Checkmate With Bishop: A Hellions MC Novel

by J. A. Hornbuckle

  “What took you so long?” So much for the comparisons between J.R. and his dad since J.R.’s voice had been trying to take on its new depths without much success. There were growls and there were squeaks but not much in between as he grew into the new registers his voice was taking.

  “We were just about out of everything,” I wheezed as I struggled to find the ground in my effort to exit the tall vehicle. “It was an every aisle job, man.”

  I caught the eye-roll J.R. was so studiously trying to keep to himself and turned away in order to hide my grin. Eye-rolls were just part and parcel of the whole raising-a-teen experience and one that I was becoming intimately familiar with.

  Snagging a couple of the handles of more than a few of the carriers that were heavy enough to slide my purse down my shoulder, I maneuvered the concrete stairs of our back door and made my way into the house. Placing them by lower countertops, I felt my purse slip even further and reached to capture my cellphone before it tumbled out and down. I’d already lost one cellphone to that kind of action and didn’t want to repeat it again.

  Setting it on the countertop I went back outside and smiled at my tall little man who had three bags looped around each arm. “Not too heavy, baby?”

  I got the full-frontal eye-roll as he slid by me with the rustle of plastic and couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped my lips. It seemed that every day my darling boy set out to prove that he was already fully-grown at thirteen even though I knew my heart would never accept it even when he was thirty-five.

  “Mom? Your…” J.R. started but the crinkling of the bags hanging off my wrists overrode him. Not that I was worried since I was within fifteen feet of him in spite of the surprise I could hear in his voice.

  Climbing the three steps, grunting at all the extra weight of the two bags I carried in each hand, I schooled my face into a determined grin. I may not have been able to match J.R. in amount, but I was pulling my own weight nonetheless.

  I watched my boy, my little boy who was not so little anymore, use one hand to pull up his sagging knee-length shorts while holding my cellphone up to his ear. “Yeah, she’s here. Just a sec’. And who can I say is calling?” My brain idly noted how he straightened at whatever was said before he twisted to me, his hazelly-green eyes turning to mine as he held out the phone.

  But it was the emotions contained within those amazing orbs that made my feet sputter in their movements as I stopped just inside the door.

  “He says his name is Bishop Bastian,” my beautiful, wonderful boy announced, confusion tangled in the set of his eyebrows. “And he wants to talk to you.”

  My heart seemed to hesitate before it began to pound as the bags I’d been carrying dropped from my arms and thudded to the floor while I reached for the phone.

  Stan.

  Stan was on the phone and had talked to J.R.

  I closed my eyes as the plastic of the cellphone hit my fingers, everything within me clenching as I struggled with the thought of…

  “Hey, Stan,” I offered, my eyes still squeezed shut even though I worked to maintain an even tone, clutching the cell to my ear.

  “Dory.” His one word response held a wealth of meanings, those I’d already learned in my time with him so long ago. Some things couldn’t be forgotten no matter how much you tried. “Did I catch you at a bad time?”

  “No.” Damn, I had no defenses to prevent my voice from going into a higher register as I walked the tightrope between the bass timbre from my past and the question in my teenager’s face. Directing my speech to the one male I knew I could control, I explained and hoped J.R. took my hint, “just bringing in groceries.”

  I took a deep breath in order to calm myself, only hoping afterward that Stan hadn’t heard. “I got your message. What’s up?”

  Okay, I had been trying for breezy during a time I felt anything of the sort but still, I’d gotten the main portion of my question out there.

  “We need to talk,” the velvet growl answered, a noise that I felt in places that had no business being awake at that time of the evening and with my son looking on. “You didn’t call me back.”

  Grabbing the first bag at my feet and bringing it up to the waist-high counter, I waved towards J.R. in an effort to encourage him to go back to the truck to continue removing the groceries.

  And to get him out of earshot, if I was being honest.

