Free Ride

by M. N. Forgy

  “Harley, don’t make me repeat myself. Get your shit and get it now!” he barks in an angry tone causing goosebumps to break out against my skin from the chill in his voice.

  Blinking rapidly, I turn and run to my room, grabbing my mermaid and leather jacket from under the bed. I look around, silently hoping I’ll never return. Shutting the door behind me I say goodbye to the bugs, and take in a deep breath before heading back to the living room.

  “All ready.” I smile. Mom and Dad look at me with red faces, I can tell they’re still fighting.

  Dad slides his hand through his dark hair and plasters a fake smile on his face.

  “Go with Roadie.” His hand swings toward the door, where Roadie stands. I didn’t even notice he was in here with all the excitement. Roadie is tall and skinny. Blond and black hair flopping in his face. “I’ll be at the clubhouse in a bit, baby. I have some shit to take care of first,” Daddy informs, glaring at Mommy. She must be in trouble.

  I look to Roadie with a nervous smile. I’ve only seen him once before when Daddy took me for ice cream. He didn’t talk much but would always smile at me when he caught me looking at him. He seemed friendly.

  Roadie clasps my hand gently, whispering for me to follow him outside.

  I struggle, wanting to wait for Daddy. I want to ride on his motorcycle, not ride in a car with Roadie!

  “Go, Harley,” Dad insists. My brows furrow, my lips pinching together in anger.

  Jerking my hand from Roadie’s, I frown and lead the way outside. Roadie sighs loudly and follows me outside onto the old porch. The same one that shoved a splinter the size of a pencil in the bottom of my foot last summer. I was crying and bleeding so badly the landlord across the street pulled it out with some tool from his garage and taped my foot up with duct tape. I showed the girl down the street the scar and she ran to her house crying. I’m the toughest kid in this trailer park.

  In a shiny black car parked right out front of our ugly green trailer, I see a little boy with dark hair looking out the backseat window, his breathing fogging the glass. I stop on the bottom wooden step and look back at him. I haven’t been around kids my age much, especially boys. I’m homeschooled, which consists of me watching discovery channel every day, and the flashcards Mom bought at the Dollar Tree. I know every card, but I still quiz myself every day.

  “Keep moving, Harley.” Roadie presses on my back. Swallowing the sudden lump forming in my throat, I make myself move off the bottom step.

  Getting closer to the car, the boy in the back seat smiles a crooked grin, and my cheeks warm. I bet if I looked in a mirror they’d be pink.

  He waves, and I hesitantly wave back. My heart grows a mind of its own, beating faster than I’ve ever felt before as I wipe my sweaty palms on my dress.

  “Come on, you can sit next to my boy, Benjamin.” Roadie opens the door for me, and the boy now known as Benjamin smiles at me like nobody has ever smiled at me before. He has dark hair falling in his face, and bright blue eyes staring at me with excitement. Wow, his eyes look just like the color crayon I use to fill in the ocean in my old coloring book.

  He’s wearing a long-sleeved Captain America T-shirt and camouflaged shorts. His knees are bruised and scuffed up, and I can’t help but notice his black boots are untied with the laces dangling down the sides. I really like those leather boots, they’d go well with my jacket. Climbing into the car, I slide along the leather seat and sit as far away from him as I can.

  “You can call me Benji!” Benjamin says, scooting closer to me. I swallow harder, my teeth pinched together at his closeness. My spine is straight, my shoulders stiff. My eyes flick back and forth from the seat in front of me to him. Why is he so friendly? He hardly knows me. Are all kids this nice?

  “I’m ten, how old are you?” he asks, not catching on to my unease.

  “I’m- I’m six,” I reply quietly. My hands clench onto one another in my lap, my chest feeling like someone released a jar of butterflies.

  “I’m older, so you have to listen to me.” He crosses his arms, his chin lifted high. I scowl, the butterflies going up in flames.

  “No, I don’t,” I snap, my face twisted in anger.

  “Yes, you do. I have to protect you. That’s how it works, the boy protects the girl, duh.” He rolls his eyes. Huffing, I cross my arms.

