by Kylie Walker
“Nothing’s wrong. You can’t stay here. Get up. Get dressed. Let’s go.” He stood up out of his chair and she felt his presence as much as she saw it when he approached the bed. He bent down next to it, scooped up her jeans and t-shirt and tossed them at her. “I’ll get your jacket,” he told her as he headed for the door. As soon as he touched the handle she said, “Kyle wait. Please talk to me. I don’t understand…”
“What is it that you don’t understand Levi? I’m watching you, protecting you, pretending that you’re my fucking old lady. But that’s all we’re doing here…pretending. So get that look out of your eye and whatever is in your head. I’m not looking for an old lady. Got that?”
“What was all of that shit about me being yours…only yours…?” She felt tears stinging her eyes but she’d rather slit her wrists and bleed out than cry in front of him.
He turned around slowly and looked at her. Smiling he said, “That’s just how I get off babe. I say that to all the club whores too.” He went through the door then and left her there feeling like someone was twisting a knife in her guts. She let herself have a moment…but just a moment. By the time he got back with her jacket she was dressed and ready to go. She followed him out to the Harley, drowning in her own thoughts as he drove her back to the motel. Once there she slid off, tossed the helmet at him and went straight to her room. She sat on the edge of the bed and wondered how far she could get on the money her dad had given her.
Fuck this shit. Fuck these domineering pieces of shit men.
She was finished with all of that. She sat there and made a promise to herself that no fucking man would ever tell her what to do again.
**
Two days later Kyle sat on the front porch of the motel in front of Levi’s room. Wanda was privy to what was going on, as usual. She was just happy to have someone around. Business had been slow once the hubbub from the murder of Johnny Fox died down. Kyle wondered sometimes why she’d even kept the old place opened. She brought him out a glass of iced tea before she’d left to go see Jim earlier and as he drank down the last of what was in the glass, he tossed in three headache pills along with it. His head was pounding. It had been throbbing since the morning before when he saw the look of hurt and rejection in Levi’s eyes when he’d treated her like a piece of fucking garbage.
He hadn’t meant to outright hurt her but as soon as he heard the sound of her voice he knew that she’d gotten the wrong idea and he needed to nip it right away. He hadn’t planned on sleeping with her but he’d been drunk as shit the night before and that coupled with the fact that she was hotter than fuck and willing, made it inevitable. He wasn’t usually one to drink until he was falling down drunk, but as soon as he’d seen Levi the day before, everything had come rushing back. His friendship with Will. Will’s sweet little sister. His kind-hearted parents. All of the opportunities Kyle had that he never would have had otherwise. He was raised by a single mother who worked her ass off to support them but never had any time for him. By the age of thirteen when they first moved to Las Vegas so that his mother could take a better paying job, Kyle had already been arrested twice for boosting cars for a guy that ran a chop shop in their neighborhood. His life would have continued down that path if not for Will’s family, and he would have probably been in prison by the time he was eighteen. Once he started spending time at the McGarden’s home he stopped hanging out with the wrong people. He stopped smoking pot and stealing his mom’s liquor. His grades were going up and for the first time in his life he found a place where he really belonged. Then Will died and everything was fucked up again, only worse.
Kyle hated himself after that day. He thought that he should have been stronger. He should have been able to pull his friend back up to safety. He let him down. He let him die. He ruined the family that he’d practically come to think of as his own for six years. He didn’t believe that after all of that, he deserved to be happy. He became a Skull with the idea that he would live hard and ride hard and die young. He didn’t expect to find another family, but that was what the club had come to be to him. He’d never been the kind of happy he was when Will was alive. His kind of happy now came from being on his Harley, partying with his friends or fucking one of the club whores. But that was the only kind of happy he thought he deserved. Not the kind that came from really having a woman like Levi. The ringing of his phone interrupted his thoughts. He looked at the face and was relieved to see that it was Asa. Maybe they’d come to some kind of agreement with the Sons and he could go back to his former life and Levi could get on with hers.
“Asa! How’s it going?”
“Hey man. I’m starting to think you got the better deal here.” Kyle grumbled and Asa went on to say, “I’m down here with Jared and Drill and we’re getting our asses kicked. Meanwhile, I hear you’ve got a hot new old lady.”
Kyle shook his head. There was no bigger group of gossips than a bunch of bikers. “Yeah, yeah, it’s all for the cause. Rodney thought it would be better in case anyone came sniffing around Poison. She’s using a different name and we made up a backstory about meeting in Vegas.” That was as much of that story he wanted to tell Asa at that moment. Changing the subject slightly he said, “What’s going on out there?”
“Well we finally got an appointment with the grand fucking Warlock himself. Getting in to see Red Bull is like trying to making a fucking appointment to see the queen.”
“I’ve heard they’re protective.”
“Shit, protective doesn’t even cover it. Jared, Drill and I had to take on five guys an hour after rolling into town just for walking into a bar wearing our kuttes. We held our own pretty well until one of the crazy fuckers pulled out a gun. His buddy talked him out of using it right then and there and they dragged our asses out to some warehouse in the middle of nowhere where at that point I figured we were dead again. They kept asking what we were doing in town and they wouldn’t settle for us just being there to request a meet and greet with Red Bull. They kept us tied up in that hot ass warehouse for an entire day.”
