The Judah Black Novels: Boxed Set of books 1-3

by E. A. Copen

  I put the jacket on and climbed up behind Sal.

  I’d only been on a few motorcycles in my life but never owned or driven one. Alex owned one for a short time, but he was no mechanic, and the damn thing was always breaking down, so we didn’t ride together much. I did know the basics of how to ride thanks to him.

  I wrapped my arms around Sal and leaned in. “Deal.”

  He kicked up the kickstand, revved up the engine once, and we moved down the ramp and out into the street in silence.

  The side streets sped by, the hospital windows lit up with orange and yellow glows. Shadows moved behind the false security of thin glass and plastic blinds. Street lights flickered above, illuminating the cracked car windshields and the flashing red lights of engaged security systems. The streets were painfully quiet aside from the roar of us, winding our way down the middle of the street. The whole city felt fragile, explosive.

  We hit a red light and eased to a stop behind a short line of other cars. Sal turned his head and raised his voice over the sound of the engine. “You good with me opening her up a little more?”

  I wanted to say no. We’d barely hit thirty-five and already, the rush of moving so fast without the familiar barrier of a car made my heart pound. The safety of a car was an illusion. I’d seen enough wrecks to know how true that was. Still, I wasn’t comfortable enough without it to risk highway speeds. But I— the federal agent, slayer of ice giants, wendigos, sorcerers, and demons—wasn’t going to admit out loud that I was afraid of a little wind. I nodded against him. “Sure.”

  We pulled away from the red light, sped up an empty on ramp and onto the highway, flirting with speeds I wouldn’t have dared on the crowded freeway. Sal made it look easy, dodging into the tiny spaces between semi-trucks and cars without breaking a sweat. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t sweating. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t showing off. The wind burned against my cheeks and made my fingers numb. My eyes watered until I squeezed them shut and hugged Sal tighter, enjoying the body heat he gave off.

  The bike slowed as he leaned into a turn. I cracked open an eye. We’d left the glow of the city behind and hit the two-lane highway headed west. There, on the right, just off the highway, was a dirty looking little roadhouse. There was no business name on the sign, just a dusty old bit of wood in the shape of an arrow that read BEER and POOL in hand painted letters. We turned into the dirt parking lot where seven other bikes and Chanter’s truck were parked. What was Chanter’s truck doing there?

  Sal eased on the brake, circled the bike, and backed it into an empty space between two others. I unwrapped my stiff arms from around him as soon as the bike slowed but stayed where I was, even once the kickstand was down and he’d killed the engine.

  “Is this your clubhouse?” I asked, frowning at the sad, sorry looking front of the building.

  “Diabla’s place,” Sal said. “But yeah, I guess you’d call it that.”

  I cocked an eyebrow. “Diabla?”

  “Nickname. Nobody knows her real name. Just that she’s a scary lady that keeps us all in line.”

  “Why’d you bring me here?”

  He motioned with his head for me to get off the bike. I did only because it was awkward to talk sitting behind him. Sal lifted his goggles over his head and let them dangle in his fingers. “I know it’s hard for you, but let’s quit dancing around it. This is my life. You want me, I come as is, club and all. If we’re doing this for real, and I’d like to, then I want you to know what you’re signing up for.”

  “I’m a federal agent, Sal. I can’t get involved with anything illegal.”

  He climbed off the bike and put his hands on my shoulders. “Nobody’s asking you to. But you got to leave the cop talk outside. That’s the price if you want to keep going forward with me.”

  I crossed my arms and looked away, knowing I should have just told him to call me a cab. I should have known better than to hope things would work out between us, that I’d have one good thing outside my job. We were barely ankle deep in whatever it was we had, and it was already too complicated.

  But love is a funny thing. It overrides every other sense and supersedes rationality. As much as I wanted to walk away and save my skin before things went sour, I couldn’t make myself not fall for him. Doomed as we were, I didn’t want to go through life wondering what might have happened if I hadn’t walked away.

  “One beer,” I said, looking back at him. “And then you take me home.”

