Vindication: A Motorcycle Club Romance

by Valentine, Sienna

  The bartender interrupted to drop off their fresh drinks. Muriel bit one of the olives off the toothpicks in her martini before she continued. “You’ve got that little sparkle in your voice when you talk about him.”

  Bridget took a drink and rolled her eyes heavily—too heavily, she realized, when Muriel’s smirk only grew. “He’s pretty hot, but he’s also in a biker gang.”

  “Jesus, seriously?”

  “He’s got the leather vest and everything,” said Bridget. Shit, now I can’t stop thinking about everything underneath that leather vest…

  Muriel seemed to suddenly get less jovial about it all. She looked at her martini, and even though she was still smiling, her words were not. “So, what, are you gonna like… date this guy?”

  “Ugh, do I still date?” Bridget said, leaning on the bar. “I can’t even remember the last date I went on.”

  “I think it was that dark-haired lawyer who wouldn’t shut up about his visit to Nepal.”

  Bridget crinkled her nose at the memory. “Oh, right, him. God, he was so boring. He tried to call me for like two weeks after that, and then he just left me a text he actually signed ‘namaste.’ ”

  “I guess a biker would be the next natural step from that,” said Muriel with a half-laugh.

  Sensing her discomfort, Bridget turned to her and said, “What’s the deal? What’s bothering you about this?”

  Muriel looked up at her, the freckles splashed across her face dark and flushed. “I don’t know, honey, do you think that’s a wise idea?”

  “What?”

  “Dating a biker guy?”

  “God, who’s dating a biker guy?” said Bridget. “I’m barely contemplating the idea of a date with him.”

  Muriel’s mouth squished up to one side. “I know you about as well as anyone, Bridg, and you barely even contemplate dates with very attractive and suitable men who basically follow you everywhere. You turn down single dads with hedge funds who slip their numbers during parent-teacher conferences…”

  “C’mon, that’s different. Dating students’ parents is a snake pit.”

  “Still, I insist the point. If you’re even considering a date with this biker dude, it must be because you actually. really want it for once.”

  Redness flushed over her face. “Fuck,” said Bridget with a snorting laugh. She stared down at her beer with a smile. “I did not expect such an astute observation of my bullshit to come out of your mouth.”

  “Just be careful. Some people might start to talk if they know you’re hanging out with a man like that.”

  “What year is it, 1956?”

  “I’m just saying,” said Muriel, an apologetic whine to her voice. “I don’t want to see you get yourself into trouble with some rough guy, or have Henrietta hassle you.”

  Bridget was silent a moment. Muriel did know her just about as well as anyone else did, but there was still a lot Muriel didn’t know. She knew about Bridget’s time in the service, and she knew it wasn’t entirely pleasant. She seemed to understand why Bridget’s PTSD-like symptoms existed and never bothered her about it, where other friends had raged or abandoned her outright.

  But Muriel didn’t know the other part of all of it, the deep part of Bridget that drove her to things like the military, the parts of her that made her so fiercely independent. That same untamed part of her was wildly, hopelessly attracted to Ghost. Having Muriel sit there and warn her against it suddenly made the reality of her feelings stand out stark, like the silhouette of a howling wolf against a full moon.

  The reason Muriel didn’t know was because Bridget was a stranger in her world. She loved the kids at the Academy, but there was nothing about this comfortable, even decadent, world that Bridget understood well. She was simply intelligent and good enough at adapting that she could fit in here without having been born into it. She played a part. She figured out exactly how rich parents and stuck-up Ivy League-educated teachers wanted to be talked to, and she used it to get her job done. She let them assume anything they wanted about her background, knowing they would fill in the blanks with some familiar story about debutante balls and sorority houses, and she never had to correct them. She let everyone paint their perception on her like a blank canvas, never letting them see what she really was underneath.

  Muriel was born into this world. She’d never want for anything in her life, and never had. Even if she stopped teaching tomorrow, the rich fiancé in the finance industry she had waiting at home for her would make sure she had everything she needed. Bridget was just a visitor, a pilgrim wandering through, who had only settled down in LeBeau and taken the job to make sure Gramps had someone around until the end. She didn’t care about maintaining a reputation with the powerful people she knew now.

  She would do what she always did—what she wanted. But Bridget knew she couldn’t make a woman like Muriel understand it. Women like Muriel turned their fire down for their men, and Bridget didn’t. That’s why Bridget was alone, and Muriel wasn’t.

  Bridget cleared her throat. “I’ll be fine,” she said without looking at Muriel.

  She would never admit it to her friend, but Bridget had her own reservations about being with Ghost. They just had very little to do with her reputation.

  ~ SEVEN ~

  Ghost

  Already he loved and hated this city.

  Ghost had lived in plenty of cities in his life, before he settled down in LeBeau for good, and he nearly always felt the same about them. The parts he loved, he loved with all his heart: the anonymity; the energy and culture; the endless possibilities of a labyrinth of back alleys, side streets, winding halls, and identical doorways. There was a power in cities that, when tapped properly, could send you rocketing into the stratosphere. But it didn’t take much of a hiccup to turn your flight to the stars into an interstellar explosion.

