Devil's Marker (Sons of Sanctuary MC, Austin, Texas Book 4)

by Victoria Danann

  “I’m no art expert.”

  “Me either. She says it’s an investment. Anyway, about the skylights. That caused what you’d call a kerfuffle around here. I had to pay to rectify that situation out of my own fucking money.”

  Win cocked his head. “How do you ‘rectify’ skylights?”

  “Oh we have these inch-and-a-quarter titanium shields that automatically slide into place and lock in case of emergency.” Boss leaned forward a little. “That titanium. It’s lightweight, but a direct hit from a bazooka wouldn’t leave a scratch on it.”

  Win stared straight ahead as he was imagining the tab for that. “Wow.”

  “Yeah. Wow.” Boss leaned back in his tall tufted leather chair. “Far as the easy access and the families bein’ exposed. We’ve got eyes posted for blocks all around. Every one of them has remotes that would set off alarms and close those gates so fast it would take off your hand.”

  He responded with a wan smile.

  “What’s that about?” Boss pointed to Win’s face.

  “Please don’t take offense at this, but I wasn’t expectin’ state-of-the-art high tech in Waco is all.”

  “Why? We have internet, trains, trucks, and planes like anyplace else. You’re from here, right?”

  “Texas, yeah. But I’m south Texas. Beaumont.”

  “Well, then, you should know.”

  Win nodded. “Looks like you’re doin’ alright for yourself.”

  “Can’t complain. But like Joe Walsh said, sometimes I still do.” He chuckled.

  “You were sayin’ somethin’ about potential trouble?”

  “Well, it’s Saturday night. We got a celebration goin’ on tonight. Everybody’ll want to meet you.”

  He scrubbed a hand down his face. “Is it Saturday?”

  Boss chuckled. “Yeah. A long haul will do that to ya. Get a shower and some sleep. Things’ll be lively ‘round here tonight.”

  “Okay.”

  “My pride and joy’ll be here. And about my daughter.”

  “I know. Stay away from her.”

  “I was gonna give you a courtesy heads up, but not ‘cause of what you’re thinkin’. I was gonna tell you that if you meet her and reach out to shake with your right hand, you’d better be clutchin’ your ball sack with your left. Girl don’t like bikers. At. All. She’s determined to marry a stockbroker or some such nonsense and wants nothin’ to do with our kind. She’ll tear you a new face. So, forgettin’ I’m her daddy, man to man, watch out. Consider yourself warned.”

  That was a new one. Some woman’s father was tryin’ to protect Win from his daughter.

  Huh.

  “Her mama ran off when she was little. I think maybe she believes it was ‘cause of me. The life. Ya know? My little girl. She’s smart as a whip. Beautiful. Likes things her own way.” He seemed to snap out of a reverie. Standing he came round the desk to walk Win partway to the door. “Come out to the thing tonight. I’ll see you there. Introduce you around. Meantime, go on and tell Cue I said to get you set up proper.”

  “Thanks, uh, Boss.”

  He laughed. “You’ll get used to it.”

  Win turned and reached for the doorknob just as the door came crashing in and collided with his face. That was the first blow.

  “Jesus, Daddy! It smells like zombies have been in here havin’ a cigar party. What is the matter with you? Even if you don’t give a damn about your health, this smoke…” She waved her hand in the air like that would make a difference before continuing the shouting. “And the smell is disgustin’, is hard on this museum quality work of art you have hangin’ in this beautiful office. Pearls before swine, I tell you.”

  “Do not give me that pearls before swine shit. I’m your father, missy.” Boss matched her volume decibel for decibel.

  “You may be my father, but if it wasn’t your birthday I’d kick your ass for this. I told that cocksucker, Cue, not to allow any cigars into this building.”

  “You think you’re gonna interest some Wall Street dandy with a mouth like that, little girl?”

  “You need to be more worried about what you’re puttin’ in your mouth than what I’m sayin’ with mine. You know damn well you’re not supposed to be smokin’ those fucking cigars.”

  “It’s my birthday. I got a box of Havanas.”

