Steel My Heart

by Vivian Lux

  Kicking the bike to life, he roared away from their stares. He didn't need this shit. This was the exact opposite of keeping his head down. Causing a scene with a former Philly police officer was something he'd have to tell Teach about. It would probably earn him some lumps. He would ask for one knock to the head.

  Maybe that would knock loose the memory of her lips on his.

  Chapter 12

  Emmy

  The first sound I was aware of was a crash from the kitchen. The echoing clatter pierced my eardrums and I clapped my hands over my ears.

  I was in my own bed, under the sheets. Rolling over in confusion caused a sudden pain to knife through my head. "Oh my god, fuck," I moaned out loud. The words were thick and muffled. I was parched and nauseous at the same time.

  Why was I hungover?

  I tried rolling over again, and this time was successful in making it on to my side. I rested for a moment, waiting for the spinning to stop before I opened my eyes. Tentatively, I peeked through one slitted eye.

  My box was upturned and the contents spread across the floor on my side of the bed. I sat up in alarm, the memory of last night flooding me with panic. Robert hadn't come home and I had gone crazy. I had gotten drunk and kissed a biker. And somehow I had ended up back in my bed.

  And Robert knew. Robert knew everything.

  Another crash from the kitchen shattered my composure. It was followed by another echoing boom, then a clatter as if all the silverware had been dropped at once. Through the pounding in my head I realized dully that Robert was punishing me.

  I lay carefully back down and slid my head under the pillow to block out the light. Robert had opened all the shades, and the dawn light was pouring in through our tinted windows. I had never hated our twenty-story view more than I did right now.

  But I hated myself more.

  "Goddammit Emmy," I groaned to myself.

  The effort of speaking hurt my throat. I remembered the taste of the cheap whiskey on my tongue, how it had burned my throat raw.

  How could I have been so stupid? The one cardinal rule in my life was never to rock the boat. Fighting back only caused problems and made things worse. Why hadn't I remembered that? What had possessed me to think I could get away with openly defying Robert? I was in for a world of hurt now.

  I gripped the sheets tightly as I wracked my throbbing brain. I had no idea what to do next. The idea of going down to apologize made me sick. Robert would assault me with questions. He would cross-examine every minute action, twisting my words around into greater and greater betrayal until I was no longer able to hold on to my own thoughts. I would give up trying to explain, and just let him tell the story of how I had failed him. My story would become his, and I would be punished for what he said I had done.

  Maybe it would be a week's worth of silent treatment. I had gone through that before, tiptoeing along the edge of rooms, wondering when he would acknowledge me again. Maybe it would be the food thing again, it had been a while since he denied me anything to eat without his permission. Maybe I would have all my clothes taken away again.

  At least this time it was summer and it wouldn't be so cold and drafty by the windows.

  The fear of anticipation rippled through me, but in the back of all of it was the dimmest memory. A memory of a moment, one single moment from last night. How J. had just let me be. We had sat together, talking without agenda. He had listened without appearing to wait for his turn to speak. He didn't dismiss what I said with a scoff and a sarcastic remark. With him it had felt...easy.

  I smacked myself in the head quickly, pushing out the disloyal thoughts. Bright lights flashed behind my eyelids on impact and I moaned again in spite of myself. I needed water.

  Moving slowly and deliberately, I pushed myself up in the bed and swung my feet to the floor. I waited, balling up the sheets in my fists, until the nausea passed and I could stand without falling. Using the bed for leverage, I made my way around towards the master bath. When I ran out of bed to lean on, I lunged for the wall, hitting myself in the shoulder and jarring my tender head. I heard a sharp exhale behind me.

  He was in the room, watching me as I made my labored way to the bathroom. I didn't turn. I didn't need to see him to know how his eyes blazed with fury and disappointment. I didn't want to see.

  His voice in my head told me everything I needed to know about how terrible I was. What the hell did you think you were doing? Are you some sort of cheap slut? What gives you the right to just throw my love away like that? What is wrong with you?

