by Jc Emery
“You’re supposed to be here,” he finally says, his voice a little lighter than a moment ago. “Ruby, she uh,” he begins, but doesn’t finish. I turn and face him fully, practically begging for answers. There’s so much I don’t understand about what’s going on and why. I’m willing to take anything he’s willing to give. I can’t squander this opportunity.
But he’s all tight-lipped and silent now. I take a deep breath and push it out quickly. “Please,” I say so softly that it brings back unwanted memories of every time I’ve asked my father for lenience and he refused to grant it. The memory is anything but welcome.
Finally, Ian turns so that we’re face to face. He’s average height for a man, which means he still comes close to a foot taller than me. Searching his eyes for answers I can’t decipher, I’m struck by how much he reminds me of my brother. Though his coloring is much lighter than Michael’s, they have the same eyes. My mother’s eyes. Ruby’s eyes. My eyes.
“Just give her time, okay?” he says. I tilt my head to the side as I focus on my breathing. In and out. In and out. The creeping kick of sorrow begins to engulf me. All I have left of my brother and my life before are my memories. A life I can never have again. But she’s not here, nor is anybody I have ever loved. I don’t understand these people or their ways.
“For what?” I finally choke out, hoping it doesn’t sound too much like I’m on the verge of tears, even though I am. For the first time since meeting him days ago, Ian gives me a moment of vulnerability. His face softens, and he tugs his lower lip into his mouth.
“She’s not good at this shit,” he says then walks away, leaving me disappointed. I could chase after him and beg for answers, but he’s shut down. I have no hope he’s going to give me any more than he already has.
I spend the next few minutes observing the people around me. I catch the attention of most of the men who pass me; a few nod their heads, a few just stare, but nobody stops. It isn’t until I grow restless enough to contemplate seeking out Ruby that I see her. She heads toward me, an apologetic smile on her face. Urging me toward the center cabin, she tells me there are people I need to meet. She introduces me to men who I won’t remember with nicknames I’d blush if I said aloud. They all become a blur after a while. Thankfully, bikers aren’t the most talkative of folks, so the introductions are quick. Finally, we reach the old men in the rockers.
“This her?” the one on the left asks. He’s so wrinkly and hairy I can barely make out the tattoos that cover most of his flesh. He has a full-length beard that mostly covers his leather vest. Beneath the distractions, his blue eyes sparkle with a rare kind of interest. It’s both a curiosity and an appreciation that, surprisingly, doesn’t feel creepy.
“Alexandra Mancuso,” I say, without waiting to be introduced. I offer my hand and give him my most respectful smile. Slowly, he lifts his hand and places it in mine.
“Rage,” he says. Though life and age have gotten the better of him, I have no doubt he earned his name, just like they all have. And with a name like Rage, I choose not to discount him, despite his friendly demeanor. His grip tightens on my hand, though the effort appears to tire him out as his hand shakes. “I’d change my name if I were you.”
“You think I need a nickname?” I ask, trying to keep the mood light.
“Mancuso isn’t a friend,” he mutters. My stomach sinks in fear. I want to trust that Ruby, my mother’s sister, wouldn’t go through all of the trouble to save my ass just to bring me here to a group of men who hate my father enough to take revenge on him through me. Still, what do I really know about Ruby?
“You can’t have loyalty to Forsaken and Mancuso. I don’t care if he is your father.”
Gathering all the courage I have, I say, “I have no loyalty to his family.” As awful as it sounds, it’s the truth. Carlo has always put his family before mine. Never once have I felt he loves and appreciates me for who I am, but rather what I can do for him. I want to believe he loves me, in his own way.
“Don’t make us regret this.”
And just like that, our conversation is finished. Ruby takes me by my arm and leads me away from the crowd, around the corner of the cabin. Night is falling now, and the sheer darkness of the desert is intimidating.
“The van will be here soon, but we won’t be leaving until morning,” she says gently. I nod and open my mouth, but nothing comes out. She catches the movement and raises an eyebrow. “There something you want to say?”
