Breaker
“How could you? How could you do this to me! To us! Breaker!” Aimee’s eyes are wide and livid as she pushes up against the two men attempting to restrain her. Her tan, muscular arms thrash from side to side, forcing a third biker to intervene and grab her by the hips.
“Get that bitch out of here! Bring her up to my office, and this time, make sure there are men up there who can actually play lookout,” Vice spits. He’s exactly how I remember him to be in the few encounters we’ve had, and that bald head with the fresh tattoos only makes him look more ominous.
Aimee screams back at me again, “Breaker! Are you serious? Why did you do this!?”
I don’t look at her, staring at the ground under my feet instead. I can’t bare to see her taken away from me, knowing that I’m the one responsible for it.
She puts up a fight all the way up the four flights of stairs. Not that I didn’t expect anything different from her. So many underestimate a girl like Aimee. They think she’s broken and rundown, but she’s much more than that. She’s got spunk and fire. She’s tenacious. I was confident of that when I made the choice to out us, and I know it’s going to get her through what comes next.
Finally, the room goes silent. About a dozen men have formed a circle around me, each with a makeshift weapon in their hands. Some clutch broken pairs of scissors from the packing supplies, while another few have pieces of plywood thrown over their shoulders. The rest have guns.
This is my cue to drop mine. With caution, I lift my bare hands towards Vice to show him I’m clear. Then, I make a motion towards my pants.
“Let me take mine out. I’ll completely unload.” I’m not even through my sentence when he lifts his chin towards two men behind me. They manhandle me, tossing my arms higher. Their burly hands travel the length of my body, finding my stash of weapons easily. One by one, they examine what I’m carrying with sly, satisfied grins. In our world, this was equal to stripping a man down.
“Is that it?” Vice asks though I’m not sure to who. I stiffen in response while the other two nod back to him. “Good. Now that that’s taken care of, I want to know who the hell you are and why the fuck you think you could get away with robbing me.”
I don’t see it coming. The guy’s fast—too fast. He lands a jab straight to my diaphragm so that the air seeps out of me like a popped balloon. Every muscle in my abs contract and the strength in my knees gives way. They hit the ground with a clunk, and I have to use my hands to keep me from falling head first at his feet.
“I’m Breaker Monroe. I—”
He interrupts me, looking towards the man I assume is his second or an assistant. “Breaker Monroe?” he growls. “I know that name. How the fuck do I know that name?”
“He’s with the Gravediggers, sir.” The second man crosses his arms over his chest; his face lit up like it’s Christmas morning. Something tells me that they’ve been looking for me.
“You’re fucking kidding me!” Vice kneels before me, not taking his steely black eyes off of me. “This pile of shit is the Breaker Monroe that got away with his men from the Eagles? This motherfucker was the one that drove the getaway for that job back in Denver? That must mean... “
“The girl. She’s probably the one that robbed Anderson at the bank!” The second man is all too eager to get in Vice’s way. Vice shoots him a look that says, “Get the fuck out of here,” and the guy scurries away obediently towards an office near the entrance. No one else bothers to speak. It’s clear who holds the balls in this club.
Vice turns his attention back to me. His long fingers pick up my chin, forcing me to look dead at him. I still haven’t recovered from the first hit; otherwise, I’d sucker punch the prick right in the damn face. But with the air still flooding back into my burning lungs, I have to listen to his slimy voice.
“I suppose it’s like that old phrase they say about fools. Rob me once, shame on you. Rob me twice, and well, I learned that lesson. Killed Anderson the day we found him on the interstate for being so incompetent. But a third time…”
“... time to get a new damn club?” I offer, knowing what was going to come next. A boot slams into my eye, knocking me blind this time. I can’t see the other men as they dogpile up on me. There’s a flurry of fists pummeling into my flesh. Low, bloodthirsty shouts batter my eardrums. Something hits my head—once, twice, and then nothing.
Everything goes blank. I fall into the darkness without even trying to hold on. The void takes me away, and I’m floating. I try to force myself awake, promising that if I could just move my arms or kick my feet, I could get some revenge. But nothing happens. It only gets darker, colder, more silent... until there is nothing.
“HELP ME! PLEASE! ANYONE! HELP ME!”
Aimee? I try to turn my head towards the sound, but the muscles in my neck won’t budge. Then there’s that whole thing with my eyes. Bruised and battered, I can only get the lids open enough that a small burst of light pops through. I try speaking next, but my lips and mouth taste like fresh blood, causing me to gag.
