“Another local boy died a few months ago.” She flipped the pages until she found the one with the clipping. “There was a big honor ride, just like with you.” Gently, reverently, she smoothed out the edges of the newsprint. “Alex was there. I didn’t see him myself, but he’s in this picture.” She touched the image, careful to keep away from his face. She had two more papers at home in case she needed to replace the article inserted into the scrapbook, but she wanted to keep it as pristine as possible. “You remember him, he was here with me for a while last year.”
After he’d left, riding away into the sunset, she’d curled up on the blanket and wept more, sobbing herself to sleep, awakened by the calls of coyotes in nearby fields. Cold and stiff, she’d gathered up everything and trekked back to the car.
She glanced at the flag. “Was he here before me?” He hadn’t wanted to intrude, she remembered him saying that.
She remembered everything he’d said.
For the first month after meeting him, her dreams had seemed evenly split between Martin and him.
Martin’s were always the same, movie reels of the milestones in their lives. High school prom, graduation, wedding, officer school graduation, first deployment. Known events, ones that made her smile upon waking, until she remembered.
The ones featuring Alex had been different, more like an old Technicolor movie where the hero was a swashbuckling larger-than-life character, always setting out to save the damsel in distress. She was always cast as the damsel, and as weeks went on, her swooning reactions to his appearance became more and more erotic. She’d woken just yesterday morning with her hand in her panties, and had been shocked to find unfamiliar slippery wetness there when she changed her underwear.
Cheeks flaming hot, she flipped more pages in the scrapbook. This was part of the ritual she’d missed last year, and Amanda was determined to stay on track today. She began the familiar recital of all the things that made up their lives. “Do you remember when…”
A couple of hours later, she was back beside the car, blanket held high in the air as she folded it into manageable squares. She heard motorcycles in the distance, coming closer, and she clutched the material to her in anticipation. Nerves she didn’t know she still had zinged through her chest and belly, and she turned to catch the first glimpse of the riders.
There, at the very front of the line of bikes, was Alex. His head turned and he gave her a wave with his free hand. The riders behind him looked at her, heads swiveling to match Alex’s, a few hands rose in a similar wave. She lifted her hand in response, holding her breath until they’d completely passed by, the roar and thunder of their pipes fading just as quickly as it had swelled.
Hands shaking, she finished folding the blanket and tucked it away then climbed into the car. Amanda sat there a moment, fingers tight around the steering wheel.
He’d remembered.
***
Monk
The cemetery disappeared into the distance, and Monk settled deeper into the seat of his bike. Even without the reminder on his calendar this morning, he’d known he would be detouring the planned ride to pass by the place where Amanda’s husband lay.
The past year had started out as a shitstorm of epic proportions. Blade had wrecked out, and for a couple of days, it hadn’t looked like he’d make it at all. Then the docs weren’t sure if he’d be the same if he woke up. He’d proven them wrong, and Monk had been there beside him every step of the way, his arms the first to help his brother stand, his voice the loudest one arguing with the man when Blade wanted to give up.
There’d been plenty of that, too. In quick succession, he’d attended funerals of three men he’d served with overseas. Gun, drugs, and a bridge abutment had been their exits of choice, and he’d stood at the foot of each grave, back straight, chin lifted, trying not to see the faces of the family they’d left behind.
Just yesterday, Blade had thanked him, his tersely spoken “Don’t know what I’d’a done without you, brother,” music to Monk’s ears.
A year ago today, his brothers had asked where he’d been, and Monk hadn’t offered the real story, instead giving out winks and nods that let them draw their own conclusions, all of them wrong.
Not that he would have minded their versions. Not at all, and his body had reinforced the idea since his cock stood at half-mast whenever he thought about Amanda. Not even needing one of the little blue pills he hoarded like a miser. Amanda in his lap? Boom, stiffy. Amanda smiling at him as she said the ridiculous word “ixnay” and yep, stiffy. Amanda touching him, palm to his chest as she offered heartfelt condolences over the death of a woman she’d never met? Wham, stiffy. That one he’d acted on, and found the orgasm easier to chase, the solo ending more satisfying than any he could remember.
