by A. J. Downey
“You say that with some serious conviction,” I put on a musing tone as I said it, more curious to see what he would do. It was kind of unnerving how he managed to pick up on things so easily. Okay, for me, it was really unnerving. I wasn’t sure I liked it.
“Look at you, hiding behind your high walls. You’re like a concrete maze, Darlin’. Just when I think I got you figured out, the maze changes and I’m right back to square one,” he leaned in as if doing a push up against the wall and whispered the last against my ear, his breath fanning and sending a pleasurable little rush down the side of my neck, “You trust me a little, I’ll trust you…”
He pushed back and his warm brown eyes searched mine. I let go of his leather vest with my left hand and held the inside of my left wrist in front of his face. His eyes refocused on the writing there and followed the sweeping lines.
“Virtue,” he read, “Gonna have to fill me in, Beautiful. I’m not picking up what you’re putting down.”
I licked my lips which were suddenly very dry and swallowed a couple of times. It was hard to think with him so close, smelling so good; like clean saltwater and ocean breeze.
“I have two sisters, Faith and Charity… One is missing. The girl I am looking for was the last person to see her.” I relented. Cutter stared at my face, hard. The lines of his own collapsing into neutrality.
“Wait here,” he said and kissed me one last time roughly. He pushed back up off the wall, away from me, before stalking around the corner and back into the bowling alley.
“Council!” he barked, “Outside now!”
Uh-oh. Looks like I just opened up a can of whoop ass on somebody. I almost felt bad about that. The guys that formed the leadership of the club weren’t half bad, that I could tell. I pushed off the wall and closed my eyes. With a groan, I fell back against it and leaned on it hard. What the fuck did I just do?
Chapter 8
Cutter
The boys were all silent, and like me, none of them were happy. I wanted to tell her, but the ramifications of that would be far reaching for my club, so I had to put it to a vote. The council stood around me at the far end of the lot and mulled over the implications.
“Tiny’s got our nuts in a fucking vice,” Nothing growled.
“Too fucking right. Wish the happy bastard would just fucking retire already,” Radar kicked a rock across the worn out asphalt of the parking lot.
“We can’t tell her anything, not until we know she’s not going to flip out. We need a full club meeting, make sure every damn one of us is on the same page,” Marlin said judiciously.
Pyro huffed a laugh and I looked at my best friend, “Play time is over. I’ll get everyone over to The Plank where we can put it to a vote. I’m sorry, Brother,” he said to me, “I don’t see this going any but one way. She’s connected to the cops. She’ll fucking fry us.”
“You don’t know that,” I said and scowled at my best buddy.
“We don’t know that she won’t, so put your resting bitch face on ice there, Captain,” Atlas said. I sighed.
“Round ‘em up. Have Hossler take Hope back to town. I want this shit settled in house and everyone on the same page.”
My proclamation was met with a bunch of ‘Aye, aye, Captain’s,’ and the boys drifted off in the direction of the bowling alley. It was Marlin who stayed behind. He put his hand on my shoulder and sighed.
“Man, I’m sorry, I know you like her. Haven’t seen you this engaged since L’il Bit went home with her man,” he patted me roughly on the shoulder twice but my gaze was fixed across the lot on Hope who was looking coolly back at me, her deep brown eyes calculating and curious. She knew something was up. I hadn’t exactly bothered to hide it.
“C’mon Honey, Captain wants you to ride with me and I could use some girl power for a minute after hanging around with these assholes,” I heard Hossler tell her. Hope hitched her purse higher on her shoulder and slid her sunglasses on her face.
“I’m down like four flat tires,” she said to Hoss and got up into the passenger seat of Hossler’s old ‘85 Land Rover Defender. The thing was ancient, the paint oxidized and rusted in places but there was no denying its reliability. Didn’t break down often, and when it did, Hoss usually fixed it herself. Hope would be safe enough.
I froze and went back over my last thought… Hope was a big fucking girl who could handle herself. What was I fucking worried about? I thought about it, couldn’t quantify it, so I got on my bike and rode for The Plank.
