by Nicole Snow
“Cuz, I'll do you one better. It's all right here. My authority begins and ends with this badge.” He held up a leather holder and let it fall open. “You see that, Emma? Special Agent. I don't need a fucking judge to bring down a bunch of terrorists from out East shitting up this state! And I sure as hell don't need it to demand answers when you're stonewalling me, you ungrateful little cunt.”
I pinched my eyes shut. Fuck, my fists were shaking now. So hungry, so hot, so ready to beat that fucker senseless. I wouldn't bother dropping him off in the garbage and kicking the can down the goddamned driveway.
This asshole was talking about my club. He'd just threatened Emma and my brothers. We'd reached ninety-nine percent certainty he wasn't leaving this house alive. Now, I just had to figure out how I'd send him to meet Satan, as soon as he gave me a few more morsels of why.
I had to find out how deep the shit was facing my club.
“I see it, asshole,” Emma growled back with equal piss and vinegar, matching his nasty fucking tone.
Her hands moved. She jumped back as the asshole blinked dumbly. She snatched away his badge and held it up.
“Oh my God!” Her jaw dropped, sheer terror lining her face. “You...you lied to me. What the hell is going on? This is expired.”
Mark stood there like the dipshit he was for several long seconds. Then he took a long step forward, cornering her against the little table near the wall.
“Give that back,” he said coldly.
Emma laughed, amused and enraged simultaneously. “Did you really think I wouldn't notice? You idiot! The corner's clipped! I know what that means with passports. I did study abroad in college. If they cut the corner to make civilian IDs invalid, I'm going to bet that applies to ATF badges too. You're not an active agent at all, are you, Mark?”
He stopped in front of her, shaking his head. He wasn't just a sinister man standing before her anymore. This was a fucking time bomb.
“Give. It. Back.”
“No.” Emma looked up, tears in her eyes, shaking her head. “No, Mark. I'm going to keep this fucking thing and show it to some real cops. How much you want to bet you're a mad dog on the loose? I'm sure they'll be happy to find out they've got a rogue agent on their hands. What did you do to get drummed out of the force, anyway?”
Mark lost it. I was rushing toward him before he broke Emma's neck, but not fast enough. Her eyes bulged as he picked her up by the throat.
She dropped the badge and slammed it against the wall, kicking and flailing against him, trying to break his horrid grasp.
“Bitch!” he roared, ready to throw her against the stove or refrigerator.
“Motherfucker!” My scream deafened everything as I rammed my shoulder into his as hard as I fucking could.
Something snapped as he whirled, dropping Emma and bouncing back and forth in her narrow kitchen. Spice jars crashing on metal and tile. A stack of oranges went tumbling to the floor, and I crushed more than a few under my boots in my rush to grab that asshole before he could do anything else.
“Tank! No!” Emma tried to scream with all her might when she saw the killer instinct in my limbs, but he'd hurt her throat.
He hurt her throat. Damaged her. Wrecked her sweet fucking voice.
The asshole bounded off the stove and was drawing his gun when I plowed into him again. The fuck fired, up above my head. The bullet went right through the ceiling.
It was the last sound that motherfucker ever heard.
I tackled him to the floor, cracking his damned skull on the table as we went flying. I didn't need my gun or knife for this shit. I put my fists on his fucking face again and again, landing more blows when I felt it. The bastard's hot, thick blood on my skin was like a matador flashing bright red to a bull.
I kept going as Emma screamed hoarsely behind me, busting his teeth, obliterating what was left of his eyes. The warmth was starting to leave his worthless carcass forever when I finally stopped.
Holy fuck. Emma was sobbing behind me. All I wanted to do was reach out and comfort her, tell her it was all gonna be okay.
But there was blood, so much blood, all over my fucking hands. I'd killed so many fucks over the years with knives and bullets. None of those jobs threw this much red gore all over me, like I'd wandered out of the goddamned slaughterhouse.