The BFMC had a support club in her town, and he’d used those contacts to keep track of her. When his man reported in that her car hadn’t moved in days, he’d gone down to check it himself. The engine had a cracked head, and the tranny was trashed, all a result of hard driving in the vehicle’s past he attributed to her dead husband. A quick recommendation by his man had Monk conducting a transaction at a local mechanic shop.
He’d slipped the envelope with the gift certificate into her mailbox himself, heart racing as he rang the doorbell like a kid doing ding-dong-ditch and sidling around the corner of the building. He’d held his breath as the door opened and closed, then opened again and he’d heard the rattle of the mailbox.
He hadn’t stayed after that. Made his way back to his bike and headed out of town, mission accomplished.
He saw the diner in the distance and held up a closed fist in warning. Glancing down, he glimpsed the still-white fabric of his new officer patch, and a swell of pride rose him in. Wonder what Amanda would think, he thought as he turned on his indicator and patted the air in a “slow down” motion. When he’d met her at the gas station, she’d been terrified of him and his brothers. From what she’d shared at the graveside, her life had been tame and staid in comparison to his, and he smiled as he angled onto the blacktop of the diner’s parking lot. She’d gotten over her fear, of him, at least.
Rumbling exhausts surrounded him, and he blinked away the shadows of nonexistent mountains, forcing his shoulders upright. Their Road Captain shouldn’t be afraid, and he wouldn’t let his brothers down. He parked and got off the bike, stretching for a moment as he watched the lot fill with all the bikes he’d led on today’s ride. Blade and Neptune stood nearby, and he saw Wolf walking their way, an easy smile on his lips. All my brothers.
“Monk, hey, Monk.” He looked over to Blade and lifted his chin in response. “Was that the widow back there?” His chest burned and he opened his mouth to retort then closed it tightly, unsure what this flare of anger and jealousy meant. She’s supposed to be just mine, not for him. He shook his head and saw the confusion on Blade’s face. “No? You sure? It looked like her, man.” His hands passed through the air, tracing an hourglass shape that had Monk gritting his teeth. “She seemed to know you.”
He stared a moment, then dipped his chin and looked away. “Yeah, that’s Martin Stewart’s widow.” Maybe if he didn’t say her name, he could get through whatever his brothers would be throwing at him over the next few minutes without decking one of them. His mouth had other ideas, because it kept talking. “Today marks six years for him. I figured Amanda would be at the cemetery.” Jesus.
“Amanda?” Neptune drawled her name slowly. “That’s the widow?”
Monk pushed through their little group and angled towards the front door of the diner. “I’m gonna get a table before it fills up.” They had enough men on the ride today that some would have to eat in shifts or get their food to go and have their meal outside. He glanced up at the sun, still high in the sky. It was hotter today than last year, and he wondered if she’d remembered to drink any water. She’d been leaving the graveside earlier than last year, and he thought that was good. “See you inside.”
“Monk,
hey, Monk.” He glanced over his shoulder at Blade who was standing there with his hands out to his sides, looking more confused than before. “I piss you off or something, brother?”
With a sigh, he turned back and shook his head. “No, man. It’s all good. Just hungry, you know?” At Blade’s reluctant nod, he returned it and then made his way inside, ordering a drink and a burger.
Neptune was the first to join him, sliding onto the seat facing him with a low grunt. “Blade didn’t mean anything by it.”
“I know. It’s no big deal.” Phone in hand, he saw he’d missed a text from his mother, thumbing a quick reply as the other two men claimed their seats. “I got a burger,” he told them as he flipped over to his social media. He kept a low profile because of the club, but used it to keep track of his family doings.
