Slate moved his position to halfway between the door and the bar, barely getting there when the door opened. Looking up, he grinned. “Bingo, son of a bitch, it is good to see you.” They clasped wrists, pulling into a one-armed hug, and Slate winced as his raw back was pounded by Bingo’s fist.
“Oh fuck, man, you had your colors done today, didn’t you?” Bingo apologized as he beat Slate’s back again in painful affection. “Sorry, man, I forgot. How’d I forget? That’s the reason I’m back this weekend. I’m a forgetful fucker sometimes, I swear.” He struck Slate’s back one last time, releasing him to stand back and give him a wicked grin.
Slate laughed, wincing still. “No worries, brother. How’s your family in the Fort?” He’d visited once, checking the set-up of the clubhouse in Bingo’s hometown. He knew the sister had died; her kids moved in with Bingo, and he was raising his nieces and nephews as if they were his own.
“Kids are great, man. Fucking kids can bounce back from anything. Hell, Tyler broke his arm playing football a month ago, and I caught him trying to cut his cast off yesterday with a hacksaw,” he said proudly.
Slate laughed again. “Tough fucker, man.”
Bingo moved to stand next to Slate, and together, they surveyed the crowd in the bar. “How many different patches you got here tonight, you think?” he asked softly.
Slate paused for a second, thinking before he answered. “I’m tracking fifteen right now, but I am missing one guy, who was at the bar...maybe he had to piss. Yeah, he’s coming back out now, so...fifteen patches. It’s a mix of RC and MC. We don’t get many MAs in here; it’s too coarse for them usually.” He narrowed his eyes towards the pool tables; there were voices raised in an argument for a moment until they saw his focus on them. Without even moving a step, he calmed that shit right the fuck down, and turned to see Bingo grinning up at him. “What?” he asked innocently, and then laughed.
His and Bingo’s phones buzzed, as did a few others in the room, and each looked up at the others with alarm on their face; incoming texts to multiple members were seldom good news. Pulling his phone out, Slate saw, Machos on cicero abt 50 - help inc, and heard a far-off roar of bikes as he finished reading the text.
“Fuck me,” Slate whispered to himself before yelling to the crowd, “Machos! It’s war! Fucking war.” He watched the bikers and customers scramble and scatter as they heard the first gunshots down the street. Running behind the bar, he grabbed a spare 9mm and a half-dozen loaded magazines from the locker on the floor. Turning, he shouted at a waitress, “Tara, lockdown,” and saw her nod as she began gathering the employees, using words and motions to sweep them towards the panic room in the back. “Rebels, arm your-fucking-selves,” he yelled, pointing to the now-open armory Bingo was coming out of, his hands filled with weapons.
Shades trotted up. “Skeptics stand with Rebels. You got guns for us?”
Slate nodded, jerking his head towards Bingo. Positioning himself behind a stout pillar about thirty feet from the front door, he listened as the roaring of bikes peaked close by, and then died off, leaving no echoes.
He looked behind him, and saw a green patch trying to sneak into the bar from the back; the door must have failed. He pointed at Bingo and then the door, and heard the thwack of the knife without ever seeing it pulled and thrown. The Machos member went down soundlessly, the hilt of the knife having hit him hard in the middle of his forehead.
Shades saw the action, and he cautiously went into the back to secure the door; he returned in a minute with a second man, also unconscious. He piled his guy next to the one already on the floor, and placed himself behind the bar, waiting.
The quiet didn’t last long, and Slate gritted his teeth, hearing screams he assumed came from his Rebels who had been positioned outside, and then the silence that meant they were at least beyond pain. This was the first attack the Mexican club had made in retaliation for the deaths at the strip club. The Rebels had been waiting for this shoe to drop, because the Machos’ brutality was well known. “Shades,” he called quietly, “can you see if the back is open? I want to flank them if we can.”
“No way, man. They’ve got two guys on that door, Slate. I’ve got it locked and blocked, but it’s not a way out right now,” Shades delivered that unwelcome news.
