by A. J. Downey
She watched the fights with mild interest at first, eventually her eyes glazing with a lack of concentration while she disappeared way away inside of herself. While she made a show of watching the screen, and most of the rest of the guys were glued to the action on it, too, I watched her.
I spoke perfect English. Had been born here, but my origins were decidedly more… Slavic. I spoke at least four languages fluently, and though I hadn’t intended to offend, the little nickname honey eyes, for the golden-amber cast she had to hers, had just slipped out in my original Russian. Her reaction had been fiery, to say the least, and I thought back to what her grandmother had said about her. About how Marisol lied and was a liar.
Something didn’t feel right about that. I think it was more a case of Marisol wasn’t believed. She had the air of a girl who spoke hard truths freely and doing so wasn’t apt to earn you many a friend. I got the distinct impression it had earned Marisol the opposite. I wasn’t sure if it was at school, at home, or some combination of both where she had been bullied but she certainly had a chip on her shoulder as a result.
The very second she thought we were having any sort of laugh at her expense, fire had sparked in her eyes, and she looked a hairs breadth away from turning into a full-blown Latina hellcat.
I know the fiery Latina was a bold stereotype, and in a lot of ways unfair, but stereotypes became stereotypes for a reason and there was nothing wrong with a little fire if she knew how and when to properly unleash it. Looking at her beautiful profile now, I could see trouble radiating off her like the heat patterns off the highway coming in. I was betting some time and distance from her family would do something to cool her off, though. If not, I was in for a wild ride with her, so long as it wasn’t too much drama.
I wouldn’t be able to get her full measure until it was just her and I alone and I could get over, under, or just plain through some of the heavily guarded walls she had up around her. Even though she’d volunteered for this, her defenses were up, and she seemed to be on red alert. It was going to be a lot like approaching a wounded wildcat to get close.
I expected to get clawed a time or two in the coming days or weeks. I was getting ahead of myself, though. Right now, we just needed to get through tonight so we could head home.
I came around the bar and heaved myself up onto a stool behind Marisol and let myself get lost in the fight for a minute. All of us were chill, laid back, and little better than armchair critics making a chess match out of the brutality going down on the screen.
Occasionally I would glance at Marisol and finally, Deacon looked back over the backrest of the couch to say something to me but whatever it was didn’t make it past his lip. He quirked an eyebrow and asked instead, “You want me to do something about that?” and gestured to the girl.
I felt my eyebrows go up, got to my feet, and came around her side to find her fast asleep on her seat.
“That’s impressive,” I commented. How she hadn’t come unseated off the stool was a mystery, but so long as she could maintain while I made up a pallet for us, I was good.
“Like I said,” Deacon said, a twinkle in his eyes. “Need a hand?” he asked, and I shook my head.
“Naw, I got it, man. Just gimme a few.”
I went to the pool table and pocketed the balls off its surface. Hard? Yes. Not the most comfortable? Also true, but it would allow me to keep her close tonight as it was easily big enough for the two of us. I went back by the front door and grabbed my bedroll. It was just a couple sleeping bags rolled together, good enough to lay down for a base and throw the other over the top of us.
Deacon got up and helped me, anyway, in making up the table into a makeshift bed. Fen threw some couch pillows our way for our heads. I was unsure at first, touching her shoulder lightly not wanting to just go for it and scare the shit out of her. She jolted away, and I took the weight of her pack with my hands.
“Come on, beautiful. Your bed awaits.”
She yawned, pressing the back of her hand to her mouth to cover it as she stretched, and she was like a sleepy kitten. I smiled and she let me have the bag. I passed it to Deac without looking and he pulled a chair from one of the regular tables over and set it in it next to the pool table so it would be at hand for her.
“Up you go,” I said, turning her back to the pool table.
“I thought you were joking,” she said, voice thick with sleep.
“When I joke, you’ll know it,” I promised her. She hoisted herself up onto the table and feet dangling, finally shrugged out of my coat. I laid it over the arm of the chair beside her bag and she went to settle.