  The part Ghost hated about cities burned hotter than the things he loved. He hated how much harder everyone made it for each other, and themselves, living all cooped up and cramped together all the time. It didn’t matter how nice the city was or where it had been built. Maybe he’d notice it in a day, maybe not for a few years, like with Seattle. But eventually that stench of apathy caught up to him and he was on his bike again, off to somewhere he could find some brightness for a while. LeBeau ended up being that place for good, right when he was about to give it up for myth. He liked the space. He liked the defensibility of the cozy mountain corridor. And he liked being a bad guy that kept the worse guys away from people like Sid and Bridget and the rest of the town. The MC’s jobs slated the lust for blood and adrenaline he was sure now would never go away.

  He’d been to Eagleton once or twice for something or other, lame errands he couldn’t remember now. Mid-sized, fairly clean and quiet, not as progressive as a place like Seattle, but certainly not as sheltered as the Midwest. The Black Dogs charter up here made their money distributing guns; they’d take in the shipments from the harbor, rent a warehouse to package the merch, and then make shipments to smaller outlying places around Eagleton. Sometimes the guns went straight into the hands of men at war, ready to use them on a rival gang. Lots of times, they were being resold, sometimes three or four times before they found a permanent home. Other charters like LeBeau frequently act as hubs for sales or storage, if needed.

  Two of the Eagleton Dogs were outside the building, smoking on a worn, wooden picnic table, when Jase led the four of them, mounted on their bikes, through the open chain link gate and down the wide driveway. Ghost was sure he remembered some of the faces from one of those times LeBeau managed a weapons sale, when Eagleton dudes had come down to them.

  The charter had converted an old office building from the 40s into their clubhouse, but erased much of the charm by painting the place a stonewash gray and replacing all the landscaping with gravel. Ghost supposed it was more efficient, but where was their sense of drama and elegance? These city boys had no showmanship.

  Ghost and his brothers parked their
bikes neatly against the chain link fence. By the time they turned, two more Eagleton Dogs had come outside at the sound of the engines, and the smokers were walking over to greet them.

  The tallest of them was broad-shouldered with soft, ginger hair that fell across his eyes. He held out his hand to Will. “Hi, there. Shaun Lee, president of Eagleton.”

  “Will Bowers,” said Will, shaking his hand. “I think we met a few years ago.”

  “Did you boys have a good ride?”

  “Ran into some construction coming out of Athens that took longer than we wanted, but nothing horrible. How are things here?”

  “About the same as when we spoke to Henry last. I assume he caught you boys up.”

  The other Eagleton Dogs approached, boots crunching on the gravel, and all of them lit up cigarettes as they came to a stop. Next to Shaun was Scott Turner, a skinny kid in his mid-twenties with a gentlemen’s haircut and a mean collection of arm tattoos. Rick Cappello, the charter’s VP, was a short and round Italian dude with wiry, black curls that Ghost imagined he hated trying to fit under a helmet. Last was Harvey Lucero, skinnier than Scott, but in a lean and hungry way. He had thick, gray streaks in his bushy beard and spoke with an accent that told Ghost he probably called Appalachia home. He insisted no one use his first name.

  “I’m Jase Campbell, I’m running things from our end. This is Will Bowers, Tommy Castillo, and Ghost McBride,” said Jase as he gestured to them in turn.

  “Thanks for coming up and helping us out with this. We can’t tell you how much we appreciate it,” said Shaun. He was tall, but a big guy, with ropy arms and a lot of incidental scars on his hands and neck. “We’ve never been in a bind like this before that we couldn’t dig ourselves out of.”

  “Hey, what’s the point of the cut if we don’t help each other out?” said Will.

  “Well, I look damn good in mine, that is an important point,” said Ghost, straightening his own. Rick and Lucero both snickered.

  Shaun had the leadership here, and when he was finished with his smoke, his men all followed suit. Jase had already blazed through his, and Will, God bless the poor little cinnamon roll, he was trying to quit before his baby arrived. Ghost could only see his stress if he looked at the corners of Will’s big, brown, puppy-dog eyes; it was small, but it was there.

  The inside of the clubhouse was unexpectedly warm, with original exposed brick and hardwood floors. The large main room stretched back half the building and up through the second floor, which was more of a loft, accessed by a small staircase on the south wall. It was open and airy and light, but also had sterility to it. The Eagleton Dogs relinquished seats on the well-worn furniture to their guests, and stood around the room instead.

  “So we leave in the morning. Is that going to leave you boys enough time to get some rest and learn the ropes?” said Shaun.

  Rick came over with beers from a tall industrial fridge in the corner. As Ghost took his with a nod, he said, “You got any place to sleep around here?”

  “Upstairs, there are a couple spare rooms we’ve converted.”

  “I gots to have my beauty rest,” said Ghost, and then tipped back his beer.

  “We can order you some take-out, too. There’s pretty much anything you could want around here,” said Lucero, his gruff, southern voice standing out stark.

