by Violet Blaze
“No problem, Miss Deputy Mayor,” Fauna says, dressed in a silver top covered in sequins. She looks like she's getting ready to work the bar, her makeup thick and dark but pretty. Glinda's missing her usual pink jacket, wearing a plain white blouse that I could see my mother in. Dressed down like this, with a pair of jeans and sparse makeup, she seems a little less scary. Well, except for the pink cowboy boots she never seems to take off. Those are still admittedly quite terrifying. “This is a weekly tradition of ours. Being the new girl and all, we figured you might want to join us.”
“I appreciate it, really,” I say as Janae smiles at me, dressed in black slacks and a cream blouse. Her dark hair is tousled and wavy, but her lips are tight. I guess I didn't do much to endear her to me at the barbecue. But I had to put my foot down, I know I did. Now, I just have to get to know the woman and everything will be A-OK on this front, I'm sure of it.
“We usually invite Mia along with us,” Janae adds as she gestures with her chin for us to start moving into the store. She pushes the cart; nobody else has one. Without asking, I dump my purse and bags into it. “She keeps the clubhouse stocked for the boys, you know.”
“Well, she did,” Glinda says absently, shrugging her shoulders. “But not now. Probably not ever again. I heard she lost her job on Friday.”
“Oh, hells, I didn't hear that,” Fauna says as we pass by a display of organic produce. I try not to let my lips purse, but I think they do anyway. Mia. A girl that slept with my fiancé and cut my hair off, sliced up my face. A girl who showed up at Royal's door yesterday and begged him to take her back while I stood and pretended not to listen at the end of the hallway. A girl who keyed my fucking car. I feel bad for the woman, truly. To be that broken, that lonely, it must be horrible. A part of me feels like I should befriend her, see if there's a way to free her from her own torment. But maybe I'm not that nice of a person.
“What happened?” I ask, trying to be a part of the conversation. As much as I dislike Mia, I feel like I need to hear this.
“She didn't show up for work,” Janae says with a tight mouth, the skin on her forehead wrinkled with frustration. “Not since she got kicked off the compound.” A quick glance in my direction. I keep my face forward, focusing on the squeak of my wet boots against the faux hardwood floors beneath our feet. Ah, gourmet grocers. Got to love 'em. “I hear her boss tried to cut her a break, but …”
“Where did she work?” I watch as Glinda pauses next to the rows of flour and starts to scan labels. When she settles on an organic unbleached flour, I smile a little. Eco-conscious biker ladies. Interesting.
“She worked at that pizza place in McKinleyville, the one on Central.” Another sigh from Glinda, a shake of her blond hair. She tucks some of it behind her ear and moves onto the sugar section, selecting yet another organic brand. “Now she'll never get out of that goddamn motel.” The bag of sugar plops into the cart. I haven't bothered to ask what we're making; I'm assuming they've already got a plan or a tradition they're working off. I decide to observe. “And before you ask, I'll tell you. Mia lives in the Flamingo on Broadway in Eureka.”
I raise both brows.
“She lives in Eureka, works in McKinleyville and travels all the way up here to the clubhouse?”
“All in her clunky piece of shit Toyota. Damn thing's older than I am,” Fauna says as she starts grabbing sprinkles at random and tossing them in the cart. Glinda goes behind her, checks the ingredient labels and removes a few.
“That red dye 40 will give you cancer,” she says as Fauna rolls her blue eyes.
“You and your cancer,” Fauna says, but I notice that she doesn't put them back. I smile again, enjoying the familiar way the girls interact with each other. They really do feel like a family. “Poor Mia. She needs to get her head on her shoulders and stop chasing fantasies.”
“She was chasing Royal,” Glinda says as three sets of eyes flick my way. I meet their gazes and smile softly.
“I didn't plan for this,” I tell them as they continue to look at me, practically cornering me against the maple syrup with their stares. “In fact, being with Royal is something I actively tried to avoid. He … being with him doesn't exactly fit the life plan I had for myself.”
“You got a degree, Miss Deputy Mayor?” Fauna asks me as she reaches up to play with a gold cross around her neck.
