by Hazel Parker
* * *
“Gentlemen, it’s not getting any better.”
Trace’s words as we began our hall meeting were like getting shot.
“We’ve had a couple of reports about people yelling at us from car windows or, in one case for Splitter, having a couple of drunken guys yell at Amber that she could do better than a criminal.”
“Swear I wanted to break their fucking little necks,” Splitter said, miming the action. “Amber is just… she’s too sweet and too kind to get yelled at like that.”
Not the time to get all roller coaster, Splitter.
“BK.”
All eyes turned to me. As they should have.
“I also spoke to Sheriff Wiggins about everything that’s going on. He wants to help us, he really does. He’s still friendly with us. But his hands are getting more and more tied by the moment. The mayor and other local politicians are coming down on him to bust us for more stuff so they can talk to us. They’re not going to care about getting a noise disturbance complaint, but they’re going to use it to try to get some of our other guys to talk.”
“God damnit,” Splitter said.
I just sat in silence as I processed it all.
“If the sheriff can’t help us, BK, then we’re in a really bad spot,” Trace said. “We’re not in the worst place financially because Amber agreed to let some of the charges go by, but we still had to pay her a little bit. And it should come as no secret to all of you that the club doesn’t exactly make as much money as it used to on the legal side of things.”
That was no surprise. The mechanic shop had never been a real money maker. Some quarters, it made a little bit of cash, but never enough to fund our love of bikes and our activities. Most of the income was from… other things, let’s say.
“We need a plan, BK. What should we do?”
The question brought back the flashback I’d had a couple of days ago. The feeling of failing… the feeling of leading my men into death…
It was starting to form in my head again… just like it did when I was alone. This never happened… I was getting stressed… I—
“Formulating a plan,” I said with a visible headshake. “Need to reach the youth.”
The expression across the table wasn’t exactly satisfactory.
“BK, I sure hope so,” Trace said. “We’re getting to the point where we can’t be formulating anything. We need to be doing things. Can I trust you to recognize that as well?”
Like how I recognized that we were going into a dangerous war zone in Iraq? Like how I led them to near-certain death?
“Yes,” I said.
No. I will not fuck up again.
I have no choice.
Chapter 2: Megan
It was later in the day than when I usually got to my office, but I’d been working since seven in the morning.
At that hour—which wasn’t too early for me, though it was earlier than usual for my working day—we’d gotten a call from a first: a client on the East Coast that wanted to use MWM Solutions for their marketing needs.
It was a big day for me. Megan Walker Marketing Solutions had been a huge risk on my part. I’d been in marketing for a decade, making a rapid ascension from associate at Facebook to CMO of a medium-sized company in San Diego called Homer before deciding it was time to determine my own schedule.
Still, just jumping out into the deep end as I had sometimes made me question my sanity. I was going from a six-figure paycheck that, with bonuses and incentives, could have hit seven-figures, to a position that not only promised nothing, but it could have resulted in financial loss. Sure, I had a list of clients I could take to MWM, but I was so used to doing things by the book, by being the high achiever, by, well, being a perfectionist, that the idea of having to work a few months in the red was horrifying.
But today, after two years of running the firm on my own, I had finally gotten a client that was outside of my California bubble. We were already on the up and up.
And so, when I pulled into the parking garage of our office on Sunset Boulevard, I wanted to share the news with the entire team.
Instead of heading straight to my office, I made sure to go through the lobby, say hello to all of my employees, shake their hands, and let them know the news. Everyone reacted as I had hoped they would—with cheers, excitement, and a sense of hope. I was pretty good at picking up when employees were full of it or putting on a pretty face, and on this day, no one was faking enthusiasm.
It’s only been a couple of years, but now we’re dealing with companies like banks, startups, tech giants… it’s a way different ball game.
After I finished with the rounds of employees on the first floor, I repeated the process with the second and third floor before heading to my private office. I’ll admit, it was a little bit more decorated and souped-up than I would have liked, but the truth was that a lot of older professionals had trouble thinking that a young-looking woman in her mid-thirties could be successful. The awards, diplomas, and photos with various celebrities and politicians were essentially my way of signaling “I am competent.”
I had to. My youthful face made me look like I was twenty-five, and that wasn’t a brag—it had me get hit on by men who were far too young for me, it made people assume I didn’t know anything in business, and it got me teased all the way through college. I wasn’t going to say that I was hoping to look older, but to look my age would have been an enormous improvement upon my life.
At least in business, I’d accumulated enough success and had generated enough of a name that I didn’t have to worry about too many people questioning my competence. I could see it happen silently on the faces of older CEOs from time to time, but my presentations were usually given enough attention and edits that I put to bed any questions.
Dating, though…
Well, I had no idea what it was like to date. It had been…
I couldn’t admit even to myself how long it had been since I’d gone on a date. Heaven knows it had been even longer since I’d had the pleasure of sex. I was perhaps a bit too focused on my work.
But when my work rewarded me as well as it did, it was awfully hard just to download Tinder and start swiping with men who smoked pot all day and didn’t do jack shit.
