by J. C. Allen
I was walking toward my chopper purposefully but quickly, my boots screaming on the hollow emptiness of the garage. I felt like I was moving in auto-pilot, and I was almost glad for it. It made me feel like I didn’t have to be held responsible for what I was prepared to do.
Though I’d been holding my phone almost the entire time—practically crushing it in my grip—I only just called Matty. I didn’t need Eve hearing me somehow as I got on the elevator. I didn’t need my plans crushed this early in the night.
“Derek?” he groaned, answering after only one ring. “Motherfucker! Ya got any idea what time it is?”
“Yeah,” I said. “You know that plan that we had installed for tomorrow night? That’s changing. It’s going down within the hour. Time to bust some Falcon skulls, Roost. Time for Rock to fucking die!”
“Oh?” Roost’s voice was alert; while his tone was questioning, he didn’t sound the least bit surprised. I suppose if I had done any detachment in the last twelve hours, I would have figured out really quick that I wasn’t going to be sitting on the sidelines during tonight and tomorrow morning. “What happened?”
I was on the chopper, setting Eve’s helmet down on its original space at my feet.
“I’ll tell you,” I said. “But not like this. Meet me at the shop in an hour.”
I can never be too paranoid. Someone could be listening in. I need to see Roost in the flesh.
“Sure thing, boss,” Matty said, past the point of sleep, concern, and fully immersed in business-mode. “See ya there.”
Give Roost this—when it came time to get down to business, the laughable gay man vanished. In his place, a steeled, grizzly soldier appeared, a man of few words and seemingly endless guts. It was like witnessing a transformation, almost a dual personality type of deal.
I hung up and started the engine. Then I was off, but my first ride was not to be a long one—I was about to do something I hadn’t done since the night Maggie died.
I was about to kill a man.
I pulled the chopper into the motel’s parking lot, parking it at the far side, far away from anyone else who would pick up on the meaning of a flame-painted motorcycles. At first, it was what was not here that pissed me off.
No flashing reds and blues, no yellow tape—nothing. A girl, a young, sweet girl, had run, screaming and bloody and nearly naked, through their lobby… and nobody had even bothered to call the cops. And if they had, the cops sure didn’t seem to give a shit.
There was just one problem with that assumption—my father actually had a working relationship with the cops, and as a result, many of them knew me too. We weren’t exactly friends, given that many of our activities were technically illegal, but they were willing to turn a blind eye to much of what we did.
At least, they had before the Black Falcons started turning this city into a shithole.
Still, they would have come here if someone had called. It was not deep into Black Falcon territory, and while it was shady as fuck, it was more shady because of drugs and hookers, not violence and gang warfare
So, in short, no one called to help Eve. Assholes.
I gave myself a mental note to torch this place so far into the ground that survivors would have to dig just to find the ashes.
As I walked to the front door, I contemplated just what I was going to do. I had no room number, and even then, there was a decent chance that the guy might have died from his wounds—or just outright escaped. This was, quite possibly, a really fucking dumb move.
But the small chance that he was recovering in his room, too humiliated to face his boss because he’d gotten stabbed by a hooker he wasn’t supposed to be using—given he didn’t have his cell phone and couldn’t lie over it to Rock—gave me all the motivation to charge ahead. No one was going to fuck with me given my size alone. I’d have my chance.
Just don’t be dead, asshole. You need to die right.
The guy behind the desk looked pale, nervous. I guessed he’d been the one to witness the scene earlier. I thought about putting a good hurt on him, too, for not doing anything to help Eve.
But really, the guy didn’t look any older than in his early twenties. He’d probably taken the night shift, thinking he’d make some extra dough, not realizing what kind of a world he’d gotten himself wrapped up into. In his mind, ignorance was survival, and in some ways, he was right.
Still, I kept it in the back of my mind that if the police suddenly decided to show up, I’d be wise to get a crack in at him before bailing.
Now I had the question of which room Eve had gone into. Which—
Fate smiled upon me.
If ever there was a silver lining in Eve’s wounds, I had just discovered it. Her trail of blood, the fresh red lifeline dripping out of her body, led me right to the door.
A locked door, granted, but like that stopped me. The coward was dead—if he thought a flimsy wooden door was going to prevent me from getting to him, then he had clearly never tried to kill a Savage Savior. He was a pencil pusher.
I almost hoped he had some muscle on him. I didn’t want some fat slob to kill. I wanted a challenge—it would feel that much better to kill yet another Black Falcon, this time, with my bare hands instead of a gun.
I raised my foot, chambered my knee, leaned back, and slammed my boot right beside the knob. The entire door folded like a piece of loose leaf paper. I heard a cry on the other side of the door and then, for good measure, kicked the door again all the way down. I stared there in the hallway, knowing the darkness of the room made me much more intimidating than I was.
It wasn’t pitch black, and I could see the man, but I saw a man who looked like he had only woken moments before, his hand over his side. He was still alive—and that was all I needed from him. He had greasy hair, weary eyes, and blood all around him.
“Who are you?”
He sounded so weak, I almost took delight in making him quiver. If a man could die from fear, it sure seemed likely that this man might. Funny that a Black Falcon could prove to be such a fucking coward.
