Game Changer (Hell's Saints Motorcycle Club) (17 page)

I was so excited I was squirming in my seat. I couldn’t wait to see Claire. Couldn’t wait. I had talked to her a couple of times over the phone and she sounded good. Really really good. We were going to have to go to some sort of family meeting before she was released, but then she was coming home with me. Whatever we decided that home was to be. Me and Claire like always. We would decide that together.

The only spot that threatened to block out the bright sun of my day was sitting next to me chain smoking. Reno looked pissed. No, scratch that. Reno
was
pissed. My heart had fallen to my feet when Prosper had talked to me about who my escort for the trip was going to be and why. They were worried about something going on with Gino. I didn’t think I mattered enough to Gino for him to come after me but Prosper didn’t share my view on that. Plus, Prosper had said that Gino was involved in stuff that touched the club. Weird. Gino had no way of knowing my connection to the Saints when we met. I wasn’t stupid and I knew that the club had criminal enterprises and there was no doubt in my mind now that Gino was criminal minded. So, I guessed like sought like. Something about water seeking its own level or some kind of crap like that. I wasn’t surprised.

What did surprise me was the constant animosity I felt from Reno. He flat out didn’t like me. He barely spoke to me unless he had to and a couple of times I caught him glaring at me for no reason other than that I existed at all. At first I had gone out of my way to be nice to him, then I had gone out of my way to stay out of his way. Looks like he drew the short straw on this one. But I wasn’t going to let him ruin my day. It was a half days trip and we had been driving for a couple of hours.

“Hey Reno.” I said lightly.

Nothing. Not a damn thing and I know he heard me. Sigh. Really?

“Reno?” a little louder this time.

Nada. Zip. Zilch. But I saw his foot push down just a fraction of an inch on the gas pedal.

“Reno, you have to pull over at the next stop.” I leaned forward to turn down the radio.

“Not gonna happen.” He grumbled.

“Reno, I’ve to use the bathroom.” I colored red.

“Should have gone before you left. You gonna have to wait till we get there now.” He turned the radio back up.

This was ridiculous. We still had at least a few hours to go.

“Reno, I really have to go.” I raised my voice.

“Raine, you’re really going to have to fucking wait.” He met my voice and raised me an octave.

I felt tears form in the back of my eyes and a burst of anger flash along with them.

“Jesus, Reno really?” My voice cracked just a little. My bladder was uncomfortably full and had been for about a half an hour. I really had to go.

His face was hard. The wind from the open window blew his hair briefly in front of his eyes. He had a smoke dangling from his mouth and mirrored aviator sunglasses. I couldn’t read his expression but I had this nagging sense he was getting off on this power play. Prick.

“Reno, please stop at the next rest area so I can pee.”

Asshole.

“What was that?” Oh, he was so enjoying this.

“Please.” I was going to find a way to make him eat dirt for this. I swore it.

“Magic fucking word, Baby.” He grinned and pulled into the next stop.

The whole time I was squatting in the woods I was plotting my revenge and I continued plotting it until we reached Willows Point where I would promptly forget my plot in the excitement of seeing Claire.

Reno leaned with his back against the car, arms crossed waiting for Raine to come out of the woods. He was being a real prick and he knew it. What he didn’t know was why. Christ, she brought out the worst in him. The thing was she was really an okay bitch when he thought about it. He had never heard her whine or complain. She didn’t flash her tits around or hang all over the brothers. She seemed smart and she had a great smile which she flashed freely in his direction until she stopped looking at him completely.

Maybe it had something to do with Prosper. Maybe he didn’t like sharing that father shit. Prosper had really stepped up for him and his mom. Reno had noticed and appreciated. They had a special bond him and Prosper. Then Raine enters like a long lost favorite daughter…Jesus could that be it? Was he jealous? The thought pissed him off even more. When he saw her come out of the woods he stomped out his cigarette and got in the car. When Raine got in the car she thanked him for stopping. Thanked him after he practically made her beg him to stop. Maybe the bitch wasn’t so bad after all. Time would fucking tell.