Midway down the highway it dawned on me. That night on my boat, we kissed and I’d told her that I wasn’t out to dick her over, that she just needed to have some faith. I think I’d just figured out which one of her sisters was missing. I ground my teeth, I wanted to beat the motherfucking brakes off Tiny for bringing this all down on our heads. This was a right cluster fuck, and I didn’t see any way out of it where I had a shot at Hope. Which that was a damned shame. I really liked the girl. Something about her felt different, like she was the moon affecting my tide. I felt pulled in her direction and wasn’t it just my fucking luck? I find a chick who is single, who I like and who has been a challenge this far and the whole thing we’ve got going on between each other is nothing but a pack of lies and half-truths.
I spent the rest of the ride trying to figure out how to convince my crew that Hope wasn’t a threat and to tell her what we could to hopefully help her find her sister. I had a couple of possible avenues to pursue that didn’t involve my club, but it damned sure came close. I backed in next to Marlin who shot me a sympathetic look before getting off his bike and heading inside. I spent a moment longer shutting her down and collecting my thoughts before heading inside myself. I went straight to the back and took my seat, the rest of the club, and I do mean everyone, pulled up chairs expectantly.
“Hey, Trike! Close up and lock the doors, wait outside!” I yelled. The prospect did as he was told and closed up the bar, taking up post outside. I looked over my guys and shook my head. I wanted to help her, but it was up to my club…
“Why’d you bring us here, Captain?” Stoker asked. A tall, beefy motherfucker, Stoker was the lead singer for some band and looked every bit the rocker and metal head that he was. Long dyed black hair, kohl lined eyes and a deep dark stare, he looked like fucking Dracula or some shit, which is where he got his road name, after the dude that wrote that shit.
“We’re dipped in shit, that’s why,” I said with a sigh.
“This have to do with the girl that Hope chick is looking for?” Lightning asked.
“Yeah, Hope ain’t going to give up boys. The Suicide Kings’ bitch was the last person to see Hope’s sister before she disappeared.”
I looked at a lot of troubled and impassive faces while they mulled this information over and waited, with a sinking feeling, for the questions to start.
“So don’t tell her nothin’,” Tiny said with a shrug.
“Shut the fuck up,” Atlas barked, “If it wasn’t for you going off on your own fucking program we wouldn’t have this problem.”
“Man, this sucks; I kind of like Hope,” Radar said. There were grunts and nods of agreement from the fellas that had been at the bowling alley.
I let the dilemma sink in and tried to judge what my crew was thinking by their faces. It was a rough mix. Hope had personality and the dudes that’d been at the bowling alley had gotten to see it. She was witty, sarcastic and a riot to be around. She was also pretty damn solid from what I could tell. Her looks just sealed the deal.
“What’re our options, Captain?” Nothing asked.
“Depends boys. This affects the club no matter which way you look at it… Really it comes down on if you think we can trust her or not.” It was an unknown quantity, trusting Hope.
“She works with the cops, man. We can’t tell her shit!” Atlas said.
“What if we didn’t tell her anything?” Beast asked. He was an older dude, like Tiny, in his fifties, bald with a mostly gray trucker ‘s
tache. He was carrying a gut on him but he was as his name implied in a fight. A total beast.
I shook my head, “She’s in it to win it and she’s got a scent. She isn’t going to give it up unless she gets answers.”
“So take the bitch out.”
Silence, almost as one the rest of the crew turned towards Tiny, incredulous. Marlin was the one who finally spoke.
“Tiny, you dumb fuck. Have you not been listening to a word that’s been said? She works with the cops. She’d be missed and none of this would be happening if it weren’t for you in the first place. If you’d done what you were fucking told, and had taken the first bitch home. So dude, do us all a fucking favor and shut your god damn hole for the remainder of this meeting.” My VP and Tiny locked stares for several tense minutes before, as expected Tiny got up.
“Man, fuck you!” he declared and stormed out. A collective sigh ran through the rest of my men.
