CHAPTER TWO | ACE
You could see the sign from half a mile away. The words were spelled out in faded green neon tubes that seemed to hover in the black night sky.
LUCKY BRAKE MOTORCYCLE REPAIR
It was a dumb pun, but it got the job done. Everyone who mattered knew that the mechanics at Lucky Brake weren’t really in the business of fixing busted carburetors or replacing worn out timing belts.
That’s not to say that we would ever turn away a paying customer. If some sorry shit wants to pay us top dollar to grease his chain or swap out a spark plug, we’re more than happy to oblige.
In fact, just last week we had a poser pull into the shop bitching about a strange, crunching noise coming from his engine. Took all of twenty seconds to discover the crunched up coke can that had gotten wedged in the chassis. The strange, crunching noise was the sound of aluminum scraping asphalt.
I wasn’t even gonna charge him for it until I caught him eyeing the patches on my vest.
“Uh-oh. Looks like we’ve got a real badass over here!”
He paid for that one alright. Easiest $100 I’ve ever made.
Making a little extra cash on the side never hurt— and it made it a hell of a lot easier to cook the books when tax season rolled around—but the truth is, Lucky Brake isn’t anything more than a front for the real business we’ve got going on underground.
I revved the throttle as I coaxed my bike over the curb and into the Lucky Brake parking lot.
The garage itself was a tall, rectangular structure made out of cinderblocks. At one point, the shop had been painted white and an elaborate mural of a piston and a pair of dice surrounded by flames had been stenciled on the wall and filled in with paint. Over time the white brick darkened to grey under a blanket of grime and exhaust, and the vicious desert sun bleached the mural until only an outline remained.
That was probably for the best. If the shop looked too inviting, we’d be swarming with posers. Rough edges keep away unwanted attention. And in our line of work, the less attention, the better.
It was nearly midnight, and from the street Lucky Brake looked closed for business. The parking lot was empty and the windows were dark.
I coasted around to the back of the garage, where the asphalt turned to gravel and a square lot had been cordoned off with a 12-feet-tall chain link fence. The fence walls were covered in black privacy tarp, and the top was lined with maximum-security style barbed wire.
Necessary precautions.
The fence gate was open just wide enough for my bike to pass through, and I rode over the rugged gravel.
Lucky Brake might have looked dead from the street, but the scene inside our private parking lot told another story. The fenced-off square was full to the brim with bikes, parked in jagged rows.
We’ve got a full house tonight… and that just made what I was about to do all the more complicated.
I rolled into my usual spot at the front of the lot and flicked the kill switch, then I jammed the kickstand down into the gravel and dismounted. I peeled off my helmet and hung it off of the handlebars, then I shook out my hair.
“Pretty boy hair.” That’s what the guys called it.
They weren’t wrong; dirty blonde, shoulder length, and more waves than the Gulf of Mexico at the height of hurricane season. Damn right, I had good hair.
But pretty wasn’t on the menu tonight, so I gripped my mane between my palms and tugged it back into a tight nub at the base of my neck, then I secured it with a rubber band.
My boots crunched over the gravel as I strutted towards the shop.
The back of the garage faced into the fenced off lot, serving as the fourth wall of the enclosure. The white cinderblock was decorated with the High Rollers Motorcycle Club logo. Unlike the mural out front, these colors never faded.
A single yellow flood light beamed down from the roof, illuminating the painted logo and a metal door that was propped open with a decommissioned engine block. From the outside, you’d probably assume that the door was a rear entrance to Lucky Brake. That wasn’t actually the case. Instead, it opened to a narrow stairwell that led down to the shop’s basement.
I could see the top of the stairs from the parking lot. The walls were painted black, and several tangled strings of bright red Christmas lights lit up the steps going down. Between the red glow and spooky shadows, it kinda looked like a staircase leading straight down to the gates of hell.
Rook was on door duty. He was stationed on a metal folding chair next to the door, swinging a wooden baseball bat between his knees.
Rook watched me approach, but he didn’t stand to greet me. Instead, he gave me a silent nod as I stepped through the door.
At the bottom of the stairs there was a black door, and when I pushed through it I stepped straight into a bustling casino pit.
Now when you hear the word ‘casino,’ depending on who you are, you probably think of gaudy ballrooms with gilded chandeliers and lacquered roulette tables and croupiers done up to the nines in tuxedos and bow ties.
Well, that’s not how we roll down here. This ain’t the ‘Viva Las Vegas’ Elvis crooned about, and if you were looking to play cards on a velvet-covered blackjack table while a waiter served you Mai Tais on a silver platter, then you best turn around and head back to the Bellagio, because you sure as hell wouldn’t find that shit here either. Not in High Rollers territory.
The basement I stood in now was a full-fledged casino, minus a few bells and whistles. We had table games and slot machines on the floor, and a full-service bar ran along one of the walls.
Over the bar was a grid of plasma TVs constantly playing sporting events and horse races. On game days, the club’s treasurer played double duty as bookie in the spare room behind the bar. He was damn good at it, too. We called him Banker for a reason.
