Life Lesson #2: sharing isn’t another word for stealing

➸ Yarrow ☆

The eight-foot security fence and evergreen trees keep us safe and provide privacy. I like that part. The problem is they also block my view of the world outside our complex. Sometimes, I get worried about what is outside the fence. All those years in the dark room, I thought nothing beyond my walls existed. Sometimes, I find myself peeking through the trees to prove the world is bigger than what I can see.

I’m not obsessive about checking. I leave the property enough to know the world is still out there. On some days, though, when we remain homebound, I need to know things are how I remember them.

Today is one of those days. Ginger and Oz invited the Heretics over for a backyard barbecue. The kids are out of school for fall break. Everyone is working from home or lounging. Every time I checked on a pregnant Bay, she’s sleeping. Pepper won’t stop shopping for baby things online. Clove has a sinus headache and decides to veg on her couch and binge watch House Hunters. Outside, Duffy walks circles around the pool while Makoa and Alani swim inside it. Cayenne vegges in the hot tub.

With everyone inside the property, I begin to worry the world outside the property has fallen away leaving only a dark nothingness behind.

Distrusting the security cameras, I walk to the front gate and peek through the brush to check on the road. I find quiet homes, a few cars on the road a block away, and a woman staring back at me.

“Hello,” she says when our eyes meet.

“What do you want?”

“Do you live here?” she asks, backing away and disappearing from view.

I walk to the front security door, caress the hilt of my gun for reassurance, and then step out to the sidewalk where the woman waits.

“Why are you here?” I ask.

Dressed in a red baby doll dress and black tights, the young woman has white-blonde hair and black-lined eyes.

“Is Blackjack here?” she asks rather than answering my question.

“Who’s that?”

“He’s one of the Heretics working on your property.”

“I think they’re done, and I don’t know what any of their names are.”

“He’s got a beard.”

“So?”

“I saw him go inside, and I really need to talk to him.”

Her blood-red nails dig into the already irritated skin on her arm. I watch her blue eyes survey the eight-foot fence.

“Talk to him about what?” I finally ask.

“He hurt me, and I want to know why.”

“Hurt you how?”

“I can’t say. It’s private, but you understand. You’re a woman, so you know how it feels for a man to tear you apart and toss you away like trash. Can’t you help me?”

I’ve never been able to tell when someone’s lying. The slight nuances of the face and body gestures are lost on me. With the woman scratching and looking around, I can’t get a handle on her. She seems upset, and what she’s telling me makes sense. Logic says I am on her side, but my gut says I’m on my side, and I don’t like people on the property.

“I can see if he’s inside.”

“Can I come with you?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know you.”

“I’m Annie. I told you that.”

Frowning, I don’t remember her telling me her name before. “Stay here or leave. Either way, you can’t follow me while I ask if someone named Blackjack is here.”

“I know he is. I saw him go inside.”

“Why didn’t you talk to him when you saw him arrive?”

“I couldn’t.”

“Why?”

“He went inside too fast.”

The hairs on the back of my neck stand up, and I caress my gun again. “Why do you want to talk to him if he hurt you?”

“I need to know why he hurt me.”

“Why ask him now?”

Annie swings her arms around and then drops them to her side. “Can you let me inside, please?”

“No. I’ll go get him.”

I don’t turn my back on Annie because men might be naturally evil but women are no prizes either. Cayenne likes to say, “Trust is earned,” and I agree.

Backing into the property, I close and lock the gate. I give Annie one final wary glance before hurrying around the side of Ginger’s townhome to where the barbecue grills are set up. I hear Oz’s voice first followed by one of his Heretics. They all stop when I appear.

“Need something?” Oz asks.

“Which one of you is Blackjack?”

The bikers turn their heads to look at a massive, angry man with the beard. He glares at me with nearly black eyes, and I can imagine him hurting Annie. My gaze flashes to his large hands, picturing them wrapped around a woman’s vulnerable throat. I look back to his agitated expression and hold his hard stare.

“There’s a woman looking for you.”

“What woman?”

“Someone you hurt.”

Oz steps closer to me and then thinks better of it. Blackjack, though, approaches me without hesitation. I lift my chin so I can regain eye contact now that the biker is standing so close.

“For fuck’s sake, what woman?” he growls

“Annie said you hurt her. Shouldn’t that information have narrowed down the list of women?” I ask and finally turn around to walk away. “Or do you have too many victims to remember?”

I assume Blackjack won’t follow me as I return to the front of the property. Behind me, I hear Oz speak to the other guys and hope he teaches Blackjack some manners. As for the woman at the gate, my plan is to tell Annie to forget about the awful biker who hurt her and move on with her life.

“I didn’t do shit to her,” Blackjack says only a foot behind me.

Flinching at how close he seems, I refuse to look back. “Then why does she say you did?”

Blackjack is suddenly directly behind me—the heat of his body burning into mine—and I freeze.

“I stuck my dick in her like she wanted,” he growls into my ear.

Swinging around, I immediately have my bowie knife out. Blackjack jumps out of the way when I swing the blade at him. He’s faster than a man his size should be. Despite his strength and speed, my blade knife will cut through him as easily as any other man.

“For fuck’s sake,” he says, walking backward with his hands up. “Be cool.”

Rage and fear feel almost the same to me. Destroying what I hate and fear fixes the problem, and I want to destroy this man. He has no name. No history. No reason for existing. He is the enemy who burns a heat through my cold, unaffected body.

Blackjack keeps speaking to me, but I don’t reply. There’s nothing to say. I want him dead, and he doesn’t want to die. I can’t imagine we’ll find common ground. One of us will win while the other loses. With nothing left to negotiate, I lunge with my blade and hope I’m the winner.