Blow Out (Steel Veins Book 1)

by Jackson Kane

  What the fuck just happened?

  “Are you okay?” No response. “Dammit, Remy! Talk to me!”

  “I’m sorry,” Remy let the near whispered words out in the same breath as a heavy sigh. His voice was strangled by sorrow. “Last night... I... I lost my way.”

  “Lost your way? How?”

  I didn’t understand. When I walked into that doxa cooking room last night and saw him on the ground holding that dead woman’s hand, I almost didn’t recognize him. And when he didn’t answer me, I thought I’d lost him forever. I was lucky he snapped out of it when the Lobos showed up, or things would probably have gone much, much worse for the both of us.

  Seeing him sitting there catatonic was more terrifying for me than when he was shot. At least when he was shot there was something I could do to help him. The bullets were physical. I knew where the wounds were and what happened. As hard as it was, I could wrap my head around what needed to be done.

  But seeing Remy hollowed out like a jack-o-lantern scared me on a whole different level. There was nothing I could do to help him. PTSD was something I knew nothing about. All I could do was wait and hope for him to return to me.

  If he returned to me at all.

  “What the fuck happened to you in there?” I asked cautiously.

  “The Knights were holding kids as hostages so their mothers would work and stay in line,” Remy reluctantly began. “That’s why I went in.”

  I was so pissed when I saw him disappear, especially after he reassured me that he wouldn’t. Right after I stopped the biker from leaving, I ran into that building, not just because I was worried about him, but also because I was fumingly angry. I was angry that he’d do that to me after he expressly told me he wouldn’t.

  Hearing what his reason was made me feel like such an asshole.

  “Kids? I didn’t see any….” It started to dawn on me. My heart rose in my throat when I summoned the courage to ask him, “What happened to the kids?”

  I felt my chest crush with dread at the anticipation.

  “Most of them escaped with their mothers. I gave them our car keys.”

  “Oh.” That could have been it, but it didn’t feel like that was it. Seeing the woman dead was shocking to me, but with all he’d been through with the club, it couldn’t have been to him, at least not shocking enough to put him in this kind of mood.

  It had to be something else.

  “The woman that you saw—” Remy paused, struggling to get the words out. “—I killed her.”

  “What?” I couldn’t think of any situation where that made sense.

  “She’d taken several rounds from one of the Knight’s AK and wasn’t going to make it. She was holding a little boy when it happened. And he….”

  No. My eyes shot open. I knew what he was going to say, and I felt nauseous. I didn’t think anything of the bulge under the sheet and the additional red spot at the time.

  “Oh, God,” I gasped. Remy watched a little boy die.

  “Yeah.” Remy stopped to collect his thoughts and calm himself. “His mother whispered something to me when she knew... when she knew he was dead. She begged me to—”

  “You put her out of her misery?” The words felt disgusting in my mouth. This was a human being, not a sick, stray animal.

  “One round through the heart.”

  “Remy, that’s awful. I’m so—”

  “There’s more,” he interrupted before going into a long pause. He swallowed hard and then said, “Before you came in, I put the gun to my head and pulled the trigger. But the gun was empty. Used my last round on her.”

  I covered my mouth. I was speechless. It was horrible. My God… Remy tried to kill himself! “Jesus, Remy!” The thought of finding his dead body next to that woman in the post office made me almost start crying. I didn’t want to imagine being without him, especially not there, surrounded by Lobos.

  I suddenly got so angry at him. How could he do that to me? I wanted to scream at him. To slap him for almost leaving me. The anger quickly turned into guilt over my internal reaction.

  This happened to him, not me, I scolded myself.

  I immediately felt horrible for thinking such selfish and shitty thoughts. I could feel the incredible amount of grief within him. He opened up to me because he trusted me. I couldn’t betray him with that kind of thinking.

  He needed my support, not some self-righteous judgment.