“No! Please! Please don’t. I’ll stop. I will. Just don’t—” Aimee’s voice rumbles through the room as if she’s right next to me, but by the echo, I know I’m most likely hearing her through a grate or through the walls of a few empty rooms between us.
I have to get to her. Every instinct tells me that I need to rescue her. Whatever they are doing in there with her is much worse than what they’ve done to me. A few cuts, some bruises, a concussion—that’s nothing. They’ll kill me quick, but they’ll torture her for what she has done to their club. And that’s a far worse fate for a person like Aimee to endure.
Wherever she is, she’s gone quiet again. The hairs on my neck stand on edge. Something ain’t right. I force my eyes open wider, and that light grows, but as soon as I can come to my senses, I realize that it’s just the light from the crack under the door. They placed my body on the floor of an open, blank room that smells of mothballs and dust clouds. The carpet under me is stained and wet. It’s most likely my blood I’m lying on, but with Vice, you never know.
The light flashes dark. The shadows of two feet, then more, pop into view through the crack. I turn everything off in my mind so that I can hear the men speak.
“You know what to do with the girl and our guest, Nico?”
“Yeah, boss. But you sure you don’t want some backup in there? I’ve heard stories about that guy. He’s not just—”
Vice walks closer to the door so that I can hear his hand take the metal handle as he responds, “Do your job. Don’t worry about mine. I’ll call you when you go to the next step.”
Quickly, I force myself up, darting towards the corner of the room so that I can use the two pieces of wall to prop myself up. The worst thing I can do is come across as weak from a little beating like that. Obviously, those guys heard the rumors about me. They know about my past. If anything, I have a reputation to uphold, and I can use that to convince Vice.
“Well, well, well,” Vice snickers, “Someone’s up—finally.”
I wonder how long I’ve actually been out for. Judging by the tiny window in the corner, the sun is just beginning to rise. So it couldn’t be more than three or four hours since we left the Gravediggers’ bar.
“You’re not looking too bad,” he continues, hardly able to contain his glee. “I’m disappointed. I thought you would have bled out by now.”
I grit my teeth and push through the pain in my stomach as I try to speak. “Didn’t want to ruin your carpet, Vice,” I pant. “That would have been rude of me.”
“That would’ve been a real issue…” He tries to hold back something, maybe a smile. This guy was a prick like me. They all are. It takes bravado and a ton of ego to get to this point of being the president of a club.
“So then, tell me, Breaker. Why the fuck are you here? Who gave away our location? And why did you turn yourself in?”
Aha. Now, he’s finally made it to the real questions at hand. I thought we’d never get here, or that I would’ve been a corpse in the back of his truck by the time it dawned on him that I gave us away to him instead of just dashing out the door with the safe in my hand.
“I have something that you want, Vice. And you have something that I need. I came here to make a deal.”
“You fucking steal my safe and pretend like you actually came here to make me a bargain?”
I cough back the taste of blood pooling in my throat, ignoring the red splotch on the inside of my fist when it’s done. “No, that was part of Biggs’ plan. He forced Aimee and me to rob you—both times, actually. Threatened to kill us if we didn’t. But when I saw you, I realized that we want the same thing.”
“And what’s that?” he asks, his eyebrows raised, clearly not convinced.
“We want the Gravediggers.”
He takes a seat in a metal folding chair camouflaged by the darkness. It creaks as he leans back with his hands resting on his head. “Are you really telling me you’re betraying your club? A guy like you takes that loyalty oath to his grave.”
“I took a fucking blood oath, man,” I spit back as I remember that day nearly fifteen years ago when I stood before the fire with my hand outstretched over a dug grave. A member cut my wrist so that it bled fiercely. He turned it towards the empty grave and let the red liquid melt with the dust of the earth and the blood of my brothers.
Their faces pop into my mind, one by one, as I add, “But I took an oath to my club, not to Biggs. He’s been running the club into the ground, stealing money from its members, and challenging us. No more. No more. So I want to make a deal with you.”
“My brothers and me,” I explain, “we tried to pull a coup. There’s talk of an uprising coming. The club is split into two factions. The oldest, most experienced guys fall in line with me and Hen—with me. They would follow me.” I stop myself with Henry’s name, unsure of how much I should share at this point.
“Huh. So what’s stopping me from finding out where your base is and taking the club myself?”
