I’m workin’ myself up to a real fuckin’ shit fit when my phone goes off. Not Prince’s “Peach,” although my pulse spikes anyway. The Hollies. “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother.”
“Speak.” I sound angrier than I mean to.
“You with your girl?” Heavy booms, speaking over brothers laughing, females shrieking. He must still be at the cookout. I didn’t see him there; he must’ve rolled up late.
“Nah, man.”
“Good. Meet me at The White Van. ASAP.”
“Heavy. Dude. Not in the mood. Besides, it’s Sunday. They’re closed.”
The party sounds fade on Heavy’s end, and I hear his bike rev. “Cue called. There was a break-in.”
“Shit.”
“You believe in coincidences?” Heavy asks.
“Sure as shit don’t. Be there in twenty.” I mount up and tear off, grateful for the speed and the wind and the reason to stop thinking for a minute about the grand mess I’ve fuckin’ made with Kayla.
When I pull up at the club, four bikes are already lined up at the door. And shit. The Rebel Raiders’ tag drips from the fake, tufted leather front door.
Cue’s gonna be pissed. He commissioned that door from some dude in Philly.
“’Sup!” I call out as I go in, not wanting to set off Nickel’s hair trigger. Saw his Street out front. Looks like a bitch’s bike next to the Softails.
“In back!”
The place is destroyed. Torn curtains, glass everywhere. It reeks of liquor and no wonder. The top shelf of the bar is empty, but some asshole took the bottom shelf shit and shattered it against the mirror.
I make my way through overturned tables and past the stage, back through the short hall to the dressing room and Cue’s glass-walled office. He’s got a view of both the dressing room and the stage from his swivel chair, the perv.
Heavy and Cue are leaned over the CCTV feed, and Forty’s standin’ in the doorway, chin up, chest out as always.
“At ease, dude.” I slap his shoulder as I make my way past. It’s tight back here.
Nickel has popped a squat on a bench in the dressing room, and he’s bouncing a tennis ball against the lockers. Smart man. Ain’t none of us small men, so it’s ass-to-jock in Cue’s office. Besides, Nickel’s not really the figurin’ shit out type. He’s more the execution. And sometimes, the executioner.
“There.” Heavy directs Cue to zoom in on a grainy image on a monitor.
I get closer and check it out. There are three motherfuckers on screen, black hoodies, neoprene half-masks. One’s clearly young, bouncing around like he’s on a pogo stick—and meth—spray can in hand. One’s packing, standing look out by the door, and the third is pitching liquor bottles, throwin’ his head back, raisin’ his arms wide, and howlin’ at each explosion of glass and booze.
Smash. Head back. Arms wide. The young one bounces, tippin’ tables, taggin’ the walls, while his buddy throws discus. Smash. Arms up. Head back.
“Stop.”
Cue hits pause.
“Ho-ly shit.” Cue squints, his bald forehead wrinkling, and Forty steps closer.
“Good eyes, Charge.” Heavy claps my back.
“Mother. Fucker.” It takes me a second to place him, but then…I knew it. I knew there was somethin’ I hated about that guy.
Paused, in blotchy grey and black, is asshole Dan. From Garvis. The dude with the initialed forms. Des Wade’s “man Dan.”
“You know him?” Heavy asks.
“He’s Garvis. One of Des Wade’s.”
“Well that’s fuckin’ intriguing.” Heavy exhales and sinks onto a round-seated, girly chair next to Cue’s desk. I can only think of fuckin’ King Kong crushin’ shit into sticks. The chair wobbles, but it holds.
Heavy closes his eyes and leans his head back, resting it on the wall. Cue’s got it papered with old headshots of the big-time strippers that used to come through back in the day. Blaze Starr and Satan’s Angel.
If you didn’t know Heavy, maybe you’d laugh. This enormous hairy motherfucker, takin’ a nap against a wall plastered with pics of tassled tits. Maybe you’d think he’s some giant moron, in over his head. But then you wouldn’t know Heavy.
“He thinkin’?” Nickel’s come and joined us in the office.
“Ayup.” I nod at the screen. “You seen him around here?” Nickel heads security at The White Van when we ain’t aimin’ him at somethin’ and firin’.
