by A. J. Downey
We showered in record time, even for us, and dressed carefully. Hope dressed to ride and pulled her hair into a tight French braid. I was putting on my boots when she bounded onto the bed behind me. She gathered my wet hair in her hands and I froze and let her tend to me. She didn’t put it into a French braid like hers, but rather just combed it out and put it into a low, regular braid, tight and efficient.
“Thanks,” I murmured. She put her arms around my shoulders and hugged herself to my back, nuzzling the side of my neck and giving it a quick kiss.
“Welcome,” she breathed and just as quick as she’d been, she was up, shrugging into her jacket and giving a last check to her boot laces.
I pulled on my jacket and cut and pulled my keys out of my pocket. She had her helmet on and I put on my glasses as we went out into the bright light and oppressive, muggy heat that was classic Louisiana.
“About fuckin’ time!” Pyro called up. Hope bounced on the balls of her feet a couple of times and gave him the finger. He grinned up at us and we came down from the second floor and went to my bike. I fired it up and Hope got on behind me. I missed Florida, and the ride we took helmet free. I missed watching her expression and the wind catching her hair. I fucking hated the impersonal black carapace looking helmet that hid her beautiful brown eyes and sharp features from me.
She snugged up close to my back, her arms around me and I took off, my boys fell in and we went back to the Voodoo Bastard’s compound to one hell of a fucking barbeque going on full swing. No wonder the guys seemed excited. None of us were overtly a fan of a strict diet of fast food.
We parked and Hope wandered over to her bike to drop her helmet with it, but she wasn’t fooling anybody. She wanted to make sure her pride and joy was doing okay. Satisfied she came back over and we spent the next few hours strategizing and talking about how we wanted tonight to go down.
One of Ruth’s boys had been sent on some recon the night before to get the layout of Objections. Apparently it was a higher class joint. One that did jeans, but paired with some Nancy boy polo, certainly not with a jacket and cut. His man hadn’t been able to get in and no one else could pass muster either. So it looked like we were flying blind.
“Well that leaves you out in the cold, Lover,” Hope mused, and she didn’t sound at all happy about it. Still it didn’t get her down, she was already looking over the rest of The Kraken and Voodoo Bastards alike. She took a sip of her Sweet Tea out of its red Solo cup, ice cubes rattling as she contemplated her options.
“Marlin’s out, too,” she muttered.
“Why?” I asked casually.
“You ever see a lawyer type or judge with long hair?” she asked, “While we’re at it, La Croix, is definitely out, Hex would have worked except he’s got tattoos on his hands so that nixes him, Pyro stands out too much with that hair…” she sighed and twisted in her seat.
“Nothing!” she called out. My treasurer looked up darkly, “You fancy a date at a high class titty bar with me tonight?”
Laughter erupted and Hope got up, moving in Nothing’s direction, he looked slightly poleaxed but she was right, he was the only white dude we had that with a little clean up could look respectable. I sure as fuck wasn’t cutting my hair. Hope spoke with Nothing and he looked my way. I nodded and he gave me a nod back, listened to her some more and nodded his agreement. Hope nodded and was swiping away on her phone. She said something to Nothing and he nodded.
“Okay, we’ll be back!” she called.
“Whoa, hey! Where you going?” I demanded.
“There’s a Good Will thrift shop over in Metarie not far from here. Gotta look the part. We’ll be back before you know it,” she called.
“Nothing you going with her?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he waved me off, and dare I say, might have even been blushing.
“Oooo! Can I go with you girls why you try on clothes?” Atlas teased.
“Good idea, At! Go with them!” I called out. Atlas looked over startled and I scowled.
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered and set down his beer. I grinned on the inside. Hope gave me a fast kiss and was over and onto her bike.
“You watch my woman’s six!” I ordered and my guys nodded. No one really seemed surprised by my declaration. Maybe they were seeing something I wasn’t, who knows? I watched them go and tried not to get jittery. I knew she could, and would, take care of herself but damn.
“Fuck,” I huffed a laugh.
“What?” Ruth asked.
“I think I’m straight up in love with that woman,” I said.
