Misadventures of a Biker
Scott Hildreth
This book is an original publication of Waterhouse Press.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not assume any responsibility for third-party websites or their content.
Copyright © 2020 Waterhouse Press, LLC
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Derek “The Bone” Hildreth sat across from me and waited patiently for me to finish this novel so we could spend some time together during his last Christmas break from college. That time never arrived. As always, my work took precedence. For his sacrifice, I must dedicate this book to him. Derek, this one’s for you.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Acknowledgments
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About Scott Hildreth
Chapter One
Devin
I didn’t regret the actions of my past. Not one. Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but wonder how different my life could have been if I hadn’t spent the past ninety-seven months in federal prison.
Being incarcerated hadn’t changed my appearance. On the surface, I was the same person. And when I walked beyond the razor wire–topped fence that separated the institution from the free world, I was sure my life would begin where it left off.
I was mistaken. Now labeled a criminal, finding a place that would employ me was proving to be difficult, if not impossible. With a pool of law-abiding citizens to choose from, it seemed I provided potential employers with no good reason to select me. Each company gave a different version of the same apology.
We’re sorry, Mr. Wallace. We’ve decided to go another route.
I had until Monday to find a job. If I failed to do so, my parole officer would send US Marshals to hunt me down and drag me back to prison. Considering it was Friday, I was willing to accept the first position someone offered.
Standing in front of potential place of employment number twenty-seven, I checked my reflection in the tinted-glass door. My long-sleeved shirt hid most of my tattoos. The ones on my hands, knuckles, and the base of my neck were impossible to conceal. Hoping whoever conducted the interview was open-minded, I pushed the door open and stepped inside.
I stopped dead in my tracks. Floor-to-ceiling windows were in every direction. Long planks of gray hardwood flooring gave the space a feeling of endlessness.
Twenty feet away, a curved reception desk acted as the foyer’s centerpiece. The massive section of seamless blond wood was fitted with a white Carrara marble countertop. Gray veins trailed through the stone in every direction.
Two identical waiting areas flanked the enormous desk. Decorated with brightly colored contemporary furnishings, they appeared like everything else.
Clinical.
Beyond the atrium, a V-shaped wall was centered behind the reception area. Following the theme of the waiting areas, each leg of the wall shared identical attributes—a corridor with two large pieces of abstract art on either side.
There wasn’t a soul within sight. Muffled voices came from each of the two corridors. I sauntered to the receptionist’s desk and peered over the massive slab of stone. An ergonomic mesh office chair, a telephone, and a computer monitor were all that cluttered the twenty-foot-wide space.
I cleared my throat.
The sound of distant voices continued.
I rapped my knuckles against the wooden edge of the desk. A hollow thud echoed throughout the lobby.
Five minutes passed. I was fractionally more versed on the intricacies of modern art but no closer to landing a job. Left with no alternative but to take a stroll down one of the hallways and hope for the best, I chose the corridor on the left.
I paused beside the first open door. I waited while a woman spoke on the phone. As soon as she hung up, I stepped into the doorway. An attractive thirty-something brunette was seated at her desk, carefully tapping the tips of her fingers against the screen of her phone. The white sleeveless dress she wore accentuated her well-toned arms. She set her phone aside and looked up. Upon seeing me, she gasped.
“Oh my God.” She covered her mouth with her hands. “You scared the crap out of me.”
I shrugged apologetically. “Sorry.”
She lowered her hands. “Are you with Neeson?”
“Pardon me?”
“Neeson-Frye,” she said, flashing a set of snow-white teeth. “The decorator?”
I shook my head. “No, I’m not. Are you Teddi?”
“Teddi?” She stood. “I’m sorry, she’s out.” She gave me a quick once-over. “Is there something I can help you with?”
She had olive skin and the figure of an athlete. Her wavy hair was parted in the middle and swept away from her face. Caramel tendrils blended well with what I expected was her natural color, a chocolaty brown. Her full lips were parted, and the corners of her mouth were turned up slightly. There was only one way to describe her.
Breathtakingly attractive.
“A friend sent me,” I replied, meeting her gaze. “He saw Teddi at the bank yesterday. She told him she needed to hire a receptionist.”
Her face washed with confusion. “You’re applying for the receptionist position?”
“I am,” I replied. My tone lacked the enthusiasm I hoped to convey. “I’m pretty excited about it, too.”
