“Dogs,” the man responded flatly.
“Must be quite a few, they all yours?” Otis asked as we followed him toward the garage.
“Yep, Pits,” he responded as he stepped down the stairs into the garage.
Otis turned, glanced over his shoulder and winked. After rolling his shoulders and stretching his arms back, he expressed interest in the man’s response.
“Pit Bulls?” Otis shrugged.
As the man turned to face him, Otis swung a two-punch combination into his stomach and chin. As I expected, the man collapsed onto the floor of the garage, unconscious.
Quickly, I pulled the zip-ties from my back pocket and zipped one around each wrist tightly. Another zip-tie tying each of the two together provided a cheap set of handcuffs which would be all but impossible to remove.
“Legs?” Otis asked as he pulled him to his feet.
“No, fuck it. It’ll be good if he tries to run. Add to the excitement. I’ll open the garage door,” I said.
I reached for the remote mounted on the wall, and pressed the button. After the garage door opened, I walked out to Tater’s truck, reached in the back, and removed the grocery sack. As I began walking back to the garage, the man was regaining consciousness.
“What the fuck,” he hollered as he realized his hands were bound behind his back.
“Shut the fuck up,” Otis growled. “Listen carefully, and I do mean carefully. Your life depends on it. I’m going to ask you a question, and you’re only going to get one chance to answer me. Only one. Understand?”
“What the fuck’s going on? Who are you two? If you’re here for that money I owe Pedro, I’ve got it. In fact, I got it all,” he whined as he alternated glances between Otis and me.
“Shut he fuck up. We’re not here for money,” Otis said. “Again, I’m going to ask you once, and only once. Answer truthfully, and you get to live. Lie, and I’ll fucking kill you, so you decide. All I need’s the truth, and I can assure you, if you provide it, I won’t kill you. Got it?”
Sitting on the floor of the garage, the man looked up, studied Otis for a second, and then studied me. After a few seconds, he turned toward Otis. “Yeah, I got it.”
“Pit Bull pup was shot outside of town maybe a month back. He was six months old or so, I don’t know. Brindle colored pup with white under his neck. He was shot three times with a 9 millimeter. Did you shoot that dog?” Otis asked.
The man stared at Otis for a long moment and swallowed. After glancing at me, studying the sack in my hand, and turning to face Otis, he responded.
“Don’t matter what I say, if I tell you the truth, you’ll let me live?” he asked.
“I won’t kill you if you tell me the truth,” Otis said.
“Yeah, I shot him. But there was a reason,” he said as he tried to stand.
I planted my foot on his shoulder and shoved him back onto the floor.
“Let’s hear it,” Otis said.
I nodded my head.
“Pup cost me a lot of money. Couldn’t fight for shit,” the man explained.
“All I needed to hear, you got anything?” Otis asked as he shifted his eyes in my direction.
My blood boiling, and ready for the next step, I shook my head and reached into the bag. “Hold him still.”
Otis pulled him up from the floor and placed him in a choke hold. As Otis held him from moving, I opened the packages of hamburger and stuffed the pockets of his pants with the meat.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he howled as I shoved the pockets of his pants full of meat.
“Hell his shirt’s tucked in, drop some inside,” Otis said.
I opened the last package and shoved a handful of the bloody meat inside his shirt and pressed it into his chest. As Otis began to lead him outside the garage, he realized what we were planning.
“Oh fuck no, you can’t toss me to those dogs, not with this meat all over me. They’ll fucking eat me. Seriously, dude. Dude, I’m fucking begging you, they’ll kill me. You said. Holy shit dude, no. No! You said you wouldn’t kill me. You said that,” he cried as Otis dragged him toward the dog kennels.
The fenced in area had kennels on each side, and a fenced walkway in between that the kennels opened into. It would allow a dog to be taken from a kennel, and into the walkway without coming into contact with the rest of the kennels. All the kennels, however, could be opened into the walkway at the same time, releasing all of the dogs to roam freely throughout the walkway. Each end of the walkway was shielded from an exit by a gate.
