Chapter 5 Grudge
GRUDGE
“You pot that black ball and I swear to God I’m calling this whole fucking thing rigged,” Atom, my newly promoted sergeant at arms, says as I line up to shoot the ball on the clubhouse table.
“It was your idea to play best of five for a hundred bucks.”
Atom huffs. “Yeah. But that was before I realized you were on a hot streak and capable of winning three in a row.”
I stand from where I was lining up the cue ball. “Haven’t potted the black, yet. Are you trying to jinx me?”
Atom tips the beer bottle back and finishes off his beer. “At this point, I’d do whatever it took to keep my hundred bucks.”
His phone rings, and he looks down at it before answering. “Hey, sweetheart.”
He listens to what she’s saying, for a moment, and I can see the concern growing on his face. “I’m at the clubhouse. Why?” Another pause. “I’m on my way.”
He picks up the hundred bucks he put on the side of the pool table and hands it to me. “Here. You win. There’s trouble in town. The girls are at Whiskey Fever, but some Rebels just overwhelmed the doormen and flooded inside.”
Ember, Atom’s old lady and daughter of Butcher, owns Whiskey Fever. It’s only just reopened after being set on fire by the Bratva. The last thing she needs is trouble from the Rebels and the place getting smashed up again.
“Then, let’s go. Are they causing problems?”
Atom shrugs. “She doesn’t allow colors in the bar. Ours or theirs. She doesn’t want it to become a biker bar. Must be bad if she’s asking me to give her a hand clearing them out.”
We grab Catfish and Smoke as we walk through the bar and persuade Jackal and Shade, the club’s new enforcers, who are in the lot about to climb on their bikes, to join us.
“Remember, no unnecessary violence that wrecks her goddamn bar,” Atom says.
Smoke chuckles. “So, wait until we drag them out onto the street before we kick the shit out of them.”
I roll my eyes. “As much as I love a good street fight, remember, cameras are not our friend.”
“So, drag them down a side alley and smash their faces in behind a dumpster?” Catfish asks.
I grin and squeeze Catfish’s shoulder. “That’s more like it.”
The ride into town hits different. I’m still getting used to riding at the head of the column.
I’ve ridden behind Butcher for so long, it feels weird to be solo out in front.
It also means I’m the first to see the long row of bikes parked on the curb outside.
Maybe ten of them. I pull over onto the other side of the street and start a line for our bikes.
When we’re parked and cross over to the bar, I see Ahmed, one of Ember’s doormen, sitting on the curb with an icepack to his head.
“Good luck getting them out, boss,” he says to Atom.
The country music is playing loud, but there are raised voices coming from inside. Knowing we’re here for Atom’s old lady, I let him go first. We’re not here as a club.
Yet.
For now, we’re just helping an old lady out.
But given the people are Rebels, our nemeses, there’s a conflict of interest.
We killed a high-ranking member of their club, recently. Well, Wraith did. The man killed his wife and child, after all. And right now, we can’t guarantee that this isn’t a response to that.
“I’m calling in reinforcements,” Catfish says. “Just in case.”
There are six of us and ten of them. Even with the lack of balance, I still rate our chances as high.
What I don’t like about the whole thing is that there are a shit ton of patrons in the bar. “Do not kill anyone,” I remind my brothers. “Too many witnesses.”
When we step into the bar, Ember is waiting for us. She hurries over to Atom and whispers something in his ear.
He nods and turns to me. “General disrespect. Breaking glasses, broke a pool cue, harassing women.”
“Then, let’s clean house.”
Atom and I walk to the first of the bikers sitting at the bar, who have yet to notice us. We take them by surprise, grab them by their cuts, and drag them to the exits.
“What the fuck?” the guy I’m hauling out yells. He stumbles, tripping over his own feet. But I don’t stop; I drag.
People part out of our way as the men scramble to try to get their feet back under them. I glance at the cut I’m pulling on. Says his name is Pitbull, and he’s the club secretary.
“What part of ‘no colors inside’ do you not get?” I ask.
“It’s a free fucking country,” Pitbull yells.
“And this is a private establishment with its own rules. You aren’t welcome here in this town. This is our territory. This bar belongs to one of our old ladies. And you need to get a long way from here.”
He finally finds his feet outside and takes a swing at my jaw. “Fuck you.”
I manage to bob and weave out of his reach before landing a punch on the side of his head. While he’s down and dazed, I reach for his weapon, empty it, and toss it down the street.
The last thing I need is to be shot like Butcher was.
“Stay fucking down,” I say.
Atom throws a second guy out. As a rancher, Atom can toss hay bales all fucking day without breaking a sweat. This guy is light weight compared to that.
