Nomads' Fall: Burning Bastards MC (10 page)

Demon grabbed the rest of the ice cubes from the glass and rubbed them over his face to rinse some of the pussy juice off, and pulled his t-shirt up to dry himself off. “It’s good to be back.” He looked at his empty beer bottle and limped to the bar.

Big Dog and Georgie were sitting together drinking and complaining about women, Demon figured he’d join them for his own entertainment. He didn’t own a woman, didn’t want to either. Maybe someday, but not until he found one that did more for him than make his dick hard. Not to mention the thought of sharing a woman on a permanent basis with Knight kept filtering through his brain when he thought of locking down.

“What happened to make you brothers look like you want to pound on something?” He sat and put his feet up on another chair with only a small wince. The bullet had been removed and everything was healing nicely in his thigh, but he still had to watch out and not make any moves that might pop one of the stitches.

Georgie gave him the ‘eat shit and die’ look and slugged back his beer. “Women are the fucking bane of every man’s life. A man can kiss her royal little ass, put a ring on her finger, and give her everything he owns,” he pointed his bottle toward Demon, “that’s not enough for them, oh no, boy, she wants to put a motherfuckin’ ring through a good man’s nose and lead him around with a pretty pink fuckin’ leash.” He nodded for emphasis and sat back in his chair.

Big Dog nodded in agreement. “A woman is the most evil enemy a man has, yep, always getting in a man’s business. She has her place in a relationship, why can’t she stay in her place? Oh no, gotta snip and snap at a man. Do you know Future found out about our hunting program, I think Georgie’s woman ratted us out. Fuckin’ bitch.” He looked at Georgie who was scowling at him for calling Gladys a bitch. “No offense to you, brother, she’s a good woman with a few bad habits, like telling Future things the old ladies don’t need to know.” He belched and got up hitting the bar for more beer.

“Sorry, Big D, we’re out of longnecks. I just tapped a keg, so hang on, it’s cold. I’ll bring them out to you and the guys in a couple of minutes.” Big D navigated his way back to the table and swore the reason they were out of his favorite beer container was because some bitch must have fucked up something.

Needles joined the table of friends and Knight pulled another table to butt up with the one they already had. Mick, from the body shop came in, and even Beadle found his way to the table. Show sat at the bar talking to Tiny. They seemed to be the only men here that weren't bitching and whining about women.

Tiny looked up from pumping up the keg and saw the crowd at the table. He looked around and spied the bucket he used to shuffle ice from the icemaker in the back room to the bar, so he grabbed the bucket and filled it with beer from the spigot. He snagged a stack of red plastic cups on his way to the table.

Beadle’s woman left him and took the kids when he came home and beat the shit out of her for refusing to let his pregnant slut move in with them. Two weeks later the slut lost the kid when he slapped her around a bit. She told him to die and she hoped bugs crawled on his rotting flesh. The bitch had given him nightmares about bugs crawling on him every time he closed his eyes now. “I don’t give a damn what you say, ain’t no woman worth the hell a man has to go through with one.”

Demon got up to take a piss and his chair was filled within minutes. He walked past Show and shrugged his shoulders, “I got no pony in that show, and those boys are going to blame the headache in the morning on women too.” He shook his head, “I think I’ll just go find me a friendly housecat and give her a lap to sit on for the night.”

Knight watched Demon leave the room and knew where he was headed. He was getting tired of hearing the woes of the locked down brothers as well and decided to have some fun at their expense, and really piss the whiners off.

“Well, I for one hear you all yapping and crying about how mistreated you boys are. Why don’t you just toss ‘em aside and be rid of them.” That got some of the men’s attention. “Some other sucker will come along and take what you tossed out. Fuck, man, I’ve seen all you fuckers’ old ladies and wives. There ain’t one of them a red blooded man wouldn’t want to fuck, so they won’t be hanging on your dicks for long.” He had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing at the looks of hatred he saw on his friends’ faces. Damn they were so easy to fuck with when they were drunk.

