Chapter 4 Definitely Not A Shakedown
Raine
The shop is quiet as usual, quieter than I need it to be.
There was a time this place hummed—engines rattling in every corner, my dad with half the city lined up because he was the best. People drove in from two towns over just to let him touch their bike.
Now? It’s a fucking ghost town. A hollow echo of what it used to be.
He’s dead.
I pull the old cash box from the bottom drawer, heavy and full of crumpled bills I got from the fights, from working bikes, and paying customers. It's all the same shade of green when he comes to collect.
Dad didn’t just leave me tools or a garage. He left me his mafia debt, too. Which, honestly, may be why he taught me to fight.
That’s a lie. He wanted a son but got a daughter instead. Not that he could tell the difference.
Dad raised me like a boy. I’m not a lady in any way, shape, or form. I hate dresses. Makeup? Fuck that shit. Heels? You’d have to kill me before those torture devices touch the soles of my feet.
I was swinging punches before I was allowed to ride solo, tearing down carburetors before I could legally buy cigarettes. He made sure I could handle anything—engines, fists, life.
And I’ll give him this: he was a good father in his own way. Rough edges, grease-stained hands, a voice like gravel—but he loved me. He prepared me. I know he took on this debt for me. For the shop. For us.
So, no. I’m not mad at him for the mess he left me when he crashed off Highway 69. Shocked when I found out, yeah. Devastated when he left me holding the bag, sure. But not mad. He did what he thought he had to do.
Still doesn’t change the fact that every month I get to play hostess to Bash.
Right on cue, the bastard strolls in like he owns the place—silk tie, suit that costs more than my entire toolbox.
Black glossy hair with a Fortune 500 haircut.
He's tall, broad, and smug, with too many guns in his holster.
Pale enough you know he doesn't get enough sun.
His arrogance is too tall for a man his age, only thirty-four, eight years older than me.
“Well, if it isn’t my favorite doll.” The words come easy, practiced, his dark eyes fixed on me as he smiles. “I love it when you greet me in the mornings.”
I want to punch that smile right off his face and into next year. Break his perfect nose so it never sets right. But bullets are a thing, and Bash likes using them to make an example of people who fight back.
Fists I can handle.
Guns are a different thing altogether.
I'm tough, not impenetrable.
So I swallow the fire and hold out the wad of cash—sloppy and crumpled—just to spite him.
He makes a face as he crooks a finger at his goon to step forward and snatch it, flipping bills with practiced hands.
“It’s not like it came out of my bra,” I mutter, rolling my eyes. “Relax. No boob sweat here. Just grease.”
“It’s the grease I worry about, doll.” Bash straightens his sleeves slowly, wanting me to see my time belongs to him. “Can’t stain my suit. I’ve got other places to visit.”
“How many innocent shops do you have under your thumb these days?” I shoot back without hesitation, all bite.
He smirks like I asked exactly what he wanted me to. “Don’t worry your pretty little head about it.”
He lifts his hand and tries to pat me on the head like I’m a pet, so I bend down at the same time, snagging a rag off the floor, forcing him to miss. It's smooth enough that he thinks I didn't notice his hand. The heat of his palm hovers a second where it should have landed, but I pay it no mind.
He instead pokes at the cheap display of neon pine-tree air fresheners like that's what he meant to do all along. “Just know you’re my favorite stop.” He grins, half-cocky, half-something I don't want to name.
If he's actually flirting with me, I might hurl.
But I also might have bigger problems down the road than meeting his increasingly demanding rent money.
His goon looks at him too long—jaw tight, eyes flickering like the math isn’t adding up, because all the money is actually there and I know they were hoping it wouldn't be. Bash’s smile stiffens when he notices.
For three months, he’s been hiking the price every time. Trying to push me into a corner, to make me break. He wants me to launder money through this shop and trap me in his system. But somehow I keep paying somehow. I keep fighting, and he fucking hates it.
Point for me.
Those cold, dark eyes meet mine, and the smile doesn’t reach them. “Always so reliable, aren’t you, Raine?”
“Bet you wish I wasn’t,” I mutter, tossing the rag on the counter where his sleeve rests. Grease smears faintly on his cufflink.
Consider this my small rebellion.
He doesn’t look, but I hope he notices later.
“Don’t be so cold, doll.” He coos it like a favor, dragging the words out as if they’re meant to soothe. “I want nothing but for you to pay back every dime your father owed. But you know how it is. Interest. Protection fees—”
“I don’t need protection,” I cut in before he can enjoy it too much. “And if I did, you’re doing a shit job of it. Six break-ins in three months. I patched the windows myself.”