“Nah. He looks like a bitch.” Nickel cracks his neck, and he gets that dark look, the one he’s got more often than not these days, the detached, nothin’ look that only breaks when his fists fly and blood sprays.
At least it’s not like when we was kids. Back then, he’d pop off for nothin’. And more than a few times, it seemed he was lookin’ to get his own blood spilled.
Heavy sniffs, shakes his great bearded head, and sits up.
“Here’s the plan,” he says. “Charge, take Nickel and find this fuck.”
“Do him?” Nickel asks.
Heavy groans. “God damn, Nickel. How many times I got to tell you. We ain’t one percent. We businessmen.”
“Beat the shit out of him then?”
“Yes. I want to know who the other two are. And I want to know everything about the Rebel Raiders. Where they hangin’ now, date and time of church, every-fuckin’-thing. We even know for sure if Book Daugherty’s still president?”
“You thinkin’ change of leadership?” I eye Heavy. I don’t follow this shit like he does, but I been around long enough to know how shit usually goes. Some asshole makes a play for head of table, he often gotta make his name off someone else’s ass.
“Would explain the change in tactics.” Heavy stares down the hall to the mess. “This is petty shit. Like the break-in at Patonquin. Tryin’ to get a rise. They want us to take the bait.”
“So we gon’ take the increase in the insurance premium then instead? Might as well start takin’ it up the ass, too.” Cue’s pissed. This place is his old lady, baby girl, side piece, all in one.
“Yes to the insurance premiums. And to the other, I don’t judge no man. ‘Cept if that’s your thing, your choice of décor and profession’s a bit bafflin’.” Heavy strokes the side of a black-and-white tassled tit on the wall behind him and waggles his bushy-ass eyebrows.
“You talk like you got a dick up your ass right now,” Cue grumbles.
Heavy laughs, hauling his Hagrid-size bulk to his feet, and he lays a huge paw on Cue’s shoulder. “I’ll send some prospects over to put this place back to rights. Don’t let the girls in ’til it’s set to rights. No need to freak them out. Charge and Nickel, take care of Dan the Vandal. Forty, I want you on background. What the fuck’s goin’ on with the Raiders? Why now? When we know what we’re dealin’ with, then we move. We ain’t all stupid.” Heavy cuffs the back of Cue’s bald head.
We all stand, make to move, but Forty speaks before we can shuffle out. “And Des Wade? We gonna ignore the fact that Dan is apparently his guy?”
Forty don’t talk much, and never against Heavy. His words rend the room like a record scratch.
Heavy’s lips thin, and for a second, I think he’s pissed at Forty. But then I see the unholy light, the pure rage turnin’ his brown eyes black as sin and cold as death. This is the rage reserved for the shit that cannot be changed, that cannot be made right. The past. Hobs’ brains dripping off a Rebel Raider’s baseball bat. Crista Holt’s broken body curled, knees to chin, to keep her insides from leakin’ out.
“Leave Des Wade to me.” Heavy says.
“This ain’t about you alone, brother,” Forty pushes.
Heavy’s shoulders square, and I take a step forward, in between him and his VP. All of a sudden, this small office feels veal-pen tight. Fists fly, ain’t none of us comin’ out unscathed.
Nickel slips to stand at Heavy’s back, and I inch forward to block both men from havin’ a clear shot.
How did shit go so quick to hell? My girl, my br
others. Like someone took the world and shook it like a snow globe filled with bullshit and bad news.
“No, it ain’t. It’s about Steel Bones. Our paychecks. The future. And Crista and Hobs, and yes, makin’ wrongs right, but also the shit we’re building. It’s about you trustin’ me. You all trustin’ me.”
There’s a long pause, a weighty silence, while we wait for whatever’s goin’ on behind Forty’s hard, still face.
For me, for Nickel—Heavy don’t need to ask for trust. That’d be like him askin’ for his own arm. Forty, though. The time he did overseas put a thing between him and us. A thing he’s gotta negotiate every once in a while. A few minutes for him to remember we’re his brothers, too. First and always.
“Trust,” Forty says, and he nods. “Can we get the fuck out of here? It smells like stripper sweat and whatever wax Cue uses on his head.”
