by Paula Cox
“Well?” she says, staring at me.
I get the feeling she wants to leap across the coffee table and scratch my eyes out. She’s looking at me like it wouldn’t be such a bad thing. Eyes brimming with outrage. I reflect, not for the first time, that Heather has done an admirable job of bringing all the terrifying characteristics of a mom into my life.
“Well, what?” I ask.
“Well what, she says!” Heather leaps to her feet. I’m pretty sure she only sat down so she’d have the opportunity to leap to her feet. “Now you listen here, young lady!” she snaps. “I have not been an auntie to you all these years just to have you skulk away in the night and go off with some—with some—”
“Leather-wearing bandit?” I offer.
“Yes!” she screams, waving her arms frantically. “I only want what’s best for you, you know that, you have to know that! Ever since you were a—”
“I need your help,” I say, cutting her off.
“My help?” She brings her hand to her chest like a melodramatic actor. “What help could I possibly offer you? Why should I help you? You abandoned our daughter and went gallivanting off into the night with a man who has no business being with you, who can only do you harm, who will most likely cause you heartache one day. And you want my help.”
“Listen to me, Heather,” I say, walking around the coffee table and standing close to her. I put my hand on her shoulder, which softens her a little. I see it, in her face, in the way she lets out a begrudging sigh. “I need you to know something. I need you to listen, and know I’m being serious. I love Slick. I have always loved Slick. I want to be with him. I’m going to be with him.”
“Now wait one second—”
“No!” I break out. “Why don’t you wait a second, huh? I’m so sick and tired of everybody telling me what’s good and bad for me. Everybody telling me what I should do, who I should be with. I love Slick! I love him, and he’s good for me, and he’s Charlotte’s daddy! Isn’t that enough?”
“Dadda?” Charlotte murmurs, from behind me.
I turn and see her standing in the doorway, clutching onto it, face tilted at us, mouth in a cute O. “Dadda?” she repeats.
“Dadda,” I say, going to her and picking her up. “Dadda, sweetie.” I kiss her, and then whisper in her ear, “Do you want to meet Dadda one day soon?”
“Dadda!” Charlotte squeals, clutching my neck and kissing me on the cheek. “See Dadda—lemme see Dadda!”
“You will,” I say. “Soon, baby, you will. But first we have to sort some grownup things out, okay? Why don’t you go and play with your blocks, alright, honey?”
I set her down and she returns to the bedroom. Not for the first time, I thank the heavens for making her a well-behaved kid.
“You see,” I say, returning to Heather. “Charlotte wants her father, too. She doesn’t want some asshole you set me up with pretending to be her dad. She wants her real dad. And her dad is a good man. So what’s the problem?”
Heather shifts from foot to foot, a cornered animal, cornered by logic and emotion. She must be able to see how much I care for Slick. And there’s no way she can ignore how badly Charlotte wants to see her father. You can raise a kid without a dad, but it’s difficult to tell a kid they’ve got a dad and then take that away. If there’s one person Heather loves more than anyone, it’s Charlotte. She doesn’t want to see her hurt.
She slumps onto the couch. I go to her, sit beside her. For a while, she just gazes at the coffee table. I see our reflections in the huge TV: both of us looking flustered and disheveled, but for different reasons.
“You said you needed my help?” Heather mutters.
“Does that mean you’ll help me?” I ask.
“Don’t twist the knife,” Heather says. “I just—look, Brianna, I can’t be the one to keep that girl away from her father. You know that. I think you planned that. I think you went in there and told that little angel to come out there and say Dadda to trap me.”
“I didn’t,” I say honestly. “But that’s a good idea. I should have, instead of leaving it to luck.” I grin at her. She returns it, a little weakly, but with real emotion in there.
“You Shields,” Heather says, groaning. “There’s no talking to you. What do you need help with?”
“I want you to set up a meeting with Dad and Slick,” I say. “He’ll listen to you.”
“What!” Heather cries, throwing her hands up. But it’s a performance, meant to trick me.
I’m not tricked. “Heather,” I say, taking her hands and looking closely at her, “I know you like to pretend that you have no contact with Dad, but I know that’s not true. I’ve seen you two, over the years, meeting in the clubhouse. And even since I’ve been living here, I’ve heard you on the phone. And let’s face it, arranging for me to stay here didn’t happen by telepathy, did it?”
She blushes, looking away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she murmurs.
“Heather!”
She starts, and then shakes her head slowly. “Why do you want me to set up a meeting with Jacob?” she asks.
Jacob, I note; only a select few have ever called him Jacob.
“Because I need him to see Slick. I need him to hear Slick out. I can’t have him treating Slick like this anymore. I need him to properly hear Slick out, really listen to him. I’m tired of him treating Slick like some kid. He isn’t a kid. He was the best courier this club has ever had, and now he’s one of the best earners. And—he’d done things, for the club—”
“I don’t want to hear that,” Heather says with dignity. “I don’t want to hear any of that.”