“Shit, Brother; saw that the day you first pulled in,” Ruth chuffed a laugh and pushed his girl Sherelle off his lap. She smiled and he lumbered off towards the bathrooms. I smiled and chuckled and stared off into the distance where Hope had turned off and sighed.
Some things just weren’t worth fighting and with as good as it felt to be into her, I just plain didn’t want to. She made life interesting. I liked that, and I usually tried to keep what I liked around. Even when it wasn’t good for me. I didn’t think Hope was bad for me. Not like the last girl I’d been in love with. After all, there wasn’t anything worse than being in love with someone who just plain couldn’t love you back.
Chapter 23
Hope
“Seriously Nothing, stop holding yourself so stiff, I’m supposed to be your girlfriend,” I whispered harshly, smiling the whole time I did it. We were in line to get in to Objections. Line. Like this was some kind of night club except it wasn’t it was a ‘gentleman’s club’ and I was the only woman standing behind the red velvet rope, waiting along the runner of red carpet to get in.
I was dressed like a total hooker too. I’d found a skin tight LBD and with the addition of my garter and stockings, some heavy tramp makeup and some whore red lipstick I looked like the high priced escort I was pretending to be. The Metairie Good Will had been a gold mine in the men’s suit department. We’d found a very nice, if a bit big, light charcoal one and a shirt and tie to match. It’d cost me more for the rush dry cleaning and alterations than it had for the suit but with Nothing standing here looking like that, we were a lock to get in this place.
Some business men came out the front door, and the bouncer looked inside before the door shut. He let the suits in front of us go and we were next at the rope. I leaned into Nothing and smiled up at him and he valiantly tried to help me, to play his part. He smiled down at me and licked his lips.
“God, my wife…” he breathed and looked tortured for a second. He was going to rabbit, he was going to bolt, shit. I smiled up at him and whispered.
“It’s club business, she’ll understand,” I murmured.
“No, she won’t, Hope… she’s dead,” he said and there was nothing I could say to that. The bouncer had lifted the rope, was checking our ID’s and we were being ushered into the club. It was like the universe had hit the flush lever and we were swirling inexorably, caught in that vortex and right down the drain into the second circle of hell. For all of you non-Dante fans out there, that would be the circle of lust because holy smokes… these women were hot, the shit they had on was barely there, and they were writhing in the laps of oil tycoons and trust fund babies like their lives depended on it.
“Hope…” Nothing sounded strangled and I led him to a seat where I could see everyone, and to protect this brave and tortured man from the big bad lap dancers, I parked myself there first. Nothing’s hands settled on my waist like he was afraid to touch me at first but I met his dark and twisted gaze with a pleading one of my own and that seemed to center him out. He nodded and seemed like he was back in control.
I let my eyes adjust to the lighting in here and took a more solid look. On second glance it wasn’t that bad in here. The dancers were plying their trade, but the men were keeping their hands to themselves. I glanced around and spotted what was either the owner or a floor man, wandering throughout the throngs of men and dancers, checking hands with a shrewd gaze.
A girl in tasteful French lingerie, with a little round tray sashayed up to us, “Get you a drink?” she asked, and she was goooood, just a slight bite to her lower lip, a seductive and inviting sweep of her gaze over Nothing who I think had completely stopped breathing underneath me, and a subtle wink of her long lashes.
“What do you want, Baby?” I cooed for her benefit. Nothing swallowed hard, his Adams apple bobbing beneath the knot of his tie.
“Jack and Coke,” he said and he at least sounded steady. I smoothed his hand from my waist down my leg to rest on my knee and gave him a winning smile that I hoped like hell was reassuring without tipping our blonde waitress off.
“What about you, Honey?” she asked me.
“Cosmopolitan please, and thank you.” I winked at her and her smile grew and she flounced off in the direction of the bar.
“Oh God,” Nothing muttered and blushed bright crimson when I moved his hand up my leg to rest it under the very short skirt of my dress almost at the apex of my thighs.
“Relax Nothing,” I said for his ears only, “Just have to look believable. You’re holding me like I’m your sister.”
“Um, Hope, I’m really sorry…” he said and a second later I felt why. I dipped my head and captured his eyes with mine a second before my lips brushed his.
