Smolder: Trojans MC (50 page)

Chapter Two

Falcon made a hard right and turned down a path that the Screaming Eagles had cut through the hunting preserve. But the path was dangerous and in order to stay in control of his bike, he had to slow down. There were exposed roots, broken branches, and rocks that jutted far out of the earth and Falcon sped past and through all of them praying the cops hadn’t seen him. He had never felt more alive. His eyes were wide open and they saw every danger seconds before they became deadly. He saw a rock and instantly swerved to avoid it, sending him into a fallen tree branch that he managed to run over and compensate for, staying in his seat and continuing to run.

The forest was filled with paths and trails to get the bikers out in a situation just like this. Falcon knew that in five miles this path would spit him out onto a busy highway and he could disappear into the crowd. He just needed to make it. He heard the roar of a bike behind him and he took a moment to glance in his rearview mirror, but what he saw was the last thing he expected.

It was a woman. She wasn’t wearing a helmet, and she knew how to ride a bike. She was speeding down the path and to Falcon’s surprise she was gaining on him. He glanced at her again in the mirror and saw her getting even closer, her long, dark hair flying behind her like a flag as she zoomed down the path.

I can still make it
, he thought as he gunned his engine. But an increase in speed came with an increase in danger and he saw the rock only as his front wheel hit it. His bike jerked to the right and he compensated, but then heard his engine began to cough and he felt his bike shudder beneath him. “No, no, no!” Falcon cried out, his voice rising in panic. An image filled his head, a little girl with bright blue eyes and a thick head of curly dark hair. He could see her clearly and as his bike died beneath him, Falcon knew he had failed his daughter.

He jumped off his bike, letting it fall, not caring about how many scratches and dings it would acquire.

“Get down. On the ground, dirtbag, now!” Her voice was stern and strong sounding.

Behind him she jumped off the motorcycle Falcon recognized as Eric’s. For a second he didn’t move, his hand hovering over the holster to his gun. Finally, he turned to face the cop and saw she was almost as tall as he was and curvy, with vibrant green eyes and he had to stop himself from doing a double take. She was gorgeous, full bodied and confident. Falcon wondered how she had come to be a cop. A woman that beautiful should have been on the cover of magazines, not arresting bikers in the woods.

“Reach for that gun and I will end you. You really want to die in these woods?” Her gun was out and aimed at Falcon. He stared at it in disbelief; had this really happened? Was he about to be arrested by a woman more beautiful than any he had ever seen before? He knew his prints had been found at over seven murder scenes, and there was no way of knowing what the police knew about the Screaming Eagles operation. He was going to go to jail, probably for the rest of his life. He would never see Sophie again.

“Get down on the ground and keep your hands where I can see them,” the cop said.

Every time Falcon had imagined this scenario he had watched himself go out in a hail of bullets. They’ll never take me alive, no sir. How many times had he said that? And, yet, here he was, hands raised as he awkwardly got on the ground.

His face was in the dirt as he felt the cop rifle through his jacket and remove his gun. She roughly grabbed his arms and placed his wrists in handcuffs.

“You have the right to remain silent,” she said as she started to recite his rights to him. His hands were cuffed behind his back and she grabbed his arm and helped him stand up. Now, informed of his rights, they started back down the path towards the processing facility.

“What’s your name?”

“Falcon, Falcon Marks,” he said with a huff. He was furious with himself. Had he been a coward? There would have been no way for Falcon to get to his gun before the cop shot him, but, still, he should have at least tried. But what would have happened to Sophie?

“Yeah, right, and I’m Princess Bubblegum” she scoffed. “What’s your real name?”

“Falcon Marks is my real name,” he answered.

“We’ll see about that. I’m Detective Santiago. You can refer to me as Detective Santiago.”

“How did you find out about us?” Falcon asked.

“A hunter reported some very strange activity in the area. We had some other tips come in recently, but the call from the hunter pushed us over the edge. It was a real risk bringing the whole team out here, but, boy, was it worth it,” she said and Flacon could hear the smug edge to her voice.

As the path opened up before them Falcon felt his heart sink. There were over a dozen police vans and what looked like a hundred cops swarming the facility.

“Grace! You got one!” he heard a voice call out and as one every officer on the field turned to look at the two of them and a cheer went up. Standing handcuffed next to the woman who arrested him Falcon had never felt more exposed or humiliated. They were celebrating his defeat and, what was worse, they were making him watch.

Officer Grace Santiago led him to the stump of a long dead tree and sat him down on it.

