The Sin Eater

by Lee McIntyre

  “Of course neither the Expediter nor the Commander backed my story. They didn’t want to go down for this. By that time I was facing a dishonorable and a year in jail. There was nothing more they could do to me at that point. My life was as bad as it could get. That’s what I thought, anyway.”

  “So why did you end up going to prison for five years?” Adam said.

  "The expediter made one more mistake. He walked into the NCO Club that night while I was drowning my sorrows about losing the pilot. I beat him unrecognizable. Took out eight of his teeth and broke his left eye socket. Then I got my hands around his throat. They had five guys trying to pull me off. When I heard an M9 jack a round behind me, I finally let him go.

  “For a while they were talking about trying to put me away for life, but I had a good JAG. The story about the pencil-whipping came out. The Maintenance Commander rolled over on the expediter and they both ended up doing time. In other circumstances, I would’ve been cleared. But I got five years for what I’d done to the expediter. And by the time I got out, everything was gone.”

  “They kicked you out?”

  “They betrayed me. I was loyal to the Air Force. Aim higher and all that crap. I did the job they trained me to do and then some. But when the time came, no one had my back. All they cared about was what I’d done to a senior NCO, justified or not. So it was off to Leavenworth, and that’s where things got worse.”

  “Ummm — you, uh —”

  “Way worse.”

  Oh shit, Adam thought. This is it. He never should have let Tugg tell him the story. “In a military prison?” Adam said. “Tugg, I can’t believe it. You always hear about that kind of thing in a state prison, but —”

  “Adam, just stop. No one punked me while I was inside. If you mind your own business and you look like a gorilla, you’re golden. But the problem is your life stands still and everybody disappears. You can’t protect anything. They limit your contacts. Hell, I couldn’t even contact you until I got out, remember? That’s what I’m talking about.”

  Adam was confused, but he dared not ask. What a relief that he’d been wrong about what had happened to Tugg in prison. Time to change the subject.

  “You’re a man of great loyalties, Tugg. I’m sure your buddies back on base heard the real story. I’ll bet they were on your side.”

  “Fuck ’em.”

  “What?”

  “Fuck ’em. They never contacted me once. Not when I was inside, not when I got out. After that, I never joined anything again. My loyalty goes to damn few.”

  Adam thought of the outlaw motorcycle club they were heading back for. The humilities of being a ‘prospect’ and the things Tugg was expected to do that he wouldn’t even talk about.

  “And now you’re giving that up for me.”

  Tugg turned toward him. “For you, buddy. You’re all I’ve got left.”

  Adam was sick of secrets. He owed his pal more than that. If Tugg had something he had been carrying around with him, Adam should’ve helped him with it. Relieved his burden. Loyalty ran both ways.

  “So what did you have to do back there in Ashland that you can’t talk about?”

  Adam was surprised to see Tugg smile. “Same reason I couldn’t bring you, I can’t tell you.”

  “You’re protecting me again.”

  “Damn straight.”

  They drove in silence for a while. Adam still didn’t know everything, but maybe things would be better now. Tugg had finally confessed his big secret. And Adam had learned a big piece of the puzzle behind Tugg’s PTSD. Maybe that would help.

  The fir trees had thinned in the higher elevation and the sky was a little brighter. Were those stars overhead? They must be near the summit.

  “I guess after your mother died it’s like I was your only family.”

  Tugg was quiet for a moment and the smile disappeared. “Who said I never had a family?”

  Chapter 32

  Lisa Castro pulled the rose-colored curtains back in the second bedroom of her tiny condo in the West Hills of Portland. Breaking dawn was always her favorite time of day. If she looked in the mirrors on the closet doors, she could just make out the outline of Mt. Hood in the distance, all lit up from behind, like a crown on her majesty. In a few minutes the room would be flooded with sunlight. When she’d chosen this room to be her home office, morning light had been the essential factor.

  Of course, in some ways it hardly mattered. If she wanted to work in bed all day, she could. If she wanted to eat over the sink, she could. Lisa lived alone and could do as she pleased which meant, of course, that she had to pay for everything, too. The condo was too expensive. She could have gotten twice as much for her money across the river in East Portland. But the views were worth it. She was worth it. If you sacrificed having a husband and kids — and let’s face it, even a social life — for your job, it was important to take care of yourself. Somebody had to.

