Chrome & Leather - The Novel (Adriana Ness ♯1) (Motorcycle Club Romance) (5 page)

Linda’s story gave me something to latch onto, a release point for the growing weight behind my eyes. I think a visit to the hospital to take care of a loose end for her was inevitable. Rationally I knew the visit could bring untoward attention to me, but my heart told me it was the right thing to do. It was the only way to ease the mounting pressure.

I reattached the chain to the tree stump as we headed up the dirt road to the small wood cabin.

The cabin stood in a small clearing surrounded by silver birch trees. Parked outside were three motorbikes. The sun glinted off the polished chrome of the exhaust pipes. Birds chirped as they dove into a dark cloud of insects buzzing in the air, snatching mouthfuls of the bugs as they swooped about.
 

As Blackjack pulled up in front of the cabin the door opened and a man with greasy blonde hair walked out. He wore a beaten up leather jacket that looked like it had seen several lifetimes of action. The elbows where scuffed and worn and it looked like the man lived in the jacket.
 

Blackjack stopped the bike and got off. The blonde haired man came down the steps and they hugged like brothers.
 

“This here is Linda Lake, she helped me out back at the ambush,” Blackjack said.

The blonde man tipped a hat that wasn’t there towards her.

“I’m Bill, but everyone calls me Red,” he said extending a hand to Linda.

She took his hand and it was engulfed in a large warm and calloused embrace.
 

“That’s one hell of a shiner you have there,” Red said.

“You should see the other guy,” Linda said and giggled nervously.

Red winked at her and turned to Blackjack.

“Is he ready?” said Blackjack.

“Yeah we got the jump on him when he was leaving some whores place in old-town. He didn’t know what hit him. He's inside cooling his heals right now. He will be happy to see you,” said Red smiling a shark tooth grin.

“Is everything else set up?” asked Blackjack.

Red nodded and leaned up against his bike. He took out a match from a back pocket in his grease stained jeans and started to pick his teeth with it.

“How bad was the fracas at the bar?”
 

“Nothing I couldn’t handle. They where packing some serious heat. I didn’t recognise any of them. They looked like out of town help. Things got dicey for a minute. Linda helped even the odds.”

“You can handle yourself?” said Red admiringly to Linda.

“I know which end of a gun to point at trouble,” Linda deadpanned.

Red let out a snort of a laughter and said “you’re a veritable Calamity Jane, good for you”.

Linda gave him a slight smile. He seemed friendly enough, but she could see that behind his openness and jokey charm was a darting furtive intelligence. She could feel herself being sized up even as he smiled innocently and laughed along with her.

“I think we have let him stew long enough, lets do this,” Blackjack said and walked towards the door.

“What about her?” asked Red.

“You wait outside while I have a little chat with a compatriot of mine. It wont take too long,” said Blackjack.

Linda nodded and hung back by the bikes. There was nothing she could do. She knew from studying the stacks of files on motorcycle gangs that most of them never let any of the women be involved or witness anything they got up to. She was lucky to have got this far so quickly.

She ground her boots into the soft earth kicking up puffs of dirt trying to bury her frustration about being left outside. She needed to work on making herself indispensable to Blackjack. She needed to get to a point where he never wanted her away from his side. She thought she knew exactly what she needed to do.

Blackjack and Red entered the gloom of the one room cabin. The first thing that hit Blackjacks senses was the acrid smell of piss. Clearly the prisoner had soiled himself in fear. He should be afraid, Blackjack thought darkly to himself.

In the middle of the room was an old beaten up armchair. Chunks of the foam padding poked out through holes in the faded green material. The chair was flanked by two large bald men. They both had the same large crooked nose and jug ears. They where the gangs enforcers known simply as “the brothers”.

Tied to the chair and the source of the acrid piss was a young man in his early twenties. In better times he would have been called good looking, the sort of guy who always had a beautiful woman on his arm and a devilish glint in his eyes. Right now a woman would of screamed at the sight of him.

