“Well now, only thing we need is a name and I will file my first official paperwork as attorney for the club when I file for our business license along with copyright on the name.” Jag smiled at us.
“Sons of Black Hawk Custom Rides.” It hit me as I looked at each one of my friends and took the smacks to my back as a unanimous yes.
Looked like Black Hawk MC was going to have a new business.
The lot at B&B was full as I parked the cage toward the end of an aisle. The ol’ ladies’ food had run out and it was time to stock my place. I’d had a productive day between clearing the room, breaking down the bike, and making plans for a business with my best friends. All in all, not a bad day.
After the guys had left, I showered, dressed, and headed to town. I swung by the diner and ate a burger and fries before I made my way to the store. No way was I going in this place hungry. I’d learned that lesson years ago when I’d had my first place and had thrown out more of what I bought than I had eaten.
Hadn’t taken long to fill the cart, I only had one more aisle to back track to, the cereal, my weakness too. I ate plenty of meat and vegetables to keep my physique prime. However, I’d never been able to make myself eat the healthy cereal, I enjoyed the shit I’d eaten as a kid: Fruit Loops, Lucky Charms, and my favorite, Captain Crunch.
When I headed down the aisle the first thing I noticed was the little body hanging on to the top shelf with one hand and reaching the other to get a box from the shelf. The kid was stretched on her tippy toes and my only thought was that was so not going to end well.
“Darlin’, you need some help with that?” I wanted to grab her but didn’t think a grown man grabbing a little girl and scaring the shit out of her would be such a good idea, but it happened anyway when I spoke ‘cause her foot slipped and she was headed down the shelves.
I grabbed her around the waist and set here down quickly, then reached and snagged the box she was trying to grab off the shelf. I turned and looked down at her.
“This what you wanted?” I hadn’t paid that close of attention to her until she looked up at me.
“Yep, thanks, mister.” She reached her small had out for the box but I didn’t move, I just stared at her. The little girl with my face, hair, and eyes. Fuck me. No doubt entered my mind on her parentage. I imagined I’d have looked just like her at that age if I’d been a girl. Considering how she was dressed in jeans, a t-shirt, and boots on her feet, her hair and facial features were the only things to give away she was a girl. A beautiful little girl who no doubt belonged to me.
“Can I have my cereal? I said thanks like my momma told me to when peoples help.” Her eyes stared into mine and I watched her eyebrows draw together in thought and she sucked her lip between her teeth.
“Sure, darlin’. Where’s your mommy or daddy at?” It was wrong but I wanted to know what the little girl had been told.
“Momma forgots to get my favorite so she sent me while she was going to gets her female things. Whatever that means?” Damn if she wasn’t a cutie and she hadn’t been done talking either.
“I don’t gots a daddy? He’s gone. You got a daddy?”
“No, my daddy is gone too.” I continued to watch her face as she watched me. Then, after she looked up and down the aisle she leaned closer to me and lowered her voice.
“Benji said I couldn’t goes to the party at school for dads ‘cause I don’ts have one. Did you miss daddy parties too?” I had no clue who Benji was but the kid needed his ass kicked. I may not have known this little creature existed until this moment but no one, and I mean no one would ever hurt her, she was fucking mine.
“That right, huh? Whatcha your momma say to that?” It was wrong pumping the kid when I should let her go to her mother before her mother came looking for her. We’d have a conversation about what was mine but it wouldn’t be in a damn grocery store.
Her voiced lowered, “I punched him in the nose and momma said I wasn’t to hit peoples even if they said ugly things?”
“You did good, nice job, slugger.” Yeah didn’t care about father of the fuckin’ year, my girl would take no shit off anyone.
“I’m spider, not slugger.”
“Spider?” Christ, I had no clue about little girls.
“Spider monkey.”
“Oh, because you climb?” I chuckled when she just stared at me.
“Not just that. I gots black hair and I am fast. Perry said it’s because I’m evil likes them.”
“Did he now?” By my calculations the ass kicking numbers were going to sky rocket. Fuckers hadn’t said a goddamn word.
