CHARLES

 

They found Walsh’s body in some brush. It was a clean death, a bullet straight through the head. Better than I would have given him but the end result wasn’t something I could complain about. I wasn’t in the mood to celebrate, given the circumstances, but I wasn’t about to cry for him either. As far as I was concerned, the bastard was in a better place.

I wasn’t about to let Lieberman try to intimidate me. She wasted all of her time poking and prodding me. But there was no secret for me to spill when the truth was I had nothing to do with what happened to Walsh.

They locked me up in a cell. Every now and then, Lieberman would come waltzing to me trying to get me to crack. There was nothing for her to find.

It took a few hours but Garnet finally got me a lawyer. They didn’t have any reason to keep me locked up. A scuffle with Walsh wasn’t enough to prove I’d killed the motherfucker. I was back out on the street in no time.

A couple of messages to Lenora went unanswered. I hid out in my hotel room until I finally got a response. She told me she wanted to meet with me. Somewhere safe. Somewhere we wouldn’t have to worry about anybody watching us.

So I got on my ride and told her to get to The Grindhouse as soon as she could.

I was at the bar staring at the beer in front of me when all of the other patches gathered around me. They patted me on the back and congratulated me. I wasn’t much in the mood for celebrating but considering all the shit that just went down, a cold beer was exactly what the doctor ordered.

“You feel like playing tonight?”

Needle kept eyeballing me, goading me into a poker game. I smirked as I shook my head.

“Not tonight,” I replied. “I’m not interested in taking your money.”

“Big talk from a man with no balls,” Needle said.

“I got plenty of balls. Why don’t you give your ol’ lady a call and I can prove it?”

The pretty blond man rolled his eyes at me and excused himself to the poker table with the rest of the club. The president stayed behind and put an arm on my shoulder.

“I just talked to Ghost,” Garnet said. “He tells me you’re interested in being a prospect.”

“I’m not interested in being a prospect,” I said with a laugh. “Going through all of that shit… Trying to prove myself again… No thanks. But if that’s what it takes to get patched into this chapter, I’ll think about it.”

“We could always use another patch. We already know you’re a Reaper. Strength in numbers, brother.”

“What’s this I hear about you having a deal with the Chinese?”

Garnet straightened up and looked around the bar. The clubhouse was crowded with men and broads just trying to enjoy their night out. It was a busy night but not rowdy enough to be concerned about it.

“Is that what this is about?” he asked. “You looking to make some money?”

“I got money. I did all right in the service. And my old chapter had their ways… But money never hurts.”

Garnet smirked at me.

“The Triads pay well,” he said. “They’ve got so much product to move, they’re dealing with more MCs in Ivory than they can count. But I’m sure Ghost has told you shit’s dried up because of the feds. Whatever Lieberman is up to, it’s enough that even the Chinese are spooked. It’s gonna be an honest living until she’s out of town.”

“What’s that bitch out here for? The feds wouldn’t come out to Ivory if they didn’t have a good reason.”

“Nobody knows. Lieberman runs a tight ship. There haven’t been any leaks. She could be here for Chinese. She could be here for the MCs. Hell, she might even be here for someone else. There’s no way to tell for sure. Maybe you should have asked when she was interrogating you.”

I scoffed at the thought and took a big gulp of beer.

“It wasn’t much of an interrogation,” I said. “She asked me her questions but nothing I couldn’t handle. She didn’t have anything on me.”

“Still… You need to watch your back. We got no idea what she’s up to.”

Garnet leaned in close to me and whispered so nobody else heard even though everybody else in the bar was distracted.

“You wanna stick around in Ivory, you’re gonna have to lay low,” he said. “I don’t know how you’ve lived your life. I don’t know why you left and went nomad. But Ivory’s a quiet place. The only time there are fireworks is during the holidays.”

“I can dig that. I did enough tours. I’ve seen more fireworks than I’d care to remember.”

“Ha!”

Garnet hit me on the arm and sipped on his beer. He leaned up against the bar counter and looked out into the crowd.

“What’s her name?” he said.

“Jesus Christ… You, too?”

“Ha! Only some wet pussy would be good enough to get a guy to stick around. Don’t feel bad about it. You’re a man and you got warm blood. At least you know you’re alive.”

“If you’re expecting me to talk about my feelings and emotions, you can keep the patch.”

“Is that why you went nomad? Because you didn’t want to share your feelings in the chapel with the rest of the club?”

Garnet and I shared another laugh. From what I could tell, he was a good man. He ran the club well and everybody seemed to respect him. I wouldn’t have any problem dealing with him if it came down to it.

Before Garnet continued fucking with me, he looked over my shoulder.

“Well, well… What do we have here?” he said.