“Just like we said,” Otis said as he dragged the man into the walkway.
After dragging him to the far end of the walkway, the dogs began to bark and howl. I stood at the close end and watched as Otis shoved the man onto the ground and zip-tied his cuffed hands to the wire fence. Now covered in meat, and tied to the fence, the man didn’t have a prayer. The dogs, at least in our opinion, would rush to the far end of the kennel after the meat, allowing us to leave without incident.
Although the man lived outside of town, Axton had already spoken to the local police chief regarding our plan, and learned the city had jurisdiction of the area. After we left, we were to call Axton, and he would contact the police. They would respond to a domestic call in the area, and find the dogs mauling him. They’d give him the option of keeping his mouth shut and seeking medical attention, or telling his version of the story to the Fed’s while they processed him for fighting Pit Bulls. According to everyone’s beliefs, the dogs wouldn’t kill him, but having a jaw pressure of over 200 pounds per square inch, the dozen hungry fuckers wouldn’t do him any good, either.
As Otis walked past each gated kennel, he opened the door. After opening the last one, he hurriedly walked to where I stood. As the man screamed, I opened the gate, let Otis pass, and stood back to watch the show.
“Let’s get the fuck out of here,” Otis said.
I shook my head. “I want to see this.”
Slowly, the dogs came from their kennels into the walkway. After the first one stepped into the freedom of the 100 foot long fenced area, several others followed. All the dogs appeared scared and extremely shy. At virtually the same time, they lifted their heads and sniffed the air. Slowly, one began to walk toward the man. After a few steps, he began to run. The others immediately followed.
As they began to maul him in an effort to get the meat from his pockets, immediately things changed from a really good plan to a really disgusting event.
“You sure you want to watch this?” Otis said over his shoulder as he turned away.
“Can’t do it,” I said as I shook my head. “Fuck, won’t be anything left for the cops to find.”
I turned around and began to walk to Tater’s truck. As Otis and I reached the truck, I turned toward the kennels.
“God damn, didn’t quite go as planned, huh?” Otis said.
“Sure don’t look like it,” I responded. “Serves the cock sucker right.”
“I agree. But holy fuck, huh?” he said as he opened the door to the truck.
“Don’t look like the cops are gonna be able to clean this mess up, fellers. Maybe one of ya ought to get a pair of tin snips or Dutchman’s out of my tool box, walk around the back of that pen, and cut them ties of that feller’s arms; from outside the pen, you know. And the other go close the front door and the garage door. Maybe they can make it seem like he went out to feed them dogs, and it went to hell in a handbasket. Hard to say it’s an accident if his arms are cuffed to the fence,” he said in a slow southern drawl.
Otis turned toward the kennel. “Fuck I’ll do it. Yeah, looks like if they’re gonna haul him to jail, they’ll need a bucket to carry the pieces in. God damn.”
I didn’t argue with Otis’ offer.
As Otis walked to the bed of the truck and opened the tool box, I walked to the house, careful not to turn toward the kennel. The sound of the dogs alone was more than I was prepared for. My statement to the vet still held true, I did
n’t kill the man. If Otis got the zip-ties removed through the fence he was tied to, it would truly look like an accident happened during feeding.
As I walked back toward the truck, Otis began walking from the back side of the kennel. We met at the truck at the same time.
“Can’t say it enough,” he sighed as he leaned onto the bed of the truck.
“What’s that?” I said as I opened the door and crawled into the truck.
He reached around the cab of the truck and held the four zip-ties in front of the window for me to see. “Devil looks after his own.”
“Amen,” Tater nodded.
Amen.
Chapter Seventy-Six
SYDNEY
Life hadn’t really offered me a tremendous amount of significant choices. As far as I was concerned, life just kind of happened, and I was along for the ride. I do realize I had made choices in my life, and the repercussion or benefits of the choices were a result of my decisions, but I had never felt any of the decisions were the life altering ones.