We pulled up to the rehab center where I was going to see my baby sister. It looked like a dormitory type building made out of brick with no personality. It was a little depressing honestly. I knew that there were literally thousands of rehab centers in the United States. Everything from boot camp style places to palatial settings on the beach. Claire was stuck with what our insurance paid for. Standard twenty eight days in an insurance approved institution. I squared my shoulders and poked my head out the car searching the windows for some sign of life. There wasn’t any. I really hoped for Claire’s sake the inside wasn’t as dismal as the outside. Willows Point Alcohol and Substance Abuse Center looked like it meant business.

I got out of the car and heard the driver side slam shut as well. Oh no he wasn’t.

“Reno, you can’t come in with me.” I said to him.

Reno leaned against the car and crossed his big arms across his chest.

“I’m waiting.” He said.

“Waiting? This is not an “I’m gonna run in for a minute keep the car running kind of deal here. I don’t know how long this is supposed to take or even what to expect. This could be an all day thing.”

I warned him.

“Still waiting.” He answered.

“Suit yourself, but you might want to go get a coffee or a magazine or the newspaper or something. We just passed the center of town, I’m sure they might have something you might want to read.” But then again, I thought, probably he didn’t read much.

He just kept leaning and staring.

“Jesus, you gonna sit there like that all day waiting?” I was exasperated and didn’t like the thought of him just sitting there. It was unsettling. “I can call you when we’re ready to go if you give me your cell number.”

Still staring.

“So you gonna just sit here for as long as it takes?” This was stupid.

“Order came down. White on rice. That’s how it came down. That’s how it’s gonna be.” Reno said.

I gave up and shaking my head I walked up the steps and rang the buzzer by the side of the door. I couldn’t resist one last peek at Reno who except for lighting up his smoke, hadn’t moved a muscle.

I gave my name at the front desk and within minutes my little sister came walking through the frosted glass doors. It took me a minute to recognize her.

I guess I hadn’t realized how bad things had gotten for Claire in the year she was with Jamie. It had been such a slow and steady decline that I had somehow grown accustom to the signs of desperation and addiction that had served to ravage my sweet sister. Seeing her now, I almost hadn’t known her. Gone was the stringy lanky hair, the dark hollows under her eyes, and body that had become skeletal under the throes of Jamie’s abuse and her own addiction. The young woman that stood before me was healthy and whole. Her beautiful dark hair shone with luster and curl, her eyes were clear and she had put on some weight. When she looked at me her smile lit up the room. And my world. All my fears for Claire vanished. I had my sister back.

We hugged for a long time. She gave me a tour of the place and introduced me to some of her friends. The place was as gray on the inside as it was on the outside but the staff was friendly and there were little sprays of fresh flowers throughout the various halls and sitting rooms. Our family meeting wasn’t scheduled for a couple of hours yet. I had arrived just in time for lunch and I was able to join Claire in the dining room for a tuna salad plate, fruit cup and unlimited soda, tea or coffee. Guessing sugar and caffeine addictions were the least of the residents’ problems, they let them have at it.

I filled Claire in as much as I could about what had been going on. She wanted to hear it all and said that we would be doing enough talking about her later. I tried not to leave out much. I told her about the MC and the brothers. I talked to her about Prosper and Pinky and what my life had been like the past few weeks at the compound. I told her about Diego and Crow. I talked to her about the scene with Ellie. Then more about Diego. Then about my job at Ruby Reds. Then some more about Crow. Then a little more about Diego.

She understood. She understood everything. Not only did she understand, the student had now become the teacher. The hours of therapy hadn’t been wasted. My little sister hadn’t only acquired an inner peace but a wisdom that rose above our circumstances. She started talking then. She talked about how scared she had been that night when it all went down. How sick she had been of the drugs and the lies and the beatings she had taken at Jamie’s hands. How much effort it had cost her to keep most of it from me.