  True to his early-teen attitude though, my kid stood across from me in a pose of studied casualness and watched with sharp, all-seeing eyes. He was deliberately ignoring my hints. Covering the bottom half of my cellphone, I was done with suggesting and decided to give a clear directive. “J.R., honey, can you bring in the rest of the groceries?”

  “Sure, Mom. Groceries. You got it,” he grumbled, his changing voice only breaking once as he shoved away from the counter and exited through the still opened back door.

  “Sorry, Stan,” I offered, calmer without an audience, although not by much. “You were saying?”

  There were a couple of beats of silence, enough so I pulled the phone away from my ear to check the connection. But when he spoke again, I thought Stan’s voice sounded weaker and more strained than it had before. “Did he just call you mom?”

  I swear to god, my heart that had been beating so fast and so deep stopped at his question. In fact, everything I was stilled on both my insides and outer body. “You heard that?” Another blurt but this one was offered on a whisper.

  “Kinda hard to miss, babe.”

  As my body restarted, my mind raced to come up with an answer. But wait! I didn’t owe Stan a goddamn thing, much less an explanation of my life now and who was or wasn’t in it! And that knowledge gave me courage while adding steel to my tone. “Why are you calling, Stan?”

  “How old is he?” Stan’s growl came across loud and clear, enough for me to know the expression he was wearing as he asked the question. It would be one of pinched eyebrows that were lowered around narrowed eyes. “Your son, Dory. How old is he?”

  I sighed. I knew the man on the other end of the phone. Had dated him for two years then had been married to him for five. So unless he’d gone through a drastic personality change in the time we’d been apart, I knew he wasn’t going to let the question go. “Listen, Stan. I’ve had a long, exhausting day and don’t have the time or the strength to deal with this right now. Maybe we could talk another time.”

  “When?”

  “I don’t know. How about I call you when I have a few extra moments?” Actually, I thought that was a great way to get him off the phone. Of course, I had absolutely no intention of following through on it.

  “Babe…” he started and just that one word, that one measly little word said in his bedroom voice shot straight through me and I knew I needed to stop the conversation as fast as possible.

  I closed my eyes as I blustered my way through the only way I could think of to get him off the phone. “I’ll talk to you another time then, Stan. Bye!” Only opening my eyes wide enough to see the red button, I disconnected the call and put the cell down, wiping my sweating palms on my jeans.

  God! That had been close!

  “Mom?” J.R.’s voice broke the silence and I realized my relief, such as it was, was to be short-lived. “Who was that?”

  “Uhm…” I started, turning to the first grocery bag and peering into it as if it held an answer suitable for my inquisitive son. “Just a guy.”

  “But he said his name was Bastian.” Damn the kid and his memory! “Is he like my uncle or somebody?”

  “Not really, honey. Listen, why don’t you put the groceries away and I’ll start dinner? Is spaghetti okay?” I was chattering, trying to distract him by changing the subject. “It’ll be ready in twenty. Are you hungry?”

  “Mo-om.” Uh-oh. My kid only employed the two-noted sing-song tone when he was starting to get pissy and thought he could get his way.

  I started moving quickly around the kitchen, pulling the ingredients for a quick marinara sauc
e out of the plastic bags and placing pots on the stove. “Really busy here, J.R. and need you to help.”

  He wasn’t fooled but he did as I asked albeit with a lot of eye-rolls and sighs that I completely ignored. We seemed to be playing this game more frequently, and I wasn’t sure if it was just his age that was causing it. Admittedly as a single parent, I was a little stricter with J.R. than the parents of some of his friends but it hadn’t really been an issue until he’d turned thirteen.

  Somehow, my kid considered thirteen to be in the adult age range that gave him the right to argue with me. I’d tried reasoning with him, explaining some of my decisions, but the kid was just as stubborn as his father and when he wanted his way, he’d debate a point to dust.

  Wait…what?

  His father.

  I did a half-turn from the stove and glanced at my son, taking in his long, lanky frame and deep-brown shaggy hair as he bent over a bag on the floor.

