Tainted Rose (2 page)

*

T
HE DARK REBELS OWNED THE
Velvet Cat and a string of other bars and strip clubs along the Trans-Canada. Up till now all their ventures had been on the Quebec side of the border. They were the largest and most powerful MC in Quebec. They’d been in the game for years and had chapters all around Montreal and Quebec City. They’d wiped out most of their competition in a series of fast and brutal wars about ten years ago. Rose’s father’s club, the Sioux Rangers, had been one of the clubs that had been wiped out. The Cat was the DRMC’s first bar across the border into Ontario. It was a big risk for them. They knew it could start a turf war with one of the big Ontario clubs but so far nothing had happened. This place was so remote and so far north that none of the Ontario clubs had paid it any notice.

The chapter in Val-d’Or ran the bars on all the northern routes and the local vice-president came out about once a week to check on things. He was a real brute, a big muscly guy by the name of Serge Gauthier who kept his head shaved and had these crazy blue eyes that Rose would often have nightmares about in the middle of the night. That man had done things to her that should have gotten him locked in jail. He was a real sadist, a crazy drug addict, and a filthy son of a bitch. Once a week he’d ride out to the bar from town and stay overnight. Rose was always expected to spend the night with him and she loathed those nights with a passion. Serge would check on Murdoch, make sure things were running smoothly, and ride back to town in the morning with the weekly take. Those nights were hard on Rose. She knew she could only tolerate them for a little while longer before she snapped.

Dancing was one thing. Being used as a whore and a sex slave by Serge Gauthier was another matter. She could manage Murdoch, he was old and wasn’t the fastest on his feet, but Serge and his friends were different. They were genuinely scary. Rose had no doubt that they’d killed people, even women and children. They seemed to have no honor, not like the men she’d known as a child. They carried guns they could easily conceal. They did coke and speed and other drugs. And they were brutal to her when they got her cornered in a bedroom.

Most of the time she was too scared to oppose them. When they told her to do something, she did it. But she fantasized about one day cutting off all their dicks and forcing them to eat them.

*

R
OSE PULLED UP TO THE
parking lot behind the bar in the beat up old Ford that Murdoch let her drive. The car felt like it might literally fall to pieces every time she pulled out of the driveway. It could barely make the two miles along the highway from the house she stayed at with Murdoch to the bar. Unless it was really cold, he would take his bike to work and she had the use of the car. If it was too cold she’d have to ride in the car with him in the morning.

She didn’t have to dance till afternoon or evening, and then, only when there were customers. Sometimes Murdoch would make her clean the place up when they were quiet but for the most part she just sat at the bar and drank coffee and waited to see who’d show up.

All of their customers were truckers. They were the only people this far north. They weren’t allowed to drive all night like they used to in the old days because of safety regulations so they’d pull into the lot in front of the bar after sundown and sleep in their trucks. They’d come into the bar for a little entertainment before going to sleep. Murdoch would serve them beer and burgers that he grilled on an eighteen inch Garland electric grill and they’d eat and drink and watch Rose dance.

It wasn’t the most glamorous life in the world, stripping in a roadside bar while the stench of grease and charred meat oozed from the grill. There were times when Rose would leave the stage weeping. But for the most part she tried to enjoy the dancing. She liked the music, she liked being in the spotlight, and when business was good she could clear a couple hundred in tips from the truckers. If someone paid to take her to the back room, she was expected to give them a little something to think about when they went back to their truck and bedded down for the night. That was just a part of her job and there was nothing she could do about it. She hated to think of herself as a whore but that basically was what she was.

When it was really busy and the bar was full of men, harsh, coarse, rugged loggers and truckers from the wilds of the far north, she felt the thrill of being a performer. She could give fifteen or twenty men an erection with a single motion of her hips or a flash of her bare breasts. She felt cheap at those times too, she knew she was dancing in the filthiest, vilest place imaginable, but the excitement of the performance was real and she clung to it. It was all she had.

Often she thought about trying to escape. She had the old Ford. Every time she got on the highway she fantasized about driving right past the Cat and heading off into the wilderness. The problem was that she knew the car would never make it. Even if it didn’t break down twenty miles down the road, she’d never be able to outrun Murdoch on his bike. She wasn’t sure she’d make it to the nearest gas station either. Murdoch kept the car and his bike fueled from a tank at the back of the house and the key was on a chain around his neck. And even if she managed to get fuel, which way would she run? West was hopeless. Timmins was four hours away and the Ford would die long before it made it over the treacherous hills that way. East into Quebec was Val-d’Or, which was closer than Timmins but that was also where Serge’s DRMC chapter was based and the club watched that highway. Murdoch would just have to call ahead and Serge and his guys would be waiting for her.

She had nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, and she knew it. She was stuck there, at least for the time being, and there was no point in thinking about escape. That’s how it had been for the past two years. When she’d first arrived, she’d thought of escape every day. She’d tried running the Ford west toward Timmins and Murdoch had caught her. She’d tried asking the truckers for help but they all knew how things worked. None of them wanted trouble with the DRMC. They had to live on that highway and the MC was harsh on anyone who betrayed them. Once she asked a guy who drove for a paper mill in Ontario for help, he was based farther away and she thought the MC might have less of a hold on him. She’d been wrong. He’d gone straight to Murdoch and the next week, when Serge came by to pick up his money, he beat her so badly she had to lay in bed for two weeks. He broke two of her ribs and she still wasn’t sure if they’d healed properly. She’d thought he was going to kill her. She didn’t want to risk going through that again. And there was no point going to the police. The closest station was in Val-d’Or and the MC had both officers on the payroll. She didn’t even know how far it was to the next police station but she was pretty sure their officers would have been bought by the DRMC too. You didn’t get to be the biggest motorcycle club in Quebec without knowing who to bribe.

