Pin

by Hope Stone

  All my other notes were about drug activity in La Playa. The Hammonds and the Elenes had been convinced that bikers were drug dealers. There were rumors of course, but also some compelling evidence and even a few arrests. I would want to push on my contact at the police department to see if there was a high number of biker dealers, or if that was a stereotype.

  I hadn’t realized it, but Outlaw Souls was fairly well-known. It hadn’t taken the parents much to dig up the name of the club.

  “These bikers, they know how to avoid getting caught,” Mr. Hammond had said. “And they know how to use young girls to move drugs. No one suspects a pony-tailed teen.”

  I felt the man was a bit dramatic, but I had to admit he had a point. If the bikers were on the radar for drug activity, it would make sense that they would want to recruit some impressionable helpers. Not to mention it wasn’t unprecedented to use teenagers.

  There had been a big drug bust in LA a few years ago in which a detective discovered cocaine being moved through a college sorority house. It had gone on for years because no one had bothered to look past the shiny pink facade of Beta Kappa Gamma.

  On my final page of notes were two other names: Grace Vasquez and Phillip Harding. The Hammonds and Elenes’ had explained that those two had also attended West La Playa High School and had run away about a year before.

  The parents had reported it, but the investigations had fizzled out. I would have to check, but according to the Hammonds, Grace’s parents had pretty much given up on her. She had been a wild child and got involved with a bad crowd. Rumor had it she had been dating a biker dude before she dropped out of school and vanished.

  Grace and Zoe had been on the same volleyball team. It was a tenuous connection, but the Hammonds clung to it. Zoe could have been introduced to her mysterious older boyfriend by Grace. Once again, I figured this was something Liz could confirm or deny.

  As for Phillip, the only connection was bikes. He had been a known bike-lover. He had even fixed up his own Harley during his senior year. He had been a month away from eighteen when he left his home. His mother, a single mom with three other kids, hadn’t even reported it. The name only came up because Hector’s friend had mentioned Hector getting in touch with Phillip at some point in the last year.

  I sighed as I came to the end of my notes. Between the random dates, lists of names, and theories based on local gossip, it was a tangled web indeed. It’s what I had asked for though. By solving this case, I could actually make a difference.

  Instead of one cheating scumbag getting his comeuppance (which was satisfying in a small-ball type of way), I could be extricating some poor kid from a drug ring. I could be saving them from jail, addiction, or death. I could be ensuring that the streets of La Playa stayed a little cleaner.

  Plus it would feel good. I smiled as I pictured myself busting a drug ring and sending a bunch of no-good guys to jail. I hoped whatever pervert had preyed on a sixteen-year-old girl got the longest sentence.

  I had a photo of Zoe taped to one page. She was cute, but visibly young. It was a school photo, her brown eyes wide open and she wore a bashful smile. Zoe was cute, but not the type to get a ton of attention from boys. Her mouth was too wide and she hadn’t quite grown into her looks. Her parents had said she could be shy as well and desperate to please others. The exact type of girl that older guys could manipulate.

  I tore my eyes away from the photo and snapped my notebook shut. I had thirty minutes until Pin’s arrival. I shoved my book into my desk drawer and headed to the bathroom. I ran a hand through my hair and swiped on a layer of pink lip gloss, then surveyed the results in the mirror. I was wearing leggings and a cream cable-knit sweater. My feet were bare.

  I wanted to look good, but not like I tried too hard. Pin clearly wanted a hook-up. I had figured he would, but he was the one who came out and suggested a night in.

  I hadn’t decided if I would sleep with him again. It was a tricky line to walk. For one, I had already slept with him and it had been good. Definitely good enough that I was not averse to repeating the experience.

  But would I just be sleeping with him for the case? When it was put that way, it all sounded a little bit grimy. Then again, who cared what methods I used as long as I got results? Plus, there was no guarantee that Pin was involved.