“Fuck me,” Slate breathed. “What are they waiting on?” His phone buzzed, and he pulled it out; the number was unknown, but given the situation, he answered it readily, saying gruffly, “Yeah?”
“Nearly there, brother,” came Mason’s voice, and Slate all but sighed out loud in relief.
He started giving Mason the rundown. “It’s quiet outside now, but pretty sure they’ve killed Buzz and L.J.; I have six brothers in here, and another five Skeptics who stand with us. Girls are in the panic room, and we are staged in the main room with the backdoor locked. We have two unconscious Machos in here. Tell me what you need, Mason. Tell me what to do.” He heard, “Just hold, brother,” and the connection was cut. “We hold,” he called out to the room, looking at his men and nodding confidently. “We got this. We hold.”
There was a scuffling noise from the front of the building, and they heard bikes being started. Slate remembered he’d installed closed circuit security cameras after a customer’s bike was trashed, and he ran behind the bar, ripping the sliding door off the cabinet.
He punched the monitors on and stared at the four screens that showed up. There were about forty men spread across the parking lot in front of the building, and then he could see another ten in the back alley. There were two men he focused on, standing between their bikes and the bar door, confident in the protection their club status afforded them. He knew that one of the men would be Estavez, Carmela’s uncle. He had brought war across the border in a big way.
He saw several bodies lying a few feet from the outside door. It was hard to tell on the black and white screen, but one of them looked a lot smaller, maybe female. The killing must have pulled in civilians, which would make this a much more difficult thing to contain.
They felt the low rumble before they heard it; there had to be at least a hundred bikes coming from multiple directions, because the noise and vibration was everywhere. Outside, the men in Machos’ colors scattered to their bikes, looking as if they were ready to evacuate.
On the monitor, Mason was clearly visible on his motorcycle as he led a double column of bikes into the camera’s view, and Slate broke for the front door. He pointed at Bingo and called, “Stay with the greenies in here,” as he pulled the door open, striding into the open with his gun held low by his side.
Mason pulled within inches of Estavez, idling to a stop as the two men stared each other down. Slate couldn’t hear what was said, but Mason’s face swung his way for a moment, then back to the Mexican. The male bodies piled in the parking lot all had on club cuts. They were laid out in such a way that he couldn’t see the patches, but none of the men looked familiar. Scanning the lot, he saw Buzz and L.J. leaning up against the outside wall of Tupelo’s, their wrists and ankles secured by zip ties, and he whispered, “Thank fuck.”
Stalking over to the stack of bodies, his steps slowed and stopped as he recognized the hair on the lone female figure. His chest hurt, and it became difficult to pull in enough breath. He looked over and saw Mason shaking hands with Estavez, and his brain froze for a second at that sight. Mason climbed off his bike and motioned for Slate to come over to him.
He looked back and forth between that bright green hair and his chosen brother, between his friends. This was insane. How could Mason be standing so casually with the man who killed Silly? Slate walked halfway and then stopped. Pointing backwards to the still forms, he asked, “Sylvia? Silly? Fuck, Mason, what is going on?” Mason motioned him over again, irritated, and Slate took another few steps to stand equidistance between Mason and Estavez, forming a triangle.
“Listen for two minutes, brother, and then you tell me what we need to do.” Mason stepped back a pace, leaving Slate to fa
ce Estavez alone. Running his hands through his hair, Slate waited for the man to begin talking, and caught the calculating gaze that swept him up and down.
“Andrew Jones, I have wanted to meet you for two years,” Estavez stated with a pronounced accent, but his English was spoken plainly enough to be easily understood. “In Juarez, you aided me with a serious problem, without any knowledge of the assistance provided. You did my family a great service, and for that, I am trying to repay your family here in Chicago.”
Slate cocked his head, and made a hand motion urging Estavez to continue, then was staggered by what he said. “You saved my daughter, my heart, my life—Maria Luisa Carmela Estavez—my child, stolen by my brother and hidden from me for more than two years. I could not find her, but you saved her and brought her back into the light.”