  Lisa flipped on the desk lamp and booted up her computer. Wanda had chosen a hell of a week for a vacation. The office would be a zoo, and it was best to get a head start. The requests for foster placements just kept coming. She’d better get cracking on finding some new ones. She’d have to get creative on where to put those new kids coming in from Alameda and Goose Hollow. These weren’t the customary places that foster cases in Multnomah County came from, but no one said that you had to place them in their own community. That was just for Native American kids. And they weren’t even doing that these days.

  The screen lit up. No matter how busy, Lisa always started her day with a quick scan of news stories that had been tagged by the electronic clipping service for CPS, then a quick read of the Oregonian. The first was usually uneventful, but she wanted to make sure she didn’t miss anything. There’d been a car accident overnight in Gresham that killed both parents, but the kids survived and were in CPS custody; a foster Mom up in Camas, Washington, had been convicted of running a prostitution ring out of her home; the warrant for Adam Grammaticus was still outstanding.

  Lisa knew that she should start working on the new placements, but she couldn’t help but be drawn back to the ones she’d already made this month. Those were done — a success — so she should have crossed them off her list and barreled forward. But she couldn’t help it. The Grammaticus’ grief had been so real, and familiar to her in a way that an extraction from poor families sometimes wasn’t, that Lisa couldn’t help but feel their pain. But that was silly. She admonished herself for such unexpected snobbery. Was she turning into a conservative all of a sudden? Abuse could happen anywhere. Rich parents were probably just better at hiding it. They had lawyers and resources and often managed to stay out of the system. But that was changing.

  Still, Kate Grammaticus didn’t seem like an abuser. Likely she wasn’t. Just duped by her husband, as Lisa’s mom had been. That didn’t make it right. You had to stand up for your kids. Even if you couldn’t stand. But damn it, Kate Grammaticus couldn’t even take care of herself. If one case haunted Lisa, this was it. She’d stopped taking Kate’s calls last week, but surreptitiously Lisa was still checking up on her. Kate seemed to be getting some social support from her friends at work and she had help around the house. Maybe if that continued, and the husband stayed away once the baby came, Emma Grammaticus could go back to her mother. Lisa could help her find enough nannies. She probably owed her that.

  In the meantime, at least Emma was safe. Lisa had hand-chosen one of the best placements she knew: a two-parent family with two of their own kids and six foster kids out in Troutdale. Not much money, but a good placement all the same. A group home wouldn’t work for Emma’s situation. Too vulnerable. Emma’s father and that scary-as-shit Hells Angels type he was palling around with were out there somewhere, probably roaming the state looking for her. Maybe the police would pick him up soon. Good. If they did, Lisa made a mental note to call Steve Carnap and tell him that Emma could go home to her mother.

  Selfish dad. He was the reason his daught
er was in foster care. A double murder two decades ago, and he’d probably killed the nanny too. No sense even considering sending Emma back while he was still out there.

  The sun rose clear of the mountain, bathing the room in brilliant light. Particle or wave, beam or supernova, the instant blast of sunlight always caused Lisa to marvel at the path it had traveled. All the way from the sun through 93 million miles of empty space, somehow the light had found its way to her tiny little office. If sunlight had a smell, Lisa had decided as a child that it would be hyacinths or lilacs. Something purple. Rich and fragrant.

  Lisa enjoyed the warmth crawling like a cat along her shoulders. She leaned in toward her computer screen. It was time for the newspaper: a proposal to treat river water for use in the state drinking system had been defeated in the Legislature; the state budget was still in a mess; the Governor had pardoned someone named Richard Norwood.

  Why did that name sound familiar?

  Chapter 33

  The compound for The Immortals looked more like a cross between a military base and a wrecking yard than a motorcycle hangout, but maybe that was the point. Once they got past the swinging chain link gate, Adam saw the distinctive half dome of two Quonset huts, one of which said “Iron Horse Garage” on its large metal door. The other building looked like some sort of barracks, which probably made it the clubhouse.

