by Amber Burns
“I think we have a sniper or two in the Brotherhood, but you might know better than I do. People like you more than they like me,” I glanced back at him as I said it. “So, you could ask around because I think having that kind of training is going to be useful for the future.”
“Think it’ll come to that?”
“We’ll find out on the way home.”
We came across our motorcycles and began to slowly weave the rest of the way out of the woods. It was a relief to get to the street. We weren’t limited by the trees and roots now, there was the freedom to rev our engines and go as fast as we pleased.
“We forgot to check in,” Van Cleave hollered over the whipping wind, and I shrugged lightly.
It didn’t seem important to me, though I imagine it should have been. We had killed so much time with Tony and Suzy we were already going to be late getting back. We could easily check in when it was time to gas up.
The longest part of the ride home was navigating the walk then the drive through Tony’s forest. I lost track of time and just paid attention to the road. It was a mistake, me losing track. The ride out here took so long and was uneventful that when it was time for the ride back I missed the signs that we were being followed. I didn’t even notice our tails until Van Cleave flashed his lights at me. I shot a look over a shoulder and spotted two bikes behind us. It looked like just two, a hard look at the mirror supported it. Though, at night, it could be hard to tell.
How it would go from here would be telling as to how we would approach this club from here on out. If they just tailed us and made no attempt at contact, as boring as that sounded, we would carry on. Though the next ride through we made would come with backup. If they made any attacks while we were riding, shooting at us or whatever, then, assuming the two of us survived, we would retaliate in kind.
I slowed down, causing Van Cleave to slow, too. It was sign enough that we knew they were there. After a moment there was a roar of an engine that caught my attention. One of our tails raced around me on my left then the other came around the right side. They weaved back in forth in front of us, slowing, so we had no other choice but to follow suit or pass them. If we passed them, we’d probably get bullets in the back. I gave Van Cleave a fleeting glance before nodding towards the guys in front of us. We’d submit to what they wanted, but if they got aggressive, we’d show them who was really boss.
Soon they had us pulled off the road and onto the shoulder. They immediately dismounted, but I motioned for Van Cleave to remain on his bike. We killed the engines and watched the two guys approach.
“You not gonna get up and take your helmets off?” One barked.
“We can get up,” Van Cleave started. “If you don’t mind telling us why you forced us off the road.”
Between the two of us, looking at them there was no competition between us if one of them came at us swinging. But, eyeing them both I could see the guns on them. The one on the left had a patch that said prospect the one on the ride bore a patch that had four aces for each suit.
Really? I asked myself. Crazy Aces was actually their name?
I tried not to groan aloud. I shot Van Cleave a look, even with our visors down I knew he would be able to get my feels. I thought I heard him cackle.
“Your cutting through the Aces’ territory man and from your cuts I can tell you run with another crew. Why not be respectful for where you’re riding?”
“Who the fuck is the Boneyard Brotherhood?” the prospect piped up.
“Could ask the same about the Crazy Aces,” I heard Van Cleave grumble, it was probably too loud because I notice the expressions of the men in front of us changed.
I decided then to get up off my bike, I wasn’t going to let one them cause me to drop it. I went as far as to pull my helmet off next and I sat it on the seat.
“We were just going for a ride,” I said as I eyed the two of them. I figured they might be mid to late thirties. Maybe older, it was hard to tell in the dark. “The last time I went through here no one had claim on it, it’s a pretty trashed stretch of road. What’s to claim?”
“Did we come into your territory calling it trash?” the member asked, his expression darkening.
That was the deciding factor as to what way this would go. I heard Van Cleave sigh as he pulled his helmet off and got off his bike. He knew it, too. “Taking shit the wrong way, man. We were just on a joy ride. Now, we’re trying to get home. We didn’t ask for trouble, didn’t come here to start it.”
“How come we ain’t heard of Boneyard boys before?” the prospect asked, his arms folded and I could see the attempt to look big on his face.
“Because we’re private,” I said. “We only cater to a certain type of individual.”
“And it’s Brotherhood, son,” Van Cleave smirked. “Ain’t no boys here.”
“Give us one reason we shouldn’t break our boots off in your asses?” The prospect spoke, his face contorting in his anger.
I glanced at Van Cleave, and I saw the smirk still on his face. Well, if there was anytime to be an asshole now was the time to do it.
“I doubt you could do that, son,” I mirrored my expression to match my friend’s. “Boneyard is mostly military. We kinda know a little bit about handing people their asses.”
There was something about calling someone older than me son, it was demeaning on a level I enjoyed. Of course, our taunting wasn’t taken easily. They didn’t do the easy route, didn’t go to throw a punch or react with a curse. Instead, without much of a warning, the patched guy pulled out a gun and shot Van Cleave clean in the chest.
“Mother fucker!” he cried out.
