Ride Me Right

by Michele De Winton

  “Shit.”

  “Shit is right.” She took a deep steadying breath. “If Jake hadn’t been there . . . God, he was right, I was an idiot. I ran right into it. Thought I was being the big hero, running to try and save some other bikes, and then, he grabs me and . . .” She trailed off as the full impact of what would have happened if Jake hadn’t been there took hold.

  “Those fuckers set fire to your bike and you tried to save theirs? What’s that about? Why bother?”

  Why bother indeed. Lucy checked her reactions. But it hadn’t been a conscious decision. Her body had seen bikes in danger, and she’d gone to their rescue. God, it made her sound like some sort of motor worshipper. The revelation hit her. “It’s not about whose bikes they are. It’s about the motors themselves. I just wanna make them sing.”

  Sly was quiet a moment. “Check you out. You big romantic.”

  Lucy shrugged even though she knew Sly couldn’t see her. “Hardly.” She could be romantic all she liked, but that wasn’t going to pay her rent, or look out for Katie.

  “It’s gonna make it harder when you break the news to them though.”

  Lucy was jerked back into the reality of sorting out her future. “Break the news to who?”

  “The Hell’s Boys. Or was that your plan? Make nice by trying to save their bikes then say sayonara and jump ship to the dark side? Not a bad plan. Still going to go down like a burning bag of dog shit. Reckon it would have been better to just drift away quietly. But that’s me. I’m not a romantic. Practical bones, that’s what my parole officer said.”

  Lucy rolled her eyes. “I think your parole officer was probably just trying to be polite.”

  “Whatevs. Anyway. Time’s ticking. Did you get your stuff or what? Everyone’s itching to get going now.”

  “Hang on. You told them?”

  “You said you were in.”

  Had she? Lucy went back over their conversations. She’d gone through with the break-in. Had been serious about setting up with the Reapers of Menace. About leaving Hell’s and all the support they’d offered her. “I don’t know. I thought you weren’t going to talk to anyone until I actually had the contacts and was ready to go.”

  “But you are, aren’t you? Come on, you can’t be earning shit in that job. And you know it’s only a matter of time until someone decides they’re going to move in to the bunkhouse too. Don’t tell me you’ll be happy about that.”

  That was definitely true. Waking up with a snoring, six-foot horn-dog in her room was not on her top ten hopes and dreams list.

  “I need a bit more time.”

  Sly muttered something she didn’t catch.

  “What? Hey, come on, this is a big deal. And remember who it was that saved your ass so you could win your bike back.”

  “I know, I know. That’s the reason I’m doing this. I want you working on my bike. Legit. Don’t take too long thinking about it. The Reapers of Menace are waiting and they’re not that good at waiting. Make a clean break. Come work and get a life. Hell’s Boys’ll get over it.” He hung up.

  Lucy stared at her phone for a second and sat on the edge of the bunk. Flicking her eyes up around the room she took in the four small walls that her life had boiled down to. This couldn’t be all there was for her. It was too much like being stuffed under the staircase by her mom.

  Turning her gaze to the door she let her mind stray to Jake, resting, probably, upstairs. She’d felt badly that he’d stood up for her in the face of Martinez’s wrath over his broken bike. Given her an alibi even. Jake hadn’t deserved her spinning out at him because she felt embarrassed. But then he’d gone and saved her from the explosion anyway. Shit. She meant something to him. Enough to risk his life for her. Yet when it had all been over, he’d been the one to yell, fear bright in his eyes, a fear that didn’t seem to be only about her. The man had a lot of demons to kill and whether he had room for hers too she wasn’t so sure. It seemed impossible that things could change so quickly and so dramatically. She took a deep steadying breath.

  No need to get melodramatic about it. She was still the same. “What do I want?” That was the crux of it. Except it wasn’t what she wanted, that was clear, it was how to make it happen.

  Without a bike the best she could do to clear her head was go for a walk, so after throwing on her clothes, Lucy slipped out a back entrance. The one thing she knew for certain was that she was the only person she could count on. Time to look out for her.

