Chapter 7
Mad Dog
“Status report.” Marx slams his fist into the wall behind him and stops any messing around in its tracks.
Chewy’s baby shower has been on the calendar for weeks now and we all know if we turn up late the Ol Ladies will have our balls.
Marx is already in the shit from checking himself outta hospital after being shot.
I doubt he wants to test his Ol Lady. Lovely will have him sleeping on the couch in the common room at the first sign of a fuck up.
“Well, looking at everything we’ve managed to find on the Quarter Mile MC, I’m not sure who they’re working for,” Wire begins.
“Wait, I thought they were in bed with Richard Thomson?” Nitro turns to look around the table.
“So did we, but we can’t find a link.” Wire replies. “Not to mention the MC themselves are pretty damn new.”
“How new?” Marx frowns.
“18 months?”
“Huh.” Marx’s gaze lands on me and I lean forward in my seat.
“They seemed pretty green when we were watching them. Their Road Cap and Prospects came running when Rider laid into one of their members. They hesitated to draw weapons and one of the prospects wasn’t even holding it right. They’re untrained by my eye.”
Rider nods. “They don’t look flush with cash, either. Matthew Thompson’s people always have top of the line shit.”
He’s not wrong. We’ve been taking out his people for a while now. Every damn time we stumble across them they have the latest tech and weapons. The Quarter Mile MC? They look like every other small town MC you come across.
Marx curses, running his hand down his beard. “So, they could be working with Thompson or have nothing to do with Thompson. Either way they’re an extra problem for us.”
“Pretty much. Until we can find out more.” Wire shrugs.
“Chewy?”
“Yeah?” Marx and Chewy sit in silence as she stares at him. “You want me to crack the case?”
Marx closes his eyes and Gus pushes some Tums his way. He takes a deep breath, exhaling before opening his eyes. “If you could that would be fucking great.”
Chewy bobs her head and I can’t help smiling at her. She’s a pain in the ass, but she’s our pain in the ass. Speaking of pain in the ass, I haven’t seen Pops yet, and I know just because I’m avoiding him I’ll end up paying for it twofold.
“Well, I’m not sure I can. I’m too relaxed after Willa’s massage.” Everyone's brows raise at this information. We all know what Chewy is like with touch.
“I never took you for a massage type person,” Tank says quietly.
“Oh I’m not, but there was a little action beforehand, which relaxed me right down.”
Action? What the hell? “What kind of action?” My palms are spread on the table as I lean forward, eager to know.
“Oh, the client before us was getting handsy. Tried to choke her out but she threw hot oil on his face.” Chewy snorts. “Screamed like a little bitch. Rhodie and Gus did something or other with him.”
I slowly turn my head to my youngest son. “Son, were you going to tell me this?”
He stares at me, raising his damn brow. Just like his brother. Just like me. Ugh. “I was, but I hadn’t seen you’ til just now.”
Before I can open my mouth, Switch speaks up. “This client, he gon’ be a problem?”
“Well, of course he will, he’s her ex Ol Man husband,” Chewy says, not even looking up, too busy playing some fruit game on her phone.
“Her husband?” Switch frowns.
“Ex,” I growl. “More importantly, he’s MC. Dunno who yet. We’ll need that information from Willa. But he’s in town, alone. From what I can gather he tracked her down.”
“Shit.” Marx inhales., “Maybe your Ol Ladies might be able to get something outta her.”
“Or, you could just fucking ask her?” I growl. Marx stares at me and I throw my hands up, not knowing what else to do with my hands. Left to my own devices I’d probably punch a hole in the wall. This is me being restrained. “She’s prickly son, not damned stupid. Just ask her.”
“Mad Dog is right. If she knows it’ll keep Joy safe, she’ll tell us,” Remy adds, giving me a little smile.
Marx scrubs his beard, glancing at the clock on the wall.
“Fine. Ask her. In the meantime, I need the Computas to find out as much as you can on the Quarter Mile MC. Savage, get with dad and Rider, they wanna know the Death Riders compound. That’s where these assholes been camping out, right?