She did as she was told now. She danced when they told her to dance, she gave it up when they wanted to fuck her, and she didn’t talk to anyone about escape, ever. She’d accepted her fate.

She stepped out of the car onto the muddy lot and was glad she was wearing snow boots. The snow was so filthy it was black. It was April, pretty much the worst time of year for slush and melt. The little warmth there was only served to melt enough ice to make a mess. She’d never imagined that somewhere so cold and so isolated could also be so dirty. She was glad winter was finally coming to an end. There would be more traffic on the highway and there was always a sense of hope that accompanied the coming of spring. She grabbed her bag from the backseat of the car and trekked through the filthy slush and in through the back door of the bar.

II

W
HEN ROSE ENTERED THE BAR
Murdoch was sitting at his desk, slouched back on his chair with a can of Budweiser resting on his bloated belly and a cigarette dangling from his mouth. He looked like he hadn’t slept or shaved in the past twenty-four hours but Rose knew he’d been home. She’d heard him come into the house during the night. Now he was here before her. He wasn’t usually such a good worker but he always got a bit more conscientious when he knew Serge was coming.

“You’re late,” he said. “I need you to clean the toilets before you get changed.”

Rose sighed. She hated that this was the man she shared a house with. She shared her entire life with him. It was just the two of them at the bar most of the week. In winter when the road was closed they could go days without seeing anyone else. During those times he’d get so frisky she’d have to stay awake at night and guard her bedroom door in case he tried anything.

He had a TV on the desk in front of him and he was watching his soap operas in French and drinking beer while he
managed
the bar. It wasn’t a difficult job, at least not till the trucks started to roll in.

“I cleaned the toilets last night before I left,” she said.

“And why are you late?”

“I had car trouble,” Rose said. He only cared because Serge was coming in. He usually didn’t wake up till well into the afternoon.

“That’s what you always say.”

“And no one ever does anything about it. I thought bikers were supposed to know something about engines.”

She had a hard time even thinking of the DRMC as bikers. They were nothing like the men her father used to ride with before they’d all been killed.

“Come over here and I’ll teach you something about engines,” Murdoch said, beckoning her.

Rose ignored him and walked through to the changing room. Murdoch tried to slap her on the ass as she passed but she dodged his hand.

“Oh,” he said, “and Serge just called. He’s not coming out till Thursday.”

That was good news. She hated Serge a lot more than she hated Murdoch, but now she just prayed that there would be some customers, otherwise it would be just her and Murdoch. He’d already started drinking and by the time they called it a night and closed up he’d be good and drunk if he didn’t have any work to do. He’d also have been watching her strut around in her g-string and bra all night long and his dick would be as hard as an engine rod. If he didn’t fall asleep from all the beer he’d be in her room as soon as he got home and she’d have to put up with whatever sorry attempt he made at lovemaking. She supposed rape was the correct word for it but there was something about Murdoch that made what he did seem a bit too pathetic to constitute actual rape. Not like Serge. She just prayed there would be customers, then Murdoch would be busy all night, he wouldn’t have time to get drunk, and she could count on getting a safe night’s sleep when she got home.

There was a small, circular window in the changing room door and she could see out to Murdoch in the office. He was about as repulsive a man as she could imagine. He was overweight, had a tobacco stained beard and gray stubble on his cheeks and his shirt had sweat stains around the armpits and beer stains down the front. Who’s idea had it been to put a window in the door of a dressing room, she wondered.

*

S
HE THREW HER BAG ON
the bench in front of her locker. Her wallet fell out and opened onto the last photograph she still had of her father. If Serge ever saw that he would destroy it. Seeing it made her think of everything that had happened to bring her to this hellish place. She’d been so foolish. It had been two years ago. She’d been short of cash at the time. She wasn’t desperate or anything but rent in Montreal wasn’t cheap and she was finding it difficult to get her tuition together for college.

And then she’d met an old friend of her father’s, a man she recognized from the old days with the Sioux Rangers. She was amazed that he was still alive. She never should have trusted a man that looked like him but she’d seen her father with him in the clubhouse so many times that she just let all of her usual guards down. They started talking about old times and then he told her he could help her make some fast cash.

She should have run as far and as fast away from that man as she could, and ordinarily she would have. Rex Savage was his name. She’d remember that name for as long as she lived. Like any girl who’d lost her father at a young age, Rose had a weak spot for anyone who had a connection to him. When Rex talked about riding with her father she’d been blinded to all the things that should have made her suspicious.

He came into the restaurant she worked at in the old quarter, completely out of the blue, and asked if she was Jack Meadows’ daughter. From that moment on she would have believed anything he told her. She met up with him a few times for drinks and he seemed okay. He never tried anything, and he sure knew a lot about her father and his years riding with the Sioux Rangers. Looking back now, she should have seen the signs of drug addiction.

He’d held it together pretty well but he was obviously a man on the edge. He was sickly thin and he always seemed to have a cold. His eyes darted around the room like he thought he was being watched. Sometimes he shivered and other times he would be sweating for no apparent reason. Looking back, Rose knew she should have recognized that something was wrong with him. At the time, she was just so happy to be able to talk about her father that she overlooked it all.

One evening, he told her he knew a really easy way for her to get her tuition money together. She could earn four grand in a single night delivering one small package to a guy in Iroquois Falls. Rose had never heard of Iroquois Falls. It was a tiny village, deep in the northern forests over five-hundred miles from Montreal.

It was pretty obvious that the package contained something illegal. Rose wasn’t
that
naive. She knew Rex was still involved with some MCs and she figured the package contained drugs. She weighed up the risk of being stopped by the police against the chance to earn four grand and get her tuition paid and she took the deal.

Never in a million years would she have guessed that the real package wasn’t drugs at all, it was herself.