Big Dog didn’t like the idea of another man talking to his woman, let alone another man taking her to his bed. “Oh fuck no, she ain’t fucking no damned motherfucker but me. The first sonofabitch that touches her will be feeling my fist in his mouth before his arm stops bleeding from where I tear it off him and beat him to death with it,” he mumbled. “Touch my property and I’ll kill the sumbitch.”

Georgie’s eyes narrowed into slits as he thought about some other man sliding into place beside his Gladys and his fist hit the table, making the cups of beer jump. “I’ll shoot his fuckin’ balls off and drown him in that damn lake she’s so in love with. Don’t be getting ideas about her, she’s mine, motherfuckers, and don’t you forget it.”

“Oh come on, think about it. You’d be free to find a woman more to your liking. There’s always new sluts and party girlies coming through here. Grab one that’s still young and dumb.” That got several groans from the table of men.

“I ain’t got the time or patience to deal with some chickie that has trouble deciding what color nail polish matches her outfit. Damn you, Knight, you ruined a good damned bitch session for me, asshole.”

“Oh hell, man, you can sell those homes you all share with the old lady, and live here with the rest of us again. If you haven’t gotten used to privacy and doing your own thing, or not having to share a shitter with thirty other guys, it's great, right? Why stay in an empty house, right? Who’s gonna clean it?

Beadle got up and took a swing at Knight who was trying not to laugh as the smaller man twirled around due to the momentum of a swing that had no chance of connecting. “You’re a sonofabitch, trying to make me feel bad after all I been through, comme’re, I’mma beat your ass. Some sumbitch is fuckin' Kelsey right now I bet, an you gotta remind me.”

Knight wasn’t about to lecture Beadle about the reason a woman might not want a man that not only beat her regularly, but thought nothing about moving his girlfriend into the same house his wife and kids lived in. He gave the small man a gentle push and Beadle sat on the floor staring into space.

“You get a mouse, you give her a house, and when she’s gone, you don’t need the house anymore. You’re free agents, man.” He spread his arms to his sides. “Look at me, I have no responsibilities to anyone but the Bastards and me. I’m happy here with the Bitches, and the bar. Hell, I get pussy from a different woman each night if I want.” He took a cup and dipped it into the bucket and drank it down.” It’s gonna be fun, having you brothers back at the crib.”

The grumbles of “Oh hell no’s,” were music to his ears. He hated to see good people screw up their lives from petty shit. Someone busted a chair and he looked to see who was doing the damage, it was Georgie. Old boy was getting wild, and Big Dog wasn’t much tamer.

They drew a man’s silhouette on one of the tabletops and leaned it against the wall. It became a competition of who threw his knife in a vital spot. The “dickless motherfucker” game was on. As drunk as they were, most of them threw with decent accuracy. A heart shot got encouraging words, but the cock shot got cheers and whoops.

Needles sat with the single men enjoying the show the men with woman troubles were putting on. He saw the shit these men were going through and counted himself lucky to be without a permanent woman in his life. Show got tired and drifted off to find his bed. Needles hung in there with Tiny and helped him clean up the mess that had been made when the table was upended by a raging jealous Big Dog.

Most of the men were passed out on whatever piece of furniture they sat down on during the competition. Big Dog was laid out on the floor and Georgie was sitting in a chair with his head and shoulders on the table in front of him. Mick was in the lounge on one of the couches, and several others were scattered on the rest of the furniture and in the backrooms where they’d wandered to find a bed.

Knight went out back to the shanties and kicked off his boots before lying down and sleeping. He hadn’t had as much to drink as the rest of them, so the room wasn’t spinning for him as he drifted to sleep.

*****

Jolly found a hotel room on the outskirts of Louisville. She didn’t really want to spend the money, but if this was going to be her last night on earth, she was going to sleep in a real bed with clean sheets. She’d indulged in a chicken sandwich and her favorite caramel frappe for dinner, and sat in the hotel room watching television for the first time in months. The local news anchors must have changed since she left the area, because she didn’t recognize the two people smiling as they reported on yet another murder in the basin area. It was forecast to rain all night and there was going to be more rain tomorrow with possible thunderstorms. That wasn’t necessarily a bad thing for her, if the rain was falling, there’d be fewer people out and about and it’d be easier for her to visit her mother. Afterwards, she was going to the strip club to ask Porter to call off his dogs.