The High Rollers Casino might not be much to look at. We’d gotten poured concrete floors and brick walls, and instead of gold chandeliers we had Christmas lights and a disco ball (don’t ask). But the boys and I built this casino from the ground up, and you could bet your ass we were proud of it.
Success didn’t happen overnight. We started small: placing bets, poker games, that kind of shit. And it was Motorcycle Club only. If you weren’t in a club, you weren’t in the game.
When Buck became club president, that rule got thrown out the window. Once we were public, business really started booming. I’m talkin’ more games, crazier bets, higher stakes, and much bigger payouts. Within a matter of months our quiet little side gig had blossomed into a bonafide gambling ring, and the High Rollers Motorcycle Club suddenly had more cash than it knew what to do with.
Turns out Notorious B.I.G. wasn’t kidding around when he said more money, more problems. We had tens of thousands of dollars worth of illegitimate income streaming in and out of the club every month, and we were running out of ways to wash it clean. It was only a matter of time before someone noticed; the feds, or worse, one of those rent-a-cop losers over at the Gaming Commission.
We needed an honest front to hide our dishonest dealings; a sham business that could explain large cash deposits and vague outgoing expenses. It could have been anything: a laundromat or a car wash or even a strip club. Finding a vacant garage on the edge of town was like hitting the jackpot… and the fact that it came with a basement just sweetened the deal.
Lucky Brake Motorcycle Repair officially opened for business the same day that we cut the ribbon on the High Rollers gambling den in the shop’s basement. The garage didn’t see a paying customer for the first six months that we were open, but the books told a different story. We were turning a pretty hefty profit, and Banker saw to it that every last dime was accounted for and washed. He even found us tax write-offs.
A lot of that income got invested right back into the business. Loans and financing plans are non-existent when you’re operating an unlicensed casino out of your basement. If you can’t pay out of pocket, then you’re just shit out of luck. Luckily cash isn’t the only currency underground, and good ol’ fashioned bartering helped us out a hell of a lot more than a high-interest loan from a greedy corporate bank. The state-of-the-art chrome beer tap dispenser that glistened at the bar was proof of that.
I could have damn sure used a drink right about then, but I had a job to do. So I bypassed the bar and walked through the crowd of patrons, making my way towards the back of the basement.
Edge was waiting for me, arms crossed and back pressed against Buck’s office door. He straightened when he saw me.
“About damn time,” he muttered, then he glanced at my hair and cracked a smile. “Hey, that little manbun is a good look for you. Really shows off your cheekbones.”
I scowled. This was no time for jokes.
“I came as soon as I got the call,” I told him, then I nodded at the office door and asked: “Is he in there?”
“Yeah,” Edge said, but he didn’t move away from the door. “I already roughed him up a bit. I could have finished the job, too, but…” his voice trailed off.
It was no secret that the club’s president played favorites, especially when there was a job that needed to be done… and needed to be done right.
I wasn’t the strongest muscle in the club by any means, but Buck knew that he could count on me. And around here, that kind of loyalty packed a greater punch than any fist ever could.
Some of the guys got jealous of that, but I wasn’t sure why. There was nothing glamorous about getting called to the casino in the middle of the night because someone needed their ass handed to them.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” I told Edge. “You were just supposed to keep the situation contained until I got here.”
“Why does it matter who pulls the trigger? Whether it’s you or me… he winds up dead either way. This punk practically signed his own death certificate when he decided to count cards at the High Rollers Casino.”
“Is that what happened?”
“Buck didn’t tell you?”
“I didn’t ask,” I shook my head. I never did. What was the point? It wasn’t the executioner’s job to pass judgement on the condemned.
“He came with a few friends,” Edge explained. “They were in on it too, but they booked it as soon as they realized we were on to them. They’re long gone now.”
“Fuck.”
“I know. But they were just pawns. This guy? He was the mastermind; the brains behind the whole thing.”
“You sure about that?” I asked. “How do you know he was counting cards?”
“He made five g’s the first hour he was here,” Edge said. “He probably would have made a hell of a lot more, if I hadn’t pulled him off the floor.”
I whistled. Five g’s? That was a lot of dough. The club had killed for less than that before. I slipped on my leather gloves, then I nodded for Edge to open the door.
He let me enter the office first, then he followed me inside and locked the door behind us.
Buck’s office wasn’t much of an “office” at all. If you were looking for a desk and bookshelves and metal filing cabinets, you’d find ‘em in Banker’s bookkeeping den behind the bar. Buck’s office, on the other hand, was more of a multi-purpose room; four windowless brick walls, ready and waiting for whenever a need arose.
Tonight, there was a metal chair in the center of the room, and the man accused of counting cards was strapped to it with—Christmas string lights?!
My eyebrows shot up and I glanced at Edge.
“Really?”
“It was all I could find,” he hissed back with a defensive shrug.
I rolled my eyes. This was why Buck left the dirty work to me.
Besides the crude bindings, Edge had bound the suspect’s wrists and ankles with plastic zip ties. His head was covered with a white plastic shopping bag; the kind that has THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU printed in bright red letters. Only now, the words were obscured by blotches of red that stained the inside of the bag.