“Keep moving over,” I said and gestured. She scooted to the other side of the table and I hoisted my own tired ass up onto it and laid down, raising an arm so she could tuck herself into my side. She hesitated, but finally did, turning onto her side, resting her head cautiously on my chest.
Deacon flipped the top sleeping bag over us, and I propped my head on the couch pillow, my other arm up under the back of my head.
I watched the rest of the fight and let her sleep. It was going to be a long ride tomorrow, and she was far more tired than I’d thought earlier on.
I woke when she shifted against me, pushing herself up onto her hip sometime the next morning. The rest of the guys were racked out in one spot or another around us.
“You alright?” I asked, voice rough with sleep.
“Yeah, just have to pee,” she said frankly.
I smiled and said, “Bathroom is through those doors there,” and pointed at the doors past the bar to the left of the entertainment center where Squatch, Fen, and Deac were passed the fuck out on the sectional. Cipher was nowhere to be seen, but I didn’t worry about that.
“Who dat?” his voice came from under the pool table Marisol and I were on when her booted feet hit the concrete floor. I closed my eyes and tried to suppress my laugh, but it was hard.
The Eastern Washington boys had apparently fucked off back to their respective homes at some point last night, which I couldn’t say I blamed them. I would damn sure take a real bed over this bullshit if I had the option. A penny saved was a penny earned, though. Why spring for a motel in what was essentially hostile territory and invite suspicion and trouble?
Fucking Rebel, I thought dispassionately. He just had to make shit difficult for nothing other than his own fuckin’ greed.
Marisol disappeared into one of the small bathrooms that had only a toilet and sink, shutting and locking the door behind her.
“Are you seriously under the table?” I asked Cipher.
“Yeah, you drank me here, don’t you remember?” he asked and without realizing it, I walked right into it.
“No.”
“That’s because you drank me here.”
I rolled my eyes, Fen cracking up from over on the couch, sitting up and shaking his head.
“Cipher, you’re a fucking nut,” Deacon declared, from where I couldn’t see him, still lying down in the bend of the ‘U’ shape the sectional made.
“Fuck,” I muttered and laid back, pressing the heels of my hands into my eye sockets. My eyes felt gritty and tired from a combination of allergies and shitty and insufficient sleep. I wanted to go the fuck home, take a hot shower, fuck the shit out of the hot woman that’d be sharing my home for the next month and finally, sleep for like the next three days. In. That. Order.
The bathroom door opened back up, and I breathed deep before sitting up forcefully and asking Marisol, “You know how to make coffee?”
She made a face at me like I was stupid or something and said, “Yeah.” Without any further lip or preamble, she went behind the bar and started rooting around to get the coffee maker in the back corner going.
She was somewhat of a self-starter, good to know. I got into my jacket pockets and pulled out this prescription bottle with the label peeled off. In it was a mix of shit. Some MDMA or Vitamin E for personal use, some 24-hour decongestant allergy pills, a few ibuprofens,
and a couple of Captain Cody’s or Tylenol with Codeine from up over the border.
I kept the shit I took relatively low-key. I stayed the fuck away from the hard shit like meth, coke, and opioids. Hardest I went was MDMA, weed, and if I was really feeling froggy? Maybe some Alice Boomers – what the old hippy motherfuckers called magic mushrooms.
I also kept my shit to myself and didn’t share, unless it was with Dahlia and I never rolled on any E around her. Molly got me way too in the mood to fuck, so it was only around club girls or a readily available bitch willing to put out that I let myself get high on that shit. Still, it was usually only when I was super stressed and needed to check out for a few hours that I hit the Vitamin E. Molly tended to mellow me the fuck out like nothing else when I came down off it and with how long I was in the throes of the effects? Yeah, well, weed was my usual go-to, let me put it that way. Also, weed was legal in these parts so it was safer to have it on me on the regular.
The two Molly I had on me were from Goner and were headed straight for my stash at home. If she got curious, I would indulge her, but I wasn’t one to pressure anyone into trying something that wasn’t their thing.