Though I was sure the bullet didn’t actually hurt him, getting shot with a vest kept the bullet from penetrating his skin it still hit with a force that hurt. The shot of the gun put me in a gut reaction, I didn’t wait and didn’t question it. The gun at my back was in my hand faster than the other guy could pull the trigger again. I opened fire on him, and I heard gunshots returned. I felt a shot burn past my head, and Van Cleave railed out a curse again before the older man went down. I hadn’t been shooting to kill, but after that, I decided that neither of these guys would be making it back to their clubhouse to do a report. I made sure my aim was true. While I couldn’t be sure the first guy was dead, I would make sure he was after I eliminated the prospect.
I felt another shot come my way, clipping my right shoulder but I didn’t feel it right away. Another hit me in the gut and my vest, fortunately, caught the brunt of the damage. I glowered down the barrel of my gun and squeezed the trigger, watching shortly after as the little bastard fell backward.
“Are you still breathing?” I asked without looking away. I didn’t see movement, but I didn’t trust they were out of the game until I put a bullet in their heads.
“Yea,” Van Cleave wheezed. “But fuck it hurts.”
“Can you use your phone?” I ventured closer and in quick succession proceed to make sure both men were going to stay down.
“I think it hit my collar bone,” he took in a sharp breath. “Fuck I can’t do shit.”
I fought my phone out of my pocket, adrenaline still pumping through me double time. I glanced at my phone long enough to find Wilson’s number then old habits kicked in. I was clearing the perimeter of Ali Baba again, even after two were on the ground.
“About damn time you called,” a gruff voice cut through the trance I had been in. I had been stalking around the short bit of shoulder we had pulled over looking for more insurgents.
“We ran into trouble,” I reported. “Van Cleave is hit and not going to be able to get back on his bike.”
“Not dead?”
“He’s not,” I assured him. “The trouble is.” I made my way back to him, his olive skin was pale, and he had a hand pressed against his collar. “We’ll need a pickup and quick.”
“You’re lucky I got worried. We’re already on the movie. Can you give me any exacts to your local?”
&nb
sp; I looked around, “No buildings. I think we passed the clubhouse already which is where we picked up these two. You’ll need to clean up this mess. I’ve been hit, and I can’t feel the pain, yet.”
“We’ve been on the road for an hour, put pressure on your wounds and his. Can’t be more than thirty minutes away,” was the only answer I got, he hung up.
I cursed a shoved my phone back in my pocket, I clicked the safety on, but I wasn’t quite ready to put the gun away. “Dizzy?”
“I don’t think anything vital’s hit,” he responded. “But I know I’m not going to be riding for a while.”
I went to my bike and started digging around a saddlebag. I had to have something to staunch the bleeding.
“He said thirty minutes at least,” I found a shirt, it looked clean enough. “Can you wait that long?” I offered it to him, I wasn’t ready to stand down I had to make sure we were still safe.
“Not much of a choice,” he grunted.
“Talk to me,” I ordered, because as long as you were talking, you were okay. I know it wasn’t true, but it still seemed logical. “Talk about whatever the fuck you want. Just keep talking.”
He sighed roughly, and he pressed my shirt against his chest.
“You know what I said before? About being able to get a girl out of your head? Out of your system if you fucked her enough?” He winced and didn’t wait for a response. “That was a lie,” he released a breath. “If she stays in your head, you remember her smell and her taste after and it sticks to you. That’s It, man. There’s no going back. Fucking her again just helps her set up camp.”
“Why’d you fucking say that then?” I shot him a glare.
He gave me a weak grin, “Would it have mattered anyway? You were going to hit it again anyway, amirite?” I grunted, because I couldn’t argue. I kept my eyes on the road, my head started to throb, and I could feel blood starting to drip down my temple. “If she lingers after the first time she’s got your interest still, you probably didn’t stand a chance in the beginning. Whatever black magic she did to get in your pants the first time was just sealing the deal.”
“Black magic?” I thought I could see lights in the distance, my bearings were off, and I couldn’t figure out the direction. I leveled my pistol at them and waited as the got closer. “Sound pretty bitter there, got a reason behind that?”
“Let a girl get her claws in me,” he sounded tired. “I lost her, and she still lives in my head.” I looked to him with the way he sounded bad. But when I saw his expression the pain on his face I realized it might not have actually been psychical. “It’s some shit that’s hard to live with, having a girl in your head and heart without being able to do shit about it.” He was starting to get too quiet for me, “It’s a terrible way to go. Don’t fuck your chances with this girl if she’s already in your head and working her way into your fucking heart.”
“So, you’re not bitter,” I said I looked back to the approaching car. “You’re heartbroken.”
“You got me,” he laughed a little then winced, telling me he was hurting good. Van Cleave was a man that lived to laugh. Hearing him pained to do that was worrisome.
I pulled my phone out and redialed Wilson. I didn’t wait for a greeting when he answered, “What’s the ETA?”
“I think I see you,” I saw the brights on the vehicle flash on. “So, we can’t be more than a mile from you.” I heard someone beside him say they were punching it. “What’s the status on Van Cleave?”
“He’s talking, and I’m sure he’ll live.”
“I’m not gonna be able to ride,” he whined. “Aw, I feel that pain in my bones now, not just the broke one now.”
“Tell him to quit his bitching, I don’t want to hear it. We’re pulling up now.”
