by Bella Knight
Table of Contents
Book 3
Lost MC book 4
Prologue: Pickup
Afterburn
Baton Rouge
Return
Back to Vegas
New House
Dirty Vegas
Wedding Bells
About the Author
Finders Keepers
The Nighthawks Motorcycle Club
Bella Knight
Book
3
Edited by
Natasha Lind
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Contents
Prologue: Pickup
1. Afterburn
2. Baton Rouge
3. Return
4. Back to Vegas
5. New House
6. Dirty Vegas
7. Wedding Bells
Lost MC book 4
About the Author
Prologue: Pickup
“Every day is a winding road…”
The ride through Arizona that June was delicious, the morning air with a hint of coolness, soon to be erased by the heat of July. The entire club rode in the bright sun, even tiny Alicia, now with meat on her bones. Alicia rode behind Bonnie on her low-rider. They had their shades and helmets on; many of them also wore cloth masks against the desert dust. Most had cooling vests on under their leathers, the skull of the Nighthawks emblazoned on the back.
The school looked imposing, low-red and yellow adobe-and-brick buildings rising out of the desert, arranged in a semicircle. The lawn was green and there were trees everywhere. There was a soccer field, a basketball court, and targets on a wall made of hay bales for archery. There was a small lake with a boathouse, fat horses in a paddock, a huge red barn, and riding trails snaking up into the low hills.
“Shit,” said Henry, walking over to Ace when they had all parked their bikes. “Would have loved this when I was a boy.”
The principal came out, an Amerind woman with long, blue-black hair and dark eyes. She was wearing jeans and a flowing top. Henry said something to her in Paiute, and she answered, smiling.
“Principal Wovoka,” said Ace, shaking her hand. “How’s Keiran doing?”
“I hear Henry has been tutoring him. It is very good to meet you,” she said, turning to him. “All his grades went up this semester. He has A’s and B’s as of yesterday when the final grades were entered. You must be very proud of your brother.”
“I am,” said Ace.
“Thank you for bringing Pavel with you. I told his parents that he would be writing a report based on the trip. We have summer camp activities and summer classes starting in three weeks, but it is good for him to see America. He is very excited.”
“We’ll take good care of him,” said a stocky man with sandy brown hair and piercing blue eyes, standing on the other side of Lily. “My name is Dimitri, and I am from Russia, too. My family moved here when I was twelve. These kind people allowed me to join their riding club last year. It will be nice to speak Russian again.”
Keiran walked out from the dorm with a tall, rangy boy with brown hair shaved on one side, deep blue eyes, and a huge grin on his face. Both boys had packs on their backs. They jogged over at an easy pace.
“I told you they were here, Pavel!” said Keiran.
“You cannot miss the noise of bikes,” said Pavel, laughing.
Ace ranged forward and grabbed Keiran in a bear hug, “Nice to see you,” he said. He turned to Pavel, “I’m Ace. Nice to meet you, Pavel.” He held out a hand.
Pavel shook it, “Nice to meet you too, Sir,” he said.
Lily walked over.
“Ace,” said Pavel. “You sure do know how to pick the ladies!”
Ace and Lily laughed, “That I do. Pavel, this is Dimitri. He…”
The two Russians embraced like old friends, and they began speaking in their mother tongue.
“Friendly, aren’t they?” said Henry.
Ace looked over at his ex-teacher friend, “Did you get Dimitri to tutor Pavel?”
Henry shrugged, “He’s a math teacher.” Ace smiled.
“Thank you for the rescued horses,” said Principal Wovoka.
“I know people,” said Ace.
“He knows me,” said Inola. “I hear the students love working with them.”
“Absolutely!” The two women beamed at each other.
“Hey!” said Bonnie. “The lovefest is nice and everything, but let’s get to New Orleans! I want me some shrimp, and some music, and some dancing!”
“Yeah, Ace!” said Gregory, his lady love Katya behind him.
Elena, Katya’s daughter, was at a summer camp for kids recovering from dire medical circumstances. Her latest surgery for her burn scars a complete success. Katya and Gregory were planning to marry when they got back from the New Orleans rally.
“Let’s move it!”
Ace and Dimitri dealt with the boys’ bags, stowing them in saddlebags. The boys put on shades, helmets, cooling vests, and leathers, then everyone loaded up. Keiran behind Ace, and Pavel behind Dimitri. They rode out the U-shaped driveway and turned onto the highway, on their way to rejoin Route 66. Bonnie put on Tom Petty and the Heartbreaker’s Running Down a Dream, and they all headed out into the desert sun.