His nose was flattened and broken on his face. Blood streamed down his chin and ran down his naked chest. His face was puffy and uneven from multiples blows to the head. The brothers had worked him over good. Three of his fingers on his right hand were broken. They had been pulled back until the knuckles popped and cracked as if they were brittle twigs. He had passed out briefly from the pain of the second finger snapping. The brothers allowed the black veil to swallow him momentarily then one of them wrapped his hands around the bound mans neck and began to squeeze. His eyes shot open immediately in panic and he flailed weakly against his constraints.

“Wake up fucker” said the brother as he released his grip on his neck.

Blackjack circled the broken and bleeding man, pacing in long slow loops of the chair and saying nothing. The tied up man followed Blackjack , tilting his head back and forth so as not to lose sight of him. His eyes bulged in his head in fear, afraid if he lost sight of him the cobra would strike.

Blackjack stopped circling and dropped to his hunkers in front of the man.

“Pike, you look like you have seen a ghost. Did you really think your plan was going to work?” Blackjack asked.

Pike began to babble “I made a mistake, please Blackjack please let me explain.”

Blackjack nodded to go on.

“The Man approached me himself, gave me a deal. If I could tell him a place and time were you would be he would erase you. He would make sure I would be leader of this gang.” Pike lowered his voice in a conspiratorial tone and continued. “The Man didn’t know I was playing him. We met at his secret clubhouse. I was doing it for you. We can stop him and his gang now. I know how he operates, I know where he hangs out, we can get him. It was all for you Blackjack, all for our gang. We can finally stop The Man and his band of degenerates. Please Blackjack, I was playing him, please I …”

Blackjack was all too familiar with The Man as he liked to be called, his real name was Diaz Jones. He was a punk ass beaner from across town with delusions of grandeur. His gang was nothing more than a loose group of wannabes and burnt out junkies. They would have never registered as any kind of serious threat to him. Blackjack had some low level dealings with him over the years, but nothing that would of predicted an all out assault on him. Something big was going down he thought, there was no way that Diaz could of organised something like this with his gang of low level fools. There was someone else behind it.

Blackjack stood up and turned to Red “Is the liars tomb ready?”.

“Everything is set up outside” replied Red.

Pike started to thrash in the chair his breath coming out in ragged gasps as tears and snot streamed down his broken face.

“Blackjack look at me, I did it for us, for us.”

His voice trailed off and he gently rocked against his constraints repeating again and again “Believe me”.

Blackjack nodded towards the brothers and said “Hang back for a minute and then bring him out”.

The backdoor groaned loudly as Blackjack opened it, the rusty hinges sounding like the wailing lament of a broken hearted woman. Red followed him outside.

Blackjack looked over the setup for the liars tomb and nodded grimly. It was something his gang had used for a long time against anyone found to be doing anything detrimental to the gang. When money and power was involved Blackjack had found that even the most trustworthy of men could sometimes falter. The liars tomb was the great boogie man of his gang, often whispered about by the lower down members.
 

Blackjack had to employ its use only twice in the ten years of the gang. The first time was to his trusted right hand man Drake “The beast” Cray. Blackjack had started to notice little by little how Drake would slightly undermine him in front of other gang members. At first it came across as a nothing but some gentle ribbing. Drake would joke about Blackjacks penchant for only sleeping with African American woman, jokingly calling him a traitor to his race. Then Drake would start to second guess Blackjacks plans or instructions in front of the other men. Little by little chipping away at Blackjack. He could handle the insults to his choice in women, but second guessing him in front of others could not stand.

Blackjack confronted him about it in a knock down drag out drunken fistfight. Drake swore that it was nothing more then brotherly rivalry to keep Blackjack on his toes. He didn’t believe him. He knew what was really going on. Drake was planning a coup.

Blackjack had only one course of action. He needed to show his strength to the rest of the gang. Show that he was a strong and decisive leader who would not take any disrespect. He needed to show that nobody was above reproach even someone like Drake who he had grown up with and at one time was his most trusted brother.

