Death Lords Motorcycle Club: Annie, Michigan, and Easy (The Motorcycle Clubs Series) (18 page)

“Hey Annie!” Wrecker yells out. Wrecker’s Judge’s only son. He and his girlfriend, Chelsea, were a year behind me in school and their relationship rivals mine in the most gossiped about. Chelsea and Wrecker grew up together as brother and sister. She’s Judge’s stepdaughter.

“Morning, Wrecker.” I wave my hand at him. Out of the two of us, I don’t know who is more scandalous—Chelsea or me. Shacking up with two men is almost better than sleeping with your stepbrother in some folks’ minds. Judge and Wrecker cast long shadows but they aren’t everywhere that Chelsea goes and they aren’t able to fully shield her from the snide remarks and judgmental looks.

I didn’t know either Chelsea or Wrecker well. They were part of the crowd my father had warned me against, and at seventeen I still paid attention to everything he said because I clung to him as my only family.

But my eyes wandered and my heart wondered. I watched as the Death Lords road into town, riding two by two down the street. Their loud engines set off car alarms and hormones. They walked the sidewalks of Fortune like they owned them, wearing their tight jeans and their loose fitting leather vests full of patches.

I'm beginning to understand that that confidence comes from their feeling of belonging. That no matter what they do, someone else has their back. I kind of feel that way now with Michigan and Easy.

I heard about the mashes that took place out at the old granary on Friday and Saturday nights. They were supposedly full of every vice and wickedness that man could dream up.

Having been to a couple, the gossip isn’t far from the truth. I’ve seen more couplings and in different positions than I’d ever imagined was possible. Women taking on more than just two men and men enjoying the attentions of two or three women at a time. Sometimes there’s so many bodies enjoying each other, it’s hard to tell where the group starts and stops.

I think the pheromones in the mashes set everyone off. I don’t have any desire to be part of the group sex scenes but I won’t deny it’s easy to get turned on by watching it. At first, I was embarrassed but Michigan and Easy get so pleased when I’m turned on that it’s hard to hold on to that shame unless you try hard. And I’m trying hard to let all those prejudices from the past go so that I can enjoy everything that I have access to.

Meaning if I get excited because Easy’s whispering dirty things in my ear while we watch a woman taking a big man down her throat, there’s nothing wrong with that. And there’s certainly nothing bad about enjoying Michigan’s big, capable hand between my legs as we both watch Easy play poker. And I’d never say no to the two of them leading me upstairs to the top floor and finding an empty room so that one of them can kneel between my legs and the other one feeds my mouth full of his penis.

Shoot, just thinking about all of that is making me flushed and wet.

My panties are starting to stick to me and I wonder if I should just take them off. Nothing worse than wet panties.

“What are you thinking about, baby?” Easy growls in my ear. I catch a glimpse of myself in the long glassed in window that separates the office from the main garage. My eyes are glittering and my mouth is half parted.

“Stuff,” I mumble.

“Sure you are.” He strokes a hand down my back and over my butt and I can’t stop the shiver of longing in response. His head lowers as if he’s going to kiss me which would lead to me climbing him like a tree and then we’d need to find some private place where we could both get off.

“Annie, I’m surprised to see you,” Judge says, interrupting the eye sex Easy and I were having. He wipes his dirty hands with a cloth, one that is not much cleaner than his hands and I don't know that he gets any of the grease off. But I take his hand anyway because this is a working garage and a little grease never hurt anyone.

“I’m going a little stir crazy at home and thought I’d come in and start working.”

“She’s also pregnant,” Easy adds.

“Van Beasley!” I smack him across the shoulder, calling him by his Christian name. All thoughts of taking him to the back room and making the ache between my legs go away are replaced by me strangling him in the back room. “That was a secret.”

He shrugs because my slaps against his rock hard shoulder probably feel like a gnat bite. “He’s your employer. Figured he should know.”

Judge pounds Easy on the back. “Congratulations, brother. No better time than when your woman is pregnant.” He bends down and looks at me. “Don’t know that you should be working here, though.”

“That’s what I said,” Easy replies and folds his massive arms across his chest. Judge does the same, forming a wall of seemingly impenetrable testosterone. And this makes me angry enough to glare at Easy
and
Judge.

“I’m perfectly fine,” I retort and turn toward the office door. “Easy, you go on now. We agreed that I’d call you.”

He shoots a finger at me. “First thing you contact the doctor. And call if you need anything.” The words are supposed to be for me, but he’s looking at Judge the whole time.

Judge nods and I roll my eyes at this preemptory activity. “I’m fine,” I repeat and leave the two behind as I stride into the office. Outside I can see the two of them still talking. Judge claps a hand on Easy’s shoulder and then Easy finally leaves.

