by Cat Porter
“I’m really happy for you, Grace. After everything you’ve been through, the little Alicia’s told me. We don’t even know each other really well, but I feel like we do.”
“Maybe one day you’ll tell me all about what you’ve been through. We think keeping it bottled up is a good thing in the beginning, that we’re in control as we’re picking ourselves up off the floor. But then one day you take a good hard look in the mirror, and you don’t recognize the person staring back at you.”
“No, you don’t,” I breathed. “But I’m used to her now.”
Grace let go of my hand and sat back in her cushioned seat. “You know, my sister was a very wise woman. Just before she died she told me to let go of the ghosts and get on with joy. It seemed impossible to me at the time. But she was right.”
“Hmm.” I averted my gaze and rubbed my fingertips along the edge of a napkin that lay on the table. “If you have a minute or ten, come by my store before you head home so I can take your measurements and you can tell me about your wedding dress. Since I heard the news, I’ve been drawing a corset in my head for you.”
She sat back and tugged her coat on once again. “Let’s go. I can’t wait to see what you have in mind. I’ll get a cardboard cup for my coffee.”
She wasn’t going to push me. She knew the signs all too well.
I created a corset for Grace in a super sheer cream colored tulle decorated with intricate floral embroidery. The barely there bra was a padded silk quarter cup, and the bones and waistband of the piece were bound with smooth silk.
Three weeks later, as Grace came down the aisle of the church in Meager, holding on to her father, a slight wobble to her walk on her high heels, her figure looked divine in the elegant, strapless, pleated, off-white wedding dress she had chosen. I was thrilled to be at the wedding and witness her and Lock’s happily ever after come true. Full circle.
I took in the high beamed ceiling of the old church. I didn’t believe much in God. I’d never even been inside a church before this. There was never much talk about Him when I was growing up, or any reference except for the tiny gold cross my grandma wore around her neck and never took it off. Sometimes I caught her murmuring to herself, hands clasped together and I’d watch her in these peculiar, intimate moments. I never asked, and she never shared, but I knew it was special to her, meaningful.
At the front of the church, Grace and Lock exchanged vows and rings under the guidance of a pastor. All their friends and family leaned forward, listening, participating in the ritual. Simple, beautiful. A stop in the daily grind of life to be thankful, and to mark that thanks forever with a blessing.
There was a strange harmony at work in the world to have gotten me here to this very place with these people.
I clasped my hands together like Grandma used to do. “Thank you,” I whispered. I scanned the crowd. I had braced myself for seeing Tania at the wedding, but she wasn’t here. I’d been looking forward to it, actually. I missed her. I missed Beck, I missed—
My gaze caught on a pair of velvety brown eyes that smiled at me.
Tricky.
I returned his smile.
Tricky was a One-Eyed Jack who worked with Lock at the club’s car and bike repair shop. He had a thick mass of dark hair which usually fell in his brown eyes, giving him a sultry, but innocent look. I squirmed on the pew. He was maybe fifteen years my junior which put him in his late twenties. Whenever we saw each other, our exchanges usually segued into flirting.
After the ceremony, the celebration continued at Dead Ringer’s Roadhouse, a historic and favorite biker haunt off the highway in between Rapid and Meager. Once she arrived, Grace immediately tossed her high-heeled sandals at me, Dee, and Alicia, and gleefully slid on her new western boots Dee had ready for her in a shopping bag. Grace jumped to her feet with a loud, exultant “Yes!” Lock came behind her and swept her up in his arms, kissing her hard as he took her over to the huge dance floor. We whistled, clapped and hooted as they took their first dance as husband and wife.
We drank, we danced, sang along to old and new hits. I met Grace’s dad and her brother-in-law, Alex. I explained a couple of my tattoos along the insides of my fingers to her adorable nephew, Jake.
“Hey, Lenore.”
I swiveled around in my seat. “Hey, Tricky.”