As he was scrolling through his oldest brother’s pictures of a recent picnic with the family, a friend request popped up, the bright, white number one flashing at him briefly. Blade and Wolf were debating the wisdom of a couple of prospects apparently ordering Mexican before getting back on the bikes for the last hundred miles planned for today, and he snorted at Wolf’s graphic description of the mistake he saw happening right in front of him. At the phrase, “exploding pants,” he tuned the pair out and tapped the request.
Amanda Reynolds Stewart.
Reynolds must be her maiden name.
Clicking on her profile, he found only a few things were public. A picture of her with a dog, an image of her husband’s headstone, and an American flag posted last Veteran’s Day, thanking the troops for their service. He shifted uneasily when he read her relationship status still said married. Uncertain if he should accept, he was staring at her picture when the request went away, a message flashing across that it had been withdrawn.
She’d looked him up, and requested it, then backed out. Scared, maybe? If he hadn’t been looking at the app, he might not have ever known it happened. She wasn’t afraid of me when I saw her last. There was no reason for her to have changed her mind. Dammit. He punched the friend request button, and watched the pending status for a moment, then locked the phone. It’s up to her, now.
***
Amanda
An instant after hitting the button, she’d had second thoughts and retracted her request.
Now, she stared at the status on the screen with a frown drawing her brows together. It had changed again, so fast she nearly hadn’t seen it happen. She’d just fallen to her doubts and canceled the friend request when it popped back up, but this one said decline instead of cancel, which meant Alex had noticed what she’d done and issued another request from his end.
She still had his profile page on the screen, pictures he’d been tagged in went on and on. Rows upon rows of family and friends who’d laid claim to him as theirs. Either a brother or son, an uncle in a couple of cases, or a good friend, most of those had motorcycles in the background.
His relationship status said married. There was no name, and nothing in the images spoke to a significant other, but the status definitely said married.
He hadn’t spoken about a spouse, someone special in his life, but to be fair, the single day a year ago that he’d spent with her had been entirely focused on her and what she’d needed to get through the hours spent at the graveside. He’d talked about the tragedy of his younger sister, and how it impacted his folks. He’d shared a few memories of his time in the service, but nothing more personal than that.
Of course he’s married.
A man that handsome, sensitive, and self-confident?
Of course he’d be taken.
She left the friend request where it was, and closed the laptop, setting it aside.
Chapter Three
Monk
The club was doing well. They’d grown in numbers, and he’d sponsored a prospect, his first. That had taken up more of his time than he’d expected but felt good. He found he liked the role of mentor, passing on his wisdom to a baby biker, just as he’d done to the newbies in the service. He’d changed apartments, going smaller, just a single efficiency this time, because all he did there was shit, shower, and sleep. The rest of his days were either spent at work or with the club.
Monk took his duties as Road Captain seriously, wrenching side by side with members to get their bikes ready for a run. He’d personally knifed more tires in the first half of the year than he’d expected, because so many of the members just didn’t pay attention to the condition of their own bikes. Wolf had gotten him a deal with a local racer, and the club had a stock of his take-offs in the shed out back now. Tires too slick to race on, but with plenty of tread for at least a season for most of the men in the club.
So work and the club were both doing well, and if his personal life wasn’t anything to write home about, he wasn’t going to cry because his nights were spent alone.
Two days before the anniversary, he opened the social media app, prepared to stalk Amanda’s profile as normal. He’d already planned what he wouldn’t do this year, and arranged to be working on the day. Nothing good would come of his obsession with this woman, not when she was still tied so tightly to a dead man.
When he navigated to her page, instead of the three pictures, he found dozens. A wealth of images of her. Old and new, they tracked back to high school and he smiled to see her standing awkwardly on a stage stuck inside a costume that looked too big. Her wedding picture was there, and it caught at his chest, leaving him aching inside to see her standing next to a man he assumed was Martin, face shining with happiness.
Documentation of the kind of graduation ceremony he well remembered was there, Amanda tucked in beside Martin, the man standing ramrod stiff in his dress uniform, a shiny single bar on the epaulets of his jacket. Butterbar. Monk smirked. He’d always hated that name. Another picture of just the man at some station overseas, his posture as casual as it ever got when surrounded by enemies, the mixed tans of the desert stretching for miles behind him, those damn dark mountains on the horizon.
