’t always be here, Jorga. You’re too dependent on me.” I grimace as the words leave my mouth, and I slam the door shut.
As I’m riding back to the Cobras’ compound, I begin to wonder if my words weren’t true. Are we both relying on each other too much? I don’t know how Jorga feels, but me loving her scares the fuck outta me. Maybe I need to pull away and show her I’m not the person she should crave for company. I shouldn’t have even entertained the thought of having something with her with the life I lead. She’s too good, too innocent.
Parking my bike along the line of others, I meet my brothers at the shed where everyone is gathered. A few of them have only just returned from Arizona, doing a job for Chatty’s cousin Tinsley.
Hanger’s eyes meet mine as I step up to the group, and he begins talking, "For those of you who have been gone, I want to let you know that Drifter has found our rat." Drifter stands proud when we glance his way. He has every right to feel proud when no one else could figure out who the fuck it was. Hanger goes on, "The rat has kept a secret phone and used it to keep in contact with Deuce."
Demon questions, "Do we know for a fact this time?"
Hacker pipes in, "Yeah, I looked into it. Burner phones are untraceable which is why we use them, but Deuce, on the other hand, is a fucking idiot. Either that or he was so comfortable with the fucking traitor working against us that he was using a regular cell."
Hanger makes the announcement I have been longing to hear. "I also sent Hunter to Texas to where we now know Deuce is hiding out. Because Deuce has been using a cell instead of a burner, Hacker was able to backtrace the number on the burner phone, and it tracked right back to Deuce. On top of that, we were able to pinpoint the tower where all of Deuce’s outgoing and incoming calls were pinging from."
"The rat's in there?" Chayser tilts his head in the direction of the shed doors.
Bear explains, "Yes. He's been hanging up the last couple weeks, but we’ve taken him down to eat and drink water, enough to keep him alive until we were all together once again. As a club, we will kill our traitorous brother."
Romeo asks the question they all wanted an answer to, "Who is it? Who’s the rat?"
Hanger opens the door to the shed. "Ghost!" Gasps and murmurs are heard throughout the group. My gaze travels around to all of the shocked and angry expressions of my brothers.
"Why would he turn on us?" Bam Bam probes.
Hanger replies, "Because he didn't approve of the way I've been leading this club."
I stare at Ghost’s bloody and beaten naked body, hanging from chains inside the shed. I shake my head to stay in the here and now. Him hanging there is fuckin’ with my mind. Anger bubbles inside of me as I’m reminded of my time in the freezer. Reminded of every lashing, burn, violation, slice. Reminded of every single goddamn thing that happened to me. I breathe in through my nose out through my mouth. Because of Ghost. All of it was because of Ghost.
Romeo asks, "So, what now?"
"Now, he dies." Hanger's hard stare bores into his for a moment before traveling over the rest of us.
I think I should feel something…guilt, remorse, sorrow, something, but I feel nothing. I’m numb. We all considered him our brother. He was part of this club long before I ever was. But because of him, Gunner was shot and bound to a wheelchair for a while, his legs numb and unusable. Thankfully, he has been getting feeling back in them and is out of the chair. Plus, there was what happened to me… Ghost deserves everything that’s coming to him, and I don’t feel any goddamn way about it.
"Let's do this." Demon bounces on his feet, ready to s
ee a river of red spilling from the betrayer’s body. We all are. He forfeited his right to live, and we will deal with him like we would any traitor. Probably more so since he was one of our brothers. Betrayal from family. That’s the worst kind of betrayal one can have.
As we enter the shed, Hanger stands next to Ghost's hanging body. Hanger grabs the blow torch that's sitting on the wooden workbench. "You wanna be a rat?" Hanger fires up the torch and places the burning flame on Ghost's back, against the tattoo of the Satan’s Sinners emblem. Ghost’s head lifts, and his screams echo throughout the small space. The smell of burning flesh should make me grimace, but it doesn’t. His flesh boils until it's charred black. Hanger doesn’t stop until there’s nothing left of our mark on him.
"Gunner," Hanger calls on our vice president who was gunned down because of Ghost.
Gunner steps up on his crutches and pulls out his gun. He fires as many shots into Ghost's body as he got hit with that day.
