by Lee McIntyre
Chapter 46
Adam was trying to do a better job of keeping up, riding side by side with Tugg on the open road.
At this pace, they’d be back at the clubhouse in a little over two hours. He hoped they could talk to Wanda, delicately try to extricate Tugg from the club, then try to find some alternative means of transportation and resume the hunt for Emma, wherever the trail might lead.
That was a lot to ask. Maybe it couldn’t be done. But by now, Adam was getting the hang of Plan Z. Some things just couldn’t be planned. First order of business was to find his daughter. The entanglements with the club might have to be dealt with later. At this point, Adam wasn’t even sure how solving the conspiracy — if they could do that — would lead to Emma.
The clock was ticking. Adam was still a wanted man. One slip-up before they found Emma, then where would they be?
The air felt cool against Adam’s face. He was getting in tune with the bike. The engine pitch seemed to change like a bird in flight. Speed and elevation, nearness to another bike, even the wind could change the road noise from moment to moment. It was all part of the experience. You didn’t just drive the miles, you lived them.
Tugg’s engine whined and Adam wondered whether he’d changed to another gear. Tugg looked down, then swiveled his head and took a quick look behind him. Was something wrong?
Tugg looked over at Adam and flashed a peace sign at him.
Adam smiled and flashed one back.
Tugg shook his head and made the gesture again, more insistently.
Two more miles to a stop?
Change to second gear?
Threat level two?
Adam heard the engine whine again and realized it wasn’t coming from Tugg’s bike. It was coming from behind them.
When Adam turned his head, he saw two bikers, closing fast.
Chapter 47
Adam held his speed as steady as he could, while Tugg remained right alongside him. So far nothing had happened, except that two motorcycles had passed them.
The colors on the jackets were clearly visible.
The Reapers.
But the two had become four, then six, with the bikers riding in a pattern around them so that Adam and Tugg were flanked on all sides: an eight of spades traveling down the highway.
Adam’s heart was slamming like tennis shoes in a dryer.
The two guys out front were dropping their speed. Adam and Tugg had no way forward and no way around. Adam saw that Tugg was backing off, so he did too. The speed kept dropping, as Adam saw the biker on the far left begin to crowd into Tugg.
The intention was clear. You are going to stop.
But they hadn’t attacked them, signaled them or even spoken to them.
Yet.
Maybe they just wanted to talk? Fat chance.
Would it make a difference that this was Immortals’ territory?
Finally, the whole scrum drifted off to the side of the road at about 10 miles an hour and the guy out front held up a fist.
All of the bikes halted. Adam noticed that only the two out front put down their kickstands, so Adam kept his up, same as Tugg.
A beefy guy with chaps and a cigarillo planted somewhere in the vicinity of a mouth behind a dirty yellow beard took off his helmet and began walking toward Tugg. Tugg took off his helmet.
There was zero traffic on the road and the hot sun was beating down.
“Are you the guys?” Yellow Beard yelled at Tugg.
Adam decided to take off his helmet.
Tugg was cool. Tugg was always cool. Tugg had weapons all over his body and he could get to them at a moment’s notice, but the other bikers would have weapons too, so maybe the point was to leave them where they were as long as possible.
“Get the fuck off our territory,” Tugg said to the leader.
Yellow Beard seemed stunned, then gave a hearty laugh.
“Are you the same guys who shot up two of our motorcycles from the back of a blue pickup a couple weeks back? It sure didn’t matter to you that you were on our territory then, did it?”
Tugg didn’t respond.
“Our clubs settled this,” Tugg finally said, low and threatening. “And part of the settlement was that you stay the fuck off our land.”
Yellow Beard threw down his cigarillo. “Well, I don’t seem to remember that, so we still got payback comin’. And that happens now.”
Adam saw one of the guys on the flank make a gesture toward his jacket, but Yellow Beard waved him off.
“Bullshit,” Tugg said. He put down his kickstand and walked up to Yellow Beard. “We set it up in Ashland last week. And we settled it like men. I fought three of your guys.”
“You?” Yellow Beard pretended to laugh, but his eyes said he believed it.
“Yeah, I think I still got a couple of teeth in my boot somewhere. But the deal was if I won, there’d be no war. Your club agreed to stay off our land and I got to walk away.”
Yellow Beard laughed some more, then turned around. He just wouldn’t stop laughing. Now he was doubled over. Was he insane?
When he stood back up, Adam saw that the guy had a handgun and it was pointed right at Tugg’s heart.
“Maybe you walk away, but your friend here ain’t a patch, is he? We never agreed to anything about him.”
The other bikers nodded and looked at Adam.
A guy at the flank spoke up. “That’s the shit who took out my bike. I saw him.”
“You sure?” said Yellow Beard.
“Unmistakable.”
“Game over,” said Yellow Beard. “You can go or you can stay here and watch, but your friend is dog meat.”
Chapter 48
The heat rose up from the pavement, as Adam lived a lifetime in the next moment. Seeing what was about to happen, like film on a broken reel.
The rest of the kickstands went down and five bikers began to walk toward him.
Tugg was down on the ground with a gun pointed at him.
What would happen to Emma? Would Kate get her back?