“But you’ll set up the meeting?”
“What’s the alternative? Being the reason for Charlotte never knowing her daddy? A lifetime of resentment from you and her when Slick is hidden away from the two of you? Being forced to see you reduced to tears when the love of your life is sent away, or worse? Is that the other option, Brianna?”
I don’t need to answer. She knows it already.
She stands up and goes to the phone as I watch. It seems like the conversation happens very quickly. When she returns to me, she tells me she has arranged for the meeting to take place in a bar down the street.
“Why not here?” I ask.
“Because he thinks Grizzly might use the privacy as an opportunity to hurt him.”
“You’re kidding!”
She shrugs. “Let’s get her ready. I’ll come into the bar to say hello, but then I’m waiting in the car with Charlotte. I want no part of this—more than I’ve already had, I mean.”
About half an hour later, we’re sitting in Heather’s stylish sedan outside a bar called Primadona. It’s a fancy place, with pink neon letters and a bright lit-up figure of a curvy woman leaning on the P, holding a cocktail glass in her hand, and waving for the customers to come through the doors with the other. Inside, it’s mostly empty, apart from a few women in the corner with pink bands across their torsos, the word Hen on them.
“Why did you pick here?” I ask, climbing from the car.
Heather smiles shyly. “I couldn’t resist the urge to see Grizzly in a place like this,” she admits.
I take Charlotte from the car and we walk into the building, across the dance floor to a corner booth. I’m surprised to see Dad sitting there alone, a whisky before him, tapping the table with his fingertips. I thought he’d have a few men with him. I don’t even get a chance to say hello when he rises to his feet and brushes down his clothes, like a man before a date. I watch in astonishment as Grizzly, the man who for all my life has been a terrifying MC President, makes as though to offer Heather his hand to shake, and then thinks better of it and nods instead.
“Heather,” he murmurs, completely ignoring me and Charlotte.
“Jacob,” Heather says.
Before we left, Heather straightened her hair and put on a red sparkling dress I’ve only ever seen her once before: in a club, at night, when she wanted
to attract the attention of men. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but seeing her at ten o’clock in the morning in an empty bar standing before Dad in that attention-grabbing dress really brings it home. Heather truly does have a thing for Dad!
“I . . . uh . . . I was surprised it was you who called me,” Dad says, like a nervous teenager.
“Yeah, well—you know.”
After an awkward pause, both of them seem to remember where they are. Heather spins on her heels—red, sparkling, emphasizing her calf muscles—and takes Charlotte from my embrace. “I’ll leave you to it,” she says. “Wouldn’t want to get in the way of business.”
She leaves the bar, clip-clipping on the floor, with Dad watching her every step of the way. It isn’t until she’s completely out of view that Dad turns to me. “Where is he, then?”
“Are we just going to pretend that didn’t happen?” I ask, sitting down in the booth.
“What?” Dad grunts, returning to his seat.
“You and Heather—”
“Nothing happened.” He tosses back his whisky. “Where is he, Brianna?”
“I have to call him. He wouldn’t come right away.”
“Scared?” Dad asks.
“Smart,” I counter.
“Call him, then.” Dad waves a hand, and then sits back in his chair. I’ve seen him like this before. Dormant but angry, moments before he flies into a rage. He never aims the rage at me, but I’ve seen him with the men over the years, waving his hand in the same way before going berserk. But right now he’s calm, and here, and listening. That’s all I can ask for.
I take out my cell and the scrap of paper.
Wondering how all of this is going to turn out, so nervous my hand is shaking, I make the call.
Chapter Nineteen
Slick
I have to ask for the name of the bar twice. Even when I’ve got it, I find it damn hard to believe that Grizzly would ever go to a place like that. He must have another reason for agreeing to the location, something I don’t know about. I wonder for a second if it might be Heather. I remember seeing them together when I was a kid sometimes, but they always seemed to dislike each other. I let it slide and climb onto the bike, kick it alive, and make for Primadona. Sitting outside the bar, just down the street, I do a quick scan of the surrounding areas. No Clint. No club men. Just an everyday street with a bar at the end of it.
As I climb from the bike, I keep feeling a phantom gun in the back of my head, reckoning that at any second one of Clint’s men is gonna get the drop on me. But I listen as I walk and don’t hear shit. Still, it’s only when I’ve walked through the bar’s doors and seen the hen party in the corner that I feel any sort of safe. I reckon Clint’s men ain’t above shooting up a place like this, but they wouldn’t wait this long, lettin’ me get close to Boss. When I reach the table, Grizzly is running his finger along the rim of an empty whisky glass and Brat is just sitting there with her hands in her laps, looking between us anxiously.
“Drink?” I say, as my opening line, not sure what else to say.
“Whisky,” Grizzly says.
“Alright.”
As I turn towards the bar, Brat says, “And me. Please.”
“Alright.”