The truth came out when Drake was introduced to the liars tomb. It always did. After that Blackjacks legend grew as
 
a ruthless and cold leader. He only had to use the tomb once more after that. That time he had been wrong about the man and he pulled back from using it again. He had promised himself not to use it another time, until now.

The rat fuck Pike deserved it and it was the only way to find out the full truth.
 

Red walked over to the pit and kicked a sod of dirt in. He had supervised the setup of the liars tomb that afternoon. Grim work for him and the brothers. They had dug the pit in a frenzied two hour session of digging, hopped up on a potent mix of corn whiskey and speedballs.
 

The soil was soft from heavy rains the night before and the digging went easy. Once the brothers finished they surveyed their handy work. The coffin and the modified lid lay off to the side. A dark duffel bag sat beside the coffin awaiting the time when its contents would be used like a demon spectre haunched over a struggling man ominous in its existence.

Blackjack walked around the open grave and nodded to himself, “Bring out Pike” he said to the two bald and gargantuan brothers standing like stone implacable gargoyles at the backdoor to the cabin. They went inside to grab the whimpering Pike.

Red spat into the dirt and turned to Blackjack “Whats her story?” he said.

“She rides with us now. Things got a little dicey back in the bar. She came through for me.”

“Can she be trusted?”

Blackjack turned and glared at Red “She can be trusted”.

Red knew he had stepped over the line, he also knew Blackjacks weakness for dark skinned tail. Sometimes it would blind him to a woman’s more craven nature. Red had seen it time and again, women who threw themselves at Blackjack, excited by his power. Sometimes they where regular folk who wanted a bit of bad to shake up the humdrum. Others times it was some batshit crazy woman who was nothing but trouble. Red had seen it all and he knew Blackjacks weakness for damaged women. He attracted them like a coyote to a rotting carcass. Red was usually the one left to handle the fallout when Blackjack became either bored with them or the crazy became too much. He would need to keep his eye on this one. Something about her didn’t sit well with him. Red always trusted his gut.

The two brothers walked out with Pike between them. As soon as he saw the open grave and what was awaiting him his legs gave out from under him and he voided his bladder again.

“Please please no, not this, not this” he babbled as the brothers picked him up and dragged him forward.
 

All rigidity had left his body and he flopped around loosely in the brothers iron grip. He looked like a rag doll his head lolling back and forward as he mumbled. His eyes wide and white as he looked to the sky and then back to the pit.

“Don’t do this Blackjack, I will do anything for you. I can infiltrate the other gang and kill the leader for you. Bring you back his fucking head to show you my allegiance. Please anything, ask anything of me. I will prove my worth to you” Pike said as tears streamed from his eyes.

“Enough” said Blackjack.

“You know how this goes Pike. You have to go in the ground. If you tell me the truth I will let you out.”

Pike looked from man to man as cold waves of panic spread through his body. His face glistened in a cold sweat. His shirt clung to him in damp patches. He looked around wildly hoping vainly for help, hoping for anything to stop him having to enter the liars tomb. His wild gaze only returned steely looks of determination from the other men.

The brothers dragged him towards the open coffin. Pikes body suddenly went rigid as his legs began to pinwheel like a cartoon roadrunner. Nothing he could do delayed his slow inevitable march towards the open coffin.

As he drew ever closer to the coffin he stopped crying and wailing seemingly resigned to his fate. Blackjack had seen this before, sometimes a calm quiet would befall the marked man once he knew all options were gone.

When his shins hit the edge of the coffin all resistance left his body and he slumped forward as the brothers lowered him into the coffin. The lid was quickly placed on top and secured with heavy metal clamps. The lid of the coffin had a circular hole cut in it, large enough to see the occupants face.
 

Pike looked up at the small patch of greying sky above him, his face pale and ashen and streaked with tears. The reality of his situation rammed home with the loud metallic click of the securing clasps. He began to trash his legs, kicking with all his might against the coffin walls. He slammed his fists against the coffin lid bloodying his knuckles.