I looked in the direction he was staring and saw Lenora walking toward us.

She looked just as fucking gorgeous as she always did. Less makeup than I was used to but her skin was clear. Her dark hair was put up over her head. And the black dress she wore… That shit was so tight every straight man was staring at her ass and tits.

“Hey,” I said. “You all right?”

There was a slightly bewildered look in her eyes. She looked around the bar like she was checking to see if someone was watching her then smiled nervously at me.

“I’m fine,” she said with a shrug. “I… I heard about what happened.”

“There’s nothing you need to worry about. Lieberman doesn’t have shit on me. Plus, my man Garnet here got a lawyer for me if shit goes down.”

“Best lawyer in town,” Garnet said to her.

The club president bowed his head as he greeted her.

“I don’t believe we’ve met,” he said.

“Lenora,” she said as she shook his hand.

“Lenora… Pretty name… I’m Garnet—”

“Garnet. Black Reapers. President. Everybody knows who you are.”

“My reputation precedes itself.”

He kissed Lenora’s hand and smiled at me.

“She’s a keeper, Char,” he said. “You make sure you take real good care of her. A good old lady is hard to find.”

Lenora’s cheeks started to blush. I stared at her and smiled.

“Yeah, they sure are…” I said.

“I’ll let you two lovebirds have some time to yourself,” Garnet said. “It’s not often you can celebrate a man not having to deal with the feds any longer.”

Garnet patted me on the back and left me alone with Lenora.

“You want a drink?” I asked.

“Yeah… Sure…”

She wasn’t looking at me. She kept staring across the bar. When she got her beer, Lenora took a huge gulp.

“You trying to get drunk tonight?” I asked.

“Maybe. Why not?”

“Are you sure nothing’s wrong?”

“I’m sure,” she said with a nod.

She worked a smile onto her face and I was given another reason why I fell for her. She had these dimples on her cheeks that were almost distracting enough to make me look away from her green eyes.

“It’s just…”

She looked down like she was struggling to find the words.

“…You came here for Walsh. And now Walsh is gone.”

“That’s right.”

“Now what? Do you know what’s gonna happen?”

I’d forgotten that Walsh was the reason I was in Ivory in the first place. Even before he’d died, I’d forgotten about him.

“All I wanted was for Walsh to pay for what he did to me,” I said. “Now that he’s gone though… I can focus on more important things.”

“More important things like what?”

“Like you, for example.”

I took my hands in hers. I leaned my head down and shoved my tongue into her mouth. She didn’t resist, letting me play with her tongue as our lips pressed together. I didn’t give a shit if the rest of the clubhouse was looking at our sloppy kiss. If anything, I wanted them to see what she did to me.

Lenora was royalty. She was my queen.

She pulled her lips away from me, her red cheeks apparent on her pale skin.

“You kiss me like you haven’t seen me in ages,” she said.

“It has been ages. I want you, Lenora. I want nothing more than to be inside of you… be with you… You make me feel good. You know I’d do anything…”

The smile slowly left her lips. Her hands dropped down from mine. When I looked into her eyes, I realized what she was. She might have been my queen but to everybody else, she was something else. A poor woman who had to live a life she didn’t want to because there was no other way to make ends meet.

“Is it the money?” I said.

“What?” she exclaimed.

“The money. I promised you the 50-grand once I got my hands on Walsh but I never actually got my hands on him. Not in the way I wanted, anyway…”

“No, it’s not that…”

She scoffed at me and started giggling.

“…I don’t care about the money. I just care about you. You know that.”

“Then what’s wrong.”

“It’s… It’s Blade.”

“Blade… Right…”

I hadn’t met the motherfucker but I knew he was gonna be a problem.

“Why can’t you just tell him you’re done working for him?” I asked. “Tell him to find someone else.”

“It’s not that simple. It’s…”

She looked down and started twiddling her fingers nervously. I knew there was something fucking bothering her but I wasn’t going to squeeze it out of her.

“…It’s complicated,” she said.

“Complicated? What’s complicated about it?”

I put my hand on her chin and made her look up at me. I stared into her eyes. I could see something. It almost seemed like she was about to start crying. She clenched her jaw and her throat shifted with a swallow.

“Lenora… If you want me to deal with Blade—”

“I don’t want to talk about Blade. Not anymore. I just wanna be with you.”

“You know I’ll do anything you want me to do. Most guys have to pay to spend a night with you. And I’ll pay whatever it takes to spend tonight with you.”

“You don’t have to spend anything tonight. It’s just… I’d rather be somewhere else right now. Take me home?”

“Yeah… Of course.”

Lenora smiled softly at me. I kissed her on the lips and took her hand in mine.

I was fully intent on getting to the bottom of whatever was distracting her.