Blood & Rust (Lock & Key #4)

by Cat Porter

  “Now what, goddamn it?”

  “I’m going to be picking you up from practice and bringing you home from school. Every day.”

  “Hell no. I got my bike. I don’t need—”

  “You can ride your bike, but you’ll be riding it alongside mine. You got that? Home, school, home again.”

  “Am I grounded, too?”

  “That’s up to your mother.”

  “You gonna tell her about—”

  “She’s the one who found the shit on your bike and told me about it! You think she didn’t know what it was?”

  Wes let out a hiss under his breath, his body going rigid.

  “We clear?”

  He raised his head, an ugly twist to his mouth, his eyes narrowing. He was either going to explode or cry or implode. Any was good for me. He needed to.

  I leaned into him. “Right now, you are putting our club at risk. Igniting a war that is unnecessary, dangerous, and very destructive.”

  Wes grunted, his gaze jumping to my side. “She’s coming.”

  I turned. A petite redheaded girl bobbed toward us from down the street. Her fingers tugged on the open ripped neckline of her cropped tank.

  I knew the various stages of girl through woman all too well. I’d been with plenty of jailbait and older women in my time. I’d grown able to make the fine distinctions of age from the way females carried themselves, their expressions, their skin tone, the lines on their faces. This was no woman. This was barely a full-fledged teenager.

  “She’s just a kid,” I muttered.

  “She sure doesn’t act like a kid.”

  “That makes it all right?” I grabbed his collar. “What the hell are you doing? What are you thinking?”

  He pushed against me. “She’s crazy about me.”

  The girl’s pace slowed down under my and Wes’s stare, her teeth raking over her highly glossed bottom lip.

  “Um, hey,” she mumbled, her eyes widening as she looked up at me.

  Her gaze darted at Wes for a second and then shot back to me. She gaped at my colors, her eyes widening.

  “What’s going on?” Her voice came out tiny, low.

  I shot a look at Wes and turned back to the girl. “I’m Wes’s uncle. What’s your name, sweetheart?”

  “I’m Lindy.”

  “Got to get you home, Lindy.”

  “What? I don’t wanna go home! I’m here with Wes. Right, Wes?”

  Wes didn’t answer.

  She grinned unsteadily, still clinging to the dream. “We’re going to the ZZ Top concert tonight.”

  “Oh, yeah?” My eyes slid to Wes.

  He only jammed his hands in his pockets.

  “Hey, what up? What’s going on?”

  Zach, Wes’s buddy from home, approached us, a plastic bag filled with beer cans hanging from one hand. Lindy blinked at him.

  I eyed Wes. “The three of you came up here together, huh?”

  “Yeah, we did,” replied Zach, slinging his free arm around Lindy, pulling her close.

  Lindy shifted, but Zach only held on to her.

  “Let go of her, Zach,” Wes said.

  “What the hell’s going on?” Zach shot back, his neck rigid.

  “I said, let Lindy go!” said Wes, grabbing Lindy’s arm.

  Zach jerked Lindy back. “The fuck you say!”

  I lunged at the kid, my one hand cuffing his throat, the other releasing Lindy from his grip and shoving her toward Wes. The girl let out a loud gasp as she scrambled away.

  “You gotta listen when you’re spoken to, boy. And you gotta show me respect when you’re in my presence. And you sure as hell don’t go grabbing girls who don’t want to be grabbed.”

  “She’s—”

  “I know all about it.” I hooked an arm around his neck and leaned in close to the freckled-face wiry kid with the flashing eyes. He was almost at my height, but he had no strength whatsoever. “Now, shut the fuck up before I rip your tongue out and then drag your ass back to Meager, hanging on to the fender of my bike by your fingernails.”

  He shoved against me. “You know who my dad is? You—”

  “Oh, yeah, I know who your daddy is, you little scumbag. I even know where you live.”

  His face paled.

  His dad, Zachary Kendrick Sr., was a high-ranking member of the local Rotary Club and a devoted golfer who always had gold cuff links on his perfectly pressed shirt, no matter what time of year, and a BMW SUV to ferry himself to his fancy law firm in Rapid every day. His wife—a PTA president—always had a sneer on her face whenever Alicia, Grace, Mary Lynn, and the other old ladies would volunteer for anything from the minor bake sales to the football team spirit club fundraisers.