  “That is dumb, who says the girl even needs a boy to protect her? Maybe the boy is the one who needs the girl to save and protect him.”

  His blue eyes turn a shade darker, and he looks confused.

  “Wait! Come back, Harley!” Mommy cries. I look over Benji’s shoulder, just as Dad steps out onto our broken porch and stands behind Mommy, his face hard and unfriendly. Dad grips Mommy by the arm, pushes her inside the trailer like a ragdoll.

  “Say goodbye to Mommy, Harley.” Dad gives me a hard look.

  “Bye, Mommy…” My words are lost on my tongue. Fear for her knotting in my stomach.

  “What is Daddy doing with Mom?” I ask Roadie who is now behind the wheel.

  “Oh, things are just getting heated is all,” he informs with a bored tone.

  Lifting up on my knees I look out the back window at the trailer. Will I ever see Mommy again? I know my mom is not the best mom in the world, but she’s still my mom. The idea that I’ll miss her surprises me, and my eyes begin to well with tears.

  A cold hand rests on top of mine, and my head whips down to Benji looking up at me with sad eyes.

  “It’s okay, you got me.”

  Swallowing the tears back, I slide back into my seat as Roadie pulls the black car away from the trailer.

  1

  Twenty Years Later

  Harley

  A large callused hand grasps the nape of my neck, the familiar smell of leather, weed, and whiskey wafting around me. That smell should be put in a candle, it’d sell a shit load the way it eases the anxiety in one’s chest.

  A hard, warm body presses up against my back, and my eyes nearly roll into the back of my head.

  “Benji.” The name falls from my tongue like a moan midst ecstasy. He feels so good against my body, my mind nearly loses its reality.

  His lips brush against my ear. His hands slowly, lazily, slip down the back of my jeans, and his fingers brush against my sex. Tingles of pleasure surround my wetness, the notion to forget what is right and wrong nearly a breath in the wind with his hands on me.

  “I want to bite this ass, trail my tongue down your supple cheeks until I dive my tongue deep inside this hot cunt of yours,” he mutters.

  I grit my teeth with temptation. I want to wrap my legs around his neck while he licks every drop of my wetness. My body clenching around his tongue as I release what I’ve been denying myself into his mouth. I want to let him mouth fuck me into another world where it’s just him and I… but that would be selfish of me. A fucking mess.

  I could lose him.

  I grab him by the wrist and pull his hand out from my bottoms, his finger leaving a trail of wetness behind it.

  “You can’t say my name like that, and deny me that tight ass, Harley,” he growls into the back of my ear.

  “We can’t do this, you know that.” I clear my throat and shake my head.

  There’s no denying that Benji is a catch. Tall, dangerous, and smoldering eyes that make you want to throw the idea of wearing panties into a fire.

  But, I’m not capable of having a traditional relationship. I’m not saying that to be that teasing bitch everyone knows. I’m just the kind of girl that doesn’t get to experience the glamorous kind of love. No, my heart comes with a little bloodshed and a shot of insanity on the side. That’s the biker’s way of life, after all, and that alone makes me bad at this thing called love. I can’t promise I won’t break his heart. If I did lose him as my best friend, it’d be the first thing I’d never forgive myself for. Even if I did tease him, you couldn’t blame me. Benjamin Daxton is the sexiest man in this club.

  I’m not mentally stable to love
Benji.

  My eyes water as I think about the first time I realized I’d never be good enough for Benji.

  Waking up in an uncomfortable position, I sit up. My vision blurred, my head pounds and my mouth is dry. I notice I am in the backseat of some truck I’ve never seen before. The smell of stale beer and Old Spice deodorant making me want to vomit. The material of the black dress I didn’t know I even owned, makes my skin itch and sweat, and I pull at it impatiently as I try to figure out how I got in that truck. The sound of someone heaving in the front seat has me sitting forward. Looking over the vinyl blue bench seat, I find a young man with tattoos all over his back throwing up in the floorboard. I’ve never seen him before. How did I get here? Did we do anything sexual? God, I hope not.

  “Why am I here?” I ask with a shaky voice. Scared of what he’s going to say. My heart flutters with the words about to fall from his dry lips.