Then she told me about therapy and how she had discovered her recently acquired coke habit was a symptom of the real problem. That had come part in parcel with her nightmare relationship with Jamie and she had a strong will to beat it. But her addiction to the wrong men was a life time pattern that had started real young. I got that. As much as I had tried to shield her and steer her away from bad boys, she had been raised knee deep in it. Of course that’s something she would gravitate to! I got that and it scared the shit out of me for her.

When we sat down to the family meeting, I met Claire’s therapist. Her name was Dolores. Dolores was in her late fifties. She was a large dark haired woman who had an easy smile and a no bullshit attitude. She encouraged Claire to talk to me and she did. Boy did she. And what she said made sense not only for her, but for me as well.

Dolores explained more clinically what Claire had already told me. Claire’s underlying addiction was to Jamie and men like him. Those relationships would serve as gateways for her. Gateways to criminal activity, or drug abuse or whatever else served the relationship. Thinking back, the few boyfriends that Claire had, had been assholes. That was true. The whole bad boy attraction thing.

Dolores explained that Bad Boys were men that acted like delinquent adolescents. They lie, cheat and totally refuse to take responsibility for any of it. They are not capable of intimacy and for them it’s just the means to control and get their way. When they feel they have lost that control, they withdraw, looking for the next victim.

It’s a toxic and addictive relationship. Toxic because it costs you your dignity and self- esteem. It’s addictive because the good times are wound in with the bad times. Dolores had gone on to explain that these types of relationships perpetuate intermittent reinforcement which research shows is the strongest kind of reinforcement there is. You’re in it for the next happy time, and will wait for it. Dolores said that women don’t usually leave this kind of relationship, they get left. Claire found the strength to leave when the one thing she loved most in this world was threatened. That one thing had been me. My heart swelled upon hearing this.

I didn’t know if it was appropriate or not, but what the hell. This was family therapy after all. I shared my relationship with Gino and how it had felt just like that. It didn’t escape me that even though I left him, it was only after I caught him in bed with the underage neighbor did I leave. And honestly, if he had come back with his heart in his hand instead of his fist, who knows how long I would have repeated the cycle of taking him back.

We talked about how we grew up and the kind of men that were our role models. Because I might be bringing Claire right back in the thick of all that we talked about the Saints MC and the kind of men that made up that brotherhood. We talked about the roles of their women. We talked about our roles. We talked about Prosper and Jack and Maggie and Pinky.

We talked about cycles and how to break them.

Dolores then said something that really surprised me. She said that bad boys came in all shapes and sizes and from all walks of life. While the general consensus saw the bad boy as a James Dean or Marlon Brando type, that wasn’t always the case.

She shared with us that she too had been an Old Lady back in the day, when her young husband had come back from Vietnam and joined an MC. He had joined the Renegades. I knew that MC by reputation and they were pretty hardcore. She said her man had done what he had to do to keep himself sane in the aftermath of the war and joining the “Gades” is what did it for him. So by societies’ standards he was a bad boy. He wore the cut, and did what was asked of him. But he never let that touch her. He managed to keep his life in the club and his life with her separate. He didn’t cheat, lie to her or lay a hand to her. They had a love that lasted a lifetime until he died of a heart attack a few years ago. Dolores had gone back to college and had gotten her degree in counseling. She worked with Veterans a couple of days a week and addicts the other days. She said she had wanted to give back. I, for one, was glad she felt that way.

“So,” Dolores was wrapping up the meeting. “What I guess I’m telling you is that you were born into a life, you might be going back to a life filled with what could be a host of triggers for you, Claire. But you could also find those triggers in a college class or the local coffee shop. Use the tools you learned here to guide the rest of your life. I would and do recommend that you stay out of any kind of romantic entanglement for at least a year after treatment. As a matter of fact, I would say to run like hell from anything that even comes close to you getting laid in the next year.”

I snuck a peek at Claire and she was colored a bright shade of crimson. Dolores waved her hand at Claire and continued, “Your drug of choice is the wrong men. But don’t worry lamb, I’m going to schedule you for some follow up sessions and you call me whenever you want. I know it may seem like we’re cutting you loose, but we’re always here for you. You’re going to be just fine.”