  He gave me that stupid grin of his, and I fought the flutter in my chest as he leaned down to plant a light kiss on my lips. “Deal.”

  Chapter Four

  Roadhouses, bars, and biker hangouts all have a particular atmosphere. Dim lights, stained wooden floors, neon, and wood panel walls made up the inside of this place. The smell of sweat, leather, and cheap beer hung heavy in the air against the distinctive sound of pool balls striking one another in the far corner. Something country played on the old jukebox.

  The place could have passed as any old roadhouse. It wasn’t. I felt it the moment I walked through the door, as if I’d stepped through a thick, velvety curtain of magick. Of course, I didn’t notice the symbols etched into the doorposts until I’d already stepped through. Had I not already been well versed in the ways and practices of the occult, I might not have noticed them at all. They weren’t the kind you see every day. These were part of a protective spell used only in very specific, very powerful circles of voodoo. Had I been a casual passer-by, stopping in hopes of a quick drink on my way through, I would have felt uneasy enough to make my visit short.

  Behind the bar stood a top heavy black woman cleaning a shot glass. One patron sat at the bar, a light brown-skinned fellow in a white suit and pristine white shoes. A single red rose stuck up out of the lapel of his suit. With the flick of two long fingers, he willed a bottle of whiskey off the bar, and tipped it so it would refill his glass. He watched me with interest as I followed Sal through the place.

  The two pool players stopped what they were doing to have a look, too. One of them was a heavy-set woman in black platform heels and fishnets, while the other was a flabby, white haired grandpa type with a beard that reached down to his stomach. As I watched, a third arm reached out from under the beard to scratch at his chin.

  A few of the bikers I’d met at Aisling sat around talking. Bran looked up from where he was sitting with the scrawny, red-haired guy whose name I’d never learned. Bran was the opposite of the short, stuffy Asian stereotype. Tall enough to look down at Sal and almost always smiling, Bran reminded me more of a very large, very cuddly teddy bear. I still wouldn’t have wanted to make an enemy of him, especially if I frequented dark alleys. He carried a katana around and I’d seen him use it. As soon as he saw us, he motioned for us to come over. I was about to go and greet him when another familiar voice cut through above the music.

  “About time you showed, girl.”

  I turned directly into Chanter’s embrace and froze. It was strange enough to be hugged unexpectedly. For Chanter to be the one doing the hugging was extremely out of character for him. The reason became clearer when he leaned in and growled next to my ear, “Tread lightly here tonight.” He leaned back and smiled as if he hadn’t just spoken a warning.

  It shouldn’t have been a surprise that he and Sal were both members of the Tomahawk Kings. The two of them were closer than thunder and lightning in a rainstorm. But it was a shock to me just the same.

  He turned to greet Sal with a pat on the back. “You should have told us to expect her. You know how Istaqua feels about surprises.”

  “Is he here?” Sal asked, and his eyes darted back and forth.

  Chanter shrugged and gave me a wary glance. “He is here, but he took a fifth and two hang arounds into the back. If your visit is brief and uneventful, I expect you’ll miss him tonight.”

  A hand came down on my upper back with just enough force to knock me forward a half step. Bran had patted me on the back. “It’s
good you didn’t die, Ms. BSI.”

  I offered him a smile. “It’s just Judah tonight.”

  “I don’t think we’ve been formally introduced. I am Yuri Branaslav.”

  He extended a meaty hand and I took it. His grip almost broke my fingers. “That’s the most Russian name I’ve ever heard, Bran.”

  “My mother and step-father had a sad sense of humor. I am, unfortunately, more Japanese than Russian as far as genetics go. It has made life interesting.”

  “Bran moonlights as a prison guard when he’s not busy being an outlaw,” Sal said.

  “Not much difference between the two jobs sometimes.” He roared with laughter and patted me on the shoulder before wandering back to the table he’d come from.

  Chanter motioned to the bar with his head, and the three of us went to take a seat, Sal in the middle. Without so much as a word, the bartender pulled down two shot glasses and filled them with whiskey, pushing one toward Sal and the other to Chanter. They both downed their drinks, and then turned their glasses over, sliding them back across the bar.

