Chapter 2 #2
Danger nodded, grimacing as he shifted around, trying to use his good arm to leverage himself back to his feet. Ocean hurried to help him, with Pope stepping in on Danger’s other side. Together, they got him standing so he could limp closer to his machine.
“If she’s good, I’m good,” Danger said.
“Hey, you the one with the first aid kit!” A burly man called out as he rapidly approached.
“Yes, sir,” Ocean replied and hurried to scoop it up, offering it to him.
“Just need a few Steri-Strips if you’ve got them,” the man said.
“I should, unless someone already got to them,” Ocean replied, digging around for them. “Shit, no, they’re gone, but I’ve got a suture kit.”
“Perfect, because we’ve got a Doc,” the man said. “Thanks, kid.”
“You’re welcome,” Ocean replied.
“Mark,” Pope said when the man turned away. “This is Riptide’s boy.”
“Holy shit!” Mark said, turning back around, gravel crunching beneath his boots as he invaded Ocean’s space.
The moment was surreal as hell, considering everything else that had happened this afternoon. If this was the Mark…
After eying him up and down for about a half a second, Mark yanked Ocean into a bone-rattling, backslapping hug that made his teeth clack together.
“Unfuckingbelievable!” Mark bellowed as he turned him loose. “Shit, let me get this to Doc, but don’t you move!”
He hurried away while Ocean stood there blinking and tried to regain his equilibrium.
“Was that the same Mark whose kid my dad saved?” Ocean asked Pope.
“Yup,” Pope replied. “And he meant it when he said for you to not go running off anywhere. He’ll want to catch up and hear more about your dad. A bunch of us will.”
“Couldn’t go anywhere even if I wanted to,” Ocean replied. “Which I don’t. I was hoping to run into someone wearing one of my dad’s old patches. Just never expected it to go down like this.”
“Fate has a fucked up sense of humor,” Pope said, chuckling as he knelt and started inspecting Danger’s bike.
Danger needed help kneeling beside him, and then shoulder to shoulder, they went over the damaged machine while Ocean watched others doing the same. The rough, rattle clack of an engine trying and failing to fire drew his gaze over to where a redheaded man stood shaking his head at his bike.
Pope’s head swiveled in that direction too, another rattle followed by harsh clicking forcing the man to turn off the machine.
“Craven!” Pope barked. “Quit fuckin’ with that before you break it worse. Scout rode back to the shop for the flatbed. Creature is working his way down the line checking out all the bikes. He’ll get to you.”
“Thanks, brutha,” Craven replied before getting off his Triumph.
“I’m not seeing any fluid where it shouldn’t be, just a lot of dings and that scrape. Fire her up and let’s see what happens,” Pope instructed Danger several minutes later, after a thorough, hands-on inspection of his Harley.
The damage to Danger’s machine appeared to be all cosmetic; there was nothing wrong with the way she ran, nor any hesitation in starting. Ocean stood beside Pope, listening to the bike run for about thirty seconds before Danger turned her off.
“Yeah, I’m good to go,” Danger declared.
“Did you check on Roan?” Pope asked.
“He’s good, kept the wheels on the pavement and was helping out one of the bruthas back there,” Danger replied, pointing in the direction where they’d seen Roan earlier.
It took a moment before Ocean spotted the man again, holding a splint in place around another man’s leg while someone secured it.
“How bad is it up front?” Danger asked.
“The Prez maneuvered around the bastards with Kat and Saint on his heels, which meant Night went for it too; they’re all good.
A couple guys behind him veered; a few managed to keep it on the road instead of going off the edge, two didn’t, and three more spun off into the road, then it became a crap shoot.
Wreck, Bellamy, and Cody were riding right behind me.
They had the good sense to cut the wheel when I did, which is why we’re parked up there by Ocean’s Jeep. ”
When Ocean glanced over, it was to see a line of several bikes neatly parked in front of his lopsided vehicle, all having avoided the cluster of falling bikes.
He’d been so focused on those license plates that when the bikes had skimmed past the vehicles, he’d thought he’d hallucinated them.
That the moment had been real was a testament to the skill and experience of the riders who’d pulled off such a dangerous maneuver.
“How badly did you get gashed up?” Pope asked Danger, lowering his shades enough to stare at the shredded leg of Danger’s jeans, concern etched into his features.
“Meh,” Danger grumbled. “I’m sure Doc will have to throw a few stitches in when we get back to Joker’s Wild, but Ocean did a good job of patching me up.”
Pope nodded before clasping Ocean’s shoulder and giving it a squeeze, a look of approval in his gaze when their eyes met. “Must have sucked getting stuck here, but I’m glad you did.”
“Me too,” Ocean admitted.
“Let’s go see how badly those wheels are wedged,” Pope said.
“I thought I wasn’t supposed to move,” Ocean said, scanning the collection of bikers clustered together, some of them gesturing adamantly, seeking Mark out among them.
“Like you said, you can’t go anywhere,” Pope said, jerking his head in the direction of Ocean’s Jeep.
He followed Pope over as another car appeared, creeping along, eyeing the collection of people and machines along both sides of the road.
“Everything okay?” a man asked, rolling down his window.
“All good, thanks,” Pope replied. “Just watch yourself on this stretch; there are some idiots out here.”
“Thanks,” the guy said, rolling the window back up before cruising along at the same slow pace until he disappeared around the bend.
When they reached the far side of the Jeep, Pope made a whistling sound.
“Yeah, you’re sunk in there good; it looks like the runoff from the last rain undercut the edge, making the whole thing fragile.
The county needs to get someone up here to look at this before more of the road erodes.
We’ve got enough guys here to get you out, though.
We just need to regroup for a moment and get the injured home. ”
“No worries,” Ocean replied, just as Mark bellowed for them and waved for them to come back across the road.
Whether it was luck, fate, or just a chaotic bit of irony that had put them all on this collision course, Ocean didn’t know, but as he followed Pope to where Mark and a bunch of other men in kuttes stood waiting for them, he was grateful that the edge had crumbled when it had.
Feeling like he was on the verge of finally getting the answers he’d craved for most of his life, he met the gaze of every man who introduced himself, clasped hands with them like the warrior his father had raised him to be, and felt, for the first time in years, like he’d found his family.