CHAPTER 4 IRON JACK
IRON JACK
Ilike the feel of Greta over my shoulder. I make a goal to put her there as often as possible.
The air outside is brisk. Even Florida has to concede to Madam Winter in January. The lights over the parking lot beam down in yellow cones over the motley assortment of beat-up trucks and bikes.
Greta stops hammering my back once we’re outdoors. Maybe her denial was only for the audience. Or maybe she’s plotting.
I think she’s planning my demise.
I like that.
We arrive at my bike, and I lean forward to deposit her on the asphalt.
She stands up, flipping that crazy red hair back, hands on her hips. “You are a boneheaded, blustering, ugly-mugged Neanderthal!”
I rub my chin. “Ugly mug?”
She sputters at that. “Well, I mean, maybe…” She straightens. “Ugly is as ugly does!”
I can’t stop the chortling laugh that echoes over the quiet parking lot. “Did your Nana teach you that?”
“Grammy Alma, and you better not say one bad word about her.”
I unstrap the extra helmet tied to the back of my Harley.
I keep it there for my NFNF rides. This won’t be one of those.
I doubt Greta is familiar with the “no fuck, no fun” creed of the biker.
I won’t enlighten her right now. I’ll do it the next time I want to see her cheeks turn the same shade as her hair.
“I’m not one to diss a nana,” I tell her. “Now put this on.” I toss her the helmet.
She catches it, but stares at the straps. I’m guessing she’s not sure how to wear it.
“Need some help?” I ask, tugging mine off the handlebars.
“Of course not. It’s a helmet.” She shoves it on her head. It’s the right way, so I leave her alone about it.
I snap mine into place and throw a leg over the bike. “Well, hop on then.”
She fiddles with the straps, but they hang low under her chin. When she takes a step forward, the helmet careens to the side.
“Come here,” I tell her. “You ain’t safe for a New York minute without it tightened.”
“What do you know about New York?” She shoves her hands in her jean pockets as I reach over and adjust the straps.
“Not a lot. You got a purse or something? You can stick it in the bag on the back.”
She pulls her phone and a slender card carrier from her pockets. “This is all I brought since Bailey drove.”
“Good enough. You ridden a motorcycle before?”
She sucks in a breath, chin lifted, and I can tell she’s about to lie her ass off.
“Put your feet on the pegs,” I bark before she can answer. I kick at the one near her. “When I lean, you lean. Don’t fight it. And hang on.”
She swings on behind me, perching her borrowed boots on the foot peg. I wait for her to wrap her arms around my waist before kicking the starter.
The engine roars in the night. A couple fellas whoop a few rows over. I didn’t know they were there. I lift a hand in greeting without bothering to look.
“Hold on,” I call behind me, and we shoot forward.
Greta lets out a squeal and grips me more tightly, locking her hands together at my belly.
We bump over the edge of the parking lot and onto the road.
The chill is more bracing as we ride, and I figure she’s probably cold in that sweater. It wasn’t an issue in an enclosed car with her friend, but we’re exposed.
It’s not far to the clubhouse. I’ll get her something warm to drink, or Carol will, probably. She’s got four kids and doesn’t bother trying to leave the clubhouse for the bar anymore. She’s the ol’ lady of my VP Stoney. She and Betz more or less run the place, although Marietta pulls her share.
We drive through the forest and past the marsh, barely passing a soul on the way. Miami itself is a line of jeweled lights in the distance.
I turn down the side road to the club, the darkness cut only by the headlight of my bike.
I forget about Greta for a second, pondering the arrival of that member of Lucifer’s Kin at the bar and what it meant.
Before I took him down, he insisted I’d been wrong.
The Kin weren’t responsible for the death of my parents a few years back. We’d burned their club for nothing.
But it wasn’t for nothing. The connection to my parents was the shine on the chrome. The real muscle behind our action had been them bringing a drug trade into our territory. We weren’t down for that.
My parents’ death had all the markers of being a job by the Kin. The road they were on. The formation they made. The use of a random external trucker as part of the plan, one who took the fall but wasn’t affiliated with any club.
Heck, the Kin had pulled a similar maneuver on Merrick while he was a prospect.