  The fire had shown her just how quickly things could go wrong. Big wrong. Even on a rumor, a couple of gang boys had gone crazy. Imagine what would happen if she did actually jump ship.

  Sly had asked her if she was in or out. Despite going through with the break in, deep down she knew this was way bigger than she wanted to go. Working with a rival gang was too big, too hard, the future too unknown. The thinly veiled comments from Sly about them coming to get her might have been a joke to him, but if she’d been on the receiving end they would have got unfunny pretty quick and if she burned her bridges with the Hell’s Boys, she’d have no one. Not a one. Except Jake? Maybe. But she couldn’t count on him. He was about to go back into movie land and take over the world again. No, better that she worked out her own future, like she’d always done.

  And what does that mean, really, genius? She couldn’t stay working at Wilde’s forever. Her soul would shrivel. And if this Rick guy turned out to be moderately okay, then her wish of running the Hell’s shop was never going to happen. Turning a corner, she spotted a brand-new strip of shops, part of a development that Briony’s new husband, Cole, had built. At the end was a shop. A mechanics shop. One that hadn’t existed a week ago. A stripped-down car on a jack was visible through the open roller door, but in the back, she saw a couple of bikes lined up. “Holy shit. Really?”

  Was fate just about to hand out candy too?

  Sticking out her hand to the first guy who approached her, she took a deep breath and channeled all the charm she didn’t have. “Good afternoon. My name’s Lucy, I’m a great bike mechanic, and I’m looking for work.”

  The guy’s eyebrows shot up. “Right. Better talk to the boss then.”

  Is that a good thing? The boss was a huge tank of a man. Taller than Hade and wider than most bikes. Lucy couldn’t help herself and blurted out, “Fuck me. How do you fit under a car?” Idiot. Almost ramming her fist in her mouth, she squeezed her lips tight to stop anything else stupid from coming out. “Sorry. Sorry.”

  The guy’s eyes widened even farther and, thankfully, he threw his head back and laughed, long and loud. “Shit, girl. Here I was thinking you were way too pretty to last two seconds covered in grease surrounded by the shitheads who work here. Reckon I don’t have to worry about that, do I?”

  She smiled. “No sir. I’m used to making sure the work gets done. Period. Anyone has a problem with that, they’re probably not paying enough attention to their own job.”

  He nodded. “Name’s Clint.”

  She put her hand out. “Lucy Black. I’ve worked on bikes for the past two years. Some people call me a wizard. I just want to do the work. Make the machines sing,” she said, channeling her new revelation. “The rest is none of my business.”

  His eyes scanned her and Lucy felt his approval before he said anything.

  “I can’t say I’m particularly tolerant of . . . foolish people. So as long as we’re on the same page you’ll be fine.” Again, he laughed. “Just so happens I need a bike mechanic. Be nice to have a woman in the shop to keep us in line. My wife would like it, thinks we’re a pack of meatheads.”

  Lucy’s heart just about jumped into her throat. “Really? I can start whenever you need—”

  Clint put up his hands. “You’ll have to do a trial. And I want to see some references.”

  Shit. What would Gav put down on paper about her? And how was she going to walk back in there knowing she’d broken into his shop? Could she keep the guilt off her face? You have to. So she would. Right now
was the easy part; the trial she could deal with. “No problem. Will take me a day or two to get a reference from my last job but it won’t be a problem. And I can do a trial for you whenever suits.”

  “How about now? Got a bike out back there that’s sat here for three days. No one knows what the fuck is wrong with it except that the clutch is off. It’s fine one minute and then we take it out and end up wheeling it back in when it cuts out and someone ends up stuck in the wrong gear going nowhere fast.”

  Lucy’s brain started going a hundred miles an hour working through the possible issues with the bike’s clutch. “You sure it’s the clutch?”

  Clint tilted his head. “I guess not. If you can prove to me it’s not and then show me what’s wrong with it, you get a three-month trial, references or not.”

  That was more like it. “Got a spare pair of overalls?”

  “Be a bit big but yep.”

