by April Lust
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Ten grand? Those aren’t small debts. Come on, stop trying to pull a fast one and tell me how much you really need.”
“Okay, I’m only about five grand short,” Ryan admitted. “I’ve got some of it already, and I’m good for the rest, Mark.”
I laughed again. “No, you’re not. If you were good for it, you wouldn’t owe it,” I told him.
He really looked like he was about to cry as he continued to beg. “Look, you’re the only buyer I’ve got who could possibly help me out. Everyone else I sell to is in the little leagues compared to you, man. You gotta help me out here, Mark.”
I thought about it a moment. I wasn’t about to give him an advance, but I wanted to help. I didn’t want our partnership to end over his inability to manage his own funds, but he probably did need some help controlling his spending or his use, if he was using. I didn’t really give two shits about his spending habits, but if he was using, he needed to get off the shit.
“Like I said, I don’t do advances or loans. I don’t give money on promises.”
He crumbled.
“But, I can do business with you,” I added, reviving him a little. “I’m willing to make a deal with you for the money you need.”
“Anything,” he said, the hunger in his voice pleading with me for an answer.
“Nora. I want Nora. You let me have her, I’ll give you the ten grand you initially named.” She was worth more than that, easily.
He looked at me like I’d punched him in the gut. I watched his eyebrows work as he tried to wrap his brain around my demand.
“I mean, I know you guys like to treat your women like you own them, but I’ve never known anyone to actually buy or trade them like actual property,” he said.
“I know it’s a lot to ask, so I’ll give you until tomorrow evening to decide.” I got up and walked around the desk. I put a hand on his shoulder and tilted my head toward the door, letting him know we were done.
“Tomorrow night,” he said, his voice still full of disbelief.
“Tomorrow night. I’ll see you then,” I told him as I held the door for him to leave.
I stood and watched as Ryan collected Nora from the bar. She looked at him with concern. She shot a look at me over her shoulder before getting up to walk with him.
I nodded to her, and she turned her attention back to Ryan. He wouldn’t look at her. He walked slumped over, his head down. He said a few words to her, but wouldn’t really acknowledge her. Even when she put a hand on his back and rubbed between his shoulders, he kept his eyes down.
She had to get the door for him. She glanced back at me one last time before walking out.
I gave her a little smirk. I could see Ryan had already made his decision. This time the next night, she’d be mine.
Ten grand was a small price to pay for what I was going to get out of the deal.
Chapter Five
Nora
“We’ve got to go back to the Reapers,” Ryan said the next night, getting ready in a huff. He threw a coat over his shoulders and pulled on his boots.
I narrowed my eyes at him. He hadn’t said anything the night before about having to go back. In fact, he’d been acting pretty weird since we left the clubhouse the first time. Now we were going back? Two nights in a row?
“Alright,” I said, letting out a sigh to let him know I wasn’t pleased by the surprise.
I was starting to get a picture in my mind of what was going on with him. Something was up with business. He had talked about money and being short on it when he came in from crossing.
We hadn’t even had sex since he’d been back, and that was usually one of the first orders of business. It was one of the reasons he kept me around. If he wasn’t getting it back across the border, then whatever was wrong with business must have been pretty bad to keep him from sleeping with me.
Still, I didn’t ask. I figured he would have told me if he’d wanted me to know.
I changed into jeans and threw on a jacket to go out. He drove me in his old beat up pickup truck over to the clubhouse, again. The truck had seen many, many miles. It spent weeks at a time in the wilderness, unused, sitting up in the elements. I could have offered to drive him in my car, but that never really happened. That wasn’t something we did, taking my car.
“Stay here at the bar, okay,” he said as we entered the clubhouse.
I only responded by nodding. I didn’t say anything. It wasn’t like I was going to get up and go somewhere else. I always stayed at the bar when we were there. I nodded to Ed as Ryan walked to Mark’s open office door.
“Jack and Coke?” Ed asked as I sat down.
“Yeah, that’ll work,” I told him. I turned and watched Ryan disappear behind the office door as it closed.
I wondered what they were talking about. Had Mark shorted him money? Had he shorted Mark? He’d certainly been acting like he was up to something like that. I knew that if it had been something serious enough, Mark and the guys would have come for Ryan, not the other way around.
“Here ya go,” Ed said as he slid me a glass, bringing my attention back to the bar.
“Thanks, Ed,” I told him, taking a sip.
“Nora, hey,” a husky voice said. I looked up to see Ozzy Hayes walking in.
“What’s up, Ozzy?” I greeted him.
I watched for Alice to come in behind him, but she didn’t. I knew Ozzy because he and Alice had been dating for a while. I had expected him to make her his old lady at some point, but it hadn’t happened yet. I wondered where she was. She was almost always at the Reapers, especially if Ozzy was there.