Kidnapping
The ride from Tucson to El Paso was an easy ride, with stops from time to time for bathroom breaks, drinks, and snacks. The scenery was beautiful. With mountains, desert and flashes of green. They saw cows, sheep, horses, and the occasional coyote. When they arrived, they went up to the scenic overlook to watch the sun set over the El Paso. They went back down into the city, and ate at a barbecue joint, covering their tables with ribs, chicken, beans, slaw, potato salad, biscuits, barbecue sauce, and honey. They stayed in an inn with a red roof, buying nearly all their rooms available. They rose early, ate a huge breakfast of grits, bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs with cheese, and
biscuits with honey. Then, they rode out into the desert again.
San Antonio had fantastic music and excellent Mexican food. They started at the Alamo, then went down to the river and walked around. Ivy, Bella, Inola, Bonnie, and Katya took the boys on a boat on the river while the others meandered. They found a bar and grill and danced and ate tacos with beans and rice. They had chips with salsa and guacamole, empanadas, and fajitas until they could hardly walk. They rode just outside the city and took over two hotels. They watched the sun rise over the desert and mounted up for another day to ride.
The ride to New Orleans was incredible. They swung around Houston, then stopped at a suburban mall in a Houston suburb to please everyone’s demands for food. The mall rats took their leather and skull emblems and dusty sunglasses in stride. It was obvious they wanted to order pizza, barbecue, and Chinese food at the same time. They made it to Beaumont before stopping for the night.
They crossed the Texas-Louisiana border in the morning. The air was hot, still, and muggy. They could hear cicadas and frogs when they stopped in at Lake Charles to eat a late breakfast and look at the gorgeous water views. They ate lunch in Baton Rouge; coconut shrimp, crab cakes, hush puppies, and fries loaded with cheese and bacon. They stopped off several times to take pictures of the mind-bogglingly beautiful scenery.
They made it to New Orleans by dusk. They were scattered amongst five hotels; one bed-and-breakfast, and two apartment rentals. Dimitri, Pavel, Keiran, Ace, and Lily were in a hotel in what was known as the Old Quarter. They ate shrimp etouffee and Po-boy sandwiches. In the morning, they had beignets and little pots of chocolate. Dimitri rested while Ace and Lily took the boys to a swamp tour on a flatboat… after dousing themselves in insect repellent. They got to see snakes, birds, and actual alligators. They ate Cajun food for lunch and danced to Zydeco music. They went back to the Quarter, picked up Dimitri, then went down to the Mississippi River. They ate fish and chips and fried shrimp at a little fish shack there, they couldn’t seem to keep the boys from getting ravenously hungry every five minutes.
They took a dusk walking night tour, learning about the history and stories of the place. They listened to jazz and ate oysters and shrimp. They all went for ice cream, laughing as the boys tried to lick the ice cream from their cones before the ice cream melted. It seemed a losing proposition in the heat. Ace and Lily shared a hot fudge sundae at a bistro table, and Dimitri ate a sorbet with the boys at another. Dimitri took the boys back to the hotel two blocks away so they could wash off the ice cream.
Ivy and Ace had just finished their hot fudge sundae when Keiran came running around the corner, his face a mask of blood from a scalp wound.
“Dad!” screamed Keiran.
Lily had never seen Ace move so fast. He was at his son’s side before Lily was halfway there. She saw a cop and waved her arms.
“Hey! Over here!” she screamed. The cop rode his bike over to them.
“Dimitri fought with them. They took Pavel! Dimitri is hurt!” screamed Keiran, into his father’s face.
Lily ran toward the hotel room, the cop right behind her. Dimitri was on the stairs, stumbling down, holding his side. The right side of his face was covered with blood.
“They took boy,” he said. “Three men, ski masks, dark skin. Like espresso before milk. One is still in room. I think dead. I punch him several times. He not say where they take boy.”
The cop ran past them to the open door of the room, yelling into his shoulder mic about an Amber Alert. Two cops and an EMT converged on them. Lily helped Dimitri down the stairs and to a low wall, where he could sit.
One of the cops ran upstairs.
He called back down, “Stay with that guy,” to the EMT.
“I know parents. I talk with them on phone about boy. They are in Ukraine on business.” He hissed when the EMT pulled up his shirt. “They not forgive me for losing boy.”
“He isn’t lost,” said Lily, “someone kidnapped him. There are a lot of us and police people too. We’ll find him.”
“How? We are in strange city. Not know area, not know people.”
Lily pulled out her phone and looked at the text, “Ace and Keiran are at an urgent care center around the corner. We’ll meet them there.”
“No, you won’t,” said the EMT. “This man has two, possibly three broken ribs. He’s going on a gurney to a real hospital before he punctures a lung.”
