Forbidden Beauty

by Abriella Blake

  “Jesus.”

  “I know. The fuzz found him face down on South Beach, bike vanished. It was a Magnum .45, killed him. Three bullet holes—the neck, the temple, the left shoulder. Those fucking Knights of Styx will have hell to pay.” Dog's face was now twisted with an anger I'd never seen on him before. His lips were a cruel snarl. For all his nickname, he looked like nothing so much as a livid Rottweiler.

  “How do we know it was the Knights?!”

  He gave me a look like I'd asked him if two plus two still equaled four. So that was where we were: behind enemy lines. This meant war.

  “Really, Dog. I don't think they did it. Why would they? We've all got a lot of enemies. Coulda been anyone.”

  Clearly unconvinced, my friend offered his arm to help me stand. “There's going to be a council meeting this evening to figure out our next move. The gang will want you there. Den Mother gets a say in things, too.” His face grim, Dog turned to go.

  “You're not even going to ask me if I need a comfort fuck?” I teased, merely hoping to get that hellbent look off my buddy's face. Determination made Dog frightening. I much preferred him as the ever-inappropriate joker, or even the creepy, too-handsy ex...whatever.

  But he didn't bite. Instead, the biker pretended not to hear me and swiveled on his boot heels, leaving me alone in the kitchen.

  * * *

  Before the council meeting officially commenced, Dixon made a big show of filling everyone's tumbler to the brim with Cutty Sark.

  “In vino veritas,” the bloated biker said, coming to rest on his stool. Something from a discarded Latin textbook drifted through my memory: vino was wine, wasn't it? Whatever. A humid wind rustled through the rafters of the Crossroads. Outside, the sky grew dark. Mosquitoes buzzed around us.

  Flapper—too antsy to sit—was pacing the ground. He'd take a quick slurp of his booze, then hustle back and forth so quick that much of his drink slopped along the floor, joining the detritus of a thousand ancient parties. It smelled especially rank in the Crossroads that day—a whiff of decomposing rodent ran through the air. I shifted on my upturned bucket. I wanted to steer the Cheaters towards a new leader as much as anyone, but this meeting already felt creepy. The silent leaders, the solemn drinking of booze... it all felt like the stuff of old drama, the kind of thing Tati and I might have picked up in one of our secondhand school books. Something is rotten in the state of Miami-Dade...

  Flapper, at last unable to contain his fury, spoke first. “Well, we know who it was. The problem now is only: how do we find the bastards?”

  “They'll be in hiding already, if they know what's good for 'em. Goddamn cowards.” Dixon removed a pinch of chew from a tin and fixed this below his bottom teeth.

  “I say we put all the spare riders we got on reconnaissance. Look everywhere. Scour Miami Beach, downtown—tip off any friends we have on the force. We find one of the dipshits, we find 'em all. Plain and simple.”

  Dixon and Flapper nodded in mutual assent, but then both riders turned to Tall Man. The old bastard had spoken not a word so far.

  “With this way, you will bring war on the Coffin Cheaters again,” he murmured slowly. “I do not think we should move towards a showdown. Not just yet.”

  Flapper's eyes seemed to pulse with rage at this placid suggestion, but Dixon convincingly swallowed his pride. All drank for a moment in silence. For the first time it occurred to me that there must have been bad blood circling between our club's three de facto leaders. These three men, despite any pretense to the contrary, were not friends.

  “Den Mother,” Tall Man said, turning to me. “What do you think?”

  Feeling six angry eyes on me, I sucked down a finger of the Cutty Sark so hard it made me break out coughing. Not a one of the bikers leaned forward to pat me on the back—they just continued to stare at me, dubious, as if I were some object they'd been told contained a magical property.

  “So the choice is between—sending out all the scouts on some kind of rampage, or...doing nothing?”

  Disappointed, Tall Man flicked his eyes away from me. He spat out his next words. “We would never do nothing.”

  “I think Tall Man is asking if we should we risk an open assault, or look for a culprit on a quieter scale.” Dixon contemplated the bottom of his glass as he said this, and for a moment he looked like nothing so much as a sad drunk at a day bar. “We have ways of moving around...quietly.”