I never in a lifetime of lifetimes would have guessed I would make such a statement, but looking at my life now, I wouldn’t change any portion of it if I were able. If I never would have been an orphan, I wouldn’t have been homeless, and if I hadn’t been homeless, I wouldn’t have met Cambio. Even my brother’s imprisonment brought Avery and I together as better friends, and without her, my life would be free of a having a girlfriend; something I now found essential to being a girl.
“If you can’t say it with a picture, it doesn’t need to be said,” the tattoo artist scoffed.
“You’re Steve, right? This is your shop, isn’t it? We are at Hell Bomb, right?” Avery responded.
“Yes, yes, and yes,” he said as he turned away from us and toward his station.
He looked like a younger version of Pete. He had a shaved head, tattoos down to his wrist on both arms, tattoos all over his hands, and a beard that went almost to the middle of his chest. Although he smiled as he spoke, he looked like he wouldn’t take shit from anyone, or be convinced to do anything he wasn’t comfortable doing, whether someone was paying him or not.
“Well, Erik Ead told Axton that you’d do whatever we wanted, and that you didn’t do stupid tattoos. And neither of these are stupid,” Avery said as she walked around the edge of the partition.
“Customers aren’t allowed in the shop unless they’re getting tattooed,” he said over his shoulder.
“Right, and you’re going to tattoo us,” Avery snapped.
“I close in like 30 minutes, I’m not about to tattoo shit,” he said as he looked up at the clock on the wall. “Who sent you?”
“Ead. Erik Ead. Doc Ead, rides a Big Dog Chopper, and has a new Street Glide Bagger. He’s a psychiatrist here in town, but he doesn’t practice. Rides in a club, it’s called, uhhm…” She paused and turned to face me.
I shrugged my shoulders.
“Doc Ead? Big snake on his chest? Got a full sleeve on his right, and a half a sleeve on the left arm? Black haired wife, cute as fuck? Mouthy little bitch, uhhm, Kelli?” The tattoo artist asked.
“Yep, that’s him,” Avery agreed.
“Well, hell. What are you looking to get?” he asked.
“I want a tattoo of script on my left arm, on the back side of it. And so does she. Here,” she said as she handed him the piece of paper.
“Veritas Vincit,” he said as he looked down at the sheet of paper.
“Looks like Latin. And you both want the same tattoo?” he shrugged as he studied us both.
We both nodded our heads.
“Well isn’t that fucking cute,” he said with a laugh. “What’s it mean?”
“Truth conquers,” Avery responded.
“Hmm. Isn’t that the truth. Why this? You sure you want it? You know after I do it, you might have remorse, and there’s no removing it afterward,” he said as he glanced up at the clock.
“Look. My brother got stuck in prison for saying he’d kill someone in a rival bike club. It looks like they may have entrapped him, like coerced.” I hesitated and turned toward Avery.
She nodded her head and grinned.
“Yeah, coerced him to do it. Like forced him to make a decision he wasn’t going to make on his own. So, they gave him life in prison, and he’s in Big Sandy doing life, and I met Avery, and she said she’d file a legal motion, and she did. Now, well, now…” I paused and took a deep breath.
I was almost too excited to speak. After exhaling and collecting my thoughts, I pressed my palms into my thighs and continued. “The upper court, the appellate court…”
Avery nodded her head and gave me the thumbs up.
“The appellate court said they’d rehear his case. And her boss is going to try the case and he’s never lost. Not a single case. So now, my brother might get let out of prison. And I want this tattoo, I want it more than anything. Because in the end, the truth does conquer. It prevails,” I blurted.
“Hell’s Fury,” The artist said with a nod. “Club was Hell’s Fury?”
I nodded my head eagerly. “Yes. Yes, it was.”
“Remember when it happened. Fucking ATF pricks. Hear that Kevin? Remember when the ATF infiltrated the Hell’s Fury and set that guy up on conspiracy charges?” he asked over his shoulder.
Without looking up, a man to his right responded. “Sure do.”