  Oh god!

  He looked just like Stan and was beginning to act just like him as well!

  At only thirteen!

  I whipped back to the stove when our eyes collided, feeling my cheeks heat. Dear god! You’re gonna have to tell him. Shit, tell both of them!

  In all my wildest imaginings, I’d never foreseen this happening. Had never once envisioned Stan back in my life, even if it was only via telephone. Or that J.R. would be exposed to him.

  Why had the bastard told J.R. his last name, for Christ’s sake?

  I’d gone back to my maiden name of Leone as soon as the divorce was final but in a moment of post-partum sentimentality, I’d named our baby boy after his father. Stanley Robert Bastian, Junior. But I could never find the right name to call him, a name that seemed to fit the strong-willed, demanding infant. So I’d taken to calling him J.R.

  As soon as everything was put away and all the carrier sacks stowed, my guy came to stand beside me. I heard an indrawn breath and knew he was going to pick up the conversation where we’d left it.

  Cutting him off at the pass, I cheerily announced I’d made enough food for an army. “Why don’t you call Rich and see if he wants to join us for dinner?”

  “Seriously? Can he stay the night too?” By the excitement in J.R.’s voice, I knew I succeeded in derailing whatever it was he’d been about to say.

  “Sure,” I replied, forcing my lips to smile. “We can drive him home on our way to the shop tomorrow.”

  Snaking a skinny arm around my shoulder, J.R. kissed my cheek before running to grab his cellphone and make the offer.

  Disaster averted!

  Yeah, but for how long? I wondered.

  *.*.*.*.*

  Bishop pulled the phone away from his ear, stunned. She’d just blown him off. His Dory had just flatly refused to answer him and had disconnected with a fucking half-assed promise to call him ‘another time’.

  What a crock of shit!

  His Dory would never treat him like he was an unwanted intrusion! Like he had no business calling and asking questions about her and her kid.

  Dory had a kid.

  A boy who was old enough to be in the middle of his voice changing. Which would make the punk, what? Eleven, if he was an early-bloomer. Thirteen or fourteen maybe. But that wasn’t possible because that’d mean she’d been pregnant when she’d left.

  Bishop dropped the phone to the couch cushion and rubbed his hands on his knees as he tried to make sense of what had just happened. Of how much his Dory had changed, had become stronger in ways Bishop was unaware of and didn’t like.

  Maybe she’d had to become stronger since she was a mother, his mind argued. And he conceded the point even as he tried to work that knowledge into something that made sense. In his mind, Dory had remained as he’d last seen her with her beautiful red hair flowing almost down to her waist, her green eyes shimmering with tears as she gently kissed him good-bye.

  It had been a bittersweet end to a marriage that had gone horribly sour.

  And the woman he’d just tried to speak with was definitely not of the sweet variety. She sounded determined and in control. A ball-buster if he were to give it a name.

  Wait! If the kid was an adolescent, that meant his Dory had gone and gotten herself pregnant pretty fucking quick after leaving him and their life in her rear-view mirror.

  A little too goddamn quick for Bishop’s taste.

  It was one thing for him to have one of the Honeys between the sheets two weeks after Dory had given him her goodbye, but a whole different thing if she let herself get knocked up so soon after leaving him.

  What if she was married?

  Bishop sat back on the cushion, blinking deep at the disgusting thought. No way! There was no way in hell that his Dory could be married to somebody else. But in light of how she hadn’t wanted to talk to him, how she wouldn’t answer his questions and got him off the line so quickly, the thought made sense.

  Leveraging his way up and off the deep couch, Bishop went for his laptop at the bar.

  He knew of more than a few ways of getting information.

  And Bishop wasn’t afraid of employing any of them in his effort to unravel the mystery of Dory Leone Bastian.

  Chapter Four

  Bishop had spent a terrible night, one filled with more questions than answers that all revolved around the few minutes he’d spent with Dory on the phone. So by the time the first wave of agony hit, he was almost grateful for the distraction.

