by Zoey Parker
“Well, play time’s over for now,” I told her. “We’ve got to get back to HQ.”
“I thought we were through with you trying to get secrets out of me,” she said, her voice heavy with warmth and desire.
“Yeah, but that’s not what I want out of you now,” I told her, letting the obvious suggestion hang in the air between us.
“Really,” she said with a sexy little grin. “What about my clothes?”
“We’ll handle that.”
Chapter 7
Sasha
My mind was reeling from how quickly everything was moving all of a sudden. When we got back to HQ, Cole called a meeting. I quickly excused myself, not wanting to infringe on anything too private, though I knew I was missing important information that Fang would have wanted by dipping out of the meeting. I was on the verge of panic. I needed to get in touch with Fang to ground myself again.
I had charged my phone while I was at Cole’s apartment. Carrying my backpack into the bathroom with me, I had plugged it in under his counter. When I fished it back out at HQ, it had just enough battery life for me to try to call my boss. I couldn’t risk trying to listen to all the voicemails he’d left me and killing my phone in the process.
I hurried downstairs to the basement, sure I would be alone to talk freely away from everyone’s prying eyes and ears. It went to voicemail after a few rings. I checked over my shoulder to see if anyone was around before leaving a message in a hushed voice.
“Hey, it’s me. I don’t have long. My phone’s about to die. I wanted to let you know I’m okay. I haven’t listened to your messages, but I’m okay. I’ll get back in touch as soon as I can,” I said quickly.
I disconnected the call and put the phone away in the pocket of the jeans Cole had bought me on the way in from his apartment. All of the clothes I was wearing were new, all purchased with the sizes I told him, but bought with his tastes in mind. I thought I looked damn good with the flowing, low cut black top, the tight jeans that loved my ass, and the perfect bra and panties that told me exactly what he had in mind for later. Having these clothes on was like having his hands on me. It was a delicious feeling.
Then, I heard footsteps coming down the concrete steps behind me. I turned around, hoping to see Cole, but it wasn’t him. It was an older member of Hell’s Overlords in a worn leather vest, an old ragged t-shirt, and tired jeans that seemed to wear every single year he’d been riding. He wore sunglasses and had his salt and pepper—mostly salt—hair pulled back in a long ponytail reaching down his back. His vest had more patches on it than anyone else I’d seen so far. He’d been with them a while.
“What’s going on down here?” he taunted as he reached the bottom of the stairs and started walking towards me.
“Nothing, just needed to get away for a minute.” I backed away nervously. “I had to make a phone call,” I told him.
“Oh, a phone call. I see. You wouldn’t happen to be calling your boss to let him know you were in with Cole, would you?” He moved like a snake as he approached me, backing me into a corner. He wasn’t built the way the rest of the guys were. He was thin and ratty, covered in old, faded tattoos. His breath smelled of cigars and whiskey with a hint of pot hanging over him.
I wasn’t sure what the protocol was now. Normally in this type of situation, I wouldn’t have had any trouble handling him, but as a guest, I wasn’t sure Cole wanted to come downstairs and find one of his members face down in his own blood, especially someone who’d probably been with the MC longer than he had been.
“What’s your game, old timer?” I asked him with a tough edge in my voice, trying to let him know I wasn’t one to fuck with.
“No game, princess. I just don’t like spies and thieves hanging around my MC. That’s all. I know what you’re up to. You may have Cole fooled, but you won’t get by Gage, baby doll.” He ran a hand through my hair, and it was all I could take.
“You don’t touch me, old man,” I snapped, smacking his arm away from me. “I may be here as your boss’s guest, but that doesn’t change what I will do to you if you touch me again.”
“Hey, hey, hey! What’s going on down here?” Cole called out from behind Gage.
“Just checking out your new toy, son,” Gage said venomously as he walked past Cole and up the stairs. “I’d keep an eye on her if I were you.”
“Are you okay?” Cole asked, rushing to my side as Gage ascended the stairs out of the basement.
“Yeah, I’m fine, but you might want to keep an eye on your boy,” I told him.
“What do you mean?” He took me by the arm and guided me away from the wall.
I looked at him and took a deep breath, shaking my head. Then I realized my whole body was quaking from anger and adrenaline.
“Sasha, what’s going on?” Cole asked, the concern in his voice growing.
“He cornered me, Cole,” I told him. “He pushed me downstairs and cornered me. He ran his fingers through my hair and kept talking about how I was your new plaything. He told me he wanted a taste, too, and that you were going to pass me around the MC once you had your fill of me. What the hell?” I gave in to my shakes and stress, letting a few tears roll down my cheeks for emphasis.
I knew that wasn’t what had happened, but I wanted to test Cole and see what he would do if I had been threatened by one of his guys, no matter who it was.