  I didn’t have the right words to say, if any even existed, so I pulled his head onto my chest. Rapid, heavy exhales blew across my breasts, and then his tears rolled down my stomach. I couldn’t imagine how hard this bloody lifestyle was on him.

  The slayings last night. Lorenzo and the kill teams sent after us. The death of his blood brother, Bren, before that. Then losing the rest of his club family afterward. Having to work with the Lobos to save his club after those very people caused the situation that killed his wife and shot him nearly to death.... All that he shouldered alone. That weight. The pain he must have felt was unfathomable.

  How could anyone keep it together like he had?

  It stunned me at how strong he had to be to survive all that. It was hard to breathe just thinking about it, let alone going through a fraction of what he went through.

  That’s why the sex felt so wrong. He wasn’t fucking me; he was coping with the pain the only way he knew how. Sex was his only escape from the all the madness that swirled around him.

  “You’re not alone anymore,” I told him after desperately searching for other words that just weren’t there.

  “Yeah.” That word was pushed out in a slow voice that was laid low with gravel, broken glass, and heartache. He kissed my stomach sweetly, and with the sound of budding relief filling his voice, he whispered, “I know.”

  I held him as tightly as I could. We lay there in silence until the soft hues of morning crept through the cracks in the shades, and as exhausted as we were, sleep finally, mercifully embraced us.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Star

  The phone Bones gave Remy vibrated in a semicircle on the nightstand. Remy answered, but mostly listened. It’d been almost a week since the ghost town and the hard night that followed.

  Since then, a faint brightness had returned to Remy. He looked lighter somehow. That fire was still there, but that wasn’t the only thing that scorched his dark orbs.

  There was hope.

  We’d had sex every night since. It wasn’t just sweaty, mindless sex or shared mechanical release. He was having sex with me, not because of some coping mechanism or a need to feel something other than constant pain, but because I understood him now.

  Because I let him lose himself in me.

  “It’s on. Let’s go.” Remy hung up, kissed me, then threw a few things into a bag.

  Aside from the guns, one change of clothes each, and a few odds and ends, everything else was abandoned. We paid for the room in cash, under fake names, so we didn’t bother to check out or anything.

  To look at us, with everything we left with, you’d think that we were only headed out for a few hours.

  “Wait.” Remy stopped in the doorway right before closing our room for the final time and went back in for something. Whatever it was, it had to be important for him to pull a full stop and go back for it.

  “What is it?” I went over everything we’d packed in my mind. We had all the ammo magazines, and the weapons were cleaned and ready to go. It wasn’t something stupid like the keys to the bike, was it? “What’d we forget?”

  Remy returned with the Friends DVD boxed set.

  “Yeah?” I asked, not containing my smug smirk. “Okay.”

  “Don’t judge me.” He kissed me firmly, then put the DVDs into the duffle bag. “And for the record, they were not on a break. Ross is just a fucking idiot.”

  I laughed so hard that Remy had to drag me to the bike.

  And just like that, we rode off and left a whole life behind.

  All the frus
tration of trying to stay on the right side of the law was gone. I looked back at the motel fading off into the distance, and I felt that limbo, that fake middle life, fading with it. I would never miss the waitressing, the struggle for money, the long hours with no respect. All that toil, and at the end of the day, I never had anything to show for it.

  That life wasn’t us.

  It was time to forge a new future that wasn’t burdened by the exhaustive rules of society. This would be a future that we were good at, one that made sense to both of us. In the past six months, there had been so many no-turning-back moments for me that now they just felt like phases of my life. We were crabs outgrowing seashells one after the other. Soon, Remy and I would find the perfect fit.

  For now though, we had to make it through the next twenty-four hours. Now there was only Remy’s plan or death. Either way, the life we’d been leading these last few weeks was over, and I had completely come to terms with that.

  After a day’s worth of riding through New Mexico, Texas, and then Oklahoma, we finally pulled into a decent-looking hotel about an hour outside of Leslie just before dusk. We parked at the edge of the sea of chrome and rubber. There must’ve been thirty bikes lined up.

