“Yeah.”
“She split when the rest of ‘em did?”
“Yeah, but left the boys behind. Never wanted to be a mother. And the club fallin’ apart was the perfect excuse for the bitch to escape. Left me raisin’ the two hellions all by my fuckin’ lonesome. And tryin’ to run this damn shop.”
“How old’s Cage?”
Dutch squinted as if he was thinking hard. “Don’t fuckin’ know. Lost track... Old enough to drink, not old enough to have a lick of fuckin’ sense. But then his older brother don’t have any, either. That’s my fault for tryin’ to raise those boys myself.”
It wasn’t Cage he remembered from back then, it was Dutch’s older son. Rook, if Trip remembered right. “Wasn’t Rook around Sig’s age?”
Dutch’s brown eyes landed on him. “Yeah, ‘bout there. And Cage was born ‘bout five years later.”
Trip did some figuring in his head. That meant Rook was about thirty-two now and Cage about twenty-eight. “Where’s Rook?”
“Somewhere where the sun don’t shine.”
“Fuck. Sorry to hear that.”
“Yeah, But he’s a short-timer. Just got a month or so to go yet.”
Huh? “He ain’t dead?”
“Fuck no, boy. He’s in County.”
“Where?”
“Lycoming.”
“What’d he do?”
“Bought weed from an undercover pig, then fled.”
“That’s it?”
“And then took the pig to the ground.”
“And?”
“And knocked ‘im the fuck out.”
Damn. “Out soon, huh?”
“Yeah.”
“Where’s he goin’ after he’s out?”
“No fuckin’ clue. Rook does what Rook wants to do.” Dutch shook his head. “Though he’s a damn good mechanic.”
Trip might have to make a trip to Williamsport and offer Rook a place to land when he gets out.
“Anyway, got your first member. Now you got a club of two.”
“And you. That’s three.”
Dutch ignored that. “Need your executive committee.”
“What spot you want?” Trip asked, hoping he’d bite.
“None. Leave that shit to you young fucks.”
“How ‘bout interim VP? ‘Til I get who I want.”
“Who do you want?”
“Sig.”
“Fuck, boy,” Dutch groaned.
“Know where he’s at?”
Dutch’s bushy eyebrows shot up. “Makin’ his ass VP already and you don’t?”
“Nope. It’s on my list.” That never-ending fucking list. But Dutch was right, he needed to fill the committee so decisions could be made and set in stone. The whole “live free, ride free” shit was a myth. All MC’s had rules that the members and prospects had to follow. And they all had someone to enforce them. One more thing added to the list. Finding someone to fill those boots. Someone willing to fill those boots.
Damn, he needed to start crossing some of those things off. No time like the present.
“Yo, Cage!” Trip yelled across the garage.
Cage’s head popped out from under the hood of an old Chevy sedan.
“My first order of business is makin’ you Road Captain. Can you handle it?”
“Can handle anything you fuckin’ throw at me.”
Right. The only question would be if Cage would throw that shit right back. Like a goddamn monkey throwing its own shit at people standing outside its cage.
Trip’s lips twitched until he heard, “What about me?” from behind him.
“What about you, Mouse?” Dutch grumbled at one of his mechanics.
“Got a bike.”
Trip turned and checked out the twenty-something guy. “Name’s Mouse?”
“Mickey. Dutch just likes bein’ a dick.”
Dutch snorted but didn’t deny it.
“What kind of sled you got?” Trip asked.
“An Indian.”
If you didn’t own a Harley, an Indian was the second-best bike out there. “What kind?”
“Dark Horse.”
A Dark Horse was a badass bike. And while Harleys were the norm and sometimes required in an MC, he needed to decide if an Indian was good enough.
Another executive decision he needed to make on the fly. Or needed to delegate to his new Road Captain.
“Yo, Cage!”
Dutch’s son lifted his head again, appearing annoyed.
“His sled bad enough to ride in your lineup?”
Cage’s eyes slid to Mouse and back to Trip. “Yeah.” He ducked his head back down.
“There you go, Mouse. You’re in.”
