Forbidden Beauty (Coffin Cheaters Motorcycle Club) (3 page)

I thought of the ladies in the kitchen that morning:
everyone
needs a little D sometimes, Gizzy...

I tilted my chin just slightly, and Carter slid a firm hand
up to the back of my head. Pressing his fingers into the nape of my neck, he
wrenched me backwards, toward his mouth. I almost yelped at the sudden change
in pressure, but he smiled, and I felt safe.

“Now I really don't do things like
this
very often,”
he murmured.

“Oh give it up, Romeo,” I grinned. Raising an eyebrow, Carter
closed the distance between our mouths with one fluid push. His kiss was warm,
but determined. He tasted of smoke and sweet daiquiri. And I was content to let
him pull me forward, draw me further into the kiss—to let him dominate me. All
the while, his fingers remained deep in the muscles of my back, the base of my
skull.

Just as I began to wonder if Carter was wondering the same
thing—if perhaps it was time to retreat from public eye into the swamp, where
we might tear one another's clothes off with the zeal of kids opening Christmas
presents—Scotty's little pate came bobbing along the walkway. He was upon us
before I could slink away from Carter's grasp.

The owner's face was oddly grave.

“Sorry to interrupt, you two. But, err, Knox? I think you'd
better scram. Few unsavory characters outside.”

Carter dropped his hands, and at the exact same moment I
felt my surfaces cool. Though he said nothing, I could sense some
eye-contact-only communication going on between him and Scotty. Whatever was
up, he didn't want to say it in front of me.

“We should leave separately, Gisele. I'm sorry to run out on
you like this.” My date was already grabbing his jacket and helmet, regarding
his half-drunk daiquiri with a tinge of regret.

“I'll go with you,” I said quickly. “Hey, I'm no stranger to
running from the law.” I attempted a smile, but Carter's face was ashen.
Whatever he'd been feeling a moment ago had already evaporated. Something about
this made me unbearably sad. I then had a neurotic, wild thought:
what if I
never hear his laughter again?
What if this was it, for the two of us?

“Really,” I said, stepping closer and forcing his gaze to
meet mine. “I can go with you. I run with a tough crowd.”

Carter looked at me a little strangely. He seemed to be
searching my face for something, the same way he had on the highway. But again,
a thwarting Scotty interrupted before my date could speak.

“Knox, I mean it. You should go.”

“How can I find you? Don't you have a phone number?” I
asked.

He shook his head sadly, one foot already half out of our
little enclosure.

“Well, will you come back here?!”

Scotty started to pace, fully irritated now. “Knox! You
think I just sit here and shout for my health?”

“I'll find you, baby,” Carter said, darting back towards me
to plant a chaste kiss on my forehead. Though his violet eyes were scanning,
distracted—his voice sounded truthful. Then I thought about this for a second:
was it even possible to hear the 'truth' in someone's voice? Had I perhaps just
been played for a sap?

Like yeah right, who in 2014 didn't have a
phone
?

When Knox had all-the-way vanished back towards the highway,
leaving me alone in our little tiki love-nest, Scotty regarded me for a beat. I
didn't want to stick around Casablanca anymore—the magic I'd felt in this bar
moments before had utterly dissipated when my highway hero had flown the coop.
The patio looked contrived to me, now—the little sundial looked tacky, not
romantic. Who operated a day drinking tiki-bar? Where were we, some tropical
port city at the turn of the century?
Someone
was trying too fucking
hard.

“He doesn't lie, darling,” the owner wheezed, watching me as
I slowly gathered my helmet (and composure). I wanted desperately to believe
him, but I couldn't help but hear a thread of pity in Scotty's voice.

Making my way back through the public part of the club, I
glanced around for the so-called “unsavory characters.” Scotty's place had the
aura of a bar without a liquor license, so my first thought was: cops. Perhaps
plainclothesman were out here taking names, in some echo of prohibition
justice. But here on the main floor, the waters seemed unperturbed. People were
still dancing like sweet old fogies to sweet old tunes. There was laughter and
drinking and no visible scumbags in sight.

Was it possible that I'd been the butt of some cruel joke?
Why? Why would someone do that? Almost better to let me die on the highway than
jump through all these humiliating hoops...

Before I succumbed to hot, frustrated tears for the second
time in a day, I saw a familiar face in the bar crowd: Dixon, a senior member
of the Coffin Cheaters. He raised his eyebrows over his beer on seeing me,
making no attempt to suppress his shock. But then, of course he was shocked.
Not only did I rarely elect to leave the MC compound for anything other than a
joyride, but I wasn't exactly known for being a big party girl on the days the
boys raised hell
on
site, let alone off in the Florida foothills. The
old fool probably didn't even realize that I could hold my liquor, I just often
chose not to. Especially when a bunch of handsy fuckers were so quick to refill
my glass.

“Gisele!” Dixon called across the room, beginning to thwack
his way through a cluster of dancing older couples towards me. “Wait up! Fancy
seeing you here, sweet butt! Just wait'll I tell the boys!”