  “As long as they’re not yours I’m sure they’ll be fine,” she said. “Could probably fit my whole body into one of your legs.” Again, he laughed and Lucy’s heart made itself a field of flowers and started skipping around in them.

  Walking back across the shop floor, Lucy felt all eyes on her. The three other guys in various positions under and over cars tried not to show it, but she felt the skepticism pouring off them. At least they’re not angry though. She’d take skepticism over brutal bullying any day.

  “This is Lucy Black. Gonna look at that bike than none of you guys have a clue what to do with. She fixes it I figure she gets a shot here. Fair deal?”

  The men shrugged but the tension in the air eased palpably.

  All right, girl. This is it. Time to show you really are a wizard, otherwise you might as well own the fact you’ll be cleaning toilets the rest of your life.

  Looking over the bike, she could see instantly that whoever owned it had ridden it hard. That would be half the problem most likely, but whatever was causing it to cut out would be tucked up inside the motor, and with any luck it would just be a matter of being systematic rather than actually having to whisper some sort of spell on the thing to make it reveal itself.

  She asked for a range of tools and got to work.

  Two hours later, she had half the motor disassembled, helped by the fact that the boys had already taken the cover off. Clint had gone off for a coffee, and one of the car guys, Steveo, according to his overalls, was watching her, asking a question about every other minute.

  Making herself stay calm and focused, she answered them as best she could and just kept plugging away.

  “There.” Finally, she found it. “There’s a hole, there in the vacuum line from the intake manifold. And if you look there, under the spark casing, those tiny balls, there’s water in the fuel somewhere, might have even gotten to the filter. That’s what’s causing it to cut out.”

  “So you can fix it?”

  “Already halfway there, Steveo. The clutch is a bit screwed, but if I replace that too this baby should sing like a happy little canary who just found her momma.”

  He grinned and slapped her on the back. “She’ll do,” he said to the other two as he walked back to the car he was fixing and they both simply nodded and got on with their work.

  Lucy’s head spun. Was it really going to be this simple? If fate was about to give her candy this easily, why had it taken so long? Walk in, almost fuck it up by swearing at the boss straight off the bat, then . . . this? Hang tight, sister, you haven’t fixed the bike yet, and you haven’t got the job. Clint might give her a three-month stint on the back of her getting this bike purring, and he’d said he didn’t need references right away, but if she wanted to stay, she was going to have to convince Gav to write her a reference that wasn’t a pile of steaming horse poo.

  The next hour flew by as she drained the tank, flushed it out, and put a couple of cans of gas treatment through it. By the time she was sure it was fully wiped clean of water, she’d replaced the filter too. Finding the hole in the casing underneath was the last step in fixing the cutouts and with the wire stripped and reattached, she was damn sure the bike would be good to go.

  Just as Lucy was reassembling it Clint arrived with a woman who headed into the office. “So. Was it the clutch?”

  “The clutch is screwed, but just because it’s old. Has she had a service in like, forever?”

  Clint rolled his eyes, but not at her, with her. Lucy’s whole body wanted to hug the guy. Ease up, it can’t be this simple. “The guy who owns this thinks bikes should run themselves,” Clint said. “Honestly he probably weighs more than me but he’s only five foot two.”

  Lucy patted the bike. “Poor baby got a lotta weight to carry around. No wonder she was struggling.”

  Clint’s jaw tightened. “Boys said you found something else though.”

  She talked Clint through what she’d done and then he waved Steveo over to take it out for a ride.

  “I’ve tweaked the clutch enough to get you on the road happily. Probably last another couple of months. But I figure that if the owner isn’t going to do shit, sorry, I mean, if he’s not going to bring her back soon, it’s better to replace it. That’s your call though.”

  Clint nodded. “Appreciate that. Let’s see what you think, Steveo.”

  Lucy shut her eyes, willing the bike to be good to her.

  The bike started first time Steveo thrust down on the starter and when he turned the throttle, the engine roared, filling the garage with a perfectly tuned bubble of sound that made Lucy sigh a happy sigh. Opening her eyes she looked up at Clint and the guy gave her a nod.

