Smolder: Trojans MC (29 page)

CHAPTER EIGHT

David kneeled next to his bike, a dirty rag in one hand. He had spent that morning working on the bike, changing the oil and cleaning out the gears. It was spotless inside and out, just how he liked it. He was meticulous with his bike; he took the time to buff out every scratch, to remove every spot of dirt and drop of oil. He knew that it would just get dirty all over again the second he took it out on the road, but that never stopped him. David stood up, wiped his hands on the rag, and surveyed his bike. It looked good, all shiny and beautiful. He was pretty sure he loved that bike more than anything else. 

He still had no idea what he was going to do about Olivia Waters. Bribery, he figured, would be the best and easiest way to do it, but what if she didn’t take it? When he closed his eyes, he could still see her in her apartment dressed in practically nothing. It was all he thought about anymore. Why did it have to be such a beautiful woman? Why couldn’t Lance have another fat partner that would be easy to bribe? Someone David didn’t need to think too hard about?

His bike now clean, David pushed it out of the garage and into the bright morning. He straddled the bike and stepped on the gas, revving the engine a few times before peeling out and heading to the coffee shop he knew Lance and Olivia would be at. He didn’t have an exact plan yet, Olivia was still too much of an unknown, and he didn’t know enough. He needed to talk with her. Watching her and spying on her hadn’t been enough; it was time for more drastic measures.

He rode up to the café and waited for the two of them to arrive, typically their first stop of the day. He parked his bike on the street and found a bench underneath a tree and sat in the shade and waited. He didn’t need to wait long. Within five minutes the cruiser had arrived, but this time Olivia was driving. This made David nervous. New recruits never drove, ever. The senior officer got to drive, unless he was hurt or injured or had some excuse. He watched as Lance got out of the passenger’s seat and walked up to café while Olivia remained inside the car. She was wearing a silver pair of aviator sunglasses, but David could see that she was looking in her side mirror. She was looking back at him. David got up and walked toward his bike, revving the engine and heading to the designated meeting stop.

Hillary was already there. She had the glazed over look of someone high, and occasionally David would have to prod her to keep her from nodding out. Hillary was Mike’s newest piece of arm candy, and she would do anything for a hit, even call in a false domestic disturbance call to the cops. David was sitting outside of Hillary's trailer, the hot sun was rising behind him, and he was resting in the few feet of shade remaining.

The call had been made two minutes ago, and already David could hear the siren coming closer. Olivia Waters was the real deal. She was actually interested in protecting and serving the community—even when it meant breaking up another fight between two junkies. David still wasn’t sure what his play was going to be, bribery was his first option, but he needed to be delicate. It was a federal offense to bribe a cop, and Olivia might just be crazy enough to decline the bribe and send David to jail instead.

The car pulled up, Olivia in the driver’s side and Lance in the passenger’s. Olivia jumped out of the car, leaving the lights flashing but the siren off. Lance was a little slower, waiting until Olivia was practically at the door of the trailer before sighing and slumping out of the car.

“Who are you?” Olivia demanded. She was wearing a pair of silver aviators, and David was distracted by his own reflection looking back at him. He could see himself in her eyes. He was sitting on a rough-hewn front porch. The wood beneath him was strong but cracked and weathered and half buried in sand. His shaggy blond hair was falling into his eyes; his arms bulged out the simple black t-shirt he was wearing; and his long legs were stretched out in front of him, resting on the sand.

“I’m David. I came by a few minutes ago and broke up the fight. Sorry you came all the way out here, officer,” David said. He was desperate for Olivia to take off her sunglasses. Having to see his own reflection as he spoke unnerved him. He needed to be manipulative; he needed to be strong; and he needed to be dangerous if the situation called for it. But seeing his own reflection just called him out as a faker, as a little boy dressed in adult clothing. Who was he that he thought he could manipulate this woman? She was like a solid wall made of ice, and even in this hot desert sun, she showed no signs of melting.

“So there’s no fight?” Lance whined, as he finally joined the two of them at the stairs to the trailer. “We came all this way.” David suppressed a sigh; they had traveled less than ten blocks in an air-conditioned car. He wondered how Olivia put up with Lance, how she kept herself from strangling him. But then again, she was driving the car now; she had clearly put him in his place. Now David needed to put Olivia in her place.