  “But no one knows who's done it still, isn't that right? No one saw who killed Rodney?” My pulse was quickening. Unless...

  “Oh, we've got a pretty good lead on that. There's a few friends of the Cheaters can attest to a Knight in the area around the time of the incident—fella called Knox, according to a credit card bill we've got our hands on.” My heart sank.

  I reached for my glass again, to the raised eyebrows of my council peers. They were used to the company of quiet, sweet-voiced women. Nunu and Esse and Rayna liked to make a big show of their two drink maximum—it took each of them just a glass and a half of white wine before they became giggling heaps of lady garbage. Tati was the same way, but I'd never understood this female compulsion to act cute in front of the boys—perhaps because I had such a hard time with playing coy. Though was it just my imagination, or was Flapper smiling over his glass at me in an especially lecherous way? I averted my gaze from the rider and focused on finishing my drink. Yeah—focus, Gisele. What you say next is very, very important.

  “I don't think a manhunt is the answer,” I said carefully. I rocked to and fro on my bucket, I huffed a bit of air towards my flyaway reds—anything to convince them that there was no stake behind my attitude. I was pure casual. “The morale of the club has already been compromised. Wouldn't it be better to present a strong front? Turn the other cheek for now, wait until a good opportunity for retaliation presents itself?”

  The council was studying me closely. Dixon had even glanced up from his empty tumbler.

  “What kind of opportunity?” Tall Man ventured. His eyes were so cold and grey. The perfect opposite of Carter's warm, dark pupils.

  “Well...” I scrambled. “Say there's a big skirmish in the paper in the next few days—some unsolved robbery or something.” Dixon laughed. In our county, such things were daily occurrences.

  “We could tip off the cops, maybe. Find some way to link the Styx to a high-profile case. The police around here are always happy to have cause to investigate an MC. And can you think of anything more humiliating for a rider? 'MC found complicit with some big racket, every single one of the suckers goes to jail?'” I made myself let out a small giggle, praying all the while that it sounded unstaged. “I just think—we could do something bigger, something better. Something that will hit the whole club where it hurts. Violence is what they're good at. They'll be expecting us to tail them, and they'll be prepared.” Okay. That last part had made sense, at least. Please, face, don't blush. Whatever you do, don't blush.

  The Crossroads fell silent again, each man lost in his own thoughts. Flapper was evidently not a fan of the high road—he continued to clench and unclench his fists as he stomped across the seedy ground.

  “I don't want to lose more men,” Tall Man conceded at last, after a pause that had felt hours long. I might have collapsed with relief, but I couldn't show my cards. Pops had taught me that, in midnight poker games by the moat.

  “It might be better to wait. To come up with some...plan.” As soon as he'd forced the word out, I was sure I was home safe. If there was one thing Riders were not good at, it was following through with a plan.

  The three of us turned to Flapper, the little mad dog. His eyes found mine for a brief staring contest, and I mustered my courage. What was so scary about him, anyways? So there was a rumor he'd shot someone. There were plenty of rumors everywhere. Talk was cheap in an MC.

  “I don't like it,” the smallest rider began. “I think 'morale' would be just fine if we put a price on the head of every Knight of Styx we've ever seen. And
that's the god's honest truth.” He fumbled in his leather vest for the crooked end of a cigarette, jammed this into his mouth. “But if the council wants to wait...I will follow the council's decision.” He cut his eyes at me again, then returned his attention to the smoke. I let out a slow, silent exhale.

  Then—weirdly, in my opinion—Dixon bowed his head like someone in church. “Thank you, Den Mother, for your righteous guidance.” Drawing the last few fingers of Cutty from the folds of his leather jacket, he leaned over the circle and filled my glass again. The previous draught was already beginning to make my head buzz, my limbs loosen.

  Without a word of goodbye or a glance in my direction, Tall Man lurched out of the Crossroads. Dixon smiled weakly at me, then also began to weave away towards the clubhouse quarters. Watching them retreat, I wondered if either rider were truly sorry to learn of Rodney's death. Though not always on the best of terms, these men had shared a brotherhood. Vows had been exchanged. Were they remembering the good times with their former leader? Did they feel at all like I had, when I'd lost my father? Or even how I felt daily, recalling the absence of my twin?