  I tried to picture Pin approaching a teenage girl and giving her drugs to carry. It seemed totally out of the question. And I had difficulty imagining that Kim would be cool with that kind of behavior.

  I considered Moves or the other guys I had met at the Blue Dog Saloon. I hadn’t spent enough time with them to get a gauge. Moves had been friendly, and he did have a certain self-aware charm. Would he use that charm to manipulate a younger girl or perhaps a kid who looked up to him?

  As for Kim and Pin, they could be ignorant since it was a bigger club or they could be in denial. It was amazing how people could justify crimes in their heads. People could be so blind when it was convenient. Like maybe Pin hadn’t looked too close at a brother’s new girl. Maybe he hadn’t noticed she was super young because noticing that kind of thing would only keep him up at night or lead to him having to question his friend.

  It was possible. If I had learned anything in my time as a PI, it was that anything was possible.

  And as a PI, I had to use every resource I had access to. Which was why I hadn’t even hesitated to text Pin once I had all the information about the case. He was an easy way into the Outlaw Souls. I could ask around for months before I got intel that Pin could give to me in a day. He had already told me plenty about the club on our fake date.

  Pin had said that Outlaw Souls were above dealing drugs or any other illegal activities, but he would have said that no matter what. He handled the money after all, so he was definitely going down if it turned out they were running a drug ring.

  I felt a strange prickling at the back of my neck. If a biker club was running a big-scale drug operation, they would need a good accountant. Someone to keep the books looking clean. Someone smart who understood how to make the money disappear, go somewhere safe. Someone to make the books look legit.

  Someone like Pin.

  I flipped open my notebook and jotted down a few more notes. So far I had interacted with Pin, Moves, and Kim. Pin had mentioned there were almost twenty members in the club, not to mention pledges and family and friends. That was a lot of unknowns.

  I put my notebook back into my desk. This time I wouldn’t take it out again. I needed to be light and easy around Pin. All the unanswered questions concerning Zoe, Hector, and the others had to disappear from my face. Pin wasn’t going to want to spend an evening with a PI haunted by a multilayered mystery.

  He wanted a chill girl. A girl who wouldn’t ask him to define the relationship or act too clingy.

  I’d gathered that much from our night together, but his leaving in the dead of night had confirmed it. For whatever reason, Pin didn’t want to be the morning after guy. That was just fine with me. As long as he didn’t suspect that I was investigating his beloved bike club.

  Pin came off as a pretty mild and even-tempered guy, but I had no doubt that if he sensed for even a moment that I was prying into biker business, he would be furious. To be honest, I didn’t have a plan. I had to own up to that as seven o’clock drew nearer. I was going to have to play it by ear.

  The fact of the matter was that Pin might not want to have any sort of conversation with a chick he was hooking up with. And I wasn’t sure I could make him pursue me in earnest. I had a healthy self-esteem, but even I knew when a guy didn’t want a girlfriend.

  Besides, becoming his girlfriend would be going way too far. I just needed to be peripheral. I needed to hang around Pin as much as I could, maybe even go out with him and Kim and other bikers. I needed to drift on the sidelines, cute and approachable, but not a threat at all. I needed to keep my eyes and ears open.

  That was the only semblance of a plan I could come up with. All great investigato
rs knew that plans always went to shit anyway. Veronica had a favorite saying: I make a plan, and God laughs.

  I would just adapt and think on my feet. To prove my point, I bounced on the balls of my feet and shadowboxed, just to pump myself up.

  As if on cue, there was a knock on my door. Pin had arrived.

  “It’s showtime,” I whispered to myself. I put a smile on my face and headed to my door.

  As I gripped the door handle in anticipation to see him, the smile started to feel genuine.

  Thirteen

  Pin

  She was even prettier than I had remembered. Or she had gotten prettier in the last few days.

