A Leap in the Dark (Assassins of Youth MC Book 2) (4 page)

But I knew I had. Irrevocably. By kissing a girl who was destined to marry a sixty-year-old elder two months later, I had committed the ultimate crime.

“Damn you all to hell,” uttered Mr. Pratt from between shaking lips like two pieces of liver. “I cast you into the outer darkness where traitors and apostates go. You will be ground into a native element in the darkest spot on earth.”

Now, straddling my saddle in the shadows of that gas station, it was rushing back to me. I normally succeeded in keeping the floodgates closed on that particular part of my life. But that night it all came pouring in, with all the floating trash and random pieces of shit that come with a flood.

My hand actually shook as I yanked on my wallet chain and grabbed the bulky leather. The hundred dollar bills were still wrapped around the guy’s business card.

Ladell Pratt

Mayor

Town of Avalanche, Utah

I got off my ride and walked into the brighter light, blinking my eyes. I looked again.

What. The. Fuck.

The brain wants to deny what the eyes plainly see. Eventually it was my stomach that wrested control from both, sending a plume of bile spewing up my throat. There was no choking it down—I had to retch it onto the ground or it would’ve come out my nose. The remnants of my lovely, homey dinner with my men came gushing from the pit of my stomach, splashing loudly against the asphalt.

Luckily no one saw me. I righted myself quickly and jumped back on my scoot, panting heavily, gulping clean air.

Motherfuck. Motherfuck.

Ladell Pratt was not Zelpha’s dad. He was her uncle.

He was one of the men who’d kicked me in the ribs when I was down, defenseless.

Without thinking it out in defined linear terms, I started thrashing it back to the dingy hotel.

Avalanche, and all the other little towns in the county, employed many men who were sympathetic to the Cornucopian cause. Some Lost Boys in my age group had actually been driven out of town by policemen and county sheriffs. Postmen, bartenders, businessmen, you name it—they were all on Allred Chiles’ payroll.

But why did this asswipe come back to taunt me? Didn’t he get what he wanted fifteen years ago—me gone, Zelpha married to some pervy elder?

He obviously wanted something more from me. Had I met him before? Had he come to Liberty Temple before to wrap his depraved, polluted lips around my cock?

My mind flew quickly, jumping from one conclusion to the next, discarding each verdict just as quickly. He’d never been to Liberty Temple before because we scanned each client’s driver’s license and new clients put up a red flag for a background check—unless he had a fake one. Of course my IT guy had done a background on Ladell Pratt before letting me go to a motel to meet with him. We didn’t just meet with any moron off the street. He’d used a fake name, but the credit check was all Pratt.

Why has he developed a sudden need to swallow another man’s sword after fifteen years?
The answer, of course, was that he hadn’t.

He’d probably been doing this all along, with unsuspecting, naïve Cornucopia boys, and the more I thought on it, the angrier I got. That was hypocrisy of the worst sort—fondle a boy to orgasm in some twisted rite of release, then throw him to the wolves as punishment for the sins
he’d
committed. Pratt got off scot free, in the eyes of their warped God at least.

Well, not in mine.

I was going to take down that twisted pedo if it meant getting arrested for assault. I must’ve been doing seventy in a forty zone when I turned into the hotel parking lot. I was so pumped to get in a few front kicks and eye gouges, I could practically feel my fingers sinking into the slime of his eye socket.

So when I cut my engine and saw no sedan parked out front—the windows of the room dark with no activity behind them—momentum just carried me forward. I strode to the door, wrenching and rattling the handle. I pounded and shouted to no avail. I even stormed into the office demanding to know where Pratt had gone. They must’ve thought I was a hit man sent by the ATF to put a bullet in Pratt. And they wouldn’t have been too far off.

Of course they could tell me nothing, and I stormed with impotent rage back to my scoot, kicking a concrete block with my steel-toed boots on the way. I angrily dialed my IT guy who could tell me nothing other than Pratt’s Avalanche address from his license and that he needed corrective lenses. Almost insane with my powerless inability to do anything to this creeper, I thumb-punched my phone to dial Deloy Pingree.

