OUR ACCIDENTAL BABY: Hellhounds MC

by Paula Cox

  I nodded somberly. I had prepared myself for this and I could feel my tears threaten but they didn’t fall.

  We drove to his house in silence and I sat down at his computer. “Can you log me in?” When he had, I opened my email and clicked on the link. I stood, moving from in front of the computer without saying a word.

  Cain looked at me and then sat. He spent a couple of minutes looking at the documents and then looked up at me. “Is this true?”

  “Sloane said it was.”

  “And you believed her?”

  “Yes.”

  “This proves nothing!”

  “I know. That’s why I just decided to leave. I didn’t know what to believe anymore.”

  He turned back to the screen and spent the next forty minutes looking through the documents. He got up and retrieved a flash drive from the bedroom and copied all the files to it before he deleted them from the server.

  “Let’s go.”

  “Where?” I asked, suddenly afraid of what he might do.

  “To get some answers.”

  We rode in silence until we arrived at the clubhouse. “Cain…I don’t want to go in. This is all my fault.”

  “Yes it is, but part of being a Hellhound is owning up to your mistakes. Are you a big enough person to walk in there and admit you were wrong?”

  I started to cry. “I don’t know.”

  He sat, staring at me, waiting for me to make a choice. I opened the door as I sniffed. “Let’s go.”

  When we walked in, the party that was underway fell deadly silent. “Why is she here?” Eva asked.

  “We have some business with Thad,” Cain said. “She’s still my old lady,” he added, his tone making it clear that he would still protect me.

  “She fucked you, Cain! She fucked us all, and look what it got us!” Cherie snarled. “I liked you, Alex. How could you do this to us?”

  “I’m sorry,” I said as I looked at my shoes, but then I raised my head. “I’m sorry for all of this. It was all my fault. I didn’t intend for any of this to happen, but…” I stalled, not wanting to outright accuse the club of killing my parents.

  “The Bulls gave her some documents that makes it appear that we killed her parents about twenty years ago,” Cain finished for me. “It was obviously a play to try to use her as leverage, but the documents appear to be legit.”

  I held my head up, though I wanted nothing more than to slink out of there with my tail between my legs.

  “Can we see them?” Thad asked.

  “Right here,” Cain replied holding up the flash drive.

  “Come on,” Thad said and Cain and I followed him to his office.

  Thad looked through the documents. “Why didn’t you bring this to us, Alex?”

  “Because I was afraid. Afraid if the documents were true and you had killed my parents, you would kill me, too, to keep the secret. But I couldn’t be sure, so I didn’t want to go to the cops either. So I just decided to leave, to go home and forget all about the Hounds.”

  “And now?” Thad asked.

  “I don’t know. You risked so much to save me. I don’t know what to think. I’m sorry, Thad. I really am. I wish I could take it all back.”

  “Is it true?” Cain asked.

  “Honestly, I don’t know. But I think I know someone who will.” When he rose from behind his desk, I stepped back and lowered my head in guilt, but he pulled me to him and held me. “I’m sorry you had to go through all of this,” he said softly. “We don’t keep secrets from each other, Alex, and it appears that we may be keeping a big one from you.” He released me and I had to grit my teeth to prevent myself from crying. “Let’s see if we can get you some answers.”

  When we stepped into the main room, all eyes were on us. “This club owes Alex some answers,” Thad said, then paused as he met each person’s eyes. “She should have brought her concerns before the club. She was wrong to not do so, but she’s new and didn’t know. But we’re much more in the wrong. She asked us a simple question, ‘Did we kill her parents?’ and it appears that we may have. This club doesn’t keep secrets from each other. She is one of us, and we may be keeping a secret from her right now. When she asked, I should have dug deeper into it rather than just assuming that she was wrong. Cain and I are going to go and try to find out the truth now.”

  “And if she is wrong?” Cherie asked, her face hard.

  “Then she was wrong. We all make mistakes. Her mistake was to not trust us, but of all the mistakes that we have made, that seems pretty low on the list, doesn’t it?”

  “And if she is right? Are you going to the cops?” Eva asked, staring into my eyes.

  “No. It won’t bring my parents back, and none of you are guilty. And you gave so much for me. No… I would never do that. I owe you too much to ever turn on you.”

  I stood my ground, meeting their eyes, until Thad pressed his hand into my back to start me walking. “Let’s get you some answers.”

  ***

  “What is this place,” Cain asked as we stepped out of his truck.

  “This is Grapevine Lakes Assisted Living,” Thad said. “Del Kozlowski lives here.”

  “The founder of the Hounds?” Cain asked in surprise. “I thought he was dead!”

  “Not dead. Not yet,” Thad said as we stepped up to the door and he rapped on it solidly with his knuckles.

  “Who is it?” a man’s voice called from inside.