  I stood to go, turning my back on Flapper, who now murmured softly in the direction of his drink. Of all the club members, this man felt the least like a “brother” to me.

  “Seems odd, is all,” he said now into the dirt, bending down to snuff his cigarette in the mushy earth.

  I couldn't help it; I turned around. Curiosity killed the cat. Flapper's agitation was palpable in his movements—he looked dangerous as a funnel cloud. I fought a sudden urge to run out of the room. Find my bunk, lock the door, push a chair against the lock.

  “A Knight killed your Pappy. And not one bone in you wants to hunt the fuckers down?”

  “I don't go in for all that cowboy justice. I just think we could hit harder if we think things through. That's all.”

  Flapper took a few paces towards me, his brow furrowed. I held my ground. “When you lose someone you love, last thing you should be doing is thinking, little girl.” Then, before I could move, Flapper had snaked a beefy arm around my middle. He drew me close to him, so I was inches away from his spotted, pocked face. His fingers were clammy. He smelled like tobacco and stale rain. A smile revealed a spotty top shelf of crumbling, yellow teeth. When he spoke to me, he whispered.

  “You ever need help finding your heart in that foxy shell—you know where to look.” Then Flapper dug his fingers into the flesh of my arms. His nails were so sharp they nearly drew blood. I was too afraid to knee him in the junk, but too proud to scream for help. As I pushed against his grimy touch, the old Rider just pressed me closer and then proceeded to slide his long, scratchy tongue across the surface of my cheek.

  Then, just as suddenly, he dropped me like a hot potato. I wavered, stunned, in my motorcycle boots, but didn't fall to the earth. Flapper's eyes looked wild, crazy, and I saw that he was laughing. Neatly, he barreled past me, making for the exit. Finally, he called to me over his shoulder:

  “Better watch out for those unsavory characters, little girl. Can't trust no one. Not your family, no one.”

  For his last act of humiliation, Flap pulled the dangling string of the Crossroads' bare light bulb—the wide room's sole light source—leaving me alone, to fumble towards the outside in absolute darkness.

  Chapter Eight

  * * *

  Once I had returned to my room—and locked the door, and shoved a chair against the lock—I began to pace along the floorboards. This was hot water like I'd never known before.

  I was so totally and completely in over my head. Time to think, Gizzy. Think, think, think.

  At the very least, the whole MC wouldn't be out tailing Carter tomorrow morning. I had done my best to protect my lover (or whatever I was supposed to call him)—and at this point, not having his blood on my hands was about the best I could do. But that didn't mean his club was safe from the Cheaters' vengeance—especially not with cretins like Flapper on the road.

  Then again, I thought, halting my train of thought: who was to say that the Styx hadn't killed Rodney? It seemed, in that moment, as likely as not that our oldest enemies were behind the murder of our leader. And Carter! He hadn't struck me as a liar, when he'd bragged to me in that darkened bedroom about how he'd never killed a man—but was it possible that I'd been hoodwinked? Might Knox, in some way, have been using me to get to Rodney? Moreover, was Knox a killer? I paused in my treading, leaning against my bedframe for support.

  But no, wait, hold up—a real leader didn't think this way. There was no hard evidence, no proof whatsoever that Rodney had even been murdered on the beach with a Magnum...all I had to go on was the word of the high council, and Lord knew that those three misers were capable of trading in misinformation. It was certainly better to not jump to conclusions. And some illogical but confident inner voice believed Knox—he couldn't be a murderer. I figured that no one with those hands, those eyes, that mouth, was capable of destroying life. Flapper, on the other hand, had the markings of a madman. Even if I didn't know all the facts yet, I knew who I could trust.

  My mind was made up, if my allegiance was still confused: I needed to get a message to the boy, and fast. If Carter was still bumming around town because “he couldn't not touch me” (oh, how I flattered myself...), he needed to scram. I also wanted my own answers: what were the Styx really doing back in Miami-Dade? Didn't they know how dangerous it was, even crossing Coffin Cheaters turf?

