Black Dogs Motorcycle Club: Full Series Box Set (43 page)

Technically, the gear was
contraband. Staff would fill a lot of requests for residents, but not for any
of this—and most of these dudes would rather die than ask their family members
for a porno magazine. Ghost knew being old didn’t make you less of a person,
and he sure as shit planned on abandoning sobriety for good once he was like
them, old and sick enough to be stuck in a place like this. This tiny group of
vintage grunts fought alongside Marty Dillon, father of Black Dogs VP Douglas
Dillon. Ghost met them years ago when Douglas was laid up with appendicitis and
asked him to make a check on his old man. Marty had since passed, but these
four were still kicking, and Ghost had been making monthly visits to their
makeshift platoon for years. He made sure they had their vices, played a little
poker, and swapped stories about war and women. He figured he got as much
pleasure out of it as they did, at the end of the day.

For Walter, Ghost also had
an extra treat—a giant Cuban cigar he’d won off of Henry Oliver, president of
the Black Dogs, but only after he’d gotten him good and drunk first.  “Happy
anniversary, Walt,” said Ghost as he handed the stogie across the table.
Walter’s face froze for a moment as he took the cigar, and then his eyes misted
up just a bit. He couldn’t say anything back to Ghost, but raised the cigar in
thanks, and Ghost nodded at him with a smile. Walter didn’t like talking about
his wife, ten years in the grave, but Ghost knew he had a ritual on their
anniversary.

“Sit, sit!” said Ben, the
oldest of the group and the only one who was confined to a wheelchair. He began
to maneuver himself to make room at the table, turning to holler at one of the
orderlies until Ghost stopped him.

“Nah, I can’t stay long
today, guys,” said Ghost. He looked forward to these afternoons, and he felt
just as disappointed as the men were, groaning and giving him sharp little insults.
“There’s a big meeting at the MC. I’ve gotta be there.”

“Pussy!” said Frank,
already cracking open one of the small glass bottles of rum. He looked around,
making sure the coast was clear, before he took a small sip and started
coughing almost immediately. The men laughed, and Frank reddened with a happy
smile.

“All work and no play
makes Jack a dull boy,” said Ben with a wag of his finger.

“True, but I basically
don’t work at all, so no worries,” said Ghost. “I ain’t gonna dull on you, old
man.”

“What do they need you at
the meeting for, anyway? It’s not like you do anything important,” teased
Walter, chewing on the cigar.

“Oh, suck my dick, Walt! I
hope the next hit contract I get is on you, so I can finally put you out of
your misery,” Ghost laughed and pointed his finger at Walk like a gun.

Walter only busted up
laughing and helped himself to a bottle of vodka.

“Hey, before you go, would
you be a pal and do me a favor?” asked Sid, looking up at Ghost from his chair.

“Sure, buddy, anything.”

“I left my lighter in my
room, and my ankles are swelling up something fierce. Could you run and go
fetch it for me so I can have it when break time rolls around?”

Ghost nodded. The silver
box lighter was a war memento, and he had never seen Sid without it.
“Absolutely.”

“Room 1434. I can’t
remember exactly where I left it, but it should be easy to find. I use the damn
thing every day.” Sid took a small keyring out of his breast pocket and dropped
it in Ghost’s hand.

“I’m a master detective,
don’t you worry.”

“Yeah, just keep your
sticky fingers to yourself!” said Sid as Ghost headed out of the common room.

“What’s that?” called back
Ghost sarcastically. “Help myself to whatever I find? Sid, you’re a gem!”

He could hear the men
laughing at him behind his back as he headed down the hall, twirling the
keyring in his fingers and whistling Def Leppard to himself. He’d been to Sid’s
room once or twice, but still took two wrong turns around Shadyside before he
found the right hallway. Everything looked so uniform, he found it wondrous
that the residents found their way around at all—especially the ones that
weren’t all there.

There were only three keys
on the ring Sid had given him, and the second one opened the door to his room.
Ghost carefully entered the small apartment and closed the door behind him.
Sunlight filtered in vertical towers across the living room floor, shining
through the sliding glass door and its hanging shades. A bloom of colorful
flowers wafted gently in the breeze on the deck outside. Ghost poked around the
living room’s warm wooden furniture, sneaking peeks in candy jars, tiny
drawers, and glass bowls filled with pocket paraphernalia, but didn’t see Sid’s
beautiful silver box lighter.