“We still need to talk to Ms. Sweetie and make sure she’s ok,” Olivia said.

“I agree,” David said. “Plus, we should offer you some nice cold lemonade as a thanks for coming all the way out here.”

“Yeah,” Hillary agreed, her voice sounding hazy and far away—even though she was only a few feet behind him, standing on the other side of the trailer’s screen door. “Please come in officers. I’m mighty tired. I might go and rest for a few, but please, come in and have a cold drink. I’m alright. David here sent my lying, useless, bucket of garbage boyfriend out on his ass, so I’m alright now.” She was slurring her words and repeating herself as her high set in comfortably somewhere in her head.

David stood and opened the door. He motioned for Olivia to go first, but the officer just crossed her arms and stared. So David went first, holding open the door for Olivia to follow, which she did after a quick moment’s hesitation. Lance followed at first, but he got one look at the inside of the trailer and said, “Oh, thanks, but I’m alright on lemonade, trying to stick to water for my diet. I’ll just wait out here, but call if you need me. I’ll be right outside.” David couldn’t help but notice that something had changed between Olivia and Lance. There was no more leaving Olivia alone to fend for herself, and Lance was polite to the point of obsequies. It gave David a new appreciation for Olivia; it hadn't taken her long at all to make her senior officer her subordinate in everything but name.

Once inside Olivia finally removed her silver sunglasses, and David breathed a sigh of relief. He could look into her eyes—her large, smart, brown eyes. He still remembered watching her through her window the other day. Watching her while she had been wearing practically nothing. She was tall, almost as tall as David himself, and she presented a strange image in the tiny trailer, like she was a goddess strolling the earth and visiting unsuspecting mortals.

He knew from watching her that underneath her tough demeanor she was just a regular woman, like so many others, like all the others. She was a beautiful, normal woman who had stumbled into a dangerous world. But she wasn’t just beautiful; she was tough and hardworking and smart, maybe too smart for her own good. He wanted to warn her that this was dangerous business she was caught up in, very dangerous. Taking a bribe and looking the other way was the best course of action for Olivia, and David needed to make her see that. And if she didn’t, if she refused to look the other way? Then, it would David, himself, who would need to take care of her. It was quickly becoming something he wasn’t sure he could do.

CHAPTER NINE

The trailer was not clean, and for once Olivia didn’t blame Lance for wanting to wait in the car. The trailer must have been at least thirty years old. The walls were painted a faded mustard yellow, and the carpet was a threadbare pea green. The walls were covered in wood paneling that held a thick residue from years of cigarette smoke, and there was another chemical smell to the air that spoke of even more illicit substances. But Olivia refused to be swayed; she knew that it was important for police officers to spend time with the people who lived in the neighborhood. She needed the people who lived here to trust her; it was the first step in making the neighborhood a safer place.

And then there was David. Something about him was so oddly familiar, but Olivia couldn't place him. It was like seeing someone from high school or a co-worker from a job you had ten years ago. Only Olivia hadn’t gone to school in Marina’s Crest; she had never held a job other than cop here either. But still, she knew she had seen this man before—those strong arms, that mop of blond hair on his head, the way he cocked his head when he was thinking about something. Olivia was sure that if she had met this man before, that she would have remembered him, but instead he was just a niggling bother in the back of her mind that she was trying to ignore.

He poured her a glass of lemonade, using a clean, red Solo cup fresh out of the packaging—something Olivia was grateful for. She took a long sip of the drink and stared at the man across from her.

“Thanks for the drink, David,” she said. “Are you a friend of Ms. Sweetie?”

“Oh yeah, me and Hill go way back. Actually, at the moment she’s dating my boss, so it’s a good idea for me to watch out for her.” His voice was deeper than she expected, and he had a slight southern accent when he spoke.

“Where do you work?” Olivia asked, taking another sip from her drink.

“Well, that’s a tough question, officer,” David said, leaning back against the table. He looked out of place in the trailer; he looked like a model doing a high concept shoot for Vogue. His handsomeness was distracting. “You ever heard of God’s Reapers?” David asked.

Calmly, Olivia put down her drink—better to have both of her hands free. “I have,” she answered, staring straight into David’s eyes. “They are a criminal organization, and one that I hope you don’t have any ties to.”