She paraded around the corner of her desk and paused. She folded her arms beneath her perky breasts. “Really?”
I offered her a phony smile of reassurance. “Really.”
“You don’t seem very convincing.”
I scowled. “I take exception to that remark.”
“Oh, wow,” she said. “You are serious.”
“I’m looking for a change of pace,” I said matter-of-factly.
“It’s just—” She shook her head. “You don’t look like a receptionist.”
“What do I look like?”
She shrugged one arm. “A tattoo artist? An artist?” She looked me over good, taking a moment to study my visible tattoos. “Maybe a movie producer or something. A creative type, for sure.”
“Sorry to disappoint you,” I said. “But I’m just a guy who desperately needs a job.”
“What’s your background?”
“Construction. Four years hands-on. A little less than ten in management.”
“So, you know the trade?”
“Janine’s going to go nuts over your tattoos,” she said, nodding at my hands. “I can’t wait until she sees them.”
“Who?”
“Janine.” She tilted her head to the side. “She’s crazy about hand tattoos. Tattoos in general, really.”
“Does that mean I’ve got the job?”
“The position has been vacant for two weeks. We haven’t had one decent applicant. This time of year, the only people searching for work are either in school and looking for a part-time job, or they’re seventy years old and hoping to supplement their social security.”
Naples, Florida, had roughly twenty thousand residents in the off-season and three hundred thousand during the winter months. The city was built to support the influx of inhabitants, leaving many businesses to suffer from April to December. The reduced income during the slow months wasn’t the typical business owner’s only frustration. A small selection of available year-round employees was equally unnerving.
“I’m well aware,” I said. “I went to high school here.” I extended my hand. “I’m Devin Wallace, by the way.”
“Sorry, I should have introduced myself.” She shook my hand. “Katelyn Winslow. I go by Kate.”
She wasn’t lacking in the self-esteem department, but everyone needed reassurance from time to time that they were attractive. I gave her a quick undressing with my eyes and grinned. “I can start on Monday.”
She flushed a little. “Come with me. I’ll grab an employment packet.”
I followed her to a large conference room. She disappeared momentarily and then returned with a manila folder. She placed it on the table beside me.
“There’s an application in there, an I-9 form, and a four-page questionnaire,” she said, gesturing to the folder. “It shouldn’t take you long. Let me know when you’re done.”
The questionnaire resembled the personality profile assessment I’d taken upon entry to the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Realizing the similarities between the two tests, I answered most of the questions opposite of what I had in prison. Being independent, dominant, impatient, and analytical weren’t qualities I suspected they were seeking. After completing the questionnaire, I reached for the application. The first question following my personal information was the same one that had prevented me from being hired on my twenty-six previous attempts.
Have you ever been convicted of a felony?
If I lied and got caught, it would be a one-way ticket back to the joint. If I told the truth, I wouldn’t be hired. In four days, I’d be picked up by US Marshals for not complying with the conditions of my release. Under no circumstances was I going back to prison.
I stared at the question, wondering what I could do differently.
Excluding that question, I filled out the application and placed it in the folder. Hearing the click-clack, click-clack of an approaching pair of heels, I pushed everything aside and turned my chair toward the door.
A petite blonde stepped through the doorway and paused. The buttermilk tone of her poker-straight hair was about as credible as my personality profile responses. Massive fake boobs heaved out of the plunging neckline of her bright-yellow dress with each breath. In contrast to her age—which I guessed to be in the mid-thirties—her deep brown skin was leathery and sun-spotted from overexposure to Southwest Florida’s sun.
I stood. “Teddi?”
“Janine.” She looked me up and down. “Janine Bazoli.”
Her Jersey accent was subtle but impossible to hide completely.
“I’m Devin,” I said. “I’m applying for the receptionist’s position.”
“Yeah.” She gave me another quick look. “So I heard.”
“Out of curiosity.” I turned to face her. “Are there any men in this office?”
“Including you, there’s one.”
“How many women?”
“Four full-time and one part-time,” she replied. “That doesn’t include Theresa Bianchi’s skinny little ass, who uses this office to do her deals because the lying bitch doesn’t have a Realtor’s license.”
Before I could comment, she continued.
“You can tell her I said that, too. I’d say it to her face if she was standing beside you.”