Adam saw a girl of about six falling off a bike, her knee shiny with blood.
A fierce middle-schooler, slashing the ball into the net.
A brunette beauty of about 18 at the top of the stairs, flashbulbs popping.
Then wearing a white dress, walking through a garden, holding the arm of a grey-haired man Adam did not know.
“Ok Dad, how you doing there? Getting enough air?”
“I’m fine,” Adam replied. “Just take care of her.”
Kate was on the table, fully awake, with her head lolled over to one side staring straight at him. The surgeons were hard at work, just on the other side of a little blue drape that looked like a ping pong net between Kate’s chest and belly.
“You don’t worry about what’s going on down there,” the anesthesiologist said. “Just talk to your wife.”
“How’re you doing?” he said to Kate.
She nodded, then grimaced.
Adam could hear the pulling and cutting, and feel the movement of Kate’s body jostling.
His whole life was on that table.
“Is he going to pass out?”
“No, he’s going to be ok,” said the anesthesiologist.
“Watch that finger please,” said the surgeon. The resident was pouring a river of sweat off her forehead.
Kate turned her head to the other side, so Adam looked down at the floor and said a silent prayer.
“This is taking too long. We need to get that baby out.”
Kate turned back to Adam with tears in her eyes.
“Everything’s going to be fine,” he said. “I promise.”
“Hands now,” said the surgeon.
The table rocked a bit from side to side.
And then it happened.
The loud screaming startled him at first, but then he saw the baby, covered in blood, held up like a prize on the other side of the blue drape.
Kate’s eyes were wide.
> Their new baby girl gave another lusty cry.
“Wow,” the surgeon said. “Welcome to the world. That’s a perfect ten APGAR.”
Kate had broken into a full smile and was trying to peek over the curtain.
“Hold still, Mom. We haven’t sewn you up yet.”
Adam watched the doctors pass the baby from one person to another, until the last person in the bucket brigade wiped her off with a little towel and laid her down in a transparent bassinet.
“Dad, would you like to come over here and see your daughter for the first time, while we close the sutures?”
Adam looked at Kate. For the last nine months his entire world had been in one place. Suddenly it was two.
“Go,” Kate said. “I’m right here. Emma needs her Dad.”
Adam eyeballed the surgeon, who gave him a wink as he kept his hands busy.
Adam got up from the little stool and walked over to the bassinet.
Perfect nose. Perfect lips. Tiny little ears with fuzzy black hair on them. What did he expect, a pink ball of play doh?
“Would you like to hold her?” the nurse said.
“Can I?”
They handed him a thick blue drape, then the nurse deposited Emma into his arms.
He looked down and whispered.
“Well hello there, honey bun. I’m your Dad. I just met you, but I’ll always take care of you. You and your Mom. You’re my world now.”
Emma gave another long cry, then her face scrunched up and Adam felt warmth on his arm.
“Uh….I think something’s happening.”
The nurse smiled. “Yeah, sometimes that happens. At least she didn’t do it ten minutes ago. You’d better get used to it. Here, you can do her first diaper.”
They wiped Adam off and handed him a tiny white diaper.
He could just catch Kate’s smile over the top of the drape, as he turned his back to do his duty.
You waited your whole life for this moment.
You imagined it. Acted it out when you were a kid to see how tough you were. Then spent the rest of your life hoping it would never happen.
Now it was here.
How dare they take this from him? His past and his future.
Adam felt sparkles of light as his head and neck flushed.
He would not go gentle into that good night.
Chapter 49
Running from the law. Two weeks in a biker club so he could have one ten-minute conversation. A ride in a sidecar with an amputated leg.
What’s in the bag boy?
Emma was out there waiting for him. Maybe hurt and alone.
Three skinheads had Tugg down on the sidewalk, whaling on him.
Go get her! Kate screamed.
Yellow beard still had the pistol pointed at Tugg’s chest.
Have you lost enough yet?
Adam picked up the branch and launched it at the skinhead’s perfect white dome.
“Hey you,” Adam called to yellow beard. The blood sang in his ears. “Fuck you and your friends. And fuck your mothers too while you’re at it.”
When they all started coming at him at once, Adam just laid down with his bike.
He heard the gunshot, but couldn’t see if Tugg had been hit.
One. Two. The fists were raining down.
Adam heard a ferocious scream, followed by another gunshot.
At first Adam tried to cover his head, but then the body kicks started coming. Pain exploded in his ribs. What had he been thinking? If only he could get to his feet. Adam cocked his legs and rocketed sideways off the motorcycle’s seat. Suddenly free of the crowd, he scrambled up and took off.
Tugg was on the ground, with a pistol in his face.
If he could just get to Tugg’s bike.
An old joke came to him. I don’t have to be faster than the bear, I only have to be faster than you.
Adam changed direction up the road with a bunch of bikers clomping after him. College track versus cigarette lungs. The pain seared through his chest.
Tugg hadn’t made a sound. Was he shot?
Adam zigged left, then zagged right when he heard the footsteps begin to fall away behind him. After ten more steps he cut back on a semicircular path toward Tugg’s bike. The bikers who moments ago had been behind him were caught flat-footed, no longer between him and Tugg’s bike.