“Don’t be, it’s biological,” I said against his mouth, “I know, just hang on for me okay?”
“Yeah, sure. Just,” he huffed an uncomfortable laugh, “Just don’t tell the Captain, I don’t want to die,” he said and I threw back my head and laughed. Nothing remembered then, what it was to smile, and was better able to ease into his part.
We played it up that I was the freak and it was sometime during my second lap dance that Nothing was watching me get, that I spotted the bartender give a telling chin lift to a dancer with red hair that clashed some with her royal purple lingerie. She and I both followed his gaze to a decidedly eastern European looking man who gave the dancer a hard look and a nod. He was a brutish fucker in an expensive suit, his hair barely there it was buzzed so short. His nose crooked from one too many breaks.
The dancer leaned down giving him a great view of her décolletage, but the fish she had on her hook only gave her a hard look and I think, told her to get dancing. She smiled and straightened and went to the bar, retrieving, yep… a vodka double, neat, before returning to the brute in the suit. Heh. Nothing paid my dancer, which had been instructed to dance for me but to pay attention to Nothing so I could keep playing eagle eye and he followed my line of sight.
“About fucking time,” he breathed as I moved back onto his lap. I kissed him like the dance had turned me on like nobody’s business and his hands were taught on my waist. He was ridged beneath me but he played a convincing game. The floor man wandered past the red head and the brute and when he was past, that’s when I saw it.
Wow. Ballsy motherfuckers… but then again, the lingerie didn’t leave much to the imagination. He slipped his hand up her skirt and when it reappeared it had no trace of the cylinder that’d been in it. The girl finished shaking that ass and he paid her and with a wink she sauntered a little stiffly to the bar, and with a laugh and a wink made her way to the back. I broke my kiss with Nothing and only then realized that his chest was heaving, I frowned.
“Sorry, you’re really fucking good at that,” he said.
“Yeah well, I’m off to follow my mark. Stay put and red really isn’t your color,” I said and got up. Nothing put his fingers to his mouth and wiped, coming away with my red lipstick. He swore and tried wiping it off with a cocktail napkin but I was slipping into the dressing room where Ms. Thing had just disappeared to.
I closed the door and shot the lock behind me. She wasn’t anywhere I could see her just yet, but I could hear her.
“Shit!” she hissed, “Fucking asshole…”
“Too rough shoving it up there?” I asked, coming around the bank of lockers. I leaned my shoulder against the cool metal and cocked my head. The girl looked up sharply and her eyes hardened.
“I’m gonna scream, Jack will be back here before you…” I pointed the Ruger in her face.
“Can pull the trigger?”
She froze, got real quiet and held out the cylinder towards me… ewe no. Not only no but hell no.
“I don’t want that,” I snapped tersely, “I want to know where you take it.”
Her eyes were wide and tears leaked out, I cocked the hammer on my Ruger to take advantage of the dramatic effect and purse my lips, raising my eyebrow.
“They’ll kill me,” she whispered.
“Bitch, you’re looking down the barrel of my gun and you’re worried about them killing you? Tell me what I want to know, I walk out that door and let you go on with your miserable life. You go on as if I was never here. You say nothing. You tip them off? I find you and I kill you a lot slower than a bullet to your head. You get me?” She sank down onto the bench and put up her hands nodding and cringing.
“Where. Are. They?” I demanded.
“Saint Rose!” she cried, “I make the drop at a house over in Saint Rose. 112…” she listed off an address on River Road in Saint Rose, Louisiana. A suburb of New Orleans that I didn’t think was far from here.
“Write it down,” I demanded. She nodded and with shaky hands wrote it down, ripping the page off her waitressing ticket book and handing it over. She was shaking so bad it was like she had a palsy or something. I stuffed the slip of paper into my beaded clutch purse that hung crossways over my chest. It barely held the Ruger but it’d done its job and gotten it in here. I backed up towards the exit to the dressing room and left the woman shaking and bawling on the bench.
“Please don’t hurt me…” she keened, “I never wanted to do this! I just owe them too much, I had a real bad coke habit… I got clean but they’re making me do this to pay off my debt.”