  “Say what you want to say, girl,” Chanter mumbled. “I don’t have the time to mince words anymore.”

  I shrugged. “Guess I’m just surprised that you’d be a part of this.”

  Chanter smiled. “I can do a lot to surprise you if I put my mind to it. I don’t ride anymore, but the Kings still have room for a dying old man and his truck, it seems.”

  Sal stared down at the bar.

  Chanter grunted and turned on his stool to face me, placing his wrinkled hands on his thighs. “This group fills a need. There’s a no-man's-land between where the law leaves off and where the evil picks up. Too many good people get hurt with no recourse. The people here, they need the Kings. I hope you understand that.”

  “I still don’t know how to feel about it.” I rubbed my temples. “And I’ve got enough on my plate right now that this barely rates.”

  “Work?”

  I nodded.

  Chanter grunted. “I heard they were doing an escort tonight out to the hospital. I don’t know what’s happening but if we can help, don’t hesitate to ask.”

  I shook my head and wished the bartender would come back around. Something to drink would help calm my nerves. “I’m sworn to secrecy under threat of violence.”

  Sal clenched his jaw and flexed his hand.

  Chanter watched his face with a wrinkled forehead. “Life’s full of hard choices, isn’t it? We all have to do things we don’t like. Usually, we come out better for it in the end.” He stood. “Well, I’ve said my piece. It’s time for this old man to go have a smoke.” Chanter squeezed Sal’s shoulder on his way toward the door.

  Sal and I sat in silence for a long minute before I said, “So, you promised me a drink.”

  He reached behind the bar and felt around for a glass, much to the displeasure of the bartender. She came waddling down from the other side of the bar and smacked him on the wrist. “Young man, nobody gets behind this bar when I’m here but me.” She wagged a finger at him.

  “I wasn’t! I was just looking for another glass!”

  She ignored him and turned to me. For the first time, I noticed that her eyes were unfocused, cloudy and white. “What’ll you have, honey?”

  “Scotch, neat.”

  “Only way we serve it around here.” She went to the shelf, feeling along the shelves beneath the bottles.

  It seemed an odd fit, a blind bartender, but I’d seen stranger. The way she’d poured for Chanter and Sal, I never would have guessed. Considering where I was, and the wards in the doorway, I thought maybe she didn’t need eyes to see.

  She poured my drink and put it down in front of me, but when I reached for it, she put her hand over the glass. “Members, friends and family drink for free at my bar. Everyone else gets three dollar shots and throws two to the house for expenses. Course, if you think you don’t owe me for the drink, you at least owe me an introduction.”

  “Diabla, this is—”

  The bartender cut Sal off. “I didn’t ask you, young man. I asked her. She’s got a mouth and don’t need your hand up her ass to make it work.”

  I couldn’t help but chuckle at that, especially after Sal lowered his head and said, “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Judah Black,” I answered with a smile and extended my hand.

  Diabla frowned. “She’s holdin’ her hand out to me, ain’t she? Girl...” She leaned in closer and pointed to her eyes. “I’m as blind as justice and twice as mean. I don’t shake hands.” She took her hand off my drink and slid it to me. “I like you, though. You’ve got good taste in men. Sal’s a good boy.”

  “I haven’t been a boy in fifteen years, Diabla,” Sal grumbled.

  She ignored him and leaned in to feign a whisper. “And he’s got an ass you could bounce a quarter off. That’s the nice thing about being an old blind lady. You get to touch everything.”

  We laughed and the tension in the air eased. Diabla patted Sal’s forearm and then pointed at him as she waddled away. “You be nice to that girl, young man.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He gave her a playful salute. “See?” he said to me once she was at the other end of the bar. “We’re not bad people.”

  “That’s why you brought me out here?”

  “That and I’m hoping to get laid.”