He changed his whistling
tune to the Black Eyed Peas and decided to try the bedroom. A small,
Tiffany-style lamp was on next to the bed in the otherwise dark, tidy room.
Something about the place felt very much like a woman lived here—or should have
lived here. Ghost couldn’t quite tell if it was the furniture itself, the way
the rooms were so carefully and tastefully decorated, or the tiny impractical
accents that men of Sid’s generation just didn’t seem to give a shit about
unless they were trying to please a woman. Sid had been married once, and Ghost
wondered if he had just replicated the world he lived in with her, piece by
piece, even though he was on his own. He figured there were worse ways to deal
with heartbreak.

By the light of the lamp,
Ghost searched the places in the bedroom most likely to hold his treasure, and
after just a few minutes he found the lighter nestled in the pocket of Sid’s
night jacket, a plaid, well-worn thing hanging patiently on the bathroom
doorknob.

“Goddamn, I’m good,” Ghost
said to himself, wrapping his hands around the lighter.

“Yeah? You better fucking
hope so.”

The voice behind him was
feminine—and angry. Ghost stood and whirled, expecting to find one of the
nurses. Some of them had never quite taken to him and would hassle him any
chance they got. But what he found instead was someone he’d never seen before.

She was tall and lithe,
built like an athlete, her blonde hair falling like shining fabric across her
shoulders. Even though her outfit was professional, there was aggression in
it—the solid blacks and grays, the heavy boots, the pants instead of a skirt.
She stood in the doorway to the bedroom, blocking his exit, her fists clenched
at her sides. A brown leather messenger bag that reminded him of something
Indiana Jones would carry hung at her side.

Ghost was stunned. She
could have been a supermodel. But it was the blazing anger in her bright green
eyes that made his heart stop—and his dick swell. Eight out of ten women would
have already turned and fled at the sight of a strange biker poking around a
room where they didn’t belong. But it looked like that thought hadn’t even
crossed her mind.

She squared her jaw. “Just
what the hell are you doing in here?”

~ TWO ~

Bridget

A migraine had been pulsing, teasing at the base of
Bridget’s skull since lunchtime. Fridays always had a special energy and chaos
to them, and today was no exception. Once she saw Xander Trudeau upchuck an
entire carton of chocolate milk in the lunch room, she knew it was going to be
one of those days. As she stared, furious, at the rough-looking man snooping
around her grandfather’s apartment, she felt the headache start to fade away
under a wash of rage-fueled adrenaline.

Immediately, Bridget
assumed she had stumbled onto a robbery. She knew old people were frequent
targets, but she was shocked to see someone here at Shadyside. It had been a
long goddamn time since she had been in a fight, but she was ready for it. She
realized her fists were already clenched, and some part of her brain had
already planned on how she would maneuver out of her messenger bag before she
struck. This asshole had picked the wrong day to try and mess with her family.

As she squared her feet,
Bridget took a deep breath. “I’m not going to ask you again, shithead. What the
hell are you doing in here?”

He looked her over, his
eyes lingering over her breasts, and for some reason, her fists—yet he seemed
completely unconcerned. “Valhalla, you’ve sent a Valkyrie for me, after all
this time?” said the man in a quiet, excited voice.

“Does this have to get
ugly?”

“Whoa, hey,” said the man,
raising his hands up in surrender. Bridget saw a shiny glint in his right hand.

“Are you in here
stealing
from old people?” she spit, taking two hard steps toward him. He had a good
four inches in height on her, but in that moment, she was fearless.

“No!” he said, actually
sounding insulted. He didn’t move back when she approached, but he did keep his
hands up. “What am I, some piece of shit meth addict?”

Bridget reached out and
flicked the black leather biker cut lying on his muscular chest. When she
looked up at his face with accusatory eyes, his eyebrows were raised, and a
tiny smile teased at the corners of his mouth. What was that—surprise? No…
amusement.