“Yeah well, drugs are bad, mmkay?” I said, shoving the Ruger into my purse and snapping it closed.
“I get that, and I’m sorry! I’m really sorry!” she cried harder.
“Yeah, you should be,” I shot back mercilessly, I was only thinking about Faith, about what Joe had told me about underage victims. This bitch was part of the problem, hopefully now she was part of the solution, but right now I had to get me and mine out of here. I ducked back out into the darkened hallway, running smack into another dancer. Shit.
“Oh! I’m sorry!” I exclaimed and wobbled on my heels, hopefully convincingly, “Looking for the bathroom, silly me!”
“Oh, you passed it, Honey. It’s back that way…” the girl pointed up the hall but I could tell she was suspicious. Shit.
“Oh, thank you! Must’ve had just one too many, I’m so sorry!” I kept babbling apologies as I backed down the hall. The dancer nodded and let herself back into the dressing room. As soon as she was out of sight I straightened and made a bee line for Nothing. He stood when he saw me. I gave him a sharp nod and we went for the exit, slipping out onto the street, walking away briskly. We made our way up Bourbon passing bars blaring blues and clubs pumping bass to the bar Ruth had told us to meet them at.
We picked up our shadows, Lightning and Hex, and they trailed us three or four groups of tourists behind. Marlin and Saint were leaning in the mouth of an alley up ahead, Nothing shot them a hand signal, and Marlin nodded and they started walking up Bourbon ahead of us by two or three tourists. We made our way through the crowds and Marlin and Saint stopped outside a bar, The Dragon’s Den. Saint lit up a cigarette, which was our signal that we were good.
I slipped in ahead of Nothing and he followed me close, right on my six. We found Cutter, Atlas, Ruth, and La Croix at the back and I immediately handed the slip of paper to Ruth who was on a burner phone. He read off the address.
“Get on it and stay on it. Tell me if there’s any movement,” he said and hung up without so much as a goodbye. I rose an eyebrow at Cutter who was giving me a once over.
“Pyro and Radar ar
e on it,” he said. I nodded, satisfied that we had some of our own eyes on the situation.
“Doin’ okay, Darlin’? You’re lookin’ a little pale…” Ruth commented.
“I just shoved my gun in a lap dancer’s face and scared the ever living shit out of her to get that address. I’m not sure how I feel right now,” I said honestly. If she’d been telling the truth, which who knew if she had been or not, then she was just another victim in all of this. I sighed inwardly. Faith. We were close, I could feel it, and I needed to stay focused. I could feel sympathy or whatever for the rest of the players in this damn drama later.
Cutter drew me into his side and I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, sighing, leaning into him and taking the strength that he offered.
“You ready to bounce?” Ruth asked.
“God yes, get me out of this monkey suit,” Nothing griped, pulling his tie free.
“Aww, but you look so handsome,” I cracked and winked at him. Nothing wouldn’t meet my eyes, turning his head and fixing his gaze on the floor. I felt bad then. Ruth and La Croix led the way out of the bar, Radar and Cutter just behind them. Nothing went ahead of me and I caught his hand with mine. He met my eyes then and I smiled slightly, and mouthed the words ‘thank you’. He gave me a terse nod and pulled his hand and wrist from my grip stalking out behind Cutter who glanced back at me.
I gave my man a reassuring little smile and a half shrug. He nodded, and looked over Nothing, his brow crushing at the red lipstick on his man’s collar.
“Oh for the love of Christ, knock it off,” I said stalking past them both, rolling my eyes. Nothing looked surprised. I patted his cheek and winked at Cutter, “I’ll fill you in later,” I said low enough for just him to hear, Cutter grinned broadly at me and laughing, shook his head.
I was beginning to live for these moments with these guys. The light hearted smiles and laughter no matter how dire the situation or circumstances surrounding us. I felt like I had been adopted into their tribe or something, and I was beginning to understand why this life of theirs appealed to them so strongly. It was starting to appeal to me, even though I had no fucking idea exactly how I fit into it, but hell, that had been me my whole life up to this point anyways, why change it up now?