  Tugg pulled the truck over to a graveled area, got into his bag and put on his colors.

  “Hey, prospect!”

  Adam turned to see a small, dark man in black boots walking toward them. The patch over the left side of his chest said “sergeant-at-arms” and another triangular patch on the other side said ‘1%’ just above a third that said ‘13.’

  “You’re fucking three days late. You’re already out,” he said to Tugg.

  “What?”

  Adam could see the horrified look on Tugg’s face.

  “Doc’s pissed. He said to bring your cut directly to him when you got back. Now!”

  Tugg looked at Adam but didn’t say a word.

  Adam stood by the truck and watched Tugg crunch his way across the gravel behind the little man, who suddenly turned and said, “Hey, citizen! You’re part of this too. Get going.”

  Adam fell in behind. Tugg shook his head and held his finger to his lips. Whatever this was, it was Tugg’s show.

  The garage was dark and choked with exhaust fumes. There was a deafening roar from what looked like a vintage World War II motorcycle and sidecar that two men were fussing over. When Tugg and Adam came into view, the taller man ran his finger across his throat and the other one cut the engine.

  The guy looked like every father’s nightmare. Doc’s hair was kinky and combed straight back, but his skin was alabaster white, ghostly even, except for a swirl of red and green snake tattoos coiling around each arm, disappearing inside the armpits of his leather vest. His eyes were huge black circles and, as he ambled around from behind the bike, Adam saw that he had a prosthetic leg.

  “First fucking job we give you and you fuck it up.”

  “I — I —”

  Adam remembered Tugg’s advice. Explain without making excuses. And show respect at all times.

  “You what?” Doc said, pulling out a cigarette.

  Tugg pulled himself up straight. “I have no excuse. Spider said he was going to call, but I should have done it myself. I meant no disrespect.”

  Tugg found no purchase in the two lifeless disks staring back at him and started to pull off his vest.

  The laughter broke somewhere over Doc’s shoulder from the back of the garage. Now that his eyes were adjusted, Adam could make out the dim outline of twenty or thirty people. Doc grinned and his mouth worked the cigarette over from one side of his face to the other.

  Spider stepped out from the shadows.

  “Prospect, I feel thirsty after my long ride. Why don’t you get us all some beers?”

  Tugg handed Adam a beer, then opened his own and took a long swallow.

  “Tomorrow’s our bike run,” Doc said. “You made it back just in time. All the charters in the whole state are gonna be here. Maybe we’ll give you your bike back instead of making you drive the chase truck.”

  Tugg nodded and took another pull at his beer.

  “What about his friend?” the little sergeant-at-arms bellowed. “Put him in the back of the chaser. I hear he shoots a mean Remington.”

  Laughter rose from the forty or fifty bikers and the handful of ridiculously underdressed women who were standing around in the garage.

  “We’ll make a biker out of him yet,” someone called out, which provoked another round of laughter.

  What the hell was this? High school run by pirates?

  “Yeah,” Doc said, turning to Adam. “You showed some class for the club, so we ain’t gonna put you in the chase truck either. But you sure as shit ain’t going to ride a bike with us, and you ain’t going to ride on the back of this prospect’s bike like a couple of pussies.” Doc glared at Tugg, then his face lit up.

  Doc motioned Adam over to the vintage motorcycle he’d been working on, but when Adam got there he could see that what was attached to it wasn’t a sidecar but some sort of oblong wooden box with a metal wheel on the bottom. It was a mini-coffin, complete with R.I.P. painted in black across the top.

  “Ain’t she beautiful?” Doc said.

  “Yes,” Adam said. “What is it?”

  The group hushed, as if Adam had made a major faux pas. Or maybe a sermon was about to befall them. Or both. Whatever it was, they’d obviously heard it a million times before.

  “That’s fate,” Doc said in a low voice. “That’s my leg.”

  Adam didn’t get it at first and then — all of a sudden — he got it all too clearly.