“I do.”
“In what?” Janae, this time.
“I have a law degree,” I tell them and they exchange glances.
“You do understand what that 1% means, don't you?” Janae starts pushing the cart again.
“I do.” We pause again next to the cocoa powder. A canister of free-trade organic cocoa flies into the basket. “Look,” I say, getting in front of the cart and curling my fingers around the metal bars. “I'm not here to pull a William Queen on you,” I say and Fauna blanches.
“What?” Glinda asks as I wonder if I've just said the wrong thing.
“That guy that infiltrated the Mongols MC—William Queen. He spent years befriending them, patched-in, got elevated to treasurer …”
“We know who William Queen is,” Janae snaps, trying to push the cart forward. I stand my ground.
“I'm not here to twist up the natural order of things. I don't need to be queen of the compound or anything, don't need to change the rules. I just want to love Royal and live my life.”
“Honey, that's a pipe dream. You do understand that Royal's the president of the mother chapter of the Alpha Wolves? They have other chapters across the country. This is a big fucking deal.” Fauna leans over the cart toward me, her lined face crinkling with emotion. She looks suddenly ten years older. “These boys love each other with a fierceness I will never understand, but you know what? They also won't hesitate to kill each other if one of them steps out of line. Some old lady lawyer? Sweetheart, get out while you still can and go be mayor, be an attorney, whatever. This isn't the place for you. I know you think we're picking on you, but that's just not it at all. You can't walk into this life all willy-nilly, walk away when you decide it doesn't work. You have to be all in or nothing. Do you understand?”
I take a deep breath and close my eyes.
“I know I love Royal, and I know I'm willing to compromise to make things work.”
“There's a hell of a lot more than compromise to this, Lyric Rentz. If you decide you want in, we'll welcome you with open arms, but understand that this other life of yours, it is over.”
I open my eyes back up and move out of the way of the cart as my mind spins and twists and my tummy flickers with butterflies. Jesus. I thought after the barbecue things would get better, but I have no idea what I'm doing here. I swipe my hands down the thighs of my jeans and watch as the girls pick out milk, butter, eggs. I don't join in their chatter.
When we get to the checkout, I offer to pay and nobody turns me down.
“Are we heading to Janae's?” I ask as the automatic doors slide open and we start walking the groceries under the awning towards the rain. It's coming down hard, in thick, glossy sheets. We pause at the edge of the dry pavement while Glinda pushes a button on a key fob and a blue minivan winks back at her.
“Well, we figured your place might be better,” she says, pausing for dramatic effect. “I mean Royal's. He's got a beautiful kitchen, doesn't he?”
“Sure. Sounds good,” I say, feeling weird about inviting three people I don't know over to the house of the acquaintance-turned-lover-turned-fiancé I also don't really know that well. “You guys know the address?”
“We've had get-togethers there before,” Janae says as we all face the heavy downpour. Fauna unwraps the sweater she had tied around her waist and slips it on, throwing up the hood against the harsh, salty bite of the wind while I slide my phone surreptitiously from my purse. There's nothing from Sully or my parents—thank God. I shoot off a quick text to Royal.
On our way to your place to bake organic cookies.
I smile and tuck the phone aw
ay. Royal's probably still at the clubhouse, but at least we'll have Sketch and some dude named Jump-Start outside to keep watch. Oh, and Royal's unregistered SR40c with the serial number scratched off. I bet Agent Shelley would love to find out about that.
“Ready?” Glinda asks, taking over and pushing the cart ahead of herself, straight into the icy downpour. From what I can gather, the three of them took one vehicle here. Means they'll have plenty of time to gossip about me on their way to Royal's place. At least I have the wolves in my car for company.
We're sprinting across the pavement together towards Glinda's minivan. I figure I'll help them load the groceries before getting into my own car.
The cart comes to a stop in a deep puddle as Fauna reaches for the handle of the sliding door, pausing when she notices Glinda staring at something over her shoulder.
I turn to follow her gaze and feel the blood drain out of my face.
Standing in the thick downpour is the leader of the Alpha Wolves groupies.