“Name’s Mickey.”
“Name’s Mouse. If you survive six months of being a prospect and earn your rockers, then, and only fuckin’ then, I’ll let you change your road name. Got it?”
Mouse nodded. “Yeah. Got it.”
Now he had a prospect, a Road Captain and a reluctant temporary VP. He was getting somewhere.
“How ‘bout the other one?” Trip asked about the other twenty-something guy in the corner. Watching and listening but keeping quiet.
“Sparky there?” Dutch barked out a laugh. “You that desperate?”
Trip didn’t want to admit he was. “What’s wrong with ‘im?”
Trip was pretty sure the mechanic could hear him and Dutch quite clearly. Especially since Dutch had a booming voice. On a volume scale of one to ten, the old man talked at a fucking twelve.
“Don’t ever think his balls dropped. Still livin’ with his momma over in Liberty. Might even still be sucking on her tit, too.” Dutch raised his arthritic hands, palms out. “Just like the military, don’t ask, don’t tell.”
Trip shook his head. “He good with bikes?”
“The best with bikes. One of those idiotic savages.”
Trip bit back a laugh. “Idiot savants?”
“Yeah, one of those. Why I hired him. Told ‘im I wouldn’t change his diapers for ‘im, though.”
“He got a bike?”
“Yeah, a Huffy. With a ding-a-ling and streamers.”
Damn.
Trip called out, “Sparky.” He jerked his head, indicating the guy should come over.
Sparky didn’t even hesitate.
“That all true?” Trip asked him.
“Like to suck on tits, but not my momma’s. Don’t have a sled but have been savin’ up for a brand new one. Livin’ with my momma so I can do that.”
“Your momma need you there? Or can you leave?”
Sparky shrugged. “I can leave. Dutch don’t pay me enough to pay a lot of rent.”
“No rent. Got a place for you if you wanna prospect. Give you a bunk, roof over your head, showers, and a kitchen. Everything you’d need, just gotta share it with others. Need a sled, though.”
“My uncle used to be in a club. I can get his old bike fixed up for now. Been sittin’ in my aunt’s shed.”
“Harley?”
“Yeah.”
Well, hot fucking damn. “That’ll do. What’s your name?”
“Whip.”
“Whip?”
“Yeah, started out as a joke when my great granddad used to call me a young whippersnapper and Whip stuck.”
“You like it?”
Whip lifted one shoulder. “Yeah.”
“Then you’re Sparky. You can change it once you earn it.”
“Fuck,” Whip—now Sparky—muttered.
Trip smothered his grin. “You in?”
“Fuck yeah.”
“Welcome to the Fury.” Trip held out his hand. They clasped palms and bumped shoulders. “Don’t change diapers, though. Just a warnin’.”
Dutch snorted next to him. And they stood silently as Sparky went back to work.
“Truth is. He’s a good one. I give him and Mouse a lot of shit to build their character. Can’t get any better prospects than them.”
“That’s only t
wo and still need to fill the table first, Dutch. Beggin’ for you to take the VP spot ‘til I can get Sig.”
“Lemme think about it. I’ll stop out at the farm tomorrow, bring these knuckleheads and check shit out.”
“Sounds like a plan.” Trip turned and looked out of the open bay door. “Got a favor.”
“Damn, boy, askin’ for a lot today.”
“No more runnin’ guns, no more peddlin’ drugs, no more prostitution, no more shakedowns and everything else the club used to be involved in. Doin’ it right this time.”
“Didn’t hear a favor in there.”
“Need you to work on the ’48. Get it in tiptop runnin’ condition. Maybe Bondo the rust spots ‘til I can get the bodywork done right.”
Dutch’s eyes narrowed. “For what?”
Trip was sure Dutch already knew that answer, but he said it anyway. “Gettin’ the repo business back up and runnin’.”
“Gonna need a bond, a license, a—”
“Know what’s involved. Gonna do it right.”
Dutch’s eyes were focused on the wrecker when he asked, “When you want it done?”
“Soon as possible. Gettin’ all the paperwork together and submittin’ it later this week.”
