Chapter Nineteen
It shouldn’t have bothered me as much as it did, but she was acting like we’d never been anything to each other, and I’m not trying to be a pussy here, but one minute we were talking about fucking each other again, and the next, she was avoiding me, and then acting like I was nothing but scum to her.
I didn’t exactly expect to be anything other than that to her, but maybe I at least thought she’d act less cold with me or something. Jesus, when the fuck did I turn into such a pussy? She’s the one who never showed up that night, even if I’d been called away. That spoke volumes.
I laughed it all off when I got back to the clubhouse, after a firm discussion with Lawson on the way back, which involved me demanding that he keep his mouth shut about the arrest this time, because hadn’t they given me one more fucking chance to avoid her before they decided to end her?
If Micro hadn’t shoved me, I’d have backed down after a bit of banter.
Getting arrested again hadn’t been the plan, but it got her hands on me for a moment, and apparently that was all I was getting now.
“We’re gonna fuck off, man. It’s time to fuck my wife.” I groaned, because did I really need that visual right now? Or ever?
“We don’t need a fucking commentary, Pres, just go do your thing, and we’ll see you when you’re back.
” Were they having a honeymoon? No, because he was meant to be here daily until the club got patched over, at least, and he still didn’t know if he’d be around after that happened, because the word ‘interim’ was literally not just his title, but also his fucking life right now.
In my humble opinion, they’d be fools not to make it permanent, because he’d done wonders with this place.
Weeding out the assholes and psychos, bringing in new prospects.
Getting the place cleaned up and liveable, because it was a real hole when I first arrived, and bringing the bikers together like a brotherhood.
That last part was the hardest, because he was, after all, instrumental in killing off everyone in power for the old club, and even the softest grudges had been an issue for a while.
I waved them off with the others, and headed for my room, because as much fun as it was, shooting the breeze with the guys, I needed some time for my brain to decompress.
That last meeting with the Don had been an eye opener, because my being here was clearly ruffling some feathers back at the compound, but he was keeping me here for a reason.
Knowing that my little PC Pain could be in danger if I didn’t toe the line was an additional threat I hadn’t needed hanging over me, but I’d fought for her, and yet somehow she was acting like I’d never fucking touched her, never made her come so hard she forgot how to breathe, never showed her how a real man treats a woman.
“Hey, Grease,” Andy, one of the prospects was heading in my direction, and as much as I didn’t want to talk to him, he’d been offsite for almost a week looking after his mother, and seemed like a decent enough guy.
“‘Sup?”
He rubbed his hand over his jaw as he joined me. “Got a confession to make, man. I’m really sorry about this, but it happened like, right before I got the call about mum having that fall, and you know, shit just got real for a minute.”
I nodded, leaning my shoulder against the doorway of the building I very nearly escaped into, rather than having to make nice.
“She okay?”
He nodded. “We thought she broke her hip, but it’s just bruised, and she sprained her knee, and stuff.
She’s starting to move about again now. I just kinda want her in a place with no stairs now, because now I’m expecting the next call to be saying she fell down those too, and fuck me, why am I burdening you with this shit?
” I was wondering the same damn thing, but I’d asked, hadn’t I?
“Hope she gets back to normal soon, man.” I slapped his shoulder as I straightened up, ready to make my escape, and that’s when he caught my arm, and tension locked me in place.
Someone fucking touched me, and that shit wasn’t cool with me.
I could shoot the shit with these guys, and slap backs and stuff, but when someone grabbed me like this, or tried to put a hand on me, like they had some kind of right to touch me, that’s when I could lose it and hurt someone.
“The fuck?” I spun on the spot, slapping his hand away from me, and his eyes widened.
“Whoa, sorry. I just… I had to tell you something, and you were leaving.”
“Never put your hands on me, man, and speak fast. I’m losing patience.” He grimaced, backing up a few steps, which honestly I think helped both of us. He was nervous now, as he fucking should be, and I was on edge.
“Jesus, don’t kill me now I’ve pissed you off already. Just, you had a visitor that night, but I got called away, and you weren’t here, and I… shit, I just forgot to tell anyone to tell you.”
I froze, somehow knowing this was gonna be bad, because what night was he even talking about?
Things had been crazy for a while here, and I’d been distracted by all the balls I was trying to juggle.
Toe the mafia line while playing biker, the role I really wanted in life, reporting to fucking everybody, and hearing that clock ticking in the background, my fucking escape running out, and the impending return to mafia life hovering over me like a death knell.
“What?”
He swallowed hard, lifting both hands. “That cop, the lady one. She came by to see you that night. She was uh… she was dressed real nice, I dunno, maybe on her way somewhere after. Anyway, I told her you were gone. Away, like. I don’t think she was too happy about it.
” Fuck. My blood ran cold in my veins right then, because suddenly I knew exactly what fucking night it was, and exactly why she was being a fucking ice queen. She didn’t fucking ghost me after all.
I’d called here that night, asking if anyone had been by to see me, figuring I’d get a message to her, even if it was too fucking little too late, and the prospect I spoke to said no.
I guess he’d taken over from this prick, and my little visitor had gone unwelcomed, and fucking unwanted.
I’d just assumed she’d changed her mind, because we both knew it was a bad idea, and risky as fuck.
I figured getting laid wasn’t that big a deal to her in the end.
Now, maybe, she was thinking I’d been the asshole, when I’d been convinced it was her this time.
“Are you fucking serious?”
He groaned. “I’m sorry, man. I’m really sorry. My mind was on my mum, and she was forgotten until, well, until I got back here and heard you’d been arrested again, and then it was like a fucking light went on in my head.”