“Just working,” Ozzy said as he continued past the bar.
“Hey, Ozzy,” Ed called to him. “Need a drink?”
“Not yet, Ed. I’ve got a few things to handle first,” he said, heading into one of the rooms off to the side.
From Alice, I had learned that Ozzy was Mark’s right-hand man. Something big must have been going down, and I was afraid Ryan was at the center of it.
“Looks like it’s just us again tonight,” Ed chuckled from behind the bar.
“It looks that way,” I agreed, looking around. “I mean, it’s dead in here, Ed, absolutely dead. What did you do, run everyone off?” I joked.
“I guess so.” He leaned forward and lowered his voice like he was telling me a secret. “I think the boss has some business to handle right now, so he and Ozzy might have put the word out for people to stay away a few nights.”
“Really?” I asked.
He shrugged. “I’ve seen it happen, but no one ever tells me anything like that. I could have taken a few nights off.”
“What would you do if you did?”
“Probably hang out here,” he laughed.
“Man, go read your book,” I told him.
“You good? You seem a little worried tonight,” he said, checking on me before taking my advice.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I lied.
“Look, if it were really serious, they would have hunted him down instead of expecting him back in here. You know that,” Ed reminded me.
“I know,” I assured him. “But something doesn’t feel right, you know? We’re here two nights in a row. It’s dead. Ozzy just walked right by the bar and didn’t stop for a drink or to talk because he has work to do.”
He chuckled. “You need to finish that drink. You sound pretty paranoid right now. You’re good as long as you’re in the clubhouse, alright? Remember that. You may not be an old lady or one of the club bitches, but you’re practically one of us, Nora. You’re alright.” He tapped the bar and pointed at me, then walked back to his stool at the far end of the bar where he sat and opened up the book he’d been reading the night before.
It was strange to see someone like Ed, an old biker, reading a book. I wondered what it was. The way he held it, with one side of it rolled around behind the other, I couldn’t see the title. What the hell did someone like Ed like to read? I watched him
and pondered all the possibilities. In the end, I decided he struck me as a true crime type of guy. He was probably reading about some of the guys he started riding with back in the day.
I sipped my Jack and Coke and waited for Ryan. I occasionally sang along with part of a song playing on the jukebox. When I caught myself doing it, it made the bar feel that much lonelier. I really was the only person in there other than Ed the bartender.
The office door opened suddenly, and I looked over my shoulder to see Ryan storming out of it. He walked straight to where I was sitting. His face was flushed, and there was something angry in his eyes. He grabbed my arm when he made it to me.
“Come on,” he barked.
“Are we leaving?” I asked him, reaching for my drink, in a hurry to finish it.
“No, I need you in the office with me. Now.” He pulled me off the stool. It was all I could do to get my feet underneath me and to keep from falling on my face.
“Hang on,” I protested, taking the last of my drink down in one gulp.
I was never included in his business dealings with the MC, so I didn’t really understand what was happening. I hurried beside him, his fingers digging into my arm. He didn’t look at me until I stopped and tried to pull my arm back.
“Let go,” I snapped. “You’re hurting me.”
“Just come with me,” he said, turning so that his face was right in mine.
“I’m not moving until you let go of me,” I growled at him.
His grip tightened. I looked over my shoulder to see Ed putting his book down and getting up from his stool. It was a small gesture, but coming from someone like him, it was threatening. Ryan saw it, too, and he let go of my arm, holding his hands up.
“I’m sorry. We need you in the office,” he said, dropping the forceful, angry tone he’d been using.
“That’s better,” I said, falling in line behind him.
The walk from the bar to the office seemed to take forever. With every step, a feeling of deep dread grew in the pit of my stomach. The door stood open still, from where Ryan had thrown it back when he exited. I couldn’t see Mark, though. I knew he was probably sitting behind the desk, but all I could see was the very front edge of the old, dark red wood.
With the way Ryan had been acting, I wondered what he’d done that was so terrible he needed to drag me in there with him. Why was I being included?
“Here she is,” Ryan announced as we walked into the office.
The room was warm and inviting. Mark sat behind the desk, leaning back in his chair and looking me up and down with hungry eyes as I entered. He was leaner than the guys who worked for him and much younger than I had ever noticed. I’d seen him many times before, but I hadn’t really paid him any attention.
Now that I was being paraded in front of him, I didn’t have much choice other than to notice him. He had a lot of ink, just like the rest of the guys. His long dark hair was swept back from his face. He looked at me with those intense eyes, and I could feel the desire emanating from them.