Yellow Beard looked up at what was coming and swung the gun toward Adam’s face.
Yellow Beard’s legs shot out from under him as Tugg was on him in an instant.
Adam heard the siren behind him, but couldn’t tell how close it was.
He leapt toward Tugg’s bike.
Maybe they’d reach him before he got it. This was his only chance.
Tires skidded along the road as Adam tore the shotgun out of Tugg’s ditty bag.
“Hah! Fuck you!” he screamed. “Five shots!”
The closest biker was right in his sites.
The police car looked like it was about to run over the bikers, which put it on a direct path for Adam next. He jumped out of the way and saw that Yellow Beard’s gun was now in Tugg’s hand.
“You guys! Drops the weapons!” The deputy had the door swung open and was perched behind it with a shaky handgun. Miraculously, he hadn’t run over the bikers.
Tugg slid the handgun out on the pavement, but that was all he surrendered. Adam put the shotgun on the ground at his feet and raised his hands.
Before he knew it, Adam was lying face down on the hot pavement with the other bikers, a row of trout on a stick.
Now the shakes started coming.
Would they even have a paddy wagon in a small burg like this? If they did, the sheriff would be awful proud.
Chapter 50
Welcome to Harper, Oregon.
Any dreams of escape were dashed by the time two other squad cars showed up with a pair of bulky farm boys whose glory days of high school football were about ten years behind. They executed a quick pat down on all of the bikers, which turned up both of Tugg’s Glocks, his Ka-Bar, wallets, keys, and a pirate’s bounty of weapons from the other bikers.
The ride back to town was amazingly short. They’d had the good sense to put the guys in Reapers jackets three and three in the back of two squad cars, and loaded Tugg and Adam in the third one. But when they walked into the police station Adam saw that it was just one big holding cell for all of them. Maybe that weapons search had been a blessing in disguise.
Now came the fun part.
Adam had been smart enough to ditch his wallet a week ago, figuring it was better to be picked up for driving without a license than to face down a murder warrant. His odds were slim, but it might slow them down a bit. He didn’t see any wanted posters. Did they still do that?
“Mike, you gonna do ’em one by one or should we just bring ’em over to Vale tonight?”
Farmboy Mike took out a set of keys and stood over by the holding cell. “Inside, gentlemen.” He turned to the other cop. “Let ’em wait. Let’s figure out who we got first. We can do ’em all at once.”
The cell door slammed and Mike took out a bag of wallets. “Let’s see. We got eight men and seven wallets. Who am I missing?”
When no hands went up, Mike dug into each wallet and did a little game of concentration with the photo IDs, until he finally got to Adam. “Did we miss your wallet? You were the guy holding the Remington, right?”
Adam just looked down. “I lost my wallet.”
“What’s your name?”
“Sorry.”
“Your name is sorry? That’s what it’s gonna be.”
The cop’s face turned red and Adam stole a glance at Tugg. Would things get harder or easier in the next few minutes when the other bikers discovered a triple murderer in their midst?
Mike looked at the other bikers, but their faces were stone. Even if they’d known Adam’s name they wouldn’t have told him.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Adam didn’t fool himself. To
night the alliances would shift back again.
“Guess who’s got the first strip search?”
Adam supposed he should feel a little lucky that they hadn’t already recognized him, given all of the media coverage over the last few weeks.
“Step out of the cell.”
The door swung open and Adam stepped out.
“Right here?” he said.
“Right here.” Mike looked delighted with himself.
The jacket came first. Mike was smart enough to grab it and drape it over a chair. Maybe he had enough experience with bikers to know that he was asking for trouble if he let it hit the ground.
“No patches. Are you an Immortal or a Reaper?”
“I’m an Immortal,” Adam said.
A couple of Reapers in the cell snorted.
“Yeah, well, he sure had the drop on you freaks when I drove up.”
Adam felt a rush of adrenalin that he recognized as pride.
“So you ain’t even a Prospect then, like the other guy?”
“He’s just a hang around,” Tugg said from the cell. “He gets his Prospect patch next week.”
Mike nodded and turned back to Adam. “Well, let’s see how the rest of it’s hangin’ then, Mr.Hang Around. Boots and jeans next.”
When Adam was finished, he felt glad that there was a difference between a strip search and a body cavity search. But what happened next?
“Hold on just a second,” Mike said. “They got scrubs over in Vale, but here you get your own clothes back.”
Mike picked up the pants from the floor and started to go through every pocket. After the boots, he started on the jacket.
Even though Adam could hardly have considered his single arrest as much experience with the criminal justice system, he could already spot a flaw in this procedure. What was to stop a guy in the holding cell from handing his contraband to a friend before they searched him, then getting it back when he returned to the cell?
“Whoa, what’s this?”
Mike pulled his pudgy fingers out of a small interior pocket and held up the driver’s license like it was a crackerjack prize. He glared at Adam. “Randall Oppenheim. Geez, I hope they give you a nickname once you’re patched.” Mike narrowed his eyes and peered at the picture. “Doesn’t do a thing for you. Here.” The cop handed Adam back his clothes, but kept the license.