by Leah Wilde
The adrenaline of moving all of my stuff into the new office wore off, and I crashed into the thick, soft leather chair behind my desk. I sat and stared at the towers of folders on my desk and understood why some of the other young professors had pushed me so hard to get everything filed electronically. I was not looking forward to putting those files up.
I needed a break, a vacation. I needed to get out of the university and get back in the field. My focus was Russian history. From politics to religion, from the geographic and ideological isolation to the rich culture and language of the Russian people, I had immersed myself in anything and everything Russian.
And it had finally paid off!
I wanted to get out of the office and celebrate, but all of my research had left me short on friends to celebrate with. I felt like I should have been at a point where I could take some time for myself finally, but there didn’t seem to be much self to take time with. Everything I used to identify myself was sitting in the office with me.
I wanted to call my mom and to share the news, but she wouldn’t know I was even on the phone.
I stood up and walked to the window, looking down at the students and professors walking through the courtyard. Some were holding hands. Some had their arms around each other. I hoped one day that would be me, but I knew it was a long way out. I still had a lot of work ahead of me, and a lot of bills to pay between student loans and my mom’s medical expenses.
The reason I couldn’t call my mom was because she suffered from an early onset of Alzheimer’s, and it was advancing pretty rapidly. I’d moved her into a home while I was still working on my PhD. She required almost constant care, and as a student and research professor, I hadn’t been able to provide the kind of care she needed.
At times I found it easy to feel guilty, like I’d chosen my career over my family. But I reminded myself that she’d done the same, waiting until her late-twenties to settle down and start a family of her own, waiting until she had established herself as a doctor of linguistics.
I kept a picture of her on my wall from the day she graduated with her PhD, one of the proudest moments of her life. The apple didn’t fall far from the tree. On a trip to Russia when I was a child, while she was studying some of the lesser known Eastern European languages that had re-emerged after the fall of the Soviet Union, I’d heard someone trying to talk to her in Russian, and I fell in love with the language. That was the beginning of my lifelong love affair with the people and their country, a country shrouded in mystery for most of my peers who had never visited it, thanks to the Cold War.
I pulled the picture out of a box and held it in my hand. “I’ve made it,” I told the young version of my mom, knowing that she would have understood what I was saying, and who was saying it.
There was a light knock at my door, bringing me back into the office. I turned around to see one of the professors’ assistants standing in my doorway, eagerly looking in on the boxes and stacks of papers cluttering the room.
“Dr. Danvers, there’s a gentleman here to see you,” the graduate student said uneasily. “Do you want me to tell him to come back?”
I looked around the room and sighed, dropping the picture of my mother back on top of the box it temporarily called home. “No, go ahead and send him in, I guess.”
“You got it,” he said, tapping the door frame and starting to turn away.
“Wait,” I said quickly, catching him before he could get away.
He poked his head back into my office. “What is it?”
“First, can you help me clear off my desk?” I asked him. “I don’t want to receive any visitors with this clutter in here. We don’t have to put this stuff away, but I’d like to look at least a little like my title.”
He laughed nervously. “I’ll be glad to.” He grabbed stacks of papers and set them on the floor in front of the cabinets along the bottom of one wall.
“Any idea who it is?” I asked.
He shook his head. “No clue.”
“Student or faculty?” was my next question.
“Neither.”
I set down the last stack of papers from my desk and tilted my head, wondering who was coming to see me. Today of all days. “Go ahead and send them in,” I told him.
I walked around behind my desk and stood with my hands on the back of the chair. Realizing it was almost a throne, the back of it tall enough that I felt like I was hiding behind it more than standing, I stepped to the side and waited for my guest.
A few moments after the teaching assistant left my new office, a tall, dark, musclebound mountain of a man entered the doorway. I let go of my grip on the back of my office chair as I looked him over. His body was a work of art. The definition of his muscles carried my eyes from his shoulders down his arms to the black leather cuffs on his wrists.
His face could have been chiseled from stone. He scowled with a hard, strong jawline and deeply set dark eyes. His dark hair was slicked back. He wore a closely cropped mustache and goatee.
He wore a bright, clean white t-shirt under an old black leather vest with patches on it. They looked like Boy Scout badges from hell. Tribal tattoos snaked out from underneath his short shirt sleeves and down his arms in thick black bands. He even had tattoos on his hands, most of them too small for me to see without getting up close, and I did not intend on doing that; I was close enough where I stood, thank you very much. He had something tattooed on each of his fingers in Gothic lettering, on both hands, but I couldn’t read it from where I stood.
“Dr. Danvers?” he asked in a husky voice as he entered.
