45. Ridge
RIDGE
We waited for Audrey to go to work Thursday morning to grab our masks and head for the bikes.
She’d been tapped when we’d gotten home from the warehouse, and we’d said goodnight and sent her to bed.
Without us. Unfortunately.
Still, I was learning there were more important things with Audrey than satisfying my incessant lust for her mouth, her hands, her body. Things like taking care of her, making sure she was okay, making sure Ella was okay because when Ella was okay, Audrey was okay.
“We’re sure Ella’s at school?” Holden asked “Last thing I want to do is scare her.”
“I’m sure,” I said. “Audrey said she was dropping Ella off on the way to the hospital. We should be able to catch Dean before he leaves for work.”
We stashed our masks in our helmet locks — riding with the masks was a sure way to get the wrong kind of attention — and fired up the bikes.
Graham headed out first. I pulled out behind him, then Holden.
We passed through the gate and headed for the main road, then made our way past the rolling meadows of the Calloway ranch and the smaller surrounding farms. It was a beautiful day for a ride, the fields turning green under the June sky, the sun warm.
I was almost sorry we had an errand, sorry we couldn’t just keep on riding up into the mountains of the Blackwell Preserve.
The houses got closer together, the plots of land smaller when we reached the outskirts of Blackwell Falls.
We turned onto Main Street, then headed for Dean’s house — the house that had once been Audrey’s too — on a small street in the nicer neighborhood behind the businesses on the north side of town.
The houses here were big Victorians and Craftsmen-style houses with a few new McMansions sprinkled in.
Traffic was light — parents like Audrey had already dropped their kids at school on their way to work — and no one looked twice at us as we rumbled past on the bikes. There was more than one MC in the area, the Blackwell Blades and Blackwell Barbarians being the largest.
Motorcycles were a part of the fabric of Blackwell Falls, one of many reasons I liked living in the area. My parents had hated my interest in motorcycles from the beginning, and their suburban neighbors had always looked at me with suspicion when I’d driven by.
It hadn’t done anything to dampen my interest. Riding a bike was like riding a horse: wind in my face and unbridled strength between my thighs.
It was as close to the pleasure I got from fucking without actually fucking.
We pulled up next to the curb a block away from Dean’s address, climbed off our bikes, and traded our helmets for our masks.
The masks had been Holden’s idea. Let Dean try to prove we’d fucked with him when our faces were covered, all of us wearing jeans and black T-shirts, our tattoos covered.
No one said anything when I pulled the hammer out of my saddlebag.
“Let’s teach this asshole a lesson,” Holden said.
We headed down the block, waiting until we were at the end of the manicured pathway leading to Dean’s front door to put on our masks.
There were cameras. No surprise.
Holden knocked on the door, then looked up at the camera with a grin I wasn’t sure Dean would be able to see behind Holden’s mask.
“Tick-tock, motherfucker,” he said.
I heard shuffling on the other side of the door.
“Fine with me,” Holden said.
He backed up, cracked his neck, and hit the door full force with his shoulders.
The door frame rattled but nothing gave.
I opened my mouth to say something, but Holden backed up and went at it again, harder this time.
The door caved in.
“I have a hammer,” I said.
“Why didn’t you say so?” Holden asked.
Graham stepped through the door first. I was a couple steps behind Holden when I spotted Dean disappearing up a fancy staircase leading to the second floor.
We followed him at a casual pace, and I took a look around, cataloging the house, the place Audrey had once called home.
It was all high ceilings and modern chandeliers, cheap art and trendy furniture. The kitchen was so white it was almost blinding, a fireplace that was obviously gas yawning in a living room dominated by a TV and wall-mounted speakers.
Audrey was wood beams and soft light, old pantings and solid furniture. Audrey was long conversations and warm blankets, hot coffee and fresh-from-the-oven muffins.
This place was all wrong.
We followed Dean up the stairs and I heard a door slam as he tried to hide.
I almost felt sorry for him.
Actually, that was a lie. I didn’t feel a thing for that sick bastard.
The second floor of the house was as over-the-top and expansive as the first. It was the kind of house built to impress the neighbors, one where you’d have a hard time finding a good place to put up your feet, set down your drink.
