Liberated

by Dez Burke

  “Kendra.” Her name came out as an anguished plea. “Wait a second.”

  Her eyes were wide with confusion and mistrust. “You’re his attorney?” she asked. “What the hell does that mean? How is that possible? I don’t understand. You work at the tattoo parlor, right?”

  Flint felt like the earth was shifting underneath him. First Jesse, now Kendra. Everything was going to hell. He should’ve known the warm, happy feeling was too good to last.

  “It’s a long story and one that needs some time to tell,” he said. “Can you trust me enough to wait until I can explain it all to you before jumping to conclusions?”

  She threw up her hands and looked away. “I don’t even know what to say.”

  To Flint’s surprise, Sam stepped up beside her. “Kendra will be fine here with me. I’ll make sure she gets home safe and sound. You need to go and take care of Jesse. He needs you. I’ll take care of your girl. Don’t worry.”

  Flint reached up and squeezed Sam’s shoulder. He knew this was Sam’s way of offering an olive branch and making peace with him. It meant more to him than his younger brother would ever know.

  Flint let out a long breath. “Okay,” he said. “Can you make sure one of the crew follows her home? I need to get to the police station before Jesse loses his temper again and starts talking. They’ll use every tactic they know to make him lose his cool. And with Jesse, it doesn’t take much for him to go off anyway. I’d better hurry. Thanks, Sam.”

  He grabbed Kendra quickly and kissed her firmly on the lips. “I’ll make this right,” he said. “I’ll call you as soon as I can.”

  ****

  Kendra’s drive home from the party went by in a blur. Sam kept his word and sent one of the few crew members who wasn’t dead drunk to follow behind her and make sure she got home. He waited until she unlocked the front door and waved back at him before he took off.

  Kendra felt like crying when she finally made it inside her own house where nobody could see her. But she wasn’t the crying type, so she didn’t. Crying never solved a damn thing and it wouldn’t make her feel any less hurt at the moment, either.

  She couldn’t imagine ever being more shocked or surprised. Watching Jesse be arrested for the murder of the woman who had tried to help them was bad enough, but when Flint had stepped up and announced he was Jesse’s attorney, she felt like she’d been hit with a brick.

  Flint was a lawyer? How was that even possible? He would’ve had to spend several years in college and then law school. She thought he’d been gone from Bardsville for a couple of years, not a decade. Even crazier was the thought that the Steel Infidels had allowed a lawyer to be a member of the MC. Wouldn’t there be tons of conflict of interests there to consider? The ethical boundaries Flint was crossing must be incredible.

  It hurt her to think that in the time they’d spent together, Flint had never felt it important enough to mention he was a practicing attorney. In fact, he’d clearly led her to believe he was a tattoo artist who worked with Sam. He’d lied to her and now she felt betrayed and sick inside.

  She never should have trusted him so quickly. After all, what did she really know about Flint Mason except what he’d told her? Which if today’s incident was any indication was all a pack of lies.

  She rubbed her temples. Crap! Wouldn’t you know it? A damn migraine was coming on. Like she didn’t have enough problems at the moment. She reached for her prescription migraine medication and took one with a sip of water. The headaches always hit when she least needed them and when she most needed to think clearly.

  All of their conversations kept circling around and around in her head. Had he ever said outright he was a tattoo artist, or had she jumped to that conclusion? The more she thought about it, the more she realized he had never actually come right out and said what he did for a living or mentioned how he made money. All he had said was that he could do a mean tattoo and then offered to do a hummingbird tattoo for her.

  She hadn’t asked too many personal questions because she figured he was a private person and couldn’t talk about the MC’s business anyway. The few times she had started to ask about the tattoo parlor, he had changed the subject and asked about one of the coyote pups that had just come into the clinic or a Blue Jay with a broken wing. If she had been paying closer attention, she would have realized he was uncomfortable talking about his job. Probably because he knew he was covering up a lie. But why? It didn’t make any sense.

  In her heart, Kendra knew there must have been a good reason for him not to tell her he was a lawyer. It certainly wasn’t anything to be ashamed of and in fact, he should’ve been proud of his accomplishments. Unless he’d been disbarred, which he obviously wasn’t if he was able to represent Jesse.

  Kendra spotted her laptop sitting on the table. She’d been so busy lately that it hadn’t been turned on in weeks. Any quick emails to her clients were usually done on her cell phone while rushing between animal checkups. She wasn’t much of a computer person and felt like it was a useless time drain most of the time.

  Except for the very first night at the safe house, she hadn’t sincerely considered Googling Flint’s name to see what she could find. And then once they were solidly together as a couple, she had felt too guilty to be spying on him like that. Almost as if it would be a huge invasion of his privacy to dig into his online background. After all, she wouldn’t want him poking around in hers. Though her life was so boring there wouldn’t be anything to find, except maybe a few old photos of her with braces and glasses she’d rather nobody see.

  Taking a deep breath, she walked over and flipped open the laptop. As the computer booted up, she realized the main reason she hadn’t done this before was because she was afraid of what she might find. Oh sure, she could pretend like she was protecting his privacy and all that bullshit, when the honest truth was she didn’t want to find out anything that would make her care for him less.