Before I could move a muscle, the front door in front of me collapsed. Three chubby cops came storming in, guns drawn, every one of them pointed at my head.
“Freeze! Put your hands in the air where I can see them! Right now!”
The whole world went white.
I reached high above my head and barely felt the cop struggling as he tried to fit the handcuffs around my huge wrists. I saw nothing. Nothing but white and black and red 'til they turned me around, leading me away like the drugged up bull I'd become.
“Tank...” Emma was still flattened against the wall on the other side of the room.
The tears in her eyes made them glow like lightning. Her whole face contorted, ripped apart by pain, staring at me as long as she could before the sobs clamped her eyelids shut.
“Let's go! Move it!” The cop barked, poking me in the ribs to nudge me around.
I followed.
Crunched up in the tiny squad car, I finally figured it out. The sick jokester who ran the universe gave us this time together so I could do my fucking job one more time. I'd protected her, and I'd protected my club.
Now, my ass was heading behind bars, and I'd be damned lucky if I ever saw Emma or my brothers again without being stuck in an orange jumpsuit behind plenty of glass.
VIII: Torn Apart (Emma)
A dream became a nightmare. It was all so surreal, and I couldn't believe the whirlwind that started as soon as Tank was in custody.
Two long days at the police station, Missoula cops and men from the ATF grilling me, asking me everything I knew about Mark and the Prairie Devils MC. The shifty lawyer the club sent told me there was nobody after the club except my dead rogue cousin. I didn't have to answer anything they asked about my involvement with the Devils, so I didn't.
I gave them nothing more than what everybody across the Midwest already heard: the Prairie Devils MC was a group of motorcycle enthusiasts with an eye for business. Their parties were legendary, their charity work put them in lots of folks' good graces, and they were a better support network for all the vets in their ranks than the Feds.
Nothing more to it.
Nothing. If only it were that fucking simple.
At least they couldn't charge me with anything. I had the marks on my neck to prove Mark attacked first. It was amazing what a few seconds of a man's fingers digging into the tender flesh on my neck could do.
I thought the interrogations at the police station were the worst of it. But that was before Blaze.
As soon as I was at the clubhouse, I was in his office, down on my knees. The pointed questions kept coming over and over, offering certain death if I answered wrong, or just couldn't convince him I was telling the truth.
“Did you rat out the club?”
The third time he asked, hovering over me, angry muscle about to explode, I collapsed. I was a stupid, sobbing, screwed up mess.
“Never! I didn't give my cousin a damned thing. Everything he fit me with, I turned off when I was here. It was just one time...and he got shit. Nothing incriminating. Nothing important. I swear, Blaze.” I looked up, trying to see his devilish face through all the tears. “I swear on my mother's life – on Tank's! – nobody got anything about your MC. I couldn't let them. I couldn't wreck the Devils after spending so much time here. Please, I swear...”
When I looked up again, he was gone. The door closed, rattling on its hinges. He was pissed, but he'd accepted I was telling the truth.
I only realized it later because none of the brothers came to make me disappear. At the bar, Saffron tried to console me. I didn't tell her about Blaze's harsh interrogation. He'd been a demon, but he was doing his job as club
President.
I tried to drown my sorrows in booze. She offered me my favorite beer, but I refused it for whiskey. Ugh. How the hell did everybody around here drink this stuff constantly?
Dark brown bitter venom bit deep. Tasting it made me cry more because I thought about Tank. It was what he'd sucked down during good times and bad – especially when things between us were really fucking bad.
Us. When I thought about how they'd locked him up and left him to rot, I knew there'd never be an us again. Nothing more than two desperate faces pressed to prison glass, if I was lucky.
I'd lost him.
Even in death, asshole Mark had taken him away, destroyed the happy moment we had, the start of what was supposed to be our everything, our eternity. I didn't feel bad about my dead cousin.
I hoped he was rotting and burning and suffering wherever he went.
He caused all this by running off the rails and blackmailing me when he wasn't even a real agent. The men at the police station confirmed he'd been discharged from the bureau over six months ago for breaking lawful procedures on a cartel drug case.