  With the unsaid words clanging in my shattered skull like a bell, I stumbled the last two steps into the bathroom. He made no move to help me, but I knew he was still there watching. I ran the tap and filled the water glass to the brim.

  The cold water hit my stomach like a rock. I glugged until my belly was taut and sloshing. I could feel the cells in my body come back to life as soon as the water hit them.

  Feeling marginally better, I opened the medicine cabinet to look for the Advil I always kept on the third shelf.

  It was gone. I stared dully at the space where it had been yesterday. The Advil was gone, the Tylenol was gone, the Aleve, even the baby aspirin Robert took for his heart was gone.

  He had taken every painkiller and hidden them from me.

  Now I would have to ask him to let me have some.

  My stomach roiled, rejecting the water I had guzzled. I bent over the sink and heaved and spat. But nothing came up. I wasn't going to be sick. I was just terrified.

  "Robert?" My voice was small and beseeching. I caught my cringing reflection in the mirror and hated myself.

  He didn't come, but I could hear his tread on the floorboards as he stepped closer to me. He was ready to hear my apologies. He was ready to mete out whatever justice he saw fit to give.

  The anger that had propelled me out of our building and hurled me into the arms of an honest to god biker came roaring back like a freight train. The blood pulsed in my ears, deafening me to the sound of anything but my own thoughts.

  Fuck you, you asshole.

  I saw myself in the mirror and I cringed again, certain he could hear me. But the heat of my rage burned through the hangover and I found I could stand upright. I swished another glass of water in my mouth and turned to the door. Without crossing the threshold, I peeked out at him.

  He wasn't looking towards me. His patrician profile was turned towards the windows, the early morning light casting him in high relief. I could see the muscle at his temple working as he ground his teeth furiously. That I had expected. His eyes were what startled me.

  They were afraid.

  He glanced towards the bathroom and saw me looking at him. I saw a flicker of doubt cross his face, then a sudden rage at being caught in his vulnerability

  Then those flickers were gone, replaced with a bland smile. "You sick, Emilia?"

  I stepped back. My box was strewn across the floor. The painkillers had been hidden. He deliberately woke me as painfully as possible.

  He knew exactly why I wasn't feeling well.

  He moved towards me and I stepped back again. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. I wasn't ready for him to be kind. That was the worst thing he could do.

  I stepped back again, catching the heel of my foot against the base of the toilet. I sat down with a thud and looked up at him in confusion. Should I ignore what he said and make my apologies? Or should I follow his lead and pretend?

  He stood over me, looming, and looked down with bland concern. "You don't look well. Why don't you lie down and I'll bring you something for your head?"

  "Um, okay." He waited. "Thank you, honey."

  He nodded and turned away. I sat on the toilet in a daze until he reappeared at the doorway with a huge tumbler of water and a fistful of Advil.

  "You should be lying down," he admonished me. "Since your head hurts and all."

  "How do you know my head hurts?" I managed to squeak.

  "Don't you know
I know everything about you, Emilia?" He set the glass and medicine down, then crouched down in front of me, hitching up his work pants beforehand so they wouldn't crease.

  "I can tell what you're thinking. I know you better than you know yourself." He took my wrists in his hands, circling them with his fingers. "That's why we work together so well. We know each other. We know what to expect from each other. And we know what would happen if we were ever separated."

  "What would happen?" I whispered.

  He stood up and kissed me on the forehead. "I don't even want to think about it," he said airily.

  He took my hand and led me back to bed. I crawled in dutifully and closed my eyes, but he didn't leave. I slowed my breathing, forcing myself to relax, but he still stood over me. Trying harder, I willed myself into an even rhythm, but I was sure the thudding of my heart in my throat gave me away.

  I was deeply, deeply afraid.

  Chapter 13

  J.

  It really was the perfect place for a biker clubhouse.

