“No, I was meaning the charity. She’s not one to brag, but I sure brag about her,” he said. “Last year she had a fundraiser for raising drug awareness amongst teens. Said she’s match two dollars for every dollar donated. Damned girl gave four million of her own money to charity. Year before she did the same thing for breast cancer. Year before that was to build a soup kitchen for the homeless. And, all she can do is talk about how I have that pancake fundraiser. She acts like I’m a saint. Truth be known, that girl is a gift from God if there ever was one.”
I forced a smile and ducked under the hood. “She’s a gift, alright.”
He leaned over the fender. “Say something to offend you?”
I shook my head. “No, why?”
“If there’s one thing I learned to do after fifteen years at war, it’s how to read people. Something I said tasted foul.”
“I’m not a big God person, that’s all. Don’t care if you are, I’m just not what I’d call a believer.”
“Everyone needs something to believe in.” He gazed at the engine for a moment, and then looked up. “In boot camp they asked, ‘Are you catholic or protestant?’ I said, ‘Neither.’ They said, ‘You’re one or the other, pick one. So, I picked protestant. I always struggled with God’s existence, at least until I was in combat. I found God one afternoon when I was on the receiving end of a Kalashnikov in Afghanistan. Kalashnikovs don’t jam for what it’s worth. Ever. His did. I don’t know who he was praying to, but my God answered my prayer.”
He let out a long breath. “He went on to meet his maker. That night, while I was staring up at the stars, I somehow came to believe. Ever since, I’ve been a believer.”
I felt like laughing but didn’t dare. “No offense, but having a guy’s gun jam made you believe in God?”
“I think I was just looking for a reason,” he said. “On that day I found it. If a man doesn’t believe in God, he’s left to believe he is God. I’ve got news for you. You’re not.”
I chuckled. “Never thought I was.”
He turned away, returning in a moment with two beers. He handed me one. After I accepted it, I tilted the neck of the bottle toward him. “Here’s to fast cars, battlefield miracles, and having something to believe in.”
He clanked his bottle against mine.
I took a drink and then raised my clenched fist. “For now, I’m going to believe in this brass bracelet.”
He gave a nod. “As long as you’ve got something to believe in.”
I began checking for coolant leaks. After enough time passed that I felt like I could change the subject, I did, deciding to speak about something we both had in common.
Abby.
“I’m grateful as hell that Abby came into my life,” I said. “I’ve been blind to what it’s like have someone care about me – other than family – and I haven’t had any family for thirteen years or so. Hard to put into words how much she means to me.”
He sipped his beer, and then silently studied me for a moment while I checked for leaks.
“You’ve got something to say, just say it,” I said without looking up. “Never been much for having a man stare at me and not speak.”
“She loves you,” he said. “But she’s scared to death to tell you. Don’t know if it’s my place to do so, but I guess I just did.”
I sprung upright, banging the back of my head on the hood when I did so. “Son of a bitch,” I shouted. “That hurt like hell.”
“Finding out she loves you?” He chuckled. “Or hitting your head?”
“Maybe both.” I rubbed the back of my head with the palm of my hand. “Did she tell you that?”
“More or less,” he said.
I’d felt like I loved Abby, but also feared telling her how I felt. Confiding my feelings wasn’t easy, especially when it came to love. One way to get tossed to the curb would be to tell her I loved her if she didn’t love me. More or less wasn’t much of an indication of love, though.
I looked at him as if he’d taken a liberty he shouldn’t have. “More or less?”
“We talked about you yesterday, at length,” he said. “She loves you. I thought she was going to tell you last night. It’s why I asked about your dinner.”
“Maybe she decided she doesn’t,” I said.
He took a long drink of his beer, and then lowered the bottle. “She’s scared to death of losing you. I know that.”
“I know how that feels. I can’t seem to convince myself I deserve her. I can tell you that much.”
“In my fifty some years on earth, I learned this,” he said. “When it comes to living life, we all get what we deserve. Nothing more, nothing less. If you don’t believe me, maybe you ought to have another look at that bracelet of yours.”
I glanced at my wrist. It was nothing more than a piece of brass with a word stamped into the face of the metal. But, for the time being, it was all I had. I studied the inscription. Abby may have deserved me, but I wasn’t convinced I deserved her. Not yet, at least. Before I could truly believe, I needed to tell her the truth.
The entire truth.
If she accepted me when I was done, our relationship was meant to be.
101
Abby
As a teen I was preached to about what types of boys to avoid. My parents weren’t overly strict, but they wanted me to succeed in whatever endeavors I chose. Success, in their eyes, couldn’t be achieved unless I selected the right man to be at my side.
If I chose the wrong man, I’d be destined for failure. Or, so they led me to believe. Nonetheless, I was attracted to bad boys. The kids who were always in trouble. The boys who fought after school. The hellions who were ostracized by everyone else in school for their actions or beliefs. The kids who wore black, sat alone in the lunch room, and wore a scowl from first period until the dismissal bell rang.
Those were the boys I liked.
No, no, and hell no was my father’s common response to my expressions of attraction to the opposite sex. As I grew older, I developed much more than a fascination with bad boys. They were my only desire. I blamed my attraction partially on my father’s insistence that I avoid those types, and, in part because he was a staunch pacifist.