  Los Lobos had beaten us here.

  “That’s gotta be loaded with the heavy weapons.” Remy cocked his head over to a generic white van with New Mexico plates that was parked next to the bikes. He texted Bones to let him know we’d arrived. “Assault rifles, shotguns, SMGs if they have any. They can get away with hiding a few pistols in the bedrolls strapped to the back of their bikes, but anything bigger than that and they run a real risk of the cops being called. For something this important, they won’t take any chances they don’t have to.”

  “If that truck doesn’t make it to Leslie, the Lobos lose a huge firepower advantage,” I replied.

  Remy nodded at me and smiled with his eyes.

  It felt like we were partners now more than ever. I loved it.

  We removed the bag and started walking inside. I spotted two Lobos lingering around the van smoking cigarettes and chatting.

  “Looks like they have people watching it now, and if it’s that valuable, I’d imagine they’re going to have people watching it all night.” I leaned in and whispered, “How are we going to stop the van and not have the Lobos immediately know it was us?”

  “I have an idea….”

  “But?” I waited for the other shoe to drop.

  “I’m going to need you to run a distraction.” Remy exhaled, looking almost guilty.

  “Distraction, huh? Is this going to be a thing we do now?” I smiled at him. “Some couples just do a board game night, you know.”

  “We’re not those couples.” Remy stopped me and looked for signs of hesitance. “Are you all right with this? I might be able to figure something else out.”

  “No, it’s fine.” I kissed him on the cheek. I was reminded of the strip club. Terrifying at first, but it was great to be able to actually help him. He counted on me, and I came through. It was a great feeling. “Besides, I’ve never successfully completed a game of monopoly before.”

  “No one has.” The corner of his mouth crept up on one side.

  Remy had me grab a liter of Coca-Cola and a few other things from the overpriced convenience store across the street, while he checked us into a room that overlooked the bikes and, more importantly, the white van. Our room was on the fifth floor and was surprisingly comfortable. I came back with what Remy had asked for and some dinner for the both of us. After we ate and I took a quick shower, Remy set the alarm and explained his plan. Then we both crashed out for what was basically just a long nap.

  At 3:00 a.m. the screeching alarm went off, and my first coherent thought was that I was late for school. Years later and I still had that same stupid fear. The more things changed, the more they stayed the same too.

  I chose to interpret that fear as, despite me having changed so dramatically since meeting Remy, I was still deep down the same person at heart. Murder and mayhem hadn’t stolen that from me, which was actually a little encouraging.

  “Time to get up, my little actress.” Remy yawned, rubbed his face, and got dressed. “Once you’re ready and you see one of the Lobos on watch head in to take a piss, I want you to open the curtains and flick the lights on and off a few times to let me know.”

  “You got it, Clyde.” I smiled groggily, stretching. I emptied the bag of beauty supplies that I’d picked up at the convenience store onto the bed. “All this makeup... I’m going to be so glamorous.”

  I had to pretty myself up quickly.

  “Don’t have too much fun, Bonnie.” Remy grabbed the water bottle and a pack of cigarettes, then winked at me on the way out the door. Remy somehow had the forethought to pack my skimpiest outfit. Knowing him, the devious bastard probably had this planned well before we even left Santa Fe.

  Forty-five minutes later, one of the Lobos headed inside to use the bathroom. I signaled to Remy and ran down as fast as I could.

  I was a mess of poufy eighties hair, teary-eyed mascara, yoga pants, and bra-lessness, under an obscenely low-cut blouse. If anyone I knew saw me, they probably wouldn’t recognize me, but that was the point.

  Remy extinguished his cigarette and crept around the back of the van while I drunkenly meandered near the fat biker sitting in the driver’s seat with the door open. When he predictably catcalled at me, I walked toward him and laid on the heavy flirting.

  “Whatchu need, mommie?” the fat biker cooed at me.

