by Xyla Turner
I jotted down the tag number of his plate, which was twisted around to the side of his seat.
So, not good.
When I turned to look at the man, who was several feet away from my door as if he expected me to turn into a raptor and devour him. His face was twisted up in anger and also confusion, then he sneered, “I’m not giving you shit.”
Then he was gone.
He just walked away.
Hell, I didn’t follow him or run, since I figured I just got off scot free. I did not want to press my luck, so I let the man be.
Until three days later, when a non-local number called and shared that I lost my insurance coverage. On that same day, I saw an email stating that my license was revoked.
Goddamit.
I told that pretty man that I would handle it. He just couldn’t listen, which boiled my blood even more. Without processing much, I hopped in my truck and made my way over to Manor, where the Guardians usually hung out. This, I knew for a fact, since their bike shop was across the way. They had received national recognition, along with one of their mechanics, who also did landscaping. It was in the Lancaster Times, too, which was big time for Pennsylvania.
Pulling up, I just so happened to see my enemy talking with another biker, who had long hair but was much more rugged than the one I met the day before. He looked like he took no shit, from nobody. Very biker-ish.
My mouth started before my head, and I hopped out the vehicle, pointing to the asshole and yelled, “You.”
Chapter 2
Shiz
Goddammit!
That’s the only word that was traveling through my head when that crazy ass woman was stomping across the way screaming about calling the insurance company. By the time, she finished crying and spouting something about the Vipers, I knew that Razor, our club President, would want to know about that shit.
It turned out that I was right and Razor was very interested in her story. The club was trying to find legal shit to get them in trouble with the law since they were violating innocent people. Preferably fucking with Shay and Dessy. This technically meant, they were fucking with Bronx and Bear, which meant they were fucking with the Legion of Guardians. Even the Norristown chapter was involved, and Swag was an intense dude. He nor Razor fucked around, but they knew a war with the Vipers meant casualties on both sides. The Presidents took that shit seriously.
I got it and appreciated it, but I was still young and shit. Not really too into the club shit or the politics around it. Let me ride my bike, blow something up, play a game or fuck a girl. Then, I’m listening. My club was my life, and I was all for that, but I was still okay with not taking the initiative. Following orders was fine because I needed guidance I guess. Most of the brothers kept me around for a good time. I had a freaky sense of humor, fucked with a lot of them about stupid shit but nobody took me seriously. Shit, I didn’t take my own self seriously. Eat, shit, fuck, nut, laugh and live my life.
No bullshit.
No drama.
Hence why this woman and her drama landed on my doorstep, had me ready to pack her up. I didn’t do shit like that. Even when she ran over my bike, I just left her crazy ass out there. My thing was to let the insurance people deal with her ass.
I was not.
Then I just had to get involved, like an idiot.
“So, let me get this right,” Razor said in his office as he sat across from the short, full-figured woman in the bright yellow, flared at the waist dress, that matched her yellow car. “Your brother, who is non-affiliated with any club was beat down outside of the Puff Bar in front of his girlfriend, who you knew nothing about. You know this because his girlfriend told you they were the Vipers and it was three of them. They did this,” he pointed to her phone with pictures of her brother. “You filed the police report and as soon as your brother is healed, he can help a sketch artist?”
Her spiky, black hair nodded with her head, before she answered, “Yes, to all of those things.”
Razor nodded at her, then looked at Bronx and me with another nod. Then he leaned back in his chair, pulled out a folder and opened it up where a bunch of pictures fell through.
“Is your brother well enough to see?” He asked her. “Can he identify them, do you think?”
The look on her face, morphed into a smile like she had just won the jackpot.
“Holy shit,” the woman beamed. “You guys really are avenging angels!”
The side of Razor’s lip turned up with a smirk, as she looked at all three of us with both eyebrows up in admiration.
“Not really,” Bronx shared. “We just don’t like shit like this.”