“Fuck. You guys are okay though?”
“So far. The VP showed up. Man if you think my father’s a rough looking mean son of a bitch, you gotta see this guy. He makes my father look like a teddy bear.”
“Max, right? He was Frankie’s guardian or some shit.”
“You’ve done your homework.”
“Haven’t had shit else to do for two days.” Kyle had known of the Sons before of course, but he’d known very little about them. He was amazed at how much information he was actually able to find online. Wikipedia had three pages on them.
“I thought you’d be doing your new old lady by now,” Asa said with a chuckle. Kyle had to admit to himself that was what he’d much rather be doing.
“Can we get back to your story? What did Max say?”
“I had to tell him what we were doing in town. I told him the girl was hiding out somewhere in Vegas and her father had reached out to Rodney for help. He asked a lot of questions about where she was in Vegas and how her father knew Rodney and then insisted that although they have been looking for her, they don’t mean her any harm.”
“Right.”
“Yeah. Anyways he says the club has also been looking for Frankie. His story is that they have no idea where Frankie took off to and they had assumed he and Levi were together somewhere…or that the girl had done something to him.”
“They want you to believe that she killed Frankie?”
“He didn’t say kill but yeah, that’s what he was getting at. It seems to be the story they’re hoping everyone else is going to buy. Either that or Frankie just took off for parts unknown. That’s unlikely however since everyone he’s ever known is right here in this little town.”
“So they are hoping we’re stupid.”
“They don’t really care if we are or not. They don’t care what we believe, or anyone else for that matter. They see themselves as untouchable. They’re some arrogant sons of bitches. The
y rule this town, hell this whole county. They’re not afraid of the local law enforcement at all, but right now they’re dealing with the big guns so to speak. ATF is in town and tearing apart every legitimate business they own looking for evidence of gun running and that has them shaking in their leathers.”
“Yeah, Levi told Rodney that Frankie stole guns from the Sons and sold them to the Mexicans who ended up talking to ATF.”
“The ATF came in early this week and started tearing apart every business the Sons own in town and that’s quite a few. They’re looking for guns. They haven’t found any and the story they gave us and the ATF was that Frankie was dealing with the Irish on his own without the knowledge of the club. They didn’t know anything about any of this supposedly until the Mexican started talking. He gave up Frankie in exchange for a deal. According to him Frankie sold his crew about sixty automatic weapons for the bargain price of thirty grand. He wasn’t able to say where Frankie got the guns originally or who had paid for those.”
“He stole from his own club and then sold what he stole to a snitch. Sounds like one real smart asshole.” Kyle felt a flutter of anger in the pit of his stomach as he got the image in his head of Levi being with that guy.
“Yeah. My guess from what I’ve seen here so far is that the not-so-smart asshole was coddled by his Daddy Max and led to believe he could get away with whatever he wanted to get away with. I’ve talked to more than one person down here that agrees this guy was a sociopath and had whatever he got coming. But there remains the fact that this club, no matter what they deal in, still has a squeaky clean record. No witnesses are burned into the wood on the side of their club.” Kyle got a chill down his spine. Levi was lucky she made it out of there alive even before the assholes with guns showed up.
“So, when ATF first came sniffing around and Red Bull found out they had someone in custody that was fingering one of their own, of course he and Max sent two of his guys to find Frankie. According to Max they were just going to ‘bring him in and talk.’ We both know that’s code for blow his fucking head off. Anyways their story is that when these guys got to the house Frankie was already gone and the old lady was trying to make her getaway. They’ve even conjectured that she had the thirty G’s on her at the time.”
“Shit.”
“Max claims all they want is their money and the girl will be free to go. He can’t admit that she was a witness to anything or he’d have to admit that there was something to witness.”
“Fuck.”
“Yeah…it gets worse.”
“Shit.”
“The ATF is looking for her now too. The story these assholes told Jared and me is the same one they told to the ATF. They’ve made her look like an accessory.” Kyle’s thoughts were racing. If they continued to sit here at Wanda’s they were both sitting ducks when the Sons or the ATF showed up.
“Has anyone been sniffing around the garage or the bar looking for her?” Asa asked.
“Not that we’ve heard yet. She’s using a fake name and…”
“Oh yeah, that was the other thing. Apparently the name she’s using belongs to someone Jared grew up with. Jared was a little pissed that you didn’t trust him enough to tell him what was really going on.”
“Your father was the one that said it didn’t leave the table.”
“Yeah, I told him that. He had to know the facts before we came up here. Anyways this girl Cami lives in White’s Bridge now and the Sons have been circling her like vultures looking for Levi because they know how tight they were. Jared’s planning on bringing her back with us.”
“So we’re a bodyguard service now, huh?”
“We are whatever we’re told,” Asa said flatly. It didn’t normally bother Kyle. This was his life and he accepted it most of the time. But this job was hitting too close to home, wherever that might be.
“Yeah. I should get Levi out of here.”
“Yeah, you should.”
“Okay man, stay safe and keep me posted.”