Judge reappears. “It’s pretty smelly around here so you stay in here until you get the all clear from the doctor.”

“I wouldn’t do anything to hurt the baby and there are plenty of women who work up to the day they deliver.” I can hear my voice getting a little shrill.

“Okay, fair enough. I see that you got overly protective men all over you and you don't need one more.” He grins. “Don’t expect them to let up, though, now that you’ve got their kid in your belly.”

I make a face. “Let’s talk about what you need from me.”

The office is full of paper. There are stacks of it everywhere. A pile that is about two feet high threatens to tumble over the side and into a waiting trash bin. In fact, as I peer over the desk, it looks like there are a few that have fallen into the trash. Judge places a big palm on top of the teetering stack.

“I’ve paid all the bills but they should be filed. Last year I wasted a whole month trying to get everything in order for my accountant. That sucked so I’m not doing that again. You file everything and then start keeping track of all of our expenses and our income. If you need supplies you just take it out petty cash.” He walks over to the steel gray filing cabinet in the corner and pulls out the top drawer. Inside is a small metal box which I see holds several hundred-dollar bills.

“No lock on the money box?” I ask.

Judge slams the drawer shut. “You’d have to have a death wish to steal from me.”

Good point.

“I suspect cleaning this office up will take you at least a couple of days but if you finish sooner here's the parts catalogs for the engines we build. You should get to know this shit and the ordering process. Easy said you did some bookkeeping for the church?”

“I did all the bookkeeping for the church.”

I smile at the idea Judge the outlaw paying taxes and keeping books.

“What’s that smile for?”

“I don't know.” I shrug, embarrassed at being caught. “It just seems like taxes is something that outlaw motorcycle club shouldn't be worried about.”

Judge raises an eyebrow. “Wheels Up is my business and has shit all to do with the club. And Al Capone was taken down for taxes, honey. No man messes with the IRS.”

Judge leaves me with a pile of work and I'm grateful that there is so much of it. Concentrating on sorting the bills alphabetically, making sure that they been entered properly into the software program which fortunately is very close to the one that I used at the church, makes it easy for me to think about things other than my messed up personal life.

“
W
e need
to take care of business,” Easy says on the phone as I'm driving back to Fortune.

“It’s about time.” I’ve been waiting to clean house ever since I saw Annie in her dad’s basement nearly flayed alive. It eats at me that the man who spawned her is breathing the same air as us.

“There’s just too much on her plate right now. Someone looking suspiciously like Annie and claiming to be her mother showed up at the house today.” I hear the clink of metal against metal. Easy must be at the granary today working out.

“We doing her too?”

“I think we ought to hold off on that but I’m not opposed because I can see Annie getting stressed out about it and I don’t like that, particularly now she’s pregnant. Let’s see how it all shakes out. I talked to Judge about having a vote over getting rid of Bloom.”

“How’d he take that?” My fingers tighten around the steering wheel. Either way, approval or no approval, Bloom is going down. I’d prefer it if we had the okay from the club but I’m killing him no matter what.

“He has no problem with it so long as there is no blowback to the club. He also reminded me that it's hard to parent while you’re prison.”

“Yeah, I guess.” I’d killed my share of men and never once had a whiff of the law on my tail. I knew how to kill and how to make sure we’d get away with it. Judge should know that too. Most of the deaths occurred because he’d ordered them.

“So one of the questions they asked me at the clinic today was whether we wanted to have a paternity test.”

Shit that had not occurred to me. I knew there were whispers around town about our living arrangements. Easy and I were not shy when we went out with Annie. One or both of us had our arm around her at all times. She’s ours and we like making our claim public. Not everyone is accepting of us but I don’t give two fucks. “What’d Annie say to that?”

“I think she rather not know. I figure any baby that comes out of her belly is both of ours.”

“Agree.”

“Good, then I think we ought to move up our wedding plans get you hitched to Annie.”

“What’s that mean for you?”

“It’s your name going on the birth certificate, I suppose, and the baby would have your last name but I’m okay with that. We can do it the other way with the next baby she has.”

“That’d get tails wagging.” I snort.

“Yup but as long as we’re okay then it don’t matter. We just all need to be on the same page. Doesn't matter to me what piece paper says,” Easy says. “What matters to me is that we take care of Annie and that we live a good, happy life with plenty of fucking and laughter. Hell, with three parents, we ought to have a passel of kids.”

“You’re not the one who has to pop them out.”

“Good point. Maybe a half a passel then. Like a basketball team instead of a baseball team.” Easy’s clearly thrilled with being a daddy. Me? I’m a little terrified. I know nothing about parenting other than not to abandon the kid. But maybe just showing up is half the battle.