Dolores patted Claire on the knee and then we all grasped hands and did the God Grant Me the Serenity Prayer.

Claire and I stopped the desk and set up her next three appointments. Smiling we strode arm and arm down the steps toward our new life.

Damn, I had forgotten about Reno. More importantly, I had forgotten to tell Claire about Reno.

Coming out of the meeting with Dolores, I looked at Reno through Claire’s eyes and saw nothing but trouble. I felt her tense beside me and saw the smile leave her eyes.

For Reno’s part he had pulled away from the spot he was leaning against on the car. He was nothing if not true to his word, and had stayed in the exact same spot I had left him hours earlier. A bunch of cigarette butts lay at his feet. He uncrossed his arms and stood with his hands on his hips.

He gave me a chin nod then looked directly at Claire. She moved a slight step back and behind me.

“Claire, this is Reno.” I said “Reno, this is my sister.”

Claire stood behind me frozen and Reno just stared at her. This was going well.

“Nice to meet you.” My sister said softly from behind me.

“Likewise.” Reno was looking at my sister like she was something to eat.

Then he looked at me. “Where to now?”

I explained to Claire. “I thought we would go check on gram’s house. Being there might help us to decide.”

Claire nodded.

“Decide what?” Reno asked.

This was new. Reno taking an interest in anything that had to do with me. Those two words were two more than he had volunteered the whole ride down.

I thought about not answering him. But he still held the keys to the car and I figured that no good would come out of building more animosity between us. If he was going to play nice for whatever reason, so would I. Maybe.

“Claire and I haven’t decided what to do next.” I said.

“Next?” Reno echoed.

“Yeah. Next. Our lives have been sort of on a holding pattern. We need to figure out where we’re going to live, what we’re going to do for money, where we’re going to work. Things like that.”

Things that haven’t got a damn thing to do with you and are none of your business.

Reno was getting ready to light up again. Took his time then pulled a long draw of nicotine before he continued,

“Seems a done deal to me. You and Claire here, stay at the lake house or at the kitchen house till the lake house is ready. That won’t take me and the boys long. You keep working at Reds and Claire takes a minute to figure things out for herself. Clubs got plenty of work. Legit work. Keep you two outta trouble.” He squinted as a wave of smoke hit his eye.

Really? Really?

Claire stood stock still behind me.

Reno leaned forward and craned to look behind me. At Claire.

“Sound like a plan, Sugar?” He asked.

Oh no he didn’t
. Before I had a chance to answer Claire perked up behind me.

“I think Raine told you my name is Claire and whatever the plan is, it’s for me and my sister to decide.” Claire said quietly. Then she added barely above a whisper, “But we thank you for your interest, don’t we Raine?”

I was too busy eyeing Reno suspiciously to answer. I felt Claire nudge the back of me and I answered promptly.

“Oh yeah. We thank you.” I said with absolutely no conviction.

Reno smirked at my sister, “No problem, Sugar.” Then got into the car.

Claire and I moved together and when she whispered, “Asswipe.” I nodded in agreement.

We pulled in front of our grandmother’s house and it seemed like much more than a month had passed. The plants in the window boxes were dead and even though I had stopped the mail, seems like it had come anyway. Whole house screamed abandoned. It made me a little sad seeing it because I knew exactly how that house felt. I had felt lonely and lost when I left it and damn it if the little house didn’t seem to project those feelings through its walls. I thought, maybe even was hoping, that if my grandmother’s house had radiated anything to Claire and I when we returned to it, it would be a welcome.

That’s how it had felt to me when I learned it had been first willed to our father and then to us. Jack’s mother had died when I was four. I had vague memories of a gray haired woman in her seventies with a soft smile and a softer bosom. I had recollections of a cookie jar filled with Stella D’oro cookies and a refrigerator that held little bottles of Seven Up on its door.

Our grandmother had loved to knit and I remember holding my hands out and apart so she could slip skeins of yarn around them then wrap that yarn into a ball to be used later. My father’s laugh had been easy around her and my mother smiled when she saw me sitting on Gram’s lap.