“Will do. You too.”
“Thanks.” Kyle ended the call and stared at the phone for a few seconds. He knew of one place he could take Levi where no one would think of looking for her…
He got up and knocked on Levi’s door. “What?”
“Levi open the door.”
“Or what? You’ll bust it down?”
“Come on, don’t fuck with me okay? Just open the door.”
He heard the locks disengage and she pulled the door open just a crack. He could see one green eye and masses of dark hair. “What?”
“Let me in.”
“Why?” He was finished screwing around. He pushed in on the door and knocked her backwards. She stumbled but caught herself and stayed on her feet. Levi slammed the door behind him. “Jesus, asshole, why don’t you just punch me in the face?”
Kyle closed his eyes for a second and took a deep breath. He’d never punch a woman, especially Levi, but she was making it so damned hard for him to keep his temper in check. “I’m sorry but I asked you not to fuck with me. Look Levi, I don’t want to argue with you. I just want to keep you safe. What happened between us the other night was a mistake. I was drunk. I should have known better…”
“Better than what, Kyle? You should have known better than to say things you didn’t mean? Or, you should have known better than to have sex with me?”
“Levi listen to me, okay? We have a lot more urgent things to worry about. Asa and Jared are up in Whites Bridge and it seems all hell is breaking loose up there. These guys aren’t fucking around and when they show up they won’t hesitate to kill me to get to you. We need to get you somewhere that they can’t sneak up on us.”
“Like where? And for how long, Kyle? How long do I have to hide? I was hoping that Rodney could smooth this over…”
“Red Bull doesn’t work that way. He doesn’t form liaisons with any other clubs. He’s all about himself and his club. If there’s nothing we can do for him, he’s not going to do anything for us.”
“So why did Rodney send his son?”
“Because the only way we’ll get the full story is if we just walk in there like we’re not afraid to hear it. And the only reason Red Bull would share the story with us is if he wants something in return. Asa and Jared have a meeting with him in the morning. Levi, what he’s going to tell them he wants is you. We have to get you out of here before that happens.”
“Where would we go?”
“I was thinking about the cabin. Does your family still own it?” He watched her wince at the mention of the cabin. He didn’t blame her. He wasn’t going to like being that close to those memories either…but he also wasn’t going to sit here with her and wait for them to come and take her away from him too.
“We still own it. As far as I know, no one has been up there since the accident…” They were both silent for a few seconds and then Kyle told her, “Pack what you need. I’m going to make a phone call.”
She nodded and Kyle stepped out to call Rodney. Once he ended the call and went back inside he found the room empty and the small bathroom window wide open. Shit! This girl was too much.
Chapter 9
The sun was just beginning to go down and Kyle didn’t know in which direction Levi had gone, but she couldn’t have gotten far. He got on his bike and ruling out the way she would have had to go to get to the main road, he took the one that led from behind the motel toward town. Her car was still parked in the garage at Poison so it made sense that was where she was trying to go. He cussed her as he rode his clean and shiny bike down a long dusty road. He’d tied his bandana around his mouth and nose to keep from inhaling it but his bare arms were coated with it and so was his vest and jeans. He had a good mind to give her a damned spanking when he caught up with her. What the hell does she think she’s doing? Where does she even think she’s going?
He was about two miles from town when he spotted her. She was wearing jeans and tennis shoes and a long t-shirt and carrying a pack on
her back. She heard the bike and actually broke out into a jog. If Kyle hadn’t already been so pissed off, he might have been amused. He pulled back on the throttle and within seconds he was right next to her. He stopped and turned off the bike. Levi just kept walking at a brisk pace with her eyes forward.
“Where are you going?” She didn’t answer him. Kyle put the kickstand down, slid off of the bike and caught up with her in three long strides. “Hey!” He reached out and grabbed her arm and she snapped. She came at him like a wildcat with her claws out. She got in a few good licks and left a long scratch down the side of his face before he was able to subdue her. “Stop it! Levi, stop struggling!” He wrapped her from behind in a big bear hug and took her to the ground. He held her like a teacher might hold an out of control student, with her arms crossed in front of her and both of his wrapped around them. She kept fighting for a lot longer than Kyle thought she’d be able to but eventually she ran out of steam and he felt her go limp in his arms. He could feel her body shaking, but she wasn’t trying to get away any longer. That’s when he realized how good it felt to have his arms wrapped around her. He didn’t want to let her go. “What the fuck, Levi? You came to us. You asked us for our help. Now you’re just going to run off and get yourself killed?”
Her voice was thick and shaky and Kyle suddenly wondered if she was crying. He couldn’t see her face so he wasn’t sure. He hoped not. He couldn’t stand to see a woman cry. “I can’t just stay here and be a prisoner. What kind of life is that? I’d rather take my chances.”
“Come on; let’s get on the bike and…”
. “No! I don’t want a ride home from you. I don’t want to go anywhere with you. You’re fired.” He busted up laughing. He was still holding her like a straight-jacket. There was no chance she was getting away. Yet she’d just fired him. Kyle laughed so hard that he had tears in his eyes. When he finally stopped she said, “I’m so glad my miserable situation amuses you so much.”