Hammer nodded and watched as Beth and Cindy-Lou were brought into the club.
“Looks like it’s gonna be another burn night out at Ashe’s place. I’ll make a call and have Jules meet you at Dirty Deeds. She’ll talk to you once she hears about you getting a lawyer. Unless you want to stick around here and see what we do to bitches who fuck with the club. We make sure they feel the pain; bro. Twisted got his name for being real creative and twisted. Guess he is kinda like Rabid was, but we let him get off on his kink only when we have a very good reason. I gotta stick around until they get all the information these two new bitches have given the Fiends. Shame, that Beth is a pretty girl. I wonder how she ended up with the Filthy Fiends. I heard she gives good head, too. I’ll meet up with you at the bar later?”
“Yeah, I’d rather talk to Jules and try to reason with her. I saw enough of what Rabid did. Watch your boy doesn’t end up like him.” Tramp was glad to leave the clubhouse.
“Twisted is my little brother, Tramp. He learned all his shit from Dingo, who passed on a few years back. Now that was a real sicko—made Rabid look like a saint. Twisted is good. He’s got an ol’ lady and a few kids so I don’t worry about him. He gets off on making people talk. Every club needs a guy like him. Good luck with Jules. Imma go make the call now.”
Hammer walked toward the payphone as Tramp heard a loud scream. He noticed the jukebox being turned up louder and decided he’d head over to Dirty Deeds. He tossed a twenty on the bar before he left. His boys trailed behind him, happy to be leaving.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Jersey and Joy rode back to the farm the next morning, both of them very happy. Joy was a bit sore, but content and Jersey had a huge grin on his face. Joy made it to the screen door and let out a scream. “Elena had a baby girl, Jerz! We have to get over to the hospital. I can’t believe we missed it, damn it. Thorn left a note on the door.”
“Joy, you need to shower and so do I before we go anywhere. One of your hands is coming to talk to you.” Jersey watched as the man walked sadly up to the porch.
“Miss Joy, last night that old mare, Ladybug up and died, we found her out in the far pasture this morning. We covered her with a tarp—it was natural causes. I told Miss Elena she wasn’t doing so well lately. Neither Pete nor I know how to use the backhoe. It’s too hot to let her out stay there, but we had no choice. Thorn came by and told us Miss Elena had her baby girl, but he said to wait for you to decide where you want to bury her. We’re very sorry. She was a good old horse.” He turned and headed back toward his trailer.
Joy stood there in shock. That mare had been one of her first horses. Ladybug was well loved and tears flowed down her face. She should’ve noticed Lady wasn’t doing well and someone should’ve told her. Jersey was right, she was dancing too much. She felt him come up behind her and put his arms around her. She leaned back into him.
“What can I do to help Blondie? We can’t leave her out there for much longer in this heat. I’ll help you do whatever needs to be done.”
“I’ll get the backhoe up to where she is and dig a hole close enough to her that it will be easy enough to push her into the grave. Toss a bunch of bags of lime into the back of one of the farm trucks and meet me up there. Damn it, I was just so happy and now poor Ladybug is dead. Oh hell, you better bring a gun in case there is something trying to eat her. Let’s get changed into barn clothes. We’re gonna get dirty.” Joy had buried horses before and knew how to use the backhoe.
They changed into the clothes they wore around the barn and Joy wiped at the tears running down her face. Jersey wasn’t sure what to say to her and she headed to the barn by herself. He figured he’d give her a few minutes as he loaded his gun. He’d never seen a dead horse, but he’d seen dead bodies and figured the horse was going to bother him more. All of a sudden he heard a scream and he ran down to the barn where Joy had just headed to.
Joy had entered the dimly lit barn not really paying much attention when she felt herself tossed into the wall as soon as she entered inside. She looked in shock as Stinky stood in front of her. She tried to stay calm, knowing Jersey would be coming soon. Behind her was a hay hook and she grabbed it. Stinky was smiling at her as she swung the hay hook up toward his head. He screamed out loudly in pain when she hooked him right in the face. The side of his face was ripped wide open and blood was flowing all over the place. Where the hell was Jersey?