I shook out one of the decongestant allergy pills out onto my palm and sealed the bottle back up, stuffing it back into my pocket. I sighed and went to swing my legs over the side of the table so I could get down when a glass of water appeared in my field of vision.
“Thanks,” I mumbled, taking it from Marisol’s hand. I looked up and her countenance was cool, calm, and collected. The look in her eyes sharp as she gave me a sharp nod. I popped the pill and washed it down, watching her return around the bar to finish getting the coffee going.
I drained the glass and got up, my own bladder experiencing some urgency now that I was awake.
I took myself in to drain the ol’ lizard and to splash some cold water on my face. I would kill for a fucking shower, but this would have to do for now. I could kind of only imagine how Marisol would feel by the time we got off the road.
It was a solid three hours from here to my place, just off Delridge edging into West Seattle. I was going straight home, too.
I felt like I was just completely assed out mentally. Like, I needed a fucking break. The wheel was spinning, but the hamster was dead as far as I was concerned. I just didn’t have two thoughts to rub together anymore.
Of course, there was no rest for the wicked, and the distant rumble of bikes pulling up out front was an all too loud reminder of that right now. I straightened up, grabbed for some paper towels, and dried off my face, feeling both slightly more awake and refreshed.
I stared at my reflection in the mirror, mussed hair temporarily tamed and slicked back from a high forehead with the water I’d brushed through it with my hands. It’d turned my already dark brown hair to mahogany. I had a five o’clock shadow just starting to invade the hollows of my cheeks, and goddamn did they look hollow. Didn’t help that I had these high, pronounced cheekbones that could cut fuckin’ glass.
I had an angular jawline, and a narrow-ass chest, trim, though I was by no means weak. I just wasn’t as bulky as some of the other guys. Shredded, yes, and I looked wimpy, but what I lacked in pure brawn, I made up for in speed and it was handy to be underestimated. Made it the last mistake a motherfucker ever made more often than not.
I took after my mother in body and looks, much to my father’s disappointment. He was a real chip of the ol’ eastern bloc. Must be strong! Like bull! Unfortunately, strong like bull almost always equated to dumb like ox, and I preferred using brains over brawn.
He hated me for that, and truth be told, I was alright with that. The feeling was beyond mutual. I hated my father’s guts with the fire of a thousand suns and had zero fucking regrets about it.
He had his little criminal enterprise, and I had mine. We mostly stayed the fuck out of each other’s way. It suited us.
I went back out to the front and Marisol brought me a steaming mug of coffee from the pot.
“Cream or sugar?” she asked.
“Nah, black is fine,” I said and sniffed, my nose starting to run and the sinus pressure starting to dissipate. I took the mug from her, wrapping my long fingers around the heated ceramic and blew across its surface, my eyes following Marisol as she went back behind the bar. I couldn’t wait to have her naked and underneath me, to where I could blow across the smooth surface of her skin and see if I could get it to pebble with arousal beneath my touch.
I sucked down some of the bitter brew, wincing, and looked toward the door and the remaining Eastern Washington boys coming through.
Skeeter looked about as rough as I felt, and I could tell he was a good man, running interference with Goner and Derry, who probably didn’t enjoy feeling like outsiders. I felt for them, I really did. I mean, I was pretty sure I trusted they were solid members still in good standing, but it wasn’t up to me. It was up to us. All of us in the Western Washington chapter to decide if we wanted to grow by three seats. Then it was up to National to give us blessing to do it.
Bylaws were bylaws, and we needed to follow them. Sometimes, it felt like trading one ‘man’ for another, but still, this life was a life played by our own rules for the most part and I would take that over society’s bullshit rules any day.
“You guys comin’ over the mountains with us then?” Fenris asked, and we were met with three somber and weary nods.
“Was up all night talking about it,” Skeeter said.
“Feels like we’re all starting from square one.” Derry sounded unhappy.
“Watch yourselves,” I reminded them and gave a side-eyed glance to Marisol.
“Who’s she gonna tell?” Goner asked.
