Arsen

by Kathryn Thomas

  They had gone to bed early and though she’d come on to Colt, he ignored her, once again reminding her she was an outsider. She couldn’t understand his moods. When he was with his brothers, he treated her as he treated Perri, McKenzie and Bobbi. But alone, he either ignored her or treated her as if she meant nothing. As she dried her hair the next morning, she reminded herself she was an outsider, brought here only to serve his needs, and she didn’t mean anything to him.

  It was early, long before rest of the club was up. The DVMC slept late, and partied late, but they couldn’t sleep to almost noon. Not today. They had to be in place to intercept the cash transfer. She finished dressing in her clothes, dirty and rumbled though they were.

  “Ready,” she proclaimed as she finished tying her sneakers.

  “Don’t shoot anyone,” he said as he handed her a pistol. I was just like the one she’d shot the can with and she quickly checked it to make sure it was loaded.

  “I won’t.”

  “See that you don’t. If I hear shots, I’m leaving, understand?”

  She smiled. “Got it.” She tucked the pistol into the waist of her pants and made sure it was covered by her shirt. She smiled, thinking that if Barbara Candill saw her like this, she would remind her to tuck in her shirt.

  It was just before eight and she was sitting in the public laundry, staring out of the window with a good view of the main street, when the Cash in Transit truck rounded the corner and rumbled to a stop at the grocery store. She smiled. Just like Gallup, the grocery store served as food mart, pharmacy, and pseudo bank. She took a deep breath and rose, waiting until her legs felt less like jelly. She stood there for thirty seconds, trying to decide if she really wanted to do this, then hardened her resolve and marched out.

  Colt watched as Sierra walked out of the coin laundry, crossing the street and following the guard inside. It’s all up to Sierra, he thought as he thumbed his bike to life and waited, the Harley throbbing softly between his legs.

  Sierra walked in, intending to go to the back of the store, but she was surprised to find the guard standing at a counter in the front of the store with a large satchel sitting there. Unlike Candill’s Grocery, this store had the manager’s office in the front, near the entrance, behind the counter where they sold various tobacco products, condoms, and other specialty items that required IDs. She ignored the guard and the man he was talking to and walked past, moving with purpose. She did a quick aisle check and found only one other person, a young woman with a toddler in her basket, in the store. Her basket was nearly empty and she knew from experience she would be a while before she was ready to check out. Sierra pulled the thin latex gloves from her pocket and slipped them on. They were close to flesh color and not readily noticeable, and then picked up the first thing that came to hand, a 2-liter bottle of soda. She hovered in the aisle, as if looking for something else, stalling as she waited for the guard and manager to complete the paperwork for the cash. While she waited, she sat the bottle down and pulled one of the two zip-ties out of her pocket and formed it into a loop, tightening it only to the first click before putting it carefully back into her pocket and picking up the bottle again.

  When she saw the guard take his clipboard she opened Colt’s knife and careful slit three bottles, stepped out from behind the rack, and walked to the register as the bottles dribbled into the floor. It was all about the timing now.

  “There’s pop leaking all over the floor in the soda aisle,” she said to the cashier as she stepped up. “Somebody’s going to slip and fall.”

  “Get a mop,” the manager said as he lifted the canvas bag off the counter. “I’ll be right with you.”

  “No hurry,” Sierra replied with a smile as she sat the bottle at the register and the cashier hurried away. Nothing like the fear of a lawsuit to make people jump into action, she said to herself with a smile.

  She was depending on the fact that the cashier and manager saw a customer and nothing more. When this was over he might remember she was a woman, tall and dark haired, but probably little else. She wasn’t anyone he knew, so her face would probably never register, like all the strangers she saw at Candill’s. It wasn’t until Colt had a gun to her head she’d paid him the least attention.

  The moment the man opened the door to the office she pulled a pair of panty hose from her pocket and jerked in over her head then sprinted from the register, pulling the gun as she did. She ducked under the bar and shoved the door open before it could latch.

  “Don’t turn around and you won’t be hurt!” she snarled at the man crouched at the safe buried in the floor, her hands shaking so badly she wouldn’t be able to hit him of she tried. “Face down on the floor, hands behind your head!” she continued, trying to sound tough, repeating the words Colt told her to say.

  The man turned and looked at her, as Colt said he would, seeing the gun in her hand and turning white. “Don’t shoot!” he said as he hands went up. “I have a family! Please don’t shoot!”

  “Face down on the floor!” she hissed again, panting so hard she was afraid she was going to hyperventilate and pass out. “Do it! All I want is the money!”

  Colt watched the guard walk out of the store and pause at the back of the truck. After a moment the door opened and the man stepped inside, the door closing just before the truck began to move. He waited until the truck passed, before blipping the throttle once then pulling out into the street and slowly ridding down the road toward the store.