“Joy, move to me now! Get behind me! I’m gonna kill this motherfucker, finally.” Jersey was livid and Stinky looked at him in confusion and fear. Joy pushed herself away from the wall and ran behind Jersey. She still had the bloody hay hook in her hand and wasn’t going to let go of it until Stinky wasn’t a threat. She looked around the barn expecting Filthy Fiends to come out from every corner.
Jersey shot Stinky point blank and watched as his body fell to the dirt floor of the barn. He shot him once more to make sure he was dead. He wasn’t taking any more chances with Stinky. Jersey was sick of the pain in the ass motherfucker.
“Start up the backhoe, Joy—in case one of your help comes around. I’ll toss this scumbag in the bucket. How many bags of lime do you think we’ll need?”
“I think about twelve bags will do it. We’ll stick Stinky underneath poor Ladybug. Do you think he was alone? I doubt my guys heard anything. The air conditioner is loud and they don’t hear well, anyway.” Joy was up on the backhoe and ready to start it. “Follow me with the bags of lime. Just toss a tarp over this asshole. There’s an open bag of lime so just toss some where he was laying. We’ll have to clean that up when we’re done burying them.”
Jersey threw Stinky into the backhoe bucket and tossed an old tarp over him. He watched Joy head out of the barn. He grabbed the bags of lime and tossed them into the truck as fast as he could. She’d need somebody to open the pasture gates for her. Jersey thought she had taken all of this very well. He looked around for signs of more Filthy Fiends and didn’t see any. He really didn’t want to tell the club about this. Putting Joy in danger by anyone knowing about Stinky was not an option to him. This needed to stay between them and he hoped Joy would see the wisdom of that.
Joy was waiting by the gate for him and Jersey jumped out of the truck to open it. Once she passed through, he shut it and secured it again. They went through three gates before they were up by where Ladybug had died. It seemed Stinky had used the path where the pasture was that the mare had died in. Stinky was one stupid motherfucker. There was his bike so Jersey felt sure he had come alone and was just looking around. This time he had used a path closer to the horses and the house though. He probably had only meant to scare Joy because there was no way he could have gotten her to leave on his motorcycle willingly. But with Stinky who knew what that dumb fuck had been thinking. Jersey grabbed the trap from his body and spread it on the ground. Joy tipped the body on to it. She began to dig a hole close to her horse and Jersey was impressed with the way she handled the backhoe. She clearly knew what she was doing and how big a hole she needed to make, how deep it had to be. While she was digging Jersey wandered over to check out Stinky’s motorcycle. It was a ratty bike, a shitty sportster, not worth much. He needed it to disappear though and not on the farm, either. Joy had finished digging the hole and it had to have been well over six feet deep. It was more than wide enough for the horse too. He went through Stinky’s pockets and took his wallet, he’d burn that. At least he didn’t have any weapons on him so he didn’t have to dispose of them.
Finally Joy was done. She shut off the backhoe and headed over to where Ladybug was laying. He watched as Joy walked over to her horse. She knelt down and kissed her mare on the head. He noticed she cut a long piece of her tail off and carefully rolled it up in a bandana and tucked it away in her overall pocket. He decided to get Stinky in the hole and pulled the tarp over to the edge of it. He pulled on the gloves Joy had thought to bring—good thinking on her part, he thought. He tossed some lime into the hole and tried to make sure it was spread evenly.
Stinky rolled easily into the deep hole, landing face down into the dirt and Jersey started to pour bags of lime over his body. Joy climbed up on to the backhoe, started it up and began to push Ladybug toward the hole. He could see she had been crying and there were steaks of dirt on her face. She had a very determined look on her face as she pushed Ladybug into the hole. She climbed down from the backhoe and ran into Jersey’s arms sobbing. He let her cry for a few minutes before he told her to go sit on the grass. He dumped the rest of the lime on the horse, leaving one bag for the top of the grave. Joy composed herself and got back on the backhoe and filled the hole in. Jersey watched as she packed the dirt down and yelled down at him to dump more lime on the dirt. She sat on the backhoe looking so sad that Jersey came up with an idea. Maybe she would enjoy smashing Stinky’s motorcycle up. They needed to get rid of it after all.