“You need to ask that, you’re missing the fuckin’ point,” Skeeter answered him in a growl and there was the crux of it.
Derry and Goner looked to Skeeter for leadership. My chapter already had leaders. Me, and Glass Jaw respectively. I raised an eyebrow at Skeeter who caught my eye and nodded. Good, he understood where I was coming from and to be fair, his comment could have been interpreted one of two ways.
“Nine and I have got some room at our place for at least one of you comfortably,” Squatch said. “Been looking for a third housemate.”
“I’m a bit off the beaten path but my pops and I got room,” Fenris offered up.
“For how many?” Derry asked.
“For you, country boy. My pops turned to goat farming of all the fuckin’ things after he retired. Looks like you know your way around a farm.”
“Baby goats?” Marisol said and perked up.
Fen smiled and nodded. “Usually around January and February, but yeah. We got a kid or two running around the place right now on the edge of being all grown up.”
“Awww!” It was the first crack in that hard, placid surface of hers that I’d seen since the one she’d formed in the face of her brother crying and I had to say, I much preferred this one.
“Dairy or meat?” Derringer asked casually.
“What do you think?” Fen asked and Derry nodded.
No sense in putting it out there these goats were being raised for slaughter. Why dash Marisol’s happy just as soon as she’d expressed it? Girl was clever, and figured it out for herself, her smile slipping into an expression of really guys?
“Pops rents a bunch of them out for briar patch control. It’s a full-time business and he ain’t getting any younger,” Fenris said and Marisol’s hard look receded as though she hadn’t considered that.
Fen and Derry talked about maybe working something out while Derry looked for work doing what he usually did, which was plumbing or electrical or some shit. I don’t know, I stopped paying attention.
Deacon and Skeeter were working something out, and it looked like Goner was headed home with Squatch.
That meant everyone was sorted for the time being until they could get places of their own, which was pretty sweet. Meant I had less shit between me and my own home and bed with the sexy wo
man behind the bar.
“Breakfast or just home?” I asked the guys and apparently it had to be put to a vote. Breakfast won, goddamnit, but that might not have been such a bad thing. I mean, there was a distinct possibility I was so damn grumpy because it was an actual case of hangry. I wasn’t always the best at keeping my ridiculously high metabolism fed.
You would think, edging the line of thirty it would start to slow down some on me, but it didn’t look like that was going to happen.
We cleaned up, took out trash and closed up shop here at the Moses Lake clubhouse. Marisol actually did most of it, pointing out things that we didn’t honestly even think of when it came to closing up a building for any kind of extended period of time.
She was cool about it, too. Making it into innocuous suggestions or asking simple questions like ‘aren’t you going to do...?’ and when one of the guys stopped to ask why would they? She was always ready with an astute answer that never preached and was phrased in such a way to keep the boys from feeling dumb.
I didn’t know if it was a natural talent on her part or a learned behavior. Maybe it was a bit of both. In any case, she was a mystery to me in a lot of ways, a puzzle, and I think that was why she appealed to me even more than her earthly beauty.
She had on the same pair of jeans and boots from yesterday, but she’d changed her top to something a touch more modern. Simple, black, and fitted; it had long sleeves and a keyhole cutout at her chest above her breasts and at the back that gave tantalizing glimpses of her rich, golden sun-kissed skin. She’d undid her hair from its braid from yesterday, the long tresses falling down her back in kinked waves, and had only bothered pulling half of it up to keep it out of her face using a cheap, drugstore, plastic hair clip – the kind with the metal spring action hidden beneath the decorative part.
She’d washed her face and had redone her subtle makeup and she was beautiful. Natural, earthy, with an underlying edge of badass that if she were Norse? I would compare her to one of Fen’s Valkyries.
Truth was, there simply wasn’t any comparing her to anything. Marisol was just uniquely Marisol in my eyes. Quietly defiant is how I would have described her the first time I had met her. I could see the cool appraisal and intelligence in her eyes the moment she’d locked them on me the first time I’d rode into her little village of fruit growers.