A later model SUV didn’t even pull onto the shoulder. It stayed running, but Wilson, Tillman, and another man stepped out. I eyed them each with my pistol.
“Stand down,” Wilson growled at me. “Martinez is to help with the cleanup.”
The man in question gave me a salute. “I’ll need your piece, gotta clean it up before we get rid of it.”
I gave it up without another thought. As soon as the weapon was out of my hand, I felt everything. My shoulder flared to life, and the dripping down the side of my head just seemed to make the wound on my head throb. The adrenaline seemed to drain away so every reality could bite me. I watched, instead of offering to help as they helped Van Cleave to his feet and walked him to the SUV. Martinez eyed me before nodding towards the vehicle.
“Don’t you worry about your bikes, Ted and I’ll drive ‘em back if that’s cool.”
“If you scratch it I’m breaking your face,” I said without feeling.
“No worries, bro,” he nodded at me and went as far as loading me up into the SUV, though he kept his hands to himself. It was more making sure I got in. “We should take these bikes with us,” he went on to say. “We could piece them out for parts and make a good dime off of them.”
“It’s likely to piss off whoever the hell these assholes are,” Wilson had climbed back into the vehicle after Van Cleave was loaded up. “As far as I’m concerned they had this coming to them.”
“Killing a member and a prospect is going to piss them off, too,” Tillman approached the driver’s side window. “We already knew we were playing with fire by sending them both on this run. Might as well send a message while we’re at it.”
“Do it,” Wilson grunted at last. “Make sure any signs of foul play aren’t traceable back to us from law enforcement. I could give a shit what these pricks think.”
Orders given, he rolled up the window and pulled away from the shoulder. He did a sharp u-turn that had Van Cleave wincing in the back then began to plow down the road. When the Crazy Aces found their fallen members, there’d be retaliation.
14
I had tried to shrug out of my cut as we closed in on the hospital, my shoulder throbbed and I gritted my teeth as I worked the leather off.
“We need to get his cut off,” I said to Wilson after I had mine off.
“What?’ Van Cleave protested. “Why?”
“With the cut and the vest on,” I tapped my chest. “It’ll be obvious that something illegal happened and we will bring more attention from five-oh,” I pulled the velcro off and with a wince shoved the bulletproof vest over my head. I turned to him next and quickly started to strip him of his cut. “We can’t bring more trouble back to the club.”
“You could make it worse,” Wilson growled from the front seat.
“We have had enough cops in our asses over stupidity. If he can’t get the cut off himself, give me a knife, and I’ll cut it off of him.”
“No,” Van Cleave grunted out, and he had started shrugging out of the leather vest. “Don’t cut it off me, it’s bad enough it’s got bullet holes. He’s right though,” he pulled the bloodied t-shirt off of his chest. “Don’t need more questions asked then we’re going to get.”
“I’ll handle the questions,” Wilson said as I eased the leather cut off of Van Cleave and began to carefully work the velcro of the bullet-proof vest. “Don’t you worry about the details. If any doctors or nurses ask you questions about how you got your injuries you refer them to me, end of story.”
I nodded, “Are you going to take your cut off, too?”
“No,” he paid me little mind, his attention and focus on the road.
“You’re going to draw the wrong kind of attention to us,” I hit the seat in front of us. “You’re going to tell me that the hospital staff isn’t going to look at two guys shot up and figure out some sort of gang activity is going on?”
He shot me a look over his shoulder and pulled into the parking lot close to the ER. “You think I was born yesterday? Let me handle questions, you let them stitch you up. That’s all you got to worry about.”
I grunted eyeing the hospital he had brought us to, the same one Dylan worked at. Would she be the one to stitch me up again?
I wasn’t going to hold my breath. I turned to help Van Cleave out of the SUV. He wasn’t an invalid by any means by I knew from experience that a broken bone wasn’t something you could walk off. That, and his usually olive complexion was on the pale side.
They didn’t dawdle with us in the ER for long. We were separated, predictably. Wilson stayed back in the waiting room to relay our information to the admins at the desk. I was stuck in a small room like before that only offered a curtain for cover.
I decided to save myself a shirt and tugged it off, they had been more focused on Van Cleave then me. I know I probably looked bad, but I’m sure that all my wounds were just grazes. Though, when I looked down, I could see bruises forming from where the vest had caught the actual bullets.
I’m guessing the prospect probably had shit aim while the other guy was spot on. I took two, one in the chest and the other in the gut. I could feel the ache in my muscles as I laid back on the poorly cushioned table. It was the first time I’d been shot. Which seemed funny considering the service I’d put into the Marines. I’d been shot at before, on a number of occasions, but it was the first time someone actually managed to hit me. The bullets grazed my head and my shoulder, and it wasn’t unlike getting stabbed, something I had experienced before my tussle with Billings and his friends. Luckily, bullets were hot, and though the skin was broken, it was pretty clean. So the time I had to get patched up was more so waiting for a doctor’s inspection than anything else. When I was finally given the okay and another round of antibiotics, I went to go find Wilson.