  Either way, I couldn’t help but grin when she opened the door. She was wearing an oversized sweater, her hair loose and slightly tousled. She was ready for a comfy night in, and I loved it. My stomach warmed at the thought of how nice it would be to skip the whole awkward dating phase and get straight to the cuddling on the couch phase.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “I,” I said. “I got wine.”

  She quirked an eyebrow and gave me a saucy grin as she ushered me inside. She shut the door behind me. “I had you pegged as a beer guy.”

  “Well, I assumed you were a wine girl,” I said.

  I stood still once I was inside. Memories of the last time I was there rushed to the forefront of my mind. The heat and the tension and how I had lifted her up while she wrapped her legs around my waist. We had both been too tipsy for any awkwardness then, but now I didn’t quite know how to stand or where to put the wine I was gripping in one hand.

  “Good guess,” Claire said. “And you even got red, my favorite.”

  “I thought about rosé,” I said.

  Claire let out a little snort. “Don’t insult me.”

  She grabbed the wine and waved one hand towards the couch. “Take a seat. I’ll open this and then we can decide on food.”

  I wandered over to her couch and sat down. After a moment of thought, I scooched forward and took off my leather jacket. I was wearing a worn white T-shirt and jeans. I folded my jacket neatly and placed it on the arm of the couch.

  I ran my palm over the smooth dark brown leather and gazed at the maps on the wall. I remembered the maps from the other night, but I hadn’t bothered to look at them too closely since I’d been pretty distracted. I scanned them now. California. Europe. A massive world map.

  For some reason, the decor made sense for Claire.

  She padded across the floor with the open wine in one hand and two glasses in her other hand. I admired her pale little feet as she plopped down on the couch.

  “I like your maps,” I said.

  “Thanks!” She flashed me a grin that made my heart speed up.

  “You travel a lot?” I asked.

  “No, but I want to,” Claire said. “I wanna have a massive map with little pins in every place I’ve been.”

  It made sense. She was an adventurer at heart. “You from California originally?”

  I cringed at the question. I had been eager to skip dating, but somehow I still asked the most typical First Date Question.

  “Yeah, up north though,” Claire said. “I fled to LA as soon as I could.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  She shrugged and tucked her feet up under her, leaning closer as she did. I caught the scent of her shampoo, a combination of mint and florals.

  “I wanted excitement I guess,” she said. “I thought LA would be big and glitzy like the movies.”

  “And it let you down?” I asked.

  Claire frowned. She leaned forward and poured two glasses of wine. “Everything lets me down eventually. But I still get my hopes up about the next thing.”

  She handed me a glass and I took a sip. I didn’t usually drink wine, but I hadn’t wanted to show up with a six-pack of Budweisers. Claire would have been game, but it would have felt too much like a night with the brothers. Claire was anything but a leather-clad biker dude.

  “What about you?” she asked. “What’s your story?”

  “La Playa born and raised,” I said. “Not much of a story.”

  “You’re an accountant in a notorious biker club,” Claire said. “You’ve gotta have stories.”

  She raised her glass to her lips and peered at me with her massive blue eyes as she took a sip.

  “I guess it’s the norm for me,” I said. “The bikers are all I’ve ever known.”

  “But why did you join?” she asked.

  I frowned at the space in front of me. I hadn’t expected to get deep life questions, but I didn’t mind. From any other chick I was hooking up with, I would have been annoyed. I would have wanted to cut it with the deep history and emotional reasoning and just get to the physical.

  But I liked the way Claire asked as if she really wanted to know, just to know. She wasn’t asking to fill the silence or to be polite. She had a burning curiosity, and it was directed at me. I was flattered.

  “I wanted a family I guess,” I said.

  I shocked myself at my own honesty and felt an instant wave of embarrassment. I didn’t want to be a mopy guy talking about all his baggage.

  “Not that I don’t have a family,” I said. “I have my mom, and she’s great, I just wanted more camaraderie I guess. I never had any siblings by blood.”

  Claire nodded with eagerness. “Me neither. I used to pretend I had like 7 brothers and sisters, I would even make up names and personalities for all of them.”

