by Kara Parker
“Rick is mine. He betrayed this club; he betrayed me; and he will suffer greatly for it,” Mike intoned. His voice was deep, and Olivia had to work to keep herself from stuttering when he responded.
“And if you had listened to David when he had first told you about Rick’s betrayal then this all could have been done differently. But I’ve been suspended, and the only way I can prove I’m right and get my badge back is by bringing Rick into custody. He bribed my partner into going to my captain; I deserve vengeance too,” Olivia said, her voice getting louder and louder as she spoke. “Besides, there’s close to a hundred Reapers sitting in jail, and Rick is the one who put them there. You will get your vengeance and your own brothers can give it to you.”
The men all muttered, some in agreement, some not.
“How will you ensure the charges will stick?” Mike asked.
“David and I have seen the warehouse; we know where it is. The only reason we haven't set the cops on it is because we were worried it would tip Rick off, and then we would lose him. I want Rick; I’ve done all the work to capture him. He’s mine by right,” Olivia said. She wasn’t sure what she was saying. She had never talked like this, never talked of vengeance and rights. However, she had never had someone she loved taken like this either. She had never spent nights up and awake, imagining every terrible scenario she could think of. She wanted to get Rick; she wanted to see him arrested and charged and put behind bars. She needed to see it.
“Either way, we get him,” a voice from below called. Olivia had almost forgot that there were other people there. She gaped at them, passing from face to face, as they crossed their arms and looked at her, not with admiration, but with respect at least.
“Fine,” Mike agreed, “but we’re riding with you.”
Olivia had never had an honor guard before. It was strange. Mike, on the back of one of the most impressive motorcycles Olivia had ever seen, led the way. Olivia followed in her Jeep, her short hair sweeping around her head, ruffled by the breeze of her open window. Behind her —and all around her—were the remaining members of God’s Reapers. They would sometimes be behind her, and other times, when the road opened, they would ride alongside her, and Olivia would find she couldn't hear anything over the roar of the motorcycles.
She had never felt so visible in her life. The bikes were loud and heads turned as they roared down the street. Children came to their windows and waved at the phalanx of machines as they flew past.
They left Marina’s Crest behind them and continued out into the barren desert. The houses faded away; the roads became dusty and hard to follow. There were only a few cactuses and the occasional scraggly tree to break up the view. Olivia wondered how Mike knew where he was going. There were no landmarks, but he made a hard right and Olivia followed. Her Jeep skidded off the road, but she pushed past it and bounced back up on the street, picking up her same position behind Mike.
Finally, she saw something in the hazy, heat riddled distance. At first, she thought it was a mirage, and then, as she got closer, the smudge on the horizon took shape and she saw that it was a large, wooden house. There were solar panels on the ceiling and a pump out in front. Olivia wondered who had built this house out here, so far from everything.
As Olivia followed behind Mike, the bikes around her began to spread out. In a beautiful, coordinated movement, God’s Reapers fanned out and began to circle the house, stopping at intervals and pulling out their shotguns. Olivia and Mike screeched to a halt in front of the house. Olivia jumped out of the driver’s seat and took cover behind her car, but she was surprised not to hear the shooting of guns, or someone calling out a threat.
Olivia peaked out from behind her car, and she saw Mike patiently taking his helmet off and putting it on the seat. He didn’t seem worried, and he was, in fact, rather nonchalant about the whole thing. Olivia walked over to him, and together, the two of them headed into the building, with Mike opening the door and going in first.
They found themselves in an old-fashioned living room. The wooden floor was weathered and the walls matched. There were red and orange blankets thrown on the floor and a pea green couch in the corner. Nothing in the house looked like it had been purchased after the seventies.
“Mike,” a voice called, and Olivia turned and saw Rick as he entered the living room. Her body tensed, and her hand gripped the gun in the holster Olivia had at the waist. Olivia watched as Rick’s eyes settled on her. His face went from anger to confusion, as he looked between Mike and Olivia, and she thought it was possible she saw a spark of understanding there. “Why did you bring a cop to the safe house?”
“Where’s David? Bring him up here. Now,” Mike said. He was still the Mike who was in charge of a motorcycle gang, tough and angry and not someone who gave orders twice.
“David, join us in the living room,” Rick called over his shoulder, and Olivia watched as David, looking rather pale walked into the living room. Olivia had to stifle a sob when she saw him. Their eyes met, and she saw that he was alive and unharmed. There was a fresh cut under his eye and he looked a little rough, but he was alive and ok. She had found him, but she kept her face as masklike as she could manage, not wanting to give anything away to Rick.
“So, I repeat, Mike; why did you bring a cop here?” Rick said, his voice taking on a more dangerous tone as he spoke.
“You betrayed us, Rick. It was you this whole time. I know it was you beyond a shadow of a doubt, and you blamed David! David, who was the most loyal of us all! You blamed him for what you did. You’ve been moving drugs through Marina’s Crest and selling them. You destroyed us, why?” Mike demanded.
