Connor

 

Long after the meeting ended, I stayed in the office room, nursing my tangled thoughts. Everyone else had left, but I had a full packet of cigarettes laid out beside me and a bottle of Jack I knew was stored in the filing cabinet to my left, so I was ready for the long haul.

 

I lit one, sucked deeply, and watched the flame-tipped end flare.

 

None of this makes any sense! I thought. What the fuck is going on?

 

I looked back on the meeting and Farrah’s strange behavior. She barely seemed upset at all. In fact, she seemed overjoyed! Did she really hate her aunt that much? Not to mention her wanting to ‘leave the whorehouse to rot.’ From what the rumors said, Farrah had worked hard with Venus Michaels to build that place up into the respectable, money-making machine that it was. Why did she suddenly not care at all? Was it just because she thought that Montengo could offer her a better life? I doubted that. She must know that the president’s funds were limited. The glamorous lifestyle they were living was about to run out. As soon as the club went under—which it would, if we kept treating all of its potential money-making sources with such disregard—so would everything else. The clubhouse. Montengo. The whores …

 

The whores.

 

Farrah was not the only one acting strange during that meeting. I had also been keeping my eye on Princess, and though she hid it well, she seemed terribly upset. Was it possible that she was more attached to Venus Michaels than Farrah was? All sources agreed that Venus had treated her whores very well, but that level of love and loyalty seemed strange …

 

Suddenly, a thought came to me out of nowhere, and once I saw it I realized I had been thinking it all along.

 

I don’t think Farrah Michaels is who she says she is. In fact, I don’t think she is Farrah Michaels at all. Nothing fits. None of it.

 

And where the hell does Princess fit into all this? Is she the real Farrah Michaels? And if not, where is the real one?

 

These thoughts went round and round in my head, like riding a fucking rollercoaster. I smoked one cigarette after another and took several shots of whiskey. By late afternoon, I was feeling angry and buzzed and had gotten nowhere.

 

Finally, I stood up. “I need to talk to Princess,” I said aloud. I knew she probably would not reveal anything to me, but I needed to do something. “I’ll talk to her … and we’ll figure this shit out together.”

 

That was when I heard to first gunshot.

 

Boom!

 

I hit the floor out of instinct, rather than conscious thought. It took a half-second to realize that the gun wasn’t being aimed into the office, so in a flash I was on my feet, running low into the hallway.

 

I burst out and looked left towards the entrance. There! One of the Devil’s Wings, his hands held high as a police officer held a smoking gun towards his chest. Behind him, more cops streamed into the room.

 

“What the fuck!” I gasped, sobering up in an instant. Why were the cops here? Had our bribe with Stockhelm not worked?

 

Then it occurred to me: Princess! The cops were after her before, and they were after her now!

 

Desperate, I dashed down the hallway in the opposite direction, down to the living quarters. Where would she have gone? Surely not to the bunkroom.

 

Without knocking, I reached Montengo’s bedroom door and burst inside. There was a scream. ‘Farrah’ and Montengo were naked, locked in each other’s arms on the bed. Both rose like snakes, hissing in anger, but I roared, “There’s cops here! Cops raiding the place!”

 

The girl who called herself Farrah gasped, turning to Montengo in horror. His expression, however, hardened. As much as I hated Montengo, I did have to acknowledge one thing:

 

Battle was his element.

 

He rose, went to a nightstand, pulled out a Glock 17, and made for the door. “Stay here,” he ordered Farrah, then vanished.

 

The girl now looked to me in horror, naked and not caring.

 

“Is Princess in here?” I demanded.

 

She gulped, her lips moving wordlessly, for all the world looking as stupid and helpless as a goldfish out of water.

 

“Goddammit!” I roared, and then bolted for the door. I didn’t give a fuck about this girl called Farrah. I wanted to find Princess.

 

Once out of the door, I stood for a moment, confused, until I realized, Of course! My office! Energized, I ran to the office wing and burst into darkness through my own office door.

 

Thump!

 

“Ow!”

 

Something hard and blunt struck me in the back of the head. I hit the floor, then was up in an instant, looking for what had happened.

 

“Connor?” It was Princess, flipping on the light. In her hands, half-raised as if to strike me again, was my industrial stapler. Already, I could feel a lump rising on the top of my skull.

 

“Jesus, Princess!” I complained, shoving her aside so I could slam the door and lock it. “You’re strong!”

 

“Sorry!” She breathed. “I thought you were … Oh, fuck it. Connor, what the hell is going on?”

 

“The cops are here! Raiding the place!”

 

“Christ!” gasped Princess. “They’re looking for us!”

 

“Who?”

 

“Me and Honi … Me and Farrah!”