“Yep. You gots kids?” The same color eyes looked back at me. How to answer this one?
“Sure do.”
“A boy or girl? Benji said my daddy probably left ‘cause I was a girl.”
“Benji says a lot shit, doesn’t he?” Yeah, hope Benji’s dad had fucking life insurance, Benji’s mom could be a rich woman.
“That’s a bad word. Aunt Carly says bad words too. She called Benji a little bastard and momma yelled at her. But don’t tell my momma, she don’t knows I heard her and it’s a bad word too.” I bit down on the inside of my jaw to hold back the laugh only because of the serious look on my daughter’s face. My daughter, fucking unreal.
“Sure thing, darlin’, you better go find your momma before she hunts for you.” Her mother and I would have a chat after I took care of a few other things first.
“‘K,” she said and took off down the aisle. I watched until she turned out of view and grabbed my own box of the cereal and chuckled—Captain Crunch—yeah, she was mine.
After I checked out, loaded the bags in the back of the truck, I got in the cab and waited. I wanted to see the woman, my daughter’s mother. Sami walked off in the club when she recognized me. I might not have recognized her then, but it came back to me. And wasn’t that convenient because it was her who had me up at three in the morning.
I remembered everything: the feel of her skin, the way her mouth tasted when I kissed her, the taste of her juices as I licked and sucked at her, bringing her to orgasm. But even with all that, what I remember most was her touch. Her fingers tracing my tattoos, the way she ran her hand over me, pushing the dreams back that haunted me. The faces of my comrades as they died, the enemy I killed in retaliation, it was at night when it would sneak in to torment me. She made it go away, giving me peace for the first time since I’d gone to the desert.
Motion at the front doors had me sitting up straighter in the seat. There she was, the auburn haired woman with the little girl with black flowing hair. I watched them push the wheeled cart to their car, fill the trunk with bags, and then get in and drive off. My truck not far behind. I followed at a distant until they pulled in a driveway to a small house, then I drove past. I now knew where they lived and would be back. But first, back home, and then over to the clubhouse to get some answers. It’d been kept for almost five years, a few more hours wasn’t going to matter.
I’d laughed out loud on my way back when it hit me that like the encounter with her mother, other than Spider, I didn’t get her name either.
Chapter Eleven
Speed
The door to the clubhouse hit the wall and bounced back to close on its own as I walked in. The brothers that sat in the room looked at me but not a word was said, which told me my face must have reflected my intentions.
I’d already went to my home and put the food away, not because I was afraid it would spoil, more to calm my ass down some before my head exploded. As I’d driven back from town, every emotion had flowed through me. Pain from the betrayal and deceit of my brothers, which quickly turned into anger toward them and against the woman who had kept my daughter from me. When I stepped out of the truck at my home my head was ready to explode so I took that small amount time to do something normal before going to the club.
As I walked down the hallway toward the office, the stop by the cabin had been a waste as my fists clenched at my sides. I
didn’t stop to knock, I grabbed the knob and threw the door open and walked straight into the office, catching Stroker, Flyboy, Preacher, Cruz, and Romeo off guard. Stroker sat behind his desk and the other men sat in chairs in front of him, each with their head turned toward the door I just barreled through.
“How fucking long have you known, all of you?” No way everyone who happened to be in the clubhouse hadn’t heard me yell, but I would have had to care to give a shit.
“Close the door and take a seat, Speed,” Stroker said and motioned to a chair to the side of the desk. His voice calm and normal considering I about took his office door off its hinges.
“Answer me?” I said as I turned and shut the door.
“Sit, now. I can tell you are upset but don’t forget I am the president of this club and you will have respect for the fucking position whether you don’t have respect for the man. Take. A. Fucking. Seat. Now.” He leaned back and crossed him arms over his chest and waited. The others hadn’t said a word but held identical poses.
