61. Chapter 61
“Pretty sexy, huh?”
A man who called himself Nino sat astride a bike with handlebars as tall as Lindsey.
“Is that a Dyna? Twenty-inch apes?” Jase asked.
“Twenty-four. Custom,” Nino said.
“Apes?” Lindsey asked.
“Ape hangers. Handlebars,” Jase explained.
“These babies.” Nino stroked the two feet of chrome. “You know your bikes.”
“I’ve got a ’78 Electra Glide back home,” Jase said.
“Classic. But this beauty would kick its ass up and down the highway.” He curled his lips over a row of teeth the color of pea soup and said, “What do you say? How about I take the missus for a spin on a real bike?”
“I’ve never ridden before,” Lindsey said.
Jase put a hand on her shoulder. She followed his gaze to the hooves, legs, torso, and arms of an unfinished demon tattooed on Nino’s arm.
“What? You ride and she’s never been on a bike? That’s a crime where I’m from,” Nino said. “Hop on, princess, I’ll make sure you never forget your first ride.”
Remembering how worked up Jase got about Declan, she flashed him a playful grin. He dug his fingers into her shoulder, and the shadows darkening Jase’s face suggested Nino would sooner leave with a broken jaw than Lindsey on the back of his bike.
The flutter between her legs suggested Lindsey enjoyed his display of possessiveness.
“Nino, what did Billy say?” The man in the red bandana—who’d already threatened to kill them—walked up and took Nino’s leather vest in his fist. “You’re not bothering our new friends, are you?”
“No, man, I was just going to take the lady for her first ride.”
“Their hands are empty. Do something useful and get these nice kids a couple of cold ones.”
Nino hunched his shoulders and went back into the bar without balking. Jase nodded to the other man’s arm.
“You got a set of horns under your jacket, or what?” he asked.
“Could be,” the man smirked. “You’re Jay’s son?”
“Yeah. Jase Young.”
“Curly.”
One callused hand gripped the other.
“You knew my dad?”
“Knew him? We used to ride together. He was one wild SOB. Used to drive an old Panhead.”
“A Panhead? I had no idea.”
“Where’s your bike parked?” Curly asked, scanning the parking lot.
“Ohio.”
“Then what’d you come here in?”
Jase pointed to the teal pile of dusty junk on four wheels on the other side of the lot.
“Jesus,” Curly muttered. “Follow me.”
“What’s this about horns?” Lindsey asked, following Curly and Jase down the row of bikes.
“It’s our calling card, sweetheart,” Curly said. He pulled up his sleeve to show a full Devil on his left forearm. “You’ll see some of us with pieces of the Devil until we’re fully vested. Then you get your horns.”
“Is that like getting made in the mob?”
Curly’s laugh was wet with phlegm. “You could say that.”
“How do you get the…pieces?”
“Oh, you know,” Curly said. “Doing services for the community. Waste disposal, and such.”
“Sure.”
Jase motioned to the bike they stopped beside. “This Low Rider yours?”
“You bet.” Curly adjusted his jacket sleeve over the tattoo.
“How tall are these apes?” Lindsey asked, as if she’d known what apes were for longer than a minute. “Twenty?”
“Jesus, no,” he said with another phlegmy laugh. A smile creased his eyes. Curly might’ve been handsome once. Now his face was as scarred and potted as any broken road. “Ten-inch, sweetheart, which is about as high as I find comfortable.”
“I’m with you there,” Jase said.
“Now, I don’t normally do this,” Curly said. “Seeing that you’re Jay’s boy, and seeing that you rode here in that POS, you want to take it for a spin?”
“You serious?”
“Go ahead. Take the lady for her first ride. I can’t believe she’s never been on a bike.”
“Well, she hasn’t been with me for very long or we would’ve changed that,” Jase said.
Lindsey’s head shot up. She hasn’t been with me for very long or we would’ve changed that. He said it so easily she almost believed he meant it, and the idea of actually riding with Jase sent a thrill through her stomach and lower.
“Get on.” Curly handed Lindsey a helmet. “Here, this is for you.”
Jase slid his leg over the side. A close-up of this man at home, his knuckles stretching around the grips, eyes rolling back for a moment of bliss, would fill another page in what was becoming a smutty travel log.
“Now, this is not usually the kind of thing you want to wear on a bike. Nothing between you and the ground but a little bit of flesh,” Curly said, eyeing Lindsey’s legs under her red flowered sundress. “What were you thinking wearing a dress in here anyway?”
“Well, when I woke up this morning, I didn’t know I was going to Hell, or I would’ve dressed for it,” she shot back.
“She’s cute.” Curly smacked Jase’s arm. “You should hang on to this one.”
“Did you hear that?” Lindsey asked, smacking Jase’s other arm. “He says hang on to me.”
“You’ll be hanging on to me in a minute.”
And there it was. Another flutter between her legs that was going to make riding behind him both wonderful and agonizing.
Before she fit the helmet over her head, a car sped into the parking lot in a spray of dust and small stones that pinged off chrome and polished metal.
Nino, coming down the steps with two beers, was nearly knocked on his butt by the driver—a man no older than the Young brothers, and no less out of place—who plowed past him through the door of Not Your Oasis.
They didn’t need to check his arm to know he wasn’t a Demon.
“Friend of yours?” Curly asked.
Jase reluctantly climbed off the bike. “Definitely not.”
Nino smashed the end of one of the bottles on the railing, splattering suds and broken glass on the front steps. “Good, then at least I’ll get to kill one of yas.”