“Yeah, I bet. Will you go and hang them by the balls in their own compound or something? Can you hold them and have my brother beat the shit out of them too? Oh, wait. If you get their bikes, I can run them over, since my license and insurance is suspended. What can they do to me, then? Take my nondriver's license.” The woman was rambling but as I stared at her in shock, Razor was chuckling, and Bronx was shaking his head with a small smile on his face.
“You are crazy as shit,” I found myself saying.
“No, I just have an artistic imagination.” She shared in a calm voice. “I like all three of those plans, to be honest. Can we do all three?”
Her head turned back to Razor, who simply looked at me with a look, I wanted no part of.
“What’s your name again?” He asked.
“The name is Avery. Avery West. Like Kanye West but no relation at all.” The woman nodded before continuing. “Plus, if there was, I would so be on the set of Keeping Up with the Kardashians. My favorite is Courtney because she’s not so flashy and practical. Like me.”
My eyes rolled to the back of my head but the rest of the guys were smirking with little escapes of laughter as she kept running her damn mouth.
“Shiz, can you take Avery here to the hospital to see which of these fuckers did this to her brother?” Razor asked while looking at me with that same smirk on his face.
It’s the knowing one, like he has a bit of information that I don’t quite possess.
“How did you two meet again?” Bronx turned and asked me.
“She ran over my Harley and crushed it like a bug because she thought I was a part of the Vipers.” I shared. “Didn’t ask no questions and damn sure didn’t look at the patch until after one wheel was bent in two and the rest was mangled like a piece of balled up paper.”
At first, Avery had the good sense to put her head down in shame, that I did not really care about. However, by the time I finished, her head was up, along with her body as she stood.
“I said, I was sorry. Shit,” she snapped at me. “What the fuck do you want me to do? I told you I would cover it and now, I’m fucked because you called the insurance people who dropped me like a bad habit. They’ll probably tow my car if they see it on spot, I got to pay my rent and find, but also afford another insurance carrier. I don’t get paid enough to keep the lights on in the shabby, mouse-infested place and now it feels like everything is falling apart. I just have all of this shit and now Nathan and the stupid Vipers. I wished it was one of their bikes, I swear. My dad says I’m impulsive and I should think before I act and definitely before I speak but yeah. You don’t need to know all that.”
Quickly, she gathered her purse and started for the door. Razor called her back but she kept going and yelled back, “thanks.”
Bronx looked at me, then Razor.
“Well,” Bronx raised one eyebrow.
“Well, what?” I asked. “She’s a looney tune. You heard her. Hanging men by the balls.”
My body shook with a cringe as I thought about my testicles holding my body weight. Just fucked up.
“She’s also a victim,” Bronx shared.
“One that’s in need of a decent apartment, a ride, and job,” Razor added. “Don’t you have an open apartment that needs to be rented, since Bear’s sister left?”
My head reared back as I looked at both of thos
e mother fuckers. They had the dirty nerve to get me caught up in this shit. Oh hell, fucking, no.
“I see what y’all are doing?” I shook my head. “Not working on me.”
I started moving towards the door with my head still moving.
“Yeah, just cause y’all were stung by love’s bug, y’all trying to throw me in the mix. Fuck that. I like my life as it is. No fucking way, I’m getting caught up in some woman’s drama. I don’t do drama. Remember, I’m allergic to it.”
I faked a cough.
“Seems to me, she came knocking on your door, Shiz,” Razor noted. “Well, running over your bike, then came literally to this compound, knocking again.”
“So,” I bit back. “She’s crazier than a loon. Crazy like the glue.”
“Maybe,” Bronx said. “However, we’re still Guardians. She needs help. Her brother needs help. So, therefore, we help.”
“Yeah, okay.” I nodded. “Then who can help her because I’m not volunteering.”
This was bold and I really said that before I thought who I was talking to. Razor was cool but not that damn cool. Oddly enough, his gaze sharpened on me a bit, then he said, “Okay, Shiz. You’re dismissed.”
