Kerry shrieked and immediately stripped off the offending garment. “Help!”
Laughing, Tasha and Greta moved into the shop, on the hunt for a more appropriate ensemble for Kerry.
As they shifted clothes on rods, pulling some, reconsidering, putting them back, pulling others and draping them over their arms, Greta said, “I wish you would change your mind.”
Tasha shook her head. “You know all this stuff is not for me.”
“But it’s such a grand time, and we’re all going.” She gasped and pulled a vivid blue evening gown from a rack. “And look! Size six! If that’s not a sign, I don’t know what!”
It was gorgeous, her favorite shade of blue and covered in tiny crystals like stars. In her size. She had to admit that she was tempted to try it on. But she was not going to the prom. She didn’t do that kind of stuff. It had never interested her, and it still didn’t. Kerry was right; especially compared to these two, she was kind of butch. Also, she was on a crash course with totally broke, so she didn’t need to be spending money on frivolity.
“Nope. Sorry. Not my scene, and you know it.”
Greta huffed. “Fine. You play with your new biker, and we will all be fabulous without you. Again.”
“Come on, now. That’s not fair.”
“Sure it is, honey.” Now Kerry was on the floor with them, dressed in her own clothes—a tweedy pencil skirt and a crisp white blouse, unbuttoned low enough to show off her fantastic tits. She waved away the clothes they’d been gathering for her. “I’ll do a Pretty in Pink and make something wonderful for prom myself. I’m still taking the kitten heels. It would be a crime to leave these behind. You know you’ve been getting lost in leather, Tash—but that’s okay. If you’re happy, then we’re happy.”
Tasha didn’t miss the look that passed between Kerry and Greta, but she didn’t remark on it. There was too much about Len, the Horde, and her own past that she couldn’t get into.
“Okay, well. Are you ladies ready to go?” Tasha hung the clothes she had over her arm on the rack outside the fitting rooms.
“Sure,” Greta said. “Just let me change.” She hung her discards and pirouetted toward her fitting room.
“Can we linger a bit, loves?” There was a tone in Kerry’s voice that made Tasha and Greta both take notice. Tasha turned and saw Kerry staring steadily out the front window of the shop. Tasha followed her eyes. Four men—not much more than boys, really, looking like typical country boys, in jeans and boots and trucker hats—stared into the store. The day had been heavily overcast, and it was late afternoon, so the shop lights were brighter than the world outside. No question that those boys could see in.
They appeared to be staring at Kerry. Leering.
“You know them?”
Kerry took a breath, as if Greta’s question had pulled her from woolgathering. “Yes. More to the point, they know me.”
“Trouble?”
“Maybe. I’d rather stay in here until they move on, if that’s okay.”
Tasha reached out and rubbed Kerry’s arm. “Sure, honey. Let’s have a sit. How do they know you?”
Kerry cleared her throat. “The one in the orange hat? He lives across the street from my folks. He knows me from…before. But I don’t see my folks anymore, since this.” She gestured at her body. “He didn’t know me now until recently. Had a little run-in with him a couple of weeks ago, outside Golden Age. Bobby was bouncing, and he handled it. But that boy is not a nice boy. He got…personal.”
Golden Age was a dance club that welcomed the small local community of unconventional people. Sometimes, it drew the attention of not-nice boys, who lingered outside, looking to do some stomping. The club hired especially large, especially ferocious bouncers, of whom Bobby was largest and most ferocious. Unfortunately, Bobby couldn’t bounce the whole town.
Springfield wasn’t necessarily the world’s safest place to stand outside of convention.
Tasha glanced back out the window. It looked like Ponyboy and his buddies were getting bored. “They’re moving on.”
“Just a few minutes?”
Tasha linked fingers with Kerry. “As long as you want.”
When they finally left the shop, they were subdued and watchful. They got Kerry safely to her car first.
~oOo~
“Jesus, this is making my head swim.” Sitting at the dining table, Tasha pushed the stack of papers away and closed the lid on her laptop. “There’s no way.”