Tank sacrificed himself to protect me. That big, crazy, hardheaded man had killed for me. And being locked up to pay for what he'd done, to pay for me, was surely worse than death. Every man in this MC gladly preferred death to going behind bars. Prison was worse, a place where they'd know they were never drinking or fucking or riding again.
Imagining Tank alone in some dingy cell made me bawl so loud Saffron had to lead me to his old room, before I split every brothers' eardrums open and flooded this clubhouse with my grief.
“It's him, isn't it?” Linda laid a gentle hand on my shoulder, the first real contact we'd had that was more than professional since Tank got her off my ass.
One more thing he'd done for me. Keeping her and the admin off my ass. Harsh, but effective.
There was no use in hiding it. I nodded, staring sadly into my cup of green tea. I was in the break room, alone and sulking before she came in.
“I read all about in the papers. What your cousin did, the way he mopped the floor with that guy...” Linda paused. “Frankly, the bastard deserved it.”
I looked up, daggers in my eyes, thinking she meant Tank.
“I'm talking about your asshole cousin.”
What? I wondered if I heard her right.
I was floored. Foul language and bloodlust wasn't the head RN I knew. Where did that stuffy granny go? The woman who withdrew her hand and circled the table to sit across from me was somebody totally different.
“I was harsh earlier, Emma, and I'm sorry. I want you to know I'm here to help. Not because you're part of my team – because I'm your friend.”
I shook my head. The whole damned world kept going topsy-turvy and batshit insane.
“Why, Linda? You're the one who tried to warn me about all this after they –“
“I know.” She held up a hand. “I wouldn't take the job you're doing off the books. I was mad they even offered it. But I don't blame you for doing what you need to. You've got a motive way more important than money now. This whole thing reminds me so much of Red...”
She closed her eyes, rubbing them behind her glasses. I sat up straight. She'd never breathed a word about anyone named Red before. Sounded like a road name.
“My daughter and her kids are all I have left of him,” she said with a sigh. “It was before I married Hugh. That sweet man has given me so much. Only man in the world who'd pick up a single mother in nursing school and keep on giving long after the nuptials. But the one thing he didn't do was everything Red offered...and he never killed for me.”
Cool lightning crept up my spine. I realized Linda was giving me her confession, reaching out to me the same way Saffron had as a biker's old lady.
“I was his. He was mine. It was the late seventies. The whole world was changing. I was a different girl then. Came from a broken home and started whoring around the Grizzlies club near Wallace just to get the hell out of Idaho. I never expected to fall in love.
“Red was everything. The only thing bigger than that man's tattooed muscles and his beard was his heart. He gave me his brand and a baby girl before things went to shit. God, being his old lady meant the world to me.” She shook her head. “One day, a bad deal went down. I was managing a little tourist shop just along the state border. Didn't make much serving beers and selling bison blankets. But it was the perfect place to hide our loot, everything we were saving for a house and Betsy's college.
“Like any man with a Harley, Red wasn't perfect, though he'll always be in my heart. When he drank, he talked a lot. Sometimes too much. The Grizzlies were bringing in more riff raff, about the time when old man Stomp retired and left the club to his VP, Fang. Some junkie asshole who came over from one of the little MCs they'd gobbled up around Coeur d'Alene heard about our cash.
“Red laughed too much after losing a couple thousand during a drunken poker game with his brothers. This asshole figured out there was more where that came from.
“I didn't see him coming. Neither did my little girl. The bastard broke in when I was closing up the shop. Ripped my baby girl out of her seat and put a gun to her head...”
Linda closed her eyes. Her face was tight, and she had to fight to hold in the tears.
Jesus, so did I. I'd only heard of Red a couple minutes ago, but he already made me think about Tank. My heart was breaking right alongside hers, a memory so intense and vivid I could see it as she told the story like it just happened yesterday.