 

Even with the aching in my head, I did not miss that slip. Honi. That was what she had called that Farrah girl. I knew it! I thought, then winced as a particularly painful throb shot through me.

 

“So what do we do?” Princess demanded. Despite the fear in her voice, she sounded steady.

 

“Here!” I said. “The Devil's Wings have plans for this sort of thing!”

 

I reached out to my desk, grabbed all my important paperwork, and shoved it into her arms. I was about to make for the door, but she shouted, “The envelope, Connor! The records!”

 

“Right!” I cried. I did not hesitate.

 

Dashing to my desk, I wrenched the key from my pocket and tore open the drawer. There, untouched, was the strange envelope that seemed the source of so much of this. I grabbed it and tucked it carefully into my breast pocket before closing and locking the drawer again.

 

“Let’s make them waste their time,” I muttered, at Princess’s questioning look.

 

The next second, we were out the door.

 

I did not head out to the front, where the rest of the Devil’s Wings were dealing with the cops. I knew that might have made me seem cowardly, but it was hiding our incriminating finances that was the most important thing to the club right now. Besides, they were brave, violent men, and they had Montengo. In this, at least, he could be trusted. Instead, we headed further back into the building, past Montengo’s chambers, to what seemed to be an ordinary broom closet. I flung open the door to reveal mops, several jugs of cleaning fluid, and a hell of a lot of dust.

 

“We’re hiding here?” Princess panted, but I ignored her. Instead, I flung the mops aside to reveal a small, brass hook on the wall. It didn’t look like anything special, but when I yanked on it, a trap door hidden in the wall creaked open.

 

“Okay,” Princess acknowledged in wonder. “That’s pretty damn cool.”

 

“Yup,” I agreed, then grabbed her hand and led her through.

 

There were two options. A set of dusty old stairs led downwards, to the dark and hidden basement, while a ladder, slightly less dusty but equally dingy, led upward, through a three foot gap between the interior and exterior wall.

 

“Where does that lead?” Princess whispered, and I just chuckled.

 

“Come on,” I said, and mounted the ladder. I felt it creak quietly beneath my weight, but it held.

 

“A long time ago,” I explained as we climbed, “Sam Michaels figured out that a motorcycle club would need somewhere to hide. Hostages. Money. Weapons. Information. Whatever. But it was President Montengo who added his own special touch.”

 

We reached the top of the ladder, which spilled us over onto a smallwooden platform looking back to the interior of the clubhouse. There, the near darkness in which we had been enclosed suddenly brightened, allowing us to see.

 

Princess gasped.

 

“Yup,” I whispered. “Witness President Fucking Montengo’s real legacy.”

 

A mirror. An enormous, two-way mirror, overlooking that leopard print bedroom. Remember the mirror Montengo had over his bed? It was translucent from this side, so we could gaze down, unseen, into the bedchamber.

 

I saw Princess blinking, utterly dumbfounded, not knowing if she should laugh or grimace. “Why the fuck did he build this?” she whispered.

 

I shrugged. “All I know is that sometimes he hires two hookers, then disappears for a while. I think he gets off by watching them or something. Like a peeping Tom.”

 

Princess giggled. “What a pervert.”

 

“You got that right.”

 

“Wait! Shhh!”

 

We looked.

 

It was Farrah. Or Honi? Was that what Princess had called her? Either way, she was down below, darting about the bedroom like a bird trapped in a cage. She bit her nails, stared nervously at the door, and gazed around the room, as if looking for somewhere to hide.

 

“In the closet,” I heard Princess whisper beside me. “In the fucking closet.”

 

But it was too late. Someone was at the door.

 

A police officer burst in. His eye was black, and he had a bloody nose, but neither of those made any difference to the gun he was aiming, quite steadily, at Honi.

 

Honi wilted. I saw all that bravado, all that sexy confidence, vanish from her in an instant.

 

“Please,” we heard her whimper, and then the cop stepped forward.

 

Crack! His hand shot out like a snake, slapping her clear across the face! She gasped in pain and toppled, her stupid high heels betraying her and sending her crashing to the floor. A second later, two more cops appeared, carrying, of all things, rope.

 

She screamed, thrashing and biting, but there were three of them and only one of her, and she was hysterical with terror. It only took seconds for them to bind her, hand and foot, and for them to stuff a gag into her mouth. Her screaming was silenced, and in the next instant they were marching out the door with her flung over a shoulder. I saw one of them groping her ass as they left.

 

Princess and I held our breaths, waiting in stunned and horrified silence. Finally, once they were gone and the door had closed behind them, I turned to Princess.

 

“Those weren’t fucking cops, were they?”

 

“No,” she hissed, her voice venomous. “They weren’t.”

 

“And why do they want … Honi? That’s what you called her, right?”

 

Silence was the only answer she offered me.