“I’m Derek Knight, leader of the Savage Saviors,” I said. “And I’m the man that’s going to make Satan look like a puppy.”
For several seconds, the man stammered over the words. I dared to say he was about to cry, which would have truly been pathetic. If I got Rock in a similar spot, I was going to tell him before I shot him that his men cried before they died. It would have been my parting gift.
“You going to kill me,” he said, trying to sound tough but instead just crying more.
I snorted as I stepped forward.
“Eventually,” I said. “But not before you know what Eve felt.”
“Who,” he said, and he glanced up at me.
His eyes rang just pure evil. Pure, unadulterated, unfiltered evil. It would have sent chills down my spine in any other instance.
In this instance, it just produced a Hulk-like rage inside of me.
“The whore?”
I roared as a slick smile appeared on his ugly ass face. He tried to reach for something—the knife, I knew immediately, the knife he must have pulled from his body—but he was far too weak to move quickly enough. With ease, I kicked his arm into the wall, and he dropped the knife.
I could have killed him right there, but for what he had done, he was going to suffer. First, I lifted my leg and dropped all my weight onto his hand. The crunch that came brought a terrified kind of scream from him that must have woken up the entire hotel, but I wasn’t done.
Next, I grabbed his face and slammed it against the cooling unit, smashing it in conjunction with his face. Then I took the knife and plunged it through his thigh, holding him to the carpet.
He was going to fucking suffer, I was going to make sure of it. Every scream he emitted, every cry he gave, every tear that fell from his face was nothing. He had to suffer through a couple of minutes of intense physical pain before he died. That paled in comparison to the emotional scarring Eve suffered, to the pain
the Black Falcons and Rock had put me through.
I grabbed his hair, regretted it for how fucking disgusting it was, and punched him with a right hook, knocking some of his teeth out. I did it again. And then I stared right at him.
“Your corpse is going to be a message to any remaining Black Falcons,” I growled. “Your days are over. You pissed off the last remaining Knight. And I will burn all of you to the ground, taking me down if I have to.”
He started to smile, but a swift knee to the face ended any notion of that.
And then, for good measure, I delivered about five kicks to his groin, as if I wanted to make his nuts explode. I figured by the time his eyes rolled to the back of his head I’d done enough—not like I was going to check to make sure.
And then, only because he was no longer conscious, only because he could not experience the pain of what he had done to me and Eve, did I kill him, snapping his neck and letting him collapse to the ground, drool falling out of his mouth.
“Fucking asshole,” I growled. “And you’re next, Rock.”
Breathing heavily, I snapped out of my primal rage, realizing what I’d done.
I had no regrets about killing this man, all things considered, especially for what he had done to Eve.
But I would have a hell of a lot of regrets if I lingered here any longer, letting the police or, worse, Rock’s teammates come and find me.
Before I left, I had one last thing to do.
I found the bag of disgusting toys the member had brought, carried it with me to the front desk, and slung it off my shoulder and by the young boy’s feet.
He had grabbed the phone, as if preparing to call 9-1-1.
“Don’t.”
Carefully, his eyes trained on me, he put the phone down, stepping back and raising his hands.
“This is what’s going to happen,” I said. “I’m going to leave. You’re going to call the cops. You’re going to show them this bag and show them the room where that asshole almost raped my girlfriend. It won’t be hard to find—it’s the one without a door. You’re going to let them know that I said the Black Falcons are about to be grounded permanently. And then, if you have any goddamn sense, you’re quitting on the spot and never returning.”
The boy started whimpering, tears forming in his eyes.
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” I said. “Are you going to do as I said, yes or no?”
“Y-yes, yes!”
That was good enough. He wasn’t a Black Falcon—he didn’t have enough bad blood in him.
“And try to have a good night,” I called over my shoulder as I headed out the door. “Change is in the air. You’d do well to catch the drift out.”
I walked to the bike, blood all over me. Good. Roost needs to know that I mean business. And when I see Rock, I can let him know I’ve already bathed in the blood of his minions—minions that cowered and cried before I killed them.
There was not going to be any cleaning tonight, at least not of my clothes. The only cleaning that would happen would be that of the Black Falcons, that ugly fucking stain on this city that needed to be permanently etched out.
I hopped on my chopper, took a deep breath, and reminded myself that I’d only accomplished the first of my goals tonight. I still had some people to rescue.
I sped down the streets, glad to see that due to the time, the streets were mostly empty. The night air hit my face and I briefly closed my eyes against it, working to concentrate on what had to be done. It wasn’t that complicated, but simple rarely equated to easy.
The first person I had to save was the closest, but likely the one already lost—Crystal. She’d be the first target the Falcons would order a strike on when they couldn’t track down Eve. I had to find her before they did and take her back to my place.
Assuming, of course, it wasn’t too late. And given that Eve probably hadn’t been at her street corner for a couple of hours now, that was probably an hour and fifty minutes too late.
But I had to at least try.
