But the time the sun had gone down and left twilit gloom behind, Sadie was pacing the length of her dim apartment. She was fizzing so hard she thought she could hear it against her eardrums.
Trouble was coming; she should have called Gordon. He’d have taken her out for dinner. He liked to take her out for dinner when she needed him.
Instead, she grabbed her keys.
~oOo~
Bikes filled both sides of Mariposa Avenue for three blocks—the block of Virtuoso Cycles and the Night Horde compound and a block in each direction on either side. The side streets around and behind the compound were full, too. Sadie circled the block about four times, slowly, just trying to see everything she could see. A banner spanning the street proclaimed Miles of Smiles: The City of Madrone and the Night Horde MC Welcome You! In the parking lots, behind tall chain link fences obscured with red and black strips, she could see the tops of what she thought were RVs.
The music was incredibly loud—it had to have been live. And people were everywhere. The kind of people she’d seen in all those hundreds of photos. Women in jeans so tight their legs didn’t seem to bend when they walked. Huge tits, huge hair, lots of ink, bedazzled to within an inch of their lives. The men were all hairy and wide.
Even out on the street, people seemed to be liberal with their affections. Another thing she’d seen online: plenty of public sex. Or at least public near-sex. Bikers were as bad as frat boys. Maybe worse.
And Sherlock was in there somewhere, probably drunk—no absolutely drunk. He’d said ‘absolutely.’ He’d guaranteed he would be drunk. He probably had some twat in leather booty shorts hanging all over him, was probably up to his snoot in her twat.
That was her snoot, goddammit.
She drove down Mariposa until she found a spot in the small lot of a closed accountant’s office. A sign on the wall right in front of her insisted that the lot was for clients only, but she didn’t care. They could tow her if they wanted.
What she felt as she stalked toward the clubhouse wasn’t what she usually called fizziness. It was louder and stronger that that, and it was different—the difference between opening a normal can of soda and opening one that had been vigorously shaken.
It wasn’t a freakout, at least not the kind she was used to. She didn’t feel the need to score—not right now, anyway—or to cut, or any of that. The only compulsion she felt was to see Sherlock. She needed—oh, she needed—but he was the only thing on her mind. She needed to see for herself that his hands weren’t full of anybody else’s boobs, and that his snoot wasn’t buried in anybody else’s twat.
She hadn’t thought to dress before she’d left; she’d barely thought at all. Now that she was moving through the outside edges of this mammoth party, she felt small and insignificant, in her super-comfy shredded jeans, black high-top Chucks, and ancient White Stripes t-shirt. Not a single sequin or bedazzle on her. No makeup, either; she’d been working all day in her apartment. She wasn’t even wearing a bra.
That didn’t stop guys from looking her up and down as she walked by—even guys with their hands up some woman’s shirt or down her pants looked Sadie over. But nobody stopped her progress, either. She’d been worried about that, deep down on the floor of her mind, where she’d shoved her sense: that she wasn’t invited, had, indeed, been expressly not invited, and she wasn’t sure she’d be able to get in.
But that was before she’d gotten here and seen the crush of people. Highly unlikely that there was some biker checking a list at the door.
She had to squeeze through a big cluster of people near the door, and somebody in there took the opportunity to get a good feel of her ass, but his hand dropped away, so whoever it was attached to must have been disappointed in her flat caboose. She didn’t even bother to turn around to figure out who it was; she just pushed on through.
And found that there was a biker at the door. She didn’t know if he was checking a list, but he was leaning right next to it, a bottle of booze in one hand and a cigarette in the other. He was short—not as short as she, but a lot shorter than Sherlock—and built like a bull, with a thick neck and those muscles like mountains on top of his shoulders. His shaved head was almost completely tattooed, and she thought the skin under his beard was inked, as well. The word HORDE was inked across his throat, so she guessed he was one of Sherlock’s ‘brothers,’ as he called them.
She’d read up on that, too. The ‘brotherhood,’ the ‘code,’ all that NO GRLZ ALOWD bullshit.
This Horde ‘brother’ looked her up and down, leering, and then took a drag of his cigarette and blew it out to the side. She couldn’t open the door unless he moved, so she put on her sweetest smile and said, “Excuse me.”
“You lost, niñita?”
Sadie squared her shoulders. “Nope. Right where I mean to be.”
“I don’t think so. This isn’t a place for little girls.” His leer stretched out, and she added scared to her list of careening feelings. But Sherlock wouldn’t hang out with assholes, would he?
What she should have done right then was explain to him that she knew Sherlock, maybe even tell him that she was Sherlock’s girlfriend. Definitely, she should have told him that. But if good sense had been at the controls, then she wouldn’t have been standing where she was at all. So instead of asking for help, she said, “Fuck you, asshole.”
Well, at least that cleared the leer off the guy’s face. He dropped his cigarette, grabbed her arm, and slammed her against the side of the building. And then, still gripping his booze, holding her where she was with his legs against hers, he put his hand right on her boob. He didn’t squeeze or anything, just laid his hand there and stared at her.
