Black Sheep (Rawkfist MC Book 1) (11 page)

Court

G
rowing up with only a mother, I craved male
approval. Men like Jared were superheroes in my mind. When he took an interest
in me, I ate up any damn bit of attention he offered. I still respected the
shit out of Jared, even if I suspected he was less than thrilled about Justice
and me.

We arrive at
the club meeting separately. Normally, we’d walk in together. I’m only a
patched member because he vouched for me. My father was a petty criminal and,
rumor has it, a snitch. No way would I find acceptance with men like Joe Wells
if not for Jared’s lead.

Today, we don’t
walk into the tavern together. He parks and makes his way inside without so
much as looking at me. I know I should feel bad, but I’m no longer a little boy
wanting his surrogate daddy’s approval. As a grown man, I can stand on my own
and live by my rules. Justice is mine, and only she gets to say otherwise.

The Rock Tavern
is old school with wood paneling from the floor to the ceiling. The tables
haven’t been changed out in thirty years. With thick, dark wood, they show the
wear and tear of thousands of drunken nights. I’ve always loved this place. As
great as my mom was, she raised me in a home filled with pink flowers. In
contrast, The Rock Tavern reeks of masculinity.

Standing in the
doorway of the back room, I inhale the familiar scent of beer, leather, and
varnish.

Joe Wells was
never the prettiest man, and he lacks charm. He once said the only way he ever
got laid was by chasing a woman until she was tired enough to give up. Rumor
has it the first president was everything Joe isn’t. Handsome, pretty even,
Daryl Rose loved telling tall tales about his sexual escapade. The guy had big
dreams, but he was a drunk and quick to rage. Jared once explained how Joe was
too ugly to be stupid while Daryl was too pretty to use his brain.

Rubbing his
bald head, Joe sighs in a grumpy way that sounds a lot like a bear growl.

“They call me
soft,” he says when everyone is in the room. “I call me pragmatic.”

The men around
me are for the most part pushing fifty. The club was once as virile as the
tavern, but time catches up to even the biggest badasses.

“Who says
that?” asks our vice president.

I’ve seen
pictures of Ned Smithy from when he was young. The guy looked like Marlon
Brando from
The Wild One
. These days, he looks more like Brando from
The
Island of Doctor Moreau
.

“People say it.
Enemies. Fuckers who don’t know any better,” Joe mutters.

“Fuck ‘em.”

The two men are
like a married couple desperate for a divorce but too old to live apart.

“Boy Scout over
here took care of that issue we had. Glad to know we still have friends willing
to help us hunt down problems.”

I nod when the
guys look at me. They respect me as much as they can while knowing I come from
a snitch’s seed. These men feel in their bones that disloyalty is genetic. If
your family is full of liars and snitches, you can’t help following in their
footsteps. I often reminded them how my mother kept her mouth shut about a lot
of things she saw as a waitress at The Rock Tavern. Mentioning her always
softens their stances. They remember watching her go from an eighteen year old
full of promise to a broken woman ready for the end to come.

“The world’s
going to hell,” Joe announces. “Not sure how long we can survive the way things
are these days. I remember when we started up our business. Pot and moonshine
were the only drugs anyone needed. Now people want meth and heroine. You ever
see what that shit does to someone? If we had a guy selling pot and he skimmed
off the stash, he only got the munchies. Now we got guys hooked on the project
and getting into shootouts with cops. That kind of heat never came down on us
in the past.”

Ned taps his
pen on the table like a pissed accountant. “Running whores is the same way. We
had some girls wanting to make money the old fashion way. We protected them and
got a slice. Now our business partners decide eighteen ain’t young enough. They
grab up runaways and get the girls hooked on the product and then bring in baby
fucking customers. Cops never cared much about a woman spreading her legs to
make money. You do the same thing with a twelve-year-old and cops start to
care. Every time I send one of you out to check on our people, they’ve got
someone underage in their stable. We can’t keep them from bringing that heat
down on us.”

“We beat them
down, but the assholes don’t listen,” Joe says, sounding like he’ll start
talking any minute about the music kids listen to today. “These fuckers claim
the demand is for young girls. Boys too. They say we have to cater to these
perverts or someone else will. No matter how many times we tell them no, they
sneak around. Then they get caught and want to talk about our business to save
them from prison time.”

“What’s a
business man to do in this new world?” Joe continues when no one says anything.
“We have this latest fucker beating on his woman in the grocery store. He gets
picked up by the cops, and they pressure him to give us up. He doesn’t budge
the first time around, but the cops won’t give up. They nail him for possession
with intent to distribute. He was looking at a decade at least, and no way does
a meth fucker like him keep his mouth shut. So we kept it shut for him, but now
we have to keep looking over our shoulders for cops.”

Ned picks up
Joe’s whining and runs with it. “The cops have their fucking arrest quotas and
the prosecutors are all looking for big cases to make their careers. If they
get a whiff of trouble from Tumbling Rock, they’ll be up our asses until they
drag us down. Used to be you could pay off a cop here and a judge there. We
didn’t spill blood in front of the civilians, and the law stayed out of our
way. Everyone was happy, but today we need to worry about everyone being a
snitch. I have to scan every fucking room I go in for some kind of device.
Can’t even take a shit without worrying someone is listening in.”

“So what do you
want us to do?” Jared asks when Joe just goes silent.

“What can we
do?” Ned says. “We don’t want to end up like our partner club in Deacon who got
wiped out after pissing off the cops. Half are in jail. The other half are in
the ground. We can’t expand. Not with a crew of old timers like us. None of the
guys growing up around here want to join the club. They’re soft these days.
None of them can take a punch. Oh, they’ll join if it’s all pussy and good
times, but they’re pathetic fucks. Seems the Rawkfist MC is going the way of
the dinosaurs.”