  The kid’s cheek muscles spasmed. His eyes darted back to Wes.

  My grip on him only tightened. “Look at me. I’m talking to you now. You hearing me, you little piece of shit?”

  He only nodded.

  “You been drinking? Taking anything?”

  “Uh…” He raised the bag of beer cans in his hand. “Not yet. I—”

  I grabbed him by the collar and pulled him off to the side, so Lindy wouldn’t hear. “What you got on you?”

  Zach made a face. “What?”

  I shoved my free hand in one of his front jeans pockets. Empty. The other pocket. My fingers slid over a plastic baggie with a variety of pills in it. I pulled it out, glancing at it.

  “Let me guess. X and a nice roofie you were gonna use on Lindy tonight?”

  His lips rolled. “You-you’re not gonna tell my parents, are you?”

  “And spoil their fairy-tale illusion of their golden boy?” I tossed the baggie in a garbage can to my left.

  My fingers gripped his neck, and he gasped.

  “This is what I want from you. You get on your bike and get the fuck home. Right now. Bet the University of Texas might not accept you if they hear about how you like to roofie underage virgins, huh?”

  His eyes widened.

  “That’s right. I keep tabs on my town, junior, and the people my family runs with. I’m about expecting the worst at all times. You see how justified I am?”

  “The dealer I got it from is probably one of yours anyhow!” he slung back.

  My fist pulled on his shirt, ramming him into my chest. “Sorry to disappoint you, shithead. I don’t deal in X and roofies. Now, move.”

  I released him, but he stood still, his lips pressed together.

  “You got any more stellar comebacks for me?” I asked.

  He shook his head.

  “What’s going on?” Lindy’s shaky voice rose behind me.

  “Know this,” I continued. “I’ll be keeping watch on you, asswipe. You stay away from Lindy and from Wes. Or, along with your shiny future, your fancy bike and your daddy’s fancy cars are all gonna disappear. You got that?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I got that.” Zach stumbled back and stalked off down the street.

  I faced Wes and Lindy again. “Now, I’ve got to get you two home. I got—”

  “Oh my God!” Lindy screeched, her eyes focused over my shoulder.

  The color had drained from her face, making the makeup she had obviously just applied look like patches of colored chalk blotched on her pale skin.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “My dad’s here!” She pointed down the block.

  I swiveled around.

  Fresh from the tobacco shop, not more than twenty yards away, was Pick, the Blade who had assaulted Tania back in that restaurant in Sioux Falls. The Blade whose hand I’d ripped up with a steak knife.

  “Pick is your dad?”

  LINDY’S JITTERY GAZE darted back at me. “You-you know my dad?”

  “You could say that.”

  “He’s been in Oregon. I didn’t think he’d be back until—oh God.”

  I glared at Wes. “I’m impressed as all hell now, man. I really am.”

  He was seducing the daughter of a Broken Blade. He and his buddy had t
aken this underage girl across state lines along with a roofie and entertainment drugs.

  Wes had targeted her. He had done his homework.

  I turned to the girl. “How old are you, Lindy?”

  Her face flushed. “I’m…”

  “She’s fifteen,” Wes replied, his voice flat.

  I lasered a hole through Wes’s melting armor.

  My head simmered on the verge of a volcanic explosion. I could see blood, shards of bone, and brain splattered on the cement at our feet. Tourists yelping as they shot photos of the massacre before them with their fucking cell phones. The town’s daily Old West Main Street shoot-out reenactments and that of Wild Bill’s Dead Man’s Hand, which had occurred just footsteps from here, would seem totally lame in comparison. This biker shoot out would be Deadwood’s new tourist attraction, for sure.

  “Dad!” Lindy’s voice was high. Panic.

  “Lindy?”

  My spine hardened at Pick’s booming voice, at his cold opaque eyes.

  “What the hell are you doing up here? What’s going on?”

