Alice
My cell crows at me from my purse as I fight my way through the last vestiges of LA’s traffic. Smog taints the horizon and heat shimmers off the pavement as I slowly snake my way out of the city. It’s only a couple hours to home, now.
I answer.
“Hello?”
“It’s Hammer.”
“What do you want?” I say, irritable enough that I forget just who I’m talking to and let some of my annoyance show in my voice.
“When you get to Crescent Falls, don’t take the car to the auto yard.”
“Why not?”
“There isn’t time and my regular driver is out. You need to bring the car directly to me. Got it?”
“Is there something I need to know?”
“Yeah. You drive where I tell you. Don’t disappoint me, Ms. Alice. I like you, but you are still very much disposable. When you get to Crescent Falls, get onto the road to Azul Bay. About halfway to the ocean, near mile marker 42, there will be a turnoff marked ‘Forestry Access Only’. Take it. Follow that road until you get to the machine shop. You’ll know when to stop.”
He hangs up.
I follow his instructions to the letter.
My heartbeat is hyperactive the entire way. I can’t get the tone of Hammer’s voice out of my head — lethal, serious, menacing. Something has him rattled and I need to be very careful, or I’ll soon find myself at best unemployed and at worst… I don’t want to think about that.
I find the forest road without any problem. The drive is familiar — this is the same road that Thrash took me down on our way to picnic by the beach. An empty expanse of asphalt, filled with trees and moss and wildlife.
We cruised these roads together and I held on to him for dear life while he tested the speedometer’s upper limits and I felt free. I try to recall that feeling and summon up that courage as I take the turnoff onto a worn dirt road, overgrown with weeds and darkened by the forest canopy.
At the end of the road, I get out of the car at the appointed place. Quiet, obedient, remembering that, at the moment, I am just a disposable cog in a very deadly machine.
Hammer’s waiting there with Lucky and a few of the club members that I recognize from the bar but can’t place a name to. They’re armed, they’re wearing their cuts, and they’re not alone.
Standing a wary distance from the Reaper’s Sons is a trio of men in suits, dressed to kill and armed to the teeth. Their pale skin and generally dour expressions tell me they’re probably Russian or Eastern European. The automatic, military-looking weapons and the look on their faces tells me they’re aching to have an excuse to kill someone.
Nobody speaks as I step out of the car. Hammer simply gestures to Lucky, who comes forward and motions for me to follow him.
I trail behind him to his bike and he hands me a helmet.
We drive back to town and, it’s not until we’re safely in front of The Smiling Skull that he breaks his silence with three words: “Tell no one.”
Those words linger as I start my car and sit, engine running, in the parking lot.
My future with the Reaper’s Sons has just gotten a little darker. I’ve seen things I wasn’t meant to see, I’ve been given a peek behind the curtain and I’ve become further enmeshed their dark little part of the underworld.
I pick up my phone and dial the only person I feel like I can talk to. The only one who makes me feel safe and self-assured despite the mess that my life is. Thrash.
“Hey,” I say.
“What’s wrong? Are you ok?”
“I’m fine.”
“You sure? You don’t sound fine.”
“I said I’m fine. Where’s mom?”
“Daisy and I are at her home. She’s doing pretty well. We’re watching Jeopardy and having some brownies.”
My eyebrows rise a little. I can’t remember the last time my mom has actually snacked. “I’ll be right there.”
Back at home, I step into a living room filled with a pungent and unmistakably herbal smell. My mother is stretched out on the couch, relaxing, with a bowl of pita chips cradled between her legs and a small container of hummus by her side. There’s a plate of brownies on the coffee table. She and Thrash both look supremely content, and bat questions and answers back and forth with Alex Trebek.
“Welcome home,” Thrash says, catching sight of me standing, gawking, in the entryway to the living room.
“Oh, hi, honey, how was your business trip?” My mom says.
I don’t even need to get close to tell that she’s high. Very high.
“What did you do to my mom?” I say, glaring at Thrash.
“I’m just helping her relax,” he says. “We got back from the clinic and she was having some pretty serious nausea. Paige said it’s important for her recovery that she makes her calorie counts and actually eats, so, I came up with a solution.”
“You got my mom high. That’s your solution?” I say. “Get out. Now.”
Thrash smiles and puts his hands up. “Fine, fine. Goodbye, Alice. And good night, Daisy.”
He doesn’t fight it — thankfully — and quietly heads out the door. I take a seat next to my mom and put my arm around her.
“Are you ok?”
“I’m doing very well, dear. I’m feeling so much better. You have no idea how nice it is to actually be able to eat something.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t able to be there for you, mom.”
“Oh, it was fine. Your boyfriend really is quite sweet.”
“He’s just a friend, mom.”
“Well, it was really nice to meet him. He took great care of me, and it was nice to have a handsome man like him to lean against. He’s so warm. You really are too hard on him.”
“I’m sorry he got you high, mom.”
“Please, I asked him to. I was feeling so nauseous when I got home, I couldn’t even keep down a glass of water. We got to talking about ways to help, and I don’t remember who brought it up first, but we got to talking about marijuana and I said I wanted to try it but I didn’t want to smoke. So, he went to the grocery store and got some brownie mix and we infused some oil and we did some baking together. It was a lot of fun, dear.”
“I’m just glad you’re feeling better.”
“You know, you should go easier on him. He might not look like it, but Jake is a good man.”
“Jake?” I say. Is that his real name?
“Or Thrash. Whatever you want to call him. He really helped me, and I’d appreciate it if you could give him some credit. Now, hush, the commercials are about over and they’re about to start Final Jeopardy.”
I sit back next to her, but I can’t focus on the TV.
I’ve misjudged him. And my mom is right, I was way too harsh on him. I really should apologize. I reach for my phone, but then I realize I haven’t heard that roar of his motorcycle starting.
Is he still out there?
“I’ll be right back,” I say to my mom, and she just gives me a dismissive wave telling me to keep quiet.
I run for the door.
I throw it open.
He’s there. In the driveway. In leather, with his helmet in his hand and a smile on his face, the whites of his teeth shining in the light of the rising moon. He knew I’d come.
I run to him.
I try to think of what to say. How to tell him that I’m an asshole for yelling at him, that I appreciate everything he’s done for me, that he really was wonderful with my mom and that I’m grateful that, for the first time in so long, she’s doing well the day she’s had a treatment.
I think and I think as I run that short distance to him, but no words seem adequate.
I stop in front of him. He’s still smiling, leaning there against his bike like he knew that this is how it’d all work out.
And it’s while I’m standing there that I realize that I how so much to thank him for, beyond helping my mom actually feel better for once. He’s helped me out in so many ways — in the business with the club, and now with my mom — that it’s not just enough to say ‘Thank you’.
So I kiss him.
My lips catch fire as they touch his and a shiver subsumes me that is both electric and incendiary, something that lights me on the inside and makes my body flush with heat. A rumble, deep and pleasant, comes from him as he kisses me back and our hands explore one another in this perfect moment on a chill California evening.
Breathless, I break the kiss and bring my lips to his ear.
“Thrash, I think I love you.”