  She stopped still. When she spoke again, she spoke quietly, sounding every bit as dangerous as the biggest bad ass biker Win had ever encountered. “Where is it?”

  “None. Of. Your. Business. You know what is your business?”

  She narrowed her eyes. “What?”

  “The man whose nose you just broke stormin’ in here without permission like I’m your little bitch.”

  “Do not use that word around me, you toxic, smelly, fucking old biker.” She went still again as if she was replaying the last few sentences. “What?!?”

  The second blow was when she turned around.

  Win was holding his nose with both hands, blood running down his face and dripping off his jaw onto his shirt. For a couple of seconds he forgot the pain. It was all he could do to process the totality of the woman standing in front of him, pissed like a wild cat, hands on her hips, death rays shooting from her bayou green eyes. She was tan. Long dirty-blonde hair that was natural except for the almost-white streaks on top. She was almost as tall as his six feet with the kind of athletic build that looked good in clothes, great out of clothes.

  “Christ,” she said, just before stepping to the door. “Cue, get somebody in here who knows how to set a broken nose. And bring somethin’ to clean up blood for cryin’ out loud.”

  Win heard somebody yell. “R.C. What did you do now?”

  Boss looked at Win. “Win Garrett, meet my only child. The apple of my eye. R.C.”

  Win let go of his nose long enough to wave one bloody hand.

  She rolled her eyes. “Jesus,” she said, flopping into a seat, resting one leg on the arm of the chardonnay-colored Chesterfield chair.

  She looked polished, pampered, and posh. More like a debutante than an MC princess. Of course, she didn’t talk or act like a debutante. At least not when she was confronting her dad.

  Win’s eyes were immediately drawn to the tan leg he could see at the end of her pink pedal-pushers. He followed it down to the perfect foot in flip flops, toes accented by pink polish the same color as the pants. Again, he forgot the pain of his nose long enough to decide that perhaps he didn’t hate pink as much as he’d previously thought.

  A woman came through the doorway with a first aid kit. She pulled Win’s hands away from his nose and said, “Ouch. What happened? The Boss punch ya?”

  “R.C. happened,” Boss said.

  Without looking away from Win, the woman nodded and said, “Oh,” as if that explained everything. “I’m Carla. You feel like walking to my little infirmary?” she asked. Win nodded. “Good. I think you want it to just be you and me when I put this nose back where it belongs.”

  He followed behind, not really paying attention to anything except keeping her in sight. The pain was almost blinding.

  When they reached the infirmary, she shut the door and told him to sit on the gray vinyl exam table that was identical to what you’d find in any doctor’s office.

  He climbed up.

  “Take these.” Carla handed him two pills and a bottled water.

  He put them in his mouth and swallowed them down with water.

  Carla ran the tap in the deep farmhouse sink until it was warm then got a clean rag wet.

  “I’m just gonna clean you up,” she said.

  She made a couple of painful swipes, though she was trying to be gentle, and then expertly set his nose back in place with no warning.

  He yelled out. “No motherfucking warning?!?”

  She shrugged. “I find it works out better when guys aren’t all tensed up in anticipation.”

  “Jesus H. Christ.”

  “That’s why I thought you’d like for it to just be you a
nd me. You get to preserve the illusion of macho dignity.”

  “My dignity is not an illusion,” he said. “And neither is my manhood.”

  She chuckled. “Whatever you say,” she said as she went back to cleaning him up. “So. R.C. punched you?”

  Gaping at Carla, he said, “Is that her name? R.C.?”

  “Hmmm. Not really. It’s an abbreviation of a nickname. So I guess it can’t get much more complicated than that.”

  “No. She did not punch me. We were both of a mind to open a door at the same time. She did it more forcefully.”

  Carla’s eyebrows went up. “You mean it was an accident? She didn’t mean to do it?”

  “Yes. That’s what I mean. Are you saying she goes around punching people regularly?”

  “Well, I’d say ‘regularly’ is probably too regular a word. But it happens.”

  “It happens,” he repeated drily, prodding for more information.