She was too stunned and afraid to do anything, even breathe. Then he leaned in, whiskey and smoke thick on his breath, and said, “Little girls should be careful what they say. They could get hurt.”
“Diaz, what the fuck’re you doin’?”
The short guy—Diaz, apparently—stepped back and smiled at Sadie. “Just a little education.”
The new guy, taller, clean-shaven, with long, beautiful dark hair loose around his shoulders, held out his hand to Sadie, and she took it. “Don’t mind Diaz, doll. He’s a mean drunk, but he’s not a rapist.” He pulled her from the wall. “You should go home, though. Not a place for you.”
Now she was pissed again. “People keep telling me that! I’m looking for Sherlock! I’m his girlfriend!”
Diaz and her rescuer looked at each other and then back at her. Her rescuer said, “Come again? Are you Taryn?”
“Who the fuck is Taryn?” Jesus Christ! Taryn? What was a Taryn? Did she even know Sherlock at all?
Again the two Horde glanced at each other. Somebody wanted through the door, and her rescuer, still holding her hand, pulled her off to the side, out of the way. Diaz stayed with them. The volume of the music exploded through the open door, and Sadie looked at that wedge of loud darkness as a portal out of the bizarre situation she was trapped in.
“Okay, doll, relax. Here’s what we’re gonna do. Diaz is going inside, and he’ll hunt up Sherlock. I’ll wait out here with you.”
“Fuck that. I don’t know you. Why would I let you babysit me?”
“Your choices here are go home, or wait with me.” He smiled a brilliantly white, straight smile then. “I’m Lakota. And you are?”
“Sadie. I’m Sadie.” At that, Lakota turned to Diaz. The short jerkface assaulter asshole nodded and went to the door.
As soon as he opened it, Sadie yanked her hand from Lakota’s and bolted into the clubhouse, ignoring the shouts of the men she was escaping.
Once she was in the dark, dank, loud, crowded space, though, she didn’t know what to do. She had to keep moving; Diaz and Lakota were right behind her. So she pushed her way in, past even drunker, hornier, naked-er people than had been outside, and tried to disappear into the crowd while she searched for Sherlock.
She didn’t get far before there was a big hand on the b
ack of her neck. “Sadie, Sadie, Sadie,” said a voice at her ear: Lakota. “Not a good idea. Come on.”
Sadie thought he was going to push her back outside, but instead, he ushered her to the bar.
Where Sherlock was sitting. There was a blonde standing behind him, her hands on his shoulders, kneading, and moving up to scratch at the undercut part of his hair and then comb through the longer top. She seemed to be glitter from her hair to her feet, wearing a blue sequined halter that barely covered anything at all and a white skirt that covered even less. Seriously—Sadie could see the woman’s butt cheeks.
Sherlock was talking to a guy sitting next to him. Skinny, blond, big ears, his hand inside the shirt of a busty redhead sitting on his lap. He had a patch on his kutte like Sherlock’s, but it was different, too, in a way Sadie couldn’t identify.
Again, Lakota leaned down to Sadie’s ear. “Which direction you want to go, baby doll?”
She walked forward, out of Lakota’s hold, toward Sherlock and his sparkly pet bimbo.
Bimbo saw her coming and turned out to face her, positioning herself smack between Sadie and Sherlock. She looked like she was ready to piss on his leg and mark him for her own. “You need something, little girl?”
Even in the din of the crowd and the band, the woman made the words ‘little girl’ sound synonymous with ‘assface.’
Standing in the middle of this weird place, surrounded by people she didn’t understand and who all seemed hostile to her, confronted by this sparkly, woman with great tits and ass, Sadie lost her nerve and her verve. She held her position for one more second, staring up into glitter-framed blue eyes, and then turned away. Fuck all of this. Sideways and hard.
Having a boyfriend sucked.
Just as she turned, she caught Sherlock’s eye, and under the din, she thought she heard him say her name. But it didn’t matter. She pointed herself toward the door, and Lakota, smiling kindly, stepped out of her way.
~oOo~
She got out of the building and around the corner before Sherlock started shouting for her. She picked up her pace and got almost halfway down the block before some big, bald mountain of a biker stepped into her path and caught her by the arms.
“Hold up, missy. Looks like somebody wants a word with you.”
Hah. Wasn’t that a laugh and a half. And what the fuck was this, anyway? She struggled to get free, but then Sherlock was behind her.
He took her arm. “Thanks, Eight.”
The mountain nodded and let her go. He gave Sadie a wink and then headed toward the clubhouse.
Feeling an odd pressure on the arm Sherlock held, she looked up at him and saw that he was completely fucked up. His lids were at half-mast, and he kept blinking like he was trying to focus. He swayed on his feet—that was the odd pressure she felt, like he was holding her for ballast.
When she yanked her arm again, he wasn’t quite quick enough to keep hold of her. “Why is everybody around here so grabby? And you’re drunk. Go back and be drunk. Be all the biker you can be. Looked like Sparkle Pony was ready for a ride.”