  “I’m lost. Do you know how to get back to Michael’s restaurant? I just got into a fight with my boyfriend.” I channeled my inner walk of shame from my earliest college days. I groaned a little on the inside at my terrible performance and hoped the outfit alone would be distracting enough.

  With all the subterfuge Remy had me do, at some point, I really should look into acting classes.

  While I rattled off fake laughs and feigned drunken small talk, Remy pried open the van’s gas tank door and dumped the liter of Coca-Cola in. When I saw him walk away, I took Remy’s cue and thanked the “big strong biker man” I was talking to, then stumbled around the building.

  Once out of sight, I dropped the character, headed to our room, and cleaned up.

  Remy joined me shortly after.

  Later that morning, we left with the two dozen or so bikers bound for Leslie. We had to keep this strike force relatively small. There was nothing illegal about a few hundred bikers riding together, but that always tended to draw the Feds, and that was the last thing the Lobos wanted to have to deal with.

  This wasn’t supposed to be an army assault; this was a tactical execution. We rode with the best the Lobos had to offer. The baddest of the bad. We were a prison riot on wheels. I didn’t know if the Lobos had kill teams of their own, but if they did… those were the guys that were all around us.

  Bones had the road captain wave us up and position us up front next to him. I was sure it was so they could keep an eye on us in case Remy tried to run.

  When we were about ten miles out from Leslie, I carefully pulled the phone from Remy's pocket. I found the draft text message he’d written to Tee before we left and hit send. All we could do now was pray that Tee was able to come through for us.

  Leslie was a small but spacious flat town with a handful of well-maintained brick and stone buildings. With plenty of vacant lots being developed, it was apparent that the wheels of change, although slow, were turning in Remy’s hometown. Despite the progress of industry, there were parks, public art in the form of sculptures and paintings, and a few covered gazebos for gatherings. Almost every storefront window had handmade signs with the date of some social event, most likely from an elementary school. The charming town was well cared for by its residents.

  There was this wonderful sense of community here. I really liked that.

  The rolling tide of bikers thundered through the main drag in the center of town. It was odd, bordering on c
reepy how empty the town was. Very few people were on the street or driving around today. I wondered how far that sense of community went. Had the Steel Veins been so well-regarded here that the town’s people heeded the warning from the club and stayed inside today?

  Remy had assured Bones that the mother chapter, Deadeye’s crew, would show up early in the day to help with the setup for the annual. We were supposed to get there right after they arrived. That way we’d have hours before the rest of the chapters showed up.

  The Lobos’ plan was to ride into the parking lot, kill anyone outside, then storm the building with the heavy guns out of the van. They would wipe out both Deadeye’s and Top’s chapters, then be halfway back to New Mexico before the rest of the Veins’ reinforcements could arrive.

  It was a scary good plan. Of course it was, because Remy was the one to think it up.

  Remy’s old clubhouse came into view, and I understood why it was probably easy to have such sway over a quaint little town like Leslie. The clubhouse was basically a brick rectangle with a chain-link fence surrounding the property, nothing really to look at.

  It was the location that was brilliant. The clubhouse was on the outskirts of town, out by the railway station, in the industrial district. The Veins could show up to and support all the town’s events but also keep the grittier, day-to-day stuff out of sight and out of mind for the residents.

  Leslie probably viewed the club as their hidden protectors.

  When we got close to Remy’s clubhouse, everyone pulled out their pistols. Bones glanced over to Remy just before we pulled in. He was checking to see if Remy really had the nerve to raid his own clubhouse. If he saw any doubt on Remy’s face, I was sure he’d have nodded to Spyder, who rode directly behind us, and we’d have been gunned down in a heartbeat.

  Remy matched Bones’s gaze, then pulled his bike into the lead.

  There were two Veins in the parking lot that were caught on their way back into the building. I didn’t recognize either of them from the nights at Muse’s, so they must’ve been Deadeye’s crew.