  Will tipped a gracious hand toward Tommy and took his beer from Rick. “The new kid won the race out of town this morning, so he gets to pick dinner.”

  “And don’t say pizza, you little shit,” said Ghost, pointing with false menace at Tommy’s grin. “Find something we don’t have in LeBeau. Might as well get the most out of this shitcan while we’re here.”

  “Come again?” said Lucero with a serious sneer.

  “Oh, not this shitcan,” said Ghost, gesturing around the room. “No, your clubhouse is fine. Not my style, personally, but that’s just opinion, isn’t it?”

  “What the fuck is this guy on about?” Lucero turned to Will like he was a translator.

  “Ignore him. He’s just fucking around,” said Will with a dismissive wave. “He just thinks we need to order food we can’t get at home to make the most of our trip.”

  “That’s what I said.” Ghost raised and dropped his hands.

  “What do you guys like?” said Tommy, craning his neck to look up at Shaun.

  Shaun smiled. “There’s a really great Thai place about two blocks over. You ever had Thai? You’ll get addicted, I swear.”

  That was enough of a promise for Tommy. The Eagleton Dogs took the task of ordering and picking up the dinner while the LeBeau Dogs set up their sleeping spaces. Dinner was served at a large white table that looked like it came from Ikea or some other big box store, with matching smooth, round chairs that scraped on the hardwood floor. As they dug into the hot, spicy food, Shaun decided to informally go over the next day’s plans.

  “The highway’s a really straight shot,” said Shaun around a mouthful of curry chicken. “It’s one of the flattest parts of the state. It’s easy to spot an ambush or a tail.”

  “How often do you deal with either of those?” asked Will.

  “Rarely to never. We’ve had this supply line pretty well locked down for about six years now, and the only gang in the area with the power to challenge us ain’t interested in it.”

  “Who’s that?” asked Ghost.

  “Chinese mafia,” said Rick, passing a carton of sticky rice across the table to Scott. “They like running drugs and cheap knockoff guns.”

  “And the cops?” asked Will.

  “We’ve got them contained,” said Shaun. “We’ve got two locals and three Highway Patrolmen on our payroll. They won’t intervene in a fight, but they’re not going to hassle us.”

  “So it sounds like this is mostly a contingency paranoia,” said Will. “You haven’t been threatened.”

  “No,” said Shaun. “Nothing like that. But the other gangs around here know we’re weak. We’ve never been this low on active members before, and it’s gotten to where we can’t make appearances in the streets like we used to. I don’t know how it is back in LeBeau, but that’s a problem around here.”

  “You’re losing your legend,” said Jase with a bitter half-grin.

  “Yeah, you could say that,” said Shaun, nodding. “We have to make this run or we’re going to be in a bad place financially, long before we can get our numbers back up. And if someone wanted to hit us, well… now would be the time.”

  “You’re not wrong,” said Ghost. “The smell of blood brings the predators that aren’t even hungry.”

  “So, what’s the plan?” said Will.

  Shaun slid aside his plate and some of the food containers to make space for his elbows as he leaned forward. He wiped bright red sauce off his face. “We have two identical vans. They’re marked to look like a meat delivery plant that used to operate around here. Only one van is carrying the guns. They maintain a constant distance from each other of ten miles, and each are escorted by two bikes, not close enough to make people suspicious of course, but tailing back a bit. The idea is that anyone who wants to try a hit is going to have to deal with fifty-fifty odds they’re hitting the wrong van, or somehow risk hitting both at once.”

  “Smart,” said Ghost.

  “So two men per van, and the other four on bikes?” said Jase.

  “Right,” said Shaun. “Since we know the route, I’m putting my men at the helm of each van—that’ll be Lucero and myself. Rick and Scott will each go on bikes, along with whichever of your men are taking their bikes.”

  “Bike!” said Ghost immediately.

  “Same,” agreed Tommy. “I’d rather not be cooped up in a van that whole drive.”

  “Fine with me,” said Jase. “Will, you have a problem being in the other van?”

  Will shook his head, chewing.

  “Good. So it’s just a simple drive, no stops required unless we run into unexpected delays. But our lines at the Department of Transpo
rtation say there’s no big construction or utility projects, so we should be in the clear. We’ll refuel in Burling after the sale is made and head straight back down the highway for Eagleton. Then you boys can catch another night here, or head home, whatever works for you,” said Shaun.

  “We’ll have walkies in each van, connected to radio lines that each of the bikers will be wearing,” said Scott as he got up to move some of the empty white ceramic plates to the kitchen sink. “We should get those fitted and tested tonight before you all turn in.”

  “Any questions?” asked Shaun.

  “What happens when we get to the actual sale?” said Will. “What do you want us to do?”

  “Our men will handle that,” said Lucero, pointing his own finger at his chest. “The merch is plenty light enough for us to handle carrying ourselves. We already sent out a heads-up that we’d have strange faces with us, but you four just stay put with the vehicles and don’t interfere.”