His eyes narrow, a quick second of anger that he then smooths out. Always schooled, like he's afraid any sign of emotion would let me read his mind. “As I was saying, you’re still a ways off. Let’s raise the bar. Five grand next month? That’ll chip down the interest.”
I scoff, tasting something ugly in the back or my throat. “Two hundred percent interest rate? That's your math?”
He doesn’t answer. He turns, heading for the door like the conversation’s finished.
“I’ll see you next month, Raine. Five grand.”
The bell jingles as politely as a death sentence.
When the door clicks shut, the pressure I’ve been swallowing detonates.
I spin and drive my fist into the brick so hard my knuckles split.
Hot blood paints the stone, and the scream that claws up my throat stays twisted down by pride, by stubbornness, by the knowledge that Bash would love to hear it.
I won’t give him that.
I drag in a breath, shake out my hand, and wipe the blood on my overalls. My chest is heaving like I just went ten rounds. I grab a wrench before I combust.
Work is the only thing that calms me.
I stalk to the bike frame on the lift, slam my phone onto the counter, and swipe my thumb over the screen, finding a song to scream at me. Pierce The Veil's “Pass The Nirvana” cranks through the speakers loud enough that Vic Fuentes’ screaming drowns out my own voice.
I try to keep my focus on moving the wrench, up, down, and again.
But all the while I can't help but calculate. Three customs, ten fights I’ll need to win, fifteen repair jobs if I’m lucky—that’s the math to scrape five grand on top of everything else.
Even then, I’ll still be crawling uphill while Bash pushes boulders down.
The walls feel like they're starting to close in, like I'll never escape this no matter how much I pay. The music is surging all around me, but my jaw clenches so tight it aches.
“Fuck!” I roar and hurl the wrench. It clatters hard against the far wall, the sound hollow in the empty shop.
I press my palms to the bench, trying to catch my breath even though I haven't done anything to lose it. My face stares back in the strip of steel across the counter—grease, grease on my forehead, cyan streaks escaping my bun. I don’t look like me, like the girl my father raised.
I look scared.
And I’ll be damned if I let Bash keep making me feel this way.
I pace until I wear a trench in the concrete, thinking, planning, mapping. It’s useless—no matter how I spin it, Bash still owns a piece of this place and me, for longer than I want to admit, even if I keep shoving impossible money at him.
I stop before I wear the floor to dust, pick up the wrench I threw like a toddler, set it back, and breathe until my hands stop buzzing. The bike on the lift isn’t going to tighten itself, and I’m not missing a deadline because some man in a suit likes playing God with my life.
He can go fuck himself.
I’m going to get that money if it’s the last damn thing I do. Partly because I’m stubborn and partly because I want to see his face when I slap five grand into his palm and he realizes I didn’t break the way he wanted.
I’m going to hand him five thousand dollars.
The wrench slips and scrapes my hand in a tiny shallow cut that stings. I exhale through my teeth, wash it, and slap on a bandage just as my phone buzzes.
Mack:
Got a fight for you at 10.
Raine:
What’s the bag?
I know I’ll say yes either way, but pretending I have a choice takes the edge off.
Mack:
Big. You in?
Raine:
You’re so great with the details. *eye roll emoji*
Yeah, I actually texted an emoji. Sue me.
Raine:
I’m in.
Mack:
PSA suits sniffing tonight. Watch yourself.
Fantastic. Exactly what I need—Bash’s little rats in the crowd taking notes. If he figures out why I keep making payments he thinks are impossible, he’ll buy Mack out just to shut me down.
I can’t let that happen.
Raine:
Got it.
Time drags after Mack’s text.
I throw myself back into work until it's past nine-thirty and I call it closing time. Part of me is surprised that neither Jax or Elias showed up again. A smaller yet slightly louder part of myself wishes they would have come.
You can't feel that way, Raine.
No attachments.
Attachments are dangerous with Bash around.
I think of all three of them as I change into black athletic pants, my gray sports bra, and my jacket. I don't bother with a shirt.
I pull my hair tighter into a bun, grab the roll of tape from the duffel, and drop onto the workbench stool. The shop’s too quiet again, so I play “My Own Summer (Shove It)” by Deftones, low enough to steady me.
I start wrapping my hands like I always do, quick and careless. It's sloppy muscle memory until I stop, remembering this isn’t how Elias did it.
Why do I care?
Why is he on my mind right now?