Powerful
Wrenly
I was sitting in a classroom for orientation and would soon start training classes. My instructor was a man they called Jennings, an honorary Original. I tried my hardest to stay alert and pay attention, but I couldn’t stop thinking about Travis.
I stayed with him pretty late last night. He told me stories about the high school he went to after his incarceration. I told him about Shelby and how that accident probably saved her life. She was on the same path as him, but the accident scared her enough to learn how to set goals and follow through. She ended up graduating with honors then went on to become a physical therapist and now has a family of her own. I stayed in contact with her and knew first-hand how she felt about Travis. Her parents may have blamed him, but not Shelby. She blamed herself because she was the one that provided the pills. He might have been drinking and smoked some pot, but she said he was pretty chill until she pressured him to take the pills. Within an hour of swallowing those pills, his behavior became erratic, out of control, and explosive. She didn’t even know what the pills were, but told him they were safe. When I told Travis about it, he looked like he was going to cry but held back his emotions. Hopefully, that information lifted some weight off his chest.
Jennings gave us an overview about rules, policies, and procedures. Then we learned expectations and honestly the lifestyle of Creed’s Lake. We would be tested periodically for physical and mental strength. After every mission we had to speak with Bolton. Once a month we were tested for sexually transmitted diseases, which I’m not sure I want to know why that came about. We were expected to stay in top form, physically and mentally. Then came some strict rules, which weren’t a surprise at all. He went over our health insurance, retirement, and then brought out a map that showed what they hoped Creed’s Lake would look like in five years.
I hadn’t watched a clock tick so slow since high school. Up until lunch I thought I’d spend the day after training with Travis, but I learned I’d be with Magnus because Travis was taking Addie to speech therapy. Magnus said Addie was really attached to Travis and would have tantrums if he didn’t check in with her daily. I never took Travis as a guy that would pay that much attention to kids. Unfortunately for me, that made him even more attractive. Not in the sense where I changed my mind about ever having kids, but I always found it attractive when men were good with them.
After lunch, the new prospects joined us. They weren’t eligible for a majority of the benefits we were given right away. They had goals to meet before they became permanent employees and residents, so they were exempt from our morning orientation. It was more of a meet and greet once they joined us. We were let out early so the prospects could have their own orientation.
The rest of my day was spent with Magnus in the command center. He was going through special requests, possible contracts, and then assigning new contracts to certain teams. I quickly understood why they needed more executive operatives. There was too much work and not enough Originals. We hadn’t even dove into all of his work. He had a few meetings. One with accounting, one with the tech team, and another with Felicity and Morgan. Felicity was pulling together the monthly activities calendar, and she was also helping Morgan with the Christmas giving tree and finalizing the holiday activities calendar. They just needed Magnus to approve how they were spending their budgets. My mind was spinning, and I had no clue how the Originals were surviving all the work plus their missions.
Typically, Magnus and Travis would go out for beers after work, but since he was busy we met up with Stone and Bolton then went to the tavern for bar food and beer. After that, I thought the day was over, but I was wrong. We had to go to the Community Center to check on things. Thankfully, I had my side by side and could go home, but I think Magnus went to Club X. It was still ten before I got home.
The next day was all classroom work. It was like going through the same training I did in the Marines. Jennings was refreshing our memories and then making us take tests. Near the end of the day, we got to watch a movie. I knew the others didn’t think much of it, but I got a kick out of it.
Creed and Travis documented the building of Creed’s Lake. I got to see a twenty two year old Travis on the screen as he sat at a table with the other much younger Originals. At the time, the property now known as Creed’s Lake was mostly a wooded area, except the lake seemed to be open to the public.
The camera moved from one Original to the other as they each stated what they hoped Creed’s Lake would be someday. Travis looked like a baby compared to how he looks now. I added up the years and realized he served four years, just like me, except I was over a year behind him. I was probably still sitting at camp waiting for orders when he was filming the self-made documentary. It was funny, because even back then they were giving each other hell.
Then it went on to show the road being dug, then what’s now Creed’s house, which was huge. They documented each stage as it was built.
Then I saw Travis on his bike and my heart about stopped. I knew that bike, it was Tony’s, and my heart broke for him. I was disappointed when the movie stopped, but quickly realized I was only minutes away from seeing Travis. He was meeting me at my house in fifteen minutes.
He pulled in my driveway in a side by side the same time as me. It took everything inside me not to act like a fool and run into his arms the moment I saw him. Instead, I played it cool and walked out of my garage like a normal person. That might have been all for nothing, because he once again pulled me into him and hugged me tightly, just stirring up all those same crazy and out of control feelings he did on Sunday.
He took me to the shop where I met a very strange man. I couldn’t decide if he was a hippy, a biker, or just a pothead. His name was Victor and Travis warned me about him before we even stepped foot in the shop.
Victor was a big guy with long hair that was braided and a beard that oddly enough was braided as well. My best guess was that he was at least in his mid-forties. He wore a Grateful Dead t-shirt, jeans with holes in them, and flip flops. He smelled like Spam and something else, something fishy I couldn’t quite identify. He offered me a brownie and some gummy bears but that was a hard pass.