I pulled up my calendar as I looked up and down what was to come. I had a meeting with the CEO of a new whiskey company in town, Sea Sailor Whiskey, in about half an hour. My secretary had printed out some highlights, and I started reading through them as quickly as I could.
Jose Gonzalez had grown up just north of our offices in Hollywood, in something of a tumultuous family. His father was a criminal and his mother was a junkie; he had two older brothers, Marco and Juan. Marco had apparently been killed in gang violence a few months ago, a case that was still being investigated; Juan was in jail for drug trafficking. By all accounts, Jose should have followed in their footsteps.
But, based on his bio, he managed to avoid that and applied himself as a bartender. The bio said that he realized he could make way more money producing whiskey than selling it, and so he got to work saving what he needed until he could launch it.
And given the prices that we charged, if Sea Sailor Whiskey was hiring us, it was clearly doing very, very well.
I was kind of excited about the prospect of helping SSW, as I was now going to call it from here on out. Jose wasn’t much older than me, maybe by a year or two, so I was going to see him more as someone on my level rather than someone trying to look down on me or someone I had to prove myself to. He was also, frankly, kind of handsome—that in no way meant that I was going to go on a date with him or have more than two drinks with him, but it sure meant that he was going to be easy on the eyes when I met him.
Plus, I had never worked with an alcohol brand before. It was, admittedly, not as serious a job as some of my bank work and healthcare work, but maybe that would be good for me. Maybe taking a step back from all of the high-stakes games would do me some good.
> Then my phone rang, shaking me out of my research.
“Hey, Andrea,” I said to my secretary.
“Hi, Miss Walker,” she said, a term I hated—my secretary was older than me, so she didn’t need to call me Miss. But she couldn’t help herself. “I have a Jose Gonzalez here. Should I send him in?”
Oh, damn! He’s here already? He’s kind of early.
Ah, screw it.
“Of course, Andrea, show him in.”
Seconds later, Jose walked in, and he was… well, there was no other way to put it; he was hot. He had dark brown skin, slick black hair, deep brown eyes, and even beneath his shirt, the evidence of some serious weightlifting work. He had a firm handshake, too, and a stare that was almost intoxicating.
I could certainly see how he had managed to do well in business—some of it had to do with his knowledge, but a lot of it had to do with the charm that he possessed.
“Miss Megan Walker,” he said with a slight Mexican accent. “Thank you for taking the time to meet with me. Your presence is much appreciated.”
“Of course,” I said as I made my way back behind my desk.
“Apologies if my handshake was a tad too strong,” he said. “I know I am a big man. Perhaps too big!”
I smiled politely at his business-type joke. No, you’re not too big.
The biker who came into the town hall meeting about a month ago? Now that’s a man too big. Muscles everywhere, sure; intimidating, sure; presentable? Might do good for him to go keto for a bit.
“So what are you looking for MWM to do for you, Mr. Gonzalez?” I asked.
Now I’m using mister and misses. So much for us being just peers working on a project together.
“Sea Sailor Whiskey is doing quite well in its core market here in Los Angeles,” he said, clearing his throat. “However, we are having some trouble becoming a stronger presence in some of the other areas. For example, Santa Monica and Santa Barbara are two places we would very much like to hit. We have ideas for images of drinking whiskey at a lounge in those areas, but obviously, you are the expert on that.”
“Right, it’s a little overdone, that image, but that doesn’t mean it won’t work. It just needs to resonate.”
“Naturally,” Jose said with an easy-going smile. “There’s also an area north of here that we’d like for you to hit, one that is growing every day and has a growing young population, our target audience. Green Hills.”
Why does that sound so familiar? I’ve never been there, but I feel like I know of it…
“I would say right now, the start for us would be those three locations. In order of importance would be Santa Monica first, then Green Hills, and then Santa Barbara.”
“Got it.”
“One thing I want to make you aware of, however,” Jose said, his smile fading and his voice becoming very serious. “Green Hills, you may better know as the town of the gang the Savage Saints.”
Shit.
That’s what I know it for. For being a crime hole with those bastards.
“Forgive my language, but I have a personal bone to pick with the damn Saints,” he said. “They are… they are criminals and thugs, and they’ve done a lot of things that have affected me. I… this is strictly business, of course, but I believe that by introducing a hub, maybe a production plant to Green Hills, I can legitimize the place a little bit. I can bring in jobs, I can bring in business, and I can push out something like that.”
“That would be nice,” I said.
I’m not here to play hero. I’m just here to help you spread brand awareness.
But, for what that one guy did at that one meeting and for what the Savage Saints did in North Hollywood… maybe it would do some good. Maybe it would be nice to get them the hell out of town or just out of existence.
“And the rest of the areas?” I said.
Jose’s smile returned almost instantly as he described the joy of being on the pier with a good drink or on the beach in Santa Barbara at night. He had such a gentle spirit to him when he spoke of those locations that it just made the image of him being serious when he spoke about Green Hills all the more jarring. I didn’t know what the Saints had done to his family, but it was clear that it wasn’t just some minor annoyance.