  “Del? It’s Thad. I want to speak to you a minute.”

  The door opened and a silver-haired, stoop-shouldered man was standing before us. He appeared to be in his late eighties, and slightly frail, but I could tell that he was once a powerful man. He smiled at Thad and then his eyes went first to me, then to Cain.

  “Del, this is Cain Rodgers and his old lady. They’re Hounds. Can we talk to you a minute.”

  Del stepped back and we entered the tiny apartment. There was one central room that functioned as both living and eating area with a small bedroom behind. “It’s good to see you, Thad,” Del said as he settled into a well-worn chair.

  Cain and Thad took the two chairs, and Cain pulled me gently to sit in his lap.

  “Del, do you remember about twenty years ago, anything about an investigation into our business?”

  “Twenty years? That was a long time ago.”

  “I know, but can you remember anything about it?”

  “Why do you want to know?”

  Thad nodded at me. “There was a cop killed about the same time. This is his daughter. She has evidence that he was about to shut us down.”

  Del looked at me. “What’s your name?”

  “Alex. Alexandria Bernhardt.”

  Del continued to look at me. “I remember,” he finally said, never breaking eye contact with me.

  “Did we do it?”

  “Yes.”

  Thad and Cain looked at each other, but said nothing.

  “It was all fucked up,” Del said slowly. “I sent Griffin and a couple of the new guys to Houston to talk to our guy on the docks. We had gotten wind that the cops were pressuring him. I don’t know how they tracked him down, but they had.” Del continued to look at me. “Your dad, he was a bulldog. When Griffin got there, he found out the guy had turned and he called me, wanting to know what to do.” Del finally broke eye contact with me and looked at Thad. “I told him to kill him. If he talked, we were fucked and the lot of us were going to jail.”

  “I didn’t know any of this. Why did you keep it from the rest of the club? Why didn’t you tell me about this when I took the chair?” Thad asked.

  “Because of what happened next. Griffin found out that…what the fuck was that guy’s name?”

  “Kendrell?” Cain suggested.

  “Yeah, Kendrell. Before he killed him, Griffin found out that Kendrell had talked to a Dallas cop. Kendrell had the signed papers where he had given his statement and everything.”

  “So you had him, the cop, killed?” Thad asked.
>
  Del looked at me. “No. I never gave the order. I didn’t even know about it until it was done. Griffin came back into town and told me Kendrell was dead. I thought that was the end of it. I didn’t even know about the statement until much later.”

  “So who killed her father?” Thad asked.

  “Griffin, and the two others that went with him to talk to Kendrell, Chuck Holly and Jim Peters.”

  “Jackknife Jim Peters, the President of the Bulls?” Thad asked loudly.

  “Yeah.”

  “What the fuck?” Cain muttered.

  “Griffin decided that he would handle the problem of the cop himself. I don’t know if he knew I would never give the okay to kill a cop or what, but after the death made the news…he admitted that he had set it up. He was right proud of himself, how he had made it look like an accident.”

  “How did Jackknife get to the Bulls?” Thad asked.

  “We had a meeting of the club, just the founding members. The heat was coming down on us. The cops couldn’t prove it was us, but they knew. We took a vote. Holly and Peters were stripped of their colors and expelled for their involvement. Peters joined the Bulls and I don’t know where Holly ended up. He just disappeared.”

  “Son of a bitch. No wonder the Bulls have it in for us,” Thad said. “What happened to Griffin? Wasn’t he a founding member, too?”

  “Yes…and I killed him.”

  I felt Cain stiffen under me. “You killed a brother?”

  “I had to. I beat him to death myself.” Del looked down as if ashamed of his actions. Perhaps he was. “It was the only way. He stood there and took it for as long as he could. After he was dead, we burned his marks, cut off his fingers, pulled his teeth, and disfigured his face with a hammer. Anything that we thought would lead the cops back to us. Then we dumped the body where it would be found along with a note that said he was the one that had killed the cop.”

  “Fuck…” Cain whispered.

  “There was a war coming. The cops, they wouldn’t have stopped. We had to end it.”

  “And the case my father was building?” I asked, the first time I had spoken since he asked my name.

  “They had a statement, but no witness, no corroboration, and no hard evidence. It was all hearsay. I guess the DA decided not to pursue charges.”

  “Del! Why didn’t you tell my any of this?” Thad asked. “You always said the Hounds never kept secrets!”

  “Because your hands were clean and I wanted them to stay that way. I didn’t want our stain to remain with the club. I was getting old. My brothers were killing cops without my knowledge. I knew then it was time for a change. That is why I started grooming you for the chair.”

  Thad looked at me. “I’m sorry, Alex. I didn’t know.”