“Fine Tiny a hundred bucks for the disrespect to a senior officer.” I told Nothing, it was the heaviest fine I could assess according to our by-laws, which was unfortunate. Nothing was already writing it down on one of his little notepads he always had tucked away somewhere, nodding at what I’d said as I’d said it.
“Anybody else got any bright ideas about doing something so monumentally stupid?” Marlin asked. As expected no one spoke up.
“Way I see it, we can lie to her and send her chasing her tail, which I do not recommend because all she’s going to do is come back here pissed off with the fucking cops… Jesus Christ what has he gotten us into? This is a capital offense man!” Atlas scrubbed his face with his hands and sat back in his seat.
“We tell the truth? She goes to the cops, we lie? She goes to the cops… What the fuck are we going to do?” Pyro asked no one in particular.
“We do a little of both,” I said with a heavy heart, this sucked man. This was not what we were about. We weren’t into drugs, and we sure as fuck weren’t into killing people. Our illegal activity was more along the lines of tomb raiding some of the wrecks around here, of smuggling Cuban cigars, and if we were really strapped? Smuggling some fucking Cubans. We did not kill people, that hadn’t done any fucking thing to us, let alone young girls.
“Captain?” someone said snapping me out of wherever I’d been.
“Yeah?”
“How are we going to do that?” Stoker asked.
“We tell her we dropped the girl off in Tallahassee and I call in a favor to the SHMC.” I said. Some looks were traded.
“I need a vote boys. Is this an amenable compromise?” I asked.
We voted, it was decided. I texted Hossler to see where she and Hope were at and nodded. I had a place to start.
Chapter 9
Hope
Hossler wasn’t bad company, in fact, she was pretty kick ass. I’d asked her what her function was within the club and she’d laughed.
“I don’t know,” she’d said with a gusty sigh, “I had an Ol’ Man but he skipped town and left me taking care of our kids all on my own. I guess I was liked enough by the club. Cutter helps out when my business is down and I fool around with the guys some, I mean I’m a mother – I’m not dead!” We laughed and she went on, “The club is like a family. They look out for their own and I was a patched member’s Ol’ Lady. They ever catch up to him they’re gonna beat his ass and take his patch but they aren’t bad guys. The sins of my man didn’t rub off on me or my kids. Cutter made things clear,” she sniffed.
“What about you? You got any kids?” she inquired. I leaned back in the passenger seat and sighed.
“No! No, no, no. I had a tubal last year. No kids are happening here,” I said and stared out the window.
“Why not?” It was the natural evolution of the conversation but I didn’t want to answer it so I changed the subject.
“You said when your business was slow, Cutter helps you; what do you do?”
Hossler laughed, “I breed snakes.”
I gave her a flat look, the kind that said ‘please tell me you’re joking’ and she laughed a little more.
“What kind of snakes?”
“Constricters, Pythons and a few Boa’s. Rats too, gotta feed them somehow,” she gave an indelicate one shouldered shrug.
“Holy crap, you’re serious,” I said.
“As a heart attack, Baby,” she said with a wink.
“That’s so… cool,” I said surprised. Snakes didn’t affect me one way or the other. I didn’t hate them, but I didn’t like them either. I guess I was just sort of meh about them.
We spent the ride laughing and talking about the general retardation of the male half of our species, the rest of the way back to Ft. Royal. The whole way, my mind kept whirring and clicking away, wondering what had put Cutter’s panties in such a bunch and shot him out of the bowling alley like he’d gone out of a cannon. He fucking knew something about Tonya. I knew that much, saw the lie in his eyes every time he denied it. Felt it in his stiff posture every time his lips met mine. The fierce attraction we felt for one another wouldn’t sway him from protecting his club, but what did they need protection from?
The implications laid in front of me by his actions weren’t good. I didn’t figure Cutter for a killer, he felt more like a lover than a fighter, but looks could be deceiving. Oh, I knew he could kill, that he had killed, I still had my military connections and read what I could out of his jacket. There had been a lot of redacted shit in there but there had also been a lot left readable and what had been left was almost as useful as what hadn’t been; all of it spelled out clearly that Cutter was one dangerous SOB that I shouldn’t try to tangle with, and who I wouldn’t ordinarily take on but, Faith.