  I almost spat out my drink. He laughed at me. That was the Sal I was more used to. I didn’t like how distant he got sometimes, especially since coming clean about his involvement with the Kings, but I understood. He had a lot on his plate, and I was only a very small part of his world. I’d play an even smaller part once he found out about Mia. He wouldn’t have time for me, raising a daughter.

  Maybe I should just call it off, I thought. I don’t even know if he wants Mia. What else can I do? Just leave her to be Han and Marcus’ pin cushion? That goes against the very reason Reed claimed to have taken her. Maybe he hadn’t intended for Mia to fall into Marcus’ hands.

  “I take it since you’re thinking awful hard about it, my chances are pretty slim?” Sal asked raising an eyebrow.

  I shook the thoughts from my head. “No, I was just thinking about Zoe. I was pretty stunned to see her, Sal. I was so sure she was dead.”

  “She’s dead to me.” He slid an arm around me and pulled me toward him. “I don’t want to hear any more about her tonight, especially not from you, all right?” He gave me a quick peck on the lips and tried for more, but I pulled away.

  “That’s nice in principal, but you can’t just ignore the fact that she’s back, Sal. She’s already tossed me around a padded room.”

  “What?” he growled. “You should have said something. I would have gone in there and—”

  “That’s the thing, Sal. It’s not your fight.” I sighed, took up the scotch, and downed it before putting the glass back on the bar. “It’s mine. I need to settle it. Me and her, we’ve got a score to settle, one that goes all the way back to Andre LeDuc’s cave.”

  Sal frowned at me. “No offense, babe, but I don’t think you can best her for strength and speed, not after what Andre did to her. In a straight-out fight, my money would be on Zoe. She’s got a mean, selfish streak like you wouldn’t believe.”

  “I know. I don’t think it will come to that. Not if I can help it.”

  “Maybe I can help?”

  I smiled at him. There wasn’t much for him to do. I was going to have to sink or swim through this on my own and hopefully come out fine on the other side. The more I sat there and thought about it, the more I realized I shouldn’t have even brought it up. Sal would find out eventually, but I didn’t want him to think he had to protect me and that’s just what he’d do given half the chance. Doing anything else was outside of his nature.

  “I think you’ve got enough on your plate.”

  I gestured to the window in front of the roadhouse where Chanter doubled over, coughing. In the last few weeks, I’d only seen Chanter once or twice, but he had pa
led, and hadn’t been moving around as much. He carried an oxygen tank and tubes around with him wherever he went. The cancer in his body wore him down more and more each day.

  Chanter put a hand out and braced himself against the window and Sal hopped down from the bar stool, headed for the door. When Chanter dropped, Sal broke into a dead run and barrelled through the door at top speed. Bran stood from his table and the red-head turned around. Both almost ran me over as I went to the door.

  Outside, Chanter sat with his back against the wall, shaking his head as Sal offered to take him home in the truck. His eyes were closed, and he was even paler than normal. A big red smear of blood trailed down his chin. Sal sighed, frustrated. “Will you at least keep your appointment with the oncologist tomorrow?”

  “Why? What can they tell me—” He paused to fight for a breath. “—that I don’t already know?”

  “They can give you something to make it easier to breathe and something for the pain.”

  Bran ducked back into the roadhouse and returned with Chanter’s oxygen tank. He held it out to Sal who took it and tried to fit the mask over Chanter’s face. Chanter wouldn’t have it. He swatted at it. “God dammit, boy! Get the hell away from me!” When he spoke, he threw some magick into his voice. Compulsion magick.

  As Chanter was Sal’s alpha, that left him no choice but to obey. Sal blinked and dropped the mask before he stepped away and bowed his head.

  Bran came forward and shouldered Sal out of the way. “I’ve got him, brother.”

  He grabbed Chanter by the back of the head and forced the mask onto his face. Chanter tried to fight him but there was no strength left in him. I turned my head away and pretended not to notice.

  “Now you listen to me, you mean old bastard, you take your oxygen. I will get one of the prospects to take you home and call Nina to come and look after her old man.”

  Chanter said something as Bran turned the wheel on the tank but it was lost in the noise.