“Because I’m better than you are at this!” Rick yelled. “I’m better than you, and I’m better than all of those men put together. All of them! Why should we share equally between members when half the members can’t read above an eighth grade level? Look how easy it was to get rid of your club, Mike. It was even easier to replace it. This business should not be run by a club; it should be run by a CEO, one person in charge—me. And David agrees with me. We don’t need you, Mike; no one needs you.”
“David, if that’s true, I can understand why,” Mike said, his voice softening. He looked at David and David alone as he spoke. “I should have trusted you and listened to you; I should have followed up on what you told me. I should have looked into it more, but the arrests and the raid by the cops had made me so tired. I thought I could trust my second-in-command, but I was wrong. I never would have thought he would have betrayed me. I am sorry I didn’t believe you when you came to me. I made a fatal error.”
“Yes, you did,” Rick interrupted, “and we’re all very sad about what’s happened. But now it’s over. I’m in charge now, and David has one thing he has promised to do for me. I’ll take care of Mike. Kill her, David,” Rick said, turning to David. “We can clean up the mess later.”
CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT
David stared at the back of Rick’s head. The gun felt heavy and solid in his hands, and David could see himself pull the gun up, aim it, and fire; he would be pushed by the gun’s kick back, but when he looked up, all that would be left of Rick would be a blood stain on the wall. He could do it; he didn’t doubt that. But then what would he do?
David wasn’t interested in spending the rest of his life in prison for murder. He could try and claim self-defense, but Bill was right there as a witness. David let his grip loosen, and then finally, he tucked the gun into the waistband of his jeans. No, Rick wouldn’t die by David’s hand today.
“Do you have my phone?” David asked looking around the grim and dreary kitchen. The curtains were closed, but they were threadbare and faded, and the bright desert sun managed to shine through. The kitchen was so disgusting that it would have been better if there had been no light at all. There was a solid inch of dust on everything, and there was a sour smell to the place, like a giant container of milk had been left out to sit in the heat.
“It’s at your house. We s
tashed your bike, too, but you’ll be getting that back. Oh, and here’s your wallet,” Bill said, tossing the wallet to David who scooped it up and made sure that everything he needed was still in there. David kept his face a neutral mask; he had almost forgotten how they had captured David in his own home, snuck up on him like a couple of teenage thieves and knocked him out. The memory made him furious, but he remained outwardly calm.
There was no phone. David needed to call Olivia not only to tell her that he was alive, but also to warn her that Rick had it out for her specifically. She was in real and immediate danger, and she needed to get out of town until David could fix the mess they were in. He couldn’t exactly ask the men who had kidnapped him if he could use one of their phones for a private call. It seemed that no one had found out that David and Olivia were together, and David was desperate to keep it that way.
“So, what do you think of old Rick’s operation here?” Bill asked, as Rick made a drink. “Pretty impressive, right?” Out of the corner of his eye David could see Rick preening a little under the attention. Immediately, the power structure became clear to David. Bill was a yes man, a brown-noser, a suck up; he told Rick whatever Rick wanted to hear, and Rick rewarded him for it. David knew how dangerous that was. Leaders needed people who were willing to ask them tough questions, who weren’t afraid to speak up, even if what they had to say might not make the boss happy.
“Don’t know,” David said. “I don’t know what his organization looks like, or what it does.”
“We do everything, brother,” Bill said, and David had to resist the urge to remind Bill that they were not brothers and they never would be. “We got the big three together: drugs, guns, and girls.” David could barely hide his disgust. He wanted to remind Bill that girls were people; they were human beings and shouldn’t be traded and treated like they were nothing.
“Where do the girls go?” David asked, feeling sicker by the minute.
Bill and Rick shared a laugh with each other. “Right to the girls, huh?” Bill asked. “Man after my own heart. But you gotta pay, bosses rules.”
“I don’t pay for sex,” David said, his voice even. “But there’s not too many escorts in Marina’s Crest, so where do they go?”
“Up north, to the big cities,” Rick answered. “It’s best to get them far from the border so they don’t change their minds and try to go home. It’s next to impossible to get them out of Mexico, but damn easy for them to get back in.”
“We never did anything like that with the Reapers,” David said.
“I know. Mike was opposed to it, but just you wait, David. There is real and easy money to be made there. It’s dumb to walk away from it. It’s one of the reason’s I felt the need to go my own way,” Rick said. “Mike, he’s an odd man, and he has the strangest set of rules and principles that he lives by. But don’t worry, David. I know how much you care for that old geezer, so you take care of the cop, and I’ll take care of Mike.”
“Take care of him how?” David asked. He felt numb and sick, but mostly he felt frustrated. There were so many things he wanted to say to Bill and Rick. He wanted to tell them how they were wrong and what they were doing was wrong. Drugs were one thing, but sneaking women into the country and forcing them to do that. It was nothing a sane man could ever live with.