  He coughs, wiping his face with his forearm. His face is pale and his eyes are hooded like he’s smoked too much.

  “I was going to show you a good time, but I got sick, babe.” He shakes his head with embarrassment.

  Rage sobers me instantly. My eyes filling with tears as I jerk the door open and slam it shut.

  There’s no way I would let this happen. He’s not even cute!

  “Hey, let me get your number!” the boy’s who name I don’t even know, suggests. He doesn’t know who I am or he wouldn’t be asking me so bluntly. He has no idea I’m the president’s daughter. It’s refreshing but dangerous.

  “HARLEY!” I hear Benji yell from the clubhouse. Looking at the boy in the truck, I furrow my brows. My heart beating a mile a minute.

  “You better leave. Now!” If Benji finds him, he’ll kill him. He will drag him out of his truck, and pound his fist in this boy’s face over and over again. Then my dad will take the back tire to his Harley across his face.

  I see the passion in Benji’s eyes, I know he wants to be with me. To see me with someone else… it would kill him.

  Benji groans as if I just took his dick from him and slammed it in a drawer, grabbing me from the trip down memory lane. A memory I remember often, because it’s permanent tattoo of why I can’t be with him.

  I have Dissociative Identity Disorder, also known as split personality. It ruins my life in some ways, such as having a real relationship with anyone. So, when Benji looks at me like I’m the only girl in his world… there’s really more. Harley, which is my front personality and then my alter that calls herself Farrah. Farrah has been a part of my life ever since I can remember. She’s the other half of me. When she comes forward, she’s always altering my appearance to something sweet and innocent, though she’s anything but. She’s a slut in a flower dress, and I can’t stand it when she puts me in clothing that reveals so much of my skin. I don’t know anything she does when she comes to the front, I just black out. It’s like swimming through a dark abyss as I wait to come to the front in a different place, in different clothes, confused as fuck.

  Benji pulls away from me, and I turn to face him. My face flushed and I place my hands on the dresser behind me in attempt to keep them from grabbing at Benji’s hard body.

  “What are you guys talking about today? Are you going on a run? Do you need some help?” I fire a series of questions at him. The club is about to have a meeting and I want to go so bad, I’ve wanted to go since I was a little girl. I’m the Shadow Keepers’ MC princess, and my crown is my helmet. I want to be a part of the club so bad. When I was younger, Benji and I would hide under the wooden table from time to time, but we eventually got bigger, and got caught. My dad made it a habit of checking under the table after that, and I haven’t been back in there since. Benji has been in there since though because my dad patched him in.

  He steps in where needed, the club muscle if you will. The size of Benji’s shoulders and arms, it’s a no-brainer to make him the Shadow Keepers’ enforcer.

  Benji’s shoulders are wide and built with muscle, his arms tattooed and thick. He’s the king of pain and it’s scary what his charming smile can hide. You’d never know he was a murderer if he wore a suit and tie. That’s how handsome and dangerous he really is.

  “You can’t come and you know that.” Benji slides my blonde hair behind my ear. His touch soft but firm.

  His ocean eyes bore into mine, searing me where I stand as if I’m the only girl in the world. The feeling is warm and fuzzy, and a façade. I’m not the only girl in his world. If I was, maybe things would be different between us.

  My eyes fall along his sharp face. The dark stubble on his chin causes my fingers to twitch with the urge to run both of my palms over it just to feel the scratch of it on my fingers. His shaggy black hair falls in his eyes when he looks at me. Trundles that are lighter in color from riding in the sun too much curl around the tops of his ears.

  He notices my lingering stare and flicks his nose with his thumb, his tongue sliding along his bottom lip as he looks at me with hooded eyes. His smoldering blue orbs too intense to look at, my eyes fall to the scar on the bridge of his nose. It’s lighter than the rest of his tanned skin demonstrating even though he’s beautiful, he’s an unpredictable man. I remember the day he got that scar. A club passing through stopped at the Shadow Keepers go to spot for whiskey. The Rolling Barrels Pub. The other club disrespected our club’s colors, and Benji got heated and got in his face. The man from the opposing club punched Benji right in the face and broke his sunglasses; slicing his nose wide open. Benji broke the man’s right arm after that, and there’s no pain for a biker like not riding their motorcycle.