  “Daddy!” Lindy lunged at her father’s bulky chest. “I came up here with some friends, but we got separated, and this guy was bothering me—”

  “Who? This kid?” Pick gestured at Wes, his massive chest surging with air, his nostrils flaring.

  “No! No, not him.” Lindy pulled on his colors. “This other guy. Wes, here, and his uncle—they stepped in and scared him off. I was just thanking them for helping me.”

  Pick’s fierce gaze blasted over Wes and landed on me. “You telling me the truth, sweetheart?”

  She put a hand around her dad’s bulky tattooed arm. “My cell phone battery died, and I was just about to call home, using Wes’s phone, but, wow, here you are! I’m so glad you’re here,” she blurted out, her lower lip quivering.

  Wes’s gaze shifted to his boots.

  “You’re always doing that shit, baby. How many times I got to tell you to make sure you get the battery juiced before you leave the house?”

  “I lost my charger cable again,” Lindy murmured. Her eyes went to my patch. “Thank you, Mr.…Mr. Butler. You, too, Wes. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome, Lindy,” I said.

  She glanced over at Wes and looked away again.

  “So good to see you. I thought you wouldn’t be back until next week, Dad.”

  “Things change on a dime, baby. You know that,”

  “Usually do.” I said.

  Pick eyed me. “I came home early ’cause I got a call that there’s been trouble on our property.”

  “Oh, yeah?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” he replied. “A fire at our junkyard a while back. Petty thefts all this past week.”

  “Good thing you’re heading home.”

  Lindy leaned against her dad’s side, her eyes on me. “Thanks again, sir. I really, really appreciate it,” she said, her tone even. “I don’t know what I would’ve done if you and Wes hadn’t come along.”

  “You’re very welcome, sweetheart,” I said, forcing my mouth into a slight smile. “You take care. Try to keep track of your charger cable.”

  “I will,” she murmured. “Learned my lesson.”

  “Glad we could help out. Gotta keep our girls safe.” I stretched my hand toward him. Ambitious with a heavy dose of presumption, but I needed to seal this into Truce Land. He could accept our neat story, his daughter’s passionate and plausible presentation, or he could growl, bite, and rip us all to shreds and move this blip on the EKG of our clubs’ lifelines into Code Red territory.

  Pick’s forehead puckered as he glared at my hand, at what I was offering.

  He was making his choice.

  Pick met my gaze and shook my hand once, hard.

  I nodded. “Well, we’re off. Got to get home.”

  “Bye, Wes,” said Lindy.

  “Bye, Lindy.” Wes threw her and Pick a tight grin.

  Wes and I walked in silence side by side.

  “Lindy’s a good kid. She’s not some—”

  “I know,” Wes said. “She didn’t deserve…” He took in a deep breath.

  I lit a cigarette. “Thank God I found you when I did. This is how vendettas begin and never fucking end, Wes. Had you gone through with this plan to take advantage of Lindy, there would’ve been no healing from that—for her or for you. Our colors would’ve been soaked in blood for years to come, and we would’ve been sucked into a flaming ball of meaningless chaos.”

  Wes said nothing.

  “You are not that animal, Wesley,” I continued. “That is not the man your mother raised you to be.”

  Wes pressed his lips together in a hard line, his gaze remaining locked straight ahead.

  “I get it,” I said. “I understand. I do. Wanting revenge, needing to lash out, to hurt because you hurt, because you’ve been wronged. I respect your passion, I admire it. But you’re only fucking things up for your dad’s club. Our club.”

  We stopped before Jump’s parked bike. Wes’s bike.

  “I’m going to say this just once, but it’s real important,” I continued. “You are a born and bred One-Eyed Jack. One day, you might patch in like a brother. But this behavior is not worthy of that patch nor is it worthy of your name or of the reputation your father earned over the years. You want to destroy all that for his brothers, for your mother? For him? His whole life’s work for a cruel play? And, trust me, it was a vicious, empty play that you’d have only regretted. There’s no way ‘round that one. I didn’t expect this from you. Wes, got to say, I’m real disappointed.”

  He jammed his hands in his pockets, his eyes trained on the bike.