“Same way you’re taking care of Waters. I’m gonna grab him, kill him, and bury his body in the desert. People might look, but as long as I never tell, they’ll never find him.”
“So, you and me are gonna be partners, is that it?” David asked, and he could hear that his voice was louder than he intended, but his fury was building up inside of him. He kept clenching and unclenching his fists; he wanted to hit something or someone. He wanted to scream at these men, to make them understand what monsters they had become. But he couldn’t. He still wasn’t sure how he was going to get out of here. He couldn’t help himself; he understood that Rick was full of shit, and he couldn’t hide his contempt for much longer.
“What?” Bill demanded. “Partners.”
“Now, David,” Rick said in his most patronizing tone. “I told you, the problem with the club was too many voices. I will be in control of his new operation.”
“So I work for you now?” David asked.
“Yes, but just because you work for me doesn’t mean we can’t be friends, and it doesn’t mean that I don’t value your contributions and your opinions.”
“You sound like a fucking used car salesman,” David said. He could feel himself losing his temper, and he didn’t care. He wanted to lose it. His brain was begging his mouth to be quiet, and his mouth was ignoring his brain, and suddenly David didn’t care if he spent his life in prison if it meant getting rid of Rick. He was weighing his option, when the silence of the street was broken up with the rumbling of many engines blaring down the streets.
“What the hell is that?” Bill asked.
“Reapers,” Rick answered.
“I thought you took care of them?” Bill whined.
“Most of them. There’s less than ten left, get the guns.”
“Ten is a hell of a lot more than two!” Bill yelled.
“It’s three now, isn’t that right, David?” Rick asked, grabbing the shotgun and handing it to David. Silently, David took the gun and smiled when Rick turned away.
“Gang’s all here,” Bill said, as he shifted a faded flannel curtain to the side and peered into the bright desert. David and Rick moved to the window and looked out on the road where a hazy series of black dots were making their way down the road. David counted eleven bikes; he saw Mike in the front. Then, his heart stopped. There, surrounded by bikes, was Olivia’s Jeep with Olivia behind the wheel.
He glanced at Mike and gripped the shotgun in his hand tighter. As far as David could tell he, Bill, and Rick were the only people in the house. The Reapers may have been cut down, but there were still a few left and the few that were left were coming to rescue David. They were coming for vengeance for their club. Rick had thought that he had destroyed God’s Reapers with ‘a wave of his hand,’ but here was proof that they were not so easy to destroy.
“Well,” Rick said with a shrug, “I knew we would have to deal with Mike eventually, and this is probably for the best. We are at least far away from anyone who would notice all the noise.” There was something about the emotionless tone of his voice that made David nervous. It was like Mike wasn’t a real person; he was just a wall in Rick’s way and it meant nothing to Rick to destroy him. David shook his head where Rick couldn’t see. Had he always been like this, a psychopath who was good at hiding it?
“What about the rest of the Reapers?” David asked.
“Them?” said Rick with a wave of his hand. “We’ll offer them work, selling and transportation. They’ll just have to understand that this is not a club, and they have no say. They work for me, or they leave town.”
“You think they’ll go for that?” David asked.
“Look at them, David. They’re the members who the cops didn’t even bother to hunt down. They have no other options.”
“But if they say no?” David pressed
“Then, we’ll kill them,” Rick said, shrugging again.
The house was surrounded, and David watched as Rick checked his ammo and the sight on his pistol, and then he walked out into the living room. David peered out the window again searching for Olivia, but her car was empty. She must be behind her car and taking cover, David thought, and then he heard Rick call his name.
David stepped out into the living room, and there was Olivia standing in jeans, a t-shirt, and windswept hair. She had her gun in one hand and was standing next to Mike. Suddenly, everything became very clear to David. Olivia was there, right across from Rick. Gripped in Rick’s fist was a sawed-off shotgun. Rick was a good shot; he could have Olivia in the gun’s sight before anyone could blink. Rick had been talking this entire time, but David had been going in and out. All of his senses were focused on Olivia in front
of him and getting her out alive.
“But now it’s over. I’m in charge now. And David has one thing he has promised to do for me. I’ll take care of, Mike. Kill her, David. We can clean up the mess later. ”
“No,” David said, lifting his gun and pointing it at Rick’s head. “Drop your gun. This is over.”
Rick opened his mouth and began to move his hand and David jammed his pistol into the other man’s temple and said, “Drop it, slowly.” For a moment, no one moved. Olivia and Mike were both staring at David, both tense and ready for whatever might happen while Rick’s panicked eyes rushed from Olivia to David and the gun pressed against his temple.
“Come on now, David,” Rick said. “Remember what I said in the basement? I was right; I’m still right. We are going to work together. It’ll be just you and me; we answer to no one.”