“I don’t know,” I admit. I’m not sure what I should say, if anything. Staying in this place overnight strikes a chord of panic within me, but I can’t really say that aloud. I’m so anxious to get to wherever home is and to see it with my own eyes, that I can barely contain the frustration at this delay.
“It’s Jim. He and Rage have some shit to work out. If it were up to me, we’d go straight through.”
“It’s okay,” I say, but she shakes her head.
“Who is Rage?” I ask. He seems to carry himself with a certain amount of authority, but I can’t place where he fits into all of this. I know Jim is the president, but I don’t know if that means he’s the president of all Forsaken members or just the ones in his group.
“He’s Jim’s father. Old bastard retired out here some years ago,” Ruby says, clearing her throat. She shakes her head and gives me a forced smile. “Ryan’s going to keep an eye on you until Duke and the others get here. Since you two are getting along, I thought you’d prefer that to one of the other guys.”
“Thank you,” I say, trying to control the nervous excitement that pulsates through my body. Unlike the other night when the men stayed outside of my room, I’m hoping Ryan comes inside. So far, he’s the only person who’s really talked with me. Ruby’s made some sort of effort and Ian is getting there, but other than that, it’s been a lonely journey.
In the distance, I see Ryan approaching. Despite the encroaching darkness, I can see the pleasant smile on his face as he nears. In his left hand is my bag, and in his right is a similar-sized leather bag. He comes to stand beside me, shifting both bags to his left hand. He places his right hand on my lower back, guiding me toward the surrounding cabins. From behind me, I hear Ruby shout, “Remember what I said!”
Those men are off limits to you.
I tell myself I’ll respect her wishes, even if the thought of being alone in a cabin with Ryan gives me other ideas.
Chapter 10
Love begins with an image; lust with a sensation.
- Mason Cooley
RYAN LEADS US to one of the most isolated cabins. It’s set back a few hundred feet from the rest. There is no porch light to guide our path and no walkway for us to follow. But he seems to know the way. I think back on what Ruby said, that Rage is Ryan’s grandfather. I imagine that Ryan’s familiarity with the land has something to do with that connection.
On the rickety front porch of the cabin, I’m suddenly nervous at the prospect of being alone with him. Even though I want this time with him more than anything right now, my stomach is alight with an intense fluttering of nerves. Ryan is all man. He’s tall, and muscled, and tan. He wears his black jeans (the same he wore the day I met him), black leather, and his tattoos with an arrogance that is as much a part of him as his bike is. I’ve spent more than my fair share of time around arrogant men—men who think the world owes them something, and they owe the rest of us nothing—but not a single one of them has anything on Ryan. Aunt Gloria says I’m a good judge of character. If I were to judge Ryan, I’d say that all he’s really missing in his life is a good woman on the back of his bike.
But I’m also nineteen and hopeful as all hell.
“You comin’ in?” he asks, breaking me from my thoughts. He’s already inside with the light on. I let out a shallow breath and cross the threshold, shutting the door behind me. Inside, the room is barely furnished, but Ryan’s presence is so overwhelming it fills up the space. There’s no cheesy artwork on the walls, no phone from what I can see
, and certainly no Bible in the bedside table. There is, however, a twin bed and a recliner. Like the rest of the cabin, they’ve seen better days. The walls are covered in signatures and phrases that would send my mother running to church.
“You take the bed,” he says, plopping into the recliner, letting the bags drop at his feet. Now that he’s sitting, he leans his head back, takes a deep breath, and closes his eyes. The long ride must have worn him out. Even though he’s used to riding, I can’t imagine going for so long doesn’t take its toll.
“I’m going to take a shower.” I lean down beside him, letting my arm brush against the side of his leg, and retrieve my small bag. When I go to stand up, his eyes are open, fixated on my every move. Whatever confidence I had about being in such close quarters with Ryan have disappeared. The butterflies are back. I’m so out of my element here, it’s not even funny.