Up close, Tricky inspired a little flutter in my tummy. Along with his toned body, he had a weary swagger to his step which gave his cute features a harder edge. He wiped his hair back as he settled into the chair next to mine. A white scar gleamed on his forehead, a scar from a knife fight when he was a prospect from what Mary Lynn had mentioned to me. Cute met sexy on a ledge.
“You having fun?” he asked.
“I’m having a great time. You?”
“Me too. You look fantastic, by the way.” His gaze trailed down my body.
“Thank you.” I crossed my legs, revealing them in the long split up my midnight blue dress that had a halter top along with a tiny silver shrug.
His finger traced over the skin of my shoulder, revealed by the thin cashmere shrug that had fallen back. I held his molten gaze.
“Aren’t you warm?” he asked.
“Getting there.”
“Oh yeah?”
I giggled. “Yeah.”
He leaned in closer to me, his lips tipping up into a grin, inches from my own. “How about I help get you there?”
It had been a while since I’d kissed a man, been touched, had sex. I would indulge in the odd one night stand here or there, when the mood struck, when I’d meet someone I was attracted to. But that was that, and I preferred it that way. Uncomplicated. Live it, then keep moving on. Leave nothing behind.
After my divorce I was mentally exhausted, and I’d decided to not get emotionally involved again. I didn’t have anything to give anyhow. Ask Eric. It was just as well. My heart was a particular bitch. I couldn’t kid myself about that.
Tricky’s coffee brown eyes gleamed at me, not in a predatory way, though. Eager. Anticipating.
“I bet you would,” I replied, my fingertips tracing his jawline.
He kissed me, and I kissed him back. Tequila and beer flavored my tongue from the warm, slick slide of his. Arousal pitched inside me.
His hand went down my side, curving gently over my lower back, heating my flesh through the thin material of my dress. “Dance with me,” he whispered against my ear, and a shiver shimmied over my skin.
I rose from my chair, and taking his hand in mine, led him to the dance floor. We stayed close for the rest of the evening. Hours later, he took me home, and like overheated teenagers, we made out in his Jeep the second he’d parked in my driveway.
I pulled back and opened the car door to the icy cold winter night. “Let’s go inside.”
“You sure?”
“I’m sure.” I grinned, slamming the car door.
I unlocked my house, tossed the keys on the console table and released the straps of my dress letting it slide down my body to the floor.
He let out a low groan at the sight of me in my lacy silky underthings. “Holy fuck.”
“Oh, I hope so.”
“Oh, I’ll make sure of it.”
He lifted me up in his arms, kissing me as he held me, walking us over to my sofa. He laid me down, bending to kiss me.
I pushed at his chest with my knee and he stumbled back. “Take your clothes off.”
His eyes flared, his body went rigid. He grinned and did as he was told.
“Uh-uh.” I said. “Slowly.” My hand slid between my legs and he let out a groan, the muscles of his torso contracting.
He went slower.
“Hmm. Like that.” I enjoyed the revelation of his body as he took off his clothes, one piece at a time, his eyes intent on me.
Tricky was hot, and I was in need.
Naked, he hovered over me, pushing my legs apart.
I took in a breath. No qualms, no regrets. Good times.
Or so I thought.
42
“What the hell is that?” My voice came out louder than I expected.
On the wall of the bar area where tens of other T&A shots beckoned, Drac tacked up an eighty by ten poster of a woman’s curvy body, her hands clutching her breasts, torso twisted to the side, ass revealed in a sexy panty made up of a web of straps. The photo cut off right at her chin. Winding colored vines of thorns and flowers, tiny winged creatures, numbers, fancy writing were inked all over the woman’s skin.
My chest tightened, the blood backwashed through my veins.
“Tell me you don’t like it.” Drac bit down on a piece of tape. Rip. “It’s an ad for this underwear store in Meager. Krystal went there and she brought this back for me along with some mighty nice lace numbers. Smoking, huh?” His hand smoothed over the model’s raised ass and down the back of her thighs. His hand lifted and the name of the store declared itself in gothic lettering.
