Chrome & Leather - The Novel (Adriana Ness ♯1) (Motorcycle Club Romance) (8 page)

“I’ll be back here by the morning. Be here and ready. We will take these fuckers apart,” said Blackjack as he turned to return upstairs. Before returning to Linda he grabbed a bunch of fresh bandages from a supply under the stairs. Blackjack paused for a second as he stuffed the medical supplies in his pocket. This well stocked closet represented the life he had chosen. He lived in a world were nearly all of his gang knew how to stitch a wound, repair damaged flesh or just generally patch up a fallen brother. He smiled blackly to himself thinking of all the shit his gang had been through over the years, what he was building, the plans he had. All of his life was built on a foundation of sand and he could feel it slipping away if he didn't focus and grit it out. His gang wasn't called the vengeful eight for nothing. He would bring a reckoning to all involved that would leave a trail of destruction a mile wide. There was no way he would not go without a fight even though in the back of his mind all he could think was, they have got the jump on you twice. He prided himself on being smarter than the average meathead biker he came across. His gang had always been smarter and quicker than anyone else. The combination of swift justice within his ranks and smart dealings on the street had allowed his gang to flourish. Maybe he had got greedy with the last few deals and that was why the had now become some sort of target.

His shoulder ached as he went back upstairs to Linda. Blackjack was surprised as his heart sped up the closer he got to the bedroom door, his palms even began to sweat a little. He hadn't felt like this around a woman in a long time. There was something special about this woman. He could see she was wounded and withdrawn because of the shitty deal she had been dealt by her dead beat husband. There was more to her than a bruised and battered woman, he could see that clearly. Behind the broken and damaged face he could see a strong and calculating woman waiting to be set free. He felt both protective and in awe of her at the same time. She had saved his life back in the bar and he would be forever in her debt. Blackjack felt that maybe she could be his equal, someone to trust as the foundation gave way and the sand pulled him and his gang towards its doom. He pushed all such thoughts from his mind as he entered the room.

Linda was dozing on the bed and roused from her shallow nightmare filled sleep as Blackjack entered. She smiled her crooked busted lip smile at him, wincing as she did so. He reciprocated with a broad toothy grin which if she was being honest with herself made him look hot. His smile looked good on his square jawed and very handsome face.

“Is everything ok?” she asked propping herself up on the bed.

Blackjack sat down on the bed as his smile slipped away and his usual stern scowl returned.

“Red is in trouble. Some masked freak is holding him until I meet him tomorrow morning,” Blackjack said. Usually he would not divulge any gang business to a woman he was with but with Linda he felt differently. He felt like she could handle anything he would tell her.

“We have to leave here tonight. Its not safe for you. I have a bolt hole in the city were we can crash for the night.”

He took his heavy leather jacket off and threw it on the floor in a heap. He stripped his tight t shirt off and Linda could see that blood had began to spot through the bandages.
 

“Do you want me to change your dressings?” Linda asked.

Blackjack got up and began pacing back and forth across the room, slowly rotating his arm in a circular motion. He grimaced with each rotation. His torso gleamed in a sheen of sweet and the muscles of his stomach tensed with every twist of his shoulder.

“It feels like I was wrong about the broken ribs. I think it just grazed them,” he said.

He continued to pace back and forth, each thud of his boot on the floor sounding like a drumbeat. As he paced across the room he began to talk and as each word was uttered he felt himself relax a little more and more.

“Do you know what this little merry band of reprobates is called?” he asked Linda.

She shook her head.

“Most of the gangs out there go for some sort of variation on the name devil. It makes them sound dangerous and evil, to me it sounds like a bunch of overgrown boys trying too hard. Its all surface level bullshit. The stupid names, the tattoos and the gang logos plastered everywhere. To be sure it spooks the normals. I see through all that bravado. We have none of that. We have no logo, no colours, none of that shit. We don't need it. My reputation is built on actions, not some fucking logo of a flaming skull with a dagger through it. Those other punks make me sick to my stomach. The shit they get involved in, human trafficking, dirty deals, selling drugs to kids, its all real seedy shit. We would never touch something like that. I couldn't live with myself if we did.”