  Sierra stepped forward and pulled a zip-tie from her pants pocket. “Put your hands behind your back,” she ordered as she knelt on his back, using one knee to hold him down as she put the weapon to the man’s head. “You’re almost out of this,” she said, her voice shaking so hard she sounded like a cartoon character. She slipped the loop over the man’s hands and jerked it tight.

  “Shit!” the man snarled as the tie cut into his wrists.

  “Sorry,” she said, unable to stop herself. Now that the man’s hands were bound, she tucked her gun away, glad to have it out of her hand for fear of firing it accidently because of her nerves, and pulled another zip-tie from her pocket to bind the man’s feet.

  “You’re not going to get away with this,” the man threatened.

  “Yeah? I think I am. What do I look like?”

  “You’re a woman, uh, with dark hair.”

  “What else?” When the man didn’t answer she smiled. “That’s what I thought.” She had one more zip-tie, in case she needed it, but since she didn’t, Colt had told her what to do with it. “Raise your legs.”

  When the man complied, she looped her last tie through the other two. It was barely long enough, but it caught and held, leaving the man trussed on his stomach like a Thanksgiving turkey.

  “You did good. Someone will find you soon, so don’t do something stupid, like yell, until after I’m gone, okay? Now, where’s the key to the bag?” When the man didn’t answer she sighed dramatically as she pulled her gun again, putting everything she had into her performance. “So close.”

  “On my key ring!”

  “Where?”

  “Right side, on my belt.”

  She unclipped the ring. There were a half-dozen keys on the ring, but only one looked right. She tried it and the lock on the cash bag smoothly opened. She opened the blue and brown satchel and peered inside.

  Colt stopped just outside the front door and waited, the bike idling. He wanted to rev the engine in nervous energy, but that would only attract attention. “Come on, come on!” he murmured to himself.

  “Okay. I’m leaving. If I hear you yelling before I’m gone…” she let the threat hang in the air. She opened the office door and took a quick peek. The cashier was still cleaning up the mess. She stepped out and shut the door, pulling the mask off before dropping it and the gun into the cash bag.

  Sierra strode out of the store as if she didn’t have a care in the world, just like Colt had instructed her. She walked up to the bike and carefully load
ed the contents of the bag into the two leather bags on the bike. It was a tight squeeze, and the bags were bulging at the seams, but all the cash went in before she toss the bag and the key behind a car.

  She was shaking as she got on the bike behind Colt and pulled off her gloves as he pulled serenely out into the street.

  He glanced at his watch. Three minutes. She was in the store only three minutes after the guard left. He smiled as he gave his head a small shake in admiration.

  As Lead Top fell behind her, Sierra began to relax. I fucking did it! I was scared shitless, but I fucking did it! She didn’t have any idea what the take may have been, but it had to be over a hundred grand! She and Colt were headed to Vegas, a short two-hour ride south on highway ninety-five, to lay low for the day. Maybe she would just stay in Vegas. She did some quick math in her head. If the take was a hundred thousand, her part would be…fifteen thousand. She felt a chill pass over her. Fifteen thousand dollars! I can buy a car, and rent an apartment! Maybe I can go back to school! This is it! This is the break I’ve been waiting for, dreaming of! Fifteen thousand dollars! She could hardly believe her luck.

  She pulled in tight to Colt, placed her chin on his shoulder, and dreamed as the bike rocketed south.

  Chapter Eleven

  “To Sierra Mora! The badass-est bitch in the DVMC!” Colt said softly as he held his drink aloft in tribute.

  Sierra smiled and sipped her drink. They had arrived in Las Vegas an hour ago and checked into a small mom and pop motel off the strip. As they checked in, she wondered how Colt was going to get all the cash into their room without it being noticed. While she waited, she came up with all kinds of wild ideas, such as using pillow cases or perhaps wrapping the cash in towels. When they rolled to a stop in front of their room, Colt had simple unhooked the bags, threw them over his shoulder, and carried them into the room. The moment he lifted the bags off the bike she flushed in embarrassment and was thankful she hadn’t mentioned any of her ideas.

  “I need you to do something,” he’d said as he threw the bags in the floor. “I need you to call Gallup and tell them you are Vegas and that I let you go. We want to call off the heat of a kidnapping. Don’t tell them where you are, or any details. You’re complicit now. Just tell them you are fine and will be staying in Vegas.”

  She’d nodded and done as he asked after he’d looked the Gallup Police phone number up using his cell. There was no answer so she left a voicemail, which had the benefit of avoiding questions.

  She was so jacked up with what she’d done that she wanted to strip and fuck him the moment she hung up the phone, but he was indifferent to her. This time the indifference hurt because she felt like she’d proven something, not only to him, but to herself, as well. She didn’t know what she’d done to push him away, but she swallowed her hurt and followed him back out and down the street to a bar.

  “Since I’m here, in Vegas, is this where you’re going to leave me?” she asked as he poured another shot into his glass to go with his beer.