  Before I could answer Del took my hand. “I’m sorry, too. I didn’t know what happened to you or I would have tried to make it right. I couldn’t bring back your parents, but I avenged them in the best way that I could. It’s ironic that you, the daughter of the last man we killed, should join the Hellhounds. Can you find it in your heart to forgive an old man?”

  I held my tongue, not telling him that I was responsible for so many deaths at the hands of the Hellhounds. That stain was on me. I leaned forward and pulled Del into a hug. “I can,” I whispered as I held him.

  Epilogue

  Alex returned to New Orleans the day after she spoke with Del Kozlowski. She and Cain had made up and spent the night in his apartment in the throes of passion. He had put her on a plane the next morning with a kiss and a promise to join her.

  Four weeks later, he made good on the promise, arriving in his truck, his hog in the back, and a few of his possessions. Despite her grandparents’ objections, Alex insisted that Cain move in with her until he could find a place of his own. He began to search, but he wouldn’t tell her what he was looking for until one day, two months later, he presented her with a choice. Did she want to live in a restored house in the French Quarter or a new house on the beach in Gulfport, Mississippi?

  Alex chose the house in Mississippi. Fourteen days later, they closed on the house. As they drove up to Cain’s new home, he pressed the button to open the garage. As the door rumbled up, Alex gasped at the new Ford Explorer Sport parked inside with a big red bow on it. He informed her that he was tired of squeezing into her car, and the used Civic she was driving had to go. Ale didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, so she did both.

  Over the next several months, they began to settle into their new lives. They kept her house, renting it to the Hellhounds so they would have a place to stay when they were in town. It saved them from having to sell the house, and was cheaper for the Hounds than paying for a motel each time. Alex didn’t return to work, choosing instead to enroll full-time in the LSU School of Veterinary Medicine. After she was accepted, they rented a small apartment in Baton Rouge, near the campus, so that they could be together during the week while she was in class and avoid the two hour drive home.

  Money was pouring into the Hounds coffers. Saved from a very embarrassing mistake, New Jersey had consolidated all their purchases through the Hounds, and because of it, the Hounds had picked up several other customers. Because of the increased business, they were accepting two or three shipments a week now, instead of the one or two a month before. The Hounds were becoming wealthy, very wealthy, and Cain was spending his portion of the proceeds liberally to make sure Alex was taken care of and was comfortable, but the rest he was socking away for the future. There were more important things than parties to think about now.

  Inspired by Alex’s drive to improve herself, Cain signed up to take night classes at the University of Mississippi at Gulfport, the nearest college, working toward a degree in business. It would take far longer to get his degree than it would for Alex to complete veterinary school, but he didn’t mind. He had a job that was providing a comfortable living, and when Alex graduated he would have learned enough, he hoped, to help her open her own practice.

  ***

  “Wave goodbye!” Alex called in her baby talk voice as she waved Feather’s tiny hand at the backs of the treating Hounds.

  About once a week or so, a cadre of Hounds showed up to “see the puppy.” They were actually in New Orleans to pick up the latest shipment of guns, but they made it a point to stop in. After the rest of the Hellhounds found out that they had, in fact, killed Alex’s family, the club quickly rallied around her in support. After all, the Hounds took care of their own.

  Cain shut the door, and took Feather from Alex. “You’re such a good girl,” he said softly, making faces at his daughter. “I told Uncle Clyde that baby vomit is good for leather...yes I did. It makes it soft, doesn’t it?”

  Feather was getting cranky from being handed around, and was fussing. “I’ll go put her down,” Alex said, reaching for her.

  “I’ve got her,” Cain said, bouncing her in his arms as he carried her to her room. A couple of minutes later, he returned empty handed, but with a bulge in his back pocket that wasn’t there before. He could hear Feather snuffling and fussing about being put down for her nap, but three months in they were already experienced enough parents to know that she wasn’t long awake.

  He found Alex in the kitchen, cleaning up and loading the dishwasher from lunch. He stepped up behind her and held her tight. She had lost almost all her baby weight and was looking even better than before. “I love you,” he whispered into her ear as he hugged her.

  She turned in his arms. “I love you, too,” she whispered as their lips touched. To hear her say the words thrilled him as much now as when she first uttered them five months ago.

  As they separated, he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a small black box that had been hidden in Feather’s room for the past two days. He took a step back as he brought the box around between them and opened it.

  “Cain, I —” Alex began when she saw the box.

  “Alexandria Nicole Bernhardt, will you marry me?” he asked soft
ly, pulling the ring from the box.

  Alex was flabbergasted. Cain had been hinting about getting married, but she had been evasive, wanting to be sure. “Cain…”

  “Say yes,” he whispered as he took her hand and slid the ring upon her finger. “I always get what I want…” he added as he gently brought his lips to hers.

  She flowed into the kiss, her arms going around his neck. Yes… he always seems to…

  THE END

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