“What do we got, Summers?” she asked a petite looking blond woman.

“The mother-load,” the blonde said with a grin that was about a mile wide. “Hundreds of kilos of meth rocks, pseudoephedrine, and thousands in lab grade equipment. And,” she turned to face Falcon, “there is definitely evidence that this isn't their only operation.”

“Good to know,” Grace said, turning to stare at Falcon with her arms crossed. “Boys, put him in a truck, take him to the precinct. I’ll meet you there. You're under arrest,” she said, speaking directly to Falcon. “For conspiracy to manufacture and distribute a commercial quantity of a class A drug. Say goodbye to your life. You’re going to jail for a long time.”

Falcon was driven back to the precinct alone in a police van. He was the only one who had been captured.

“Fuck!” he screamed into the empty van, his voice echoing around him. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” he repeated. He kicked out at the bench, but it did no good. He was finished. He was going to be arrested and thrown into prison. He wouldn’t get a trial. Whatever crappy, court-appointed attorney he got would just tell him to take a plea deal that wouldn’t be a real deal at all. He would spend his last good years inside a cement box surrounded by enemies of the Screaming Eagles who would want to do him in.

He would never see Sophie again. She was only two years old. Her mother would never bring her to visit; she would grow up not knowing her father. She would describe him to her friends as another deadbeat dad serving out a life sentence. He wouldn’t be there on her first day of school; he wouldn’t get to watch her grow up. Sophie was the only thing in the world he cared about and now he had lost the chance to ever see her again.

He was going to be exactly like his own crappy, deadbeat father. It was the one thing Falcon had promised himself he wouldn’t do. From the first moment he held his impossibly small baby in his hands, Falcon had promised she wouldn’t grow up like he did. She would have a father who cared for her, watched out for her, and would be there for her.

There was no point in screaming or raging. It was all over now. His life was over; it had ended the moment he had brushed his concerns about the hunter aside. He leaned his head back against the cold metal frame of the police van as they pulled into the station. He wouldn’t even have one last glimpse of sunlight, just the harsh glare of the lights in the interrogation room.

He felt the truck come to a stop and then the back door was opened and two fresh-faced young officers glared at him.

“Time to go,” one said as the other climbed into the van and uncuffed Falcon. They pulled him out of the van, his hands cuffed and his feet in shackles, and slowly he shuffled his way to the elevator.

Chapter Three

They made him wait in the interrogation room alone. Falcon had expected it, but it was still unnerving. His hands were still cuffed and the cuffs went through a steel half circle embedded in the table trapping him. His feet were also still shackled. He could barely move. If he had to scratch his nose he needed to bring his nose down to his hands in order to do so. It was dehumanizing and humiliating.

He was staring at his own reflection in what he knew was a two way mirror. He took in his reflection, his dark hair in need of a cut and his dark brown eyes so dark they almost obscured the pupil. He looked intimidating, which was the point. But he knew he wouldn’t intimidate the cops. Was someone or, perhaps, many someones on the other side watching him, laughing at him? There was no way to know, and the not knowing was driving him crazy. There were no clocks in the room and no way for Falcon to pass the time other than to think about what he had done and what was going to happen next.

He had been arrested and his life was over. Just like that, in the blink of an eye, everything he had ever worked for or been proud of was gone. His life was wiped away and that act was another person’s victory. It was Grace Santiago’s victory. The tall brunette with curves for days. That was the most infuriating part: every time Falcon remembered the bitch who had arrested him she wore less and less clothing. And then in his mind he was taking the rest off with his teeth and then he had to stop himself before his imagination went any further.

“So, your name really is Falcon Marks,” Grace said as she stepped into the interrogation room, a file in her hands. “I thought you were just pulling my leg.”

“Yeah, people tell me that all the time. Now why don’t you forget the chit-chat and get me a phone so I can call my lawyer.”

“Oh, Falcon, do you really think that’s the best idea? Your prints have been found at dozens of crime scenes and whoever you’re working with has not kept their mouth shut. Narcotics, homicide, and missing persons have all heard of you. Now, if you really want a lawyer, you can have one. But I think we both know what a lawyer is going to say. He’s going to say take the offer, make the deal. Even if it’s a bad deal, they don’t care. You’re a biker with about twenty bucks to his name, they aren’t going to care about you.”

“And you will?” Falcon demanded. He glanced up at her and almost regretted it. The raid on the processing center had brought a flush of color to her cheeks, her green eyes were bright and lively and her long hair cascading over her shoulders.