“Get out, and stay the fuck out,” he says.
Leaving the two of them on the ground is a really bad idea, but Ahmed is right there on the sidewalk, and there are more to remove in the bar.
When I step back inside, Catfish is practically wrestling with a biker the size of a small house. From where I’m standing, the thug is winning.
Gulch, the Rebels’ sergeant at arms, is big. But I’m bigger.
Catfish notices me step up behind him and shoves Gulch right into my arms.
I put him in a chokehold. His attention goes from fighting Catfish to trying to break the tight hold I have around his neck.
“Show up in my town,” I say, “you’ll always be met like this, you fuck.”
His stubby fingernails claw against my leather jacket, and he slaps at my hand as saliva drools from his mouth.
Catfish nails him three times in the ribs, and I feel every one of them as Gulch shifts back against me.
Cameras are out. I see people recording, and I wish I’d thought to cover my face. Butcher once told me that being president puts a whole different target on your back.
I realize how true that might be when I see how many phones are pointed at me.
“Grab his feet,” I yell to Catfish.
He does as I ask, and together, we manage to haul Gulch through the bar. I take his weight and, with Catfish’s help, we manage to get him to the street.
Once I drop him on the ground, Pitbull is back on his feet and charges me, dropping his shoulder at the last minute to hit me in the ribs and knock me down.
“Worse than fucking whack-a-mole.” I grunt, getting my boots around Pitbull’s thighs so I can flip him.
“You don’t own this town,” he says, blood trickling from the side of his lips as I grab his cut.
“No?” I ask, raising my fist so high that when I hit him, the single punch knocks him out.
When his head hits the road, I stand and shake off my fist. Flex my fingers back and forth to ease the ache from my knuckles.
I catch sight of the letters on them. It says LUCK, now, but once upon a time, it said LUCE.
The treatment to remove the lines of the E before having it replaced with the K was worth every painful snap of the laser.
As if by some means of witchcraft she knew I was thinking about her, she emerges from the restaurant opposite Whiskey Fever. She takes in the scene playing out before her with an open mouth. I guess that fancy restaurant insulates itself from what’s going on out here.
When she finally finds me, I wink at her.
Fucking wink.
Like I always used to when I’d catch her eye across a crowded room.
Haven’t winked at Lucy De Bose in nearly a decade, and here I am, doing it like it was yesterday.
Gulch climbs to his feet and heads in her direction.
I got no clue what the reason might be, but I’m moving toward her before I even realize my foot has taken the first step. But he’s closer and gets there first. He reaches for Lucy’s hand and raises it to his lips.
“Didn’t know the lawyer had a pretty daughter,” he says to Lucy’s mom.
Everything in my vision turns red, drenched in blood.
He touched her, and there is no missing the threat in his tone.
One minute, he’s smirking at Lucy and her mother. The next, he’s on the ground. I’m not even sure how I ended up standing astraddle his hips, holding him up by the edges of his cut.
“You dare fucking touch her?”
“Zachary, stop.” I hear Lucy’s voice, hear the panic in it.
But when I turn to look at her, I can see the arousal in her eyes. One of the things I loved most about Lucy…she never hid it when she was hungry for me.
For the briefest moment, we’re the old Lucy and the old Grudge in the same old town.
Flashes of memories assault me. Of working on my bike, and her bringing me a coffee before getting utterly turned on by my sweat-stained gray T-shirt and dirty hands. Or the summer I decided I was going to try and impress her father by felling the trees he wanted removed for free.
The fucker had the nerve to tell me he should have paid someone to do a better job, but man, I enjoyed fucking his daughter in the backseat of my truck before I burned out of there.
She loved when I did the dirty work.
At least, I always thought she did.
The sound of motorcycles roaring to life distracts me for a second, and I see the Rebels beginning to peel out.
I look down at Gulch. “My brothers would never leave without me. Yours don’t even have the balls to wait and check you’re okay. Leaving you to whatever fate I decide.”
He spits blood to one side. “Too many witnesses. You’re gonna do fuck all to me.”
I hate to admit that he’s right, but there’s not much I can do. Not with Lucy’s mother and half the town watching.
But it’s the look in Lucy’s eye, and the slight movement of her hand down by her side, encouraging me to drop him, that solidifies the decision. No one else could make me let go, except something about her can.
I throw him to the ground and step over him.
Then, I remember I’m not the old Grudge. And she’s not the old Lucy. And Lucy’s mother is glaring at me like I’m something she trod on.
So, I say the only sentence I can think of. “What the fuck are you all looking at?”