“Here’s what I think,” I said as Jose finished discussing everything he needed to. “It looks like you have a strong name, a good product, and an interesting story. We can get your whiskey served in bars and clubs, but that’s just step one of the process.”
I nearly dropped “shit” on him, but I was still feeling Jose out. He was young, but he could have been religious or just very professional.
“So while you may get the occasional sip of your whiskey in these establishments, it’s not going to be a spot where you can spread your brand and your name. Instead, what you want to do is establish a presence. Become known not just in bars but when people go to the liquor store. What’s interesting to me is your story, and let me tell you, when you’re a professional marketer, you hear so many stories that you just kind of roll your eyes at most. So you’re ahead of it.”
“Yeah?” Jose said, arching an eyebrow.
It… almost seemed flirtatious. I ignored it.
“So here’s what I can do, then,” I said. “I will send out some of my associates to make deals with some bars in the first two cities that you mentioned, Green Hills and Santa Monica. Santa Barbara, we can call that the push outside Los Angeles, so we should save that for a future date once we see what does and doesn’t work in our first two locations.”
“Makes sense,” Jose said.
“But I will go to the big names. The influencers in those towns. I will discuss what needs to be done, and… what?”
Jose’s face had gone very serious, very quickly.
“The influencer in Green Hills is the Savage Saints gang,” he said. “That is a town that, while it is changing, is still under their thumb.”
I twisted my face as I tried to figure out how to best express my disagreement.
“That may have been true before the shootout in North Hollywood,” I said. “But I don’t see how it’s true now. Turn on the news or just Google ‘Savage Saints.’ You’re not going to get a lot of fluff pieces.”
“Fair enough,” Jose said, although he didn’t seem to be on board with me. “You’re the expert, so I will defer to you. Just… be careful out there.”
“Oh, don’t worry, I’ve dealt with some crazies before.”
My mind flashed back to the town hall meeting when the Hulk-man had walked in the room, sat down, and more or less dared us to kick him out. Since it was my meeting, I did. It was easy, and he left without incident.
Although… there had been moments when I thought about everything that happened, and I almost wondered if I had been too harsh on him. He hadn’t necessarily done anything illegal, per se. There were no violent acts; it was a public meeting; he hadn’t done anything to break the law.
But that was probably just the devil’s advocate in me trying to stir up trouble. If he hadn’t caused trouble then, he would have caused it later. I had just nipped it in the bud earlier than expected.
I was pretty sure.
“In any case, Jose, I left my afternoon open to start to brainstorm some strategies for you,” I said. “But, given everything you already have in place, I don’t think we need to do a whole lot of that. We can hit the ground running. In that regard, consider yourself fortunate. You’ll save a little bit of cash.”
Jose smirked and snorted, but he didn’t say anything back. It was a bit odd to see him go from so charismatic to suddenly so silent for no real apparent reason, but this was an executive meeting, not a date. He didn’t need to be someone who could charm me into working with him. He’d already put a company card down; the rest was just logistics.
“Where would you like me to start?”
“Oh, that’s easy,” he said. “Green Hills.”
* * *
A few hours late
r, I was in a company car, a valet driving me out to Green Hills while I conducted research on the town. Jose had left with a softer handshake but a longer gaze; under most other circumstances, it would have sincerely felt like an attempt to flirt with me. I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt, but it was something that I was going to have to keep an eye out for. He was handsome, yes, but I’d seen too many careers derailed by poor romantic choices.
Maybe after.
But if the last dozen years or so are any indication…
On the car ride up, I desperately tried to search for anyone of importance who wasn’t a Savage Saint. Unfortunately, the entire damn town seemed to operate around them; there were rumors of them paying the local police to keep them off their backs, and one Reddit post had even said that they had an in with the hospital. Supposedly, the daughter of the founder of the club was a doctor there and gave them backdoor treatment.
In a way, it was kind of impressive how integrated they were with the town. Much of it might have been illegal and quite shady, but besides the shootout in North Hollywood, there wasn’t much beyond the occasional speeding ticket or DUI.
A group that gets into a shootout in the streets is a gang. It may have hidden its true colors for some time and bribed its way into protection, but it is going to reveal who it is eventually. Better to have discovered that now.
I kept searching for someone who would know something… but there was nothing.
This town was either run by the Savage Saints, with the mayor and town hall as puppets, or there was a leadership vacuum that no one had stepped into.
I thought of Jose being that person, but he was the owner of a whiskey company, not a charismatic politician. A businessman could be the kind of person to define a town, but that usually only worked if his or her family had established roots there for a couple of generations and the town was small enough for it to work. Neither was true for anyone here.
I figured by the time we pulled off the highway for the exit to Green Hills that if there wasn’t anyone I could find, then someone in a position of power could. I doubted I could get to the mayor’s office, but there was one person who probably wasn’t that busy—especially if they weren’t going to go after the Saints.