Several of the men I was in prison with were from New Jersey. One thing they all had in common was that their attitudes preceded them. Apparently that held true with Jersey’s women, as well.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever have the opportunity to meet her,” I said. “But I’ll make a mental note of what you said, just in case.”
She nodded toward the folder. “Kate said all she’s waiting for is for you to fill out those papers.”
“She told you I have the job?” I asked, expressing more excitement than I intended.
“Yeah.” She looked at me like I was an idiot. “I just said that.”
“Pleasure to meet you.” I picked up the folder. “I’m going to take this stuff to her.”
I rushed past Janine and into the hallway, hoping I wasn’t wrong about my interpretation of Kate. With the employment packet pinched in the web of my hand, I stepped in front of her open door.
She peered over the top of her monitor. “Oh, are you done?”
“More or less,” I said. “I just had a couple of questions.”
“Oh. Okay.”
I stepped inside her office. “Can I ask you three personal questions?”
“Me?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t put too much credence in that four-page thing,” she said. “We only use it to see who’s suitable for management positions. It really doesn’t apply to you.”
“It’s not that.”
“Oh. Well. Sure.” She draped her hair over her ears and smiled. “Ask away.”
“Have you ever tried oysters on the half shell?”
“Oysters.” She wrinkled her nose. “No.”
“Are you married?”
She seemed offended at the question.
“This isn’t a proposition or an inventory of your worth. Just play along. I’ve got a point to make, I promise.”
“Married?” She sighed. “No.”
“If you were dating someone and they really wanted you to try an oyster while you were out on a date, would you?”
“I mean. If he really wanted me to, sure.”
“If you liked it, would you admit it?”
“If I did? Sure. I’m kind of a foodie, so I like it when I find new foods.”
I lifted my extended index finger. “One more question.”
Her brows raised. “Who’s being interviewed for the job? You or me?”
“I wanted to find out who I was dealing with before I answered one of these questions.”
She folded her arms over her chest. “Who are you dealing with?”
“An open-minded woman who wouldn’t condemn someone for a mistake he made.”
She smirked. “You’ve been convicted of a felony, haven’t you?”
I hadn’t reached a point where I was comfortable talking about it with her. Not yet, at least. But there was no avoiding the issue.
Instead of slumping my shoulders in defeat, I puffed my chest proudly. “I have.”
“That’s okay,” she said dismissively. “I mean, as long as it wasn’t for something bad.”
Bad wasn’t clearly defined. I mulled over my response.
Not receiving an immediate answer, her face contorted. “It wasn’t bad, was it?”
“I don’t think so,” I replied. “I’ll give you the abbreviated version.”
She leaned back in her chair. “Okay.”
“I was walking out of a bar, and a guy was arguing with a girl just outside the door. They were surrounded by a large group of people, so I figured it was just some drunken argument about who was going to drive home. Before I got to my motorcycle, I heard her scream. When I turned around, he had her
by her coat and his hand was cocked, like he was going to hit her. I told him to let her go. He said, ‘Go home, asshole. This doesn’t concern you.’ I guess he thought with all the people surrounding him that he was safe. Just to let him know he wasn’t, I said, ‘Fuck you.’ Five minutes later, he was in a pile beside his car, and I was being handcuffed.”
“That’s it?” she asked.
“More or less.”
“So, what? You spent a weekend in jail or something?”
It was time to let the cat out of the bag. I twisted my mouth to the side and arched a brow. “Eight years and a month.”
“Holy crap!” Her eyes bulged. “Eight years? For a bar fight? Why?”
“When I said, ‘fuck you,’ one of his friends thought I said, ‘fuck Jews.’ He testified under oath that those were the words he heard. Because I was in a motorcycle club, and because he was Jewish, they made it a gang-related hate crime. The judge gave me eight years.”
“You were in a motorcycle club?” she asked excitedly.
She was all but drooling. She seemed rather disinterested in the fact that I’d pummeled a man half to death.
I gave an affirmative nod. “Yeah.”
“Like Sons of Anarchy?”
We made the Sons of Anarchy look like nuns. At my earliest convenience, I intended to return to them and to the life I left behind. They were the only family I had, and being without them was a reminder of it.
I shrugged. “More or less.”
Her eyes widened. “Oh, wow.”
I gave her a moment to digest everything. Staring blankly at the tattoo on my neck, she seemed to be taking it rather well.
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