  My arm hooked around his neck and squeezed. “I’ve been there. I know, so I can say this to you. These kinds of regrets are too heavy to bear, and I don’t want that for you. Ever. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you, son. You’ve got a burning heart inside you, and that’s good. But you’ve got to let that burning lead you—not to destroy—but to figure out what exactly you believe in and to stand up for it before it’s too late. Never give that a rest, or you’ll be lost.”

  He wiped at an eye, nodding, his gaze meeting mine. There was pain there, shame. And despair.

  My heart squeezed. I tossed my cigarette.

  “You and me, you got that?” I said.

  “Yeah. Got it.”

  My hand clutched his shoulder, and I pulled him into a hug. “Let me help you. Wes. Let me look out for you.”

  Wes wrapped his arms around me and held on tight.

  WES AND I TOOK THE ROAD out of Deadwood and headed home.

  “Let’s take the long way, take it easy!” I shouted over at him.

  He nodded at me, and we swerved off onto Route 14A heading south, which would take us through the Black Hills National Forest instead of the main highway. A much better road to contemplate your sins and transgressions, to meditate, to let it all fucking go rather than debate with the cars and trucks and buses rumbling in your way.

  My insides hummed with my engine as we surged over the smooth asphalt, the wind pushing over us both and us ripping through it. My lungs expanded as the road burned under me, the light and heat of the sun fervent, as the elevation descended in the forested hills. That strong aroma of mineral and earth rose around us, shading the crisp fresh scent of the air.

  Wes caught my glance and shot me a grin.

  Yeah, it was in his blood, too.

  We approached a tight curve, and he sped up ahead of me to take it. Two dots appeared in front of us on the road.

  Blocking the road. Blocking us.

  I decelerated, my hands tightening over the handlebars, my back rigid.

  From a blur, the dots became figures that became faces, and now, they finally came into focus.

  Led and another Flame on their bikes blocked our road. They raised their arms, guns in their hands.

  Bam.

  Wes spun out, his bike teetering, tumbling, plunging.

  “Wes!�
�

  He sprawled on the asphalt before me, motionless. His bike lay on its side.

  I launched off my bike.

  Bam. Led fired. Bam.

  I scrambled through the earsplitting jolt.

  Motherfucker.

  This cocksucker wanted vengeance.

  But Wes was an innocent. An innocent in my care.

  My responsibility.

  My fucking consequence.

  I slid my gun from my back and fired, diving behind Wes’s fallen bike.

  “Did you think I was gonna leave it like that?” Led charged toward me. “You giving Reich up to Finger? You using Nina?”

  Boom.

  Crack. Crack.

  I twisted back down to the ground. A numbness danced up my arm, and my vision blurred. My chest was being crushed. My heart throbbed loudly in my ears.

  Push through, push through.

  Wes raised himself up, a gun in his hand. The kid was carrying. His hand shook; his arm wavered. He was injured from his fall.

  Everything screeched to a stunning silence.

  Wes fired a round, hitting the other Flame. The heavyset man grunted, stumbling back, blood spurting from an arm.

  Boom.

  Wes howled, his gun flying, skidding across the pavement. “Shit!”

  “Wes!” I untucked my second gun, pitching it at him.

  He caught it, his eyes hanging on mine for one stinging moment. His dad had trained him. Hell, all of us had.

  He turned, sliding the safety. We both aimed.

  “Fuckers!” Led charged toward us, shooting.

  Another figure drew up behind Led and the Flame, his weapon held high.

  What the—

  We emptied our rounds into Led. The injured Flame raised his gun from behind his bike and aimed.

  Crack. Crack.

  The Flame’s body jerked forward over his bike. The bike teetered, crashing down.

  I lunged at Wes and grabbed at him, my fingers twisting in the cotton of his shirt.

  Was he hurt? I had to keep him out of the line of fire.

  He’s priceless.

  I yanked him on the ground and pushed myself upright, pain shooting in my chest, radiating through my neck, my arms straining.

  “I’m all right! I’m all right!” Wes’s dark blue eyes pulsed with life, with adrenaline, with confidence.