“I will stand here until someone answers me because if I get closer and don’t like the answer I could easily crack a few heads.” I held up my hand when Cruz’s mouth opened to speak, cutting him off, “Before you go spewing club rules and shit as the Enforcer for Black Hawk, save it. I will kick ass and take names if I don’t like the fucking answers,” I looked directly at Stroker, “and I say it with all respect to this club and the position you hold, I’ll let you know if I have respect for the man when you’re done speaking.” My heart felt like it was going to come through my chest as I looked at them and waited. I didn’t get the immediate answers I wanted, what I got was five men looking back with smiles spreading across their faces.
“What the fuck are you smiling about? I just said I would kick your asses if I didn’t like your answers.”
The door flew open and in piled Crusher, Flirt, Jag, Coast, and Devil bringing up the rear. They came to a halt when they surveyed the standoff in the room.
“Has everyone in this club lost their fucking minds on whose office this is? I don’t want an answer for that question because I’m going to answer it for you.” Stroker stood, smile gone and the mask he wore was the one I remembered from our youth when we’d sat in chairs in this office and had our collective asses chewed off for some shit we’d done.
Finger pointed at me, Stroker motioned toward the chair by his desk again, “You, there, now if you want your goddamn answers,” then he pointed at the others and motioned toward the couches pushed against the wall, “plant your asses there and if one of you opens your damn mouth without me or one of the other officers speaking to you, you’ll get a lesson on how we still hold this club and why other clubs don’t fuck with us.” He stood, waiting, as we each moved to sit. Once we’d sat, Stroker took his seat once again.
“Now, nice to see you aren’t going to have an issue questioning Crusher when he takes over as president. I worried, we all did,” his arm stretched and waved to encompass the other officers, “about you boys being too close and just going with the flow instead of asking questions or holding each other responsible for the jobs you will hold in this club. That being said, let us get to what brought you barreling into this office ready to mow down each of us.
“I’m assuming you ran into your daughter today, Speed?” I felt without turning in their direction, my friends’ eyes on me. “Hear me out before anyone speaks,” Stroker’s hand raised palm out, halting me and probably the others too from talking. “We didn’t know at first. Right before your father’s accident, we were contacted by Haven MC’s president. I’d known Wild Bill before he took over when his dad was killed, he’d just come back from the military, same battalion I was attached to, he was married when he came back too. Haven had always been rivals of Black Hawk because his old man was a mean sonofabitch. The Haven club are one percenters, which you boys know. But while dealing in moving drugs, some of the members started using more of their product. When your members are drugged up that is when the clubs become vulnerable. Wild Bill called and wanted to know if we would let two of Haven’s women come into our territory while he figured out what was going on in his club. It seems his VP along with a couple others in club didn’t like Wild Bill taking over for his dad, nor when the club got worse with the drug use, the fact he was going to clean that up. They planned a little coup per se but Wild Bill got wind. That’s why he asked to put the women here. He didn’t want them used as pawns while he figured out exactly who was involved. One is his daughter, the other the VP’s.” Stroker paused and looked around the room.
“What the fuck does this have to do with my goddamn daughter?” Then it clicked and I raised my hand to stop Stroker. “Are you saying Sami is Wild Bill Borelli’s daughter? My daughter’s grandfather?” Stroker looked as if he was trying to hold back a laugh and when I looked at the others they too were biting the insides of their mouths, their eyes gleaming with humor. My friends’ expressions would have been comical if I wasn’t shocked at my fucking luck. “Fuck me, it’s all true. And you bastards want to laugh. There is not a damn thing funny about this situation. I have a four-plus-year-old daughter that I have just met because I happened upon her in the fucking grocery store, a baby’s momma that I just remember this morning I fucked—one night might I add—with a goddamn condom on my dick—and she’s the fucking daughter of a rival club—their damn princess of all things.” I leaned my head back, closed my eyes, and took a deep breath.
Preacher’s laugh brought my head back up and my eyes narrowed when the others joined in. Cruz was the one to gather himself enough to speak.
“Speed, we aren’t laughing at you,” he wiped his eyes, “we had to be thinking the same thing though, this moment would have been damn near perfect if Cutter had been here. It just brought back the time when you boys spent more time in this office to the point your asses left prints in the chairs.”
I smiled as did the others, remembering but it was short lived because I wasn’t finished with what the hell was going on and why they hadn’t told me.