” Marx looks at me and Rider, we both nod.
We have a baby shower to get to and I got a woman to very respectfully protect.
“If there’s nothing else to bring to the table then we gotta ride out.
Before the Ol Ladies get on our asses,” Marx mumbles the last part but we all feel it.
As someone without an Ol Lady, I’m about to throw a spanner in the works, “Before we go, I’m gonna need a little help…”
Willa
“Oh, let me get that for you.” Judge smiles as he not only opens the door for me, but follows me to the car.
I smile up at him, although I’m sure it probably looks like a weird grimace. Everyone has been extremely helpful with both the setup of the baby shower and pretty much everything else that’s going on. Which is nice. But a little too nice perhaps?
“You know, I can probably get this myself if you wanna head back in?” I say, waving a hand at my car and the selection of beakers and crap.
He looks like a deer caught in the headlights for a moment before standing there silently. He’s one of the quieter brothers so I assume this is his normal behaviour.
“Ok then,” I whisper under my breath, leaning into my car and carefully lifting the box.
“Let me,” he grunts, taking all my crap from me and then standing there.
I look between him, and my car, then shrug and press the key fob to lock my car before heading back into the diner. Judge plods along behind me and Rider swings the diner door open for us to walk in.
“Allow me,” he says, bowing low and I know something is up.
Don’t get me wrong, the men from the DRMC are nothing like my ex-husband’s MC. These men are well mannered. Ish.
“Is it me, or are the men acting weird?” I mutter to Mira as Judge follows behind me, placing my box of stuff on the counter next to where I’m standing.
Mira looks thoughtful for a moment. “On a scale of Tank to Pops, how weird?”
“That is, wow, that’s one hell of a scale,” I reply.
“Well, I mean, Tyson is super normal. Like, totally normal. And Pops is, well,” Mira waves in Pops’ direction.
He’s dressed like a medieval knight with a gator on his shield. He’s also in the corner threatening Mad Dog with some type of spiked ball thing.
“Mad Dog’s been hiding from Pops,” Joy murmurs.
“Why?”
Joy’s eyes go all huge and her cheeks turn pink before she scuttles away to Switch who quickly darts his gaze. What the fuck is going on?
“OK, everyone is like, Pops level weird today.”
“Could it be the medieval alligator baby shower? And you’re about to start serving brightly colored teas in science equipment?” Blanche asks, drolly.
Looking around the room, I get it. Chewy sits on a weird throne that I’m certain has dicks carved into it.
Chomper, her funny little gator is on a miniature version beside her and Rhodie is perched on a bar stool behind her massaging her shoulders using the technique I showed him earlier.
Half the MC is dressed in a weird hybrid of medieval peasant outfits with biker boots and leather vests and almost all the men have a sword or an axe hanging from their belts.
There are inflatable gators hanging from the ceiling and me and the old ladies have been brewing up colored fruit teas to look like chemicals that are being served in beakers because why not?
“Willa, we got any more of that bright green looking stuff?” Kaia asks from behind the counter.
Looking around I spot her kids Annie-Bella and Jax are collecting the empty beakers while the Big Littles and some loud ginger kid are busying themselves in the corner booth.
“Coming right up,” I reply, knocking twice on the counter.
I grab my box of supplies and carry it to the kitchen where we made some concoctions earlier. Mira very helpfully renamed them all to match the theme, so the one that needs topping up is somewhat questionably called “Spermicide.”
I pull the giant jug of iced green tea from the cooler along with bottles of apple juice, lime juice and soda water.
“Need any help?” Mad Dog asks, leaning his big, solid body in the doorway. His arms are crossed over his chest, his bicep popping in his white tee. My god the man is hot with a capital Haytch.
“Um, yeah, lemme just mix this up and if you could take it out to the table?” I try to avoid eye contact with him because I’m sure he’ll be able to see through my tough ”friend” facade.
I really need to have a sit down and think about what comes out of my mouth sometimes.
Friends? I get an overwhelming urge to bang my head against the wall.
In my mind, being friends seemed like a good idea.
