Dante

by KJ Dahlen

  Dante just stared at his family in shock. “I’m not that bad that you have to threaten me with bodily injury, brothers.”

  “Oh yes, you are.” Mountain nodded. “All we’re saying is don’t play this girl, she doesn’t know all your games.”

  Dante walked away from their condemning looks and attitude. It gave him pause to think that’s what they thought of him. Really? He wasn’t a playboy. He just liked to play. The women he normally went out with knew the score and they played the same games he did.

  He had to frown as he looked back at his family. He wasn’t a complete scoundrel. He would never hurt a woman, didn’t his brothers know that? They grew up in the same house, under the guidance of the same man. Their father would have horsewhipped them if they ever hurt a woman’s feelings or disrespected her. That just wasn’t done in the Morgan family. He didn’t count Abby. She had been upscale but she’d acted downscale. She had been a mistake. He didn’t intended to make that one again.

  However, this Andi was 180 degrees different from her. He just never had a thought that asking her out and going out with her would lead to hurting her? This was all too much at once for him. He had been wild, sure... But hadn’t they all been at one time or another? Well, maybe just Byron, he had been a good time man until he met his girl. Come to think of it, most of them had played a little but not like Dante had.

  He walked back over to the house he shared with his brothers and went to his room. He couldn’t be around them right now. It hurt a little that they didn’t trust him to behave. That they honestly thought he’d grab what she had then drop her. Like some god dammed cad. No honor in that. But hell, he’d never done that to a girl, had he? He sat and thought back to when he was about nineteen. Yep, there it was... a girl that had crushed on him in high school. He ran into her one day at the store or something, maybe a year after they had graduated. He took her out on a few dates. Then one thing led to another and he was balls deep. Then afterward, she’d acted all clingy. Calling him and pleading to see him, talking about getting engaged, and shit. It had scared him and so he’d just avoided her.

  Then she had caught him one day, out at that same store where they had met up the first time and had been crying telling him what an asshole he was.

  People coming and going into the store had stared as she went on about him taking what she had and then running like she was some kind of slut. What a lowdown pig he was and many other expletives he didn’t care to remember now.

  Then she had moved away. He never saw her again. But hell, he had been all of nineteen! He hadn’t thought to get serious but he hadn’t stopped to check her thinking until it was too late. So from then on, he made sure every girl he went out with knew the score upfront. No misunderstandings. He never wanted to repeat that whole drama again.

  The more he thought about it the more he realized that maybe they were right. He had been partying like there was no tomorrow and the women he’d been seeing weren’t the type of women he wanted his mom to meet. They were all good time girls. Hell, he would never bring them home and introduce them to his brothers either.

  Maybe there was something to what they were trying to tell him. He needed to change his ways. But did he know how? Riding his cycle, racing rods and wild women were a way of life for him. He did need to rein himself in, he supposed, but old habits die hard as his dad used to say. Well, kicking these good time habits would be hard to do. He realized it had become a pattern. He just hadn’t looked at it clearly enough.

  Most people didn’t. They saw other people’s lives pretty damn clearly but not their own lives. What had he been doing all this time? Had he accomplished much? Just racing trophies and many pairs of panties as trophies.

  Suddenly, Dante felt like he was nineteen all over again. A dumbass, making all kinds of wrong turns. He sighed as he contemplated his wild racy life and thought of how he could change it.

  Chapter Three

  For the first time in a very long time, Dante stayed home that night. He spent the whole afternoon in the kitchen preparing his favorite supper, tips and gravy over mashed potatoes. His sister in laws, Shayna and Kelly showed up. Then they in turn, called Izzy and Quinn and soon the whole damn family was there.

  The brothers came over after quitting time and everyone enjoyed the meal and the unexpected family time. They even brought the leftover candy for desert.

  Mountain and Bowie cornered Dante just before they left. “Hey brother, are we good?” Mountain asked. “You seemed a little pissy when you left the shop today.”