Len walked around the kitchen counter and stood behind her, coiling her ponytail around his hand. “Talk it through with me.”
Three months now since she’d lost her job. She’d overestimated how far her savings would get her, and she woke up every day feeling more and more anxious. Part of her budget crisis was that she’d dropped almost ten thousand dollars to hire a consultant to help her understand how to start her own practice. She hadn’t told Len how much that had cost, but it was more than a whole month of living expenses, just gone. And possibly wasted. Because she did not see how she could make all these moving parts head in the same direction and become a life plan.
“Baby, talk it through with me. Come on.” Len pulled a chair close to hers and sat down.
Tasha sighed and ticked the items off her fingers. “Billing software. Records management software. Malpractice insurance. Unemployment insurance. Workers’ compensation insurance. Employee health insurance. 401Ks. Examination and diagnostic equipment. Furniture. Office supplies. Rent. Utilities. Maintenance. And staff! How do I find staff?! Jesus, Len. It’s at least a hundred grand to get the damn door open. And I don’t know how I’m going to keep the door I have.”
Shit. Her mouth had run far too fast for her head. Len tensed hard at that. “What’s that mean?”
“Nothing.”
“Don’t pull that shit, Doc. You running low?”
Instead of answering his question, she continued her freakout. “And I won’t get privileges at County. I might get privileges at Cuba, but that’s barely a hospital. I’d want my patients going to a decent hospital. One with a trauma center, at least.”
“What do you mean, privileges?”
“It’s a courtesy thing for private practitioners. So that they can practice at the hospital when their patients are there, even though they’re not on staff. Without privileges, I’m just a visitor. Any of my patients who need specialized or in-patient care would have to take a staff doctor. I wouldn’t even be consulted.” The other thing she wasn’t telling him was that she wasn’t getting any traction for a small business loan without the promise of hospital privileges.
“Enough of this shit. I’m talking to Isaac. I’m bringing this to the club. It’s been three months since you got fired, six weeks since I’ve known. You still haven’t told Isaac, and I’m done waiting for you to sack up. This shit’s gonna make me look bad, holding it back. And if we pull together, the club can front you the money. I know we can.”
“No. It’s too much. And I will tell Isaac, as soon as I know my plan.”
Len stood and pulled his burner out of his pocket. “I just told you the plan, Tasha. And I’m telling him about us while I’m at it. I hate secrets. They all know somethin’s up with me, anyway. I haven’t caught tail at the clubhouse in a month and a half. I think they think getting gutshot broke my dick, because I’m getting weird looks. So this secret shit is fuckin’ over.” He pushed a couple of buttons on the phone and then turned and walked away from her.
“Boss…We need to talk…No, not trouble. Not right this minute, anyway…yeah, I’m on my way in. Comin’ from Springfield, so gimme some time…I’ll talk about that, too…yeah.” He ended the call.
Tasha sat and listened to him, feeling both furious and relieved in equal measure. She knew the Horde had to be told, and not because they could help, but because they could get hurt and they needed to know she wasn’t at County to smooth the way for them any longer. But she could not bring herself to do it when the answer to Isaac’s in
evitable question about her future would be nothing but a shrug. So part of her was glad Len was taking it upon himself.
The rest of her was livid that he was steamrolling her. When he came back to the table, she glared at him. “Don’t do it, Len. Don’t make decisions about my life for me.”
He pulled his kutte on. “I’m making decisions about the club. And I’m making decisions about us, not just you. Decisions you won’t fucking make. You need to earn a living. We need you to be our doctor. We’re gonna make that happen, and you’re gonna be glad we did. Put the numbers together in a way I can bring it into the Keep. And Isaac deserves to know what’s going on between us.”
See, that pissed her off more. “Why? Why does he deserve to know anything?”
“The reason it scares you to tell him? Same reason he needs to know. Because he had you first. Doesn’t matter how long ago. Doesn’t matter he has a family now. We’re brothers, and you were his first. I need to be straight with him. And that happens today.”
“You’re talking about me like I’m some property being swapped between you.”