I stared at the photo, staring at the vine down the back of her left thigh that was made of tiny linked letter J’s and baby rosebuds. A vine I’d licked countless times a century ago. It was my vine. Mine.
“In Meager?” I asked.
Drac rolled the tape on his fingers, admiring his new acquisition. “Yeah, in Meager.”
Last I’d heard she was in Rapid City.
Years ago, while setting up the WiFi and a new printer in my office, Den had logged on to some celebrity gossip site as he worked. He’d groaned about how the lead guitarist from Cruel Fate, a band he knew, was getting a divorce. Den often worked at local music festivals as his brother owned a security company. He’d worked with Cruel Fate at many gigs in the area.
“What an idiot,” Den had said. “His wife is fucking hot. His bit on the side, not so much.”
After Den had left the room, I’d gone online and typed the fuck’s name in the search engine: E-R-I-C and Cruel Fate. The divorce came up right away. They’d filed in California, citing “irreconcilable differences.” The article mentioned that Eric had a new girlfriend, complete with a photo of him and a smiley young blonde with lots of makeup boarding his tour bus together. The reporter noted that Eric’s wife had been at home all along with their young son. A small inset photo of a woman with a hoodie over her green and blue hair wearing huge sunglasses, holding close to her chest a young boy who wore a baseball cap, a protective hand around the back of his small head, had lasered onto my brain. I’d recognize those long, bony fingers anywhere, the perfect oval of her face, the grim pull of her mouth, taut and resolute against all odds.
My Serena.
The wife was claiming their house in Rapid City as her own, and had left the rock star to his LA digs.
Lenore had put a lot of goddamn effort into sealing me out. Building walls, digging trenches, filling those trenches with boiling oil, lining the surrounding fields with mines, setting fires, exhaling thick black smoke. She’d abandoned the smoldering battlefield. And at some point, so had I. But her “normal” life had detonated and shattered. She was alone again and in Meager, not two hours away, closer than ever before. I took in a deep, long breath as if the quality of the air had changed suddenly, and I needed to take it in slowly, carefully, not sure how my body would respond.
“Hey, Prez.” Slade was at my side. “Butler’s waiting for you in your office.”
My eyes traced every detail of that thigh, that round ass, that—
“Finger?” Drac looked at me funny.
Scowling, I headed for my office. Butler’s icy blue eyes snagged on mine as I settled in my chair.
After Dig got murdered and I’d gotten out of jail, Butler had reached out to me, and we’d tried being cooperative the way Dig had once envisioned for our clubs—that “velvet network.” But once Jump had taken over as President of the Jacks in South Dakota, he’d put a cold, hard stop to it.
Butler had risen to become President of the One-Eyed Jacks chapter in North Dakota, but almost a year ago, he’d resigned and taken off, tail between his legs, for being hopped up on coke and unable to lead like a President should, not to mention, making under the table deals with the Demon Seeds. He’d gone Nomad, doing freelance work for his club. He and I had kept in touch, and kept each other on top of shit in our region.
A hard grin tilted his lips. “Hey man, how are you?”
“I want to nail Creeper’s ass to the wall and then blow his brains out,” I replied.
Butler let out a gust of air. “I’ve been on his trail. He’s as slippery as a—”
“I called you here to find him, Butler. He needs to die. He’s been playing both sides of every fence between the Jacks, the Blades, and the Demon Seeds since he took off from your club. He was a useful rat in the beginning, but now he kidnapped one of my brother’s kids, a baby, ‘cause he didn’t get what he wanted. Unacceptable. Insane.”
Creeper had been pissed late last night that he hadn’t gotten the payment he’d felt he’d deserved from Catch on a minor freelance job. Catch had called him on his shit, played hardball, and Creeper didn’t like it. He’d made threats. This morning, Catch and Jill’s daughter, Becca, had gone missing when one of the club girls had taken her into town for a ride in her stroller.
“I agree with you, completely on board.” Butler ran a hand through his newly shorn blond hair. “But Creeper is still a One-Eyed Jack, and I need to be the one to grab him and bring him in to my club first. That fucker is still wearing our colors, and I’m going to be the one to recover them.”