“When we stop out at the farm tomorrow, I’ll get one of ‘em to bring it back.”
Trip nodded, grateful. “Keep an ear out for a decent but cheap rollback, too, will ya?”
“Got one,” Dutch grumbled.
“One you wanna part with?”
“No.”
Trip rolled his eyes. “Then I’m lookin’ for one. I’ll start with the wrecker and a rollback and go from there.”
“How much repo-in’ you think you’re gonna do ‘round here?”
“Not gonna limit it around here, but I remember Buck keepin’ pretty busy in the wrecker.”
“Buck was busy fuckin’ women. Tellin’ Tammy he got a repo job, then he’d land in some other bitch’s bed. Also stole cars with that wrecker. You know that?”
Great. “No.”
“Now you do. Also gonna need secure storage for the vehicles you snag. Otherwise, won’t get your license.”
“Yeah, know that. Gonna put some thought into it.”
Another damn thing he needed to cross off that endless list.
Chapter Three
Her old Cherokee rattled like it was about to leave Jeep parts strewn along the long, rutted half-dirt, half-stone driveway leading up to the Davis’s farmhouse.
At least the thirty-year-old vehicle still started. Though, she wasn’t sure for how much longer, since it had over two hundred thousand miles on it. She still owed Dutch for the new exhaust he installed after the old one rusted off and dragged, creating sparks the entire trip from the bar to the garage across town.
Luckily, it had made it without lighting the whole town on fire and her managing not to get a ticket. It now had a shiny new exhaust system on it, even though the rest of the vehicle looked like dog shit.
Whatever.
She couldn’t buy a new-to-her SUV until she turned the bar around and it stopped hemorrhaging money. Hell, it wasn’t even hemorrhaging money anymore because there was no money, it was now falling into a pit of debt. Which was getting deeper by the day.
Crazy Pete’s was the only real bar in town. For that reason alone, it should be packed every night. She needed to get it turned around and soon. Problem was, to make it more inviting cost money and she didn’t have it.
She might never have it.
But she needed that bar. She needed to make it a success, because it was the only thing she had left.
The only thing and she wasn’t letting the damn thing go. Not until there was a sheriff’s sale and she was dragged out of there against her will when it was sold from underneath her.
But she couldn’t let that happen. She just couldn’t.
She released her held breath when her Jeep made it to the house in one piece and she shoved it into Park.
Stella had never been out to Clyde’s old farm. She never had a reason to be out there. The old two-story house wasn’t completely visible from the road and she wasn’t surprised to find it had a really cool wraparound porch. Or would be really cool if it was in better shape. It needed some work on both the railings and the steps from what she could see. In fact, the whole house needed a good scraping and the wood siding repainted. The brick chimney also needed repointed. The windows looked original which meant they caused drafts. And the back door...
Was beautiful with two long panes of etched glass panels in it. The antique wood door just needed a little TLC. Like the overgrown flower beds and shrubbery surrounding the house. The lawn was patchy, if you could even call it a lawn. It had been mowed but was due again for a cut. It looked more like weeds than grass.
An old brown wrecker, needing just as much work, was parked next to the house. Sitting beside it, an older Harley.
However, the bike didn’t need any work. It was striking and in perfect condition, which meant someone had dumped a lot of money into it to restore it.
Trip. Because a true biker would make sure his sled was top notch before anything else. He could live in the biggest shithole, have no other transportation and could even be starving, but he’d forgo the rest of life’s comforts to have a great bike.
Stella shook her head. Fucked up priorities.
Well, she had no room to judge. The bar, the apartment above it and her vehicle all needed a lot of work, too. Her father had run the bar into the ground during the last year or so he was alive. Stella had told him he should sell it and live out his remaining days burden-free, but he refused, stating the bar was his life and he was going to die in it.
Which he did.
A regular of Crazy Pete’s had called the police to do a welfare check on him when the front door remained locked during normal business hours. One of the officers found Pete sitting on one of the stools, slumped over the bar. A half-drunk beer sat in front of him and a burned-out Marlboro was found in the ashtray near his cold, lifeless hand.