I just plain didn't feel like a catch-up session, so I did
the rude thing: I mimed that I couldn't hear the grisly rider over the bar
sounds. I pointed to my ear, mouthed 'sorry,' then fled for the roadside. Once
I'd found safe solitude beside my bike, I indulged in a little breakdown.

I wiped away my tears and straightened my shoulders. I slid
onto the bike and pushed the helmet over my face. Just as I began to feel
better—if wistful—a glancing memory rushed to my mind's surface, so ridiculous
I burst out laughing.

Baby.
That sexy sap had called me
baby.
And
here I thought no man would ever get away with that, let alone a man in
leather
pants.

Chapter Four

* * *

A few days passed at the compound with me trying to remain
optimistic about the non-date, and merely content to enjoy the memory. I needed
distractions for such a Jedi Mind Trick to work, so—I rose early to help with
chores around the clubhouse, and made nice with Esse and Rayna and Nunu, lending
an eager ear to their raucous sex stories. I offered to help a few of the
riders with detailing, free of charge. One day, Dog took me into the city and
we ambled around South Beach, passing a 40 between us and talking about
nothing.

But through it all, there was a nagging undercurrent: it was
like a piece of ticker tape was sluicing through my brain, constantly
telegraphing “Carter Knox Carter Knox Carter Knox” into my thoughts. It was
almost as if I'd dreamed him—his name, his laugh. At night, in my too-small
childhood bunk bed, I couldn't keep my imagination from wandering in the direction
of what might-have-been. I would touch myself then, picturing how things might
have continued at Scotty's had those “unsavory characters” not shown up. In my
dreams, Carter undressed me with the same tenderness with which he'd worked my
spine—but then he handled my naked flesh with a fearsome strength. He pressed
his full lips into every single one of my hidden crevices, he sucked me dry, he
left me raw and damp—and after these imagined acts concluded, I would come like
a warm flood. Sleep arrived easily on these nights, because I dreamt I was
sleeping with him.

Because of all this, I hadn't given much thought to the fact
that Scotty had so deliberately used “unsavory characters” as a ruse for Carter's
escape. After all, the Cheaters had made no mention of a threat in town, and
nothing on the garage's burgled police radio suggested that a new criminal
element had come to Miami-Dade. If I'd been thinking properly, something about
this might have struck me as a little suspicious—but I wasn't thinking
properly. I was daydreaming about the boy, instead.

I finally wrote Tati, on a day when my emotions seemed too
much to keep inside:

Hey Twin,

Glad to hear you're fully living the good life. We all
miss you tons—especially the “ladies who lunch” (wink nudge nudge)—but I have
to admit, I don't think I could ever buck up and follow a band around, like
you. For one thing, aren't musicians awfully weasely? I like muscle. I've always
liked muscle. Just one more reason why we're not EXACTLY the same person,
contrary to—well—appearances.

Speaking of MUSCLE, I did have this weird moment the
other day. Don't laugh: he's another rider. Don't laugh again: he picked me up
on the side of the highway. Well, scratch that, he pulled me over when I had
some debris in a tire. Stone Cold Fox, sissy—and I basically yelled in his
face, “will you go for a drink with me??” He looks a little like George Clooney
or something. Tall, dark and CLASICALLY handsome—but it looks like his nose has
been broken before, so he's got the whole tough guy thing going for him, too. Anyways
so we went for this drink, and things started to heat up, but he ran out in the
middle because of—

I balled up the letter. Tati, I was sure, would laugh in my
face reading the words as written. I sounded totally batshit, lusting after
some random highway weirdo.

Just then, Dog ran into my bunk.

“Gizzy! Come quick! There's some kind of—summit going on!”
Dog was still pretty new to the Cheaters' vocabulary (I'd never known us to
have a “summit” before...), but the look on his face told me things were
serious. We basically never had MC meetings—this club was so old and entrenched
that its members moved around by instinct, like a flock of geese.

“Well don't just sit there, bright eyes! Put your boots on!”

Chapter Five

* * *

The only place large enough to house an MC meeting was an
old, blown-out, barn-like structure behind the clubhouse. This ugly dungeon was
so dilapidated you really had to use your imagination to picture it as a
functional building. Most of the club believed it had once been some kind of
plywood congregation, as our beachy part of Florida had scant use for a barn
and the space's floorplan was laid out like a church, with one long section
crossing a short one. Yet in a decidedly unholy way, the room was constantly
humid, and usually smelled like rotting fruit. Also, the ground was littered
with condom wrappers and cigarette butts, from all the MC parties going back
across history, probably to before I was born. They called this place the
Crossroads. I seldom ventured back there because I hated it so much.

Dixon was standing in the center of a circle of Coffin
Cheaters, squelching across the damp ground in his heavy motorcycle boots. When
he saw Dog and I rush in, he gave me an odd look—containing something like
relief. Then he motioned to us to find seats, on upturned barrels or the damp
ground. I collapsed into a squat.