“No. I’m talking about you like a woman with a history in the club. We got a way of doing things, and you know that’s true.”
“And if he has a problem with us?”
“We got a way of doing that, too.”
Beating the shit out of each other, he meant. Isaac, with his bad back, and Len, with his missing spleen. Jesus, she wanted to shake these guys until they could see how fucking stupid their sense of macho honor was sometimes.
Len bent down and kissed the top of her head. “It’s been twenty years, Doc. He’ll be fine with it. Keeping the secret is the problem. I gotta go and fix that up now. I’ll call and tell you how it went.”
CHAPTER NINE
Isaac stared at him, and Len waited for him to process, hoping that his brows would ease off a little but not expecting them to. Len wasn’t afraid of Isaac, but he had a healthy respect for his temper. And those brows forecast a high probability of storms.
They were sitting in Isaac’s office. It wasn’t much of a room. Utilitarian—a desk, a couple of chairs, some metal shelving that mostly housed bike manuals and binders, and a broken down old sleeper-sofa. Posters of Harleys, some with topless women. And a big bulletin board full of photographs of club events.
“Three months, this has been goin’ on?”
“Yeah.”
“Three motherfuckin’ months? And you knew?”
“Not that long. About half that. I kept her confidence.”
“Fuck her confidence. She’s hurt, we did it, and you let it stew?” Isaac slammed his fist down on his desk, making the pens and papers and crap bounce. “What the fuck were you thinking?”
“I was thinking that she should be the one to bring it to you. I was thinking that she asked me to let her bring it to you, and that she deserved that much. Like you say, we hurt her. I hurt her. I wanted to let her do it her way.”
“And yet here you sit.”
“She was taking too long, hurting herself more. Maybe us, too.”
“Jesus Christ. I am so fuckin’ tired. I’m just tired. Mountains of bullshit, and no matter what we do to clear it away, the next truck just comes right up and dumps another load. Bigger load.” Isaac tossed the pen he’d been holding across the desk and leaned back in his chair. “We have to help her.”
“Yeah. We’re working on an idea.”
Isaac gave him a sharp look, and Len knew a question would be forthcoming before this meeting was over. That was fine; he wanted to talk about that anyway. Well, ‘wanted’ might be a bit strong. But needed.
“What idea are ‘we’ working on?”
“She hangs a shingle in Signal Bend. We need medical care closer to town, and she needs a way to practice. She’s been doing research, working with a consultant or something, trying to figure out what-all she needs and how much it’ll cost.” He paused. “About a hundred grand, all up, all in. To get started.”
“Fuck me.”
“She can’t come up with anything like it on her own. We can, though, right?”
“What the fuck are we doin’? Turning Signal Bend into Hordesville? We already fund the library, and we have Valhalla Vin, and we put a new roof on Marie’s, and Jesus Christ.” He stopped and took a breath.
“We run this town, Isaac. It’s been ‘Hordesville’ as long as there’s been Horde.”
“Yeah, I know. Fuck.”
“The money we make from the weed run—that’s dirty money. Bloody. Omen’s blood is on that money. Sophie’s blood. Mikey and Wrench. That fuckin’ run got me shot, and Tash got fired helping me. So let’s make it worth something. Bring a doctor to town. Help out a friend. Do some good. Used to be, everything we did was meant to do some good. Now, it seems like all we’re ever doing, like you say, is trying to climb out of shit.”
“Some days I miss the meth run. That put us on Ellis’s radar, and that…but fuck, things seemed easier when the town was just dyin’. Things seemed safer.”
“We need to help her.”
“Yeah. Bring me numbers. We’ll sit down with Show. And Dom, I guess, so he can work some intel. Then we’ll take it to the table.” Isaac sighed. “Hope my kids don’t want to go to college. And I fuckin’ hope my back holds out.”
They were quiet for a bit. Len thought about how to start the next part of this talk, and Isaac looked like he was still playing out the details of helping Tasha. Suddenly, though, before Len could say anything more, Isaac turned to him.