That only made her
angrier. “Wouldn’t be much of a stretch,” she said, holding his stare.

“Are you saying all this
bulking up I’ve been trying to do isn’t working?” said the man. He looked,
concerned, at each of his biceps. “If I’m skinny enough to be mistaken for a
meth addict, shit… I knew that guy at GNC was talking out of his ass.”

Bridget followed his gaze
to his arms and found herself instantly disagreeing with his assessment. Even
though he was on the lean side, there was not a single problem with how he had
bulked up. His biceps were cut, stretching against the thin white cotton of the
short-sleeved shirt underneath his vest. No, nothing about him suggested he was
an addict of any kind. In fact, now that she got a better look, he actually looked
incredibly healthy… and handsome.

Hey. Focus. Dangerous
stranger in your grandfather’s room, remember?

“What’s in your hand?” she
asked.

He lifted up his right
hand and revealed the lighter her grandfather always kept on his person. “I’m
just getting this for Sid, I swear. I’m not stealing anything.”

Bridget flinched at the
familiarity. “Sid? Sorry, are you telling me you’re on a first-name basis with
my grandfather?”

“Oh, shit!” said the man.
His face lit up in a smile of recognition as he looked her up and down. “You’re
Sid’s granddaughter? Man, why didn’t he tell me you’re so
stacked
?”

A weird mix of confusion
and something like butterflies washed over Bridget. “Excuse me?”

“Seriously, I am
immediately furious at him for not setting us up on a blind date years ago.
He’s been holding out on me!”

The adrenaline was dying,
now that Bridget knew she was in no danger—but the headache was returning. She
clasped the bridge of her nose. “Look, guy, it’s been a really long goddamn
day. Let’s just… let’s back up a bit.”

He folded his arms and
sighed. “Well, the year was 1979. The USSR was beginning its charming little
campaign into the desert wastelands of Afghanistan, and an album by a young
street tough by the name of Michael Jackson was hitting the charts…”

“Not
to the beginning
of your life,”
Bridget snapped. Yet she was laughing under her breath. The
weight of her tension began to dissipate.

“Oh,” said the man with a
gesture. “Sid left his lighter in here, and he asked me to come in and get it. And
so, that’s what I was doing. And then you arrived, and suddenly the world got a
little brighter.” He finished with a bold smile and held her gaze.

Bridget watched him for a
moment. She liked to consider herself a pretty good judge of character. She came
from a long line of military members, and had learned a lot first-hand when she
herself enlisted and deployed overseas. And hell, being around children and
parents for her career was basically a master course in character judgement.

Something about this man
stunk of a soldier’s bloodlust. But there was something else she couldn’t put
her finger on. She couldn’t get a full read on him, and it bothered her.

She sighed and decided she
was too tired to meet this with fury anymore. “What’s your name?”

“Ghost McBride,” he said
with a bow of his head, and a dramatic sweep of his hand. “At your service,
dumpling.”

“Don’t call me dumpling.”

“Good notes; got it.”

“I’m seriously supposed to
believe your name is Ghost?”

Ghost shook his head and
made a noise like he was deeply annoyed. “Man, you know, we all collectively
agreed to participate in Prince’s insanity when he changed his name to that
stupid symbol. And I know I’m not a guitar god, but I don’t get why everyone’s
gotta hassle me about my name. At least you can pronounce it.”

Bridget stared at him a
moment, unsure how to handle his surprising disposition. Despite herself, she
laughed and shook her head at him.

“So if I can’t call you
dumpling, what should I call you? Pumpkin? Sugar beet? Or are you more partial
to some exotic food names, like Pad Thai?”

“You can call me Bridget,”
she said with a raised eyebrow. “Like every other normal person does.”

Ghost put his hands down
and took a step closer to her. There was something else in his smile now. “But
what if I want to be a special person?”

“Call your mama, then,”
said Bridget as she put up a hand. “I’m sure she’ll tell you you’re special.”

Ghost walked forward until
her hand was pressed against the hard muscles of his chest. She swallowed
against a suddenly tight throat and tried to resist the urge to run her
fingertips down his body.