  When the screen finally popped up, she entered his name.

  Flint Mason.

  Now or never. She hit the search button and held her breath.

  An hour later, she sat back and rubbed the back of her neck where the migraine had spread. She’d found out plenty about Flint Mason and had all she needed to know. Instead of the arrest records or other bad things she halfway expected to find, she instead found pages and pages of court cases where he’d represented innocent people as a public defender.

  From clearing a grandmother about to be evicted from the only home she’d ever known because her grandson was selling crack in the parking lot of the apartment building to defending a young mother accused of child endangerment because she’d left her kids alone while she ran to the grocery store. The Internet was full of his cases where he’d defended poor innocent people who couldn’t afford a big time lawyer on their own.

  From the timeline she’d mentally put together, it appeared Flint had spent the last several years working his way up in a public defender’s office in Atlanta. She knew enough to know the hours were probably long and the pay pretty low for the qualifications he had and the time he put in. She wondered what made him go into the field in the first place. And more importantly, what made him leave a job that he was obviously good at to come back home and hang out with a motorcycle club?

  There were so many unanswered questions about Flint. So much she wanted and needed to know.

  She felt like such a bitch. Flint had asked her to trust him and she’d turned away from him in a huff. He deserved better than to be treated in such a way. She wiped away the tears she couldn’t hold back any longer and grabbed her purse. It wasn’t too late to set things right.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Flint and Jesse were seated at a wooden table in the police station’s interrogation room with the two arresting officers. They’d been there for hours, with neither side making headway in either direction. The cops kept asking questions which Jesse refused to answer while Flint kept demanding that they turn over whatever evidence they ha
d on Jesse and the cops refusing to hand it over.

  Finally, after it was obvious the interrogation was going nowhere, the cops offered up the information Flint had been waiting all along for them to divulge. The arrest had been made based solely on Leah’s cell phone records, which contained several calls and a text message between her and Jesse on the day of her murder.

  The room went silent while Flint read the evidence file. “Can I have a moment alone with my client?” he asked when he was finished.

  “Sure,” the officer said, sliding back his metal chair. “I could use another cup of coffee anyway.” The officers stood up and left the room.

  Flint scooted his chair closer to Jesse. “You want to tell me now about the phone calls? Why the hell didn’t you mention this before?”

  Jesse shrugged and ran a hand through his hair. “I didn’t realize it was important. We both know the Liberators killed Leah for warning me they were on their way to the safe house. It never occurred to me that I would be a suspect in her murder. I didn’t realize it was important.”

  “You didn’t think the cops would check her cell phone records?” Flint asked.

  “I’m not that stupid,” Jesse replied. “I thought she was using a burner phone. I can’t believe she was calling me on her real cell phone. What does a prepaid phone cost? Ten bucks?”

  Flint shook his head in disbelief. “Even the Sweet Butts would have more sense than that, but it’s done now. Tell me about the calls.”

  “After Leah called to warn me that the Liberators were coming for you, she panicked,” Jesse said. “She called me several times that night because she was terrified they would figure out what she’d done. She seemed agitated and not like herself. Or at least not like the Leah I knew years ago.”

  “You think she was doing drugs?”

  “I heard through the grapevine that she was doing meth. Don’t know for sure. Something was different about her. I begged her to get the hell out of there because I knew they’d kill her if they suspected that she was a rat. I thought if I could convince her to meet me that I could talk her into leaving the Liberators for good. After I sent the last text message asking her to meet me, I never heard from her again. You know the rest of the story.”

  Flint didn’t speak for a moment, thinking about Leah’s battered body being dumped on the side of the road. He couldn’t imagine what she must’ve gone through before they finally killed her.

  “The Liberators probably found her cell phone,” he said. “Dammit! How could she have let that happen?”

  “Leah was a sweetheart, but she wasn’t the smartest gal in the world,” Jesse replied. “And she wasn’t thinking clearly if she was high. It makes me sick to think about what they did to her because she was helping us.”

  “Obviously you can’t come clean to the cops about what you two were talking about because that would lead straight back to the safe house and everything that happened on the mountain. How many text messages were there?” Flint knew any text messages would be used as direct evidence against Jesse.

  “Only one,” Jesse answered. “The text message asking her to meet me. I’d been calling her for hours and couldn’t get an answer, so I sent her a text.”

  “That wasn’t too smart on your part either,” Flint said. “So there are no other text messages going back and forth between you?”

  “No, I’m sure of that. Just the one. From me to her.”

  “Okay, that’s good to know,” Flint said. “If I had to take an educated guess, I would say the police don’t have enough real evidence to charge you or even hold you at this point. I don’t know what the hell these cops were thinking, dragging you in here with only phone records as evidence. I’m pretty certain I can get this thrown out in the morning as soon as you go before the judge. Are you sure there’s nothing else you haven’t told me?”

  “I swear,” Jesse replied. “You know everything I do.”