“Mia?” Glinda asks, squinting through the heavy drizzle of rain at her friend. Mia's a wreck, her dark hair hanging loose and tangled around her shoulders, her makeup smeared, mascara running down her cheeks like black tears. “Is that you, baby?”
“I see you're having plenty of fun without me,” she sniffs, her hand on her purse, squeezing the leather with white knuckled fingers. “I'm pretty easily replaceable, aren't I?”
“If you wanted to come—” Glinda starts, but Mia cuts her off, taking a step closer. I feel awkward, like I want to leave, but instead I stay where I am, wondering why we're having a conversation in the icy rain.
“Rebecca told me this would happen,” Mia continues and I notice Janae and Fauna exchanging a look. “So I took the money. I need it, okay? And I'm so sorry,” she says, looking from Glinda to me and lifting up her right hand. Fuck. She's got a fucking gun that I didn't see through the heavy downpour of rain and the fluorescent flicker of the store's lights reflecting off the puddles.
Mia sniffles and shakes her head.
“What are you doing, baby?” Glinda asks, letting go of the shopping cart and holding up her hands, pink acrylics bright under the street lamp above our heads. “You just put that down, okay? Everything's gonna be alright, sweetheart.”
“No!” Mia screams, waving the gun around as my hands drop to my purse. I've got Royal's Ruger in there. If I can just get it out, I'll shoot this bitch in the foot like I promised. I really don't want to have to kill anybody here. “It's not going to be okay. I tried and you know where it got me? In the fucking doghouse. I'm banned from the compound, from Royal's bed, and I've got nothing and nobody.” Mia sniffs again and closes her eyes, her stringy hair clinging to her wet cheeks as I flick the latch on my purse and her brown gaze snaps open.
In less than a second, the gun is up and she's taking a shot at Glinda. The bullet goes straight through her shoulder and smashes into the window of her minivan with a splatter of red. The rain washes it away as quick as it came, shredding the evidence to nothing as Glinda staggers back in her pink cowboy boots and hits the cement on her knees.
She doesn't scream or cry or anything, just glances over at her shoulder with a dazed expression. The air around us lights with flickers of white and the sound of gunfire. Our bodyguards, that kid Sketch and the sullen faced Jump-Start, they're fighting, too.
Shit. This isn't a grocery shopping expedition; it's a fucking coup.
Janae screams, the sound shattering the night sky as Fauna drops to the ground and pulls Glinda into her arms. The Ruger's in my hand now, and I'm disengaging the safety, lifting it up and taking a shot at Mia with two steady hands. The bullet hits her dead in the chest and she staggers but doesn't go down. Holy hell.
She fires a second shot at the same time I do, this one flying wide as blood blooms and then dies on her chest, washed away by the rain. I shoot her again. And again. And again. I realize it's probably overkill in the solid, stately logical part of my brain, but my emotions are all fuzzy and I'm breathing hard and why won't this bitch just die?!
Mia drops to the ground and she doesn't get up, but neither does Glinda. I register dimly that Janae is wailing, wilting to the cement like a flower as she pleads with … someone. My gaze flicks briefly to my left, noting the empty bikes, the missing Wolves, before I turn back to Janae and watch as a figure appears from the sheet of rain.
“Sorry, sugar, but I never much liked you anyway.”
There's a man standing there that I don't recognize, wearing a cut and a smirk for a smile. His hair is sandy blond and his skin is tanned, rugged and handsome with age. He must be in his late forties, tall and muscular and dressed in dark jeans and brown boots. He lifts his gun and points it at Janae's face, but she's quick, too. Can't be married to an outlaw and not know a damn thing.
She lifts up a revolver I didn't know she had, but it's not fast enough. I can see the man's finger tensing on the trigger, readying himself for a head shot. Nobody survives a head shot.
I take aim, release my breath, and fire into the thick muscle of his bicep, sending his shot wide. Janae screams anyway, reaching to her suddenly bloody left ear, the revolver still clutched with her right hand as the man kicks out hard and hits her in the face. Janae goes sprawling, her gun flying across the pavement as I ready myself to take another shot.