Pity there was no fucking light on in his head in general. But then, I was being an asshole, right? He’d had family stuff going on, and shouldn’t that be more important? Except for the fact that a certain defensive little pain in my ass probably thought I’d ditched her.
“Get out of my sight, man. I’m too pissed to be nice right now. No wonder she fucking arrested me again. You had one fucking job!”
He backed off, and practically legged it as soon as he got a few metres away, and I really couldn’t blame him for that, because he’d fucked up something for me, and not only did he lose me my chance with her, but maybe she wouldn’t even fucking survive his cock-up.
I swear to god, if I couldn’t fix this, I was killing that little prick.
Jamie
Evers, sorry, Alex, was waiting for me after our shift, and insisted we went to the pub for a drink, and after all he’d said recently, I really couldn’t argue right now, because he’d been right, hadn’t he?
Once we had beers in hand, and were seated at a table in the corner of the fairly quiet pub, he spoke his mind. He was really making a habit of that lately, and I wasn’t sure it was a habit I wanted to encourage anymore.
“We need to talk, Jay. Shit’s getting out of hand, and you know it.” This would be about Grease and the club again, I already knew that.
“Alex-”
He rolled his eyes. “Okay, so you’re getting better at that, but don’t try and distract me. This is important. You’re getting a reputation and not a good one. You keep pushing at that club, and you’re going to end up in trouble or worse.”
I watched him peeling at the label on his beer bottle, his eyes firmly focused there instead of letting me see into them. Maybe he was more worried than I’d realised.
“What could be worse than getting in trouble? If I get suspended again, maybe that means I’m getting to someone somewhere.”
“Oh my god. Listen to yourself, Jay. You’re talking about crooked police now.
This isn’t some big organised crime business, this is a rough, dirty biker club, and I don’t care what they’re telling us, or what patches they’re wearing now.
They’re bad news, and the kinda bad that could get you dead.
I’m not just talking about a slapped wrist. One day you could just disappear, and I wouldn’t fucking know where to find you.
I could start with them, but they’d have covered their tracks, and you… you’d just be gone.”
I caught his hand, halting the destruction of the label, and waiting until he finally looked at me. Maybe I’d been too hard on him, because this wasn’t a version of him I’d seen before. This was panic. I’d never seen it on him before, but I was seeing it now.
“Alex-”
“I’m saying that they’re dangerous, Jay.
I’m saying that they made threats against a fucking child when I bothered one of them, one time.
You’re routinely getting in their faces, repeatedly arresting one specific member of their club, and making a nuisance of yourself.
At some point, it’ll stop being funny for him, and when that happens, they’ll find a way to silence you. ”
I opened my mouth, but he shot me a glare and continued.
“Jay, there are worse ways they can hurt you, than just making threats. Maybe they don’t kill you, but maybe one or more of them tracks you down when you’re alone, and vulnerable.
Maybe what they leave behind is a version of you that nobody would recognise.
Are you getting what I’m saying here, without trying to say the fucking words? ”
I swallowed hard. “You’re talking about rape.
You’re saying they’re the kind of people who’d rape me to silence me?
They’re just thugs, Alex. They’re just… that’s not…
” I trailed off, because what was I about to say there?
They wouldn’t do that? They’re not the kind of men to do something so abhorrent?
I didn’t know that for a fact. I didn’t know anything of the sort, and Grease had made enough sexual advances that I knew it could have crossed his mind, and others there had hit on me too.
I mean, I’d already had sex with Grease, but what if I’d said no that night?
What if I’d fought him? Would it still have happened, only without the satisfaction and good feelings?
Would he have come inside me that night no matter what?
Alex caught my hand this time, and it made me flinch for the barest second, before I remembered it was him, and we were safe right now.
“They… it never occurred to me, I guess. Do they have form for that kind of thing?” He grimaced, his eyes darting around us before he met mine again.
“There’s been talk, not necessarily since whatever kind of takeover happened, but it was rumoured before that.
Girls went in there to party with the old club, and they came out ruined.
Silent, traumatised, and unwilling to talk about it.
It had to be something bad to leave them in that state, but they’d never speak against the club, and they never went near those guys again. ”
Oh my god. How didn’t I know this before?
How hadn’t I considered the fact that men in a club like that, in groups, drinking, and partying, would do such things?
How hadn’t I used my fucking woman brain, at the very least, to consider that men were often more animal than person when it came to women, especially if alcohol or drugs were involved.
“I’ve been taking ridiculous risks, haven’t I?”
Alex nodded, freeing my hand, and taking a large gulp of his beer.
“I didn’t want to scare you, but I can’t keep letting you put yourself in danger, especially if you end up going there alone at some point, and end up cornered by the fucking wrong guys.
Men can be monsters and men in groups, in packs?
Fucking savage. You see why I backed off, rather than risk the females in my family, right? ”
I nodded, downing about half of my beer in a rush, trying to shift the sudden cold numbness that had settled in my chest. Grease had said something along the lines of not having to force women, but what if that wasn’t the comfort I’d taken it as at that time.
What if it was a hint that he’d use alcohol or drugs to make them compliant, so they just wouldn’t argue?
His strength, and his ability to manhandle me that night, had unnerved me, but I’d felt safe because we were both into each other. Picturing that much man with a woman who was less willing, or less able to stand up to him, had chilling pictures in my mind that made me feel ill.
My partner was right that I needed to be careful around them, but what he’d also just convinced me of was that the club needed to be taken down, ended, closed down, locked up, whatever it took.
Because groups of people who brutalised anyone, women or otherwise, shouldn’t be allowed to ‘get away with it’, no matter who they threatened.
Maybe I was the right one to do this, because unlike Alex, I had nobody out there to care if I disappeared in the process of destroying them. I wouldn’t leave brokenhearted loved ones behind. I’d just be gone.