by Jessie Cooke
They were on a main road and Levi got the bike up close to ninety at one point as he wove in and out of traffic. He was pissing people off and he even caused one fender bender. It was the most fun he’d had in a while. It was a relatively cool summer night and the wind felt good on his face. He took the cops on a five-mile run before finally coming to a dirt road that led up into the State Park. He opened the throttle wide, and the bike was flying up the hill at over 100 miles an hour as Levi maneuvered around potholes and the shining eyes of furry, four-legged creatures on the road. The cops surprised him by continuing to give chase for another three miles or so, until the road narrowed too much for their cars to make it through the thick trees and foliage. When he heard the screech of their tires and brakes, he pulled off into a thicket of trees and waited. He wasn’t surprised to hear them leaving not long after. If they had gotten out of their cars to look for him, that would have been surprising. In Levi’s mind, cops were lazy by nature and much preferred a car chase and a shoot-out to any kind of foot pursuit. He sat there in the woods for another half-hour or so before leaving out the opposite direction he’d entered. By the time he got back to the meth lab over three hours had passed and Grant had been blowing up his phone. In person he said:
“Fuck, man, I heard your bike and those sirens hours ago. I thought your ass was in jail or dead by now.”
“Aw, you were worried about me?”
“Hell no, just pissed because you were having all the fun and I was stuck in this boring-ass place. Next time, it’s my turn.”
“Good luck outrunning them on that piece-of-shit Softail.”
Grant laughed. “That Softail would kick your bitch ass Sportster’s ass in a hot minute.”
Levi chuckled. His father had built his bike almost from the ground up. Nobody could beat him in a race, and Grant knew it. He just liked to talk a lot of shit. He was about to grab one of the cold beers out of the ice chest Grant had brought when his phone buzzed in his pocket. “Is that you again? I’m really okay,” he said, looking at Grant.
“Shut the fuck up. Maybe I was hoping they had your big, stupid ass in jail.”
Levi chuckled as he pulled the phone out. The smile disappeared when he saw that it was Cheney. “Hey, Prez, what’s up?”
“I need you to leave Grant on watch there and come back to the house.”
“Okay…can I ask why?”
“We have a visitor coming and hopefully a new venture in the works. I want you in on it.”
Levi wasn’t sure whether to be happy about that or not, but in reality, he didn’t think whatever it was could be any worse than standing guard on a meth lab. He’d been doing that for almost three weeks already and other than the police chase, he’d left every morning wanting to blow his brains out. Of course, nothing really made him happy any longer without Krissy…other than the dreams.
“Okay. I’ll be there soon.”
Grant wasn’t happy about Levi’s being called in and his being left behind, but he and Levi both knew that when Cheney hand-selected a guy for a job, there was always a reason behind it. It took Levi half an hour to get to the clubhouse. When he walked in the door and looked around, it looked like any other Saturday night. The guys that didn’t have a job to do that night were sitting around drinking or playing cards. Football was on the big-screen television over the bar and the prospects were serving up cold beer and whiskey. A few of the club girls milled around, or rubbed up against one or the other of the guys. The girls had taken to leaving Levi alone a long time ago. When he first hit puberty, he’d changed his bedmate as often as he did his underwear, learning everything he could from the experienced, older women. But the second he lay eyes on Krissy that night at the party, he’d started rebuffing all their advances. Eventually, when he started bringing her around the clubhouse and introducing her as his old lady, they backed off…at least, most of them. Once she died however, it was like he’d sprayed himself with insect repellant and they were a bunch of mosquitos. They buzzed around him in a circle, but didn’t approach. They were not so subtly waiting for the insect repellant…or in his case the grief…to go away. It had been almost two months now, and Levi still couldn’t imagine it ever happening.