  Flint stood up and slapped Jesse on the back. “I’ll take care of this. You’re going to have to spend the night in jail since it’s so late on a Sunday evening, but by tomorrow night you’ll be back in your own bed. Or somebody else’s bed. Whatever makes you happy.”

  Jesse tried to smile. “I knew all that damn lawyer stuff of yours would come in handy some day.”

  Flint rapped twice on the door to let the officers know to unlock it from the outside so he could leave. He turned back to Jesse. “You probably never noticed or needed to care up until now, but I’m a damn good lawyer. And I can be fucking brilliant in court when I set my mind to it. You don’t need to worry.”

  Jesse grew serious. “I noticed. I never said it out loud, but I’m proud of you. Always was, so go get me the fuck out of here. I’m counting on you.”

  “I got this. See you in the morning.”

  ****

  By the time Flint had filled out all the paperwork, it was already late. He hated like hell leaving Jesse in jail overnight, but there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it until the morning. Jesse was tough and he’d make it through the night just fine. It wasn’t as if this was the first time he’d been arrested either, though the offenses were usually stupid misdemeanors like public drunkenness or disturbing the peace. Never anything serious enough to keep him in the slammer for more than a day or two.

  Flint had already contacted a bail bondsman he knew and had everything ready to go if he couldn’t convince the judge to dismiss the charges first. His connections from the public defender’s office were definitely paying off now when he needed them. Never in a million years would he have foreseen having to represent his brother on a murder charge.

  Flint zipped up his leather jacket and stepped outside the police station. He headed for his motorcycle parked in the far end of the lot. Even at a police station, he knew better than to park his bike close to any of the other cars. Too many times he’d found his bike lying on its side where a car had “accidentally” backed into it.

  Even now, some idiot had parked their truck right beside his bike, even with all the empty spots closer to the building. The truck’s door opened and a shadowy figure stepped out. Flint automatically felt for the pistol he normally kept in his inside jacket pocket then remembered he had left it at the house since he couldn’t be caught carrying a weapon into the police station. The person turned and he caught sight of her hair under the pale glow of the streetlight.

  Kendra!

  He ran the last few steps then drew up short when he reached her side. “What are you doing here?”

  She tugged her coat tighter around her. “I needed to see you. And to check on Jesse, too. How’s he doing?”

  “He’s okay for now,” Flint answered. “Unfortunately, there’s no way I can get him released on bail tonight. It will have to wait until morning after he goes before a judge.”

  “Will he be in a cell by himself?”

  “I hope so. I’m not worried though. Jesse has quite a reputation, and I would be surprised if anyone in this town has enough nerve to mess with him in there.”

  “How about you?” Kendra asked in a soft voice. “Are you doing okay?”

  “Much better, now that you’re here.”

  She looked away, unable to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry,” she said simply. “You asked me to trust you and give you time to explain. I was hurt and confused so I acted childish.”

  “Kendra, you don’t ever need to apologize to me for anything. I should’ve told you the truth right upfront.”

  “Why didn’t you?” she asked, the hurt coming through in her voice. “I don’t understand why you felt you couldn’t tell me you were a lawyer. And a damn good one too, from what I’ve read. You let me go on believing you were a tattoo artist. I felt like you had tricked me. For the life of me, I can’t figure out why.”

  Flint sighed and leaned back against the hood of her truck. “This is going to sound really stupid, and you probably won’t even believe me.”

  “Yes, I will,” Kendra reassured. “Just tell
me.”

  “I’m not that person anymore,” he tried to explain. “A guy who puts on a business suit and goes to work every day at the courthouse. Defending clients who may or may not be innocent. I made a decision to leave all that behind and come home. To rejoin the Steel Infidels and to be there for my brothers if they needed me. My life is so different now.” He hesitated, struggling to come up with the right words. “I didn’t tell you because I needed you to like me for the man I am now. A bad guy. An outlaw. Not the good guy I tried to be before. No matter how much I might want to be, I can’t be that guy anymore. It would be wrong to fool you into thinking I was something more than I am.”

  Kendra moved closer and wrapped her arms around his neck. “What am I going to do with you, Flint? You’re killing me here. You are a good guy. Why can’t you see that? Maybe not the same type you were before. But still every bit as good inside here.” She touched his heart. “Where it counts the most.” She smoothed his hair back from his forehead. “I like this man. Just the way you are now. You don’t need to change anything for me.”

  Flint was still worried. “There are so many things I want to tell you,” he said. “To explain why I left my job in Atlanta and came back home. I just need a little more time and I promise I’ll tell you everything you want to know.”

  “Even about the Liberators?” she asked.

  Flint hesitated. “Yes, that too.” She deserved to know everything.

  More importantly, Kendra was giving him another chance.

  He rubbed the corner of her eyelid with his thumb, where a smudge of mascara had smeared.

  “Have you been crying?” he asked, already knowing the answer. Even the thought that he could make his beautiful Kendra cry ripped his heart out.

  “I’m okay now,” she answered truthfully. She sank her hands into his hair and pulled his face closer. “But you can make me feel much better. I know what I need.”