“Please, have a seat, Nora,” he said.
I looked over my shoulder at Ryan, making sure it was okay before I sat down. He nodded, standing with his back against the door. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to keep it closed to keep people out or to keep me in.
“It’s good to see you again,” Mark said, but he sounded professional, like he had business to discuss with me, not like he was trying to compliment me.
“Thanks. You, too,” I said cautiously. My eyes darted back to Ryan, leaning against the door and staring at the wall behind Mark’s desk now. He was no longer looking at me.
Whatever was going on, I knew it had something to do with me. I wondered what I might have said or done that warranted pulling me into the president’s office for a discussion with him. At the same time, I wondered why he was looking at me like he wanted to gobble me up. He’d never paid attention to me before the previous evening.
“Why am I in here?” I finally asked. For the first time since I’d been coming up here with Ryan or Alice, I didn’t feel safe in the clubhouse. Mark’s presence alone felt like a threat. My boyfriend blocking the only way out of the room definitely felt like a threat. And those eyes poring over my body? The hair on the back of my neck stood on end.
Mark sat forward in his chair and rested his hands and elbows on his desk. The look in his eyes changed. Desire turned to business, though I had begun to suspect that the business we had to discuss was desire.
Chapter Six
Mark
“Your boyfriend and I have been talking,” I started, working my way into an explanation of why the blonde was being asked to sit in my office and talk to me.
“I figured as much,” she said.
I chuckled. She had a mouth on her. I figured I’d be learning the real talents of that mouth soon enough.
“You’ve been talking. What about?” It was impressive how quickly she’d turned the fear and concern I’d seen in her eyes into snarky remarks.
“Ryan has been telling me about his troubles with his supplier,” I said slowly, drawing it out to see if she knew anything about it.
If she did, she didn’t seem to react. She didn’t say anything, either. I wasn’t sure how to read her steady expression, but Ryan’s nervous shifting by the door told me he hadn’t actually talked to her about what was going on with the business.
“It seems he owes money to his people in Canada,” I continued. “So, he has come to me to ask for an advance on his next delivery, a kind of loan. Basically, he needs a gift of a significant amount of money to be able to pay them off so he can continue making his deliveries.”
I sat back to see how my words hit them both. Ryan seemed to be growing more and more distraught the longer I talked. Nora didn’t seem bothered at all. She’d seemed pretty shaken when she came in, but she had fully recovered now that we were talking about business.
“Now, your boyfriend has served us well. We’ve had an agreement now for a couple of years, and he has always honored it. We’ve always paid him according to that arrangement, and we’ve never had any trouble out of him. He’s practically family.”
I cut my eyes over to Ryan, fuming by the door.
“So what’s the deal?” Nora asked, bringing my attention back to her. “Why are you telling me all of this?” Her blue eyes stared at me coolly as she asked her questions. She wasn’t afraid to push me to get to the point. That was good. That was real good.
“Well, as I’m sure you’re aware, the Reapers is a business, so even family and friends are merely associates at the end of the day. I can only give for what I’ve been given. I can’t give on promises or feelings. But,” I added before she could say anything, “I can be flexible when it comes to business. I can always cut a business deal.”
She looked over at Ryan, and then back at me. She seemed to panic, finally showing some emotion. I had no idea what thoughts were rolling around in that head of hers, but it seemed she was starting to catch on.
“I’m not asking for any fucking favors,” Ryan snapped all of a sudden. He pushed himself off the door and took a step towards my desk. He stared down at me with the intensity of someone who thought way too much of himself.
“You came to me for an advance, a loan that would basically be repaid with the next delivery, which is not guaranteed. You know we don’t do business that way. I have never provided you with an advance, and I have always maintained that we only pay when we receive the product. Now, you explain to me how asking me to step outside of our original agreement is anything but a favor,” I said calmly, relishing in the contrast between our voices.
“We’ve been doing business a couple of years now. Every few weeks, I deliver faithfully. I carry large quantities of goods across the border through the woods for you, risking worse than jail time, and I never fail to bring you the fucking best, right?” he pleaded in an attempt to bargain with me.
“Right. You have been very loyal and dependable,” I admitt
ed to him.
“If I didn’t feel like I had provided a good service, I wouldn’t have come to you for help. And I’m not asking a favor. My original request was that you pay me at least some of the money ahead of the delivery. Now you’ve asked for something far more valuable,” he whined.
I held up my hand to stop him. I wanted to be the one to break it to Nora that she’d been sold out by her boyfriend. That was my news to deliver, since I was the one making the purchase.
“Am I not doing you a favor by agreeing to work with you on this?” I asked him, slowly letting each word roll out.
“Yes, but—”