“Blondie, come down here, I need to show you something.” Jersey crooked his finger at her as she climbed down off the backhoe.
“What’s up now? We need to get back and clean up the barn, Jersey.”
Jersey smiled, “Look over at the path. There’s Stinky’s bike. Do you feel like smashing it with the backhoe? We need to get rid of it. After you have some fun banging it up, you can dump it into the back of the truck and I’ll get it out of here. We don’t need anyone but the two of us knowing about today. I don’t want the club to know we killed that asshole—the less people who know the better.”
“I sure as hell am never telling anyone about today, Jersey. You’re right, the less people that know the better. I’ll enjoy smashing that damn Stinky’s bike. How dare that bastard come on my farm again? Where do you plan to dump it? You could take this path up to the fork—if you go left there it’ll lead you to the swamps. The state owns that land, for now. Nobody goes there anymore. They used to hunt for ducks out there, but the game wardens stopped that when we bought the farm. We plan to use the pastures closer to the swamps at some point, when we can afford to improve the areas. They haven’t closed the paths off yet, but once we use those pastures they plan to block the paths off, I think. Nobody would notice if you dumped it out there. The water is too shallow for boats even. Can you move the bike out of the path for me? I don’t want to hit a tree while I’m smashing it up.” Joy had a slight smile on her face at the thought of destroying that bastard’s motorcycle.
Jersey grabbed the gloves that he’d used when he was dumping the lime and put them on. “No problem, Blondie. Knock yourself out smashing it up. Just let me get me get out of the way once I get that piece of shit bike over here. I don’t want to get tangled up with Stinky’s crappy bike accidently. When I put my hand up it means you’ve done enough damage and drop the fucker in the back of the truck bed.” They both grinned at each other.
Joy smirked at Jersey, “Do you think I’d really hit you with the backhoe after last night?”
“I hope not, Blondie—since I love your ass and I think I proved it last night.” Jersey grinned at the love of his life and she grinned back.
Joy was having a blast using the backhoe to demolish the ratty bike. She quickly had it into a twisted pile of rubble and Jersey finally raised his hand. She stopped and he had to help push the wrecked bike into the backhoe bucket.
“Joy, it is leaking gas so I’m gonna let it out of the tank. When I leave you’ll need to use some dirt to soak up the gas. I don’t like leaving gas on the ground, but it is what it is. Try and bury it as best as you can. I’ll take this shit bike down to the swamp right now and try to sink it. When we get back we need to clean the truck, backhoe and the barn. We need to burn the tarps, his wallet and these gloves.” Jersey had his plans and that was to be rid of as much evidence as possible.
The bike dropped into the truck bed with a bang and Jersey followed the directions Joy had given him. It didn’t take long for him to get back and Joy had tidied the area up when he returned. She had everything rolled into the tarp that had covered Ladybug and he tossed that into the back of the truck. Jersey led the way back to the barn, again opening the gates for the backhoe and locking them behind her.
There was a burn pit behind their house and he drove the truck to it. Jersey pulled the tarp out and shoved it into it. He headed back to the barn where Joy was hosing the backhoe bucket off with bleach and water. He grabbed the bleach and poured a gallon into a sprayer attached to a hose. Soon the truck bed was clean and they both headed into the barn. He grabbed a shovel and began to remove the blood soaked dirt while she got a wheel barrow of sandy dirt to replace it.
“Just toss that dirt into the manure pile and cover it with shit. Flies are always on the shit anyway, but covering it up would be a good idea, Jerz.” Joy sounded worn out and tired.
Jersey was impressed with his Joyful. She was no dumb blonde, that was for sure. By the time he came back into the barn she’d made it look like it always did. The hay hook had been cleaned and hung back where it belonged. He doubted even Elena would have noticed anything had happened in the barn.