  Dante shrugged. “Not pissy, just hurt that you guys would think I could ever disrespect anyone that way. I mean we all felt the bite of dad’s belt when we got out of line and that was one thing he never would have allowed to happen.”

  Bowie nodded. “Yeah we remember, but brother you’ve been headed down a one way path for a while now, and we’ve been worried about you.”

  “I guess I just didn’t see that until now,” Dante admitted. He looked over at them. “Today when I first went into that shop, I found heaven. Then I saw her and my world stopped. Oh man, she’s beautiful. One look was all it took. She was real, you know what I mean? Maybe you don’t but I’ll try to explain. The women I’ve been hooking up with, I never felt anything for them. I know that’s wrong but they were using me the same way I was using them. None of it was real. I guess going out with Abby really brought it to light. She was as fake as all the rest of them were but the way she acted when we broke up was totally unreal. She just expected me to do whatever she wanted, like I didn’t have a brain in my head. The words she screamed at me that day were unreal. Walking away from that bitch was the best thing I ever did.” Dante shook his head. “Can you believe she told me she’d get her brother to teach me a good lesson? She told me I’d never win another race either.”

  Mountain looked over at Bowie then back to Dante. “When exactly did this happen?”

  Dante shrugged. “Almost a month ago now, why?”

  “Because that’s about the time somebody started messing with our cars,” Mountain grumbled.

  “What the fuck are you saying?” Dante demanded to know. “What cars are you talking about?”

  “Three of the vehicles we’ve finished in the last month have been messed with,” Mountain explained. “Jace Reynolds had his lugs loosened almost to the point where he crashed. He called us the next morning to warn us. He knew we would never sabotage our own vehicles. Plus, he has security cameras in his garage. He could see someone messing with his vehicle but he couldn’t get a good shot of the bastard’s face.”

  “Then Paul Riggs’s car ended up with sugar in the tank,” Bowie told him. “We told him we’d replace the engine for free. He told us it wasn’t necessary but we insisted. He’s bringing it back in next week.”

  “And the third car?” Dante asked.

  “Rocky McDonald. Someone punctured his gas tank and broke his strap holding the tail pipe. He damn near got trapped in a burning vehicle when his tail pipe sparked a trail of gas behind him.” Mountain nodded.

  “And now with Brady watching us, it all makes sense doesn’t it?” Bowie stated.

  Dante was shocked. “What the everlovin’ fuck is going on here?”

  “I think Abby is making her threat come true.” Byron joined them. “Only problem is we can’t prove it was Jed or any of his minions. We got no proof that will stand up in court and I don’t know of anyone else it could be.”

  “Shit, I gotta a race coming up in two weeks and he’s one of the competitors,” Dante announced.

  “I’m thinking we need to find out what really happened in the race when Liam lost his life.” Chance joined the other brothers. “We need to dig into Jed’s career and figure out what’s going on. And watch our own backs until we get this figured out.”

  “We also need to do this on the QT,” Bowie suggested. “If he gets wind of our investigation, he isn’t going to be happy. He’s gotten away with his shit because no one looked too
closely at what he was doing.”

  “Maybe we should have Zipper do a search and see what he can find?” Dante suggested.

  Mountain nodded. “I’ll talk to Deke tomorrow. He has to ok Zipper’s involvement. We need to involve him anyway as what affect us, damn well affects them too. It’s their name under ours on the sign in front of the shop.”

  “Not to mention I’m married to his sister.” Chance remarked. “If something happens to her, he’ll bring hell down on those involved in it. He might appreciate a heads up.”

  “Sam will raise even more hell since Quinn is your woman and if that happens, blood will stain the streets of this town.” Bowie put out a warning. “He does tend to protect his daughters just a bit over the top.”

  “Exactly,” Mountain stated. “Besides, Deke needs to know because this could include the MC at some point. We are a part of that club and if we don’t give them a heads up, we could get our asses kicked as well.” Even as big a man as he was, he didn’t ever want to land on the bad side of the Tory’s.