Speaking of shitty parents, though. “What's the deal with Annie’s mom?”

“No clue.” He grunts and I wait for the clang as the barbell hits the posts. “Annie didn’t take it well. She nearly collapsed and begged me to take her to Wheels Up. I dropped her off there and she's promised to call the doctor. She says it’s okay so long as she stays away from any fumes. Judge got her a mask she’s supposed to wear if she goes into the garage but the office should be fine.”

I’m not a fan of Annie working. “Aren’t pregnant women supposed to be at home in their bed?”

“Yeah, you don't want to bring that up with her. If you do then make sure I'm there.”

“So you can back me up?”

“Oh hell no. I want to watch the explosion.” He laughs.

Okay, so telling Annie to stay home and lie in bed all day isn’t one of my better ideas. “I’ll be in town in about 45 minutes. When are we having church?”

“Before the mash on Friday night.”

“Sounds good.” I lean over to press the end call button when Easy pipes up.

“One more thing. We’re taking Mom out to dinner tonight.”

“Come again?”

He snorts his disgust at the whole thing. “She thought she’d stay with us and so I lied and told her we had too much construction going on. You might want to put a couple paint cans in the guest room just in case. I have a feeling that Annie's going to end up asking her mom to stay with us.”

“Why can’t she stay at Bright’s Motel?”

“I suggested that but the chick was not happy with that idea. My guess is she’ll play the poor me routine at dinner and Annie will cave.”

Someone calls his name. “I’ve got to go, but my grandma says that Mrs. Bloom is ‘vain and selfish’ so approach with caution.”

“Do I pretend I'm a friend?”

Easy snorts. “Fuck no, man. We don't hide who we are to no one, least of all Annie's deadbeat mother.”

I hang up and stew for the rest of the ride back to the factory where I trade the delivery truck for my bike. Mrs. Bloom's appearance raises a whole host of questions, not the least of which is she has why she thinks she's got to stay with her daughter she hasn’t paid an ounce of attention to for years.

When I roll up to our house, there’s a powder blue four-door Honda sitting next to the curb. After pulling into the driveway, I watch in my rear view mirror as she steps out of her car. Part of me can appreciate that this is a good-looking woman and that Annie’s going to be a good looking woman when she’s fifty too or however old her mom is. But mostly I’m wondering what the hell she's doing casing our house. Has she been parked there all morning?

I park my bike on the cement pad we laid shortly after buying this place. The house was a shit hole when we bought it four years ago. Since then, we’ve put a lot of time and sweat equity into fixing it up. It has a new roof, new siding, and all new appliances and flooring. After convincing Annie to move in, we added on a brand-new bedroom and bathroom to accommodate our new family. One of the existing bedrooms will have to be turned into a nursery. Fuck. A nursery. A big ass grin spreads over my face. It’s finally sinking in. I’m going to be a dad. My baby is growing in Annie’s belly and after some months we’re going to have a little person in the house. Hooleee shit.

Maybe I didn’t have any good examples of parenting growing up but I can use that as a guide toward what not to do.

I slide my leg over my bike and amble toward the side door cut into the garage. I can see her closing in but I pretend I don’t and step inside the garage, locking the door behind me. From inside the garage I can hear the doorbell ring. The shrill sound echoes once and then twice as she impatiently presses it again as if I didn’t hear the damn thing the first time.

I take my sweet time hanging up the spare helmet I had to wear since my main one is cracked after I'd thrown it against the wall. I'd have to get a replacement for that. I stop to get a drink of water in the kitchen and the doorbell rings three and then four times.
Impatient cuss
, I think. I rinse out my glass and turn it upside down on a towel to air dry and then finally go to the front door. I open it a crack.

“Sorry, no soliciting here.”

“Oh, I’m not selling anything.” She smiles innocently. “I’m Annie’s mom. I heard she lives here.” She tries to peek into the house but my big frame blocks any view. Oh she’s selling something all right. It might not be good but she wants something from us or Annie.

I don’t know a hell of a lot about Annie’s past other than this woman ran off with another man and had only the barest contact with Annie after she left. Shacking up with another man isn’t where she went wrong; it was not taking Annie with her where she tripped up. The fact she’s trying to claim some kind of relationship now makes me suspicious and disinclined to treat her with any degree of welcome.

“That's nice,” I say in a tone which tells her I think it’s anything but. If Annie were here, I might act differently for Annie’s sake. But she’ not here and all I can think of is that this woman walked away from her daughter and left her in the hands of a man who cared more about his appearance to his congregation than he ever did about his daughter.