Before she could turn away, though, he had her again. “Sadie, fuck. Hold on. Jesus fuck.” His tongue made words like it had been shot full of Novocain.
He pushed her against the wall. The pushing and grabbing and generally being manhandled was starting to put her into old-fashioned freakout territory, and she closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
“What are you doing here? I told you this was no place for you.” She could barely understand him, he was slurring his words so much.
“Everybody seems to agree with you. You’re drunk,” she repeated.
He laughed. “Yeah. Absolutely. Why are you here, little outlaw?” It came out Wh’re y’here, l’il’law? but she caught it.
“Who’s Taryn?”
He blinked. “Huh? Wha?”
She didn’t like drunk Sherlock. “Never mind. You’re right. I shouldn’t be here. So let me go, and I’ll go.” She squirmed under his hands, but he didn’t budge.
“Don’t want you to go. Missed you. Thinkin’ about you.”
“Yeah, that’s obvious. I could see that I was right on top of your brain while Sparkle Pony was trying to get on top of your cock.”
More blinking, and that was his only answer. Then he leaned in, pushing his leg between hers, and cupped her face with his free hand. His breath was like a Jack Daniel’s distillery. She was getting a contact drunk from the fumes.
“Sadie.”
Even drunk, he managed to make that sound condescending.
And now she wanted to score.
She pushed on him, but he was too heavy to move. “Sherlock, I am so beyond fizzy right now, it’s not even funny. I need to get away from here and call Gordon. Right now. Please just go back and do whatever you’re going to do and leave me alone.”
“I can’t,” he slurred. “I love you.”
She froze and tried to meet his eyes, but they were barely open, and he had a stupid, vacant look about him. He was drunk out of his head. So there she was, with those three words in her ears, words she wanted to clutch close and never let go, and no way to believe they were true.
“Oh, you asshole. Fuck you.”
He frowned. Slowly. “Don’t say that, sweetheart. I know you love me, too. I can feel it. When I touch you.” His hand came up and landed on her boob, right where his nasty ‘brother’ Diaz had touched her.
Unbidden, her brain started combing through its old files. She was in Madrone. There was a place just outside town where she could pick up Oxy. Just a little, enough to get her through this night. If she crossed Calaveras Road, she could score heroin right off a street corner. Not the good shit, but any port in a storm, and that was maybe five minutes away, tops. She wasn’t carrying cash, but there was an ATM down the block.
No. Fuck. Fuck, no. She had to get away from here, right now, and call Gordon. Find a meeting. Something.
“Sherlock, please. Please let me go.”
He made his eyes widen and focus, and she finally, for a second, thought she was looking at the man she…loved.
“I don’t know what I did.” He stepped back and let her go.
~oOo~
Gordon picked Sadie up from her car in the accountant’s lot, took her to a late meeting, then to an all-night diner. He refused to take her back to her car, insisting that he didn’t want her that close to the Horde compound.
He spent a lot of their late meal pushing her about Sherlock and tutting about her reckless behaviors. But she didn’t feel judged. Gordon never judged.
Telling her to call the next day, when she was ready to pick up her car in the bright daylight, he walked her to her door and told her good night.
She felt better—calmer, anyway, and safer—and was able to sleep well. She rarely had trouble sleeping.
In the morning, she felt sad but calm. The night before had been an ending. It had definitely had the flavor of an ending.
But that was probably for the best. Yes, she loved Sherlock. She’d kind of known that already, but the jealous fire she’d felt had crystallized the feeling. But if his life was what she’d seen that night, then it wasn’t the life for her. It wasn’t. The outlaw stuff wasn’t the big problem. The partying, though, really was. He was right: it was no place for her.
So she tried to set thoughts of him aside. She went for a run, and took a shower, and ate her breakfast sitting out on her balcony. It was going to be a boiling hot August day, but it hadn’t hit the boiling point yet.
While she sat on the balcony reading a comic book on her tablet, her breakfast done, there was a knock at her door. Thinking that Gordon had just dropped by instead of waiting for her call, she didn’t even check the peephole before she opened the door.
And found Sherlock standing there, steady on his feet, but looking like a partially-reanimated corpse. His mussed hair flopped over his forehead, and his skin was pale and a little bit on the green side. But he smiled. “Hey, little outl
aw.”
Sadie’s heart banged against her chest, but she tried not to let on. “I thought you were in L.A. today. For your big rally and party.”
“Got a visitor this morning.”
About a dozen snippy comments about busty bimbos with glitter eye shadow popped into her head, but she kept her mouth shut and waited for him to be more specific.
“For a skinny old guy, your friend Gordon is a scary motherfucker. And ballsy as fuck.”
Her chin dropped to her chest. “Gordon came to see you? Where? When?”
“Clubhouse. This morning. Walked right in as we were getting moving. Caused a stir. I guess I was an asshole last night?”
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