“I’m sorry, what?” I asked. Hossler was looking at me, blue eyes wide with that look that screamed, weren’t you listening to a thing I just said?
“Can I ask you a pretty personal question?” she asked.
“Sorry, yeah go ahead.”
“You fuck him yet?”
I blinked, “Who Cutter?”
“No, the Pope! Uh, yeah, the Captain.”
“Why have you?”
“Once upon a time.”
“Interesting.” I pondered that.
“You going to answer the question?”
“Oh, no.”
She rolled her eyes exasperated, “No, you’re not going to answer or no, you haven’t fucked him?” she asked.
I gave her my trademark, sarcastic coy little smile and looked at her demurely through my lashes. She looked at me, eyes narrowed and tried to decide if I was fucking with her which I was, I smiled at her. I liked her, so I answered honestly.
“No,” I said.
She nodded thoughtfully, “My unsolicited advice, Darlin’?” I cocked my head to the side.
“Don’t. Cutter likes a challenge, to conquer, and once he’s done that? He loses interest, fast. I like you, you’re pretty badass and can hold your own with this pack of jokers. I would hate to see you doing the walk of shame out of town like all the others.”
I sighed and dug through my purse for my pack of gum. “I thought he wasn’t the love ‘em and leave ‘em type,” I said.
“That what he told you?” she asked. I unwrapped a stick of gum and just looked at her, shoving it past my lips, the cool minty flavor scrubbing the inside of my mouth clean.
She snorted, “It is, isn’t it? Well he wasn’t exactly, lying. Cutter doesn’t lie. He just doesn’t tell the truth either.” I raised an eyebrow at that.
“He doesn’t ever love them, he just fucks them, then leaves them, or really just sends them on their way. Except for Li’l Bit. She got him but good,” she smiled and it held a flicker of savage glee that was quickly overtaken by lines of regret that morphed into a shadow of anger, all within like a three second span. It was actually kind of fascinating to watch.
“I sense there’s a story and a half there,” I said and tried to sound casual.
“You’d be right,” she said,
but much to my disappointment didn’t expand on anything, instead she changed the subject. We spoke amicably the rest of the trip into town, but my wheels were turning. Mostly on Cutter’s reaction at the bowling alley. It was telling and it didn’t tell me anything I wanted to hear. I had a seriously sinking feeling and I really didn’t want what my gut was telling me to be true.
Hossler dropped me off where I was staying and waved through the open window of the beastly Land Rover.
“Beach party tonight, you should come! Just look for the bonfire!” she called and pulled around the circular drive and out onto the street. I stared after her thinking hard, before going up to my room. I showered and changed into some white shorts and a light, peach tank top made out of silk. The dress needed to be washed, the back smudged with dust from the wall Cutter had pressed me to in the bowling alley. I swept my long hair up into a tight bun and wrapped it in a hair tie before tucking my bangs across my forehead and behind one ear.
I was just finishing putting on my face when my phone started ringing. I looked at it. Unknown caller. I answered it anyways, “This is Hope…”
“Hey Sweetheart,” Cutter’s voice purred through the line.
“How’d you get this number?”
“I got my ways,” he said and I found myself nodding even though he couldn’t see it.
“Uh huh… So what happens now?” I asked.
“Hossler tell you about the bonfire?”
“Yeah.”
“Come see me,” he intoned.
“You going to feed me some more lies? A bunch of half-truths?” I asked. I didn’t want to aggravate him but I was tired of spinning my wheels in the soft sand of Ft. Royal, Florida. This wasn’t a game. This was my sister and I wanted her back.
“I’m going to tell you what I can, Darlin’, but I’ve got to think of my club,” he said and his voice was raw and honest.
“Bros before ho’s huh?” I asked and snorted derisively.
“Not to put too fine a point on it,” he said and he didn’t sound happy about it which earned him a few points in my book.
