Devil's Due: Satan's Devils MC Colorado Chapter #3

by Manda Mellett

  Soon I have a beer in my hand and am making my way to Cad’s corner.

  Back in Tucson, Mouse had his own office, preferring to work in quiet and secrecy. I wonder why Cad is so different.

  “Can’t they find you an office space, Cad?” I wave at the chair opposite him, then at his chin jerk sit down.

  He offers a quick grin. “There’s no room. I have thought about emptying out a storeroom, but to be honest, I prefer it out here. I can keep my finger on what’s going on. And, of course, it’s closer to get my drink refreshed.” As his eyes fall on his empty bottle, then rise to meet mine, I bark a laugh.

  Taking the hint I stand, rap the bar, and get Wills’ attention.

  “Okay,” Cad’s eyes narrow when I bring his beer back. “Don’t think you’ve come to pass the time of day. What’s on your mind?”

  Hoping I’m doing the right thing as I’m about to stomp all over her independence, I take a deep breath. “You made an offer to find out about that woman I met. Got a feeling she might have money troubles or some such shit. I’ll admit I’m curious. She shut down when the clues started coming. If she’s in trouble, I’d like to offer help.”

  “She need it, you reckon?”

  Do I? Had all I saw just been worry and concern about her dog? Nah, my gut is telling me something different, and I’ve done well before to listen to it.

  Cad sees my reluctance. He leans forward. “You’re not sure if you’re doing the right thing prying into her business. It can’t hurt. We don’t find anything? No one needs to know we looked.”

  But it is a risky step. If I want to pursue a friendship with her, I’ll need to be fucking careful never to reveal I know something about her which she hasn’t told me herself.

  But the feeling inside me tells me this could be important. “I want to know, Cad. I don’t know what, but something’s not right, and she doesn’t seem to have many in her corner.”

  “Well, let me take a look.” He raises his bottle to his lips, puts it down, and pulls his laptop closer, flexing his fingers as he rests them on the keys. “What do you know about her? Full name would be a good start.”

  “Stevie Nichols.”

  His eyes narrow. “You’re kidding me, right?”

  Chapter Twelve

  “You know her?” If he does, that would cut the investigation time in half. How does he know her? Suspicions flick through my head. Is she a criminal that he’s read about? But how can a blind woman commit a crime? Computer fraud? Yeah, that would be something Cad would know about.

  His head moves to left then right. “Nah, I don’t know her. How old is she?”

  “Late twenties, early thirties?” I frown. It’s not something you ask a lady, not when you’ve only just met. Well, not without risking getting your face smacked.

  He raises his eyes. “Reckon her parents liked music.”

  He’s lost me. My confusion shows.

  “Stevie? Stevie Nicks? Sang with Fleetwood Mac? Was inducted into the Hall of Fame with the band in nineteen-ninety-eight, and in her own right as a solo artist in two-thousand-nineteen. She’s a fuckin’ legend. Love her voice.”

  He must be a fan to have an encyclopaedic knowledge of the bitch.

  “Oh, well, never mind. It could just be coincidence. So, Stevie. You reckon she’s a Stephanie?”

  “Assume so.”

  He leans his head back and closes his eyes. After a moment he looks down. “We know she’s blind, let’s start there. You know what kind of blindness? Was she born that way?”

  “Nah. Degenerative disease started back when she was a kid.” It’s my turn for my eyelids to shutter my pupils as I try to recall the conversation in my mind. I’ve got quite good recall for technical details and at last can hear her saying it again. “Something to do with retinal pigment.” Not quite that, but close enough.

  A chin jerk, then he starts tapping. “This is going to take me some time, Beef. You want to go do something else while I check?”

  “Yeah, okay. I’ll be around. Give me a shout when you know something.”

  “Beef! Wanna game?” Pal yells from the other side of the room and holds up a pool cue.

  Indicating yes, I detour via the bar and get a fresh beer.

