Chapter 2 Leo
LEO
“Yo, Prospect.”
I hear Dog’s familiar twang hollering at me across the lot as I roll my bike to a stop.
“Hey, man.” I park in the spot designated for prospects, even though, at the moment, I’m the only one. I give Dog a chin lift, returning his welcome.
Of all the guys, Dog has been the most welcoming besides Morris.
Morris helped me, I helped Morris, and through it all, we ended up earning each other’s respect—even becoming friends. When the dust settled with his old lady Alice, I had a job, became a prospect with the club, and had a new roommate in Lia.
Lia…I shake my head to clear the fuck fog that woman left me in.
Thank God I have about an hour’s worth of shit to do here before my meeting with her dad. Sporting a semi while in a sit-down with Tiny would be the fastest way to get the prospect patch ripped right off my vest. Not to mention a punch to the throat or even worse.
I follow Dog into the club where Midge and Sadie are standing in the kitchen drinking coffee, gossiping like they always do.
“Hey, gorgeous,” Sadie says, tossing me her signature smirk. “And Dog.”
Sadie is what the guys call a club whore.
I’d never refer to her that way, but she sure has made the rounds with most of them.
She’s got a good fifteen years on me—or maybe she just looks that way.
It’s hard to tell, and I don’t ask. I learned months ago not to encourage Sadie unless I wanted to find her naked on my doorstep one day. And I sure as fuck don’t want that.
“Morning,” I say, keeping any inflection that could be construed as flirting out of my voice. “Midge,” I say, nodding.
“Baby biker’s here,” Midge says, giving me a wink. “The toilets are gonna be scrubbed real good this morning.”
If Sadie’s a club whore, Midge is like the club grandma and was in Sadie’s place years earlier.
She’s got a face like a deflated walnut, but her heart’s mostly in the right place.
Her specialties are making shitty casseroles and putting up with our crap.
But she’s part of the club, which means she’s family.
I know she banged her share of bikers in her day, but now she mostly cooks for the guys and gets paid to do some light cleaning and the shopping.
“Baby biker,” I laugh. “Midge, I would never take toilet duty off your hands. I’m gonna leave that crap to you today.”
Midge raises a brow at me and pours a dash of something that smells like vanilla into her coffee. “Not today, sweet lips. Your list of shit to do today means Midge gets the day off. I might even get me a mani-pedi while you’re elbows-deep in Tiny’s toilet.”
Sadie crows and cracks up, while Dog shakes his head with a grin on his face.
I almost never get hazed anymore, but as a prospect, fuck… Everyone makes sure I feel the pain of being at the bottom of the proverbial totem pole.
Having an older brother, I’m used to being shit on and getting leftovers and hand-me-downs, but prospecting an MC is next level.
Tim, my brother, is the reason I know Morris at all. My older brother’s love affair with pills and God only knows what else nearly cost me everything.
Thanks to Tim, the building we lost was bought by the club, and Morris hired me back to work at the same auto shop my family used to own. So, while Tim cost us the building, I have a job and I didn’t lose the house, so I pretty much owe my life to Morris and the club.
But I don’t feel as if I’m in anybody’s debt.
Being a prospect is a formality.
This is my new family, and I’ve never been more grateful to have someplace to belong. Someone to belong to.
Doing what I do around this place can take up a lot of time, but it’s time I want to give.
I wish I didn’t have to keep any secrets from my brothers. I only have one secret, but if anything had the potential to get my ass tossed to the curb, fucking the club president’s daughter would probably be the thing to do it.
“Keep it in your pants, ladies,” Dog barks. “Prospect’s not here to play.”
I wink at Midge and take the cup of coffee she prepared for me. I nod my thanks to her before a grunt pulls my attention.
If I wasn’t moving my ass before, I am now. Lia’s dad, Tiny, a man whose name is the definition of irony, clamps a hand on my shoulder. “Move your ass, kid. You got shit to do,” he says, no softness in his voice.
“I’m on it,” I assure him.
I know the drill.
Normally, I’d have an hour of work to do around the club, but today, something else is up. Tiny texted me last night and told me to make sure I met up with him before I left the club to go to my job at the repair shop.
While I would have loved to spend another hour in bed with Lia this morning, time at the club is something I’d never give up.
I’ve been spending at least an hour a day at the club, seven days a week.
There’s no set schedule or written-in-stone expectations for a prospect, but the goal of prospecting is simple.
Build trust.
Prove your loyalty.
Get to know your club brothers better than you know yourself.
