Finding Allie (8 page)

“You okay? You seem a little...off,” she says.

“I’m, well...no. I’m not okay. I have a question. What do you know about motorcycle clubs?”

“You mean biker gangs?”

“That’s another term for it,” I say in a prissy voice.

She laughs. I can hear her confusion. “I watch
Sons of Anarchy
sometimes with my friends. They pirate it. We can’t afford cable. But that’s about all I know, Allie. Why? Did those bikers start another fight in the bar, or did Charlie Hunnam come to visit you last night and pop your cherry?”

I start choking. Chase doesn’t look anything like Charlie Hunnam, but she’s awfully close to the truth. I want to tell her so badly it aches inside. Something stops me.

“Right. Like I’d ever be that lucky,” I finally say, gasping to catch my breath. 

“Then why are you asking about bikers?”

“A bunch of them came into the bar, and now I’m just curious. One of them said something about Mom—”

“Who? What? Some outlaw biker knew Mom? What did he say?” Marissa’s voice is so upset and urgent that I want to take the words back. I wish I’d never brought this up.

“He just looked at me and said I look like Mom.” It’s easier to just say part of the truth than all of it.

Marissa lets out a deep, long breath. “He’s right. You do. Of the two of us, you look the most like her.”

“I know.”

We sit in silence, the seconds tickling. The quiet is comfortable. If we can’t be there for each other in person, at least we can be someone to turn to by phone.

“That’s weird, though, that he knew Mom. I wonder...no. Never mind,” Marissa says quickly.

“What?”

“I was just thinking something stupid.”

“What?”

“Maybe we could ask Jeff if he knows the biker.”

Oh, boy.

This is getting way, way too complicated.

“Ask Jeff something like that? He’ll bite my head off.”

“And serve it as an appetizer for happy hour tonight,” Marissa adds with a double dose of bitterness.

We both laugh, but it isn’t a happy sound.

“Wait a minute,” she says slowly. “Is this about that guy?” 

I stop breathing.

“Allie?” she says, drawing out my name like I’ve been a bad little girl.

And she’s kind of right.

I cringe. “Yeah?”

“You mentioned some guy. Chase Holland or something like that. When I was on the phone with you the other night.”

“Chase Halloway,” I say, correcting her. I can’t help it.

“Is he a biker?” Her voice is filled with steel and judgment. I feel like a little kid who did something wrong, knows it, and can’t help myself.

Yep. That describes me right now. Exactly.

“Um, maybe?” I squeak.

“Oh, God, Allie. No. Just...no. Those guys are killers!”

“What? Chase never killed anyone!” Now I’m mad at her. Who says something like that? She’s my sister and I love her, but now I’m angry. Chase would never, ever murder someone. He dealt drugs because his father gave him no choice, but killing someone? No. 

“Allie,” Marissa says in a forced-calm voice. “That’s how biker gangs work. If you’re in the gang, you have to kill for the gang. Everyone knows that.”

“You know that from watching
Sons of Anarchy
,” I scoff. 

“I know that because I read the freaking newspaper and watch the news, Allie. Ask your new boyfriend.” She says the word in a mocking tone that makes me want to reach through the phone and slap her.

“I’ll ask him. But I know the answer already.” My voice feels dead.

“Hmm,” is all she says.

I hate this. We never fight. She’s my lifeline, the only person I can talk to about anything. Without Marissa I’m completely lost.

“Why’d you really call?” she finally asks in a grudging tone. “You didn’t call to argue about bikers.”

The tree-man from my nightmare last night pops into my mind. He still has no face. “I, um, had a nightmare. A really weird one. And I don’t have any friends here, and no one to talk to about it.” I’m still angry, though. The thought of Chase killing someone because it’s a motorcycle club requirement won’t get out of my head. I’m upset that Marissa put the idea in my head.

And now it’s there, like a weed that spreads its seeds as far as possible to grow and choke out all the good plants.

Someone opens the front door to the bar. Weird. I thought I locked it.

“We’re not open yet!” I call out.

“I’m not here for a drink,” says a man’s voice. The sun is blinding behind him, and I can’t see his face. Then I realize I do know that voice.

“Hey, Marissa. Gotta go. David’s here for a visit.”