  I had an image of a tiny blonde Claire carrying on an imaginary argument with an invisible sibling and smiled. “Which one was your favorite?”

  “I had this awesome older brother,” Claire said. “Once we hopped into train cars and rode the rails like they used to do in the olden days.”

  “That’s sort of why I got into bikes,” I said. “I wanted to be able to just take off with my good friends and go anywhere.”

  Claire’s eyes turned dreamy, and she let out a little sigh. “It sounds lovely.”

  “It is,” I said.

  There was a beat of silence in which we simply locked eyes. It wasn’t uncomfortable though. It was more like we were seeing each other for who we were, in the light of the day, away from a dance club or a bar or fancy restaurant.

  “Well, enough about the residual scars of childhood,” Claire said with a wry grin. “What should we eat?”

  In a matter of minutes, Claire produced an array of take-out menus. To my delight, she had anecdotes and reviews about nearly every single one. One place had great pizza, but it was a long wait. A Thai food restaurant was her go-to on lazy Sundays.

  I laughed at all of Claire’s pithy comments. At last, we opted for Chinese food. I was happy to discover that Claire and I had the same philosophy when it came to ordering Chinese food. We selected several dishes and didn’t worry about having too much since we could always eat leftovers. We ordered sesame chicken, dumplings, fried rice, crab rangoon, and beef with broccoli.

  Once we had placed the order, I felt myself relaxing around Claire. She was easy to be around, and it was clear that she wasn’t uncomfortable. She flicked on the TV and we surfed the channels for a while, but mostly we just chatted about our respective jobs and friends and living in La Playa. I told Claire that Kim was recovering quite nicely as she described her colleague, Veronica.

  “I have to ask,” Claire said. “What is the deal with Moves?”

  I laughed at her bemused expression. “He’s simultaneously the best and the worst.”

  “I mean, when he dragged me over that first night, I had no idea what was going on,” Claire said. “Obviously, I went with it, ‘cause I was pursuing Trey, but I swear no one has ever wingmanned with such confidence.”

  “Confident, yes,” I said. “But not subtle.”

  “I mean, I guess it kinda worked in the end,” Claire said.

  I looked up with a start. It was the first time either one of us had referenced the night we had spent just a few yards away, in he
r bedroom.

  “Not really thanks to Moves though,” I said.

  “I’m sure he would disagree,” she said.

  “Yeah, he would,” I said.

  I shook my head and smiled over my friend. “He’s a good guy though.”

  “Yeah, definitely charming,” she said.

  “Don’t let that fool you,” I said. “There are a lot of guys in East La Playa that would not call Moves charming.”

  Claire furrowed her brow in puzzlement.

  “He’s our enforcer,” I said.

  “So he’s, like, your muscle?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “He’s the one who makes sure enemies stay in line. He’s a fighter.”

  “Oh.” Claire didn’t look horrified or judgmental. Just curious once again. “I didn’t know everyone had roles.”

  “Not the newer members, but most of us do, yeah,” I said.

  Most people who weren’t familiar with biker clubs were surprised at our organization. Most outsiders figured we just fucked around on our bikes, but it took structure to keep a club going strong.

  “But obviously the accountant is the most badass,” Claire said. “Even more badass than the enforcer.”

  I grinned at her sarcasm. I liked how she was game to joke about anything and everything.

  “Technically, my official title is Treasurer,” I said, matching her mocking tone.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Mr. Treasurer,” Claire said.

  Just then her phone rang and Claire leapt up with a cry that the food had arrived. The next few minutes were a flurry of opening all the dishes and filling our plates.

  What would it be like, I found myself wondering, to spend every evening like this? Not bad, I realized. It wouldn’t be bad at all.

  I peered over at Claire as she wielded her chopsticks like an expert to scoop up a pork dumpling. Once we had settled back on the couch with our food, Claire started flipping through the TV channels again.