  “You cremate someone and they give you the ashes. You lose your appendix and they put it in a jar. But what the hell do you do with a leg? You don’t bury it. You don’t throw it away. After the accident, I made the doc give it back to me. Now I carry it with me as a reminder. It balances my ride. And nobody ever fucking asks for a ride in my sidecar, do they?” Doc glared at the crowd.

  Adam slowly realized what was going on. He couldn’t be serious. They expected him to ride with that? Adam could see by the look on everyone’s face that he was being exalted in a way that bordered on deification.

  “I’m honored,” Adam said softly.

  “Plenty of room. You’ll have to leave your shoes with your pal for him to carry while you’re in there. We can cut it open halfway so you can sit up straight. You’ll be fine. Just don’t kick it. You do that and I’ll make you walk.”

  “No sir,” Adam said.

  If this was what it took to get Emma back, so be it. If riding around like a lap dog for the President of the club would help them get next to Wanda, he was all in.

  Doc looked out at the crowd again. “Any of you goofs take out two Reapers with five shots from the back of a pick-up?” Silence. “I didn’t think so.”

  All eyes turned toward the gate, where the sound of twenty unmuffled choppers was working its way up the road. When the bikers arrived, someone opened the gate and motioned the crew toward the gravel courtyard.

  “Forest Grove,” Adam heard one of the bikers say.

  “Yeah, they cut it close,” Doc said. He limped toward the front of the pack and greeted the squat man out front with a kiss on the lips, after which there was much whooping and hollering as everyone from the garage ran out to meet their comrades.

  Tugg walked over to Adam and stood with him for a minute, watching the scene unfold in the distance. Helmets came off, everyone embraced, and there were a few more kisses on the lips.

  “Weird shit,” Adam whispered to Tugg. “He wouldn’t let me ride on the back of your bike but he kisses a man on the lips.”

  “It’s to shock the civilians,” Tugg said. “They’re a tight crew. Closer than brothers.”

  “But they like their women, right?”

  “
Yeah, no gay men allowed in an outlaw club. They love their women. Like that one over there.”

  Adam gazed at a voluptuous figure clad completely in black leather, who was just getting off the back of some guy’s bike. Even if she hadn’t just taken off her helmet, there’d be no mistaking her for a dude.

  “I see what you mean,” Adam said.

  “Not yet you don’t.”

  “What do you mean? What’s so special about her? Besides the obvious.”

  Tugg smiled. “Because, my friend, we just caught our first break all week.”

  Adam stared at the curvy stranger.

  “That’s Wanda.”

  Chapter 34

  Thank God for goggles.

  Adam knew that he must look like some sort of lunatic Nazi general riding out front, in a homemade sidecar, with a hundred motorcycles roaring behind him. The wind was fierce and somehow it didn’t help that he was down so low, with every bug and bit of gravel nicking him in the face. Tugg had said that a bike run usually traveled at about 80 m.p.h, but at this height it felt like it could have been two hundred.

  The bike formation behind him was an impressive sight. Adam had looked back a couple of times and saw the choppers all lined up, riding 18 inches off one another’s tires, with Tugg in the far rear with a couple of other prospects. Since Adam was with Doc, he was out front, the place of honor, but he felt more like a mascot than a celebrity.

  And then there was the subject of the leg.

  Adam had his socks on, but his shoes were back in Tugg’s saddlebag, so he kept his toes scrunched up and refused to extend his feet all the way into the sidecar. Was the leg wrapped up like a mummy? Just sitting there? He was afraid to ask. Adam hung onto the sides of the mini-coffin and gritted his teeth, trying to smile every time Doc looked down at him.

  When he could forget about the leg, the country was beautiful. And the smells were tremendous. Years back, Adam had ridden dirt bikes with Tugg all over Tillamook County the summer before he went to college and Tugg went into the Air Force. After that Kate had happened and – once her multiple sclerosis set in – she’d made Adam promise to give it up. No sense both of them ending up in a wheelchair. Of course he’d agreed, but every now and then he remembered that summer. Riding in a car with the window down, you didn’t get the full effect. On a motorcycle you weren’t looking at a picture you were in the picture. A slight change in temperature. A whiff of whatever crop was growing in the field. He was hurtling down the highway in a wooden box, swimming through the scenery. It was stolen time.