by Bourne, Lena
“Now’s not a good time for that, I already told you,” Griff says. “But you’ll get your revenge soon.”
He did already tell me this, so I guess I deserve the stern reprimand that’s in his voice. But it was worth it, because I’m sure I just cemented my cover as Ace the Spawn a little more with my outburst.
“But we’ll move against the Knights soon, right?” Horse asks.
Griff shakes his head in exasperation. “Get the fuck out of here with your stupid questions! All of you! I’ll tell you when I need you to do something more. For now, just stay close to Bullard. Can you do that?”
The question is for Horse and Piston, but I nod along with them, then leave the office on their heels.
I bet the Knights are already aware of this threat against them. I wish I had something to tell Cross. Maybe the fact that Horse isn’t afraid of the cops is enough. But I doubt it.
7
Stormi
After Horse paid me, I went straight to the beach to get the rest of the money I saved up, and then to the post office. The sooner I send it on, the sooner Misti gets it. I tried not to think too hard about how much pride Horse had to swallow to give it to me. I won’t get any more out of him anytime soon. I also tried not to think how little it actually is, given how much we have to raise. That’s why I didn’t call her, because that’s what she’d tell me, right before she started begging me to just come home.
It’s five now, and I’m hoping Horse is still out as I walk as fast as I can down the dusty road that leads to the clubhouse, the still afternoon air wrapped chokingly around me and the setting sun beating against my back. I bet working in a quarry would be better than this walk back to the place where I’m just a slave. I should hurry, but my legs are as heavy and stiff as stone.
“There you are!” he shouts as soon as I walk into the bar, his angry glare promising vengeance and lots of it to come.
I walk over to the table he’s sharing with Piston and Ace.
“Here I am,” I tell him.
I know it’s not wise, but I smile at Ace. He acknowledges it with the tiniest nod I’ve ever seen. Maybe I didn’t. Maybe I just imagined it.
“That’s enough backtalk from you,” Horse barks and grabs my arm, forcing me to look at him.
“Brenda said you were in the back showering and getting dressed, but that was clearly a lie,” he slurs. “Where were you?”
I hate this man so much. I hate his touch, I hate his eyes, and I hate the mockery in his voice. I hate how much power he has over me. I hate how afraid I am of him.
I’m just staring at him with all that flashing through my mind, boiling my blood and rendering me speechless. What do I say? What lie? If I don’t find a good one, Brenda’s in for it too!
“I was…I was,” I start saying, hating how scared I sound.
“You were what?” Horse barks. “Speak up, Stormi. You know how. You were just doing it.”
“I was getting ready for tonight, but then I realized all my clothes were dirty. So I took them to the Laundromat. They’ll be ready in less than an hour,” I finally find my voice and my lies.
Maybe it was Ace’s eyes finally meeting mine that gave me the inspiration and the courage. No! What the fuck? It was me finding my backbone again.
“I just wanted to look pretty for you,” I add and manage to smile at him. His eyes go wide and the breath he was taking gets stuck in his throat. “You know, as a thank you for giving me the money this morning.”
I can’t say why I chose this moment to start flirting with Horse. Maybe it’s because Ace started ignoring me completely as he struck up a conversation with Piston.
He’s not doing that anymore. Now he’s looking at me again. Such a cheap trick, but I’ve never met a man who didn’t fall for it if he was interested in me. Ace is that!
“If you gave me some extra money from time to time, I could get some new clothes too,” I hear myself say, still smiling. Horse’s wide eyed gaze transforms into a glare, his half smile into a snarl. Too far. I went too far.
“Yeah, right. That’s gonna happen,” he says. “As if you haven’t cost us enough as it is. Besides, we don’t much care what you wear around here. The less the better, actually.”
Piston laughs, Ace’s face looks like he didn’t hear a thing, and I bet I’m blushing.