  As the hours pass and Pal and I are joined by Lizard and Thunder, I lose some, win some, par for the course. All of us are about evenly matched, which makes the games interesting. It’s getting late when I realise Cad hasn’t appeared with information. Putting away my cue, I wander over in his direction. I see him sitting, deep in concentration, a phone under one ear as he taps at the keys.

  “Hold on a sec,” he says into the phone, then looks at me. “Not proving as easy as I expected. Got some searches running that may take all night. Catch up in the morning?” As soon as I nod, he returns to his call.

  I suppose I hadn’t given him much to go on. I don’t know where she moved from, and if she hasn’t been in Pueblo long, maybe she’s not registered anywhere here.

  Another couple of beers. A nice chat with Pyro about some of the bikes that he’s worked on, then I go to bed having turned down an offer from Titsy and Breezy, who if I’m not mistaken are offering their services together. I regret once again that rash promise to Sally. As I undress, I wonder if there’s anything strange in not being able to get immediate information about Stevie, but if there’s something I need to know, I’m certain Cad will find it. If he’s not up to it, there’s always Mouse, our computer guy back in Tucson.

  Jeannie, Bomber’s old lady, is in the kitchen when I go down the next morning. Violet, Demon’s wife is with her. They seem to be directing the sweet butts whose duties apparently include cooking and serving the men. I take a plate full of a breakfast that looks as good as it smells.

  “What are you doing today, Beef?” Thunder asks conversationally. “Prez put you to work?”

  “Sorted that out with Pyro yesterday.” I point my fork at the man I’ve named. “Gonna be working in the shop alongside him.”

  “Know what you’re doing?”

  “Reckon I know the ins and outs of an engine,” I respond, not taking his question as anything other than a polite enquiry.

  All of us work. I’m happy to turn my hand to anything and will never turn down a chance to work on a bike. Cages too, though I’m not so keen on them. Especially the modern shit which are more like mobile computers than anything mechanical. Mind you, some of the recent models of bikes are becoming that way too.

  “Beef? Prez wants to see you.”

  “Just come when you’re ready.” Pyro waves off my apology about being delayed. “Sure Prez’s business takes priority.”

  It would in any of our chapters.

  When the prez wants to see you, he wants to see you. Swallowing my last piece of bacon and carrying my half-drunk cup of coffee, I head straight for his office. When I enter, I’m surprised to find Cad standing there.

  “Beef, sit.” Demon waits until I’ve done so. He notices me looking at Cad, trying to calculate why he’s there. “Don’t know how it works in Tucson, but here? If we think there’s something that might affect the club, or a member, then I want to know about it immediately.”

  I’ve only asked Cad to do one thing. “Stevie.”

  “Beef, I’m sorry, but…”

  “But Cad quite rightly brought it to me.” Demon raises his eyebrow as if daring me to object. I don’t.

  But going around my head is a question. How the fuck can a blind woman have anything to do with an MC? I finish my coffee then sit back and fold my arms and raise my eyebrows expectantly.

  Cad clears his throat. “Stevie Nichols doesn’t exist.”

  I bark a laugh. “She’s not a figment of my fuckin’ imagination, and if you don’t believe me, Pyro and Pal saw her as well. Dan too.”

  “I’m not saying the woman isn’t real.” Cad ignores my reaction. “What I’m saying is, whoever she is, that’s not her name.”

  Absentmindedly I reach for my cup, see it’s
empty—damn, forgot I’d drunk it—and replace it on the desk.

  Cad continues, “I looked in every database I could. Called on Mouse, he worked some magic and got that sheikh’s wife, Cara looking into the government databases.”

  That makes me grin. Sheikh Nijad is a Dom who doesn’t like his wife using her amazing hacking skills. When she helps Mouse out, he doles out punishment—of the type that apparently does nothing to stop Cara doing what she shouldn’t. Yeah, Mouse has described some of his threats in great detail. But if she’s got involved, she’s the best. Whatever Cad has to tell me I can take to the bank.

  “And?” I prompt.

  “There’s been no registered blind person with that name, with or without a guide dog for the past thirty years. No one on Medicare, in no fuckin’ database. Retinal pigment you told me. Retinitis pigmentosa is the correct term, but we’ve checked databases of registered sufferers to no avail.”