  It was one of the few times I got to leave the club, and I witnessed the whole club fight that night. I’ll never forget how much Benji looked like a monster and less like a man.

  Benji and I grew up together, MC brats. Both schooled and confined within the walls of the Shadow Keepers MC. My home is just above the clubhouse my father is the president of. Benji’s dad, Roadie, is the VP and they both live downstairs in two of the club’s rooms. Benji is my best friend, we do everything together. Just not runs or anything club related.

  The Shadow Keepers’ clubhouse was founded in Arizona by my father. He came back from the war a lost man and not only homeless but jobless. He stumbled upon a condemned home by a beach and slowly rebuilt it. Other lost souls joined him, and they began to get into pot running and before they knew it, they became the Shadow Keepers.

  They’re a motherfucking legend around here. A club named Tail Chasers used to run this side of Arizona. They sold weak pot and some cheap guns. Eventually, Dad moved in on their territory and wiped them out with better weed, and eventually better stock in guns. Many have tried to take out the Shadow Keepers, and many have gone missing trying. Keep your competition six feet under, and you’ll always remain on top.

  “Meet me on the roof after the meeting?” he asks with a low rugged tone. We always head to the roof, smoke a blunt and talk bullshit after club meetings. But tonight, my palm aches to hold a .45. My heart beats to the sound of the clicking mechanism of an automatic weapon. I’m programmed to wreak havoc and leave a path of blood in my wake. Nobody can stop that, not even the code of the club.

  I’m becoming restless being sheltered in this fucking club.

  “This is bullshit,” I grumble shaking my head. My eyes fall to my bed with the club colors printed on the bedding.

  “The day a woman sits at the table, is the day the legacy of biker clubs around the world die. You know that,” Benji quotes my father, but his tone of voice lacks the belief in that sentence. I flick a brow up at him, his words insulting and out of line.

  The very thought that I will never be in that room weighing heavy on my shoulders, I lash out the only way I know how.

  Grabbing the red lamp on my night table, I throw it at him. He ducks, the lamp barely missing him, and he gives me a sideways glance as if I’m crazy. It’s ironic, as we both know I’m past crazy. There’s no cure for what I have. I’m the
bitch with the leather jacket, matching boots, and joint hanging out of her mouth as I drive the fucking crazy train through the image portrayed for what a lady is to act like.

  “It’s not healthy for you to be around violence,” he raises a brow, repeating what my therapist has told me.

  “I get it. I’m a fucking nutcase,” I sneer, pointing to my head. There’s a darkness inside of me that weaves and vines through my limbs, and when my heart pounds to the rhythm of someone hurting, or I get a waft of spilled blood. That darkness blooms within me past unstoppable. Members of the club have told me I scare my own father, and that hurts. I refuse to believe I frighten him, I should make him proud. The DNA of what he stands for runs deep inside of my body, nothing will stop me until I am at that table.

  Benji growls. “You know I hate it when you fucking call yourself that. You’re just… different, Harley, and your dad doesn’t want you around club shit. It brings the worst out of you,” he clarifies.

  What does he want me to say? That ‘I’ll change?’ Be a good girl who likes to decorate and bake cookies? That I’ll look the other way of innocent blood shed as I step over the empty bullet casings serving beer to club members?

  I won’t be that woman. Ever.

  “I won’t give up my self-respect just to make people who think they love me, feel normal,” I growl in reply. His eyes widen with insult.

  “And you think I’m one of those people that want you to change?”

  My brows furrow inward with uncertainty. I didn’t think he used to be one of those people, but the way he quotes my dad so often anymore… I’m not so sure. I’m hoping he’s just telling himself I am better left up here so that one day he will believe it himself.

  “You better get going, Dad will bust your face if he finds you in here again.” I look over my shoulder with a grave expression. Benji knows he’s not allowed in my room, if Dad heard him in here it’d be both of our asses.