“It doesn’t answer why you haven’t told me about my daughter, don’t say you had no clue because that little girl looks just like me.”
“And did you say two women came into our territory? Who is the other?” Crusher spoke for the first time since entering. We looked toward Stroker again.
“The deputy, she—” Stroker was cut off by Crusher.
“Deputy Bitch is from the Haven MC? Are you shitting me? You didn’t think this was important to tell us when we got back or after she and I—”
Crusher stopped midsentence and crossed his arms over his chest and stared at the Pres.
“You and she what, Crusher?” Stroker waited for his question to be answered.
“Nothing, we’ve been circling around for six fucking months, she rides my ass every chance she gets and you didn’t bother telling me she was from another club. Some of that could have been curtailed with a little knowledge. That’s all I was saying.” Not by the look I was reading on his face but I had my own issues, which brings me to my next question.
“Did you say the VP’s daughter? The VP that was planning a fucking coup to take over. Seriously?” Christ what a huge ass fucking clusterfuck.
“Yes, she and Sami grew up together, she’s close with Sami and we all know you can’t hold the father’s stupidity against her. She wasn’t helping take the damn club over, nor has she been an issue here.” Could have sworn I heard Crusher say under his breath “Just him.”
“We keep getting off subject. Let’s get this finished. Speed, Sami and Carly moved here, they lived together in a place Wild Bill bought for Sami, they attended college. They didn’t come to the club, they didn’t hang around the businesses, it wasn’t like we sat on them twenty-four/seven, they just lived in our territory. Knew she was pregnant but figured it was by one of the men over in the Haven’s club. We never saw the little girl, she applied for the manager’s job at Soft Tails. Her knowledge of clubs wa
s a selling point on hiring her, she’d know how to keep her mouth shut. Then the guys apply for positions there, they get hired, and one day the little girl comes in with her ‘cause the babysitter was sick. That’s when we found out. Tank and the boys who were working saw her, they made the call here and we,” his arm swung to include the other dads, “went by with the excuse it was Black Hawk business. We saw her and I’m surprised Sami didn’t pick up on it because I know it shocked the shit out of us. And when that little girl ran up and spoke to us, and lifted her head, Speed, I saw Cutter. If I hadn’t known your dad so well, and that he wouldn’t have touched such a young girl, I’d have thought him the father. We got mad like you that we wasted so much time not knowing the little girl existed and that Sami, coming from a club, knowing what family means to club and not telling us, yeah we had our own moment of crazy. Stem saved us from going the fuck off, he’d been the Prospect the day she came to the clubhouse and asked for you about a month or so after you went back to the desert. All she was told was you were gone. So if it helps, she must have come here to tell you.
“Our part, son, when we found out, that was the time you were shot and healing, it was a judgement call on our part. If you hadn’t come home for good, we would have notified you. However, we’ve taken care of her, she’s been protected since the day we found out. Sami doesn’t know we know. I don’t think she even told Wild Bill. He comes in to visit a few times a year. Usually by himself, no cut, and only stays a few days. He’s never said a word to us and I’m sure he would. Let’s just say, the clubs are going to have to come to terms with one another because that little girl ties us, whether we want it or not.
“And let me add, you owe Dare, he’s kept this from Shakes. Christ, she will go nuts as if she was really the grandmother and you boys know that. She’s thought of each of you as a son and she was tough. There were times Dare thought we might kick him out of the club because if she thought we wronged you boys, she was in our shit. We can buy you some time there because that was why we were meeting. Dare and Shakes have a young girl staying with them. Everyone will be told at the next Church that she is their niece and had a few problems at home and will be staying with them for a little while. This part doesn’t leave this office though. We’ve been making a few alliances lately, the newest is with Ops Warriors, they merged two of their clubs and are out of San Diego now. They’re having a little issue involving the Mexico border, which is part of their territory and they need to stash her for a time where no one would look for her. Hence, Shakes and Dare’s niece.” Damn, new changes within Black Hawk every day it seemed. I wasn’t done with my own issue yet, one more thing needed answered though I thought I already knew this particular answer.
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