by Kiki Leach
While he continued staring at me, I noticed his brows lifting high on his wrinkled forehead before dropping back down to a straight line. His green eyes narrowed and his jaw, covered in thick grey hair that rolled down to the center of his chest, flexed.
Jesus Christ. This motherfucker was pissed.
I lowered my eyes to the ground and wagged my head again, then after placing my helmet at the edge of the bar handle, hopped off my bike and started making my way toward him. "What's up, brother?" I opened my arms wide and leaned my head to the side while parting my lips and flashing my teeth in a grin, doing my best to show off that whatever the hell would be coming my way next from him and the rest of these assholes, I was ready for it.
"Fuck you, Rome," he snapped, pointing his crooked index finger in my face as soon as I stood in front of him. I jerked my head back and locked my jaw tight, ready for an impending blow. "Prez is pissed at your stupid ass, you know that?"
I sighed and nodded, then swallowed hard and told him, "Yeah, I know."
"Do ya?" he asked, sounding unsure. He flicked a thumb out behind himself and leaned forward. "Son of a bitch has been waiting to get his cock sucked since 6am and you have managed to fuck him over with that shit in not playing your part."
"And how the hell is that?" I asked him.
"Because the chick he was hoping to get with can't make it out for the party tonight. This morning was his only chance at having a shot at her before she headed out of town again with her crew, but with you being late..."
"Shit." I dragged my hand across my mouth in a sham of concern for the current state of Prez's limp cock and exhaled. "Well look, there'll be other sweet butts out here once church is over like always, right on cue, yeah?" I said, lowering my tone and trying to smooth shit over as best as I could. "Maybe even some of those younger ones that he likes bouncing on his balls so goddamn much. I think he'll be good by then."
"Not this time, brother," he replied.
"Yeah." I tried shoving past him but he stepped to the side and threw his hand into my chest, pushing me back. I looked down into his face and snarled. It wasn't the first time the old man had put his hands on me, but for once, there was no need for it. At least not one that I had been made well aware of before showing up here. "What the fuck--?"
"You and the drop-off last night," he said.
I shrugged and looked aside. "What about it?"
"Why the hell did you fail to mention to me this morning that you had some chick out there alongside you while it was taking place?"
"Christ, it was just Colette," I told him, my response nonchalant in comparison to his full-blown panic. "You know she doesn't give a damn about any of this club shit outside of the chicks always hanging around out here, and has got no clue regarding the business side of it."
He made a face and jerked his chin forward. "Colette?" He waited a moment and closed his eyes to think, then after a few seconds, peeled them open and nodded his head. "Oh yeah, that hot chick with the perky tits, fat ass and thighs that touch that's been dating your brother for far too damn long, yeah?"
I bobbed my head and looked away from him. "Yeah." I snaked my fingers through my hair and soured. "Except they're not together anymore after the shit that went down with them last night before she showed up here to see me."
He lifted his shoulders and peered. "What the fuck happened?"
"She caught him in her bed back at her house boning Cherry."
He whistled and held back a chuckle. "Jesus, no shit?"
"No shit. That's what she was out here screaming at me about before we finally headed out to Vegas."
"Fuck." He burst into a fit of laughter and slapped his stomach a few times. "That must've been what Chute and Tracker were snickering about when I got here this morning, but I wasn't up on all the details; the whys, and hows and all that. Too bad I couldn’t see it for myself but priorities called where my cock and old lady were concerned last night, ya know?"
"Yeah, I know all about that shit, brother." I adjusted my pants, thinking back on Colette, and grunted. "How the hell did you hear about her being out there with me last night in the first place?"
"Right after I hung up with you this morning to make sure that everything was still cool, Primo gave Riggs a ring and mentioned you showing up to his compound with some chick on the back of that bike."
I groaned and rubbed my hands down the front of my cut to keep from balling my fists and smashing them straight into the door. This shit was not good. "Why the hell would he wait 'til the morning to bring that up when it didn't matter to him last night when he actually saw her out there with me? Especially when I told him that she was good and didn't give a fuck about what the hell we were even taking care of."
"I don't know, brother, but it sounds like he maybe got spooked after the fact."
"From what?" I snapped, a mixture of anger and confusion boiling up inside me by the second. "The only thing Colette gave a damn about while we were out there was getting drunk and having a good ass time to keep from thinking about my prick brother and what the hell he had done to her."
Atom tilted his head to a certain degree and made a face at me, damn curious. "And did she?" he asked me, his low voice piqued, his thick grey brows flying up high on his wrinkled forehead once again. "Have a good ass time and get drunk and all that?" I nodded. He leaned away from me and wrapped his hands around the base of his cut. "And did it just so happen to lead you into being able to get some in all this shit? 'Cause I know it's been a long while for your ass. Almost too goddamn long since you've even seen a pussy up close and personally."
"Yeah." I laughed quietly and dropped my hands inside the pockets of my jeans. "Yeah, I got something from her; something damn good that I'm still trying to figure out a way to recover from, but not 'til this morning when she was sober enough to remember all of it."
"Is that why you were late?"