“Mind if I come in?” she asks. She flicks her hair back in a move that I’d have said was a come on if it were done by club ass. Based on what Easy said about her being hooked on her own looks, I’ll chalk it up to habit rather than intentional flirtation. There are some women, no matter what age they are, that just like to kiss ass. She might be one of those.

I want to close the door in her face but decide I better not so I step back and allow her inside. Manners I didn't know I had prompt me to ask her if she wants a drink.

“I’ll take a vodka and orange juice.” She gives me my order and then walks into the living room. Her hand rubs the leather of the couch as if she’s testing to see if it’s real or something.

“We’ve got Dr. Pepper, water and beer.” Dr. Pepper is Annie’s favorite.

“No liquor? How quaint. I’ll take a glass of water then.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Oh gosh.” She laughs. It sounds like a bird. “Don’t call me ma'am. That makes me feel so old and I’m only a few years older than Annie. Child bride and all, you know. That's how people do it in religious communities. We aren’t allowed to have sex until we’re married so we marry very, very young.”

I scratch my head and then head for the kitchen to get this woman a glass of water. I don’t care how old she is and it’s strange as fuck that she thinks I would.

I stomp back into the living room and hand her the glass of water. She’s settled onto the couch and her short skirt is riding up so high I think her panties are showing. I avert my gaze. If there’s one woman’s cooch I don’t want to see, it would be Annie’s mom. “Nice place you got here. This sofa is really comfortable.”

“We like it,” I say. I don’t tell her why. We like fucking Annie there because one of us can stand behind the back of it and have her suck us off while the other one pounds her in the ass from behind. Or she can ride us, either reverse cowgirl or straight on doing the same. One in her mouth and the other in her cunt. So yeah, I like the couch a lot. What I don’t like is the way Annie’s mom is patting the seat as if she wants me to sit next to her. I fold my arms and stand by the entryway.

“I hear that Annie has moved in with you. Is that just a temporary thing while the issues with her father are being worked out?” At my stony response, she hurries to add, “I’m asking because I’m concerned about my daughter.”

“Seems it’s a little late for you to be concerned about her. After all, she’s two now, not eight.”

She smiles, not at all feeling any shame at leaving her young daughter to go pursue her own jollies. “You never stop worrying about your daughter. Her father kept us apart all these years. After I read about what happened in the newspapers, I had to come down and see how she was, no matter what her father demanded.”

She’s got a full line of bullshit she wants to feed me and it makes sense to just let her spit it all out. I nod for her to continue and she does. “I’ve been out in Seattle and had come back for a visit and I saw the whole sordid story in the paper. It’s been covered extensively in all the city newspapers because it’s so sensational. A small town pastor beating his adult daughter and then being arrested for it.”

Her narration has a sort of sick breathless quality to it as if it is about strangers, not her own flesh and blood.

“I bet,” is about all I can manage. “Why don’t I fill your glass for you?” I snatch up the barely drank glass and speed into the kitchen needing to get away before I give into my urge to deck this woman. Shit, I have to be able to do a better job than her at being a parent.

Unfortunately she follows behind me. I dump out the water and then pour her a new glass. When I turn to give it to her, she’s practically up my ass. I take a step to the side and feel a brush of a hand against my groin. Did she just touch my junk? Nah, I must’ve imagined that. Still, I move away and lean against the refrigerator as she walks around inspecting our small kitchen. 

“They tell me that Annie’s got two boyfriends and that they all live together in sin. Is that right? That she’s sleeping with both of you? How scandalous!” Her eyes are roving all over me as if she’s measuring me. “How long did you know Annie before you started seeing each other?” she asks, trailing her fingers over the granite counter top. 

“A while.” Days, really. Easy saw her first at the library when he was sent in by Judge to make sure some skinheads didn’t hassle his woman, the town librarian. Annie was volunteering. He came back to the club that night and had no interest in the sweet butts strutting around the granary.

He told me he’d found the one. I tried to resist it because I didn’t believe him. Some pastor’s daughter who blushed when he flirted with her was not going to jump into bed with two strangers. He ignored me, gave her his claiming cuff, and that was that. He was right. Not only did she take his claiming cuff, but she wore mine as well. 

“I heard that you all barely knew each other. Don’t you think you’re a little too much man for Annie?” She steps toward me, crowds me really. 

“I think Annie’s got it under control."

“Both of you, though? I saw your friend earlier.” She sweeps her hand along the outside of my biceps in an unmistakable caress. “Maybe she could handle one of you but two? You should think about someone who has a little more experience.”

I push away from the refrigerator and walk to the front door. I wrench it open. “Time for you to go.”

She hesitates but under my unrelenting glare, finally scoots out. She puts a sway in her hips but I slam the door shut immediately. I don’t wait to see if she leaves before jumping in the shower. I don’t want any of her on me when Annie comes home.