"Well, you're seventeen now," he said, holding an arm out, inviting me in. "I guess you're old enough to be in on these missions."
Missions?
Plural?
More were planned?
Had others already been executed that I didn't know about?
My gut said yes.
So then I moved forward, sat with them, and felt my gut twist into a thousand becket knots.
Because I knew two things in that moment:
One, I could not, under any circumstances, let them put mother fucking pipe bombs under the cribs of sleeping babies.
And two, if and when I warned the daycare, everyone would know it was me who was a traitor.
Life as I knew it was over.
My family would never speak to me again.
My community would fucking lynch me if they ever saw me again.
So as I sat there, nodding and making noises that sounded like interest, I made plans.
I needed to grab a bag and stuff it full of whatever would be useful, hide it, and sneak out when everyone was asleep. The only way out was with a car. We were too far from anywhere I could disappear in. So I had to steal my Pops' truck, the one with the shell. That could be useful for storage and sleeping if it came to that. Which it likely would.
"Alright, so you'll hand these off to Martina. She knows what to do?" my father asked, standing, indicating the meeting was all but over.
"Yep. She's loyal to the cause."
The baby killing cause.
Jesus fuck.
"Great. You and your wife will be rewarded for your loyalty," my father said, clamping a hand on my shoulder and leading me outside with him. "We're making a safer world for the next generation," he informed me as we walked back toward the house.
"How so?" I asked, because I knew that was what he wanted.
"We are taking out all those fucks before they can grow up to be criminals. Selling drugs. Raping our women. Raping the taxpayers to keep them in jail..."
"Right," I said, every ounce of me coming fully to terms with the foulness of my ancestry. Three God damn generations deep of lowlife scum. What the fuck did that say about me?
I felt it then.
I felt it coating every single inch of me.
I felt it seeping into my pores and polluting my insides.
Filth.
I had never wanted a shower so badly in my life.
"Tomorrow is the first day of a new era, son. Get some rest. We will be doing some celebrating."
With that, I went into my room, cranking up my music as was my usual, and locking my door. I grabbed an old Army issue duffel bag and started stuffing it full of clothes. It was summer, but I knew enough through the survivalist training we went through, to always prepare for any inevitability. Chances were, I wouldn't be able to get myself accommodations for a good long while. At the very earliest, six months from then. When I turned eighteen and could legally do that kind of shit. So I could be roughing it, living in a tent, or sleeping in the back of the car until then. I needed winter clothes.
When the bag was all but bursting, I tossed it out my window.
I turned back, looking around my room like I had never seen it before. Like I hadn't slept in it every night of my God damn life.
With that, I waited until two in the morning and I crept out, music still on, but lower. My parents would allow for noise so long as they could sleep through it. I jumped down out my window and made my way to the truck, tossing my bag into the back and making my way toward the barn, so paranoid that a God damn moth flying into me had my heart flying into my throat.
See, there was one advantage to the paranoid, survivalist freaks I grew up around. We had supplies. We had supplies for any possible situation. EMP? We had dozens of Faraday cages. Grid went down? We had solar. There was firewood for long, cold winters. There were medical kits. There were wilderness survival kits in bugout bags in case we needed to get out of Dodge.
And, of course, there was enough old Army rations and canned foods and dehydrated mason jars full of 'just add water' meals the women had made fresh from our gardens in the summer.
I grabbed a box, throwing in the foods I knew would be more useful to me- the ones with beans and meats, the ones that would keep my weight on even if they were all I ate. I wasn't worried about fruits and vegetables; I was worried about calories. I grabbed a wilderness survival bag, a tent, a couple extra knives, and two extra blankets.
That was all I could carry and I wasn't going to risk a second trip.
I ran to the car and shoved all the shit inside, making my way out of the drive and down most of the side street with the lights cut so no one could see me if they looked out a window.
Waiting for six AM was the longest span of time in my entire life. Fact of the matter was, I knew I had to wait until Martina arrived. If I called the cops and they showed up and Martina saw them, she would turn around and leave. They could never pin it on her.
So I waited. And at five to six, knowing Martina was always on time, I stopped at the only pay phone in the town, situated inside the mud room of a diner, and I called the cops. When I hung up with them, I called the daycare center.
With that, I ran to the truck and I got the fuck out of that town so fast I was shocked I didn't get pulled over ten times as I crossed out of the state.
I pulled off in another small town the next day, using some of my precious money for gas and realizing that that would be my biggest obstacle. I had enough food to get me through. I had clothes. Hell, I even had a bar of soap I could use to clean the fucking clothes and myself. But I didn't have enough money to keep paying for gas and the eventual repairs on the car. I needed, whenever I stopped, to find odd jobs.
I was big for my age. I could easily pass as nineteen or twenty. People looking for lawn mowers or foremen looking for day laborers wouldn't think twice about hiring me. And, after all the years at the farm learning to build houses, I knew enough to convince them to choose me over whoever else might be standing at the train station that morning.