It was nice and safe and I didn’t have to worry about a big burly man bossing me around.
In reality the man has been polite and thoughtful and my ovaries seem to be popping out eggs every time he’s in the vicinity like a damned confetti cannon.
Apparently every single one of the eggy bastards wants to be fertilized by Mad Dog and Mad Dog alone.
“Sure thing, babe,” he says so casually.
He steps up to the prep table I’m working on, standing a respectful distance away, because of course he is. His scent drifts over me and I have an overwhelming urge to bury my nose between his pecs.
“Stop,” I whisper under my breath to myself. I gotta rein these perimenopausal hormones in.
Why can’t I be the type where I’m turned off by sex? Why did I get the teenage boy equivalent of perimenopause?
“What was that?” Mad Dog asks, looking concerned but staying on his side of the table.
“Nothing!” I say, too damn brightly. “Just counting under my breath.”
I speed through the rest of the mixing, not giving a damn if I mess it up.
I just need Mad Dog and Spermicide out in the main diner so I can catch my breath.
I stir it haphazardly one last time, tapping the wooden spoon on the rim before having a taste.
My face caves in at the amount of lime I dumped in but you know what?
I’m sure it’s fine. I slide the concoction over to Mad Dog who gives me a wink that almost incinerates my panties before he turns and leaves the kitchen.
“Jesus H Christ,” I mutter, watching Mad Dog’s broad back leave the kitchen.
“He is pretty hot, for his age and all.”
I jump and my fight kicks in so I pull my arm back and fling the wooden spoon across the kitchen in the direction the voice came from.
“Ow, shit!”
“Sorry!” I yell at Rider, my hand splayed across my chest.
He rubs his forehead where the wooden spoon bounced off him. “Jesus, Willa!”
“Maybe don’t sneak up on me then!”
“I wasn’t sneaking, I was checking the back door,” he argues.
“Why?”
Rider freezes in his tracks, flicking a glance over his shoulder at me, “Ah, cos it’s a door?”
I cross my arms over my chest, something fishy is going on. “You don’t sound so sure about that?”
“What? No! I’m sure. I was just checking the door. For…reasons.”
I narrow my gaze at him, but hell, who am I to question what Rider gets up to? Shrugging, I collect up the empty bottles of apple juice and lime juice and follow behind him.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he grumps.
“To the dumpster? I’m not leaving these lying around for someone else to deal with.”
He stares at me, then the door, then me again. “Give them here, I’ll take them. You go hang out with the girls. I think they’re going to do some…games?”
“Rider?”
“Yeah?”
“Are you always this weird?”
He starts to scoff before rethinking it. “Ah, yeah, always weird. Love back doors.” His eyes grow wide. “But not that like! Unless the lady asks for it. But not my ass. That’s Rhodie type shit.”
We stare at each other for a moment. “Screw it, you can take the trash out.”
“Thank God,” he exhales.
I scuttle my ass back into the diner only to be met with a wall of biker backs and Blanche taking bets.
“What are we betting on?” I ask Joy who is holding a handful of $5 notes.
“Hobby horse dressage.”
“Come again?”
She turns to me, face alight with glee, “Pops is in a snit with Mad Dog so that loud ginger boy told them they should challenge each other to a duel. Somehow they landed on hobby horse dressage. I don’t know what that is, but I’m sure it’ll be fun.”
I turn my wide eyes from Joy, through the crowd to Mad Dog standing tall and proud with a horse head stuffy mounted on a broomstick clenched between those powerful thighs.
“Sweet fancy Moses,” I fan myself at the ridiculous and hot sight.
“I know girl, I know,” Debs says, her eyes glued to her man with a matching stuffy head mounted broomstick galloping through the diner.
“Outside, Peasants!” Chewy demands and, hell, who am I to deny her?
“Well, I guess we're doing this.” I link arms with Joy and we follow the club out into the sunshine to watch whatever the hell this is.
And you know what? As ridiculous as this whole day has been, I’m not hating it. For some reason that doesn’t scare me as much as I thought it would.