  “Yeah.”

  “What’s wrong with her?”

  Carla laughed. “I’m not a shrink, darlin’.”

  “What are you?”

  “Today it’s Saturday at the biker boy club and it’s Boss’s birthday. So today I’m Zipper’s old lady, but four days a week you can find me over at the VA hospital. I’m an RN.”

  “No shit?”

  “None at all. Now lay back there.” As she placed a little pillow with a clean paper cover at the head end of the table, she pushed on his chest gently. When he reclined, she pulled the lever that lifted the foot section of the table. When he relaxed she said, “I’m gonna ice that nose so you don’t bruise too bad. I gave you some sleepy pills and they’re gonna be makin’ you drowsy any minute. Just go with it. Take a little nap right here.” She retrieved a blanket from one of the metal cabinets lining the walls and pulled it from the sealed plastic bag it had been in. Covering Win, she said, “This’ll keep you warm. Don’t you worry. Nobody’ll bother you in here. I’m gonna keep the pack fresh while you sleep for a few hours. When you wake up, you may not be good as new, but you’ll be better than you’d be without the ice.”

  Win stared at the insulation panels in the lowered ceiling and listened to the sound of Carla’s voice.

  “Her nickname is Roman Candle. That’s where the R.C. comes from. You just learned firsthand why her daddy started calling her that. I guess it was him. Coulda been somebody else. I don’t know. Reminded her dad of one of the really hot-tempered fireworks.

  “I actually know her pretty well. She grew up with my girl, Robin. If it’d been up to me I woulda called her T.D. after that Tasmanian Devil thing that was in Looney Tunes. But ‘course nobody asked me.

  “One time at my house, when the girls were about ten, she and Robin filled pillow cases with flour and had a pillow fight. That was fifteen years ago and I’m still findin’ little bits of old flour hiding in cracks and crevices when I deep clean. ‘Course it was R.C.’s idea.

  “She’s a handful. Pretty though. You probably didn’t notice that, what with your nose tryin’ to marry your cheek and all.”

  As the pain subsided, his lids grew heavy and his muscles relaxed underneath the warmth of the blanket. As his eyes closed he was thinking that he had, in fact, noticed that and kind of wished he hadn’t. She was a dreamy Nordic blonde distraction and the last thing he needed when laser sharp focus was required.

  The next time he opened his eyes he didn’t feel the weight of an ice pack on his face. Turning his head slightly he saw Carla sitting in a chair, swinging one crossed leg slightly while swiping pages on an iPad.

  She noticed he was awake when he tried to sit up, and rushed over to the table.

  “Here. Here. Here.” She caught hold of him and helped him sit up with a grip that was deceptively strong. “Go easy. I gave you some pretty serious sleepy time meds.”

  “How long have I been asleep?” His voice sounded hoarse, like he’d been asleep for days.

  She cracked open a bottle of water and handed it to him. “Six hours.”

  “Six hours?” He sounded incredulous. He was supposed to be working for the SSMC and, by extension, the Texas Rangers. Not sleeping for hours on end.

  He slid forward on the table until his feet found the ground. Carla was there to steady him. “Let’s just make sure you’re nice and steady before you go chargin’ off.”

  She let go of him, but stayed close while he took a few steps, drinking water.

  “How do you feel?”

  He gave that question serious consideration. “Having trouble breathing through my nose? I sound like…”

  “Darth Vader.”

  “Yeah. Him.”

  When he reached up to touch his face, she grabbed his wrist and stopped him.

  Pointing to the rectangular mirror over the sink, she said, “Take a look.”

  He hesitated, but shuffled over to the mirror. He looked like something out of a horror movie. His nose was swollen so that he could be justifiably reclassified as disfigured. Worse. It was black with dark red streaks running through the bruise. His eyes were almost swollen shut. Also bruised underneath like he’d been in a boxing ring and taken way too much punishment.

  “Jesus Fucking Christ.”

  “That would be hard. Although I’ve heard…”

  “People are gonna think I’ve taken a beat down.”