“Deloy.”

“
Levon!
How grand to hear from you! You wouldn’t believe how dinky this town is. We just pulled into Avalanche—”

“That’s great, Deloy, listen. I need Gideon Fortunati’s phone number.”

“Oh. Okay.”

I had never met Gideon, and I had had no plans to do business with Gideon, up until now.

And this is how we met.

“Gideon. This is Levon Rockwell. I run the Liberty Temp—”

“No need for introductions, my man. My old lady just gave me a glowing review of your premises up there in Bountiful. You’re doing a great service for the Lost Boys of Cornucopia.”

“Well, thanks, although I don’t think her sister would agree with you.” I paused, because I really, deep down, wanted Gideon to comment on Oaklyn. I was rewarded for my patience.

“Oaklyn? Don’t let her get to you. She’s going through some rough times with some jackoff boyfriend. Hopefully he won’t be around too much longer. I’m trying to convince her to move down here to help get the local Urgent Care facility into my back pocket. Be good to have a clinic like that.”

“No doubt, no doubt.” I wondered at the heft of the guy who had recently arrived. He was already consolidating his power base around him. Smart move. “Looks like one of my boys, Deloy Pingree, will be joining you soon. He wants to go to dentist school.”

“Hey, the more the merrier, Levon. This is a spanking new chapter of the Assassins of Youth, so I’m building it from the ground up. I pulled a couple of guys from my Bullhead City chapter, but they couldn’t really spare any more, and I got one guy from a local riding club. The rest’ll have to be Prospects, starting off shining hubcaps.”

I was grateful to Gideon, although I couldn’t really picture Deloy sporting a leather cut, much less steering his own Harley around town. He’d probably be wearing black high-top Converses under his American Eagle Outfitters jeans, vaping on his e-cig. He probably couldn’t resist ironing a patch that said “Does this bike make my ass look fat?” onto his jean jacket vest. And his scoot would probably be a rice rocket. But I should talk. I often drive around with my dog in my sidecar.

“I really appreciate that, brother. I hate to lose Deloy, but I can understand that he wants to move on. Listen. I want to know what you know about a Ladell Pratt.”

Gideon made a sound of disgust. “Pratt? Only that already he’s been the biggest bee in my bonnet, getting in the way of me making any progress here in town. He’s been mayor since ’95 when Chiles was first excommunicated from the mainstream church and came here to set up his fundy compound. Since then, the Avalanche town government hasn’t had a contested election, or even a political campaign.”

“Sounds about right,” I seethed. “Pratt’s a polyg too?”

“I think they all are, the whole town council, the chief of police. Only, of course, they can’t advertise it as freely as they do inside the walls.”

“So, you wouldn’t mind if he suddenly…vanished off the face of the earth.”

Gideon paused. I could understand his predicament. He couldn’t run around condoning taking some guy out when he was trying to build a town for himself. Then again, he hated Pratt, too. “I wouldn’t be too shaken up. You planning to pay us a visit?”

On a cheery note, I said, “I
am
, matter of fact. Jonah Garff—Dingo—mentioned some investment opportunities. As you can guess, I have some money I’d like to—” I looked around, although of course no one was listening. “Like to clean.”

“Well, come on down, Rockwell! You’re more than welcome. We’re buying up defaulted real estate at rock bottom prices. Houses that’ve never been lived in are going for a song, if you don’t mind nineties interior decorating styles.”

“I was thinking of more like
starting
a business.”

“Really? Well, come on down, let’s discuss it.
Mi casa, su casa.
In fact, I can put you up in an empty house I’m buying that’s in escrow. You’ll just have to share it with Mahalia’s sister.”

That sealed the deal for me. It was fate that I’d be thrown together with that priggish, superior bitch. “You know what? Text me Oaklyn’s phone number when you get a chance. That way she won’t be taken by surprise at my coming, and bash me over the head with a candlestick.”