“Fuck no,” Grace said, looking him right in the eye. “I don’t care about you, and I don’t want to help you. But I do want to arrest as many members of your gang as I can,” she said.

“You’re wasting your time,” Falcon spit at her. “Any Screaming Eagles you arrested would rather die than talk to you.”

“But you’re not going to die, Falcon,” she said. Her voice was sugary sweet as she laid the folder on the table. She was resting her fingertips on the table and her delicate and long fingers caressed the table as she circled closer to him. “You’re not going to die,” she repeated. “You’re going to jail where they will be in the business of keeping you alive. Sure there will be other gangs in there, lots of rival gang members, and sure they’re going to beat the crap out of you every day for the rest of your life, but the doctors in the prisons will just patch you up and send you right back out into max seg. You’re looking at twenty years of that, minimum.”

Falcon went cold at that number. Minimum of twenty years, that mean that Sophie would be twenty-two by the time he finally got out. She would have no memory of him other than that of the convict who was never around. He would miss twenty birthdays, her high school graduation, he would miss teaching her how to swim and ride a bike. But he kept his mouth shut. He was a Screaming Eagle and he couldn’t talk. It went against everything he stood for.

“You think nobody talks,” Grace asked. She walked over and stood behind his chair leaning over to whisper into his ear. “Everybody talks. Everybody.” She straightened again and walked away from him, looking into the mirror and fixing her hair.

“You know who talks the most? The bosses. The higher they are, the faster they talk. You’re a foot soldier Falcon, and a poorly paid one at that. Are you really going to throw your life away for some boss? How did they divide the cuts from a job? Never mind, I don’t need you to tell me. I’ve heard it a hundred times. It’s a dangerous late night ride, or maybe even a raid against another gang. You’re a Screaming Eagle out there on your bike, or in the streets, fighting hard, guns blazing for your club, but where’s the boss? He’s nowhere to be found, safe and sound back at the clubhouse. And when the time comes to divide up the goods you’ve worked so hard for, who takes the biggest cut? The boys on the ground? No, it’s the fat men sitting in the clubhouse all day. You work and they reap the rewards.”

Falcon was fighting to stay silent. His jaw was clenched so tight it was aching. He wanted to speak, but he wasn't sure what he wanted to say. He wanted to scream at her to shut up, but, at the same time, a part of him knew that she was right.

“But I’m not like the bosses, Falcon. I’m on your side. I don’t want to arrest you and send you to jail. No offense man, but you’re small potatoes. I don’t want a foot soldier. I want a general and you can give me that.”

Flacon looked up at her again, confusion in his eyes. What was she saying? What was she offering?

“The deal is this: either you work for me as an informant and wear a wire, or you go to jail for the rest of your life. You will only see the sun from the tiny window in your cell and you will only have other convicts to talk to. You will spend the rest of your life in a shitty federal prison. What about your daughter, Falcon?”

She reached over and flipped open the folder and there was sweet Sophie staring back at him. The picture had been taken at the park. Sophie was with her mother, Falcon’s ex, Kelly. She was laughing at something, her smile was infectious and he could have stared at her picture all day.

“You really think your ex is going to drive this kid across the country and spend all day waiting in a security line just so you can spend thirty minutes talking to her through a phone and a thick piece of Plexiglas? You want this girl to grow up without her father?”

The Screaming Eagles or Sophie? His daughter or his gang? He wanted to be the kind of man who fell on his sword, who died instead of turning a rat. But he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life in jail. He had promised himself he wouldn't turn out like his old man, over and over again he had promised himself and Kelly and Sophie, and now here he was in handcuffs with a twenty year sentence hanging over his head.

“No jail time,” Grace said and Falcon whipped his head up and stared at her, his mouth hanging open. “Here’s the deal,” she said and she gently moved Sophie’s picture aside and showed him the deal drawn up by the DA. If he could get real, incriminating info on the Screaming Eagles he would be free of any and all charges that related to the gang. “Don’t die for them, Falcon. Don’t waste your life on them. They’re drug dealing scum, they’re not worth it. Think of your daughter, don’t you want to be there for her? You can be, just say yes and help us take down the Screaming Eagles. You could be a hero, Falcon.”

He stared at the offer from the DA and the picture of Sophie. This was his way out of the gang. He could leave the lifestyle behind for good and be a real father to his daughter. In the end it was no choice at all, blood was thicker than water and oil.

“I’ll do it,” he said looking up at Grace. “Now will you please take these damn cuffs off? My leg is itching like crazy.”