I considered telling him she wasn’t in, that I was her secretary, and offering to take a message to deliver to myself after he left, but for some reason I decided against it. Something about this visit already had a very Indiana Jones feel to it. I could see this easily turning into an opportunity to get out into the field. It was likely he wasn’t here to ask about any of my past research.
“Yes, sir, how can I help you?” I replied, trying to sound willing instead of scared and shaky-kneed. I stepped from beside my chair and offered my guest a seat in one of the chairs in front of my desk.
“Thank you,” he accepted, sliding the chair back and sitting down in his blue jeans and black leather boots. He rested one of his large hands on his knee and leaned forward with one of his massive arms on my desk, giving me a better shot at the tattoos on his arm and hand. The bold ink on his arm was certainly impressive, as was the definition of the muscle underneath.
I took my seat as well, feeling more comfortable sitting behind my desk, though if he wanted to get to me, it wouldn’t have taken much for him to get through the old solid wood. I adjusted my skirt and sweater nervously, repeating myself. “What can I do for you, Mr.…?”
“Noll,” he said. “Gage Noll. I’m sorry. I should have introduced myself.” He reached a hand across the desk. I offered him mine, and we shook. His thick, strong fingers wrapped around mine gently as his palm swallowed my small feminine hand. His touch was gentle, but I could still feel the strength he held back from me.
“Dr. Julia Danvers,” I said as we shook hands. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Noll.” With someone that big and burly sitting across from me, I wanted to be as polite and generous as possible.
“Now, what can I do for you?” I asked him a third time, sitting back and offering him a friendly smile.
“Dr. Danvers, I’m here because I need someone to translate Russian for me, and you come highly recommended as an expert on the language and culture,” he answered finally, dropping a bomb in my lap. His voice was stony, businesslike. I was impressed by how articulate he was.
I sat back in my chair, unsure of how exactly to respond. I searched his face to see if there was any possibility his proposition could have been a joke.
“I will pay you handsomely,” he added, reaching into his pocket.
“That’s not necessary,” I told him, holding a hand up to stop him. “I don’t need to
see any money. Why did you come to me? Surely there are other translators in the city who could help you.”
“There are,” he agreed, but he didn’t say anything else, leaving me hanging on his words and expecting him to give me a little more explanation.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Noll. I’m having trouble understanding why you need me instead of someone who specializes in translation. I’m a history professor and a research fellow here at the university. I’m not just a translator,” I explained to him, leaning forward with my hands on the table.
“I understand you’re a reputable expert on Russian culture and language.” He looked around my office. “I’m assuming I’m not wrong.”
“No, sir, you are very right. Indeed, I’m flattered that you were sent to me. It’s just I usually only translate documents. I’m assuming you need live translation, and there are a few offices in the city offering that service. You might be better served by visiting one of those firms,” I suggested to him. “It all depends on your need.”
“I need live translation,” he admitted. “But, I need someone who understands how to talk to Russians. I’m not looking for someone to help me with a conversation I’m able to have. I’m looking for someone to help me say the right things instead of just saying them in Russian.” He paused a moment and leaned across the desk, lowering his voice as he continued. “I’m essentially doing research, and I need help persuading someone to give me information.”
Ice ran through my veins in the instant he said those words. What he was asking for sounded illegal. “I…I’m sorry, Mr. Noll,” I stammered. “I can’t help you with anything like that.”
I rose from my chair, ready to show him to the door, as he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a wad of bills, spilling them onto the desk.
“Like I said, I can pay you handsomely. There is more where that came from.”
I sat back down and looked at the assortment of bills before me. Twenties, fifties, and hundreds stared at me from all across my desk. I couldn’t count it spread out like it was, but it did seem like quite a lot of money.
“They’re all unmarked,” he added. “That’s just a preview of how much you could make taking this job for me. And I’m sure you can find a use for this money.”
I could already think of a use for it. Just the money on the desk would help with my mom’s medical expenses. Despite the increase in my pay at my new position, her bills were going to continue to be difficult to pay off. Just the money spread out in front of me would have been enough to catch up, but the promise of more meant I could finally have some cushion against future expenses.
“Well, Mr. Noll,” I started.
“Gage, please,” he corrected me.
“Gage, this is a very generous offer indeed. I’ll be happy to meet with you later this week to go over the details of what you need and expect from me.” I wasn’t prepared to make a decision like this right away, especially without more details.
He shook his head and waved a finger in front of me. “No, no. That’s not going to work. I need an answer right away, or else I will be forced to take this offer to someone less qualified for the task. Dr. Danvers, so far you are the most qualified person in the area to help me get the information I need.”
