by Ryder Dane
“I’m ready, Daddy, let’s go sort this shit out.”
Stevie had to smile at them, “Yeah, Daddy, let’s do this.”
Rolf walked in the door first, looked around and turned back to nod at his women. All three James family members walked slightly spread, Stevie cut over to the bar where the big screen was hung on the wall behind the long planks polished over the years with seat and beer. She walked around the bar, checked out the gaming system cords, and made her selection. She plugged the laptop in and began the feed to the big screen. She gave the bartender a look, and he held his hands aloft and backed away. She nodded her head. The brother grinned at the scene behind her back. She turned in time to see her mother throw her colors in the president’s direction, and her father sneered at the big man as he shoved his vest under his nose, and left it on the table in front of him.
“I was born into this club, my fuckin’ granddad started the fucker after the war because he and his war buddies wanted to keep in touch. They had each other’s backs in the goddamned foxhole fighting the reign of that pencil lipped little cocksucker. They wanted to protect each other from their own fuckin’ unjust laws and restrictions. My goddamned father bought it two weeks after he got back from that jungle in Nam.
“I’ve put my time in defending this country, and I took the shit that came down that had nothing to do with what I was doin’. I took all that, for the group. My whole family suffered for this group. I got the proof, and the reason. I’m done giving to this bunch of turncoat motherfuckers. There’s no way that cocksucker did all this shit on his own, he ain’t smart enough. I know in my gut he had backing.”
Bernell started to rise, he was the VP after all, it was time this big motherfucker got what he deserved.
Rolf put his hand on the prez’s shoulder. “You should know you are about to lose your Vice, so you might want to stay out of this, maybe you want to go to the bar over there and watch a movie while I take care of something. Your choice, I’m done talking either way.”
He no longer cared what the others thought, he’d walked in the door and the red haze started falling, filling his brain. He walked over to where Bernell waited with a handful of men beside and behind him.
“Did you tell your pussy boys that it’s a good day to die? Did you tell them that you’re running drugs and causing families to be ripped apart?” The red rage grew brighter with every word he spoke, and Rolf reached for Bernell. The other man wasn’t quick enough to escape his clenching fists.
Rolf hauled him forward and lifted him to his toes. “Did you really believe you would engineer my downfall and walk around like a lilly assed prince? Motherfucker, you fucked the wrong family. Telling my boy not to come back was the dumbest fuckin’ thing you could do, making the deal with Pascal was the second dumbest thing, stickin’ around for me to find out you’re still fuckin’ with my kids. Well, you blue balled goat fucker, you gonna worry about it now.”
He began shaking Bernell from the moment he had him in his grasp, the fucker was smirking at him, and that pulled the red veil down completely. Bernell went flying into the nearest table and Rolf was right behind him to grab him in his hands again. Everyone in the room could feel the bone crunch when the big man jerked his opponent over his raised knee into the ribs running alongside of the man’s spine. If they didn’t feel it in person, it made no difference, watching the VP’s body arch and flopped helplessly in the legendary Rolf’s hands gave them all the proof they needed.
Rolf yanked the arrogant bastard’s arm up, jerking his bent body straight, while his fist planted itself dead center on Bernell’s face. He shoved the two hundred pound man and laughed as Bernell landed face first into the wall. He slid down the wall and lay in the floor, not even a telltale twitch was seen, but Rolf threw three chairs at the possibly already dead man.
Two of Bernell’s allies came at him, making the mistake of showing blades in their grasp. Rolf grinned at them and held out his hands in a come and get it gesture. He was busy with them and barely registered the sound of a gunshot behind him. The second shot didn’t register as he enjoyed punishing his enemies. Hearing the pained screams of the man who he just crushed his wrist that had been holding a knife and Rolf used the hand holding the knife to shove it into his buddy’s ribcage. Both men went down and stayed down, and when Rolf came after them to finish punishing them, they crawled away, leaving trails of blood and piss. He overturned tables and chairs to get them, roaring all the while.