Stress
scratching at his head again, Joe nods. “Look at my son with his fucking hand
cream and emotional baggage talk. He’s a bitch. Hell, his sister has more balls,
and she cries at the drop of the hat. Kids today don’t have the stones to make
the tough decisions and keep their mouths shut. Do you think any of those
fuckers playing bikers around the Tavern lately could keep their mouth shut
like Court did if they got snatched up by the cops on some trumped up charge?”

“We could try
bringing in new talent from outside the area?” I offer.

“How?”

“I don’t know,
but there’s got to be a way to bring in fresh blood. This area has established
ties and money to be made. It’s a nice fucking town. Seems like people might be
interested in coming here.”

“Yeah, but if
we can’t find those people, they ain’t coming. Besides, who knows what kind of
psycho bullshit they might bring with them. I don’t want the Rawkfist name being
connected to kiddie porn or dog fighting. Hell, I heard down in Bateman, they
got kids fighting fucking dogs. The world’s gone mad. No place for honorable men
like us in this new scheme of things.”

I don’t know if
I’m the only one feeling as if this meeting was called so Joe and Ned could
complain to an audience. Casually, I glance around to see if anyone looks
irritated or bored. Instead, the other men nod in agreement at everything Joe
and Ned say.

Yes, the
world is bad. No, a criminal can’t make money in an honorable way these days.
Yes, we’re fucked. No, we don’t know how to fix anything. Yes, we were once
great.

By the time the
meeting ends an hour later, I’m sick of listening to their bullshit. They were
once the kind of men who told indecisive fuckers to crap or get off the pot.
Now they’re the ones unsure how to handle a world that didn’t change overnight.
While I’m not smart enough to lead the club, I’m beginning to think they aren’t
either.

Walking
outside, I wonder how Daryl Rose would have faced the changing landscape of
crime. Would the drunken playboy wish for the old days or would he have already
embraced the ugly new realities?

“Hold up,”
Jared says when I reach my Harley.

Watching him
walk to me, I wonder why Jared never wanted to run anything. He’s smarter than
most guys and level-headed when other men’s tempers rule them. I know Jared was
in prison when Daryl fell off the ladder, so maybe he never had a say in who
led the club. Or maybe Joe was a super badass in the day, and I can’t see it
anymore after an hour of listening to him whine.

“I think we
need to discuss some shit.”

“I thought you
weren’t going to involve yourself. Now you want to discuss.”

“Look, I got to
get this off my chest.”

“Then do it.”

Even standing
away from the other men, Jared still glances around to make sure we have enough
privacy. When he returns his dark gaze to me, I search for something about his
face that reminds me of Justice.

“I’m saying
this as someone who thinks of you as a son,” Jared begins, and I know he’s
about to cut off my balls. “I don’t think you’re good enough for Justice. There
it is. I know it’s fucked up, but it’s how I feel. You’re a good kid, and I
want you to be happy, but not with my daughter. She’s got a future, and I think
it’d be better without you in it.”

“I won’t
pretend I can read your mind, but I think you look at Justice and see
Christine. You think you messed up with your ex, and now you’re saving me from
doing the same shit with Justice.”

Jared’s face
shows no reaction to my accusation. He glances around again and then suddenly
frowns.

“Christine had
big plans before meeting me, but I didn’t care. I wanted her, and I took her,
and she seemed happy, but women lie to your face. I don’t even think they know
they’re lying. I doubt Christine figured she was lying when she said she was
happy, but as soon as I had my back turned, she took off. The fact is she made
the right decision, and now she’s got a business, and she’s happy.”

“Justice isn’t
Christine. She already has her career, and I ain’t doing anything to steal that
from her.”

“You come with
baggage.”

“Don’t call my
kid baggage, Jared,” I growl, ready to throw down.

“I’m not. I meant
Becca and the club and being an ex-con. Justice has a clean record and a solid
career. Hooking up with a criminal can ruin that.”

“I’m not
breaking things off with your daughter. No matter what you say, it’s just not
happening.”

Sighing loudly,
Jared is clearly frustrated I didn’t immediately bow to his will. “You know why
I never chased Christine down after I got out of prison? I could have forced
the issue and made the girls visit me here, but I always let Christine have us
meet in Turbo. I did that because this town is a dead-end. Once I got out of
prison, I knew the right thing was to let Christine have her freedom so she
could raise the girls somewhere better. I know you want the same for Felix.”

“While you make
great points, we both know if someone had made the same fucking points to you
when you hooked up with Christine, that you’d still have married her.”

“What happens
if you and Justice have kids and then one day you end up back to prison for the
club?”

“Justice isn’t
stupid. She knows what she’s getting into. If you think she’s making a mistake,
tell her. Don’t come to me and say I ought to fuck up the only easy thing I’ve
had in my life. With Felix, I need to deal with Becca. With the club, I gotta
worry they think I’ve got too much of my rat father in me. With Justice, it’s
been easy. We click like fucking magic, and I won’t walk away. Then again, if
you think you’re right, tell her the shit you’re telling me and make her see
your side of things.”

Jared scowls
hard at me. “You know she won’t listen.”

“Of course not.
She does what she wants, and she never regrets anything. We regret all kinds of
shit so we can’t understand her, but I don’t need to understand to know I’m
falling in love with Justice. She’s a gem in a pile of coal, and I can’t lose her.
She’ll need to kick me to the curb because I won’t do it myself.”

“Love don’t pay
the bills or raise the kids or make life livable. It only holds people back.”

“If you had
listened to your advice with Christine, you’d never have Justice or Journey. I
happen to think the world is better off for you making that mistake. I think
your ex is happier having given life with you a chance. You ought to respect
your daughter enough to let her make her mistakes.”