When I was in first grade, a man bumped into my mother while we were waiting in line to be seated at a restaurant. The collision was an accident, but it all but knocked my mother on the floor. When the man regained his footing, he looked at my mother, and then my father.
He was big and rough-looking. He wore a messy beard and a baseball cap, and his jeans had holes in them.
His brown eyes then looked my mother up and down. He reached for the bill of his cap and grinned. “Nice tits.”
I understood what he said, but at the time, I didn’t comprehend the magnitude of it. My parents fought about it during our meal, with my mother asking why my father hadn’t said – or did – anything when the man ran into her, or when he made the remark.
My father explained that nothing was worth fighting for. Men shouldn’t fight one another, they should learn to love one another, he said. It sounded like a good explanation at the time, but as I grew older, I realized exactly what my mother meant.
I didn’t take a vow to never fall in love with a pacifist, but my subconscious mind must have, because I was attracted to the exact opposite man my father was. I desperately wanted to be the significant other to a man who had the ability – and desire – to stand up for me. During my younger years I dreamed of being in a similar situation as my mother and having my beau make clear what was acceptable behavior.
Porter and I were walking side by side toward the movie theater’s ticket counter when I saw him. I clung to Porter’s side and diverted my gaze, hoping to go unnoticed as he walked past us. I considered saying something to Porter, but by the time I thought of what to say, it was too late. He paused several feet in front of us, turned to face me, and stared.
“Abby.” His voice floated to us on a cloud of desire. “Oh my God, it’
s you.”
“Who’s that?” Porter asked under his breath.
“One of life’s bad F-ing choices,” I said. “Keep walking.”
I acted as if I didn’t see him or hear him. After we’d taken a few strides, he turned, took a few quick steps and intercepted us.
Crap.
“Abby, I never heard back from you after the last time we saw each other,” he said. “What happened.”
Luke Westham was a professional football player for the former San Diego Chargers. The team had recently been moved to Los Angeles, and my hope was that Luke went with them, for good.
He was an obsessed fan of my YouTube channel who had emailed me relentlessly over a six-month period. I finally agreed to meet him for a cup of coffee. That was all it took for me to decide he was a wacko. Ten minutes into our meeting, he was talking about getting married and having babies.
I couldn’t get away from him fast enough. The strange messages that followed caused me to block his email address and block him on social media. It didn’t prevent him from setting up alternate Facebook profiles and email addresses – with false names – and contacting me through them.
He was one of my worst nightmares. In fact, getting rid of him completely was number one hundred and eighty-four on my list.
I put on a face of surprise. “Oh, hi. It’s Luke, right? I almost didn’t recognize you.”
“I never heard back from you,” he said, his tone bitter.
Yes, you did. I told you I’d get a restraining order if you didn’t leave me alone.
I swallowed my desire to spew proof of his mental instability and choose to go a safer route.
“This is my boyfriend, Porter,” I said.
He gave Porter a dismissive look, and then looked at me dreamily. “When do you want to get together? I miss seeing you.”
“You only saw me once,” I snapped back. “For ten minutes. Three years ago.”
Porter cleared his throat. “Excuse us, please. We’re running a few minutes late.”
Luke shot Porter a quick glare and then reached for my left arm. “Don’t go. We haven’t even had a chance to catch up.”
Oh my God this weirdo’s hand is on me. Help! Help! His skin is touching my skin.
Porter grabbed Luke’s arm by the wrist. By the look on Luke’s face, Porter wasn’t being gentle either.
“I said we’re running late,” Porter seethed as he shoved Luke’s arm to the side. “Excuse us, please.”
Luke puffed his steroid-enhanced chest. “I wasn’t done talking to her, asshole.”
I didn’t know much, but I knew those were fighting words. But, there was never a fight. Not to speak of, anyway. It was more of a show of speed versus stupidity, I guess. The word asshole no more than cleared Luke’s lips, and Porter stepped in front of me.
The rest, I didn’t see. I mean, I was there, and I was watching, but seeing it would have required recording it and playing it back in slow motion. Hearing it was enough to cause me to cringe. I mentally jumped for joy later, but the cringing came first.
Porter’s hands became a blur. A series of horrid crunching sounds followed. Luke’s legs turned to noodles, and he crumbled into a three-hundred-pound wad of useless flesh at Porter’s feet.
“Did you kill him?” I gasped.
“I hope so.” Porter chuckled. “He was an irritating prick.”
A crowd began to gather between us and the ticket counter. “Holy shit,” I heard someone say. “Did you see that?”
A man stepped through the crowd and looked at Luke, who was attempting – unsuccessfully – to rise to his feet.
“That’s Luke Westham,” the man said excitedly. “You knocked out Luke Westham.”
“He needed knocked out,” Porter replied.
Porter looked at me. “Who the fuck’s Luke Westham?”
“He’s a running back for the LA Chargers,” I responded. “And, he’s some weirdo that was stalking me. I almost got a restraining order against him. I swear, I only met him for a cup of coffee a few years ago, that’s it.”