  * * *

  Casablanca was uncharacteristically empty that night. The dance floor, vacant, reminded me of an abandoned city pool that Tati and I used to bum around, back during our brief, pre-teen flirtation with skateboards. The whole bar was shuttered, the tiki torches unlit. I caught a glint of lonely moonlight dancing on the tip of the sundial (/birdbath...), back in the pavilion where he'd first touched me.

  “Hello?” I called into the empty, hearing only an echo. I crept across the garden path towards Scotty's house. It was a weeknight, and late, but still—I hadn't banked on the club looking like this. I crept across the grounds, scanning the area for any sign of recent traffic, but: nothing. Spooky.

  Before leaving the compound, I'd had to wait until all the bikers had trundled off to bed. Huddled in a ball in the far corner of the top bunk, I'd watched the big house until every last light had been extinguished. Then I'd walked my ride in neutral down past the moat, waiting to climb aboard until I was some distance away from the main house. It had been so strange. I felt like a runaway, sneaking away from home in the middle of the night. And a not-so-small part of me felt like a traitor.

  There appeared to be a single candle flickering in Scotty's bedroom window, which I took as an invitation. Moseying up to his front door, I knocked twice—lightly—on the screen door. As my eyes adjusted to the gloom, I took note of the interior: the room was slightly disheveled, unlike it had been a few nights prior. The living room furniture looked off-center to me, as if someone had shoved the couches and tables to the side and then failed to return them to their proper locations. Had there been some kind of skirmish here? Fear began to grumble in my chest.

  I knocked again. Louder this time.

  “Who's there?” rasped a voice, quick to respond At first I didn't recognize Scotty's scratchy baritone; in freaked-out whisper mode, the bar owner might have been a child. But following his sound with my gaze, I watched Scotty's stubby frame materialize. He was dressed in black from head to toe.

  “It's me. It's Gisele.”

  “Oh, Jesus. Keep your voice low.” Toddling toward the door and beginning to undo a few complicated-sounding locks, I took further inventory of my host. Scotty was pallid, his eyes were sleepless. It was hard to believe that a mere few days ago this man had been the gleeful conductor of a big, fun party. Now, he looked like a refugee.

  “What's going on?” I asked, struggling to keep my voice to a whisper. “Your club is closed.”

  On entering the cottage, I confirmed my original suspicions
: there had definitely been some kind of scuttle here. A slashed pillow was raining feathers across the living room floor. A creepy stain of some dark material was still glistening, fresh-looking, on the shag rug.

  “Were you followed here?” Scotty asked sharply. I noticed then how he'd kept us by the entrance, forbidding my full passage into his house.

  “No. I snuck away. But --”

  “If you want him, he isn't here.”

  “...Oh. Well, do you know where he is? Because I have an important message.”

  The old bartender regarded me as if I were a cockroach. And for a moment, my fear took on a new shape. Did Scotty think I was the enemy? Was it possible that some member of the Coffin Cheaters was responsible for the shuttered club, this destroyed room? But how could that be, when I'd been watching our club's grounds all night? As far as I knew, no one had left my camp to hunt trouble.

  Just then, I heard what was fast-becoming my favorite sound in the universe: the rumbling strength of Carter's grunted laugh, coming from someplace I couldn't see in the low light:

  “It's alright, Scotty. She's okay.”

  “But Case, how can you--?”

  “I said it's okay, Scotty.”

  I turned my head to and fro, searching for his face in the dark. In another instant, I understood: the odd stain. The slashed pillows. I ran towards the couch. Knox lay among the wreckage, his sculpted face pale. He was clutching an arm to his naked chest.

  “What happened?!”

  “As if you don't know! You and your whole filthy MC!” Scotty spat out these words, wagging a fat finger in my face. I would have defended my club, but I was so worried looking down at Knox that I couldn't spare the little goon any attention. My eyes fully adjusted to the light, I was able to piece together the crucial part of the story: someone had come and roughed up my man. A long, thick gash ran down Knox's arm. Luckily, this appeared to be his only injury. I noticed he was dressed in riding gear, the same leather pants and boots he'd been wearing when we met. Gosh, that felt like so long ago.