His office consisted of a drafting table, blue prints of bikes, a few drawings, a shit ton of crocheted stuff, posters on one wall of James Dean, Marlon Brando, and Willie Nelson. The other wall was movie posters of American Graffiti, Easy Rider, some naked chick, a spot where one was missing, and a Sons of Anarchy poster. The man was a walking contradiction, because I spotted an AR 15 just laying randomly on a table under a knitted peace sign. He spoke like a surfer dude, but there was a picture of an older couple standing in front of a farmhouse.
He tried to hug me several times, but I was able to back away rather quickly. “You’re missing a poster?” I pointed at the bare spot on the wall.
Victor turned and cocked his head then scratched his beard. For some reason I worried he had fleas in that thing. “Well, I’ll be damned.”
Travis snorted. “That was a very old and worn poster of Morgan in a bikini, remember, Victor?”
Victor shuttered, like he had a bad memory hit him. “Yes, of Mrs. Creed.”
I smiled. “Mrs. Creed?” I hadn’t heard anyone refer to Morgan that way.
Travis turned to me. “Creed taught Victor a very valuable lesson.”
“He raided my house for all my posters and magazines. It was scary because he was pissed.” Victor still looked scared.
I looked at Travis, questioning Creed’s right to do such a thing.
“You don’t want to know what Victor did to warrant that, believe me.” Travis warned me.
“Brownie?” Victor offered again, like he forgot he already offered. “They’re not very strong, I’m not sure if I baked them too long or got bad weed.”
I smiled. “No thank you.”
Victor shrugged. “More for me then.”
Despite being a cop for a few years, it wasn’t the first time I was offered drugs. Travis guided me out of the office, and I waved goodbye to the strange hippy biker pot head.
“Victor is alright in small doses, but Creed and I disagree about his drug use.” Travis said as he guided me into his office.
“So…umm.” I had questions.
Travis smiled. “I haven’t touched a drug since that night. Not since the accident.” He assured me.
I smiled because he knew what I was wondering. “I figured as much.”
“Let’s just say I’m not a supporter of recreational drug use. Well, let me teach you all about Creed’s Motorsports.”
I was assigned to Travis, meaning I was going to learn about his work. Everything from running the shop, sales, the service center, then of course meet his operatives, look over his contracts, help him command missions, and check up on his teams health and wellbeing. Even attend the trainings he gave and everything else he did on a day to day basis, except travel. I had a few weeks of formal training left until I could do any traveling.
“I guess we can start by looking over our computer system.” He pulled out his chair and gestured for me to take a seat.
I swear by all that is holy, I didn’t learn a damn thing. Who could concentrate with Travis Irons standing behind them? Fucking hell, even the palms of my hands itched to turn around and touch him. His deep voice alone was enough to soak my panties. It was going to be a very long afternoon and evening.
Eventually, he had to get some real work done. He was making phone calls, dealing with the human resource aspects of the shop, and had a meeting with his salesmen.
We ended up ordering food and one of the girls that answered phones went to pick it up. Oh yeah, that was another issue. I saw how those women looked at Travis, and it was the first time in my life that I truly wanted to pull some hair and poke some eyes out. I caught one showing off her cleavage as she bent over next to him as he sat at his desk. Another one licked her lips in a very suggestive way as she stared at his crotch. Of course, I wondered if he ever slept with them, but that didn’t exactly match what I was told about Travis. That he didn’t do casual and wasn’t seen often with women. That experience was a first for me. I couldn’t remember ever being jealous in the past. It never bothered me when girls flirted with Matt and that happened quite often. The strange thing is, if Travis noticed the women eye fucking him, he was a damn good actor because he didn’t even look twice at them.
“The women of this office are friendly.” I said just before I took a bite of a French fry.
He shook his head. “You call it friendly, but I call it flirty. They’re Felicity’s girls at night.” He didn’t even look up from the sales report he was reading as he ate. His disinterest was evident.
“You don’t enjoy your employees outside work?”
He was chewing a bite of hamburger, but his eyes shot up to mine. He finished chewing then wiped his mouth with his napkin before he spoke. “We didn’t always agree on everything as we built the community. The Club X After Dark was something Drakos proposed. Creed, Granger, Baros, and Bolton voted the same as me, we didn’t want it. But as we brought in new hires, we ran into some issues. There was a chlamydia outbreak among our prospects and a few operatives. It came to light when Drakos kept bitching about a sore throat that wouldn’t go away. This was before Zoey joined us, so Drakos went to a doctor in Clarity. He contracted it through oral sex, from the same woman another operative slept with. Creed proposed monthly STD testing and reintroduced the sex club idea. I voted against it, but I was the only one. I didn’t feel as if our employees sex lives were our business, but Creed did it to keep everyone in the community inside the gates and to promote safe sex. That’s why there’s condom machines throughout the community. Drakos was the only Original to catch it, but that was expected.”
“Drakos seems like a handful.” I noticed.
Travis shrugged. “He’s okay in small doses. I enjoy heading out to the lake with him for some beer and fishing when I have a chance. He’s really alright with every aspect but the topic of women and sex. You get used to it after a while.” He took another bite of his burger as I studied him.
“You really are different. The teenage Travis I knew would have been all over that place.” I was amused because he seemed more uptight than the others.
“Some of us grow up, while others will always be immature.” He took a drink of his tea.
I couldn’t say I was disappointed with the version of Travis I found at Creed’s Lake.