Linda wasn't sure how to take all this. Her files had been light on information on his gangs activities, most of what they reported was second hand information from street snitches. They had no evidence on any of it, they didn't even have a name for his gang. The files simply referred to them with the designated name and number of gang 359. Was he saying all this for show she wondered? For her benefit? Maybe in his twisted way he was trying to charm her, show that he was a thug with a heart of gold. Was he changing up his pitch to her telling her what he thought she wanted to hear. Linda wasn't so sure, she couldn't put her finger on it directly, but for some reason she was believing what he was saying. It could be because of his lack of swagger or forced machismo. He was the alpha male around here and he knew it, he didn't need to layer it on for her. He seemed completely earnest as he spoke and she could see the fire inside him as he spoke. His words washed over her, the deep baritone settling into her bones. The rhythmic way he spoke was unlike anyone she had heard before. He was a leader who led not by brute force, he led by something more intangible. Linda could see why he had his reputation.

He slowed his pacing and locked eyes with Linda as he spoke, his words tumbling out of him as if the very act of talking to her was cleansing him from the inside out.

“We call ourselves the revengeful eight. Each of us became members through tackling our demons head on. Only by facing the horror that tried to break you can you burn away the ashen shell of your former fearful self and become a true member. If things go badly tomorrow we will be reduced to seven” he said laughing a hollow gallows bark.

Blackjack sat on the bed beside Linda and he looked empty for a moment a hollow carapace of a man haunted by his past deeds. The act of even telling her the name of his gang, a name he held close to his heart and a force which drove him, seemed to bow and weaken him.

Linda reached out and put her hand on his shoulder. Her skin prickled at the touch, he felt electric and alive under her palm. She ran her hand around the back of his neck and pulled him close to her. He kissed her on the lips with a soft pressure which tugged at Linda's cracked lips. She let out a small gasp, both in pain and in ecstasy.

All thoughts about the case, gathering evidence and any danger she was in fell away as Blackjack embraced her in his strong arms. He drew her in close to him as she pivoted and turned to face him, she kneeled astride him as he kissed her face and neck. Linda could feel waves of heat coming off his body as she raised her arms to allow him to tug her top off.

Blackjack kissed and breathed deeply at the soft skin of her arm pit, her scent intoxicating him and sending shivers through his body. His erection throbbed painfully in his pants as he opened up her bra freeing her breasts. He rained kisses across her dark skin, his tongue leaving a wet trail as he kissed and licked at her hardening nipples.

Linda gasped as he took one of her breasts in his hand and sucked hard at the nipple. She arched her back forward forcing herself hard against his face. Her body tingled under his touch and she quivered like a tuning fork. Her body ached for him and she could feel the sweet spread of pleasure between her legs. As much as she wanted him physically she could feel doubt and hesitation start to creep in. The danger of her situation was seeping in from the fringes of the raw animal lust she was experiencing. She could feel herself stiffen under his touch. She was moving as if in a dream, her limbs not under her own control. Her mind screamed at her to let go and don't do anything suspicious. Lust began to ebb as her fear and panic began to rise, she needed to quell this before he…

“Are you ok?” he asked pulling away from her.

For one brief moment Linda froze feeling exposed under his gaze, he knows I’m a cop her frenzied thoughts screamed. He knows everything about you, he can see the real you she thought in a spiral of panic. The seconds felt like they elongated into an eternity as she sat astride him looking into his eyes.

“I’m perfect,” she said as she leaned in and started to kiss him tenderly.

They proceeded to have sex on the bed. Linda mechanically went through the motions all the while thinking she was out of her depth already and really doubting her skills as an undercover police officer. She hoped that Blackjack would not notice her lacklustre performance or put it down to first time jitters.

When they finished Blackjack lay beside her breathing deeply and sounding contented. His eyes drifted shut as he began to doze with a slight smile on his face. Without knowing why Linda leaned over him and tenderly kissed his closed eyelid before cuddling in closer to him and drifting off to sleep.