He checked in with Cheney, who told him to have a drink and he’d be out in a few. He sat down at the bar next to one of the sergeants at arms, a guy he only knew as “Evil,” and gave his order to one of the prospects tending bar. He’d barely taken a sip of his whiskey as he took in the score of the Titans game on the TV when he heard the sound of a group of Harleys approach out front. Cheney came out of his office with Jackie D in tow and stepped to the front door like some kind of fucking diplomat. Levi rolled his eyes and downed his drink as he turned toward the door to see who their mystery visitor was.
The door opened and a tall man entered. He had long, blond hair held back in a ponytail and blue eyes that seemed to take in the scene around him all at once. Next to him was a guy about thirty-five with dark hair and eyes and a small, jagged scar along one side of his mouth. A tall, lanky-looking guy with short, kinky black hair who looked part Asian and part black stood next to a huge, buff white guy with a buzz cut. Behind him, trailing the crew, was a dark-skinned guy with black dreadlocks and eyes the same color blue as the blond guy. They were all wearing jeans and leather kuttes, but Levi couldn’t see the patch on the back from where he sat. The room fell silent as Cheney said:
“Welcome! I’m glad you made it. Everyone, this is Dax Marshall. He’s the president of a club up in Massachusetts called the Southside Skulls. I’ll let the rest of you introduce yourselves,” Cheney said as he shook hands with the guy named Dax and then each one of the others. After he’d greeted them all and introduced Jackie, he told one of the prospects to bring each one of them a cold beer and a shot, and he led them to the meeting room. Jackie stopped as they passed Levi and said, “Come on. This involves you too.”
Levi got up and followed them all into the meeting room. He took a seat at the end of the table and watched as the rest of them all sat down. The dark-haired guy’s kutte said “Handsome.” Levi wasn’t sure that was the name he would have picked for that particular guy. “Scary” or “Hard-Ass” seemed to fit better. The Asian guy was “Jimmy,” the buff guy was “Cody,” and the Mexican-looking guy with the weird blue eyes was “Gunner.” Levi was as curious as hell about what kind of business they could have with a club all the way up in Massachusetts, but he didn’t have to wait long to find out. He even figured out quickly why Cheney wanted him on this job. Cheney started out by saying:
“This is Jackie D, our V.P. Next to him is my road captain, Mikey, and on his right, my treasurer, Big Sam. That guy at the end of the table there is Levi.” All the men turned to look at him and Levi felt even more at a loss, not knowing why the hell he was there. “He’s the best we have, better than any I’ve ever seen.” As soon as Cheney said that, Levi knew what he was talking about.
Levi was fifteen years old the first time his old man taught him how to hotwire a bike. They were just messing around one day, working on the bike Levi’s dad was fixing up for him, and the old man said, “What do you do if you need your bike and can’t find the key?” “Spare key?” Levi had answered. His dad rolled his eyes and said, “Yeah, knowing your mother she’d probably keep one handy for you just in case. Let me put it this way. What if you needed to start a bike you didn’t have any keys to?” Levi smiled and said, “Hotwire it and then drive like hell before they catch up to you.” His dad had laughed and pulled a piece of silver wire about six inches long out of his pocket. “Never leave home without one of these,” he said. He reached under the chrome cover on the bike and pulled out a red, black, yellow, and blue wire. He held them in order between his fingers, stripped off the colored plastic tips, and used the wire in his other hand to connect wire number two and four. There was a little spark and he pulled them apart and did it again…two more times…before the bike roared to life. He grinned at Levi and said, “There’s an
other wire on my tool-box. Grab it and you give it a try with my bike.” Levi did as he was told and his dad’s bike fired up on the first touch. Over the years, Levi got so good at it that the whole process only took him a matter of seconds and he never came across a bike he couldn’t start.
Dax looked at Levi and said, “Any qualms about taking from another club?” Levi noted that Dax said “taking” and not “stealing.” He wasn’t sure what that meant, exactly but he quickly said:
“Nope.”
“Good. Any problems taking a trip to Texas?”
Levi didn’t have to think about that either. Since Krissy died, his mom and papa were all that was really holding him to Memphis. A change of scenery might do him a world of good. “Not at all,” he said.