“Go ahead,” said Ghost in
a low voice. “You think these muscles are for me? Nah. They’re for you. They go
to waste if they aren’t touched by beautiful ladies such as yourself.”

Bridget hesitated longer
than she would have liked before she yanked her hand away and straightened
herself. “I’ll take a rain check, thanks,” she said. The words did not come out
as sarcastically as she wanted.

“
Nice,
” said Ghost
to himself, as if he’d won some victory regardless.

She didn’t know how this
guy was both annoying the hell out of her, and somehow the most charming person
she’d met in years. And she didn’t know why she believed his story, but she
did. After all, the front door hadn’t been jimmied open, and it was less likely
a crook would risk stealing keys off an actual resident. Sid had most likely
given him the keys freely. Still, he was clearly capable of dangerous things,
and she wasn’t about to let her grandfather go unchecked against him.

“I’ll take the lighter to
Sid,” said Bridget, holding out her hand, “and we’ll find out if you are who
you say you are.”

“Good!” said Ghost. “And
then you’re gonna feel like you missed a really great opportunity for not
touching my muscles when I offered.”

“I doubt that. The
lighter, please?”

Ghost dropped the lighter
in her open palm, grazing his hand against hers as he did. The feeling of his
skin on hers sent a jolt of desire through Bridget’s nerves. She closed her
hand over the lighter and pulled it away with a little groan of annoyance,
making Ghost laugh. She turned away from him before he could see the truth in
her eyes.

“They’re playing poker,”
said Ghost, pointing toward the wall.

“Of course,” she replied,
adjusting her bag on her shoulders. She didn’t wait for Ghost to follow, but
left her grandfather’s apartment and headed down toward the common room. After
locking the door behind him, she could hear Ghost’s footsteps as he hurried to
catch up.

The men at the poker table
let out delighted greetings when they saw her enter the common room. Her
grandfather pushed himself up on shaky legs to give her a strong hug and kiss
the tops of her hands. Bridget instantly felt lighter and happier, seeing the
smiles on her grandfather and his friends. Walter and Frank each saluted her,
and she saluted back.

“What a wonderful
surprise!” said Sid, grasping her hand in his as he sat back down. “I wasn’t
expecting you today.”

“I know. I was going to
call ahead, but I figured I’d just run this by.” She dug through the messenger
bag at her hip, pulled out a crinkled pharmacy bag, and handed it to him. “I
didn’t want to wait for their delivery guy, since the pharmacist already made
this late coming to you.”

“You’re a perfect angel,
honey. You didn’t have to go out of your way like this for me.”

“Ah, knock it off, old
man,” said Bridget with a playful smile as she leaned down and kissed the top
of his forehead.

“Seriously, Sid, we are
no
longer friends.”
Ghost came up behind her with his arms stretched out wide.
“How the fuck long have we known each other?”

“
Ghost
!” Sid
scolded. “There is a lady present!” He gestured to Bridget.

“Yeah, I know! That’s why
I’m pissed!” Ghost replied. “How long until you were going to tell me you have
a smoking-hot granddaughter, you son of a bitch?”

Bridget rolled her eyes
and crossed her arms. “I found this guy in your room. He said he was looking
for this.” She held up the lighter before she handed it to her grandfather. “I
wanted to make sure he wasn’t hassling you.”

“Who, Ghost?” Sid waved a
hand. “No, on the contrary! Ghost is a good ol’ boy. I asked him to fetch the
lighter for me.”

Ghost leaned over her
shoulder, his lips close enough to her ear that she could feel the heat of his
breath. It sent chills down her spine. “Will you be taking that
I told you
so
to go, or would you like to eat it here?”

Bridget glared at him
before she turned back to her grandfather. “All right. I just wanted to make
sure.”

“You worry too much,” said
Sid.

Bridget glanced over the
messy poker table and finally noticed the smattering of glass bottles, as well
as some magazines she hadn’t looked closely at until now. When the gents at the
table realized she spotted their porn, they scrambled to cover it up. Ghost
just laughed.

“So, you’re the one who
keeps bringing them this garbage?” said Bridget to Ghost.

“Hey,” he said, raising
his hands again, “these men are goddamn American heroes.”

“Ghost, language!” said
Sid again.