  She laughed. “Darlin’. There’s not a soul here who’s gonna think that. Bikers are more gossipy than old women at a bake sale. Everybody here already knows you’ve been a victim of Boss’s baby girl. Nobody’s gonna think less of you because they all know.”

  He gave Carla a pained look.

  “I can put a bandage on top of that, but it won’t help the healin’ and, let’s face it, a bandage on your face is not gonna make you more handsome.”

  Turning his face from side to side, he said, “How long am I gonna look like this?”

  “Good news or bad news first?”

  “Good.”

  “Because you had an expert on the scene, you’re probably gonna be beautiful again. Though not right away.”

  “Bad.”

  “Swelling’s gonna last at least three days. After that you should be able to breathe easier, but the bruises…” She shook her head. “That takes time. You’re gonna look like a mess for a couple of weeks. Could take a month for you to look exactly like you did yesterday.”

  He took one more look in the mirror and indulged in a deep sigh. “Always wanted to find out what it’s like to not have to fight the ladies away.”

  Carla laughed again. “Don’t know what you looked like before, but I’ll tell you this. I’m not havin’ any trouble controlling my lustful impulses. Now I’m gonna give you some pills that’ll help with pain for the next three days. But no drinkin’. Got it?” He nodded. “Repeat after me. No drinking.”

  “No drinking.”

  “Good man. I’ll be keepin’ an eye on you. At least for the rest of this evenin’. Party’s revvin’ up. You feel like goin’?”

  He tried to smile. “Lookin’ forward to trottin’ out my new face.”

  Music was playing somewhere in the building. When Carla opened the infirmary door, he got a hint of just how loud it was. Apparently the infirmary door made the room practically soundproof.

  “Follow me, chickadee,” she said.

  Win followed Carla through a couple of turns before the hallway opened into the communal space. Aside from the fact that the gathering area was crowded with people, the first thing he noticed was that it looked a lot different after dark. The rotating platform the Panhead bike sat on was lined with neon and the giant mirror behind the bar was framed with Hollywood lights. There were about five female bartenders dressed in costumes that were essentially black strings sewed together, putting on flashy Coyote Ugly performances.

  The second thing he noticed was the giant screen monitors sitting high up on the walls. Instead of boxing, or MMA, or porn, or even greatest hit clips of action or gangster movies, each of t
he screens was divided into grids of thirty-two security camera angles, some of the immediate perimeter of the complex, some of the streets surrounding the warehouse.

  Win’s first reaction was appreciation of the fact that the club had invested its profits in high tech security. Every one of the two hundred or so people at the party was a line of defense since every direction you faced was a wall of security monitors. In other words, somebody would notice something amiss.

  The third thing he noticed was R.C. doing tequila shots at the bar, laughing with a woman standing to her left wearing a halter top and cutoff jeans.

  His feet didn’t ask his permission. They just started moving that direction. He moved to the left of the brunette in the cutoffs and got an eyeful of strings that seemed to keep bartender nipples hidden no matter how wildly tits swung back and forth.

  One of the bartenders sashayed her thonged ass toward him with a smile. “What you want, sugar pie?” she said.

  “Root beer.”

  “The kids have all gone home.”

  “Well, maybe I’m a kid at heart.”

  Her smile fell almost as far as a gape. “You’re seriously askin’ for a root beer for yourself? ‘Scuse me for sayin’ so, but you look like you could use some amber comfort.”

  “That your name? Amber?”

  She laughed. “No. I’m Chalice.”

  “Of course. Just the root beer.”

  She pressed her lips together. “I’ll look around. Maybe we have somethin’ in back for the kiddos.”

  He watched her smooth tush as she walked away then angled his body toward the woman next to him on his right. It gave him a perfect view of the blonde on the other side laughing around a quarter lime slice in her mouth. He could barely hear her laughter over the music and the crowd, but he liked it.

  When she noticed him staring, her laughter came to an abrupt halt.

  Following the direction of R.C.’s gaze the brunette turned to face him and immediately drew back. Seeing that much damage up that close had to be shocking.