He had no idea he was carrying a bullet in his lower back, and was bleeding, but June Bug had shot the fucking coward as soon as she saw which man held the gun still pointing toward Rolf. She then climbed up onto the bar with her Glock .40 pointing into the crowd.
Stevie told the bartender to move from the back of the bar to where she could see him and then joined her mother in policing the twelve men still standing or sitting in the room.
Trencher had taken Rolf’s advice and skirted the fight to go over to the bar. He was lucky enough to have gotten a beer from Tim before the blonde beauty essentially shut the bar down by forcing Tim from his post. The video feed on the big screen was pissing him off, and now that he knew what had set Rolf off, he couldn’t blame the man for wanting blood. In the first few frames, he’d recognized Rolf’s boy, Harry, behind a classy bar setup, and he saw what good ol’ Leon was doing right off. The tape must have been stopped there, and resumed with Stevie behind the bar, and Leon was there too. Seeing him sneak in the building at late hours of the night after Stevie disappeared from the video, opening the board of the small stage and packing bricks inside and tapping the wood back into place.
Twice he saw Bernell and Pascal join Leon in digging the packages from under the stage and hauling them from the building. The last few minutes of the video showed the vindictive grin on Leon’s face as he set the fire.
This certainly explained a lot of what he’d been seeing in the past couple of years. He shook his head at his own stupidity, no wonder the brother was ready to do damage, Trencher himself was ready to hurt someone, but Rolf had earned his revenge, and as the president of Thor’s Legion, he made the decision to ignore anything he didn’t see tonight.
Standing close enough to kick him in the head was Rolf’s woman. She was magnificent standing over the room with that 1911 in her hands, steady as a rock. He kept his head staring at the TV screen for the most part, but couldn’t resist bending forward enough to see Stevie Lee James with a fuckin Glock, with the same stance as Momma, and he was impressed by the two women’s bravery. He wouldn’t have kicked either woman from his bed. June Bug was a rare bitch, there was no flirting with the men in the club on any level. She only had Rolf in her sights while they were in the clubhouse and he envied the closeness the two shared.
His own ol’ lady was dead, and good riddance to her. She had been a faithless whore and he’d lost all feeling for her the day she aborted his kid. She’d been with that scum from the Swamp Rats, Pappy D, and was rolled out of the door of a rusty fuckin’ pick-up truck at the driveway. She was hopped up on some drug and started running down the road following the pick-up. The stupid woman had run right in the path of an eighteen wheeler. Curtis had been around then, he had dealt with the whole thing because Trencher had been drunk at the time.
He wanted to turn around and enjoy watching Rolf clean the clubhouse’s rats out, but when it came for Church tomorrow, he wasn’t going to say one fuckin’ word against the man or his family. He was here, but hadn’t seen a thing. Dammit.
*****
John watched the Swamp Rat leave the property and he nodded at the Prospect at the gate, and turned to go back inside the building. He barely cleared the doorway when he heard bikes pulling in outside. He kept going to the back room where he saw Baron walking into behind Gunner’s wheelchair.
Myrtle had Melvin sitting his happy furry ass right up on the bar watching the people in the room. Myrtle handed him a beer as he walked past.
He needed to touch base w
ith the two men before he headed out to find his woman.
Gunner was bitching about his confinement in the motorized chair, but he was grinning and optimistic about getting out of the damn thing in the next few weeks.
“Stretch is giving me too much sass, enjoying the fact she can outrun me, as soon as I am mobile her little ass will be feeling my wrath.”
Baron laughed out loud, last night their woman had gotten a taste of the spanking she’d been courting, but touching her bare ass had led to other things and she’d sidetracked them with her passions. “Face it, bro, she has our number, and we wouldn’t want her any other way.”
He was still grinning as John walked in the door. “So we can safely say that you’ve been successful with your hunt?”