  But after the pain was bad enough to cause him to empty his guts, his thoughts went right back to the puzzle of her and the boy. He’d been unable to find any record of a marriage certificate for one Adora Bastian. And the search for Adora Leone showed only two entries: the record of their marriage back in 1995 and the motion to reclaim her maiden name in 2000.

  So, to his way of thinking, his Dory had never remarried.

  And that made her a single mother.

  It was unfortunate that he hadn’t been able to find a record of a live birth on the kid even though he’d searched the Casper courthouse records for 2000 – 2003. But they had nothing on file for any live birth listing the last name of Leone.

  Cleaning up after one of his ‘episodes’, as he was coming to call them, was never easy since he was so weak afterwards. But there was no way he wasn’t going to brush his teeth and pull on a clean shirt. While he was convinced he was dying, Bishop had his standards.

  He was just glad that he hadn’t decided to make the Saturday morning run with his Hellion brothers, something he used to look forward to eagerly. To having the wind in his hair, the sun on his face and a rumbling machine between his legs was something he’d always been geared up to do. Whether the run was with only a couple of other Hellions or a conclave of thirty, it was always a good time and one he would sorely miss. But he was simply was too tired, his body too depleted to ride for more than fifteen or twenty minutes at a time. And what the fuck would happen if he’d been hit with an episode while on his bike?

  Turning off the faucet, Bishop cast his mind over something else to do with his day knowing his options were limited. Especially since he’d been forced to hire a landscaping company to take care of his yard. And by all of his exacting standards, the company was doing a good job in keeping the flowerbeds tidy and grass cut.

  He remembered his appointment with the attorney was scheduled for Monday. According to the lawyer’s website, he was going to need to put together more than a few documents that would be given to the executor of his estate upon his death. It was a gruesome subject but he could get a head start on some of the stuff which he knew were stored in the closet bedroom he’d set up as his office.

  At least it’d keep his mind off of his Dory and her kid for a while!

  Bishop shuffled into his make-shift office, one that he rarely used since he’d gotten the laptop but where all his important papers and files were stored in banker’s boxes marked by the date range. Opening the closet door, he took in the stacks of boxes and at the sight he felt a heaviness
creep through him. Only seventeen boxes that held the records of his life, that chronicled various achievements, troubles and highlights of what he’d experienced in his thirty-eight years.

  It didn’t seem like much.

  In his mind and to his memory, there should’ve been a hell of a lot more.

  Maybe because she was so front-and-center on his mind, Bishop pulled out the box marked 1995 – 1998 as well as the one labeled 1999 – 2001. He wasn’t necessarily looking for a walk down memory lane so much as to find the legal documents that gave evidence to their marriage.

  And its demise.

  Sliding the boxes over to the sofa-bed tucked up underneath the windows that looked out over the side yard, he plopped down into the cushions with a sigh. Not too long ago, he wouldn’t have thought twice about carrying the crates to wherever he needed them to be. But they were too heavy, too bulky for that to be considered and he had been forced to use a foot to push them along the carpet.

  What a motherfucking joke, he thought propping his elbows on his knees and dropping his face to his hands. Too alive to just keel over and yet too sick to really live!

  Dark thoughts and emotions churned within him and for once, Bishop let them come. They’d been around for a while and he’d always pushed them into a corner, denying them a foothold. He couldn’t control the pain but he could control his thoughts and emotions, something he’d learned when he was a teen and battling his addictions. He was tired of the fight though. Tired of using iron control to keep his spirits up, his mind on the ‘goddamn sunny side of the street’ as his grandpa used to say.

  The thoughts seemed worse lately and he wondered if those negative feelings were the beginning of the depression that so many websites cited. When he’d first started to investigate the disease, he’d only read about the physical shit: what he could expect, what his body would do and how it would react. But the more he read, the more he investigated, he found himself reading about the other parts of him that would be affected by the pain. That the physical was only one fucking portion of the motherfucking equation.