“His sister’s in here. Looks like he may be getting a new trial,” he said over his shoulder.
I shook my head. “Is getting a new trial.”
“Oh, he is getting a new trial. ATF may have entrapped him. And the ladies here want Veritas Vincit tattoos to commemorate their…”
“Truth conquers,” the man said over his shoulder, interrupting the artist.
“You got it,” the artist said.
“I’ll donate one,” Kevin said as he looked up.
“Sounds good. You donate one, I’ll donate the other. Go lock the door and turn off the sign,” he said as he turned to his work station and opened a drawer.
As he began to dig in the drawer, I turned toward Avery and gave her a hug.
“If you mean donate in the donate sense, we don’t want a handout,” I said. “We’ve got money and we’ll pay you.”
“Well, it’s bad fucking luck on your part, I guess. Shop’s closed now, can’t accept money. But if you want this tattoo and want it done right, you’re at the right place,” he said as he fiddled with what I assumed was a tattoo gun.
“I do, and everyone says you’re the best,” I said.
“Arguable, but I’m right up there, huh Kevin,” he said with a laugh.
“Bigger’n shit,” Kevin responded.
“I’m Steve, have a seat,” he said as he patted the large leather chair in front of him.
As I sat down, Kevin called Avery to his work station.
After Steve sketched a script onto a sheet of paper, he walked to a copy machine and returned with two copies. He held one in the air for us both to see. “Take a look at this. If it’s what you want, fine, if it’s not, say so. You won’t offend me, it’s your tattoo. I can draw different versions of this thing all night, but I want you happy with it.”
“It’s perfect,” Avery said.
“It is,” I agreed.
“Sure?” he asked.
We both grinned and nodded.
As he tattooed my arm, I sat in the chair and exchanged glances with Avery. I truly felt as if I now had a real sister. Not only were we becoming the best of friends, we would now forever be marked by the same tattoo, of the same script, obtained in the same place at the same time. It may mean something different to each of us, but the same event brought us together.
Win or lose, we would always be bound by our tattoos and our memory of her attempt at what she believed was conquering her feelings of incompetence. As much as I feared being let down from the cloud I was living in by another guilty verdict, I couldn’t wait to see my brother at a new trial.
If he wa
s set free, my life, in all respects, would be nothing short of a modern miracle.
Within seconds of each other, the men finished our tattoos. After he cleaned it and wiped the area with a lubricant, he allowed me to go look in the mirror.
The script was perfect, and the tattoo looked amazing. I turned and studied Avery’s. Both were identical, and nothing short of perfection.
“Truth conquers, bitch,” Avery said as she raised her hand in the air.
I slapped her hand with mine and grinned. “I sure hope so.”
“If you two are happy, we’re happy. Good luck with your brother, and stop in and let me know how it went after it’s all over,” Steve said as he pulled off his rubber gloves.
I turned to face Steve, smiled, and reached into my purse. “You take tips?”
“Tips are always appreciated,” he said.
“Well, here,” I said as I placed two $100 bills on the counter beside him.
Steve held one of the bills in the air and waved it toward Kevin.
Avery shook her head as she reached into her purse, removing two $100 bills.
“Here’s your tip,” she said as she looked at her arm.
“Wow, thanks,” Kevin said as he accepted the money.
“You girls have a nice night, and tell Doc Ead I said hi,” Steve said as we walked toward the door.
“I will. We’re having a patch-in party in a few weeks, and he’s going to be there with several other members of the club he’s in. I’ll let him know. And thank you,” Avery said as he held the door.
“Fire and Iron,” Kevin shouted from the back of the store.
“Oh, yeah,” Avery said. “That’s the name of it, Fire and Iron.”
As we walked to the car I looked at my new watch. If we hurried, we could still make it before they closed.
“I have one place I want to stop before we head back,” I said.
“Name it,” she said as she unlocked the car.
“The Humane Society,” I said over the top of the car.
“For?” she asked.
“I want to see if they have any puppies,” I responded.
“I love puppies,” she giggled.
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