Gideon chuckled. “She
is
pretty self-righteous, isn’t she? She’ll learn, though, being around my MC. No one’s a star. We all work as a team. A well-oiled team.”

When we hung up, I didn’t text Oaklyn about my arrival. I texted her a poem by Wordsworth. Maybe I wanted to show off my literary leanings., but ever since talking to her, the poem had been stuck in my head. Typing it out helped me cleanse my soul of all doubt about what I was doing, or what I planned to do.

How strange that all

The terrors, pains, and early miseries

Regrets, vexations, lassitudes interfused

Within my mind should e’er have borne a part,

And that a needful part, in making up

The calm existence that is mine when I

Am worthy of myself!

It was my turn to be smug. Oaklyn would probably have to google it, or she’d wonder who it came from, because I said nothing else.

I had nothing to prove to her. But I wanted her to know that I was fine just the way I was—she would never change me.

OAKLYN

Avalanche, Utah

I
t took Giovanni
two days to call me back. Almost as long as the VD test results took.

By that time, as usual, I was fuming, a powder keg about to go off. I stood on the back second-story verandah of the house my sister had loaned to me. Pacing ten feet one way, ten feet back, I no longer admired the stunning backdrop of the colorful layers of Zion’s cliffs. For two days I’d been basking in the exquisite, flaming sandstone towers and summits to the east. I could see why Mahalia had decided to stay here, so close to the site of her former torture, the infamous fundamentalist stronghold of Cornucopia. That morning, the sun bouncing off the scarlet rock had been so fiery it had woken me up in a blaze of glory.

But the longer Giovanni didn’t call me back, the stronger I fumed.
Not this again. I’m not even
in
Provo and he
still
manages to avoid me? I have
got
to find a way to break it off with this guy. He’s poison, but I love him.

“Baby, please!” Giovanni pleaded. I could tell he’d been snorting drugs because his nose was plugged up. Ironically, his behavior was causing me to take drugs, too. I’d gotten some anti-anxiety drugs from Mahalia three months ago. I liked them so much I was trying to find a way to get a prescription for more without my boss, an orthopedic sports surgeon, finding out. “Please, baby! You know how much I love you!”

“It’s a strange sort of love,” I seethed, “that forces you to stay out all night and stumble in at six in the morning.” He’d obviously stumbled in at six, fallen into bed, and was just now calling me at three. Only Giovanni could have gotten away with this at the age of thirty-three. His father bought him apartment buildings to renovate, and he could do it at his leisure. Any other guy would’ve had to have gotten a regular job a long time ago.

“I don’t know how I get so carried away!” he cried. “I just lose track of time. Besides, where
are
you? Where’s Avalanche?”

“It’s where Mahalia lives, as I’ve told you several times.”

“Oh, down near St. George? Me and my dad took a trip down through Zion once on our way to go house boating in Lake Powell. Man, there are some canyons and rivers in there—”

“Knock it off, Giovanni. I’m done with you. You didn’t even know I was fucking
gone
and you
still
stayed out all night with those moronic friends of yours.”

“It’s not their fault, baby. It’s me. I’m weak. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me. Don’t leave me. Please, baby, please—”

“
I’ve had it, Giovanni
,” I shouted louder, as if he’d finally hear me. “I can’t deal with your immature fucking ways anymore. I’m a fucking RN with a boyfriend who can’t seem to come home at night. How do you think that makes me feel?”

“I don’t blame you for—”

“
I don’t care what you think. It was just a rhetorical question
.” I was bellowing so loudly standing out on the back kitchen deck, it was a good thing most of the homes in the neighborhood were empty. The closest occupied home was the Save Our Baby Brides safe house, four homes down Little Wing Street. “Why don’t you just take some time to think about your priorities, Giovanni? I’ve got business to attend to down here.” And I punched the
END
button on my phone so violently it’s a wonder I didn’t break it. I only barely stopped myself from throwing it over the railing, into the big backyard that had never been landscaped.