"Tink." It’s my turn. Finally, I can get vengeance on someone who caused me to be the way I am today. I pull my blade and begin slashing across his flesh just as they did to me with a leather strap and metal chains. I count out loud, “One…Two…Three…Four…Five…” I keep going until I’ve counted up into the twenties. It’s not enough. He deserves more, this rage boiling inside me needs to be let out. I bend down behind him and with the sharp point of my blade aiming upward, I pull my arm back and shove my blade up into his asshole. I breathe out a long gust of air and roar as I dropped to my knees. Someone lays their hand on my shoulder. I’m about to jump up when I notice it’s Gunner. He nods once.
Hanger calls for the next brother. "Demon." Demon steps up and draws his machete, bringing it up and over his head, and slashing clean through Ghosts dislocated arms. His body falls to the ground. "Drifter and Pretty Boy." They step up next. "Carry him outside to the back and bring his arms." Hanger grabs a gas can.
When we are out back, they lay him and his arms down into a fire pit. Hanger pours the gasoline over his dead body. Bam Bam hands Hanger a zippo, and he lights it before throwing the lighter onto Ghost. We watch his body ignite in flames.
While he watches Ghost burn, Hanger says, "We leave tomorrow morning for Texas." He orders, "Prospects, when the flames are gone, take him into the wooded area and bury his body." Hanger walks away, leaving the rest of us standing there.
Pretty Boy and Drifter stomp back to the shed as they grumble about having to clean up Ghost’s body. I stay at the fire pit and contemplate if getting revenge helped me at all. I’m not really sure at the moment, but I’ll be a happy motherfucker when Deuce is gone too. Pretty Boy and Drifter join me as the fire dies down. Pretty Boy holds a shovel out for me to take and keeps one for himself. We begin scooping Ghost’s charred remains and dumping them into the wheelbarrow that Drifter is holding upright. Once we are done, we go deep into the woods behind the clubhouse and dig a grave.
As I’m shoveling deeper and deeper, the only thing that plays through my mind is Jorga. She can’t ever be part of this life. She would never understand this world I live in, or why we do what we do. She’s too good to have an outlaw and criminal love her. I have no choice but to make her hate me.
"What exactly is a patch party?" I ask while we're walking toward what Lucas calls the clubhouse. He said this clubhouse doesn’t belong to the Satan’s Sinners, it’s one they are sharing with the Cobras until theirs is rebuilt. He didn’t really talk about why it needed to be rebuilt, and I’m beginning to wonder if there’s a whole other side to Lucas that I don’t know about. Dancer said not to ask questions, but it hasn’t stopped me from thinking up ideas about what really goes on in his motorcycle club. I heard stories growing up, but would Lucas really be part of the criminal activity that the rumors around the city talk about?
There might be a side to him I don’t know because he’s been standoffish the last couple days, and when I’ve questioned him about what was wrong, he simply tells me not to worry about it. But how can I not? Something’s changed with him since he first brought me here, and I'm beginning to wonder if he feels as if I'm a burden. Maybe he'd rather be here having fun and doing whatever it is he does than locked away in a house with me. Although the last couple of nights, we've been at Stilettos since I started working. Lucas still hates the fact that I took the job, and I'm still trying to figure out how to tell my parents I'm working there and that they don't need to cover my expenses anymore. I know I'm grown, and it's my decision where I work, but I'm not sure my parents would be very accepting of it regardless if I'm just a waitress and not a dancer. Did the fact I took the job upset Lucas enough that he’s pulling away?
He's expressionless as we continue trekking to the door. "It a party for me and Pretty Boy to turn in these prospect cuts and gain our rockers."
"What are rockers?"
"Basically, it means we're going to be patched in as full members and that our probation period is over." He seems irritated. His body is tense, his facial features are somber and he’s constantly two steps ahead of me instead of walking beside me. He doesn’t look happy like this party is for him. He stops in his tracks and glances over his shoulder with glaring eyes. “Damn, do you gotta ask so many questions?”
My brows knit in confusion and my stomach twists. His tone of voice felt like a jab and hurt my feelings. “Sorry. I simply wanted to understand this part of you a little better.”
He opens the door for me, and I step through. “There’s nothing for you to understand.”