Secondly, I needed to protect Eve’s mom. I didn’t think it would be too difficult to track her whereabouts, even if she wasn’t in the area. Though Rock’s influence didn’t extend too far, the Falcons weren’t above traveling far to make a point—well, neither were the Saviors.
I’d be able to get some boys headed out that way—ideally, a couple of the young, reckless punks with their bat-outta-hell crotch rockets, the ones who insisted on keeping the dial tuned up to 99.99 percent at all times—with their fanciful whims of being action heroes. They’d jump at a job like that in an instant, even if it did mean sitting around and doing nothing but eating fast food and chugging boxed coffee for a few days several hundred miles away.
I sure am going a long ass way to help Eve.
I guess I really do love her, huh.
That’d only leave the Falcons with Eve’s brother to take out their anger on, and…
Sorry, Eve. You may say you love your brother, but you will be happiest when he’s gone. He’s evil, as evil as Rock—just without the connections and the power. I’m doing you a favor.
Finally, once that was done, it was time to reconvene at the shop and take care of the final task, the task that had bugged me for two years.
Kill Rock.
I pulled up at the shop just minutes later, seeing Roost’s chopper there already. Well, I hated to have lost that race, but I wouldn’t give less of a shit if the night ended with all of my goals accomplished. I’d let Matty win every single race over the rest of our lives if it meant I got to kill this asshole forever.
I walked inside, turning just in time to see Roost with wide eyes.
“I’m hoping that ain’t yer blood,” he said.
It was more out of shock that he said it than teasing. The teasing, while not entirely gone, was on ice for now.
“Hell no,” I said. “And the asshole who got it doesn’t have any left after I had my way with him.”
“Goddamn,” Roost said.
I rarely left him speechless, at least not without the implication that the leader was speaking and he needed to shut up. It was nice to see that I had left him stunned.
Maybe it was because I hadn’t killed anyone other than Maggie’s murderer. Maybe some people saw me as a “suit” leading a gang of leather jackets. Maybe some figured I hadn’t earned my stripes.
Well, I sure as fuck had now. Those stripes were painted with the blood of my enemy.
“Who was da’ lucky ass?”
“Some prick who decided to take things too far with Eve,” I said, letting myself fall back into a worn-down sofa that Matty sometimes napped on. “He nearly killed her, Roost. Had a bag of sex toys that looked more like torture devices. And a fucking knife. Not some little switch number, either; no, some fucking cleaver-like shit. Damn thing looked like it just came off the rack at a butcher’s shop.”
“Oh…” Matty nodded and settled in beside me. “Then, yeah, I’d say he took things too far. I take it ya ain’t leave any for me?”
“Of course not,” I said, though I realized “of course” was a bit presumptive for how I’d operated the past few years. Still, Roost’s eyes suggested the message got through. “Eve stabbed him and turned half his face into hamburger meat. I left him with more teeth on the floor than in his head, a nutsack full of guacamole, more broken than whole bones, a knife through the thigh, and a broken neck.”
“Holy shit, Derek,” Roost said.
I saw something I had not expected to see—fear.
Perhaps he realized—as I was now—that if I could act like this, I was dangerously close to acting like a Black Falcon. I couldn’t forget what my father had taught, and while the streets didn’t allow for many handshakes and apologies, it didn’t mean I could just turn into a sociopathic asshole.
But I wasn’t Jesus. I wasn’t bringing him back to life. I just had to make sure I killed with honor, not with blood lust.
“So, what’s goin’ on?” Roost said, perhaps seeing
the thoughts play out in my mind.
We’d discuss them another day. We had more pressing issues right now.
“I’ll say this as calmly as I can,” I said, which was a much easier said than done task.
Just the word “Rock” was enough to bring me back to that uncontrolled state that had caused me to mutilate a man before. It might have given me great adrenaline, but it clouded my judgment and made me a terrible planner.
“Eve has a friend named Crystal, another hooker, we need to rescue. It was Eve’s word that she was good, so I trust it. I… I’ll handle this one, because I’m going to take her back to my place to be with Eve. We need to protect Eve’s mom. And, obviously, we have to kill Rock.”
Despite my fears of the words being said with vitriol and anger, they came out surprisingly easy. I guess the simplicity of it prevented it from being too complex, too difficult of a subject to talk about.
But it was the thing I didn’t say, the one request Eve had that I did not say, that would have made me lose my mind if I had to fulfill it.
“Okay…” Matty said with a sigh once I was finished. “Well, I can get in touch with Detective Rogers, get an address for yer girl’s mom. Probably best to send Banner and Cheesy on that one. They’re hotheads, but they’re not the type to be gettin’ crazy ‘less the need arises… which, let’s be honest, it may be happenin’. And it sounds like ya got things with Eve’s gal handled, right?”
I nodded, already planning to pick up Crystal after we’d wrapped up our business here. Our meeting didn’t have to be long—it just needed to be long enough to be finalized and not be wiretapped. Paranoid? Just a tad.
“And then… we’re gonna start hunting for Rock,” I said.
“Well that might be easier than ya think,” Matty said with a smirk. “Word on the street is the trouser-stain’s gone an’ put himself in a bad kinda mood—‘crazed’ bein’ a better word for it.”