Anticipate the needs of the club and fill them.
This morning, there’s not a lot going on.
Despite the early hour, Morris isn’t in his room.
The door is closed, and when I knock, there’s no answer.
I crack the door and see the bed is neatly made, so I close it back up again and head out to wash the bikes and assorted parked cars and trucks out back.
By the time I finish, it’s nearly time to head over to the repair shop. Lia opens the strip mall for us in the morning.
Thinking of Lia, I grab my phone and shoot off a message.
Me: You make it out okay? Shop good?
I’m sure she’s fine. Lia may seem like a hippie, but she’s responsible and really hardworking.
She opens the shop like clockwork and is sweet and professional.
I just… It’s been a couple hours, and as much as I love being in the compound, my mind keeps drifting to her body.
To the waves of soft brown hair covering my face as I fuck her.
The way she grunts, cries, and urges me on when I touch her.
My dick hardens as I think about our morning. Then my phone buzzes with a reply.
Lia: I made out great.
She punctuates the play on words with a bunch of tongue-out emojis. I stifle a laugh and punch in a quick response.
Me: About to meet with your pops. See you soon.
I head toward Tiny’s office, taking a few deep breaths and thinking unsexy thoughts to encourage my dick to knock it off. I get a reply from her and swipe to read it before I go in.
Lia: Give Tiny a big kiss for me.
I shake my head and jam my phone into my pocket as I knock on the door to the club office, three quick taps even though the door is open.
Dog is sitting in a chair across from an empty desk, leaning all the way back with a leg crossed over his knee. Whatever this meeting is about can’t be too bad if Dog looks that relaxed.
“Dog.” I nod at him. “Tiny coming?”
Dog nods. “On his way. He had to take a shit.”
“Fuck you.” Tiny’s voice is loud and close behind me. He’s carrying an enormous plastic cup with a straw in it.
I move out of the way so Tiny can cram past me and sit in the ergonomic office chair Midge got him last year.
“Come on,” he says, so I follow him into the office and take the open seat across the desk from him, next to Dog.
“Morris comin’?” Dog asks.
Tiny shakes his head. “He’ll be late. Kid business something or other. He texted.”
“Zoey all right?” I ask.
Last year, when Morris got together with Alice, Lia and I spent a ton of time with Alice’s kid, Zoey. She’s a sweetheart and a real firecracker now that she’s out from under the clutches of her shit-for-brains stepdad.
Tiny nods. “Yeah, it’s nothing. Lice outbreak at school or something. Looks like Zoey brought the buggers home. The whole class got ’em. He and Alice had to stop by the school to sign some kind of form for her to be allowed back in class.”
“Jesus… Kids.” Dog shakes his head. “Who knew fucking lice was still a thing. Didn’t we blot that shit out like we did with polio?”
Tiny coughs, a weird, raspy sound that makes me a little queasy. “Beats me, man,” he says, chugging a huge sip from what looks like a half-gallon–sized pop cup. “My only contact with kids is with grown ones.” He shoots me a look.
“No lice in our house,” I say, trying to lighten the death stare Tiny’s got aimed at me.
“Right,” Tiny says, coughing again.
“You all right, man? That cough sounds…sick.” Dog tips his chin at Tiny, who waves a hand in the air dismissively.
Every time Tiny sees me, he finds a way to bring up his daughter. It’s like he’s got some father-radar and he knows we’re fucking.
It shouldn’t matter to him either way. Lia’s a grown woman, for fuck’s sake, and it’s not like I’m some lowlife. Tiny only really got to know Lia a year ago when she found him after her mom retired and went off to live on some boat with her rich husband.
If I didn’t know what it was like to have deadbeat parents and a brother who shot our only stability into his arm, I probably wouldn’t begin to understand having kids you barely know. But the last year has taught me more tough lessons than I ever dreamed I’d have to learn.
Moral of the story? Everybody’s family’s got shit.
It’s clear to me he doesn’t like the fact that I live under the same roof with his daughter, no matter how “new” their father-daughter deal is.
I’m sure everyone does assume that we’re fucking because we live together, but Lia tries to make it crystal clear we’re not. To everyone, including me.
What we do behind closed doors, under the sheets and shit…ain’t nobody’s business. Especially not her dad’s. But that doesn’t mean I don’t do my part to keep him from suspecting anything.
“Fucking hot wings,” Tiny says, gulping down more soda. “Garlic pepper sauce is burning a hole in my throat.”
“You ate that shit for breakfast?” Dog guffaws and shakes his head. “Jesus, man.”