Naw. I don’t buy it. The Kin thought getting Steel and Theron out of the way would weaken the Wild Hair and make it easier to set up their operation.
They hadn’t counted on me.
The bike angles smoothly off the side road onto the private drive up to the club. The glow from the windows filters through the trees as we approach.
We pull up to the front. Looks like most of the club is here, other than the ones up at the Leaky Skull.
The minute I kill the motor, Greta starts beating my shoulders and shouting, “What the hell was that? Were you trying to kill us? I could have fallen off at any moment!” She rains blows on my back.
I sigh. She’s a diva. I didn’t take it fast or loose. But riding feels like flying when you’re used to being tucked inside a car, seatbelt keeping you in place. I get it.
I ignore her stress tirade, waiting for it to run its course. I pull off my helmet and clip it to the handlebars.
She keeps going, pummeling me like a toddler might kick the floor during a tantrum.
So I sit, my hands resting on the bars. It’ll pass. The cold will get her if nothing else. It doesn’t bother me, not the wimpy chill we get in Miami. Give me a Nor’easter and maybe I’ll put a shirt on.
Finally, she runs out of steam. I feel her shift behind me, lowering a boot to the ground. She’s slow to get off. Yeah, she worked some muscles she’s not used to.
I wait for her to step free of the bike before dismounting and collecting her helmet. “You done?”
“Asshole.” She rubs her arms. “I’m freezing and was fighting for my life.”
“Right.” I clip her helmet onto the bike. “It’ll come more naturally with time.”
“Hardly. I’m never riding another bike again.” Her face is set into a determined mask as we approach the front door.
I try not to laugh as I type the code to get in, a recent addition because the club couldn’t hang on to a key to save their damn lives.
We also took on a house mouse, two actually, from another club.
Since they weren’t born and bred Wild Hair, I want to know whose code is being used and when. A metal key can’t tell me that.
The front room is warm and blasting noise from the giant television on the wall. Carol sits on the sofa with three of her kids, the older ones. The baby is probably sleeping.
She jumps up when she sees me, touching her curlers and her robe. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t expect anyone back from the bar for another hour at least.” She tugs at the kids. “To your room.”
I swing the youngest boy, Sean, into the air. “No need to send them off. It’s fine.”
Sean laughs as I hold him upside down.
“You got any quarters in there?” I ask, shaking him.
“These are my pajamas, Iron Jack!” His giggles reverberate through me. I’m glad there are kids around the club. They’re hope in a package.
“How am I supposed to play the pinball machine without any quarters?” I ask him. We have a He-Man pinball in the room with the pool table.
“I don’t know!” I set him carefully on the sofa, but he rolls off. “Again! Again!”
I swing him back up and set him on my shoulder. He’s newly six and light as air.
Carol sends the other kids off anyway, fussing with the rollers again, her eyes darting to Greta. “Come on, Sean,” she says, picking up the remote and shutting off the animated movie. “We can finish this in our rooms.”
“But our TV is tiny!” Sean whines.
“The Wild Hair will be back soon,” she says. “They’ll want their TV.”
“Okaaaaay.”
I set him down, and he dashes to the hall.
Carol holds on to the flaps of her robe. “We’ll see you tomorrow, Iron Jack.” She glances at Greta again.
Right. Introductions. “Carol, this is Greta. She’s going to be staying here for about a week. She’s Merrick’s sister.”
Carol’s face changes in recognition. “Oh! Gosh! Yes, we love Merrick around here. Were you the one he and Diesel took back to Jersey when your husband—”
“Yes,” Greta says quickly. “My brothers helped during the divorce.” Now she’s the one to fuss with her hair. “Nice to meet you.”
“Carol is the ol’ lady of our VP,” I say. “She’s got four whippersnappers. One of them is brand new.”
“I should check on the baby,” Carol says. “Nice to meet you, Greta. I’m sure I’ll see you at breakfast.” She hurries down the hall.
“She’s nicer than the one at the bar,” Greta says.
“Betz?” I ask.
“The one who asked if she should load me in a sack and dump me in your room.”
“Yeah, that’s Betz. She’s been with the Wild Hair a long time.”
“It’s good to know they aren’t all like her.” Greta glances around the room. “It’s cleaner than I expected.”