“Tell him I said ‘hi.’ And Allie—David’s way better than some biker gang member.”

Click
. I hang up on her. It makes my stomach hurt and my heart sing. Both at the same time. 

As he closes the door, David’s features come into focus, his footsteps banging on the scarred wood floor. This time of day, with an empty bar, the room seems so stark.

David and I are friends. Just friends. We’ve never dated, even though half of this stupid town seems to think we did. He’s the opposite of Chase, with dark hair, deep, brown eyes, and a shorter stature that makes David barely taller than me. We almost look like we could be siblings, except he has more Native American blood in him than I do. My mom used to say we were kissed by the Great Spirit, and all I have are high cheekbones and a bloodline so diluted I don’t qualify for Native American college scholarships. David does. He’s going away soon on a full ride.

“Allie, what’s up?” he asks as he reaches the bar.

There’s a loaded question. I can answer my normal way, or I can tell him the truth. “Not much,” I say out of habit. “How about you?”

He seems so happy I’ve asked, his face becoming animated with that geeky excitement I love so much. “I’m doing a bunch of solar experiments out near those old, abandoned adobes. Wanna come?”

“I have to work.”

He looks at the clock. It’s 11:32 a.m. David snorts. “The bar doesn’t open until four. I have a car. We’ll be back by two. C’mon. Live a little.” He wears glasses like that Beatle, the one who got shot, used to wear. John Lennon. David’s dark and thin, and he’s always serious. 

Except when he’s making a new invention or tinkering with science stuff.

I frown. If I don’t get all the prep work done for the bar opening, Jeff will kill me.

“You know you’ll be fine, Allie. Trust me.” He looks at me with such an open, eager expression that I can’t help myself. Turning him down would feel like taking a kid’s candy away. I know David is counting down the days until he goes away to college, and this might be one of my last chances to spend some time with him. I have a feeling once he gets out of this god-forsaken place, he’ll never come back.

And I hope I’m right. For as much as I like him as a friend, he needs to get out.

So do I.

“All right,” I say, agreeing. I grab my purse and the bar keys and we head out into the sweltering day. “I need to learn to live a little, don’t I?” 

* * *

Forty minutes later, we’re walking along old caves where people dwelled, hundreds—maybe thousands—of years ago. The sun is merciless, and the ground is a mixture of sand and dirt. Climbing up a hill feels like a never-ending gym class circuit. My legs are screaming with pain and it seems like we’re never going to reach David’s little outdoor laboratory.

“Where are we going?” I whine. This is not my idea of fun.

“Almost there,” David huffs, pointing. “Just over that ridge. You’ll see. I’ve got one heck of a surprise for you.” 

I reach into my purse and pull out a bottle of water I’m grateful I happen to have in there. Drinking about a fourth of it, I hold myself back from guzzling the whole thing. When you’re in the desert, you think ahead. You never know what might happen to make you wish you’d held on to some reserves.

We walk toward the point David mentioned, and as we crest a rock formation I see a dirt bike in the distance, near a bunch of hills, surrounded by enormous cactuses.

“You’re riding dirt bikes now? When did you start doing that?”

The
vroom
of an engine to our right catches my ear. A line of dirt dust streaks along the landscape, the bike’s rear wheel kicking it up like a jet contrail. The rider is moving so fast he (she?) is almost a blur.  

Within seconds the bike slows before us, and the rider brings it to a halt, shifting the weight of the machine between his legs. It’s a guy.

Peeling the white bike helmet off, the rider frowns at us.

It’s not just any guy.

It’s
Chase
.

Without even thinking about it, I rush over and throw myself into his arms, his hot, dirty coat wrapping around me, making me suffocate. He smells like sweat and musk, like mint and dirt, and I could breathe him in forever. The sun is so sharp it hurts my head, but now he’s kissing me. The heat, the light, the pain, the bother all melt away as his lips slant against mine. His mouth says ‘hello,’ and I disintegrate into that special world that the two of us create when we’re together. 

We pull apart and I gasp, remembering David.

Chase follows my look, his eyebrow turning up in curiosity as he looks at my friend.

“Hey, Dave,” Chase says casually. His eyes travel back to me, the eyebrow still high, a question in his eyes.

And then:

“You two know each other?” we say in unison.