“And nut sack,” Cue volunteers, cackling.
We file out of the office, and Cue heads for the utility closet to get started on the clean-up, cussin’ and bitchin’ the whole way.
Nickel and Forty head for the door. I’m right on their tails, but Heavy stops me. I raise an eyebrow.
“This gonna be okay with that new little girl of yours? You leavin’ at a moment’s notice?”
“Can’t fuck things up worse.”
Heavy chuckled. “Creech told me I missed the catfight.”
I shake my head. “Not a catfight. Me handlin’ shit poorly.”
Heavy’s brow furrows. “You know, man, Harper—”
“Ain’t about Harper,” I interrupt. “Not really. I mean, Harper didn’t help shit, but…I don’t think it’s gonna work out.”
“She can’t handle the lifestyle?”
I shrug. That’s not it exactly. The lifestyle ain’t exactly what it was when I was twenty. Back then, it was rot gut and runnin’ trains and stints in county. Now, it’s mostly beers and babes flashin’ tits on a Saturday night.
“She’s got a kid. He comes first. I ain’t exactly daddy material.”
Heavy snorts. Damn. He didn’t need to agree so easy.
“Besides, she got rich parents all up in her business. I don’t think they approve.”
“Cause of the club?”
“The club. My record. My long-ass hippie hair. Take your pick.”
“So you’re her walk on the wild side? Not a bad way to rebound.” Heavy grins, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. He’s studyin’ me in that way he has. Like I’m a clock and he’s got my pieces laid out on a table.
Steaks at Broyce’s. A weekend at a couples’ resort. Yeah. Not a walk on the wild side.
My heart takes a blow with each memory. Her silly smile when I got her stuffed on filet and then ordered the chocolate cake. Her hazy brown eyes when she led me from the champagne tub to the bed, too dopey with need to fuss with all those worries she carries all the damn time.
And now my stomach is aching, too, sour with knowing I’m not enough.
She can’t do this.
With all the shit weighing her down, with all the shit she’s jugglin’, I’m fuckin’ worse than useless to her. I’m another fuckin’ problem.
And I thought I could be somethin’ to her boy?
Hell, if she was mine, I wouldn’t want her and her kid around an ex-con loser like me either.
I didn’t think I could feel lower than when Harper kicked me to the curb. But I guess I’m an optimist after all, cause damn if there ain’t a way to feel a hell of a lot worse.
I realize Heavy’s starin’ at me, waiting. “Man, I just need to get my head straight.”
“You need a long ride.” Heavy strokes his beard. “And a strategy.”
Despite the suck, my lip sneaks up. Heavy talks about strategy like some brothers talk about God and pussy.
I hug the huge motherfucker and slap his back. “Don’t need no strategy. Need a fuckin’ miracle.”
“We goin’ to find Dan the douchebag or what?” Nickel hollers from out front, and he revs that Street. For a pussy bike, it’s got a righteous purr.
I’m right behind him, now, strappin’ my helmet on. We peel out together, side-by-side, crouching low and burnin’ through the gears.
Nickel is a brother to me, closer than he could be if we were blood, but I ain’t never really understood him before. Never felt like the world was total shit and nothin’ good could ever come of anything.
When we take the turn to Dolchester Road so fast and low I can hear gravel ping off my half shell, well, I start to get it.
The man I am ain’t what my woman and her boy need.
The world is total shit.
✽✽✽
“He said what?”
Sue brings me a soda from her fridge. Jimmy’s in her bedroom, playing video games. He’s stoked. We don’t have a console, so as soon as we get to Sue’s, he’s all over her to play racing games. She always gets him the newest ones and hides them around the apartment for him to find. Keeps him busy for hours.
“Yeah. Fuck. Whatever.”
“Yeah, fuck, whatever?”
I nod, cracking open the pop.
“He’s real articulate, isn’t he?”
I crack a smile. My first in six days.
“And he texted you what on Monday?”
“Out of town this week. Business. Talk this weekend.”
“Nothing else?”
Nope. I’ve checked my phone every fifteen minutes since—except at General Goods in the warehouse where I don’t get service—and that was it. I wrote a dozen replies, and I deleted them all.