“One man’s criminal organization is another man’s job, officer, and good jobs are hard to come by in Marina’s Crest. I know that you're a police officer and I’m a biker, but that doesn’t mean that you and I can’t be friends. Or at least, we don’t need to be antagonists.”

“Yes, we do. If your club is participating in illegal activities, then we are enemies.”

“You know that old saying…there’s two things you don’t want to see made, laws and sausages? It tells the truth. All these laws, it’s just one politician after another stepping down from their helicopters to tell poor folks what to do. Hell, half the laws in this county are vanity projects designed to make the people in charge look good.”

“Really? So murder, that’s totally ok. It’s just some politician trying push his own life-is-great agenda?” Olivia asked.

“No one’s talking about murder, and no one’s getting murdered. But we in the club provide a service, and the law wants to stop us from providing this service, but we have many clients who really want what we have. We live in a democracy; the people are supposed to make the laws; and the laws should function as a service to the people. But what happens when a law is passed that the majority of the people disagree with? What’s right and wrong then?” David asked, looking up at Olivia.

“The law is the law. If people break a law they don’t like, they go to jail.” Olivia was surprised at how calm she was. This man was in a biker gang and was trying to claim that was somehow a good thing. “What service do you provide David? Drugs? Prostitution?”

“Both things that are legal all over the world and in parts of this very country.”

“But not this part. Let’s get one thing straight, David. I don’t care if you and your gang think you’re providing a service, because you are not. You’re a criminal organization engaged in criminal activities. You will be brought to justice, and you will have to answer for your crimes. Unless of course, you’re looking to get out. I know some detectives who could help you make a nice life for yourself if you tell them what you know. You don’t have to go to jail for these people,” Olivia said.

David smiled at that, a sad knowing smile towards the floor. A smile that broke Olivia’s heart a little bit. She wondered who this man was that his life had turned into this, defending a gang of drug dealing bikers. Had he ever wanted more out of life? Had he ever dreamed of being something else? Or had he been corrupted from a young age, taught that this was the only way?

“Officer, I am one of “those people”; I’m a member through and through, for life. You think an empty offer is going to make me betray my brothers. Ride or die, those are the only options. I’m not looking for a rescue; I’m offering one.” In that one second, his voice had changed. It had gone from a quiet country boy to something darker. In front of her eyes he had grown more dangerous. He stood up straight, his head almost touching the low roof of the trailer. Olivia was surprised at his height; she was so tall that it was a strange sensation to be towered over.

She looked up into David’s blue eyes. They were intelligent and intense, and he took a step closer to her so they were only a foot apart. He smelled like the desert with the slightest hint of gasoline. His eyes were crystal blue and his clean-shaven face was only inches from hers. Olivia refused to back down; she stood her ground and felt her skin tingle as he got closer. They were facing each other, close enough to kiss, or kill.

“You seem like a good cop,” he said, quietly. They were so close, the smallest movement on either side and they would be touching, skin on skin. What would his skin feel like against hers, his rough and dry hands running up and down her body, his lips on hers? “I don’t want anything to happen to you, but if you make trouble for the Reaper’s, something will. We’ll do our best to stay out of your way, and we’re just asking you to do the same. That’s not too much to ask, is it? We would be very thankful, and we could be very generous.” His voice had fallen to a whisper, and his eyes weren’t looking at hers, but instead seemed to be focused on her lips. They were so close, and his words spoken so softly, that it took Olivia what felt like full minute to understand what he had actually said.

She didn’t move at first. She understood what she had been saying, but standing next to him felt so intoxicating that she didn’t want it to end quite yet. He was offering her a bribe… “generosity”…she wondered what he meant by that, how much he could give her. She wished she were wearing a wire, then maybe she would have enough evidence to bring David in and convince him to join her side. She gave his blue eyes one last look and then stepped back.

“I am a good cop,” Olivia said, putting her sunglasses back on and walking towards the door, “and that means I won’t take bribes, and I won’t look the other way. You’ve got time, David. Time to make some better decisions and get out of God’s Reapers. If you stay with them, you will end up in prison for a very long time. I’ll be here when you change your mind.” Olivia walked back out into the baking sun that now hung high above her.  God’s Reapers were up to something, and it had to be something big if they were trying to bribe the cops about it.