I shuffle backward and dart into the open bathroom. It’s empty, not even a bar of soap or a towel. Thankfully, I have the soaps and washcloths I shoved in my bag. I turn on the water and fiddle with the knobs until I figure which is hot and which is cold. Even after figuring it out, the water is room temperature at best. The soap is harsh on my dry skin, but it's all I have. It's funny how we take the little things in life for granted. Growing up, I never wanted for anything material. Not really, anyway. My father was the reigning boss before I was born, and his position afforded us a very comfortable lifestyle. Whenever we traveled, we never used the hotel soap. When I was a child, my mother would say it wasn't good for my skin and so she would always pack my soap from home. After she died, it just stuck with me, I guess.
Dragging the white bar across my body, I feel anything but clean. A film forms on my skin that is uncomfortable and binding. My hair is stringy and feels like straw. It seems so stupid and materialistic as I stand here, trying to clean myself in this rundown log cabin, but I really miss my bath products.
Thinking about my absentee bath products is a dangerous road. Before I know it, I'm thinking about my bedspread and my pillows. Neither were particularly sentimental or expensive, but they were mine. I knew exactly where the lumps had formed in my pillows and how many blankets to use in the winter when snow would fall outside my bedroom window. My father's house was one of the nicest on the block, but it was also old and drafty in the cold winter months.
Tears well in my eyes, and I'm unable to stop them from falling down my cheeks, only to be washed away by the spray of the water. Once the first tear has fallen, I'm a goner. The rest hurry to catch up. They seem to fall faster the more I think of everything I'll never have again. My mother's nightgown—the one she died in—is gone. And that thought is my undoing. I let out an agonized scream at the top of my lungs. Placing my hands on the plastic walls of the enclosure, I slap at the plastic in a half-hearted attempt at releasing some frustration. That nightgown was the only thing that ever made me feel connected to her. She never was one to keep material things, and she was so reserved there were times I felt like I never really knew who she was. But once she passed and I dragged myself into that nightgown, it felt like a missing piece had been put into place. I could smell her, and see her in a way.
Every time I wore that thing I remembered her laugh and her smile. I remembered every bruised knee she bandaged up and how she so perfectly fit herself into my father's side. She loved that man with everything she was, and even though I often wondered why, I respected it. I think one of the only reasons I'll miss my father is because my mother loved him. And if she loved him, there must be something in there worth loving and missing.
The bathroom door flies open and, before I can react, Ryan's flung the shower curtain back and he has a gun pointed at the wall beside my head. His eyes are everywhere but on me. He's not even meeting my eyes. Through the tears and sorrow, I can feel a breakdown creeping up on me. He only has the curtain open for a moment before he's closed it again.
"Why were you screaming?"
I have no real response I can bring myself to give him. Telling him about the soap and shampoo just makes me sound like a spoiled brat who's found her circumstances to be beneath her. Trying to express the loss of the life I once had to a guy who's been wearing the same clothes for days now seems fruitless. So I say nothing. I stand beneath the cooling spray.
God took my mother from me. My father took my brother from me. Officer Davis took my father and uncle away. Ruby took Aunt Gloria away, and her crew of bikers have taken my privacy away. My grief is the only thing I have left that is solely mine, and I'll be damned if I have to lose that, too.
"Fine. You don't have to talk," he says. "But get this, you scream, I'm gonna have a .38 out and ready to shoot. Unless you want any accidents, keep quiet."
The pain in my chest has morphed into frustration, and I want nothing more than to scream, but I don't dare. Ryan's voice is already teetering on the edge of angry. I try to remind myself that he's in here, trying to protect me. He could have ignored my screams, not knowing what was going on. He could have taken the opportunity to eye my naked form. He could have done a lot of things that he didn't.
"Thank you," I whisper as loudly as I can bring myself to, but he's already gone. The last thing I want to do is to be polite. I want to be the rude one for once, the one everyone else has to dance around because you never know what she’s going to do. But I don't, because despite everything I wish I was—strong, independent, brave—I'm none of those things. I'm barely sassy. Mostly, I'm as my mother raised me to be—agreeable, polite, and docile. And as much as I love her, I despise what she's turned me into. Girls like me get to be the good little housewife. They don't get to be the girls on the back of a man's bike.