A waste of space, like Ashcroft himself.
We passed several bedrooms: one that looked like Ella’s with pink walls and a four-poster bed that had Audrey written all over it, two sterile spaces that were probably meant for guests, and two bathrooms.
We came to a closed door at the end of the hall.
Holden rattled the knob, but the door didn’t open.
He looked at me. “Your turn.”
I lifted my hammer and smashed it down on the knob.
It gave way with a bang and fell to the floor, leaving a hole that gave us a tiny window into the room.
I gave the door an easy kick and it eased open.
The room was clearly the primary suite, a large room with wood floors and a pale rug, a king-size bed with rumpled sheets overlooking a picture window that looked out over the house’s backyard.
There was a thud from the closed doors that probably led to a walk-in closet, and a moment later a shot rang out and embedded itself in the wall behind us.
“What a surprise,” Graham said. “He’s a shitty shot too.”
He stalked to the closet without so much as a beat of hesitation, then flung open the doors and hauled Dean out like a rag doll.
Dean’s handgun dropped to the floor.
Holden kicked it away while Graham shoved Dean up against the wall.
I’d almost forgotten we had on our masks, but the look of sheer terror in Dean’s eyes said it all.
He was terrified.
I felt a surge of satisfaction. Let him be scared for once. It was the least he deserved after all the years he’d spent terrorizing Audrey.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Dean shouted, finally finding his voice. “Do you know who I am?”
“We know exactly who you are,” Graham growled. “The question is, do you know who we are?”
He delivered the first punch, hitting Dean so hard his jaw snapped.
Blood trickled from his mouth.
Holden bent to pick up the gun, then shoved it in Dean’s mouth.
“You think this is going to help you?” Holden let off the safety. “I should blow your brains out right now, do the world a favor.”
He withdrew the gun, then slammed the grip down on Dean’s face: one, two, three times.
Dean’s eyes rolled back in his face, and his head lolled on his neck.
Graham hit him again. “We’re going to have make sure you remember.”
“Remember what?” Dean mumbled.
“See?” Graham said. “You’re forgetting already.”
He punched Dean twice more and I stepped forward with my hammer. “You’re going to remember not to fuck with Audrey, aren’t you?”
Dean’s eyes flickered on the hammer in my hand. “Fuck you.”
The words came out garbled, but I got the idea.
“Hold up his right arm,” I told Graham.
“I hear you like to hold on to someone’s neck.” Graham put one hand around Dean’s neck to pin him to the wall. “Let’s try it on for size.”
Dean’s eyes widened, and Graham used his free hand to slam the other man’s forearm against the wall.
I slammed the claw end of the hammer into Dean’s right hand.
The drywall cracked behind it, and the hammer embedded itself into Dean’s palm.
Dean roared in pain as blood gushed out of his hand.
“Let’s try out the other one,” I said.
Graham dropped Dean’s right hand and pinned his left to the wall.
“No,” Dean said. “No, no, n— ”
I slammed the claw into his left palm.
His howl of pain was almost inhuman, and my blood surged with satisfaction. It was the same kind of satisfaction I’d felt when I’d beat up the asshole from my crew, the crime that had landed me in the clink.
The satisfaction of justice.
“Goddamn you motherfuckers!” Dean’s words emerged in a tumble of sobs and screams.
“You’re lucky he stopped there.” Holden spit on Dean’s floor. “Stopping’s not his strong suit.”
“I’m going to have your fucking heads!” Dean’s face was already swelling, his hands a mangled mess. “You’ll be in prison for the rest of your lives. You think that fucking slut is worth— ”
That was as far as he got before I slammed the hammer into his shoulder, this time with the right end of it.
I wasn’t even looking at him. I was seeing Audrey: her face when she slept, the smile that lit up the ranch, her laughter, like a summer gust of wind strong enough to take you by surprise.
I raised the hammer again but Holden took it out of my hand. “You’re not going to finish that new coffee table in prison.”
It was fine. I used my fists instead.
And this time I didn’t stop until Graham pulled me off him.