“Are you serious right now?” Cole asked, all emotion gone from his voice.
I looked at him with sad, teary eyes and nodded. Inside, I was cracking up, but I maintained a straight face through it all.
“Come upstairs,” he said in a commanding tone, and for a moment, I thought I was in trouble. The whole way up the stairs, being led by my hand, I just knew he’d seen through my show and was going to let me have it in front of everyone before sending me off.
That wasn’t what happened at all. When we reached the top of the stairs, he waved Andre over. I remembered him from the times he watched me.
“Sasha, good to see you out of the chair,” he joked as he approached.
“Listen, keep an eye on her for a minute. I’ve got some business to handle,” Cole said as he walked away, leaving me in Andre’s care.
I cut my eyes to Andre and saw the nervous look on his face while he watched Cole. I could see that having me out of bondage made him anxious, and I smiled. He was a lot smarter than that jackass who’d just practically attacked me downstairs. I watched Cole walking towards him.
The bay doors were open to let the light and fresh air in. Guys were coming and going on their bikes. It wasn’t a constant traffic, but it seemed pretty steady. A few would leave, and a few more would show up after a small interval. I could see how Cole and Hell’s Overlords were so powerful. They were huge. They were big enough that this couldn’t have been the only chapter.
“Hey, Gage,” I heard Cole shout as he reached the old timer. “Kill the bike!”
Gage killed the bike and climbed off of it to stand up straight in front of Cole. He may not have been built as thick as his younger counterpart, but he definitely seemed bigger when he wanted to. He was probably former military, probably served overseas with lots of war stories to share.
They looked like they were having words, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying. I started walking towards them, as did just about everyone else in the room. Pretty soon, we all encircled Cole and Gage in a semi-circle that left only the bay door open as a way out. I looked around all the stern faces looking at their leader and a member who had have some kind of status among them.
“What’s everyone’s opinion of Gage?” I asked Andre, sort of as an aside. I didn’t want him to think I was trying to drive a wedge between the men.
“He’s a grouchy old-timer. I don’t think anyone really likes him,” Andre said.
“Who’s that?” I asked, pointing at the large bald man with a full, glorious beard and a tribal tattoo wrapping around his shaved head.
“That’s Dante. He’s Col
e’s right hand man.”
“He looks like he got kicked out of ZZ Top,” I told him with a light laugh.
“Yeah, he does. Or like he kicked them out,” Andre offered. “I wouldn’t want to tangle with him.”
“I wouldn’t either, but it looks like Gage is about to tangle with both of them,” I told him.
I still couldn’t hear what they were saying, but I saw Gage lift an old battle worn hand and point at me. That was when Cole lunged forward, planting a fist in the old man’s face and shoving him back with a couple of shots to his chest when he didn’t immediately go down.
Dante followed closely behind him. It looked like Gage was trying to crawl away on his back, but Cole stood over him. I clearly saw a hand held up to block any further blows. Cole looked like he said something to Dante over his shoulder, and the muscleman came back inside for Gage’s motorcycle. He lifted it off the ground and chucked it outside, returning to Cole’s side to watch the old man get up and walk to his bike.
He shouted something back at the men standing in the bay door, watching him. He stood up his bike, climbed on, and fired up the engine.
Cole and Dante walked back in to a round of applause from the rest of the MC, myself and Andre included, but Cole shook his head with a serious look on his face. Dante joined the group as everyone went back to what they were doing.
“Thanks, Andre. I’ll take her from here.” Cole wrapped an arm around my waist and started walking me away from the scene.
“So, what just happened?” I asked him timidly.
“I just kicked Gage’s ass,” he said plainly. “He’s been fucking up a lot lately, and it needed to be handled. At the very least, you’re my guest. He needs to respect that. If he can’t, then he doesn’t have to be here.”
“At the least, huh?” I teased him. “What am I at the most?”
“I haven’t decided yet,” he told me, looking me dead in the eye.
“So what happens now?” I asked.
“He’ll probably go to another chapter for a while until he gets his head straight. He may or may not be back. It’s sad to lose him. He’s been with Hell’s Overlords since the beginning, or close to it,” Cole explained, growing introspective.
“Hey, I didn’t mean to cause that kind of trouble,” I said, putting my fingers under his chin and turning his face to mine. “I can leave if you need me to.”
“Don’t be silly,” he said. “You can stay. I want you to stay. But you have to be comfortable with the fact that I’m not going to let any of my guys fuck with you. Anyone who starts anything is going to get the same treatment Gage did.”
“Damn, okay.” I was taken aback by his sudden devotion to me. I was getting too deep too fast. My professional side told me to bail, but my heart told me I couldn’t, that it wasn’t business anymore, and I deserved something real like this after hiding myself away from the world for my work for so long.