She took a long hot bath and scrubbed her skin with the hotel soap. The memory of the handsome biker telling her how bad she looked stayed with her. She washed her hair and used conditioner to tame the frizzed mess, but she couldn’t do anything about the cut.

Sleep was eluding her, but sometime during the late show, she drifted off. The sun was up when she opened her eyes and she was startled to see it was past nine a.m.

The little coffee pot was a godsend for her jangled nerves. The hot coffee laced with three of the four sugar packets and both creamers helped her focus. She used the hotel telephone to call her mother’s number since the local call was free of charge and she didn’t own a cell phone. She got a recording that said the number had been changed or disconnected.
That’s odd
.

She left the hotel just before checkout at eleven o’clock. Her mother should be up by now, and the club opened at three, so she could potentially spend a couple of hours with her mom and then go directly to face her fate.

She pulled into the driveway, and immediately knew something wasn’t right. There was a bicycle by the front steps and rock music blared from the open windows of the house. She was stunned, her mother had moved? Why would she move, it’d only been six or seven months since she’d last spoken to her, and she didn’t say a thing about moving to her then. The teenage girl that came to the door told her she didn’t know anything about the lady that lived there before. She was just the babysitter. Jolly thanked her and got back in her car.

Well that was a letdown
. She started the car and drove around town for an hour wondering what to do. Maybe she should wait until after she visited the strip club to hunt her mother down
.
All right, enough of this shit, just go to the place, wait for them to open the doors and do this.

She parked her old car on the street and watched people scurrying through the rain with their heads down, as they hurried to their destinations. She got out of the car and ran around the building through the rain and checked the back door. She looked at the parking lot and saw two vehicles there, neither was the dark blue SUV. The door opened when she turned the handle, so she went inside.

Chapter
Ten

She heard the murmur of voices coming from Porter’s office, and stood there for a minute taking a few deep breaths before tapping on the solid wood. It got quiet and someone opened the door. The man that answered was tall with wide shoulders and graying brown hair. His eyes were a green color, but it was the facial bone structure that held her attention. She could swear she’d seen him somewhere before, but had no memory of the meeting if she actually had met him.

He was smiling politely until he saw her face, now he was frowning. He stood back for her to enter the room, and she fought the urge to turn and run. Porter was sitting behind his desk with his hands tied down on the arms of his chair, and he looked at her with his head tilted sideways like he was trying to place where he knew her from. She could tell the minute he remembered who she was and he shot the tall man a look of almost,
was that fear?

Porter jerked his head toward the door and yelled at her to, “Get the hell out of here. You’ve caused enough trouble around here.”

“Oh no, she’s not going anywhere until I get some answers, and you’d better hope those answers aren’t what I suspect they’re going to be.” He pulled a phone out of his pocket and punched an icon before putting the phone back into his pocket. “My name’s William Kelley, perhaps you’ve heard of me?”

She took the hand he held out and allowed him to clasp her fingers for a moment until she drew hers back. “Jolly, I’m Jolly Baker.” His eyes narrowed even more as he shot Porter a you’re-in-trouble-now look.

The door opened, and two men entered the room. She was thankful that neither was James. She had herself pumped up to plead with Porter to call off his dogs, but it looked like Porter might have issues of his own.

“Look, I just stopped in to ask Porter to do me a favor. I’m not here to cause anyone any trouble, really. I just need to talk to him in private for a minute and I can get out of your way, I promise.” She tried to smile, but she was so nervous she knew she hadn’t pulled it off when William Kelley looked at her again.

“Well now, since I’m Porter’s boss, and I own this place, you can say anything you need to with me here, isn’t that right, Porter? She might not understand that I already know every secret that goes on here already, so she can talk freely, right?” He was looking at Porter and the club boss shook his head.

“No, our business has nothing to do with the club, it’s more of a personal problem. It’s been a long time since I last saw you. We can meet later, I’ll have James arrange something.”