Dax stood up then and his men followed suit. Levi could almost feel the camaraderie there; it was the kind of camaraderie he’d been looking for when he was a prospect for the Defenders as an eighteen-year-old. He had yet to feel that with his own club, and even less so now that his father was gone. Levi got a feeling that this might just be his most interesting job yet.
12
“You’re too young to just work and sit at home with your grandparents all the time. Come on, go to this party with me. It’ll be fun.”
Zoe and Donna, another new girl Doris hired about two weeks after Zoe got the job at the Pancake House, were out back on their break. Donna was puffing on a cigarette and Zoe was eating a biscuit and egg sandwich that her nana had packed in her purse that morning. She was constantly telling her that she could eat at the restaurant, but Nana was determined to put some meat on her granddaughter’s bones as quickly as she could.
“Nah, I’m okay, Donna. I’m not big on crowds and parties anymore.”
“Staying clean doesn’t mean you have to cut yourself off from the world. I mean, isn’t the real test getting back out there? I promise you, my friend who is throwing the party doesn’t do drugs at all…not even weed. There will be a lot of alcohol, but that wasn’t your problem, right?”
“No, I’ve never really drank,” Zoe said. That wasn’t the whole truth, but she was too ashamed to admit that she had stolen more than one bottle of alcohol in her life for those long nights when she wasn’t able to get her hands on a fix. “I know it sounds weird at my age, but my grandfather is really strict. If I’m not home by ten, he’ll lock me out.” She was embarrassed to admit that, but she and Donna had become fast friends and Donna knew about her situation.
“You can stay at my place tonight. We’re both off tomorrow. Come on, Zoe, I count you as one of my best friends and we never spend time together outside of work. It’ll be good for us both. It’s been a long-ass week.”
Donna had a point there. Zoe’s first day at the Pancake House, business had been so slow that she didn’t understand why Doris was complaining about not having enough help. But she quickly realized that because of the neighborhood they worked in, business fluctuated with the arrival and the depletion of the welfare payments, social security disbursements, and veteran’s pensions. On those days and for several days afterwards, it never let up. It was the third of the month and so far, all week it had been non-stop. Zoe left each day to ride her bike home with swollen ankles and knees that felt like they were fifty years old. She readily agreed that she needed to do something besides work, and even though her grandfather was softening at home just a bit, watching TV with him and Nana every night was getting old too. But the idea of going to a party with a bunch of people her own age that had lived “normal” lives seemed like too much of a big step all at once.
“Maybe we could have lunch tomorrow…”
Donna rolled her eyes and stubbed out her cigarette. “We’re not middle-aged women,” she said. “We don’t ‘do lunch.’ We ‘do parties.’ I’ll stay with you all night and introduce you to everyone. Come on, Zoe…it’ll be fun.”
Famous last words, Zoe thought six hours later as she stood at the island between the kitchen and living room of an older Spanish-style house in a middle-class neighborhood in Memphis. Donna had introduced her to everyone and Zoe had promptly forgotten all their names, even before Donna disappeared with some hot black guy that looked like a professional football player. It was already ten p.m.; Donna had driven them there and Zoe couldn’t even catch a cab home unless she planned on sleeping in the back yard. She’d been sipping on a Coke all night, but the colorful bottles of alcohol and the blender full of margarita mix on the island in front of her were all beginning to look appealing.
“Hello there, gorgeous.” She looked up into a pair of light brown eyes. They were in a nice-looking face with a dusting of stubble across the chin. And the face belonged to a relatively clean-cut, dark-haired guy with a slim build and lots of colorful tattoos on his arms. Zoe smiled nervously and said:
“Hey.”
“I’m Matt.” He held out a big hand. Zoe shook it quickly and let it go.
“Zoe.”
“Nice,” he said, looking her over and licking his bottom lip. Zoe wasn’t sure what he was looking at; she was still as thin as a rail. His piercing gaze was making her nervous, but when she gave him another small smile and tried to move away, he followed her. “What are you drinking?” Zoe held up the soda can in her hand and said,
“Coke.”