  I shake my head. “You can’t have run through everyone with that name…”

  “Well, with Cara’s help we investigated everything.”

  “Jeez, Cad. You’re saying she’s a ghost?”

  “Nah. Think about what I said. For the past thirty years. Found a spanking brand-new identity though. Six months old. Cara could even pin point the person who added the records. And unlike her, they were legit, or someone with legitimate access.”

  “Unless your girl was only born six months back, she’s using a fake identity,” Prez puts it simply, slightly annoyed eyes flicking at Cad. “Which is what he should have said in the first place.”

  “She’s hiding.” My teeth are gritted.

  “Seems to be the case. But it’s the why that concerns me, seeing as you’ve become involved with her. Which brings me back to how you met her and my question then. Was it an accident or deliberate?”

  Cad nods. “That question is exactly why I brought it to Prez. She’s hiding. Just might be that she’s been found and the car heading straight for her wasn’t a coincidence.”

  Fuck! If Cad’s suspicions are right, she’s in danger. My stomach churns. If that’s true, she’s at a great disadvantage. She can’t even see who’s at her door. Her hearing may not be enough to protect her. She wouldn’t hear the gun a visitor was pointing at her, not until it was too late, and a shot was fired.

  Demon’s fingers rap on the desk. “I don’t like this, Beef. Don’t like any woman being hounded, but a woman with a service dog by her side? Can’t see how she could have done anything bad enough to have someone gunning for her.”

  Resting my elbows on my knees, I steeple my hands and place my chin on them. “I might only have just met her, but I can read people well, Prez. Have enough experience not letting someone get one over on me.” He meets my eye and nods. There are skills you learn to stay alive when you ride with an MC. I continue to think aloud. “The thought of her doing something criminal is crazy, so my gut feel is she’s not running from the authorities.”

  “On the scant facts we know, I agree,” inputs Demon.

  I raise the fingers of one hand then lower them to their original position. “Unless she’s robbing someone from behind her computer.”

  “How can she do that shit?” Cad asks. “Hard enough for me, and I’ve got good eyesight.”

  I shrug, don’t know, hadn’t asked.

  “It’s possible,” Demon says. “Even blackmail can be done remotely.”

  “Or she’s totally innocent and has been caught up in shit not of her own making.”

  “So she goes into hiding. Hard to do on her own.”

  “She’s an expert with computers. Maybe she set up her new identity?”

  Cad’s shaking his head. “Cara said the way the entries were done was good enough to throw most people off the scent. She suggested there’d need to be official sanction to alter the database like that.”

  “She’s had help.” I think for a moment. “Witness protection?”

  “That would make sense.” Prez raps his knuckles this time. “And if that hit and run wasn’t a fuckin’ accident, all her carefully laid plans have come undone.”

  “If that’s the case and if she’s sensible, she’ll be talking to her handler. Moving on.”

  “Did she suspect it wasn’t an accident?”

  I go back over our conversations in my head. “No, she didn’t seem at all suspicious. Was more fuckin’ concerned about the dog. Don’t think she saw herself as a target.” Which is a worry in itself. If she’s in danger, she doesn’t know it. Damn, I need to warn her. Then she can contact whoever made arrangements for her and do it all over again. I frown, thinking how she explained she was so used to bruises. Now, with just a white stick to help her around, she’ll be picking up a load more of them if she has to start all over again.

  But she had dismissed me fast yesterday. Maybe she might not have seen the car as deliberate, but something else has spooked her. Max. Jeez. “For fuck’s sake.” I slam my fist onto my leg. “The vet is tracing the microchip. Of course that won’t be fucking registered to her current name. If, and it’s a big if, that accident was simply carelessness, that he’s checking the dog’s identity will be raising a red flag somewhere. She’s fucked whichever way you look at it.”

  “I hadn’t even thought about something like that.” Cad’s shaking his head now, his eyes sharp. “Of course all service dogs are chipped.”