Wait, what?
I wasn’t expecting that response. Thought the two of them were trying to hook me up by some situation where I’m forced to be with her.
I guess not.
“Mmkay,” I said with a nod. “Let me know if you need my help with something else.”
“Yeah,” Bronx nodded and turned to Razor so they could finish their conversation.
I left them, grabbed a beer and went to the shop to see how my bike was coming along. It wasn’t, and by the way, it was laying on its side, made me angrier at the woman. Just ran over it like it was road kill.
Snoop did not give me any false hopes about my bike making a full recovery since the model was so old. It has been passed down from my father, to my older brother and then to me. That shit was by far the most sacred thing that I owned, and she fucking wrecked it without a blink of an eye.
Fuck her.
No, I wasn’t helping her.
And I didn’t feel bad about that shit.
***
As the shop owner for Sh-Ink, I employed four tattoo artist, one admin assistant and Uno did my accounting. I owned three houses, and one belonged to me, while I rented the other two out. Razor was right about having the other house free because Bear’s sister was no longer there and my other tenant went abroad. However, with my allergy to drama, I’d be damned if that crazy ass woman was staying there. Other guys at the club had properties. Razor made sure we all had property, businesses and other shit that created, ran or operated by Guardians. He was trying to make the club the Amazon, from A to Z, of everything and was doing a damned good job at it.
My brother, before he passed away, said that he never even thought about owning shit. He even rented out the trailer that we grew up in because that’s what we knew. Our father got sick and passed away early on. Mom was a drunk and was probably dead somewhere. Then that left us. With Jordan being five years older than me, the state didn’t put me in foster care when our pop died. I was thirteen at the time, Jordan was eighteen and away at college. That ended when I came home late to find Pops lying in his own vomit, piss, and shit. White as a ghost and cold as ice. He’d died from complications of influenza.
Every time the thought of dad came, it made my stomach whirl with unease. The fucked-up part was when Jordan fell ill six years ago, the cancer ran through him quickly, and before I realized what the fuck was happening, my brother was gone.
After high school, Jordan insisted that I take some classes at the local community college. That turned into an Associate’s degree in Art Technology and a certificate in business administration. I never forget on the day of my graduation, that I didn’t attend. He was so proud that he took me out, we got pissy drunk and went fishing on the lake. When we woke up the next morning, fish were in our boat, still on the hook and some were dead in our bowl of beer because we wanted to see if they could swim or just be drunk fish.
We were that fucked up.
I got my truck driver’s license, started working for a local freight company and would do some tattoos at the college tattoo parties. It was an easy way to get chicks and do what I enjoyed. By the age of twenty-two, my brother grew sick, and it was his doctor that put me on about the Legion of Guardians. When I came to discuss my brother’s status with him, he was in his office with a short-sleeve shirt on, displaying the bottom half of the tattoo. Since I’m a tat’s guy, I inquired, and he filled me in on the group. By the time, my brother passed, various Guardians were at the funeral, giving me shit, helping me out because Doctor Brown had asked them too. The funeral home which was Guardian ran, provided a serious discount since Jordan had no insurance. A fund was started from the various members to help pay for the rest. I had food delivered every day for two weeks and that sort of overwhelmed me. I was lost, and I think Doctor Brown saw that. He even invited me out for a beer a month later, to share that he also had mourned my brother lost, but that the Guardians who were a few tables away had been helpful to him, in and out of a time of need.
One conversation with Razor about what the Guardians did, where they were going and how they operated, I wanted to know where I could sign up. I was a recruit for a bit, put in my time and now, six years later, I was a full-fledged member and I was proud of that fact. Guardians were respected because we did respectable shit. Not terrorizing people. That was fucked up and we didn’t condone that, either.
I walked into my kitchen, looked out at the trailer in my backyard and sighed. During a time, when I needed help the most, the Guardians were there. The least I could do was help out the crazy lady. Bronx was right but I was too upset to hear it. Guardians made things better.