I don’t entertain his last comment. This night’s for him and is apparently important. I don’t want to ruin anything for him by arguing. My eyes grow as I take in the scene before me. It wasn't like this the other day when I was here. The woman, naked, dancing on the pole is no big deal, I see that at work; however, the women sashaying around the bar with nothing on and no shame is shocking. The stench of cigarette smoke mixed with weed is prominent as clouds of smoke fog the air around us. Music blares from speakers around the room, and people speak over it while laughing with glasses and bottles in hand.
"Hey, Tink." A dark-haired woman with large breasts strolls past us, smiling from ear to ear.
He rubs the back of his neck as my brow arches in question. He says, "Hey, Kat."
I ask, "You've been with her?"
His eyes meet mine. "Been with?" He laughs. "No, but I have fucked most of the whores here." My gaze travels around to see how many he’s referring to. It’s more than I’d like to think about. In fact, I don’t really want to think about any of them, to be honest.
"Jesus, Lucas!" I shriek, unable to hide my irritation. "Why would you bring me here?"
He sighed in annoyance, and I swear he rolled his eyes at me. "What's it matter, Jorga? We're just friends, right? I need to get my dick wet, and they're here to make that happen. It's not like I took any of them on dates or confessed my love for them. It was fucking, that's it. Jesus fuckin' Christ. I brought you here because you can’t be alone, remember?"
I gape at him in shock, my mouth hanging open as I try to gather some words. "What's wrong with you?"
"Nothing. Let's go."
Suddenly feeling like I'd rather be at home, I wrap my arms around myself and try to push away the stinging tears that are threatening to come.
"Tink," A group of guys greets in sync as we step up to them.
I notice all of them are wearing the same leather vests as Lucas, but some have red and black patches while the others have yellow and black.
"Jorga, this is Hanger, Gunner, Writer, and Demon. They're my brothers from the Sinners. That’s Storm, Ace, Dodger, and Spike. They’re Cobras."
The one named Gunner holds his hand out for me to shake. "Nice to meet you, Jorga."
Seeing his outstretched hand, causes my pulse to quicken and anxiety to rise. Instead of taking it, I wave to each of them. "It's nice to meet you too."
"She won't shake your hand because she can't be touched," Tink snidely comments.
&nb
sp; I sneer at him, "Why would you tell them that?"
He stares at me, his face void of any emotion. "It's the truth. You wouldn't want them to think you're being rude, would you?"
My shoulders sag. "I'm not the one being rude."
"Okay." Hanger steps between us and puts his hand on Lucas's shoulder. "Let's go find Pretty Boy."
I stand there awkwardly not knowing what to do. "Hey, Jorga, don't worry about him."
Glancing up, my eyes find Gunner’s. "I'm sorry." I blink a few times rapidly, my cheeks flush with embarrassment.
"You see that table over there?" He points to a rectangle-shaped wooden table that's full of women. "That's some of the Ol' ladies. You know my Ol' Lady, Chatty, right? Tell her I sent you over."
"Thanks." I leave the guys and approach the other table. "Hi, um, Gunner sent me over."
The women give me curious looks, but Chatty smiles and says, "Jorga! Hey, I'm glad you came. Grab a chair."
I find an empty seat and pull it up next to her. "Ladies, this is Jorga. She's friends with Tink."
"Jorga, this is Zoey, Ever, Jacey, and Daphne." They are all beyond gorgeous. Zoey and Ever are twins obviously, Jacey is exotically tanned, and Daphne has an abundance of tattoos.
"Nice to meet you, Jorga," Each of them says acceptingly.
“Nice to meet all of you too.” I muster up a fake smile the best I can.
Daphne studies me for a moment. "You're the one from high school?"
I nod. "I am. How'd you know?"
She smiles genuinely. "Tink came to see me not too long ago. I do his tattoos, and he talked about you."
My eyes widen. "You do amazing work!"
"What're you drinking, Jorga?" Zoey, I think that was her name, asks.
Gazing at her in bewilderment, I reply, "Oh, I don't know."
As she stands, she grins. "Don't worry, I'll be back."
"Here we go." Chatty laughs and explains, "When we're free from the kids and hanging out, she likes to play stupid drinking games to get everybody wasted. That's why we call her Crazy Girl."