  Steel Cycles stood alone in the wasteland under the overpasses. The Frankford El and 1-95 converged overheard in a crashing clatter that drowned out any noises the bikes made. Their only neighbors had packed up years ago, leaving Steel Cycles as the lone sentinel standing amid the sea of abandoned, trash-strewn lots. The Philadelphia police ignored the area, content to let the bikers rule their little noisy corner of the world. So long as the Sons of Steel stayed here, they were pretty much left alone.

  J. flopped onto his back and stared at the clubhouse ceiling. Their bunkhouse was a small section of the garage strewn with more cots than members. Teach ran a tight ship as President, and over the years the number of Sons had dwindled down to just the core six. J., MacDougal and Case lived at the clubhouse full time. Crash split his time between the bunkhouse and his filthy bachelor pad up near Temple. Doctor D. lived alone in a studio in Port Richmond, unwilling to venture out much since losing his old lady to breast cancer. And Teach and his old lady, Mallory, had a building in Kensington they were renting out to bohemian art students. They were making a killing.

  And as far as J. was concerned, that was enough. The more people you let into your life, the more chances there were that they'd fuck you over.

  He knew he should get some sleep. He had to do the delivery tomorrow and wanted to be up early to take the chopper out on a run before he let it go. The longer the ride the longer he could give himself to clear his thoughts.

  Let the wind blow the memory of Emmy away.

  His traitorous desire reawakened the minute he allowed himself to think her name. J. turned to his side, grateful that he was the only one in the bunkhouse. The rest of the club was still out celebrating his parole, and wouldn't be back until the early morning. But after leaving Emmy in the hands of that racist guard, J. hadn't felt like partying. He would have gone looking for a fight. Someone would have said something, or looked at him wrong, or breathed too near him and that would be the end of them. The red rage would have taken over, and someone would have had to pay.

  Instead he pushed through the rage and come out the other side. If he wasn't so angry, he could have been proud.

  Instead he cursed himself again as a fool. He squeezed his eyes shut and counted backwards from ten. His breathing slowed as he concentrated on the rush of traffic above him. Prison had acclimated him to falling asleep amidst a din of noise. He listened to the whoosh of the El on the tracks above him and calculated that it was the last run up to Frankford before the line closed. He really needed to sleep.

  But the memory of Emmy's breasts pressed into his back would not be denied. Sighing heavily, J. slid a hand into his boxers. Quick before his brothers came home and caught him. He would allow himself this one last memory of pleasure before shoving Emmy forever from his mind.

  Then he could finally sleep.

  *****

  J.'s eyes shot open to the sound of the rolling garage door being lifted. The east facing door let a blast of hot summer sunshine into the clubhouse and directly into his tender eyeballs.

  "Are you shitting me?" he groaned, clapping his arm over his eyes.

  "Sorry man, it's fucking hot as balls in here already," Case grumbled, voice thick and heavy with sleep. "When we gonna get that air conditioner?"

  "Maybe when you do some actual work that brings money in?" J. retorted, rolling to face the wall. His dreams had been scattered and disturbed, and his mouth felt like he had chewed on an old sock. Now was not the time to listen to his best friend bitching about the heat.

  "Told you, I'm working on something big," Case sighed and flopped back onto his cot. His huge, Nordic frame made the springs creak alarmingly. "So shut the fuck up."

  With the garage open, there was no hope of sleeping further. The noise from the road was picking up with the Friday morning traffic. Soon enough the roads would be clogged with cars on the way to the AC Expressway and the Jersey Shore. J. loved summers in the city. Because everyone fucking left.

  His client would want to do the same. He could imagine the portly doctor sitting proudly atop his expensive, customized chopper, believing he was a badass as he and his fat wife tooled to their shore house. That was probably why he insisted on delivery before Memorial Day.

  J. swung his long legs onto the concrete floor and tested his body. He wasn't hungover, not too bad anyway, and his hands were steady. Good enough to stand is good enough to ride.