“Because we’re more powerful to you alive than dead. You go in there now, and there will be a shootout. Good men, good fighters, and business guys would be out cold trying to defend the Gravediggers. You know that. Your sect of the Eagles took out two of mine.”
He goes silent, letting me continue. “All I want is your support,” I say. “You take the Gravediggers and keep the colors like you did when you sided with the Eagles. Put a few of my guys in charge and then let us do our business. We’ll pay memberships to you for protection and some business help.”
I can tell he is mulling it over by the way his face transforms. It softens a bit, but his jaw stays jutted out like he’s chewing on my words. I need to say one more thing.
“What I also need is for you to give me back that girl. She’s no harm to you, and she wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for Biggs threatening her life.”
“You’re fucking with me, right? Do you know who the fuck you are talking to? You don’t demand that shit. I’m Vice, motherfucker! I control these highways, and those chicks! I rule every inch of this territory and beyond. And when someone messes with it, I make sure they’re never able to touch it again!”
He laughs to himself, lighting up a cigarette with a match from the inside of his pocket. “I think you, Breaker, need to meet the Devil’s new enforcer. He’d love to see you, I’m sure of that.”
Dammit! The blood in my veins boils as Vice walks away, the cigarette leaving a trail of smoke in his steps. The door closes, but I hear him make a call to send the guy up. Frantically, I scan the room for something, anything to protect myself with. But there’s nothing but that chair. I scoot myself over towards it, noting the several loose screws holding it together. As fast as I can, I take off part of the back of the chair, pocketing the screws in my hand, and taking off a metal stability bar. I place it under my leg and retreat back towards the corner.
A few minutes pass, and the door finally opens. Like a ghost, the guy’s feet shuffle towards me until he kneels down into the light. I begin to shake as I ready the bar clutched in my hidden hand.
“Well, well, well, Breaker. I thought I’d never see you again.” Henry reaches out his hand for me to grab onto, but I don’t register it in time. The bar goes flying through the air, landing him square on the shoulder hitting him so hard that he falls backward onto his ass.
“What the fuck? What the actual fuck? What the hell are you doing here, Henry? Are you working with these bastards now?” I stumble over towards him, pulling him back so I can see him for myself. Part of me wants to beat the living shit out of him for joining up with these bastards, the other part of me would rather take my own life for letting him go now that I know what he had in mind to do.
“Shit! Breaker! You fucking have to pound that into my face?”
“You came to kill me, Henry. You think I wasn’t going to try to protect myself and at least get a swing at their enforcer? I didn’t know it was gonna be you!”
“Still—damn!” He sits up, a hand on his bloodied and swollen lip. “I wasn’t here to kill you.”
“Then why the fuck are they calling you their enforcer and sending you in here to deal with me?”
“Because I am their enforcer. When you dropped me off at that field, I walked back towards the road. About twenty minutes in, I flagged down a biker I knew was with one of the local clubs. I offered my services, telling him I was on the lookout for a new, local based club. I didn’t realize then that their club was bought and paid for by the Devil’s and Vice. When they figured out who I was and worked for, they promoted me.”
“You’re fucking kidding me.”
“No, I’m not.” He lowers his voice as he says, “I’m not exactly happy to be wearing these colors, Breaker. But I gotta do what I gotta do to survive.”
“So your oath to the Gravediggers means nothing?”
“Not when they put me in a grave. And you’re one to talk? You don’t think I didn’t hear about your offer to Vice to sell the club down the river so you can get your piece of ass out of that other room? You’re lucky if she’s still alive.”
“My loyalty is for the person who’s stood by me the entire time, and that’s Aimee. You don’t think I want Biggs gone? Then you’re crazy. I want Biggs out of my club and buried in that grave I dug for you. But I can’t do it alone, not right now.”
“So you come here? Rob the club’s enemy and then try to sell your club’s secrets down the river?”
“Who’s on trial here? I’m not the one wearing their patch,” I fire back, “I’m doing what’s best for the club and for me—like I always have.”
“And you don’t think I want that?” Henry looks hurt by my accusation.
“I don’t know what the hell your endgame is here, Henry. And I don’t think I want to find out.” I hobble back towards the corner. “So if you gotta do something to me, you get it the fuck over with. I’m done waiting to be killed.”
Henry marches over, the piece of metal I used to hit him back in his hand. “Good. I’ll make it quick.”
I rise to my feet, my fists clenched, and wait for the first hit to come.