Dixon wasn't the club president—that gentleman went by the
name of Ra Rodney, and he was such a pothead it was rare to see him before the
sun went down. And in all these years, no one had officially replaced my father
as number two; in fact, much of the MC's formerly rigid decision-making structure
had fallen by the wayside over time. Most club matters were handled through a
kind of oligarchy of the senior members—there was Dixon, who'd been a Coffin
Cheater for forty years; Flapper, who'd allegedly shot a member of a rival MC
over a girl, back in the eighties; and finally, there was Tall Man—a
stone-faced Choctaw 'Nam veteran who rarely spoke, but commanded everyone's
respect nonetheless.

Rarely were all three men in one room, but here they stood
before me.

“There's been a rumor around town,” Dixon began, pinching a
wedge of chew from a tin and sliding it below his lower teeth. “About an old
enemy of ours being back in town. There've been reports of a few—shall we say—
unsavory
characters.
”

I almost giggled at this repetition. What was the likelihood
that two people I knew well in 2014 both used this one old-timey-movie phrase,
at different intervals? Oh, but...wait. Shit.

“That's right, you sons o' bitches. The
Styx
are back
in town.”

An angry ripple tore through the crowd. I felt my limbs go
numb. Dog, after shaking his head and murmuring a curse to the ground, noticed
my pallor. He drew me under his smelly armpit, started patting my head like I
was a Labrador.

“Didn't we run those sad sacks out?” called Viper, a young
kid who'd already lost a lot of his natural beauty to an unfortunate love
affair with methamphetamine.

“We did once before. We'll do it again.”

“I'd like to fucking SLICE those sons of whores. Tear every
single one of 'em limb from limb, like a beast.”

“I wanna burn them. Nice and slow-like.”

“Motherfuckers gave me THIS SCAR! Everyone see it? Everyone
seen my scar?”

“HEY.” A hush fell. Tall Man had done the improbable: risen
to speak in a crowded room. “We are all full of anger. But attention must be
paid, and pans must me considered. We will accomplish nothing unless we are
strong.” Then, the cold-eyed prophet turned to me. Everyone's eyes seemed to
follow suit.

“There is one among us who has lost family to these
miserable dirtbags,” Dixon broke in, his voice rent with uncharacteristic pity.
“Our very own baby girl here. So as we contemplate how to respond to the
threat, I want you to think about the good men we've lost to the Knights of
Styx.” The riders murmured a slow, dopy assent. These men, for all their
bravery, were intimidated by planning. Coffin Cheaters were men of action,
Coffin Cheaters were soldiers. I felt a burst of relief, imagining how all this
rabble-rousing still might come to nothing. I sure as hell didn't want a fight.
Especially when...

“There's another thing, boys. Before we all get to the
drink,” this was Flapper now, his angry little voice cutting high above the
crowd. “Because we must appear strong, it seems high-time that our MC
re-establish some of its old hierarchies. With this in mind, we'd like to appoint
a Den Mother, to help with some of the club's inner workings. Thankfully, we've
already got a nice candidate for the job right here in our midst: Ms. Gisele
Owens.”

Yet again, the whole MC pivoted in my direction. I felt my
traitorous face bloom hot again, so uncomfortable was I with the attention.

“Whyn't you stand up and stake your claim,” Dog hissed into
my ear. “You're already like our Den Mother. Comes with a bit more
responsibility, is all.”

I was dazed, so I followed the directive. As soon as I was
standing tall, the Crossroads erupted into cheers. In spite of myself, I did
feel a little honored. Dad was probably looking down from (or up from...)
wherever he was, puffing up with pride at his baby's being officially inducted
into the MC that had shaped his life. The support of the men, it did mean
something to me.

“With Gisele as our Den Mother, she must be treated with
absolute respect. She'll get a say in how the club moves, have a hand in our
financial operations, and most importantly, will help the council decide what's
to be done with the Knights of Styx MC,” Dixon explained. As punctuation, he
spewed out a long, brown trail of chew.

“...so when the time is right, we can waste every last one
of em. Slaughter them like little piggies. Vengeance will be ours, boys!”

And the men cheered.

* * *

As soon as the meeting concluded, my formerly love-addled
mind kicked into high-gear again. With a racing pulse, I ran back to the
shelter of my bedroom to think, to pace, to attempt to make some plan of my
own.

Unsavory characters.
By itself, the word choice
wasn't much of a coincidence—it wasn't the craziest thing I'd heard a Cheater
say, by any means—but something about how Scotty and Carter had murmured the
term suggested a code...
I live by a code, and I just hope someone would do
the same for me.
Then there was this clue: Knox had fled the tiki-bar when
a couple of newbies had come in, and as I was leaving I'd run into Dixon.

Jesus H. Christ.

The more I thought about it, there were other indicators, too:
the odd way Carter had looked at me when I'd refused to explain why I drove a
nice bike; the way his body had cringed when I'd mentioned that I had “friends
in high places,” or whatever damn fool thing I'd said. Then there was the fact
of the man himself, a lone rider, driving around the Miami-Dade highways midday
like some kind of...
scout.

Carter Knox was a member of the Knights of Styx. I knew this
suddenly, and unavoidably, in my gut. The only real, live adult man I'd ever
even begun to like was a kinsman of my greatest enemy. He'd been a member of
the MC that had murdered my father as he slept in his bed.