by Hope Stone
“Yeah, that’s the one. Except she wasn’t killed in a boating accident.”
“She wasn’t? That’s what everybody said.”
“I know. Principal Carlson met with the police chief and they came up with a cover story to tell the parents so that no one would freak out about what really happened. That kind of shit can destroy a community.”
“What really happened?”
“Annie was at McDonald’s after school one day with her friends.”
“Yeah, we all went there after school. It’s one block away.”
“Right. So on her way home from McDonald’s someone grabbed her from the parking lot.”
“That doesn’t make any sense. That parking lot is near a Target and a shoe store. Someone would have seen it.”
I shook my head. “The guys who grabbed her were pros, Lily. They waited until she went around the corner of the shoe store and then grabbed her, put a bag over her head, and shoved her in the back of a van within thirty seconds. She didn’t even have time to scream.”
I could see the information processing in Lily’s eyes as she continued eating.
“Within two hours she was on a plane to South America.”
“Why South America?”
“Because, Lily. She was a pretty, white, twelve-year-old girl. Probably a virgin, too. The kidnappers sold her for a fuck ton of money.”
“They sold her? To who?”
“That’s what sex traffickers do, Lily. They sell people. They sold her to the head of a massive child prostitution ring in Columbia.”
Lily stopped eating. “So, what happened to her then? Is she still there?”
“No. She was there for two days and she tried to escape. They shot her in the back and left her body in the desert.”
“How do you know all this?”
“Hawk told us. He knew the guy who kidnapped her. He was bragging about it.”
She shook her head. “That’s horrible. But I don’t understand what it has to do with me?”
“Do you know who did it? Who kidnapped a twelve year old girl and sold her to be raped and sex trafficked and killed? Do you know who did that, Lily?”
“Who?”
“El Diablo. The very guy in the Las Balas who is sponsoring your boyfriend Scorpion.”
Lily’s face went pale.
“And you know what’s worse? He did it as his initiation into the club. He was just a prospect when he did it.”
She sat there for a minute taking in what I’d said. I could see the wheels turning in her mind as she processed what I’d just told her.
I wanted to give it a minute to sink in, so I started in on my breakfast burrito. It was a little cold by now, but still damn good. Tiny’s knew how to make good food.
Lily shook her head. “Yeah, no. I don’t think they do that shit anymore, Ryder. Maybe it was like that back in the day. But Scorpion says…”
“Back in the day? Lily, that was five years ago!” Before I could finish the thought, though, something caught the corner of my eye that distracted me from the conversation. Not something. Someone.
I didn’t as much see her as sense her. The energy shifted in the room as Rocky and this woman came out from the kitchen. I felt her presence fill the room. It was like a fog or a fragrance that came all the way over to our table and wrapped me up in it.
My cock instantly sprang to life, straining to come out of my jeans. My eyes were locked on her like a target through a scope. I couldn’t think, I couldn’t breathe. All I could do was stare at her. She had blonde hair tied back in a braid, was wearing faded blue jeans that hugged an ass that looked like it should be on a bike. Her t-shirt clung to a tiny waist. Then she turned around and I saw her face.
My god. Am I hallucinating? She was the most perfect woman I’d ever seen. What the fuck was she doing here in Tiny’s?
“Hello? Earth to Ryder?” Lily was talking but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the woman.
This was not good. Not good at all.
Six
Paige
“So we keep the sauces right here, and when it’s slow, you fill up the individual cups and put them on a tray that goes here.” Rocky was pointing to a shelf stacked with trays below the counter.
My first day was going pretty well. The woman who’d hired me, Tiny’s wife, wasn’t here today so they were having another waitress, Rocky, show me what to do. I’d mentioned that I had never waitressed before, but I didn’t think it sunk in. She was going really fast.
Rocky was one of those women who tried too hard to look tough. Her hair was dyed overly black and she had a nose piercing. Not the pretty stud on the side like some of the girls in Verde Hills have, but a septum piercing that made her nose look like a bull’s. Her full lips were outlined in bright red lipstick and she tried to do that winged eyeliner thing, but she wasn’t very good at it yet.
We had to wear t-shirts that said Tiny’s on them, and it was a bit ironic that her giant breasts jutted out so far that you could barely read the word “Tiny.”
I wasn’t here to give her a makeover, though. I was here to earn enough money to get out of the shitty apartment I found myself in and hold me over until I could get a real job.
But the social justice part of me felt bad for Rocky. She looked like she’d had a rough life.
“How’s it going, Paige?” The other waitress that was here today, Julie, came up behind us and grabbed a couple of the sauces. “Rocky showing you everything okay?”
“Yeah, thanks, Julie. I think I’m getting it.” I wasn’t sure of that at all, but I didn’t want her to know that. I needed this job.
“Good to know. Let me know if you need anything.” She said this as she walked over to the heat lamp to grab a couple of plates that were ready.
Just then, the window began to rattle and for a second I wondered if we were having an earthquake.
Rocky pulled a tube of lipstick out of her jeans and slathered even more of the red stuff on her lips, pushed up her already pushed up breasts and said, “Come on, Paige. The boys are here.”