“Now go get your crappy old clothes and then put them on,” he tells me, giving my ass a stinging slap. “I got some friends coming over tonight, and they’re gonna want to see you take them off, guaranteed.”
I know I’m blushing now, though not in embarrassment, but anger.
Don’t say anything, Stormi. Stay silent. Don’t make it worse.
I almost do. I would have told him he’s not my fucking pimp and that I’m not a whore, if Ace didn’t stand up right then and said, “Show me this Laundromat. Most of my clothes need a wash.”
The cheeriness in his voice grates against my shame of being presented as a common whore by Horse just now. A whore that doesn’t even get paid.
“Just give them to her, she’ll do it,” Horse tells him, glaring at me.
Ace grins. “I doubt she’ll have the time, if you want her back here as soon as her stuff’s done.”
I know he’s mocking Horse, but it’s very subtle and could be taken at face value too.
“Yeah, that’s right, I do,” Horse says and glares at me some more. The anger and hate in his eyes are making it impossible for me to look away. Snakes hypnotize prey like this, don’t they?
“Are you coming?” Ace calls out to me loudly over his shoulder. He’s almost at the back door.
“Yeah, yeah,” I mutter and almost run after him then precede him out into the courtyard.
“Let’s take my bike,” he says, pointing at it. “Is it far?”
He mounts, but I just stand there frozen again. It sounds great, but all of this is founded on a lie and now I don’t know how to fix it. Story of my life, more or less.
“It’s not very far,” I say, after his questioning look brings me back to reality. I can stretch this lie a little further. It’s been ages since I’ve ridden on the back of a chopper and right now, it’s all I want to do.
“Let’s go,” I say, once I’m ensconced behind him, my bare inner thighs resting against his powerful hips, my arms itching to wrap around his waist. But that’d be a step too far too soon. We’re not even moving yet.
“Turn left when you get off the lot,” I say. “Then I’ll guide you.”
There’s a Laundromat in town, about a five minute bike ride from here, but I’m taking him to the one at the mall.
He grins at me and starts the bike. I grin back, and I think he knows I just want to go for a ride with him. A long one. I think he wants the same thing.
I like thinking that, so I don’t think about anything else, as we roll off the lot. It’s so nice and so much easier to just live in the present. Especially when the past and the future are as shitty as mine are right now.
* * *
My hair flying in the rushing wind that carries the freedom scents of the sea, sand and open air, a man’s solid, muscular and friendly body between my legs, and the wide open road stretching in front of us. All that makes it easy to pretend my life is as carefree as those things suggest.
I’ve never been free, not really. Worrying about my sister’s heart disease was always center stage in my life. It still is—ironically, it’s the only thing that’s keeping me alive, if not completely sane these days. Making sure she gets the funds she needs for the procedure that could extend her life considerably, and dreaming I’ll get to see her again, are the only two things that make it possible for me to get out of bed in the morning. But somehow, even that’s staying in the shadows at the edge of my mind as I lean against Ace’s back, my arms wrapped tightly around his washboard stomach and pretend this moment of blissful freedom and nothingness is all my life is.
“Which way?” he asks as we stop for a red light in the commercial ar
ea just outside of town. I never come here. It’s too far from the clubhouse to walk to, and I don’t ever want to waste money on a bus ticket.
To the left of us is the highway, and to the right is the scenic beach road. That’s the one I want us to ride. Ride it as far as it takes us. But he probably wants to find a Laundromat for real. What the hell was I thinking?
“You didn’t actually leave any clothes at the Laundromat, did you?” he asks with a bemused smile on his lips. That smile and the twinkling light—like the sun reflecting off the turquoise waters of the ocean— playing in his eyes tells me I should trust him, that I can trust him, but that’s probably just what I want to see there. It’s just something I want to pretend to see.
I shake my head and smile too. “No. That was just an excuse. But I’m sure there’s a Laundromat in the mall over there.”
My hand is stiff, yet shaky as I point to it, because it’s in the other direction of where everything inside me wants to go.