  There’s more too. “She was reticent about filling out forms for the dog’s insurance.”

  “It’s possible that’s one detail that was missed. Her new identity was set up to be watertight, from what you say, it didn’t occur to them to set one up for her fuckin’ pet.”

  Not a pet. But I don’t correct him.

  “She’s a fuckin’ wise girl if that’s the case. Careful, as she should be. I bet she’d never thought about it until she was asked for the details.”

  I nod. It was at that point her demeanour had changed.

  “She’ll know better than to start filling in forms. You know what those companies are like, they’ll want to know every detail. Including where she is.” Cad sighs. “Companies like to think they’re secure, but you’ll no doubt have heard about all the high-profile data leaks. Most times, when there’s a breach people just patch over the hole and get on with it. Young kids try to get into databases for fun. Someone like me? If I’m just looking for info, no one knows I’ve even been there.”

  “You saying if she puts in a claim then they’ll find her?”

  “Her dog’s hurt, everyone will expect her to claim.” Cad pauses, then looks from me to the prez. “People go into Wit Sec for one of two reasons. Either because they need a permanent change, they’ve been a witness in a high-profile case and they never can return to their old life. Or, they are moved temporarily until a trial is over. If the latter, whoever sorted out her new identity may not have thought of all the details.”

  “If she’s a programmer, maybe you’re wrong, Cad. Maybe she does have the skills to do it herself?” Maybe that’s why she wanted to get rid of me. A flicker of hope that she might be helping herself.

  But Cad knocks that on the head. “Not necessarily. She might know code, but unless she’s committed a computer crime which is why she’s in the system—” he breaks off as I give a violent shake of my head.

  “In that case,” he resumes, “she’s probably never used her knowledge nefariously. People like Mouse, Cara and I spend a large part of our time on underground forums learning tricks and how to look for weaknesses. Doesn’t mean she can.”

  “We’ve got one fuck of too many 'don’t knows' here, and a brother who’s been seen with her wearing our cut.” Demon uses a prez’s stare on me. “That’s what I’m concerned about. I want to know what’s at the bottom of this to know whether there could be any blowback on us.”

  Drummer would have done the same thing in Tucson. Make sure a member didn’t step in shit and then brought it back to the club.

  “Of course, all this conjecture abou
t Wit Sec might be completely the wrong tree we’re barking at. Could be she’s trying to escape an abusive ex, in which case, her preparation could be flimsy.”

  My turn to eye Demon. He’s correct. But there’s the worry that my cut might have signalled to someone that the Satan’s Devils are involved. I understand why he’s worrying. And fuck, here am I, not even a Pueblo member. Anything I’ve inadvertently put wrong, it’s down to me to right. “What do you want from me, Prez?”

  “Can you get her here? So we can talk to her?”

  I remember the way she dismissed me last night. “Pretty damn certain I can’t. I wouldn’t even count myself as being in the friend zone right now.” She’d wanted me gone. But then, if she’s got all this worry on her shoulders, I’m not surprised. Being reminded Max’s microchip would reveal details that she wanted hidden would have been a shock. If she’s in Wit Sec, she would have wanted to talk to her handler. Of course, if she is here under a new identity, her safety means her keeping everything to herself. She’s not likely to spill everything to a virtual stranger.

  Demon sees my dismissive shake. “Okay, if you can’t get her here, can you at least approach her? Find out what’s going on for yourself? You taking her to see the dog after his op?”

  “She told me she’d sort herself out. I did tell her I’d call and find out how he’s doing.”

  Demon stares down at his hands for a moment, then he looks up. “Force the issue. Go see her, Beef. Do your best to get her to open up.”

  Cad scoffs. “If she’s scared for her life, she’s not going to say anything.”

  He’s right. At the first sniff of trouble, she’ll run. But then, she might want to, but it’s not so easy for her. She could change her looks but the one thing she can’t pass for is a sighted person. Far easier for the world to have disappeared from her, than for her to disappear from the world. She can’t merge in with the background, however hard she tries.