“He was a fucking weirdo, that’s for sure,” he said with a laugh.
I’m sure women exist who would have been appalled by what happened. I wasn’t one of them. The fact that Porter knocked out a pro football player because he had acted disrespectfully made me swoon.
As I proudly took a position at Porter’s side, a few of the people who gathered helped Luke to his feet.
“Shit,” Porter said, looking at his watch. “The movie started already.”
I looked at the crowd that had gathered and realized it would only be a matter of time before the movie theater’s security arrived. “Can we just do something else?”
“You sure you’re okay with that?” he asked. “I know you wanted to see that movie.”
“We can do anything,” I said. “As long as we’re together.”
It didn’t matter what we were doing, I’d be doing it with the man of my dreams. Simply knowing he was willing to stand up for me was enough to make me weak in the knees.
Not as weak in the knees as Luke Westham, but close.
“Where’d you learn to fight like that?” I sucked a mouthful of chocolate malt through the oversized straw. “Chuck Norris hasn’t got anything on you.”
He pressed the heels of his palms to his temples. “I can’t drink any more of that thing.”
I paused from drinking, but left the straw in my mouth, just in case I wanted more. “Ice cream headache?”
He nodded.
“So,” I raised my eyebrows. “Are you going to answer me?”
“I’m thinking.”
I sucked another ounce of cold deliciousness from the cup. “About whether or not you want to answer me?”
He no more than lowered his hands and winced from the pain. “Something like that.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’ll be fine.”
“Your hands were a blur. I was just wondering if you were some Kung Fu master or some crap. That was awesome. I don’t hate people, but I come really close to hating Luke, just so you know.”
“He’d be an easy one to hate,” he replied.
Since the incident at the movie theater, Porter seemed sidetracked and incapable of focusing. “Are you sure you’re okay?” I asked. “You seem off, or whatever.”
“I’m thinking.”
I sucked on the straw until my cheeks caved in, gaining another mouthful of the perfect blend of chocolate and malted milk. With the straw resting on the tip of my tongue, I looked up. “About?”
He stared at the entrance for a while, and then looked at me. “I’m not who you think I am,” he said, his voice filled with regret. “Not entirely.”
My heart fell into the pit of my stomach. I pushed the malt to the side. “What do you mean?”
He glanced over each shoulder and then held my gaze. “I need to tell you some things about me.”
I felt sick. The malted milk rose until it tickled the back of my throat.
I swallowed heavily. “Okay.”
“The motorcycle club I ride with is an outlaw club,” he said.
I waited for him to continue, but he didn’t. I’d heard the Outlaw MC term before but wasn’t completely sure what it meant. I didn’t think it was all that bad, though. Not when compared to other things.
“What does that mean?” I asked. “In terms I can understand.”
“Well, it means the members of our club fall within the one percent of riders that aren’t willing to live by the rules of society. But, with us, there’s more to it than that.”
So far, I was relieved with what he’d revealed. There was obviously more he wanted to say, and I wanted to listen to anything he was willing to offer me.
“If you want to explain,” I said. “I’ll listen.”
He nodded. “I can’t go into detail, but I can speak in general terms.”
Anything was better than nothing. His reluctance to continue made me more nervou
s than anything. His opening statement of I’m not the man you think I am still had my stomach in a knot.
“Okay. I mean, I’d just like to know more about ‘I’m not the man you think I am’. When you said that, it made my stomach do flips.”
His jaw tightened. He looked away, toward the ice cream cooler that was on the far wall. While he stared blankly at it, he began to speak. His voice was quiet, barely above a whisper. It was almost as if he was narrating a movie.
“I had a few run-ins with the law when I was a kid. Nothing much to speak of. Fighting, and riding a scooter through town without a license. I realized at a young age that I liked outsmarting the cops. I liked outrunning them even more. By the time I was a senior in high school, I’d been in a handful of high-speed chases with the cops and had never been caught. I’d stolen an old car from a salvage yard, built an engine for it in shop class, and kept it hidden on my grandparent’s farm, in a windrow of trees. My friends and I would take it out, raise hell, and get the cops to try and catch us. The thrill of outrunning them gave me a high that nothing else could match. Although they tried, they never caught me once. The local cop referred to the guy in the sixty-five Fairlane as a Ghost. The name stuck, and I became ‘Ghost’.”
A sigh of relief shot from my lungs. “That’s cool how you got your nickname. You had me scared there for a minute. I thought there was going to be more to it than that.”
“There is,” he said without looking at me. “Gimme a minute.”
My stomach started churning.
“Four of my closest friends and I moved here after we graduated school, and we started this motorcycle club. We didn’t abide by the law. In fact, we broke the law.” He shifted his eyes to meet mine. “Intentionally.”
I acted indifferent, waiting for him to elaborate. My stone-faced expression allowed him to continue without much pause.
“In our outlaw endeavors, we needed to escape quickly. I was, of course, the driver. Crime after crime, year after year, I never got caught. I became the club’s good luck charm. The getaway driver. The Ghost.” He looked at me. “That’s who I am. I’m a biker, an outlaw, and a getaway driver.”
Devil's Disciples MC Series- The Complete Boxed Set Page 54