In the dream Blackjack was buried up to his waist in sand. It shifted around him as he began to slowly sink into it. He could feel the course texture of each individual grain against his skin as he sunk in deeper. The last thing he remembered before awaking with a jolt was his head sinking below the surface and his mouth filling with sand as he shouted. He sat up shaking his head to try and dislodge the horrific image from his head.

“Are you ok?” Linda said as she awoke.

“Bad dream,” he said getting up and getting dressed.

Linda could see that whatever joy he experienced earlier was now gone. His face was drawn and taut as he dressed quickly. It softened a little when he turned to talk to her.

“We have got to get going. I have a safe house an hour away. I know some back roads that will keep us off the radar.”

“Will you be staying with me,” Linda said sounding slightly needy.

“Not tonight. Things will be different after tomorrow. I meant it when I said you are with me now. I will keep you safe. I swear to that.”

Once they were downstairs Pops called Blackjack aside once again. Linda stood in the hall trying to seem as relaxed as possible.

“I’ll ask you again. Do you want some men to go with you?” asked Pops.

“No.” Blackjack said angrily, “I’ll take the back roads. Nobody can match the speed of my bike, I would leave any fuckers in the dust that tried to catch me.”

Pops knew not to push it any further.
 

“I’ll be back here tomorrow. Be ready. Tomorrow we go to war,” Blackjack said grimly.

Linda held tightly to Blackjack as the bike fishtailed and sprayed up a wide arch of dirt as they sped away from the ranch. In the wide expanse of darkening sky above them a multitude of stars began to weakly twinkle. A few miles from the ranch Blackjack turned onto a rarely used backroad and accelerated hard. The bike roared into triumphant life as it sped off into the night. The growl of the engine declared to the stars above the onward passage of a man fighting to hold onto his world and a woman struggling to hold at bay the panic which threatened to destroy her. The bike bellowed from its chrome windpipe as they sped onward and with each passing minute it was bringing them closer to the safe house and an uncertain future.

The man stood in the middle of the road with his arms raised to the heavens. The sky was a deep black awash with countless stars twinkling in and out of existence. The man twirled in a circle and his thin rangy legs danced a stilted wooden version of a jig. He looked off into the distance and he could see the faint glow of the city off across the open plains. In the other direction the road faded off into the dark in the direction of everything of importance to the man. He stopped his dancing and shouted into the void: “All of my enemies will fall.”

A loud crackle emanated from his rear pocket followed by some garbled speech. He extracted the walkie talkie and hit the talk button.

“Say again,” he said.

“They have passed the first marker,” a woman’s voice repeated. The man returned the walkie to his pocket.

He walked over to the ditch beside the road and stiff leggedly walked down the incline to a motorbike hidden behind some low lying bushes. He removed his cargo from the leather saddle bags on his bike and walked back up the incline. His movements were not hurried as he worked. In less than a minute he had finished and he stood back to admire his handy work. On the left side of the road he had attached a thin steel cable to a roadside billboard with a faded image of a cup of coffee on it. Directly across the road he attached the other end of the cable to a speed limit road sign. The cable was pulled taut between these two points with a device the man had engineered himself. This same device also anchored it securely to the pole.

The man flicked the wire and it emitted a metallic twang. He smiled. He squatted down and with a crab like motion moved towards the wire. The wire touched the mans neck. He smiled even more broadly. He straightened up and hid with his bike. He thought to himself that the next time he heard the wire twang he might not be able to stop himself from laughing.

Three miles away a woman in a stained and ripped white dress hid in a bush not far from the edge of the road. The corner of her mouth was stained with blood and her cheek was streaked all the way back to her ear. Her eyes were unblinking as she stared at the road. A single headlight turned off the main road and swung into view. Within a minute a motorbike had speed unseeing past her hiding spot. She picked up the walkie and pressed the talk button: “Blackjack has passed me and he has a woman with him.”