  Dante stood there stunned. Could he have set this all into motion by playing with the wrong woman? He had just took her on for the hell of it, like he did everything in his life. Hell, he just thought it was her blowing off steam and he hadn’t taken her threats seriously at all. But this... it could have snow balled and the cluster fuck could encompass them all. Fuck... his list of regrets was damn well growing.

  The next morning, Dante sought out Wes. He found him bent over the hood of a vehicle as usual. “Hey, old man.”

  Wes looked up and saw him standing there. “Hey, yourself. What can I do for you?”

  “I need to know what the other pit crews are thinking and talking about as far as Jed Stroker is concerned. Like what you may have heard or what all you know. You’ve been in the crews for a long time.”

  “Yeah, that I have. Why you wanna know?” Wes continued working on the engine under the hood. “It’s just pit talk, speculation so to speak.”

  “I think it’s more than that,” Dante suggested. “Pit crews know everything that happens on the track and with their drivers. If Jed is messing up, the other drivers need to know. Their lives are at stake every time they enter the ring.”

  Wes stood up and nodded. Grabbing a rag to wipe the grease off his fingers he looked at Dante carefully. “I’ve heard some talk and it ain’t good. The boy is becoming reckless since ole Liam crashed. Being a braggart doesn’t help his cause any but people expect a certain amount of that. No one pays too much attention to the brat but they should. Racers are like hunters or fishermen, they like to exaggerate their own stuff. You never know what’s really true or not.”

  “What’s Jed been bragging about?” Dante frowned as he stared at the other man.

  Wes shrugged and didn’t say anything but Dante got the feeling he had something to say. “Did the racing commission ever examine the car?”

  Wes nodded. “What was left of it. The car did go through a brick wall you know.” Wes reminded him wirily. “They couldn’t find any tampering but then they wouldn’t have by that time would they? They couldn’t find anything that might not have been part of the accident.”

  “What about Liam’s crew? What happened to them?”

  “Out of the five man crew, Jed took on two of them, one left town right after the accident and two died in separate accidents within weeks of Liam’s death,” Wesley stated.

  “What the fuck?” Dante swore in shock. “How come we never heard about this shit?” He wondered now, if Mountain knew all this. This could be happening just like he said.

  “Danny Owens drove his car into a brick wall on purpose and Bart Stephens was the victim of a hit and run.”

  Dante sat down in a chair hard. Lifting his eyes in a shocked loss of what the hell to think, he just stared at Wes.

  Mountain and the other brothers noticed and walked over to listen.

  “And since then?” Dante asked.

  “Jed is becoming very reckless, in his private life and his public life.” Wes shook his head. “That boy knows no bounds. Thinks he can get away with anything now, that’s there’s no one out there to stop him. He even...” Wes paused. “...took some sixteen year old girl to his room after he won his last race. So, I hear. He then had to pay off her parents so they wouldn’t press Statutory on him. That isn’t maybe as serious as all this tampering and what he may have done to his own dad, but damn...this shows his character now doesn’t it? He could give a holy fuck what anyone thinks, apparently. He also doesn’t think he has to listen to the racing board anymore. They’ve given him two warnings in writing so far. The next one gets him banned from the circuit.”

  “You think he’d really risk getting banned?” Bowie asked.

  Wes snorted. “He wouldn’t even care if he were banned or not, he’d still show up to race, I’m thinking.” Shaking his head he added, “He thinks he can’t be stopped anymore. He also thinks the law can’t touch him because there is never any evidence left behind.”

  “Huh,” Mountain snorted. “Wonder how stand up his buddies would be if he threw them under the bus to save his own skin?”

  Bowie looked over at his oldest brother. “What are you thinking?”

  “Thinking it’s time we set a trap for Jed Stroker and his fucking minions. I’m sick of this shit and it needs to stop once and for all.” Mountain growled.