"One of the reasons for it, yeah." I shuffled around him to make my way further inside the club.
"Well goddamn, was it that good?" he called out from behind me, the excitement in his voice bouncing off every wall inside the place. "What'd she taste like? 'Cause with that shiny looking brown skin, she looks like she'd taste damn good, brother. Like cinnamon or some shit, maybe even chocolate. Did she spin around on your cock like some of them do? Did she let you enter through the back door with that giant ass cock of yours? Did she swallow or spit that shit out to the side when she took you inside her mouth? I hate when they spit 'cause it shows a sign of disrespect. Especially when they do it right in front of you, Jesus."
I ignored all his questions while making my way toward the bar near the back of the place and hollered out, "Where the hell is Prez? The other brothers?" I leaned over the edge and enfolded my hands, shifting my eyes from side to side.
Atom walked up and moved in beside me; he rested his elbow against the edge of the bar and turned to stare me down in the same way he would the member of a rival club and often had. That's when I realized he had noticed the silver band on my finger.
"What the fuck is that shit?" He pointed.
I glanced down at my hand and shook my head. "It's nothin'."
"More like something, asshole. What the hell did you two do out there in Vegas last night?"
"I got piss drunk, that's what I did." I looked over at him and shook my head again. "We had a good motherfuckin' time."
He stared at me until his face colored, then pushed himself away from the bar and sighed. "Jesus Christ."
I rubbed my hands back and forth against each other and glimpsed at him from the corner of my eye. "Don't push this shit any further than what you've done already, old man."
"Somebody's got to, young buck," he spat, leaning in to make sure that I heard him loud and fucking clear. "Before Riggs comes out here and sees that shit on your finger for himself."
"He won't see shit if I remove it."
"But you won't," he said. "I know you too well and if you didn't take it of
f right after it happened or before coming here, there's no chance in hell of you removing it now just to prove some kind of goddamn point to him or to yourself." He lowered his eyes back down to my hand and grimaced. "Besides, he'd notice the print on your skin from you having it on all motherfucking night as it was."
"Shit." I sighed heavily and gulped. "Where the hell is he?" I asked him again. "And the other brothers? With all that calling you were doing before I finally showed up, I was expecting a line out the door with every one of them just waiting to kick my ass collectively and then one by one."
"There's a chance that shit could still happen -- the day's still younger than you are, fucker," he said, his voice as cold as a block of ice. "Especially after they learn about this shit." He continued glaring at me, damn near burning holes in the side of my face as I kept my eyes straight ahead at the liquor bottles sitting at the back of the bar near the cash register and mirror. "Prez is in the back trying to secure himself another blowjob for the night," he finally told me. "Chute's out back trying to talk his old lady out of killing his girlfriend after she showed up to his house this morning for something for his kids. Tracker is dealing with the prospects, Checkers and that other one, who got into it over some mutual club pussy just minutes before you showed up. Limb, Axel, Poker, Reefer and Smack went to get food and beer for tonight, while Patch went off to take a piss or dump considering we didn't know just how the hell long it would take for your ass to finally get here." He stopped and leaned against the bar again; he shoved his brows together and made a face. "Did this chick put you up to that shit out there?"
"You know that nobody can put me up to anything, old man. Especially when it comes to having my cock on lockdown for good."
"So what you're saying is that you've been hoping to tie this chick down from the very beginning of it all then? And you saw Vegas as the one opportunity to finally make it happen? Your brother being with her all these years before now be damned."
"My brother never deserved her."
"And you think your criminal ass does instead?"
I stared down at the bar and weighed my options in responding to him upfront.
Atom was the second oldest living member of the club, just behind Tracker, who helped to name and bring it all together along with Riggs and my old man right after all four were honorably discharged from the Vietnam war. His tattered leather cut, just like my old man's, was covered in not only patches for the club but patches for his time served. After my old man died from cancer brought on by not having his balls checked on the regular, on top of smoking too many packs of cigs day after day from the time he was fifteen years old, Atom became somewhat of a surrogate father for me. I looked up to him, admired the hell out of him and for as long as I can remember, have wanted to be just like him, have what he had in his loyal old lady, Perla, with kids running around the house 'til they were damn near grown; a life of happiness outside of this one and full blown security.
I often told him shit that even my old man never had a clue about, mostly to do with women or the club. Hell, he was the one who nicknamed me 'Brawler' after seeing me get into a fight with a former prospect twice my size during a pussy party after the asshole dented my truck with the front end of his bike. I had had too much to drink and was already amped up, but the feeling I got from slamming my fist into that fucker's face was almost as good as the feeling I had after Colette first swirled her tongue around the head of my cock this morning. And pressed her hand against it for the first time last night.
Once I was officially patched in by Riggs, I earned that ASS KICKER patch during a landslide vote, which meant that anytime a brother needed something handled with fists and muscle instead of guns, knives or money, I was the one to call.
"Hey." Atom threw the back of his hand into my arm and straightened himself, then pointed across the room. I turned my head to see Riggs standing near the edge of the bar.