John nodded, “Taken care of, disposed of, now I have to go hunt down my woman. I got a text saying she had to take care of her problems because she wasn’t the helpless woman she thinks I believe she is.” He shook his head. She had no idea how he really thought about her, soon, he promised himself.
“I need some background on her and Viking. Do you know, I don’t think she even knows Harry’s road name? He spent a lot of energy keeping her in the dark about the club here. She thought that we would be mad at her for whining about the extortion shit. That fucker, Leon, wasn’t with Candle when I caught up with him, so she’s going to still be a target. Lonnie is still butt hurt that she gave him the slip, and the whole goddamned thing is a clusterfuck.
“When I get my hands on Viking, I’ll be having a chat with the boy. I understand why he left, hell if it had been me, I would have done the same fuckin’ thing. He neglected to make arrangements for her safety or let her know that he’s alive, and that doesn’t set right with me. He should have known she’d be vulnerable.”
Gunner was shaking his head before John was finished talking. “Hang on a minute, man, the club let her down, he asked for us to keep an eye on her while he was gone. He was only supposed to be dead for a few months, but from the last text I got, he was following some dirty Fed fucker, then got himself fucked up when his scoot collided with a damned gator that ran out in front of him.
“He was following the fucker who was transporting the shipment at the time, so his stay in Florida was extended by over a month, and by then he had to catch the fucker on another run. He’s been with his old club, Thor’s Legion, in a charter down by Tampa. The last I heard, he was still working with Curtis. When I heard about Stevie being attacked, I sent him a text and the particulars.”
John considered what he had been told. He knew that Viking had been with another club when he walked in the door, but he hadn’t bothered to ask which club. The young brother had quite a resume if he had been with those guys. John had never been involved with any of the members of the outlaw bikers, but he’d heard plenty of stories.
It stood to reason, if Stevie’s brother was a former Thor’s Legion member, then she must be involved too. Fuck, he was resigned to the two day trip and he wasn’t actually positive that she was with them. Sighing, he looked at Gunner.
“I don’t believe she knew he was alive yesterday, so I don’t think she would be in Florida with him. Where do you think would be the most likely place to begin? I could just get on the scoot and drive, but I’d like some idea of a destination.”
Baron and Gunner exchanged nods and Baron told him about the tall skinny kid who walked into the club one night and asked to speak with him.
“The kid was good, he earned his rockers, and was loyal to the club. He brought his sister in the next day, and maybe a half a dozen times since then, but he said that she wasn’t cut out for the life. The night you helped us torch that bike wasn’t supposed to go down like it did.”
“As for Thor’s Legion, be careful, Stevie’s ol’man is the biggest motherfucker I’ve ever seen. I’ve run into him a few times over the years, and he isn’t the kind of man who will give anyone a pass when it comes to something he considers his or the club’s. Last I heard was the parents were in prison, that’s why Viking came here. He told me that he couldn’t take his sister back either.
“He was nervous, but someone had put some balls on the kid, he didn’t blink when Skids gave him shit, or any of the other’s for that matter.”
John was beginning to look impatient, and Baron gave him the information he’d came to them for. “If I was a betting man, I think it’s a safe bet she went back to the club in ‘Bama, that’s the only place I would think to look.”
John was halfway out of his chair when Gunner started to laugh.
“Man, you want to think about meeting the woman’s parents, especially if Rolf is her father. That is one fucker I think could wipe the floor with your arrogant ass. I wish you luck, man, but I’ll expect to hear you have to be carried from the man’s tender taps on your head.”
He was still grinning as John left the room after getting the address from Baron, and flipped him the bird. “Our boy has his work cut out for him.”
Chapter Thirteen
John took the bagger back to the garage and exchanged it for his personal scoot. The ride wouldn’t be as comfortable, but he liked it better and Stevie would want to drive her Jeep home, once he convinced her that she wanted to come back with him. That was going to be the hard part. The warnings about her ol’ man didn’t faze him, but then nothing much scared him anymore. He didn’t plan to fight with the man, he’d try reasoning with him first.