He laughed. “I mean, what’s in it?”
“Syrup, sugar, food coloring…”
He laughed hard at that. “You’re funny. Hot and funny. I like it,” he said, licking his lips again.
“Yeah, I’m a laugh a minute. I have to go pee now, though. It was nice meeting you.” She started to slip into the hallway where the bathroom was but Matt stepped around in front of her. Surprising her by taking the Coke out of her hand, he said:
“I’ll hold this and wait for you.”
“It’s okay,” Zoe said. “I’ll just put it on the counter.” She tried to take it back, but he pulled it away.
“It’s germy in there. Go on.” She frowned at the way he snapped the order at her. Who does this guy think he is? When she was on the streets and getting high, she would have started a fight over it. But being sober decreased her need for the adrenaline rush that getting the shit knocked out of her used to produce. She rolled her eyes at him but turned and went into the bathroom. She locked the door behind her and looked around. There was one small window, but it wasn’t big enough for even her thin frame to fit out of. She was just going to have to find her backbone and tell the creep she wasn’t interested. She reached over and flushed the toilet in case he was listening, washed her hands, and looked at herself in the mirror. She was beginning to like what she saw looking back, a lot more than she used to…but she was sure the guy in the hallway was either drunk, desperate, or both, since she knew she didn’t look half as good as some of the other girls at the party. Besides, Zoe liked her men domineering in the bedroom, but not overly forward when she first met them. That was a huge turn-off to her. She straightened her back before opening the door, resolved to get away from the creep and call a cab, even if she had to spend the night out in the yard.
“How’d it go, baby?” Matt said as soon as she opened the door. She wrinkled her forehead at him and said:
“The name is Zoe. I don’t know you well enough for you to call me baby.”
“Maybe you should get to know me better,” he said.
She rolled her eyes and tried to slip around him in the narrow hallway. He blocked her way. “Excuse me,” she said, harshly.
He laughed again and said, “Calm down. I just wanted to give your Coke back before you took off.” He held out the can and she took it. She wasn’t about to drink it, knowing that he’d had plenty of time to put something in it if he’d wanted to.
“Thanks. Now, if you’ll move out of my way…”
“What’s your hurry, beautiful? I think you and I might have a lot in common. Why don’t we find a quiet place to talk?”
“I don’t think so. I need to go.”
“It’s
early, baby. Come on, you won’t be disappointed.”
“Move.”
Instead of moving, he stepped closer so his chest was in her face. He put an arm around her and rested his hand on her back. “Just one kiss, baby, and I’ll move.”
“Fuck you,” Zoe said, trying to take a step back. He tightened his grip on her, so she did the only thing she could think of…she threw the Coke directly in his face and stomped down on his foot. While he was cussing her, and wiping his eyes, she ducked around him and ran for the front door. She had to push her way past several drunk people to get to the door. Once she was there, she threw it open and ran outside. She’d made it across the lawn and almost to the sidewalk when she felt a big hand on her shoulder.
“You little bitch. You’re going to apologize for that!” She was spun around to face the guy that only moments ago had been “kind of nice-looking,” but now looked like he was possessed.
“I wouldn’t have done it if you would have backed off like I asked you to,” she said. “Now let go of me or I’ll make you sorry again.”
The guy tightened his grip on her waist and grabbed her wrist tightly with his other hand. Zoe was just about to bring up her knee and kick him in the balls when she felt the ground vibrate under her feet and heard the rumble of a motorcycle approaching the STOP sign they stood a few feet away from. She couldn’t see the bike, but she saw the headlight shining directly in Matt’s face as he squinted. “Fucking cunt!” he yelled at the biker, loudly. “Get your fucking bright light out of my face.” Zoe heard the engine stop and felt Matt’s muscles freeze up. He was drunk and pissed and probably hadn’t meant to say that as loud as he had. If she wasn’t in pain from the hold he still had on her, she might have laughed.