Chapter Nine

Chase is taken aback. I start to laugh. David just stands there, grinning like a mad fool.

“I knew it!” he crows. “I knew you two know each other.” 

“How did you know? What do you mean?” I ask, completely confused.

“Chase kept talking about this girl in town. The one with long, black hair and gorgeous eyes. The one at the bar.” David’s cheeks are turning pink as Chase stares at him. It’s a hard look, one that almost could have menace in it.

Chase grips my waist a little tighter. “You knew Allie and didn’t tell me?” There’s something in his voice that makes David tense up. Sparks are flying between them and suddenly, everything’s different.

The sun is merciless and the wind kicks up. It feels like a rare storm is coming. Or, maybe, the guys are creating one. I don’t know. This is way out of my comfort zone.

“I’ve known Allie forever. And I’ve known you for a few months,” David says calmly, slowly. “I put two and two together yesterday when you were telling me all about her, and I thought this would be a great way to get you together. You said her father—”

“Stepfather,” I say, correcting him. It’s petty, I know, but it drives me nuts when people call Jeff my father. He’s not. My real father isn’t a peach, either, but at least I have one. And Jeff ain’t it.

“Stepfather,” David says, repeating me, tipping his head in apology. “You said her stepfather is a real asshole who’s trying to block you from seeing each other, and I figured it all out.”

“College boy,” Chase says with a smirk. “You’ve got the smarts for it. You figure things out real quick, don’t you?” The air between them is simmering a bit, settling down, but there’s an unease I don’t like.

“Thank you,” I say, looking first at David, then at Chase.

“For what?” they both ask at the same time, then laugh at the jinx.

“For talking about me with David,” I say, looking down at the buttons on Chase’s leather jacket. “You...you talk about me with people?” I look up as I ask the question.

He’s smiling at me with a look so dazzling it makes my heart glow. “Only with David. He’s my...well, I guess he’s my friend.”

Chase looks at David, who nods somberly.

“How are you two friends?” This combo is the least likely friendship I could ever imagine in a million years. David is gawky and geeky, dark-haired and olive-toned, all into science and engineering. He’s headed off to college in a few weeks. Chase is blonde and tawny, tanned and weathered, all bad-boy danger and a drug dealing biker.

You really,
really
can’t find two guys who are more different than each other if you try.

“David helps me with my stunts,” Chase explains, as if that answers everything.

I laugh, a sudden gust of wind behind me pushing my long hair in my face, whipping it in front of my eyes. “I mean how did you two meet? You didn’t go to our high school, and until a few days ago I’ve never seen you before, Chase,” I say, my words sinking in as I say them. The connection I feel with him is so immediate, so desperate, the longing there already.

How could this be so right?

David answers. “Chase was out here on his dirt bike doing some crazy jumps one day. I came out to do some solar experiments with large arrays you can’t set up near town without assholes destroying them.”

“Still? The jocks still bully you?” The outrage in my voice makes Chase frown. He looks at me, then David.

“That true?” he asks David in a voice that makes the base of my spine start tingling. I don’t think those bullies are going to last much longer.

David tries to brush it off. “It’s no big deal. They just think it’s funny to tip the arrays over. Like cow tipping, only with solar panels.” He doesn’t mention the fact that if David’s there when they come, the jocks have stolen his car and phone and left him miles from home, just for fun.

Fun.

“What do they look like? What’s their ride?” Chase asks, a determined look of calculation on his face. His eyes glow an eerie amber, and he’s laser-focused on David.

David shrugs. I can tell he knows exactly what Chase is thinking, and he’s struggling. Having those assholes get theirs would be a victory for David. Half the football team has teased him since seventh grade. On the other hand, Chase is the kind of guy who doesn’t mess around. The thought of an entire biker gang descending on a group of jocks makes my justice-minded heart sing.

But what kind of damage would the bikers do to the townies? Maybe it would be worse to tell Chase who they are.

This is David’s fight, though. Not mine. It’s all up to him. They’ve only bothered me once, about a year ago, as I was leaving the bar one night. Chuck Jorgenson cornered me near the garbage cans and tried to cop a feel before Jeff came out there and shooed him away. That was our final week of high school, back in May, and I hope I never see him again.