“The boys?” I asked?
“Yeah. Bikers. This place is a biker hangout. There’s a bar across the street where the members of Outlaw Souls have their meetings and stuff. They come here to eat and then go there to get shitfaced.”
I was looking out the big window that overlooked the dirt lot and saw five or six guys on motorcycles pulling in.
“Are they trouble?” I asked.
She laughed a raspy laugh that told me she either smoked, or used to. “You can say that, honey. But not the kind of trouble you mean. They’re harmless. Just let ‘em grab your ass or brush your tits and you’ll get a nice tip.”
Uhhh I would most definitely not be doing that, thank you.
Before I could respond, the doors whooshed open and several large, leather-clad men darkened the doorway. “Come on, Chalupa. Get away from the fuckin’ claw machine. You have enough of those goddamn things. I’m hungry.”
The guy they were calling Chalupa slid around the largest one and was holding a Sonic the Hedgehog toy he’d won from the claw machine in the waiting area.
Rocky wiped her hands on a towel and raced to the register to greet “the boys.” I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to follow her or not, so I just stood where I was.
It was like watching some reality TV show. Rocky practically sashayed over to the men, and was laughing and touching their arms as she walked them back to a large table. Sure enough, the Chalupa guy grabbed her ass and instead of kneeing him in the balls like I would have, Rocky just giggled.
“It’s pretty disgusting, isn’t it?” Julie said from behind me.
“It’s...different.” I didn’t want to badmouth anyone on my first day.
“Can you take this pie to table 12? Put a scoop of ice cream on it first. I have to take my fifteen.” She handed me a warm plate of apple pie.
“Which table is that?” I asked, looking around.
“The one
with the guy who is staring at you like you’re his next meal.” She nodded to the side and, I’m not kidding, time literally stopped.
It was like one of those movies where everything slows down. I could hear Rocky laughing and the clinking of glasses. There was the sizzle of the grill and the smell of the pie in my hand. But the entire universe narrowed down to table 12 and the guy who was staring right at me from across the room.
It was the craziest thing, but I felt like I knew him. Not in the “don’t I know you from somewhere” kind of way. But like “knew him” on a soul level. My mom was super into past lives and shit and I’d always laughed at her for it. Looking at this guy, though, I had to wonder. Why did he seem so familiar?
“Paige? The ice cream is over there.” Julie pointed to the freezer. “You good?”
“What? Oh yeah.” I came back to reality and time moved back to its normal pace again. “Go ahead. Take your break.”
“Okay. Be back in fifteen.”
I was aware of him watching me as I scooped out the ice cream and placed them on the pie. I grabbed the can of whipped cream and headed over to table 12.
The hairs on my skin stood up as his gaze went up and down my body as I walked toward them. It was the strangest feeling—as if I were being drawn into a black hole by some magnetic force.
I got to the table and managed to set the plate of pie down. He was still looking at me with those black eyes, and the girl he was with was looking back and forth between us with a disgusted look on her face. “Ew. Ryder. Stop looking at her like that.”
Ryder cleared his throat and looked away. “The pie’s for her,” he said, motioning to the girl.
“You want whipped cream?” I asked, surprised that my voice sounded normal.
“Yeah. Lots.”
I was looking at Ryder while spraying the whipped cream on the pie. I guess I must have been distracted by those long eyelashes or those full lips that looked like he’d been eating cherries. Or maybe it was the tiny scar under his left eye. Whatever it was, I was obviously not paying attention because the girl said, “Uhhh…that’s good?”
I looked at her plate and burst out laughing. I’d put so much whipped cream on that you couldn’t even see the pie anymore. It was literally just a mound of whipped cream.
“Oh my gosh, I’m sorry.” I said, embarrassed. “It’s my first day. Do you want me to get you another one?”
Ryder spoke and his deep voice took me by surprise. I wondered if he was a singer, because that baritone sound would be incredible in a church choir. He didn’t look like the kind of guy who went to church, though.
“There’s no such thing as too much cream.” As soon as he said that, my pussy felt like it had been zapped by an electrical shock.
“Okay, y’all are gross.” The girl slid out of the booth. “I’m gonna go to the bathroom while you old people finish this flirting thing you’re doing and then I’m gonna come back here and eat my pie.”
As she walked away, Rocky came up behind me. “Is everything okay here?” She spied the plate of whipped cream and leaned over to grab it. Ryder’s eyes never left me.
“We’re fine, Rocky. Leave the pie. She is coming right back.” He practically barked the command at her, and she just sort of slunk away.
“Come on, Paige,” Rocky said over her shoulder. “Let me show you the freezer in the back.”
The heat coming off my body was so intense that a little time in the freezer was a really good idea.
“Nice to meet you, Paige,” Ryder said. “It’s good to have a fresh face around here.”
“It’s fucking cold in here,” Rocky said before laughing. “But then, that’s why they call it a freezer, right?” She walked out of the huge room that was filled with ice cream, frozen meats, and other things that needed to stay frozen.