I looked at the money, then back at him. He’d been respectful, if a little stern, so far, despite his rough appearance. His request did seem to flirt with the wrong side of the law, but I really needed the money. I saw an opportunity to get out of debt and start moving forward with my life while still handling my mom’s expenses. It wasn’t a decision I appreciated having to make on the spot, but I figured it was worth a shot.
“Okay, what do you need me to do?” I asked him finally.
“I need you to come with me, first off,” he stated, standing up.
“Now? But, I’ve got things here that I need to—” I started to protest.
“Now.” He nodded, cutting me off. “I need to introduce you to the man you’ll be working with. Plus, I want to go ahead and get you an opportunity to talk to him today,” Gage explained.
If I could go ahead and knock this job out today, it would be the quickest I made any amount of money, much less the kind of money he was talking to me about. I grabbed my phone. “Let me call the department secretary and let her know I’ll be out for the rest of the day.” One of the benefits of my new position was I could call the department secretary and let them know I was going to be out in the field, and no one would ask any questions about the work I was doing, which was a good thing here because I had no idea what I was going to be doing either.
Gage quickly cleaned up the money he’d strewn across my desk, sliding the stack of bills to me. “You may want to put this money up somewhere safe. You’re not going to need it when you come with me. I’ll take care of you.”
I couldn’t help but wonder who this confident man was. His body was ripped, and he wore clothes that made him look like a biker. He was covered in tattoos. Yet, even though he spoke in harsh, commanding tones, he was well-spoken. He’d already handed me a large sum of money that I had yet to count, and he was promising me more money if I came with him. Plus, I didn’t need money of my own if I came with him?
“What do I need?” I asked, sliding the bills into one of the bottom drawers of my desk, locking it away, and dumping the key in my purse.
“Just yourself,” he answered.
I looked in my purse to make sure my cell phone was in there. I may have agreed to go along with him for the money, but that didn’t mean I trusted him. Not yet.
“Let me go ahead and thank you before we get going,” Gage said before I stepped out from behind my desk. “Your assistance in this matter is greatly appreciated. You have no idea.”
He walked out of the office behind me and stayed behind me as I closed and locked my office door. “Don’t mention it,” I said, under my breath.
“I know you’re uncertain of what you’ve agreed to, but once you meet this gentleman, you’ll understand why I need someone who understands more than just the language to be able to talk to him,” he said, stepping in front of me to get the stairwell door. I wanted to avoid the elevators, and the stairs were faster.
“It’s fine, really,” I assured him. The more he talked about it, the more I wanted to run back upstairs, to pretend none of this had happened. But at the same time, I was intrigued. He needed information, and he needed me to talk to someone who only spoke Russian in order to get it. He didn’t come across as a street thug or anything, not after talking to him, so my suspicions were starting to ease up a little bit.
When we got to the parking lot outside my building, I expected to see a motorcycle waiting on us. I’d never ridden a motorcycle, and I wasn’t too keen on starting today, so I was thrilled when he pulled out his keys and unlocked the doors of a black Suburban with blacked out windows. The lights flashed to let us know it was unlocked, and relief washed over me.
I started to think that maybe I had unfairly judged this man.
Chapter 2
Gage
Kings of Hell HQ was in one of the older buildings in downtown Chicago. We’d picked the building because of the old-timey look and feel it had. Years before we came along, the bottom floor had been converted into a mechanic shop with offices and apartments above it. We painted the bricks on the first floor black and painted our name in flames across the top, crossing over the line between where we’d painted and where the old red bricks had faded into a dingy, almost brown color.
Motorcycles lined both sides of the street, leaving the driveway into the garage open so we could pull our cars inside or take in work, which we occasionally did for friends and other connections.
Julia gasped when she realized where we were going as I pulled the Suburban into the bay of the garage to park it.
“You’re in the Kings of Hell?” she asked, appalled.
I couldn’t help but laugh at her reaction. “Honey, I’m not just in the Kings. I’m the MC’s preside
nt. I guess you could say I’m the King of Hell.” I killed the engine and opened the door to hop out.
“Take me back,” she said, not budging from her seat.
“I’m sorry?” I turned back to look at her.
She crossed her arms in the thin long-sleeved sweater she wore, looking straight ahead through the windshield. She looked like a child at that moment, not like the world-renowned foremost expert on Russian language and culture from the University of Chicago.
I shook my head and closed my door. I walked around to her side of the car and opened her door. “Don’t be silly, Dr. Danvers. You’ve already accepted the money I handed you, and you agreed to come with me.”