Blood. Edge really had roughed him up.
When the man heard us step into the room, he immediately started thrashing around on the chair. He tried to scream, too, but his attempts were muffled. Duct tape, probably. Or, knowing Edge, something worse…
“Hey Bobby!” Edge said in a sickly smooth voice as he strutted into the room. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”
I expected him to introduce me, but instead Edge reached around for the gun wedged in the waist of his jeans. The gun made a loud metallic click when he ejected the magazine, and the man on the chair immediately froze.
“Have you ever played Russian Roulette, Bobby?” Edge asked. He slipped a round of ammo into the magazine, making as much noise as possible.
The man on the chair remained perfectly still, and Edge jammed the magazine back into the gun with a loud CLICK.
“I guess it’s not really your kind of game,” Edge continued in that same cheery voice. “It’s not like counting cards, is it?”
He raised the gun slowly towards the man until it was pressing gently at his skull through the plastic bag. The man started whimpering again, and his body started to tremble.
“Knock it off, Edge,” I grunted under my breath. He ignored me, keeping the gun pressed to the man’s head:
“Sure, you can count how many rounds are in the magazine, or you can do some fancy equation to calculate the probability of a bullet firing into your skull when you squeeze the trigger…”
“I said KNOCK IT OFF!”
“But the truth is, there’s no strategy that’s going to save you,” Edge clamped his finger over the trigger. “You can’t cheat. You can’t scheme. It just comes down to dumb fucking luck.”
He pressed down on the trigger and the gun clicked softly. There was no bullet; the chamber was empty.
Then I heard a soft trickling sound, and Edge and I both glanced down to see a puddle of urine forming on the concrete floor.
“Oh for fucks sake, Bobby!” Edge grunted in annoyance.
“That’s it,” I barked. “Give me the gun.”
“Ace—”
“GIVE ME THE FUCKING GUN!”
Edge looked like a little kid who just had his favorite toy taken away. His shoulders sunk down in defeat as he slammed the grip of the gun into my palm, then shuffled towards the man strapped to the chair.
“Game time’s over, Bobby,” he muttered as he untied the plastic bag that was pulled over the man’s head. “Your fate is in Ace’s hands now.”
I loaded nine more rounds of ammunition into the magazine and locked it into place. I was just about to load the first round into the chamber when I glanced up and saw Edge rip away the plastic bag that was covering Bobby’s head.
One look, and I felt the wind get knocked straight out of me. The gun immediately dropped to my side.
“Jesus Christ,” I muttered, rubbing my forehead with my leather-gloved hand.
“What?” Edge shrugged. “What’s the problem?”
“He’s a fucking KID, that’s what!”
The card-counter didn’t look a day over eighteen. How the hell he wound up at a place like this was beyond me… but that was the least of my concerns right now.
“You still need to take care of this,” Edge reminded me. “Boss’s orders, remember?”
I stared at the boy on the chair, and he stared back at me. His eyes were leaking tears of desperation. Add that to the acne scars and broken glasses that had been knocked crooked on his swollen nose—Edge’s handiwork, no doubt—and all I could feel for the kid was pity.
He must be the same age as my brother, I realized. Hell, he could be my brother...
I blinked my eyes and in that split-second flash of darkness, I saw the image of my younger brother’s face.
Asher.
I forced my eyes to open, but it was too late. My brother’s face had already been burned into my brain. When my eyes flicked back to the kid strapped to the chair, I didn’t just see Bobby anymore. I saw Asher, too.
“Goddammit, Ace, just shoot the motherfucker!” Edge shouted.
Bobby’s face turned bright red and tears streamed from his eyes. He pleaded for his life, his voice muffled by the duct tape.
“SHOOT!” Edge shouted.
I had to do something. I knew I had to do something. But I also knew that I couldn’t shoot this kid. So instead, I raised the gun over my head and with one swift thrust I slammed the butt into the boy’s head.
His body immediately went limp and he slumped down in the chair, unconscious.
“What the fuck?!” Edge gawked, flicking his eyes back and forth between me and Bobby.
“I’m not shooting a kid,” I snarled. I opened the magazine and let all ten rounds spill out and clatter onto the floor.
“But Buck—”
“If Buck has a problem with that, he can take it up with me himself.”
“Then how exactly do you plan on handling this situation?!” Edge demanded. “We can’t just let him walk out of here like nothing happened.”
“Of course not,” I agreed. Then I added: “You’re going to dump him.”
“What?!”
“You’re going to drive up the 157 until you cross the county line and hit desert,” I said. “Then you’re going to find a spot on the side of the road to drop him off. Not too far. Just a mile, maybe two. Far enough to teach him a lesson, but not so far that it actually kills him.”
“You really think that’s a good idea?” Edge asked skeptically. “What if he goes to the cops? What if he comes back here?”
“After the shitshow you put him through tonight?” I scoffed. “I don’t think we’re going to see or hear from Bobby ever again.”
And if Edge disobeyed me, he knew he had another thing coming.