  When she heard the roar of Steveo coming back after only ten minutes out on the road, her first thought was that she’d missed something. But the bike sounded just as good coming back in as it had going out, and when he pulled the helmet off, Steveo’s face told her all she needed to know.

  “So?” Clint asked the question before Lucy had to.

  “Honestly, boss?”

  Lucy wanted to pry the words out of Steveo’s mouth as he gave the longest pause humanly possible.

  “Come on, the girl’s about to wet her pants.”

  Steveo grinned. “Think you better hire her, boss.”

  The air hissed out of Lucy faster than a tire with a nail puncture.

  “How long did you spend on that bike?”

  Lucy looked at the clock on the wall. “Three hours, ten minutes.”

  “Hell’s teeth, you’re fast too.”

  Lucy couldn’t decide from his tone if that was good or bad. Did he want to charge her out for longer like some of the garages she’d worked in? “I can slow down. I just wanted to make sure it was fixed when you got back.”

  Clint held up a hand. “Don’t slow down. You just do it how you do it, and we’ll work out the billing later. If you don’t miss anything, I’m good with you being fast. I’m great actually.”

  “I didn’t miss anything.”

  “Right then. I said I’d give you a three-month trial so we better sign you up before anyone else gets you. Once you’ve met Joy, of course. Unless there’s something else I should know. You’re not on the run from the law or anything, are you?”

  She shook her head.

  “Got a record?”

  “No, sir. Never been arrested.”

  “Well, that makes one of us. Right. Better get the boss out here. Joy!” He called over his shoulder.

  “Sorry, who is Joy? I thought you were the boss.”

  Clint’s smile was warm but Lucy saw a little bit of something else in his face. What was it?

  “Joy is my wife. Make a good impression with her when she arrives or the three-month trial is off.”

  It was respect. The look. Lucy’s heart tightened at the revelation. It was solid, simple respect for a partner. It took her a while to place it, given how little of it she’d seen in her own life.

  “Told her I was thinking about hiring a woman here and she laughed at me, told me the boys’d have to watch their backs �
�cause you’d probably be better than all of them,” Clint said.

  “She said that?”

  “I did.” No more than five feet tall to Clint’s six-four, Joy strolled out of the office, full of smiles and bright piercing eyes. Eyes that gave Lucy an up and down, which felt more like an X-ray. “She’s very pretty for a mechanic. You sure you guys aren’t going to feel emasculated having someone this pretty be better than you?”

  Lucy’s jaw dropped, her muscles literally giving up any pretense of trying to hold onto the bones in her face.

  “So you’re Lucy?” Clint’s wife held out her tiny hand and Lucy took it, wiping hers on her overalls first.

  “Yes, ma’am. Lucy Black.”

  The handshake was firm. Firmer than Lucy had expected, but with the physical contact her nerves were calmed a little.

  “You fixed it?”

  “Sorry?”

  “The bike. You fixed it? It’s my father’s.”

  Oh. Fuck. When she’d basically told Clint that the owner was a douchebag for treating his bike badly. Still said he’d give you a job, remember. Maybe he doesn’t like his father-in-law any more than the bike does.

  Joy saw her consternation. “It was in terrible shape. My father hasn’t really been himself for a while.”

  Double shit. So the guy wasn’t well and she’d been all up over him? Good one. At least she’d shut up quickly with Clint, and hadn’t said anything to Joy. “I’ve fixed it. Yes.”

  “Good. Come with me.” Joy led her over to the office where Clint left them to it, exiting quickly and giving Lucy a wink over Joy’s head.

  “So. What’s your story? Clint only just opened here, but the boys have been with him for a couple years. Bringing someone else on will change everything. Clint tells me you’ve impressed Steven already though. You know your stuff, and you don’t mess around, I like that.”

  Steven, Steveo. Woman ran on manners. Lucy made sure to not let a single cuss out of her mouth. “I’m glad he liked my work. It’s a nice workshop, good setup, and the guys seem good at their jobs. That’s all I’m after. Do the work, make the bikes purr.”

  Joy cocked her head. “So why don’t you have a job at the moment?”