I go to the bar and order three whiskies. The three of us sit silently, listening to the low, thumping music and the giggling of the hen party, as we wait for the drinks. When they arrive, we all drink them down in one gulp, Brat making a hissing noise and shaking her head. Then Grizzly sits up, placing his elbows on the table.
“Why am I here, Slick?”
“’Cause you wanna hear me out, I reckon.” I watch him as I speak, trying to gauge if I’m right. I’ve been giving it some thought. “Two months back, you locked me in the clubhouse. After I did the most for this club that’s ever been done. I reckon you didn’t just come to this idea on your own. I reckon you had that fuck Clint whisperin’ in your ear every step of the way. I reckon you’re here ’cause you’ve started to see things in Clint that you don’t like. Maybe what I said to you at the house has got you thinkin’, I dunno. All I know is you’re here and willin’ to listen, which means somethin’ must’ve changed.”
Grizzly looks away, muttering, “You’re not wrong.” I have a moment of hope, but then he follows it up with, “But that don’t change the fact that you’re drooling all over my daughter.”
“I love your daughter,” I say. “I wanna be with your daughter. Here’s the truth, Grizzly, the truth you must know by now. Charlotte is mine. Charlotte is my daughter. And if you think a man like me is goin’ to step away from my daughter and her mother, even if they happen to be your daughter and grand-daughter, you need to remind yourself who I am.”
Grizzly looks at me like he wants to punch my face in. I’ve seen him look at men like that before, and I’ve seen him smash their faces in before. But then he relaxes and leans back.
“You’re right,” he says. “I’ve known. Course I’ve known. I’m not fuckin’ blind. But I never was happy about it. That’s the truth. I wanted Brianna to have a life outside the life, a man who wasn’t—”
“Like you,” I say.
“Like me,” Grizzly agrees. He sighs, and then rubs his forehead. He looks more like a man who just wants to be left alone than the Boss right now, a man tired who hasn’t slept in years. “I don’t know if you’re right about Clint,” he says. “Got no damn idea. That’s the problem. I’ve got no damn idea no more. Got so many bastards comin’ into the club vouched for by Clint. The other day, I hear two of the bastards callin’ him Boss. I let it slide, ’cause they didn’t know I heard ’em. But . . . it’s gettin’ out of hand. But there’s one thing, Slick. There’s one thing I need to know. Clint says you betrayed us up there in Seattle. I need to know the truth. I need to know what happened up there.”
I grip the edge of the table, real dread taking hold of me. Images come into my mind: bloody, painful. Beside me, Brat makes an encouraging noise. Or maybe it’s a word. I don’t know; I can’t hear. All I can hear are the screams and begging pleas and roars of desperation from the men I was forced to kill; all I can hear are the Skull fucks calling me Beast, cheering me on as I kill mostly innocent men for their goddamn entertainment. All I can hear is a voice whispering in my head telling me I’ll never be good again, never be Sky playing with Brat on dirt bikes in the Rockies. I’ll always be the fuckin’ Beast, an animal, a killer, a traitor.
“Slick? Slick?”
Her voice comes to me like it’s inside my head, not outside. I hear her whispering inside, trying to draw me out. Then she places her hand on my forearm and I sit bolt upright like a gunshot has just gone off.
“Shit, sorry,” I mutter.
Grizzly squints at me, searching. “Let it out, son,” he says.
It’s the first encouraging thing he’s said to me since I got back from that hellhole.
“You might wanna de-patch me when you hear it,” I say.
“Let me decide on that,” Grizzly says. “Just let it out.”
I didn’t want to tell Brat like this, in a bar with Brittany Spears being tortured on the karaoke machine, the whole place smelling like glitter and cocktails. But I know I don’t have a choice, either. This might be my only chance to let Grizzly know what went on and have him actually listen to my side of the story, without Clint twisting him against me. I take a deep breath, thankful for Brat having her arm on my shoulder, giving me support. It’s tough for a man to talk about normal, everyday shit that goes on in his head, let alone this stuff.
So I get through it all as quickly as I can, telling it from start to finish. I go over the guns being fakes, my bike breaking down on me, being thrown into the warehouse where all I could do was read and wait for the Masked Man to inflict his goddamn torture on us. I tell about the machete and the gunshot. And then I get to the night of blood and I have to order another whisky. When I’ve necked that and my chest is a little warmer than it was a minute ago, I go into the ni
ght of blood, explaining to them both about how the Skulls had shotguns and forced me to keep killin’ unless I wanted to die. When I get to this part, Brat starts to cry, soft sobs, dabbing at her face with a napkin. I can’t look at her, not yet, ’cause there’s still more to tell. I go on, and tell them about how after they decided I was the Beast, they forced me to ride with them and wear their patch. I tell how I was forced to fight other Seattle clubs with ’em, kill, steal, act as courier or muscle, and how there were always three men following me everywhere I went, ready to put a bullet in my head. I tell Grizzly that every time he came down and saw me in the cell, that was a show, put on by the Skulls to fool him.