So that was what I did. Across eight states over the course of a year. I slept in the shell of the truck whenever I could in the summer. When the cops got nosy, I took to the woods with a tent. In the winter, well, I still slept in the shell. I lined the walls, ceiling, and floors in heatsheets to lock in my body temperature. I loaded up on layers. And I prayed I didn't lose any toes or fingers to frostbite.
I didn't.
By the time I hit Jersey, I had enough cash socked away to be able to afford weekly accommodations at a motel. From there, with my first real shower in a year, I hit the streets and looked for work. I was tired of moving. I was way too happy with the feel of a real mattress underneath me at night instead of thin blankets. I liked having air conditioning so I didn't sweat to fucking death. And I really fucking enjoyed having TV and proper bathrooms, and women.
Within an afternoon, I found myself contracted to a local building company, doing whatever jobs they needed an extra experienced hand with.
It wasn't a glamorous life. But it wasn't filthy and hate-filled either.
I stayed in the pay-by-the-week place because it was what I was used to. I worked. I saved money. I drank. I fucked. I tried to find a new kind of normal.
And that was the way it was for several years.
Then, as luck would have it, one day years later, I would find myself called to work on a job at some place called The Henchmen compound. The owner needed a couple extra rooms added onto the already massive living quarters, all the walls reinforced and completely windowless.
In working on the job, I saw something I hadn't realized I had been missing. I saw a community. I saw brotherhood and loyalty. I saw people who would die for one another.
And I fucking missed that.
And it was something else to see it exist without the confines of hate.
Even if what they did wasn't exactly legal.
Connections got made and, before I could talk my
self out of it, I was prospecting the club.
It had been fucking Cash who pointed me in the direction of someone to remove my tattoo, saying that not only did he think it would be good for me to get that shit off my skin for my own peace of mind, but that Reign didn't want anyone to think he and his men were affiliated with any racist bullshit like the Aryan Brotherhood.
I had two sessions and it was halfway gone, the lines being thick and the ink being black, making it stubborn to remove.
I had just never gotten around to getting the third, and likely final, procedure done.
I guess I would realize pretty fucking quick how stupid that shit was.
THIRTEEN
Penny
I couldn't think straight.
I thought I understood that phrase, but I didn't. Not until I moved out of that shower and tried to focus on basic, simple tasks like drying my body and brushing my hair. Because I couldn't freaking seem to do anything but freeze in place, staring unseeing at my reflection in the mirror to the sound of Duke still in the shower.
Duke with his freaking Nazi tattoo.
Duke was a white supremacist?
Kind, sweet, protective Duke who had held me through stitches and eased my fears and fed me and warned off the men from me was someone who could believe in such a vile ideal?
Then, as I heard a clammer outside the bedroom, I had another horrible thought.
Were they all racists?
Were The Henchmen MC some kind of hate group? Was that why they had enemies that wanted to shoot them?
Because, really, I kind of understood that.
Not that I condoned violence, but if anyone was deserving of it, it was people who could hate and harm people on the sole basis of the color of their skin or who they loved or what nation they came from.
That was despicable.
And I was just naked in a shower with someone who believed that crap.
I was stuck in a compound with a bunch of other men who might as well.
What did that say about me to everyone else?
Dirty by association, remember?
That was what Duke had said to me and it was all-too true.
I needed to find a way out of this situation.
I rubbed the makeup over my face, finding it heavy and oppressive, like my pores couldn't breathe. But what did it matter, I felt like my lungs couldn't either. Finished, I got into my clothes, flinching a little when my shirt touched my stitches, but not willing to ask Duke to wrap me back up.
"You alright?" Duke's voice broke in. It was low, but it went off in the quiet room and my frantic mind like a foghorn.
My hand flew to my heart as I saw his reflection in the mirror behind me, a towel slung so low on his hips that I could see the deep cuts of his Adonis belt. A bead of water slid down the center of his chest and stomach to slip under the towel, drawing my attention and I felt my body react immediately and uncontrollably. Apparently, the message about Duke being the worst kind of bad guy didn't get from my brain to between my thighs yet.
"Penny," he said again, drawing my attention to his face in the mirror.
"I'm fine," I said, but it wasn't the least bit convincing. My eyes were big, my brows were drawn together, my body was tense. "I just... I'm nervous about my grandmother figuring out something is wrong," I lied. "She's pretty perceptive. I, ah, need to go get my shoes on," I said, turning and all but running out of the room.
"Shit shit shit," I mumbled to myself as I rummaged for socks and shoes. I wasn't much for cursing, but if ever there was a situation to do it, this was it.
Would they even let me go?
I know Duke kept telling me that I wasn't a prisoner, but was that only to ease my mind? What would happen if I told him I was leaving? I mean... he moved all my stuff into his room in his fenced and armed-guarded compound.
I heard the dresser behind me slide closed and nearly jumped out of my skin, shrieking quietly as I fell onto my ass.
"Sure you're alright?" Duke asked, brows furrowed, watching me push myself up.
"I'm fine," I said, turning away from him and shoving my feet into socks and then shoes. I went back into one of my boxes and found a spare wallet that I kept cash in and shoved it into my jean pocket. My purse had never turned up. I didn't want to think about the whole having to go to the DMV and get new credit cards thing when or if I ever got back to my normal life. "I, ah, am going to go wait for you in the main room," I said, grabbing the doorknob and going out before he could say anything.