The look in Avery’s eyes when Razor showed her photos of the Vipers, was nothing short of a commoner looking at Super Man. She needed help and there I was a selfish prick, crying about a bike.
Fuck.
I texted Razor, almost immediately.
Me: Hey, sorry about earlier. I’ll take Avery tomorrow to the hospital and guide her through
Razor: Thanks, but no need. Uno’s got her now. Glad you came to the right decision though
Fuck.
Uno?
Why Uno?
He wouldn’t be able to handle Avery the right way. She’d eat him alive and spit him out with her antics. Plus, he came in after me and was a bit too mellow for me. He was cool with accounting and all of that but I couldn’t imagine him trying to calm someone like Avery down. The woman was a loose fucking cannon.
Me: Hey Uno, don’t worry about helping Avery. I got it from here. Thanks
Uno: Oh, it’s no worry at all, brother. I enjoy her company. She’s very spirited, plus we already have a date. Thanks, but I got it.
What the fuck?
A date?
Me: It’s just taking her to the hospital, Uno.
Uno: Brother, we’ve worked it out. Thanks though.
Fuck me.
Was he trying to stake a claim?
I was about to text him again but deleted it several times, since it didn’t make any sense to fight a dead issue. He wanted to work with Avery, then fine. By the end of the one hospital visit, he’d be more than happy to give her to me.
That’s what I thought until I walked into the compound the next day around six o’clock. At the bar, sat Uno and a woman with the same measurements of Avery West. Her black hair wasn’t spiked this day, but sat in a bun at the crown of her head, displaying her slender neck and that naturally tanned skin she rocked. She was a lightly toasted brown complexion, and the pink dress she had on with the half-cropped leather jacket and cowboy boots were perfect. The contrast of the colors popped. Almost as if everything was in black and white and here she was with nothing but the color and lighting everything in the dreary compound on fire.
A shift in my pants, had m
e adjusting them before I made my way over to them.
“Avery,” I called. “Everything works out with the pictures?”
Her body grew visibly tight, then she slowly turned and put on a smile on her face.
“Yes, yes. Nathan was able to identify the three guys, thanks to Razor’s pictures.”
Uno looked at me from the side with a grin, showing all of his damn teeth, “Hey brother, how goes it?”
“Good, good,” I answered both of them. “So, you don’t need help with anything else?”
My attention was back on Avery.
She looked to Uno and planted a large smile on her face.
“No, I’m good. Uno here is helping me out. He’s such a good listener but I think it’s because we’re both Capricorns but I’m on the other end of the spectrum. He’s the quieter version which is awesome. He’s really smart too, like my brother.” She was rambling like she does and I couldn’t help noticing the low cut of her dress, as it displayed cleavage.
I think I saw a tip of a wing tattoo.
“Yeah, I’m about to drop her off right now,” Uno chimed in. “She’s got to get ready for work, tomorrow.”
He sounded like her father, which annoyed the fuck out of me.
“Yeah?” I asked her. “So, all that’s figured out?”
I was looking at Avery again?
“It will be. Uno’s on the job. He’s very thorough.” She was still smiling. “Thanks again for introducing me to everyone. They are so helpful, and now, for once, things seem to be on the up and up.”
At that, she closed the folder she had on the counter and said, “Alright Uno. I’m ready. You do keep me on track. I need more of that in my life.”
“Happy to do it,” the bastard replied. “See ya Shiz.”
“Oh, that’s right. Shiz is your name.” Avery noted like it was an afterthought. “Bye, then. Oh, and I did receive a letter saying that even though they suspended my insurance, they would cover the incident. So, that’s good for you. Sorry again.”
Then she hopped off the high stool and made her way, with that thin waist and round ass, swaying to the beat of its own drum. The dress was made to hide how endowed she was below the waist, but it was clear and evident to me. Short and thick worked, even if it never did before. My cock was knocking against my zipper, reminding me that it definitely worked.