“Carmela is your daughter? She called you uncle and said you had sold her into slavery. You told us to bury her with the fat bastard who had been given a girl as a sex slave. How the hell is she your daughter, your heart?” Slate was angry, as furious now as he had been while sitting on his bike in Juarez, watching Devil seat the girl in front of him, taking her across the river with them into America.
“May we sit, Andrew? Mason?” Estavez asked. Mason looked at Slate’s face, and nodded without shifting his gaze. Slate looked around, aware for the first time of the men standing near the three of them. There was a mixed ring of Machos and Rebels about ten feet from them, and then beyond that, there had to be more than one hundred members of the Rebels and their local support clubs circling the entire group. Slate stepped back, watching as an aisle appeared towards the door of the bar.
“Mason, we can’t fit everyone,” Slate said low and quiet. “We can put a couple of kegs inside the door and pass out cups.”
“Do it, brother,” Mason agreed. Slate led the two club presidents into the bar, quickly making the arrangements for the beer to be set up as he had suggested. He walked over and used the intercom to reassure Tara, releasing her from the panic room. He saw Bingo was still watching the two Machos they’d disabled inside the bar, and relieved him of that duty by asking L.J. to escort the two men outside.
Bringing three beers with him to the table, he sat down beside Mason carefully. “Estavez, I don’t understand,” he started, and the man nodded.
“I can explain, Andrew, and it’s important for you to comprehend.” Estavez took a shaky, deep breath, and then a long, slow drink of his beer. “My brother and I had no love lost between us. I had the esteem of the family; he had the approval of the cartel. I was a businessman in Mexico City; he was a gang member in Juarez. My child, my daughter—my only daughter—was a favorite of us both, one of the few things we had in common. We had a falling out when our parents died, and things that had been difficult or strained went to antagonistic and hostile. I wanted him gone, and I talked to an official in Mexico City about his activities in Juarez. That was my mistake, and my family paid for my error, because that official worked for him.
“My brother, he came to Mexico City and stole my daughter from my home. He took Maria...my Maria. You have to understand the police were of no help. There are so many abductions in Mexico, so many kidnappings, that they do nothing unless there is a benefit for them in the recovery. I didn’t understand how they could be so mercenary, but I had to find her. So, I took things in hand looking for her, stalking my brother. It wasn’t until Maria—Carmela, as you know her—was at Watcher’s home that she was able to contact me.”
He smiled briefly, but it didn’t reach his eyes and the expression faded quickly. “Her uncle asked for her death. Her uncle threw her away for a favor with the cartel, and into hell. For more than two years, she was trapped with the man you killed that day. My Maria called me from America, from safety, and Watcher listened to my tears as I heard my dead daughter’s voice once again,” he spoke quietly.
“I decided I needed to deal with my honor in a lasting way, so I began to systematically take out my brother’s allies.” He sneered. “I am a businessman at heart. I can patiently strategize, and then execute on those strategies. Within eighteen months of your rescue of Maria, I gained control of his club, the Machos. My brother lies dead at my hand, as well as all of his main allies. It is now my club; these are my Machos.”
He took another long drink of beer, his throat working hard. “But a debt remained. Maria told me of your part in the events in Juarez, and your kindness and comfort to her. Your assurance of her safety allowed her to trust and be saved. She holds you in high regard, Andrew Jones. I cannot ever repay what you mean to her by becoming her shelter of security in a storm of terror, but I acknowledge a debt to you. I have tracked you from Las Cruces to Lamesa, from Longview to Memphis, and now to Chicago. Along the way, I have continued to clean up my brother’s messes, as I did today.
Motioning towards the door, he explained, “The ones killed today were loyal to my brother, and had planned on creating more difficulties for you here. The woman lying dead in the parking lot is not your Sylvia. It is Silverio, my sister-in-law. She came to Chicago months ago with the intention of replacing your Sylvia, knowing she could use that relationship to get close to the Rebel club members, and be able to hurt them.