“Not that one,” the man says, his accent thick and southern and warm. It's so odd to hear that sound coming from his cold lips. “That's the mayor's daughter.”
“Lyric!” Fauna screams, and my first instinct when I hear the panic in her voice is to duck, dropping to the pavement on my knees. The impact is hard and wet and it hurts like fucking hell, but it's better than being shot or hit in the head or dosed with chloroform or whatever. Fauna, who not surprisingly also has a gun, aims at something behind me. When she fires, I feel the wet spray of blood on my back, but I don't let that distract me. Instead, I take another shot at the blond man and hit him square in the chest.
He jerks back, but he doesn't go down.
Shit.
There's no blood either, not even the faint pinkish tinge left by the rain. Body armor? I wonder, but there's not a lot of time here to think these things through. I aim at his head this time and wonder if I can make it through the chaos and the rain and the dark. The sounds of sirens echo in the distance, bringing with them a sense of calm.
Fauna takes another shot over my shoulder, but then she jerks back suddenly like she's been punched, sliding to the ground beside Glinda while Janae lays unconscious beside them, her gun a mere twelve inches away from her hand.
I'm on my own now.
Blond guy holds his gun on me and nods his chin at someone behind me.
“Get her. We need this one,” he says as he keeps the muzzle trained on me, moving closer, his boots splashing through puddles as we sit in a stand off. It won't last long though, I know, because he has backup and I don't. Not yet. If I can just make it until the police show up …
That's when I notice the writing on the front of the man's vest. President. So this is Clayton Moore. What the hell is this guy doing his own dirty work for? I stare up at him as I try to figure out my next best option. What can I do? He wants to take me hostage as leverage against who? My dad? Royal? If I shoot him, I have no doubt the guy I can hear moving across the wet parking lot behind me will kill me.
But if I keep him distracted here, he can't go back and finish the girls off. There's no time. If he wants me, wants to get out of here, he has to move now. I keep my gun trained on the President of Mile Wide MC until I feel the heat of a second body against my back.
“Put the gun down, little lady, and we can get out of here.”
I pretend to consider that for a moment as the hard press of steel digs into my back. Water sluices between my lips, the scents of gunpowder and blood pungent and nauseating even through the cold wet freshness of the rain. My knees ache and burn, wet and oily from the puddles on the pavement.
None of
it matters.
I wait until the desperation on Clayton's face is stretched to the breaking point before I drop my gun.
And then I prepare for my second kidnapping in as many weeks.
The blow to the back of my head is pain like I've never experienced before. It makes time seem like it's in slideshow form: flickering stars, wet pavement, the backseat of a car, rain splattering against a window. I realize latently that I'm flying down the highway. Must be the highway because there are no stop signs and it feels like we're going at a good speed.
I try to sit up, but I can't make myself move. The pain is too much and I think maybe my arms and legs are tied? I try to relax into the seat. Now's my chance to grab what strength I can before we get to wherever we're going. I have a feeling once we get there, I'm going to need every last ounce of strength I can muster.
Breathe, Lyric, breathe.
My thoughts drift back to the girls and the nauseous feeling in my stomach turns sour. Janae was definitely alive; she got clipped in the ear. And Glinda's shot was through and through, but … I have no idea if Fauna survived that.
My eyes crack open against the pain and this time, I manage to turn my head to stare at the front seat. There's one man driving, none in the back with me. Outside the window, I can see redwood trees blurring by in a thick messy canopy above our heads. A careful test of my limbs confirms my theory: I'm tied up.
Not good.
No, not just not good, but actively Bad with a capital B.
Fuck.
Can't seem to shake that word, now can I?
Several hours at the clubhouse spent researching the Saldaña Cartel, and we're still not sure where to go from here. Clayton Moore's mobile number is no longer connected—can't seem to get hold of it through any phone.
I shove my laptop away and lean back in my chair. At least the vote was unanimous: it's time to call on our favors with the other chapters. We're going to need backup, and we're going to need it quick. We'll hit the cartel as hard and fast as we can before they move their asses any further north. And part of getting rid of the Saldañas is getting rid of Mile Wide.