“You’re fucking her. That’s where you’ve been goin’.”
Len blinked. He hadn’t expected Isaac to make that leap so fast, even though he’d seen that something had caught his attention earlier in their talk. Then he nodded.
“How long?”
“Six weeks.”
“You didn’t think I should know that, either?”
“Telling you now.”
“Six weeks into—into what? She another bunny in your bed? I’d think it’d be gettin’ crowded by now.”
Len’s hands clenched, but he relaxed them immediately. They both needed to stay cool. “Watch yourself, boss. I’m giving you the respect of a brother, but you got no claim, and you know it.”
“Respect of a brother would have been some weeks ago.”
For a couple of tense seconds, the men just stared at each other. Len loved Isaac. He had huge respect for him—for his strength, his loyalty, his leadership. He was a hothead, and yet he was steady. He was forthright. An easy man to trust. But he understood Isaac’s limits, too. He’d say that no other Horde save maybe Show understood Isaac like he did. As SAA, it was his job to know his President, to understand how he’d react, what he’d do. To predict, so that he could protect. And Isaac was arrogant. He wasn’t boastful or audacious, but he expected people to do what he said, and he had no patience at all for failure—his or anyone else’s. Sometimes, that arrogance gave him tunnel vision, and it took a strong hand and a thick skin to widen his view.
Still staring, Isaac asked, “Is it serious?”
“Yeah.”
“Fuck. That brings her deep into the club again. Tasha doesn’t want that. She made space for a reason.”
Len was surprised at how strongly he resented Isaac telling him what Tasha wanted. “I know. But we brought her deep already, leaning on her so hard these past years.”
“She hates it here in the clubhouse. And you know why.”
“Yeah.” Finding the limits of his patience, and not interested in coming to blows with his President if he could avoid it, Len sat forward. “With respect, boss? Not your problem now. That’s for me and her to work out.”
Isaac’s eyes went dark, but then, after a beat or two, his expression cleared and smoothed. “Yeah. Okay. Be good to her. I did enough damage for the whole club.”
Yeah, you did, Len thought. Twenty years’ worth of damage that Len was having to deal with now. He had another spike of anger at Isaac giving hi
m instructions about taking care of Tasha, again as if he had some claim, but Len was picking his battles today. So he only nodded.
“I’m bringing her to the Midsummer Fair this weekend. As mine. I want her in the club. She needs the protection, and if we’re gonna help her get set up, then I want her more comfortable with the Horde she doesn’t know so well. And with the old ladies. Lilli gonna have trouble with that?”
Isaac cocked his head. “She might. She can get jealous, and when she does, she’s hell on wheels. But she knows Tash. I think they found a level place when I was hurt. I’ll talk to her.” He cocked his head to the other side. “You sayin’ you’re making Tash your old lady?”
Len laughed. “No. If I brought that up, she’d rabbit.” He almost started a sentence that would have explained how much Isaac had fucked her up—more than Tasha herself was willing to admit—but sense saved him. That would be an express ticket into the ring. “But maybe down the line. For now, she’s just…mine.”
“Shit. I guess after seein’ Hav settle down so hard, there’s not much that could surprise me. But you getting serious with one woman comes close. There’s a lot of girls gonna be bored around here. If we keep pairing off like this, we’re gonna need some fresh blood around the table, just to keep the chicks entertained.”
Len laughed. All in all, the conversation, while tense, had gone about as well as he could have hoped. Maybe that would be different when Isaac saw Len and Tasha together. Despite his tight bond with Lilli, his happy marriage and his perfect family, it was not out of the realm of reason for Isaac to feel some conflict and a kind of jealousy to see Len with a woman who had been his. Maybe that was especially the case here, because the Horde had given him a brutal time for the way he’d hurt a club daughter.
Isaac stood. “Let’s get a drink.” Nodding, Len followed him out of the office and down the hall.
Havoc was sitting at the bar, staring at his phone. “Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.”
Isaac and Len both went immediately to him. Isaac put his hand on his shoulder, his face creased with concern. “Trouble?”
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