  He pulled a clean pair of jeans out of his cubby and pulled a tight black T-shirt over his chest, covering the patchwork of tattoos that made up his torso. J. loved some of his tats and regretted many, but all of them were a narrative of his life up to now.

  It paid to remember where he came from. He pulled on his cut.

  "Teach, you up?"

  The old man poked his head back through the shop door, dreads swinging free. He hadn't even bothered to wrap them this morning, so he must be hurting from last night celebration. J. grinned. "Should have known. Don't you ever sleep?"

  Teach's face twitched as he suppressed a smile. "You do enough sleeping for both of us."

  "Yeah and I'm up now, see?" J. shot back. "Got that delivery today. I wanted to take it for a test run first, then I was gonna ride it right to the guy's place. Where's he live?"

  The old man bent his head and J. was surprised to see sorrow furrow his brow. "J. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news again. But your sister called last night. Twice actually. She left messages both times begging you to call back. To come home." Teach sighed heavily. "That girl's got a mouth on her," he observed.

  "Yeah, no shit," J. grumbled, willing his heart to stop hammering in his chest. "Did she say why I gotta go back? Or did she just cuss out the phone?"

  "Something about your mama, J."

  J.'s blood went cold. "She sick?" It shouldn't be a surprise. Meryl Johnson had every chronic condition that came with a life of bad food and worse habits. And though he hadn't seen his mother in close to four years, he could still picture her wide body planted on the faded plaid couch, directing him and his sister to fetch, carry and serve.

  He had often wondered if Meryl had children specifically for the free labor. Sons take care of their mamas. It was the mantra she had drilled into him over and over when he was small, and he had believed it for a long while. As the man of the house, it was up to him to care for her, to bring her the pills that eased the pain in her joints, to light the cigarettes that dangled perpetually from her mouth, to fetch the beer from the friendly corner store whenever she ran out. Which was often.

  When he had gone to prison, his biggest fear had been that no one would care for her. As much as he hated her for being a terrible mother, he was still her son and he still felt that duty.

  "She's sick, isn't she," he repeated. It wasn't a question.

  "If I had to guess, I'd say yes," Teach said carefully.

  "Fuck."

  "Do you know what you're going to do?"

  J. plunged his hands into his pocke
ts to keep his fists from balling in rage. "I'll deal with it," he said, but even he could hear how unconvincing his tone was.

  But Teach merely nodded, taking him at his word. A man's word was all he had. "I ever tell you about the time my daddy cut out on us?"

  The blood was rushing in his ears, making it hard for him to hear his mentor. "What was that?"

  "My daddy, you know how he lost his job way back when."

  J. nodded at the familiar story. It was why the Sons of Steel were so named. Teach grew up up in Bethlehem, where his father had a good job with the Steelworks. When the plant started closing, he was one of the first to be laid off, most likely because of the color of his skin.

  It had broken him and pulled the family down into a spiral of poverty that they were never quite able to break free of. When Teach was eighteen, he formed the first chapter of the Sons from the remnants of that workforce, pledging brotherhood and solidarity and help to the families who needed it. And that included finding money for the families of fallen brothers, by whatever means necessary. It was them against the world. For years he kept their dignity up and their noses clean. The Sons ran the neighborhood, then the town, then the city.

  Then people started to die.

  Teach lost control of the club he had helped form. And then came the crackdown by the police. In spite of the Teach's best efforts, the lure of drugs and guns got too big for the rest of the brothers. War broke out, the Sons lost and Teach fled to Philadelphia. He tried to reform his ideal brotherhood from the wreckage. Keeping your head down and out of trouble was the first order of business for the new incarnation of the Sons.

  J. remembered his fight with the guard last night and wondered if he should tell Teach about it. It was the kind of thing the President liked to keep a close eye on. The Philadelphia police were just itching for a chance to rain down on the Sons and shut the whole club down once and for all.

  Teach was watching J., waiting for him to respond. The old man's placid gaze was just as it was in the prison classroom; implacable, stoic. He was a man who was content to wait forever for what he wanted.