I walked out into the main room to find Cash sitting there with Lo sitting next to him, legs over his, smiling at each other like honeymooners.
And it struck me how very blonde they both were.
Granted, not all the bikers were blonde. Reign was dark-haired and Renny was a redhead. But, yeah, I was pretty sure all of them were white. At least I hadn't seen any one of another race around.
That didn't exactly help the swirling thoughts about a white supremacist club.
Great.
Just great.
"Oh, you showered? How are the stitches looking?" Lo asked, focus on me and I realized I had been standing there staring like a creep.
"Ah, they're good. Duke said they're healing."
"Good. I'm glad. Before you know it, we can pull them out and you'll be like new."
Yeah, no.
I was pretty sure I would never be the same.
"Excited to see your grandmother?" Cash asked, making me stiffen.
So they all knew about her. That wasn't good either, right? Bad enough they all knew about me, but now they knew about my grandmother. If I insisted on leaving and they got ticked, would they use her against me?
Okay. I needed to relax. I was getting worked up over things I didn't need to yet. I needed to feel out Duke while we were out, see how he responded to the idea of me leaving.
And, more so, I needed to calm down.
I wasn't lying when I told Duke that my grandmother was perceptive. I had never been able to hide any thought or feeling from her my whole life. Even over the phone, she could tell when something was up and would pry it out of me.
"Alright, ready?" Duke asked, coming up behind me and putting a hand at my hip.
My whole body stiffened, something I was pretty sure not only Lo, but Cash, noticed judging by the way their eyes went a little keen, their heads tilted ever-so slightly.
"Yep. Let's go," I said, moving away from him so his hand fell and making my way toward the front door.
I stopped directly out front, realizing I had no idea where I was going seeing as the only time I had seen their compound from the outside was when I was lost and I hadn't exactly been paying that close of attention.
"This way, babe," Duke said, moving out behind me and pointing to the side of the yard where both cars and bikes were parked. "Don't worry; we're taking one of the SUVs. Can't be on bikes right now."
Right. Too easy a target.
How the hell was this my life?
But I fell into step with him and got into the passenger side of a black SUV after he bleeped the locks. I climbed in and went to sit back, cringing as my back brushed the seat. I sat forward, putting on my belt, and looked out the window as Duke got in and turned the car over and drove us out of there.
"Aren't these windows too dark for Jersey?" I asked, remembering all the tickets the guys I went to high school with got when they blacked out their windows.
"Yeah, but we'd rather get tickets than killed so that's what we do."
I nodded at that and we fell into an extremely tense silence all the way through town and down the highway toward Blue Horizons.
It was a long, squat brown building with an abundance of shrubbery to try to make it look less like a care center.
I silently got out of the car and took a deep breath only to find Duke's massive form blocking my way suddenly. I turned my head up to look at him, brows together in confusion.
"Talk to me," he demanded, shaking his head.
"About what?" I said, going for innocently confused and thinking I mostly hit the mark.
Duke raised a hand to tuck my hair behind my ear. And I couldn't help it; I flinched. His hand paused in the air then fell as he exhaled hard.
"Alright, this isn't the time," he said with a shrug. "Come on," he said, holding an arm out, "let's go visit with your grandmother."
With that, we walked into the care center and got visitor badges and a room number and walked down the halls that I swear felt oppressive, like the sadness of the people living there seeped into the walls. I literally felt heavier with every step I took.
"Feels like death in here," Duke said, surprising me that he felt it as well.
"She can't stay here," I said back, shaking my head.
"She's got to get better," Duke reasoned and he was right. I couldn't care for her with a broken hip. I knew nothing about things like that. "You can move her somewhere else after she gets better. There's a retirement community over in Silver Neck."
I felt marginally better because of that as we walked up to my grandmother's room. The door was slightly open but I knocked on it anyway.
"Unless you're my granddaughter you can just go straight to hell with all your poking and prodding," her voice called from inside, making me smile big for the first time all day.
I looked over at Duke and his head tilted at the sight of my smile. "She's got spirit, huh?" he asked.
"She likes to call it 'gumption' and says that it's a shame that most modern women don't know the art of it."
"Like black and white movie stars," Duke said with a nod.
"Exactly," I agreed. My grandmother was a huge Katherine Hepburn fan. I felt a tug of connection again to him and had to remind myself to not allow it as I turned back to the room.
"It's me, Grams," I said, moving inside, my nose wrinkling up at the smell of hospital that seemed to be everywhere. I couldn't place the exact scents that made it that way, maybe a mix of plastic and hand sanitizer and maybe a hint of crummy food and rubbing alcohol.
"I know I said I didn't want you to uproot your life to come up here, but where the hell have you been?" she asked as I stepped inside to find her laying in one of those moving hospital beds, bent upward, her legs raised a bit as well. She had on a dark blue house dress and a matching robe that I knew she would never be caught dead in outside of an emergency situation.
Duke (The Henchmen MC Book 5) Page 13