I must have still seemed dazed after that strange encounter with Ryder because Rocky said, “I think it’s time for your fifteen. Let’s ask Julie if we can take them together, since it’s a little slow right now.”
I didn’t really want to talk to her during my break. I needed some time to process what had just happened to me. I was no virgin. I’d dated some guys in college. I’d even gone skiing with Caldwell Blacktone’s family.
But this was different. This was something I’d never felt before in my life. It made everything else pale in comparison.
What the hell just happened to me?
Five minutes later we were sitting in Rocky’s truck and she was smoking and talking like I was some kind of friend, not a coworker she just met three hours ago.
Evidently she’d been kicked out of high school and sent to a continuation school that she also was asked to leave. She did a short stint in juvie for shoplifting, but the record had been sealed, which was why she was able to get this job.
“Trouble has a bad habit of finding me wherever I go,” she said, offering me a drag of her cigarette.
Shaking my head no, I asked, “Why is that?” I wasn’t trying to be a therapist, but my guess was that trouble didn’t find her; she found it.
“I don’t know. You know that guy earlier? The one with the whipped cream kid? He’s trouble with a capital T. We had a thing last year, but I knew he was a problem so I got out of it as soon as I could.” She flicked the cigarette butt out the window and twisted open the top to the Dr. Pepper she’d brought with her.
Rocky had slept with Ryder? That was interesting. “What kind of problem?” I asked. I couldn’t get my brain around him with her.
“He’s the kind of guy who seems like a decent guy on the outside…took his kid sister in when their parents were killed by a drunk driver. Helps old people and animals. Shit like that. But underneath it, he’s a cold-blooded killer. Other guys get drunk and sloppy. Not Ryder. Everything he does is calculated and for his own benefit. I figured that out real quick and now I stay away from him.”
My eyes gazed out the window and I could see the biker bar across the street. Chalupa and the guys were pulling in and I could see them laughing and patting each other on the back as they walked inside.
Maybe I ought to go and check out this biker bar myself…you know…for research.
Seven
Ryder
I was sitting in my usual seat in the back corner of the Blue Dog. It was a normal day, with the regulars sitting at the bar, the day bartender Connie serving drinks, and some talk show on the TV overhead. The pool tables were empty, but by the end of the night, there would probably be a lively game going on. Chalupa and Dog had an ongoing battle and they kept winning back the same twenty bucks from each other every week. Just a regular day at the bar.
Why, then, was my mind still across the street at Tiny’s? Thinking about that waitress with the long blonde hair, wanting to grab that ponytail and crush those lips with my mouth…
What the hell was wrong with me?
I’d been in love exactly once. It was before my folks had been killed and it was my senior year in high school. It was one of those storybook first love kind of romances. We met in English class, wrote each other poetry, went to the carnival and made out on top of the Ferris Wheel. She was my first sexual experience and I was hers. It was supposed to last forever.
I had a girlfriend, I was getting ready to go off to college and start my own life. When the accident happened, though, everything changed. I got really angry. Not just angry—I was filled with so much fucking rage that I took it out on everyone around me.
My rage got the best of me and I lost the job, lost the girlfriend, and almost ended up on the streets with a little sister to support.
That’s when I met Padre. He ran the auto shop and gave me a job, a place to live, and eventually the chance to prospect for Outlaw Souls. He taught me how to fight, how to shoot, and how to kill. If it weren’t for him, I don’t know what would have happened to me.
But love? Love wasn’t in the cards for me again. My life was no life for a woman. I’d seen what happened to guys—and Swole—who
tried to balance being in a relationship with being in the club. It didn’t work out for long. You ended up having to choose one or the other. Tiny chose his wife and that’s how he ended up opening the diner. My loyalty was to Outlaw Souls and Padre, not some woman.
Don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t exactly a monk. When the urge struck, I could easily find women to be with. There were plenty of women who were happy, like that waitress Rocky, though they always wanted more than I could give them. So we’d fuck around for a few weeks and then I’d break it off. No sense getting anybody hurt. I didn’t feel for them, and as soon as they started to have feelings for me it was time to end it.
This thing with Paige, though. That was different. Scary different. My body wasn't cooperating with me, and that could be very dangerous for everyone. It was best for everyone that I just steer clear of her.
A ray of yellow light came in the room as the front door opened.
“Padre,” Connie said as his lumbering shadow came into the room. “Long time no see. You want the usual?”
Padre’s usual was a Tecate with lime and a tequila chaser. “Yeah.”
I could hear the bar stools scrape the floor as he pulled it out far enough to sit on. He was a large man, but under the layer of fat was as much muscle as a gorilla. He was strong as fuck and one hit from him was enough to render a man unconscious. Even though the man was well into his sixties, everyone knew not to mess with Padre.
I wanted to know where he was when he missed the meeting, but didn’t want to ask. I figured he’d tell me if he wanted me to know. But it was time for a refill of my coffee, so I grabbed my cup and went up to the bar, opposite where Padre was. The Enforcer was next to me, stuffing peanuts in his mouth.
I held the cup up and said, “When you get a minute, Connie?” She nodded at me as she slid the beer and shot over to Padre.