  “Only if you want to. You said you wanted to go to Reno, and I said I would take you there.” He shook his head. “But not today. I think we have done enough for today, don’t you?”

  She smiled. He was loosening up, but every time there was a moment of closeness, he pulled back, and she didn’t understand why. It wasn’t like she was asking him for anything other than a ride to Reno. Well, and maybe ride her, too. But he was the one that got her involved in the club. She’d been trying like hell to get away until yesterday. Her smile grew larger. Now, with her cut, she could be out of his life forever, but she wasn’t leaving until he gave her a ride she could remember…and she didn’t mean on his hog either.

  “What about tonight?”

  “What about tonight?” he repeated, his tone confused.

  “There is one thing that we haven’t done that I want to.”

  He smirked. Gone was that deer in the headlights look she had when she arrived at the clubhouse. “Are you offering to prepay for your ride to Reno?”

  “Maybe. You might get a bonus when we get there, too.”

  He chuckled then tipped the amber liquid back, baring his teeth as it burned so good, pouring another. “You aren’t the shy thing I picked up a couple days ago, that’s for sure.”

  She leaned across the small table, making sure her breasts bulged up for him to see. “That’s because you haven’t collected on your promise.”

  “What’s that?”

  “That I was going to have to go all the way.”

  He grinned. “Here’s to going all the way,” he said softly before he downed his drink.

  “What are you going to do with your share?” she asked. She’d wanted to count the money, but Colt had wanted to get something to eat and drink first.

  Before he could answer, their burgers appeared. He waited until the waitress left before he answered. “Tuck it back, I guess,” he said as he squirted a huge glob on ketchup onto his plate.

  “You said you had plans. What plans?”

  “I have this idea. But the club…they’re so wrapped up in the drugs, sex and booze, they’re worthless.”

  “Not all of them. What about Gunner, Nic, Harrison and Fletcher? And their old ladies?”

  “Yeah, and there’re others. But there’re just as many that like the life, where the only thing they have to worry about is where their next line is coming from, or who they are going to fuck that night.”

  “So do something about it.”

  He snorted and took a bite out of the burger, chewing slowly. “It’s not that easy. I’ve tried, but Paul, he gets off watching the fucking and fighting. That’s how he holds onto his position, by making sure the sex, drugs and booze are always available.”

  “So leave. Take those who agree with you and start your own club.”

  Colt shook his head. “It doesn’t work that way. DVMC runs that section of Nevada. Granted, it isn’t much, but it’s ours. If another club, even one I started, were to try to come in, there would be bloody war. Nobody wants that. I would lose some friends even if I win.”

  “So you are going to just sit back and take it?”

  “For now.”

  “Is it because you enjoy the life, too? After all, you did kidnap me for sex.” She made sure to smile as she said it to make sure he knew she was kidding. While it may be technically not true since she had a choice, in hindsight, it appears deciding to go with him had been one of her smarter decisions.

  “Seems to me I didn’t have to do a lot of persuading by the time we got down to business.”

  “No, I don’t suppose you did. But that doesn’t change the fact that you still haven’t taken me all the way.”

  “You want me to?”

  “Yes. At least once, but preferably three or four times before you leave me in Reno.”

  He sipped at his beer. He was going to take her all the way. She’d pulled off one slick little heist and he’d been aching for her since it became clear that they had gotten away with it. When she came on so strong in the motel room, it was all he could do not to fuck her stupid right then. He wasn’t sure what was happening, but Sierra was speaking to him in a way no other woman ever had. She had fire, determination and strength, and she had them in spades. She’d gone hard at him the first night, as if to prove to him she was tough enough to take anything he thought he could serve up. Then she’d come up with the idea of robbing the armored car. That was a bit too big of a bite, but it had led to a fairly substantial haul. When he’d told her what she had to do, she’d gone all in and done it well. Most surprising of all was her willingness to fight for it. There was far more to Sierra Mora than met the eye, and he liked what he was seeing.

  “I want to take the club straight,” he said to avoid having to answer her. “Fletch, Gunner, Harrison, Nic and I, and the old ladies, have a business plan. We can take DVMC legit and stop having to look over our shoulders all the time. But fucking Paul Beaker won’t listen. He would rather play h
is little power games, pitting one member against another and get his rocks off watching the members fight. It’s no coincidence that President is the only position that has be voted in. It takes a two-thirds vote to call an election and a two-thirds vote to elect a new one. Anything that falls short and the old President keeps his position. It was set up like that before I joined, and that’s how he stays in power.”

  “You can’t rally enough support to vote him out?” she asked after swallowing the bite of burger she was chewing.

  “No, not even close. Monica, Dom, Skye, Blaze, Minx…a bunch of others, they all get off on the power struggles, the fighting and fucking. Skye and Monica, they are constantly at each other’s throats. Paul doles out favors and scraps to keep them that way. But deep down inside, I think they like the fighting.”