Mostly because I don’t want to say what I think I have to say. Don’t bother. It’s over.
Tomorrow’s my day off, and I can’t bear thinking about a talk. I don’t want to talk.
I don’t want to hear the nice, chill biker version of this isn’t working for me. You’re too much work. You can’t hang. You’re not down; we clearly come from two different worlds.
I’ve imagined Charge dumping me so many times by Friday, that when Sue invited Jimmy and me to her place for a sleepover, I was more than ready for a break from the strain of waiting for the blow to strike. Knowing that if the blow didn’t come, I’d have to deal it myself. Right?
Sue and I had talked Sunday night, but the connection hadn’t been the best. She’d been out of town at a convention. She said the company she worked for was using her as a booth babe, and that even though it’s sexist, it pays time-and-a-half, and who’s she to judge any kind of sex work after all?
She brought Jimmy back a bunch of T-shirts, lanyards, and key chains. I’m going to accidentally leave them at her place when we go.
“So did you hear from the parents of the year?” Sue wrinkles her nose.
I did. First thing Monday morning.
“My dad called. Said he was very concerned about the influences I’m allowing around Jimmy. That I need to seriously consider my choices and the possible repercussions. And I’d better remember that I agreed to certain conditions, and he is obligated to make sure I adhere to them.”
“Does he always talk like an asshole lawyer from a cable TV drama?”
“Yeah. Pretty much.”
“He shake you up?”
I jerk a nod. I spent the day on the verge of a panic attack. I kept thinking that I should get Jimmy from school, pack everything, leave town. But when I picked Jimmy up from school, he reminded me I promised him tacos for dinner. And I remembered I’m not a helpless kid anymore. I’m a grown woman. With taco night obligations.
Sue shoots me a sympathetic look. “So you take me up on the sleepover so you can hide from the boyfriend? Avoid having the talk?”
I shrug. “A little?”
“Do you want to make the break-up official?”
No. Really, really no. My heart twinges thinking about it. A for-real, physical twinge. Like what might show up on an EKG.
“It’s not about what I want,” I say, grabbing one of Sue’s tasseled throw pillows and hugging it
to my chest. Putting pressure on the ache.
“Then what’s it about?”
“Jimmy,” I say.
“And Charge is bad for Jimmy?”
“No.” I don’t even have to think. And then I pause. “I mean…I don’t know.”
“So let’s start there. What’s good for Jimmy?”
“Safety. Food, shelter, toys. Fresh air, sunshine. Good role models. Love.” I smile. “Vegetables.”
“Is Charge unsafe?”
I think about him before he rode off angry. His fists. His whole body tight. How he’d been that tight for hours. When Harper called him a perv. When I iced him out on the ride home. When my dad called him a loser and a user. Then, when I told him I couldn’t do it, I thought he was going to punch a wall, but he’d walked away. Well, rode away.
And I think about Charge putting Jimmy’s seat into the new SUV, and then taking it out again, unsatisfied with the fit. Twice. A third time. Until I made him let me do it. I remember Charge stopping at Outdoor World before we went boating on Lake Patonquin. He bought Jimmy a life jacket because the ones they rent with the boats ain’t worth shit.
I think about the many times, in a little more than two months, that Jimmy has let an easy catch get away, dropped his utensils, spilled his milk, tracked mud into Charge’s truck, kicked the back of Charge’s seat, grabbed him with dirty hands, shouted indoors, slammed Pops’ screen doors, run through the house… and never once has Charge yelled at him. Or ground his teeth and shot Jimmy a dirty look. Or asked me whether I had rules at my house or if I just let Jimmy run wild.
“So that’s a no?” Sue asks, poking my foot. She has an L-shaped sofa, and she’s laying on her stomach across the seat cushions. I’m sitting cross-legged on the chaise lounge part. There’s a big bowl of popcorn between us, and a movie on for cover so Jimmy can’t overhear.
“Maybe? He’s never done anything, but there’s his record.”
“Ah, yes. The infamous charges. Let’s make an informed decision.” Sue reaches down and scoops her laptop off the floor. “How do you spell his last name?”
“D-e-n-n-e-y.”
Charge: A Steel Bones Motorcycle Club Romance Page 17