He died doing what he liked, she guessed. Problem was, he died alone.
He wasn’t supposed to be smoking or drinking but Pete had been a stubborn old fuck and hadn’t listened to the doctors.
By the time they caught his lung cancer, he was stage four and it had already spread.
So, in the end, not smoking and drinking wouldn’t change the outcome. Max Bryson, the Chief of Police, had called her to give her the bad news, saying he believed Pete knew it was his time and wanted to leave the Earth on his own terms.
She hadn’t had the best relationship with her father. Actually, not much of one at all. On a rare occasion they’d talk after her mother dragged her out of Manning Grove along with the rest of the ol’ ladies when everyone scattered.
All the kids she knew from the MC disappeared in different directions. All her friends in Manning Grove, not part of the MC, were left behind, too.
She and her mom started fresh.
Stella turned her head to look at the barn about two football field lengths away from the house.
She had to start fresh one too many times than she would’ve liked.
And now Trip was back.
In Manning Grove.
Making his own fresh start. But she wasn’t sure if he was doing it the right way.
When everything went down with the club twenty years ago, it destroyed a lot of families. Members ended up dead, as enemies, or in prison, and most never saw their families again.
Now the former president’s son wanted to take those broken pieces and attempt to patch them back together. The son of the man who had been the main cause of the Fury exploding like an M-80 in a mailbox.
She got out of her Jeep, grabbed what was sitting on her passenger seat—her excuse to go out to the farm—and heard what sounded like construction noises. Saws, hammers, voices of men in the distance.
But she saw no one out front. All the noise seemed to be coming
from behind the barn.
As she took long strides in that direction, she wondered if Trip was even up yet. Maybe he was still in the house and it was just the construction crew working this early in the morning.
It was early for her, too. She usually closed the bar around two a.m. every morning and getting up at the ass crack of dawn was not something she enjoyed doing. But once the bar opened at eleven, she wouldn’t be able to get away since she was the only employee. She couldn’t afford to pay anyone else right now and there wasn’t enough business to get anyone to help out for only tips.
As she walked the length of the old barn, it was obvious where the new section started, which more than doubled the size of the original structure. The BFMC clubhouse was going to be pretty fucking epic. But she wondered if Trip was setting his sights too high.
Her own sight landed on a few men at the very rear of the building. The Amish could be seen working on the second floor, both from the open doorway at the top of the exterior steps and in the large picture windows that faced the field and woods behind the building.
Bet that was a nice view. Especially during sunset. Or a fresh snow.
A solid steel door on the lower level was also propped open and lights were on inside. Stella found it curious that the only windows in the barn and the new addition were on the second floor, all along the front, the sides and in the back. But the first floor? Nothing. The walls and doors also appeared solid.
Kind of like Crazy Pete’s, where there wasn’t a window downstairs, but the apartment upstairs had a few in the back, luckily. Mostly because people wanted to drink in peace and not have people gawking in the windows and also because windows were a lot less likely to get broken by drunks if they didn’t exist in the first place.
Maybe Trip had the same idea.
She stepped inside and let her eyes adjust from the bright natural light of the April morning to the artificial one.
Tilting her head, she heard music and decided to follow it. She walked down a very short, narrow hall from the back door into what looked like a bunch of rooms. Or at least, from what she could see, a wide corridor with a bunch of doors.
She peeked into the first one on her left. The room itself was pretty large and included the metal frames of three double bunkbeds and a wall of closets. That was it. No one was in there and certainly no one was living there yet. The first room to her right looked like a locker room. Showers, toilets, sinks. Sparse and utilitarian, reminding her of a dorm. As she moved through the center area, she peeked into each room as she passed. Small bedrooms with what looked like tiny bathrooms attached. No furniture. The walls hadn’t even been painted yet. The drywall had been taped and spackled, the concrete floors painted with some kind of brown-colored sealer. Most likely for easy clean-up.
Blood & Bones: Trip (Blood Fury MC Book 1) Page 4