“We keep it up. Don’t examine the single men’s rooms, though. Some of them are exactly what you’d expect.”
“Nothing to shine a black light on?” she asks.
I huff a laugh. “It’s a lot less subtle than that.” I gesture to the room. “This was a normal three-bedroom house at first, way before my time. We keep adding on as we grow. This is the front room, but we don’t use it for much, other than maybe waiting for someone to show.”
She takes in the dark gray sofa, the recliners, the skull and roses art on the walls. It’s not fancy, but it’s clean, other than a smattering of cracker crumbs from the kids. A house mouse will get that in the morning.
“I’ll show you around.” We walk through a doorway to the long kitchen. The center island is filled with booze bottles and the dregs of chips in plastic bowls. “We come through here for meals. You won’t be expected to help.”
“I can help,” she says. “I’ll need something to do.”
“All right.” I open the back door. “Out here is where most people hang out.”
We step onto the long wooden deck that runs the length of the rear of the house. There are three propane heaters set up at intervals among the scattered metal chairs and side tables. The two big smokers are lined up just outside of the overhang.
Most of the deck is empty, but a couple of figures shift in the dark at the other end.
A man turns and lifts a hand. “Hey, Iron Jack.”
“That’s our prospect, Adam,” I tell Greta. “And a house mouse, Jami.”
Her eyebrows knit together. She doesn’t know the lingo. “Nice to meet you!” she calls.
“We’ll let them do their thing,” I say. I’ve been watching this pairing closely since Jami arrived from a club raid we did last fall.
Greta follows me to the door. “How much of the land is yours?”
“The cleared space of the yard is about an acre, plus about four acres of the woods.” I gesture to the treeline as I let her pass to enter the kitchen. “It gets pretty boggy a ways out. I wouldn’t go very far if you take off that direction.”
“I have no intention of heading into the woods.” She rubs her arms.
Seems like she’s finally calming down.
“What’s a house mouse?” she asks.
“Just an unattached woman who helps out in the club.”
“She didn’t look unattached.”
“She’s not an ol’ lady yet. And she’s not a bunny. The only other role is house mouse.”
“Do I dare ask what a bunny is?”
“They hop from room to room, having fun.”
Greta holds up a hand. “Say no more.”
We pass through the kitchen to the long hall lined with doorways.
“Stoney and Carol get one bedroom and bath plus an extra room for the kids.” I run my hands along that door, the sounds of cartoon voices bleeding through.
“The next one is mine.” I turn the knob and push open my door. “Nothing fancy.”
She peers in. I look at the space through her eyes. Black bedspread, straightened because a house mouse keeps my room tidy. Not that I’m a slob. My mother taught me better than that.
The walls are midnight blue with a mural painted across the back side.
In the image, the moon is a ball of mottled white-gray peeking from behind a band of clouds.
My mother had that done by a house mouse who came through.
I vaguely remember her when I was little, always doodling everywhere, including on her jeans and even her shoes. She was gone by the time I was a teen.
After my parents were killed, I left the MMA circuit in L.A.
to take over the club and moved into their room.
It’s never felt like mine, just theirs. Even the twin bed in the closet I used as a kid is still there.
I don’t spend much time in here, other than with the occasional NFNF.
I prefer the room with the pool table or the meeting space.
“I like the mural,” Greta says. “Does everyone have art on the walls?”
“Just mine,” I tell her. The story about my mother will wait for some other day.
We retreat to the hall. Most of the doors are closed, the occasional caterwauling indicating that a Wild Hair has a bunny for the night. Greta’s posture gets stiffer and more uptight as we go.
“The meeting room is here at the end,” I tell her, opening the door to show the space with the long table. She doesn’t need to see the closet to one side where we keep the arms.
She nods at it and turns away. “And where will I be?”
“This way.” I stop at a door about halfway up the corridor. “You can use any bathroom, but I recommend the one near the bunkhouse for the house mouse crew. It’s right off the kitchen. Only the girls use that one. The others might offend your delicate sensibilities.”
She huffs. “I’m not the least bit delicate.”
“We’ll see about that.” I snatch her up and throw her over my shoulder one more time for good measure. I want to see if she’ll bite me again.
And I kick open the door to her room.