"Yo, brotha," he said in a dismissive tone as his brown eyes sharpened in color while staring at me. We looked at one another for a long while before he spoke again. "You know, I wasn't all that sure about you ever showing up." He threw his hand out toward Atom and nodded. "This motherfucker assured me that you hadn't deserted us for something better out there in Vegas or on the other side of this town, and I guess for once that he was right about something."
"Yeah," I replied, keeping the shit as short and sweet as possible.
Atom clucked his tongue and rolled his eyes up into his head before turning to stare Riggs straight in the face. "You ready to get this shit started and over with, Prez?"
"Mm-hm." Riggs responded but kept his eyes on me and nodded again. "Call up those other assholes and make sure they're on their way back here. Then grab up Chute from the back and tell him to send both his old lady and that sister wife from hell of hers back home. Tracker's wrapping shit up with those two prospects and'll be out here in a few."
"Alright." As Atom ripped his cell from his back pocket and started making his way toward the back of the club, Riggs moved around the bar and stood directly in front of me.
I turned to face him straight on and grabbed onto the lapels of my cut, jerking it forward. By no means did we ever hate each other; the respect was real on both sides as was the brotherhood, always had been, always would be. That was what it meant to be a member of this club. But I would be lying my ass off if I didn't cop to the fact that he had a way of doing things I often found myself disagreeing with in much of the same way that he often found himself disagreeing with me and mine. And that shit went for both in and outside of the club.
"Now that we're out of that old man's earshot, you mind telling me just exactly what the hell it is that you've been up to this entire damn time away from the club?" he spat. I took a step back from him as some of it went flying out from both sides of his mouth and onto my cut. "Atom said that you didn't even start making it back to Culver City 'til this morning after he called to let you know about church. What the fuck have you and what I just found out was your brother's old lady--?"
"She's not his old lady," I interjected, making a purpose to cut him short. "She never was."
"Alright, so whatever the fuck she's been to him for the last nine years then, yeah?" He stared straight into my eyes to intimidate and see if I would question him in return. I didn't bother. "What the hell have you two been doing since the drop-off last night? Is she the reason you insisted on taking care of this shit on your own before taking off out there instead of having a brother ride along with to help you out? She the one who convinced you to send along that half-assed check-in via text once it was all taken care of? 'Cause I gotta tell you, brother, in all the years you've been a member of this club and even long before that when you were nothing but a measly prospect like those other two assholes out back, I've never known you to handle your shit like this when it came to business that we needed taken care of. It was sloppy as fuck." He paused and eyed me up and down. "Did you get a taste of her pussy at least?" he asked. "Is that what's got you all twisted up like this?"
I cleared my throat and stood up straight. I knew nothing I said would satisfy him completely but at the same time, it was clear as shit that I had to tell him just enough to eventually get him off my back. "We got married last night."
His eyes went wide with shock and he dipped his head back to stare up at the ceiling. "Motherfucker," he finally said. "Does she know about this shit?"
"What?"
"Does she know that you two are married?" he asked me again.
"What the fuck -- Of course she knows about this shit, Prez. She was standing right there with me when we took our vows."
"So she was there with you, but was she alert? Was she hopped up on anything, dope or pills or some shit as it was taking place?"
"We just had some drinks."
"How many?"
"Enough," I told him. "Look, one thing led to another after we nearly hooked up at a bar and next thing I knew, we were standing inside that Little White
Chapels just off the Strip."
He nodded but eyed me with heavy suspicion. "So she fully agreed to this shit then, yeah?"
"We reaffirmed everything this morning once we were both sober and it's all good," I said.
"Good," he replied. He tightened his jaw and took another step forward. "Because the last thing this club needs is another situation in which we're dealing with a chick who cries about something that ain't true and accusing us of shit that didn't happen in the hopes of extorting us for more than what the hell we've got in both the bank and inside all our pockets combined. Remember that club bitch Savannah who roamed from charter to charter? Thanks to Smack, she was damn near able to fleece us blind."
"Jesus." I leaned my head back and shook it back and forth. "Yeah, I remember that shit now that you've reminded me of it."
"Mm-hm, and we don’t need what went down with the two of them a few years back to be the same situation here."
"It won't," I said. "Colette's had a thing for me for years. We're good."
"The shit better remain that way from now 'til death do you both part." His tone was threatening but I ignored it and nodded at him. "Now." He slapped his hand on top of my shoulder and dug his nails into the leather of my cut. "Was the reception you had with her worth being late for church?"
I chuckled. "Yeah."
"Well at least you were able to get something out of this shit, seeing as I won't be able to."
"No pussy came through?"
"Not a single goddamn one," he said, his tone defeated as he dropped his hand from me and stood back. "Even Cherry backed out at the last minute."
"Yeah, well, that shit's probably for the best; especially after all that went down with her last night."
"Maybe the best for you and your girl," he told me, "but my cock would say otherwise if it could." He stopped to think. "I'll check around to see what actually shows up out here tonight. But if nothing satisfies me enough to keep me from jerking off by myself in the shower later, then it'll be your head on the block. And I won't be the only one standing by, ready to chop that shit off." He latched his arm around my neck and dragged me along with him to the chapel.