“Silverio was also behind the attack you experienced a few weeks ago. She and her cadre of accomplices have been dealt with most persuasively, as you saw.” He pushed back from the table, standing and holding out his hand to Slate. “My word to you, Andrew, Machos will not bother you or your family again, but you must tell me how I can repay you in my daughter’s name. I will not rest well with an unresolved debt such as this.”
“I have to think on that, man, seriously, but as long as Carmela is safe and happy, I’m good. Yeah, I’m good.” Slate stood, accepting both the handshake and the commitment somberly.
Estavez shook hands with Mason too, and then stepped back. “I would like permission to remain in Chicago for a few days, to be certain I have cleaned up this rubbish in its entirety, if that is acceptable.”
Mason nodded. “Sure, brother. We can house you if needed.” Estavez accepted the offer, and Mason asked Tug and Bingo to begin the process of getting Machos to a secondary clubhouse in Chicago. After seeing the groups off, Mason and Slate headed back into the bar.
Drinking and talking to Mason late into the night, Slate told him the full story of the events in Mexico. He had a feeling Mason already knew about it, but felt the need to explain all that had happened, and what it meant to him. He talked for hours about the girl they had saved, and how Carmela had changed his life, showing Mason the tattoo he’d gotten in her honor.
“I need to know I make a difference, Mason. I think that’s what it boils down to; I need to make a difference,” he slurred his words, but the sentiment was honest. “My brother, my little brother Benny might need someone one day, and I wanna know I’ve racked up enough good things to give him a chance.” Slumping in his chair, he ran a rough hand through his hair. “My brother Benny, my brother Mason—I love you both, man. Karma, my brother.” He sighed. “Fuck me, I’m tired, and I think a little drunk. Can I crash here?”
Nodding solemnly, Mason helped him up and got him into the back room where the bunks were. “You need to sleep,” he said as he threw a blanket at Slate. “We’ll talk about the marker tomorrow, man. It’s all good.” The last thing Slate thought about as he fell asleep was the carefree look on Carmela’s face the last time he’d seen her at Watcher’s house.
***
Six years ago
They were arguing back and forth, debating the worth of a recent prospect who had app’ed to the Rebels, Reuben Nelms. Slate had met him a few years back in Texas, but didn’t really know him. Reuben had shown up in Jackson’s a few months ago, and like a lot of them, it seemed like he was looking for a home, a place he could set his demons to rest. Mason liked the guy a lot, but he wanted to evaluate Slate’s recommendation. He was trying to make Slate his lieutenant, and planned to have him do these kinds of t
hings going forward.
“Tell me about the girl, Mason.” Slate thought this sounded like a long-term issue, and wanted to figure out the potential blowback for the club if anything Nelms did went sideways.
Mason leaned back in his chair; they were sitting in the meeting room in the Chicago clubhouse, with a couple dozen Rebels in attendance. The other members were scattered around the room, sitting at the bar or high-top tables, or playing pool. Two prospects were tending bar tonight, and Slate held up a hand to catch an eye for a refill.
Bear brought them two more beers, wiping the table before setting down the new bottles. Bear’d been in the process for about a year now, and was a solid, settled brother. His past was tragic, but Mason had found a way to connect with the man. They were going to vote on patching him in the next time they met for church, which would be when they decided whether to welcome Nelms or not.
Gypsy was the other prospect here tonight, and he ‘d only been wearing his colors for a couple months; they’d have to take him on a run soon, see how he shook out. He was good at keeping order here in the clubhouse; he’d been a cop in Fort Wayne before he came to them, and the brothers all respected him.
Mason waited patiently for Slate to return his attention to him, picking up his bottle and turning it in his hands. “She’s a student at UI in Springfield, and he checks up on her every couple of days. He’s got a shit-for-brains brother who hurt her. When you met him in Texas, he’d ran from what was happening, and now he feels responsible. When I say the brother hurt the girl, it sounds like it had got real physical before she was able to get away. He’s loyal, he’s fearless, and he’s got a heart the size of fucking Texas. I think he is a good fit for us, but I want to know your thoughts, brother.”
Slate (Rebel Wayfarers MC) Page 17