After I've rinsed the measly little bit of conditioner I had out of my hair, I cut off the water and step out carefully. There's no bathmat to keep me steady. As I pat my wet skin down with the washcloth, I decide that alone time is the last thing I need. Every time I'm alone, I start to think about everything and it makes me resentful and angry, not to mention really, really sad. Because as much as I hated being treated like a porcelain doll, at least it was something I was used to. There were no surprises.
I dress quickly back in my dirty clothes. One thing Aunt Gloria didn't pack for me was clothes. I've been over this time and time again in my head, why she packed the things for me the she did. Apart from the money, most of the small items in my bag have little to no true use. Surely, there was room for a pair of underwear and a spare bra. When I'm clothed, I walk back into the room to find it empty. Backing into the wall behind me, panic hits me square in my gut. Aside from the fact that I'm not comfortable being alone with my thoughts, I'm just plain uncomfortable being alone. Then I see him, outside on the porch. He's huddled in some kind of conversation with another man. Instead of standing around, spying on their conversation, I drop my bag at the foot of the bed and sit down on the corner.
I'm not certain when the last time was that they changed the sheets or replaced the pillows, but it's better than sleeping in that stupid van, something I wish never to repeat. Summoning the courage, I inch up toward the pillow and lay my head down atop it. It's dusty and there are cigarette burns in the corner, and the odor is just awful. This place isn't a motel. It must be some kind of club thing. I can't imagine anyone ever paying to stay in a place like this. It's beyond filthy.
Lying on the bed, I let my gaze travel the walls. Barely an inch of the painted wooden beams has been spared. Words are written in a sporadic fashion, overlapping each other, making half of them unreadable. In what looks like black paint, the word FORSAKEN is painted in letters nearly two feet high. Beneath that, it says, WHERE SOULS SPOIL AND HEARTS ROT. On the opposite wall in equally large lettering is NEVADA.
I shove my wet hair out of the way, letting it soak the pillow. I'm so far away from home it almost feels like some sort of bad movie. Even having been raised by a mob boss, I'm not prepared for this stuff. It's just crazy.
Outside, Ryan's voice booms. He's yelling now
and seemingly unafraid of who can hear him. I want to stay right where I am and not try to listen in, but old habits are hard to break. Crawling off the bed and tiptoeing toward the door, I try to keep out of the line of sight from the sheer curtains covering the window.
"I see what you're doing, son." The voice is familiar. Jim's, I think. It's the logical choice, so I go with it.
"Don't," Ryan says.
"Ruby won't like it," Jim warns. The moment he says her name, I know for sure that it's Jim. With his warning, I know he’s talking about me. I’m not a stupid child, nor am I as innocent as Ruby seems to think I am. What is so bad about being interested in Ryan?
“I don’t give a fuck, and I’m not doing a fucking thing. Get off my back.”
“I’m just trying to help you out,” Jim says, then the sounds of heavy footfalls disappear into the distance.
“Fucking Christ,” Ryan says from the other side of the door. I move away quickly and stand beside the bed, separating my hair in preparation for braiding it. He storms in and slams the door behind him. I give him a casual sideways glance and then go back to focusing on braiding my hair. His mood wafts off of him and is covering the entire room with a layer of anger and frustration.
Plopping down in the recliner, he pulls out a bottle of whiskey from between the arm and the cushion. I try to keep my eyes on my damp hair, but it’s difficult to pay attention to anything but him. He’s like a vortex, sucking me in.
“Like something you see?” Ryan says.
I look over my shoulder. Without removing his gaze, he takes another drink from the bottle of whiskey. He swallows heartedly, and a few drops remain on his lips. My tongue sneaks out and licks my lips before I realize what I’ve done, the invitation I’ve given. He mimics my motion with his own tongue. A warm blush rises on my cheeks, and I look down at my feet as my hands resume working at the braid.
“You really are just a little girl, aren’t you?”