“Damn straight. You want to score points with your Prez now. I get that.” I picked up my Digi-Flex, a hand held exercise unit with separate buttons for each finger to individually compress. Working with it over the years had done wonders for developing isolated finger strength in my hands and maintaining my flexibility. Rubber stress balls were still a favorite, and I always had one handy, but this gizmo offered more intensity. Today was a very stressful day. A kidnapped child wasn’t enough, my eyes were still burning from seeing Drac’s fucking poster.
Butler’s gaze darted to my hand working the Digi-Flex. “I know it isn’t going to be easy with Jump.” He shifted in his seat, twisting his lips.
He always looked uncomfortable when discussing Jump, the president of the Jacks. Butler wanted back into his club real bad, and Jump was going to make him “jump” through rings of fire to do it.
“You Jacks have had it rough for a while now. You had the Demon Seeds breathing down your necks, wanting to take you over, then the fucking Russians were salivating over all our territory.”
Butler exhaled a thick stream of smoke. “Everyone wants a piece of the same pie.”
“There are rules, or none of this works,” I spit out. “These smaller links keep falling apart, it makes the heavy chain weak. We got the Mexicans watching us, dangling carrots in front of our usual clients. My contacts in South America are getting nervous. It’s only a matter of time before all of us start losing money. I ain’t having it for my club.” I slammed the Digi-Flex down on my desk. “And now the Broken Blades just south of here, on my fucking backdoor, are all restless and full of attitude, disrespecting borders.”
“Well, Notch thinks he can play mercenary and get away with it,” Butler said, lighting another cigarette. “He’s been making our life difficult in Colorado down through Texas. Shit’s got to stop. The Blades aren’t what they used to be. Business hasn’t been going so good for them from what I’ve seen. Plus, they’ve gotten sloppy. Last month, a whole chapter of theirs in Montana got wiped out with arrests. They’re grabbing at straws.”
He eyed me as he inhaled deeply on his smoke.
“Their President refused every one of my demands for respect,” I said. “He didn’t like my proposal for them to patch in now that his
numbers are way down and his reach isn’t what it used to be.”
“Notch is an arrogant asshole, but hey, he’s protecting his club.”
I held his icy blue gaze. “I want the Blades put down once and for all.”
Butler took a deep drag and put out his cigarette as he gnawed on his lips. “You won’t have any complaints from the Jacks on that score.”
“I want Creeper gone.”
“That fuck couldn’t have gotten far with the kid. I’ve been checking in with your men every ten minutes. I’m going to get back out there.”
My eyes darted to the main room where Jill, Catch’s old lady, sat with Drac’s old lady, drinking coffee and wiping tears from her red eyes. I had to hand it to Jill, she was keeping it together. I’d promised her I’d get Becca back, and I would. We were talking about a two year old baby here. This was beyond fucked up. Who the hell kidnaps a tiny little girl? A fucking sociopath. Catch’s loud voice shouting in the courtyard seeped into my office.
His agony over his daughter hit home in a way I didn’t want to admit. In a way that made my insides snap.
After Tania and I had stopped seeing each other, I’d hooked up with Rachel. She was good looking, put up with me in and out of bed, and we got along fine. We’d been together for a few months when she’d gotten pregnant and hinted that she wanted to get married. But I didn’t want to get married; I wouldn’t let myself go there again.
But the baby. Oh, the baby.
In her fourth month, Rachel had a miscarriage. Turns out she had some blood condition that didn’t let her carry to full term. She hadn’t known, and hadn’t gone to a doctor soon enough. Afterwards, she’d gone off the deep end, and I didn’t know how to help her. I couldn’t respond. I felt helpless, numb.
Having a child was a secret hope I’d had with Serena and then it had failed, and I’d had to ignore it. Crush it. With Rachel’s pregnancy, that hope had inflated again like a big red balloon. With the miscarriage, that balloon had popped loudly, its shredded remains littering the floor around us. If only I’d paid enough attention. If only…