He spent the night under the stars in his bedroll, once he’d found a grove of peach trees that had been picked clean. Looking into the night sky reminded him of the long nights in the desert and again during the time he began wandering in an attempt to find a place to call his own. Juanita had been his choice, his business was doing well. He’d been dragging ass about the family he wanted to have, and it was high time he did some catching up. He would be thirty-one in May, and the thought of little people running through the woods by his cabin made him smile.
He wasn’t in love with Stevie, but he wasn’t far from it. This nagging sense of loss was riding him hard since he read her last text. He had to admit that she caught his eye the first time he saw her coming into the garage, with her shiny gunmetal grey Jeep after her brother had given it to her for graduating college.
That day he’d thought she was younger than she actually was by a couple of years. She had a young looking boy with her that day, and every thirty-two hundred miles after she showed up by herself. She always insisted John do the oil change, her brother told her to take it to John to have it serviced, and she was stubborn about it. This last year, she’d stopped insisting he take care of the Jeep, she didn’t have the time he usually made her wait for him to finish what he was working on to deal with the simple maintenance. He felt resentment for her defection, even if she had good reason for it.
He missed catching her staring at his ass through the glass partition separating the client waiting room and the shop itself. Twice he’d busted his knuckles while staring at her instead of paying attention to what he was working on. “Face it, dumbass, she’s got your dick twisted up in a knot.”
Sex with other women was physically satisfying, and now that he thought about it, every one of the handful of sex partners had been blonde for almost a year. Fuck.
He fell asleep with a swollen cock, and woke up to the sound of something moving nearby. The colt was in his hand within seconds and pointed toward the sounds of movement in the grass. It was a deer running through the trees being chased by a small pack of mangy dogs. None of the animals paid him any attention, and he thought about shooting the damn dogs, but he didn’t want to draw attention to his resting spot, and hell, the laws of nature. The dogs were at least working for their dinner, he hoped the deer got away, but if he didn’t, at least the meat would keep the dogs from attacking someone’s kid or a farmer’s livestock.
He groaned as he got up and stretched the kinks out of his back. Damn, it seemed the ground got harder each year. He took a piss and pulled a bott
le of water from his saddlebags and rinsed his mouth, before drinking the clear liquid to quench his thirst. First stop would be for food and gas, it would be another long ride today to reach Wescott, Alabama.
He pulled into the parking lot of the former corset factory turned into the Mother Chapter for Thor’s Legion. There were several scoots already there, and once he parked his bike, he admired a beautifully restored 45 flathead 1948 model. Painted a bright candy apple red, with added chrome accents, and he envied the owner.
He could hear muffled sounds that sounded suspiciously like a bar fight. The man sailing through the door confirmed his suspicions. Unfortunately for the man, whose neck got slammed by the heavy steel door, a long arm grabbed the head of greasy hair and tried to pull it back into the building without moving the door from where his neck was wedged between the door and frame.
John decided to save the cleaners the trouble of cleaning up a decapitated head and pulled back on the door handle to allow the unmoving body to be moved on the next jerk of the head. The noises of breaking furniture and the continuous roar of a deep voice gave him reason to sneak a look around the opened door and step inside.
He looked around to see several hands exchanging money while a man roughly resembling a Kodiak bear was tossing men around like they were matchsticks. His hair was as wild as his eyes, and John had seen men in this condition before and wanted no part of what this man was dishing out.
He was tossing tables and chairs out of his way in his quest to capture the men that scrambled on hands and knees to avoid whatever punishment he was planning for them. One man was holding his bleeding side and had been heading toward the door when it was open. The crestfallen look on his face as the door slammed shut was almost comical, and the man hung his head in defeat. The berserker sent his huge booted foot under the bleeding man’s ribcage sending the man onto his back, only to be picked up from the floor by his cut, and having a meaty fist pulverize his face and head.