Together they walked up to their house. Nobody was around and Joy was right, the air conditioner in the trailer was quite loud. All that was left to do was burn the tarp and its contents. Jersey grabbed the lighter fluid for the grill from the small shed and they made their way to the burn pit. Joy was grabbing some rotten wood that was lying around and tossed it into the pit.
“It is gonna stink like hell, but I guess it’ll burn fast, won’t it?” She hoped it would because she was tired and wanted a shower badly.
“Go in and shower, Joy. I got this. No sense in you having to smell it. Tomorrow I’ll move the ashes to the manure pile when it is all cooled down, but I think we need to figure out a way to block all the paths from the woods into the farm. There are too many of them and I’m going to invest in some good sturdy fencing. I’ll ask some of the bros for ideas on how to block those paths because just logs won’t do much.”
“Elena was talking about barbed wire for now since we don’t have the money to do very much right now. The paths were a concern to me when we were buying the farm, but we got a good deal when we bought this place. Maybe thick chains across the paths might work. I think they’re old fire trails. I hate the idea of fire, it scares the hell outta me. When I was young I saw a barn go up and my dad got burned getting horses out. Fire really scares me. Are you sure you want to invest in this place?”
“I’m not leaving you, Joyful—I thought that was clear. Plus, now we’re partners in crime now—aren’t we?” Jersey had a crooked grin on his face.
“I guess we are, but I feel bad you’re always paying for stuff here. Do you mind if I go back to the house now?” Joy sounded sad and a little defeated.
Jersey could see she didn’t want to watch the fire and didn’t blame her in the least.
“Nah, go back and rest. I got this.” He preferred she left anyway.
Joy nodded and walked toward the house, but she came back with the garden hose. “You should have water in case the damn thing blows up. I think we need a pitcher of Red Death. I’m going to call Elena and tell her that Ladybug died. She’ll understand why we can’t visit. I don’t think either of us is up to visiting after all of this. I’ll wait for you to shower with me, too.” As she was walking away Jersey tossed a match into the burn pit and she heard the whoosh of fire starting.
What a day it had been. Drinking Red Death seemed to be a fitting way to end it. She wondered what would have happened to her if Jersey hadn’t been living with her. The whole time they worked together he hadn’t been bossy at all, either. Maybe this was her chance at being happy with a man. They worked together in harmony and she felt slightly better. Poor Ladybug had to share her resting place with Stinky, though. That did bother her a bit—but it was a good place for him. At least now she no longer had to worry about him. She washed her hands and called Elena—who was sad about Ladybug, but understood why they weren’t coming. Elena had Tears, Thorn and Thrash visiting anyway. She made the pitcher of Red Death and stripped off he
r clothes, placing them in the hamper. She’d do their wash as soon as Jersey came back. Having him as her ol’ man was a really good feeling now. She was willing to give Jersey a try and although she hated that four letter word—LOVE—if she was honest with herself, she really did love Jersey. She believed he loved her just as much—if not more, too. In her heart Joy had a feeling they’d be together for a long time and quite possibly even end up having children one day.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Tears was on her way to the Lodge. Her new dress was placed carefully across the backseat of her car with an overnight bag.
Jo, her dad and the twins were going to spend the next few days with her grandparents in the Poconos Mountain cabin they owned. For some reason her dad hadn’t made her go along. Maybe Jo had told him she had to work—she was the more logical one of the two. Nailz had insisted she stay at the Lodge though and it fit right in with their plans.
Today was her wedding day and she couldn’t wait. Nobody had noticed she was a bit nervous when they had been leaving. Nailz had been too busy making sure everything the twins needed was packed and Jo was cranky, being pregnant again. Tears had felt a bit sad that her family wouldn’t see the wedding, but she figured her grandparents would want to have another wedding for her if everyone didn’t disown her. Nailz might yell at her and maybe fight with Thorn, but she thought Jo would be more understanding. After all, Jo wasn’t much older than she was and Kima was near her age, too.
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