“I don’t need to wash any clothes,” he says and chuckles. “I just wanted to the go for a ride, and I figured taking you with me would make it even better.”
A smile I feel like a river of warmth in my chest stretches across my face. I’ve never felt this carefree and in the moment. Not ever in my entire life. And I’ve lived most of my life trying to be as free and carefree as I could.
“Make a right then,” I tell him. “We can ride all the way to Mexico on that road, if we want.”
The longing, no, yearning, in my voice shocks me, and him too, I supposed since he cocks one questioning eyebrow at me, his eyes suddenly very serious. But I just smile even wider and point to the orange traffic light. “The light’s about to change. Let’s go.”
The traffic light turns red just as we make the turn. We made it, but barely.
The warm, fragrant breeze coming off the ocean I enjoy so much on my walks turns into a full-on wind as he picks up speed along the near-empty beachside road. It’s a refreshing shower of air, cleansing me inside and out, blowing away the ashes I thought were all that was left of my heart and revealing healthy, sound flesh underneath. For the first time in months I dare believe that maybe my life isn’t lost to me yet.
* * *
For a long time we just rode, with just the right speed along the ocean road, as though he read my mind that this is exactly what I’ve been craving for the longest time. Funny thing to crave for someone stuck in a house full of bikers, but none of the Sinners have ever offered to take me for a ride on their bikes, not even Horse.
The sun has almost set, I watched it descend into the water as we rode, coloring the sky orange then purple and finally lilac as it went down. Now the sky is a velvety indigo with just a band of hot pink along the horizon. He pulls into the parking lot of a brightly lit restaurant near the edge of a cliff.
The breeze coming off the sea is tinged with the coolness of night and tickles my windswept, bare arms as we stop and dismount. The coolness is a stern reminder than everything is not a perfectly fine as I want it to be, but the breeze is also carrying the scents of salt, and flowers, and all kinds of other freshness that the dust of the road masked.
“It’s not Mexico, but it’s a Mexican restaurant,” he says and chuckles. “Hope you like tacos.”
I smile and nod, unsure of what to say.
“What I said before, that was just a joke…about going to Mexico,” I try to explain, tripping over my words as we approach the entrance. I barely know him. The last thing I need is for him to go gossiping with Horse that I wanted him to take me to Mexico. If he does, they’ll take what little freedom I have away too. How will I call my sister then? How will I send her the money?
The fear washes over me like a huge tidal wave and takes me under. It’s just as suffocating as water. I should’ve been back at the bar hours ago. Why did I let him take me on this ride?
“You feeling alright?” Ace asks me, concern in his eyes as he studies my face. I stopped dead in my tracks when the reality of what we did, of the mistake I made when I told him I wanted to ride this afternoon crashed against me.
“We should go back,” I tell him, my voice all shaky and uncertain. “Horse’ll wonder where I am. I was only supposed to be gone an hour tops.”
There’s mostly pity in his eyes as he grins at me. “Don’t worry about that. I’ll tell him it was my idea.”
“I don’t know—” He cuts me off by placing his arm around my shoulders and steering me towards the restaurant.
“I do,” he says in a take-charge voice. “I’m hungry and we’re at least an hour out of town, so stopping to eat makes perfect sense.”
I fell in step with him without deciding to, probably because there’s no arguing with the soothing tone of his deep voice and the steady firmness of his arm around me. For whatever reason, this man makes me feel safe the way no other man ever has. I don’t know what to make of it. Maybe I’m just feeling this way because of how profoundly unsafe I’ve been these last six months. That’s gotta be it. What else could it be?
He asks to sit in the garden, and the waitress leads us to a table for two at the very edge of the wooden deck out back. The space is lit with multicolored lantern lights and candles in red-tinted mason jars, one to a table. Soft, slow guitar music is playing, the serene, mellow, gentle melody unhooking something in my heart, something that’s held my sadness, fear, worry and grief locked up tight, because those doors are suddenly wide open and pain is all there is, so much pain my eyes are flooding with tears before I even realize I need to cry. I don’t cry, I never cry, so why are tears streaming down my face like a waterfall now?