  His brothers all stared at him. They knew Mountain was crafty when he needed to be. He’d been in a couple of bad scrapes and made it out just fine. He ran with a hard as nails MC in the past. He had this look in his eyes that all his brothers recognized and it meant bad news for whoever had crossed him.

  Just then, they all heard the roar of bike engines as Deke, Sam and a few others pulled up. Deke and the guys joined them as Mountain laid out his plans. He first told Deke about the recent trouble they’ve been dealing with, then about Abby’s threats and the suspicious accidents, including Liam’s crash.

  They then turned to Wes.

  He told them what all he knew. Said some of it was just speculation. “However, the crashes weren’t that. They were sabotage pure and simple.”

  “I will get my man on it. If there’s any stone unturned he will turn it.” Deke agreed to get Zipper to dig into Jed’s past, not only his, but his friends.

  “That fucker can’t mean to keep getting away with this shit,” Sam added with a growl and a hard glint in his eyes.

  “Heads up, my friend,” Mountain warned his president. “If we do this, he could come after us. Hell, he’ll more than likely come after us, we’re already on his radar with Dante dumping his sister, but this could spill over to your family as well since Chance is married to your sister.”

  Deke glared at him. “He’d better leave well enough alone if he knows what’s good for him. He hurts one hair on Quinn’s head, he’ll wish he’d never been born. I’ll introduce him to hell itself.”

  “And if he doesn’t, I sure as hell will,” Sam vowed.

  None of the Morgan brothers were surprised by these statements. If you took on Sin’s Bastards, you weren’t leaving the battlefield, at all.

  Dante and all four of his brothers lived for hot rods and racing, but they weren’t willing to put their families at risk for anything. Well, maybe not all his brothers, Mountain was just too big to get into a hot rod and race like the rest of them did. He stood 6 foot 9inches tall at a solid 350 pounds and that was just too large to fit comfortably in the close confines of a race car. But he did enjoy building them. Nowadays, while he got his thrill from riding a two wheeled machine, he could still revel in the building of a sweet hot rod.

  The brothers had joined their older brother in Troy about two and a half years ago when he surprised everyone by finding his long lost daughter only to find her in trouble and under the protection of an MC.

  When the trouble was done and they found this MC was one of the better ones, the brothers had talked about staying in the area. It had been Mountain who’d s
uggested opening the shop and building custom hot rods. After all, they couldn’t just leave the public with only two wheel vehicles. So, Morgan Brothers Custom made Hot Rods Garage had been born.

  They’d all been welcome to join the brothers in the MC. Well, that was one step, the Morgan brothers had taken, and they hadn’t been sorry. The shop had become successful on its own and they were busier than ever.

  “Maybe you should have Zipper check on Abby’s past as well,” Dante informed them. “She’s never worked a day in her spoiled life, yet she’s always had plenty of money to throw away on trivial shit. She depends on the kindness of strangers or rather dupes, she can con her way around but it might be interesting to see who’s paying her bills.”

  Deke just stared at him. “And that’s the type of woman you go out with?”

  Dante shook his head. “I had three dates with the woman and I wouldn’t exactly call them dates. They were nothing but hookups. When she started going off on me about taking her shopping and paying her bills, I put an end to it.”

  “After three hookups she wanted you to take her shopping and pay her bills?” Sam frowned.

  Dante shook his head. “No she expected me to just hand her my credit card. She said she’d earned it by sleeping with me. She told me nothing in life is ever free and she was certainly not giving it away.”

  “That is one crazy bitch. And her brother has been causing lots of damage, the fucker,” Deke swore.

  “You got that right,” Dante agreed with him. “I admit, I jumped in on that one without looking at how deep the water was. I plan to be more careful of...women in the future.”

  “Yeah, a man never knows about a female and what mistakes you can make with them,” Sam nodded.

  Deke shook his head as he smiled for the first time since he arrived. “This over here is experience speaking, men.” He pushed a thumb at his dad.

  Sam glared at him.