He blinked them away.
She’d accepted.
After a year, she’d finally accepted his friend request.
He clicked through to read her posts, not surprised to find them sparse of real information. More a surface glossiness to keep family and friends at bay. A way to keep them from asking too many questions, to satisfy their curiosity and dampen any inklings of concern. He recognized the tactic, because it was what he did, too.
Day manager is way better. Winky face emoji. She’d tagged a local hotel and he grunted. He’d stayed there a few years ago when his bike broke down in nearby town. The only American-owned place within a reasonable distance. At the time, he hadn’t been living in the area very long and didn’t feel comfortable asking his brothers for assistance. Suck it up and make do had been his motto at the time.
He frowned. If his prospect had done the same, Monk would be pissed as hell, because it would show a lack of faith in his brothers. Lesson learned.
This movie is the best. Red heart emoji, thumbs-up emoji. There was an image accompanying that post, a selfie of her with a movie poster in the background. Monk smiled. He’d been to see that movie on opening night, suffering through the shouts of “nerd” from his brothers as he drummed up company to go with him. She was alone, still smiling, but he thought he could see cracks in the façade. They were there in the way her smile didn’t reach her eyes. In the forced quality of that smile. Compare it to that damned wedding photo, and it was clear that she was still hurting.
In the profile summary, he saw something that had him stumbling mentally, trying to find a foothold on his emotions. Then he was dialing his manager, asking for a favor and getting it. A last-minute schedule shuffle to give him an unexpected day off.
Relationship: Single.
***
Amanda
Heart in her throat, Amanda carefully steered her car into the parking lot she’d become so familiar with over the past seven years. It was empty, as was usual
ly the case, and she tried not to let disappointment overwhelm her. She knew once the tears started, they wouldn’t stop until she was wrung dry, no matter what set her off.
She killed the engine with a twist of the key, then sat with her head resting on the steering wheel for a moment. Just another anniversary, and no reason for her to believe it would be any different. On the one hand, she was kicking herself for waiting so long to accept his friend request, and on the other hand, she knew it didn’t matter that he’d remembered the day for the past two years. Martin hadn’t been a friend or in the corps with Alex, so there was no reason for him to come here.
Leaning over the seat, she gathered up her supplies. A new blanket this year, after the boisterous puppy she’d fostered had chewed holes in the previous one. A water bottle instead of a bottle of water, and she smiled slightly at the distinction she made in her own mind. Renewable was the new trend, and it made sense to her, so she’d stopped buying cases of water, instead depending on the filter she’d attached to her kitchen faucet.
That was another change, bigger than most of the rest of them. She’d saved her money, and between the better pay at the hotel along with help from an unexpected insurance payout, she’d signed papers and put a down payment on a little house at the edge of town. Not big, just two bedrooms, still it was hers in a way she’d never had before. After moving from her parents’ home into a garage apartment at Martin’s folks, then into the house he’d wanted, she’d never had a space that felt like it was just hers and she found she liked it. If she wanted to paint the kitchen, she could, and there was no one to tell her no.
Same scrapbook, with new pages in it to document her life. There was one with the newspaper ad for the job that started her on the current path at the hotel. And another with a picture the realtor had taken of Amanda holding the keys to her new house.
Amanda had talked about it with another widow at a survivor’s group she’d started attending, and thought the words given her had been profound. “Maybe it’s a way to remind yourself that keeping on, continuing to live, isn’t bad. Maybe it’s a way to find things to celebrate in your life now.” She’d reached out to touch Amanda’s arm, and for a moment, it was as if the woman’s tiny tattoo had glowed brightly as a supernova. Amanda had stared, then turned her own arm over, showing the matching symbol etched into her skin. They’d clung together and wept, and exchanged numbers, the first time Amanda had done so since Martin died.
Twisted Tales of Mayhem Page 16