Just then, I saw Dante walking over to us with a serious look on his face. I knew that look. It was business. Something was going down.
Chapter 8
Cole
I wasn’t sure what the hell was going on anymore. I didn’t realize what I’d just done until I was talking to Sasha about it. I’d just knocked the shit out of Gage, one of our longest standing members, for Sasha. My relationship with Sasha was just supposed to be professional. I was supposed to just be using my connection with her to get information from her. Instead, I was getting involved and punching out my own men.
At least I could take comfort in the fact that Gage had asked for it. He’d been asking for it for a long time. I told myself that it was his insistence on being a jack ass that lead to me kicking his ass. His incident with Sasha had just been the last straw.
“Boss, we have a problem,” Dante said over my shoulder suddenly as I walked away with Sasha. Before I turned around, I looked into her eyes and saw that she was as worried as Dante sounded.
“What is it?” I asked him, turning away from Sasha.
“I think we may have tracked down some of our stolen product,” he said.
“How do we know?” I asked, holding Sasha behind me by her hand.
“A friend,” Dante said carefully, shifting his eyes to Sasha standing behind me.
I pulled her in front of me, to stand between us.
“Is someone selling my drugs?” I asked her.
“I don’t know. I would imagine if my boss has me stealing them, he’s doing something with them on the other end.”
I narrowed my eyes at her, pressuring her with my look to make sure she was being as honest as she could be with me.
“Listen, I don’t know. My job was just to steal. I didn’t handle anything else,” she defended herself.
Not satisfied with her answer, I waved for Andre again.
“Yes, sir? You want me to watch her again?” he asked.
“Yes, keep a close eye on her. If she does anything, use this.” I passed him my gun.
“I’m sorry, do what with it?” he asked.
“What do you think, Andre?” I asked.
“Yes, sir, I read you loud and clear.” He stuffed the gun in his waistband and pushed her away.
“I’m sorry, Sasha, but security comes first,” I said to answer the angry look in her eyes as Andre pushed her away.
“Alright, tell me what we know,” I told Dante with a hand on his shoulder.
“Sure. One of our partners called from the field this morning. Said he met with a new dealer last night who’s been trying to get him to come on board,” Dante started.
“Is this someone we’ve shorted recently?” I asked.
“No, just a rat,” Dante assured me. “Small time.”
“Okay.” Those guys were great because their allegiance wasn’t necessary for business. They were guys who just hopped around trying to find the best fix for the best price. They acted as informants for us.
“Anyway, he calls and tells us he thinks he got some of our heroin off this new dealer. Cole, how much you want to bet this dealer is connected to Sasha’s boss?” Dante asked.
“I know he is,” I told him. “You know where the deal went down?” I watched Andre urge Sasha upstairs with my gun. I hoped I could trust him alone with her—more like her alone with him; I wanted to come back to find both of them still intact.
“I can get the address,” he told me.
“Do it. We’re taking a little ride to check it out,” I told him.
“On it.” He pulled his phone out and called the guy, stepping away a moment so he could hear him better.
I hopped on my bike and waited.
“Got the address. It’s not far from here,” he said.
“Alright, let’s go.” We fired up our engines, both bikes coming to life in a loud roar that filled the room and echoed off the far wall.
We drove further into the old industrial section of town, where more and more dilapidated buildings populated the streets. The only thing that hung around this part of town was the riff raff and vermin. The only life that seemed to crawl through these streets—if it could be called life—were the forgotten ones. Honestly, most of the people we ran into on this side of town seemed to be little more than ghosts. It wouldn’t have surprised me if none of them were even real.
We pulled down an alley lined with stolen or otherwise forgotten dumpsters and loose newspapers. Real rats wouldn’t even live down there, I thought.
“So, where is this guy?” I asked Dante after we killed our engines. I glanced around at the tired, old gray concrete buildings with their empty windows. They were merely vacant husks providing homes for the derelict and the feral, the lost souls who roamed the streets down here on the edge of civilization.
Dante just nodded to the building to our left. I followed him, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching us. It felt like we were walking right into a trap.
“Listen, do we know we can trust this guy?” I asked.
“Yeah, he’s coo
l. He’s helped us out before, man. Chill out, paranoid. It’s not a trap.” He crept carefully in through an empty doorway.
“Hey, man,” a voice croaked from the shadows, and a shifty-looking dude in ragged clothes appeared, merely a shadow himself, his skin as gray as the concrete surrounding us. His rotten teeth—what few he had—smiled at us as he drifted towards us in the darkness of the abandoned building.
“Good to see you, buddy,” Dante said as the guy approached us. “I brought my boss with me, man. I think he’s got some questions for you about the drugs.”