Ace was discussing the menu with the waitress, but now he’s trying to meet my eyes through this flood coming out of them.
“We’ll need a couple more minutes,” he tells the waitress, who nods and leaves.
“What’s going on?” he asks, his voice apprehensive and confused more than anything else.
I’ve never made such a fool of myself in front of a guy before. I wish I at least knew why I was crying. I wipe my eyes on a napkin and try to suppress a sob but fail miserably. He doesn’t say anything else. He just moves to sit next to me, wraps his strong arms around me and pulls me close. It’s like the safety of his embrace and his strong body to lean on, are the permission my tears have been waiting for to flow even worse. Never mind how I absolutely never want to show myself as a crying weakling, and especially not with this guy.
But sobs are racking my body, and I’m trying to be quiet about it, I’m trying to stop, but I can’t. He’s patting my hair, but not saying anything for which I’m grateful.
I don’t even know why I’m crying. I just know that I’ve been holding on to all this pain and fear and sadness, trying to hide it, trying to live despite it, but I suddenly can’t anymore. It’s too much. It’s too heavy. Too painful.
Eventually the tears stop flowing, and sobs don’t come as violently anymore. Pain and sadness don’t return with a vengeance either once I stop crying. But shame kinda does. I’m seeing and sensing everything as though it’s wrapped in thick gauze, even the music is muffled. I don’t want to leave his embrace, but I’ve embarrassed myself enough, I think.
I pull away from him, and he lets me go. Most of my mascara comes off when I wipe my eyes, and I hope my face isn’t too much of a horrible mess as I smile at him.
“This isn’t what you expected us to be doing when you took me for a ride, did you?” I ask, smiling at him.
He chuckles. “I expected you to take me to a Laundromat. That was about the extent of my expectations.”
“Yeah, right, sure it was,” I say sarcastically and laugh.
He grins, telling me without words that I guessed right. Telling me with a red-hot searing jolt of desire that shoots from his eyes straight to my core.
“Just so you know, I don’t usually go into crying hysterics on dates. I don’t know what happened just then. It was the music, I think,” I say and stand up. “I’ll go
fix my face and you order for us. I do like tacos.”
I smile as he nods, then rush in search of the bathroom. I can’t recall the last time I’ve embarrassed myself this badly in front of a guy on a date. I don’t think it’s ever happened before. And yet I’ve never felt this OK about embarrassing myself either. Who is this guy and where did he come from?
And why does he make me feel like a blushing teenage girl out on her first date? What the fuck?
“I got you a scotch,” he says as I return to the table, my cheeks and eyes stinging from both the tears and the scrubbing I gave them to get rid of my ruined make-up. “But you can get something else if you want.”
He’s moved back to the chair that’s across the table from mine, and I wish he hadn’t.
“Why are you so nice to me?” I ask. I didn’t want to sound accusing or suspicious, but I kinda did.
He shrugs.
“You look like you could use someone being nice to you. And you’re pretty,” he says then chuckles and winks at me. “Plus, you were very nice to me last night.”
I smile too. “The other guys at the club all treat me like crap.”
I leave it at that, because I don’t know where I was going with it. Did I mean to tell him that’s how he should treat me too? Or that I’m afraid he’ll start treating me like crap once he finds out my full story?
“Why don’t you just take off, if it’s that bad?” he asks. “Like you said, Mexico isn’t that far from here.”
I can’t believe how badly I want to tell him my whole story. How badly I want him to know that I’m not just a random, thieving club whore with nowhere to go, but that I’m doing all this for my sister who’s dying. Tears choke me again, but this time I’m strong enough to banish them before they start flowing.