She looked at his head wound next. She turned to her partner, who had a gurney.
“Head lac too,” she said.
“Who do we know?” said Dimitri. “This is strange city, many people.”
“We know bikers,” said Lily determined.
Dimitri hissed as the EMT bandaged his head, “Yes, we do. And I know Russians. Even in this strange city, there will be Russians.” He punched buttons on his phone.
“Unless they’re the ones that did it,” said Lily plainly.
“Unless that,” agreed Dimitri. “We do not have much time. Boy will be very scared. Must find him.”
“Yes,” said Lily. Her phone vibrated.
She took it out and saw that Dimitri had sent her pictures of the man upstairs. She took in the ski mask. And his dark skin, black eyes, that opened onto nothing. And his black jeans, shirt, and tennis shoes. There were black tats of a spider web with a black widow spider in the middle, and tats of black tears and of crossed swords.
She turned as Henry and Inola came running up, “We must find him. We will find him!”
“Every day is a winding road…”
1
Afterburn
First Steps
“Life sucks sometimes.”
The first cop arrived at the Urgent Care while the doctor sewed up Keiran’s head. He had several injections and was sitting quietly. The police officer opened the curtain and stood next to Ace. She barely came up to Ace’s shoulder. She was African-American; her multi-brand went halfway down her back.
“Officer Champs, NOPD. I see your son got a crack on the head.”
“My son was the victim of a kidnapper.”
Her eyebrows crawled up her forehead, “Would you like to explain that?”
“The kidnapper took my son’s friend Pavel, who was with us on this trip. We’re from Las Vegas.”
“Were you there?”
“No, they were with Dimitri. He’s on his way to the hospital. The kidnappers broke some ribs.”
“Who is Dimitri?”
“Dimitri Ridelov. He’s a math teacher who has been tutoring Pavel, and we’ve been friends for about a year now.”
“The bastards took Pavel,” said Keiran.
Finally, the sewing stopped and the nurse wiped off all the blood so she could put a bandage over the stitches.
“They got in through both the doors and window on our hotel room. We couldn’t run. They had ski masks and they wore jeans and hoodies and they had machetes. I drop-kicked one of them. Pavel went all whirling-dervish and got two. Dimitri pulled one off of me, then they started whaling on Pavel. I pulled one off Pavel and got him in the balls, and I elbowed the other one in his face. They hit me on the head, and they got Dimitri in the ribs. Then they got Pavel and dragged him out. I tried to go after him, but I slipped on the blood and I went down. Dimitri tried to get up, but they kicked him again.” His voice cracked, “Ace, I really tried to stop them from taking Pavel.”
Ace gently reached around and grabbed the back of his brother’s neck, “I know you did. Keiran, you’re really brave and you fought back.”
“He’s your brother?” asked the cop. “Where’s your mom?”
“In jail,” said Ace. “That’s why I have custody.”
“What did she do?”
Keiran hopped off the gurney. Ace caught him before he could fall.
“My mom rubbed out my dad,” said Keiran exhausted.
“Rubbed out?” asked the cop.
Ace sighed. “She murdered our dad, yeah. The trial is in about a month. She has tons of
evidence against her, but she’s trying to ‘high-price-lawyer’ her way out of it.”
“You busted the other lawyer,” said Keiran. “Can we get out of here now?”
“Can I get him out of here?” Ace asked the nurse.
“I’ll get the doctor,” she said.
“The other lawyer?” asked the cop.
“He tried to have us killed,” said Ace. “He did plead guilty. Got lots of evidence against him on all sorts of stuff.”
“Dirty deeds are done dirt cheap,” said Keiran. “Where’s the nurse? We have to find Pavel!”
The cop valiantly tried to keep the thread of the conversation, “Could your mother or her lawyer have anything to do with this?”
“I doubt it,” said Ace. “Her assets have been frozen for months now.”
“Then who took Pavel? Where are his parents?”
“They’re Russians visiting the Ukraine on business,” said Keiran. “They'll be a bitch to get hold of. I don’t have their number. Wait, I’m an idiot. Dimitri has it.”
“So, they didn’t kidnap him?” asked Officer Champas.
“If they did, they did so remotely,” said Ace.
The doctor showed up, a man with many cultures on his face; a French nose, and African-black, twisty hair, and a slight reddish cast to his skin.
“I’m Doctor Protrero. Sit down, young man, and let me take a look at that head.”
He did an examination, shining a light in his eyes, checking him cognitively.
“He can go now, but he needs rest. He may be dizzy, or feel sick to his stomach. I will give you a prescription for Tylenol with codeine. Get some rest, young man!”