“I managed to get him away from Bets and walked him to the stockpile we kept in a safe out back. Red showed up just in time to pick us up. He figured out fast something was fucked up. I watched him creep up behind the man while the weasel was distracted, hunting knife in his hand.
“Red was fast. Efficient. Unfortunately, so was he.” She sighed. “The jackass spun as soon as Red grabbed his head and put that knife in his throat. Somehow, he got a clean shot off before he bled out. The bullet went through my old man's heart. I held him as he died, felt the very second his soul gave out and his heart stopped pumping blood in my hands. I tried like hell to seal his wound, knowing it wouldn't do any good. I tried and watched him die.”
I lost it there. Tears started pouring out my hot red eyes. I grabbed Linda's hand in both of mine and squeezed as hard as I could.
God, how many times had Tank's blood been on my hands? If things had gone down differently with Mark, it would've happened again, maybe for the last time.
Bad as this was, he was in prison. He wasn't dead. And as long as he drew a single breath, I wasn't giving up.
When I visited him in jail yesterday, he'd tried to show me the door. I ran from that glass, trying to forget his heavy chains and orange jumpsuit, trying to scratch away the horrible words that kept rolling around and around in my head.
You wanna talk about regrets? Only one I got is breaking your heart. But if that's what it takes to keep you safe, then I'm game. One day, everything'll make sense, and I'll be nothing but a distant fucking memory.
Get the hell out and go live enough for both of us.
No, Tank. I wouldn't do it, no matter how many times he ordered me to with evil words. Didn't he see it?
Without him, there was no living. Without him, I was hollow, dead, ruined.
“Em, I left that lifestyle after Red. Losing him hurt too damned much. I tried to forget about it until the Devils showed up and started raising hell in town. At first, I wrote them off just like the filthy Grizzlies. The bears are a gross shadow of what they were when Red was alive...” She wiped her eyes with her free hand, trying to calm down. “I wrote you off too. Thought you were a fucking idiot for taking their money. I tried to scare you straight with that stunt about the medical supplies all those months ago...”
I nodded. Finally, I understood. “Oh, Linda. It's okay. I wish I'd known. If you'd told me about Red before...”
I stopped. I would've done things differently was at t
he tip of my tongue, but it would've been a lie.
No. Hell no. If I'd known about Red, the only thing different would've been rushing to Tank's side sooner, loving him more than any woman should.
I wouldn't have let him tell me no, the same way I won't hear it now.
“I was wrong, Emma,” she continued. “I've been coming around to admitting it for weeks. Red's been on my mind a lot, and I've been seeing his ghost twenty-four-seven since I heard about what happened with you and John.”
“Tank,” I said. “His road name's Tank. I don't care what they call him when he's locked up. Tank, John, whatever...I'm a total helpless fool for him. And I'm going to keep loving him the same way you loved Red.”
She nodded, solemn and approving. “You do that. Don't let him push you away! Don't let a few prison bars come between you two either. If Red had gone to jail, I would've been right there waiting. Just between you and me, as wonderful as Hugh's been for me since my young days, I'd give anything on this entire screwed up planet just for another hour with that man.”
Linda was looking right through me. It was like she could see him standing behind me, a phantom in the flesh, the man she'd loved and suffered for and kept loving long after he was dust.
“I won't do anything different,” I said, feeling my heartbeat filling my ears. “I can't! Thanks, Linda. You just got a ton of crap off my mind. I'm finally awake.”
She patted my hand. “Same here. And don't forget – if there's anything I can do to help – call me. I don't care if it's three o'clock in the morning. Call me, Emma. Best way I can honor Red's memory is making sure you ride off with your man, no matter how wrong it seems or how many laws you have to break.”
She got up and left the room. Probably needed more tissue after spilling her soul, and I didn't blame her.
You're wrong, Tank, I thought with a grimace. I'm not going to let you change your mind again. Somehow, someway, I'm going to dig my heart out and push it into your cell if I have to.
You saved me. Now, I'm going to do the same.
My dead fucking cousin and the law won't kill this love.