Page 37 of Hidden Desires (Bikers of Mayhem #2)

BLADE

W hen one thinks of a Latino/Asian gang hideout, one usually doesn’t think of a large desert pit, surrounded by flaming oil drums, broken-down cars, and at least forty drunk and rowdy Latino/Asian gangsters cheering around a homemade fight club.

Blade could see the appeal. Being in the desert, they were not bothered by the public, authorities, or pesky social media influencers making an ass out of themselves while dancing around in a grocery store or walking around the city asking people stupid questions.

Blade loved a good joke, same as any dude, but he had trouble finding the shit he saw on social media funny, even when the rest of the droned-out viewers thought so.

He parked his bike next to a dark-colored SUV and killed the engine.

“Wasn’t sure you’d show,” a deep voice said behind him.

Blade turned around and instantly recognized him as the man he had met in the hospital.

“Thought I would come and listen to the boss’s offer. See if it’s worth me leaving my crew.” Blade didn’t want to seem too aloof or overly excited. He needed the man to believe that he was there because he was actually interested in possibly joining the man’s crew… if the price was right.

The man nodded.

“Follow me.”

Blade followed the man toward the large gathering of drunk and cheering partyers. They all stood in a large circle, drinking beers and smoking pot as they cheered at something happening at their feet.

As they approached the crowd, Blade realized that they were all standing around a large sand pit, cheering on two bloodied men who were battling it out in the crater below.

“Are you a betting man?” a heavily tanned man asked as they approached a large, plush chair that sat on a homemade platform about four feet above the ground.

There was just enough height so the man could see over the people and down into the pit.

The man was Latino, probably just over six feet, with tattoos running along the right side of his face and covering the entirety of his right pec muscle. To say the dude looked scary was an understatement.

In addition to the fear the tattoos brought, the man also had a nasty-looking scar that ran across the length of his stomach.

Blade stared at the man, wondering about the question.

“Only on poker and whether or not I’m going to catch an STI from my one-night stand.”

The scary-looking man grinned at him. It seemed that he had given the correct answer.

“I see you get your sarcastic mouth from your father.”

Blade’s eyes narrowed. Just the thought of his dad made his blood boil.

The man raised a hand in defense.

“Sorry, I forgot that he tried to kill you. I can assure you that was not the order I gave him. He was supposed to bring you to me so I could meet you and convince you to come and join my crew.” The man raised his hand and gestured toward the cheering crowd below.

The commotion was so loud that Blade struggled to hear the man as he talked.

“Well, my father was always a rotten bastard. So it isn’t a surprise that he wanted to knock me off. He always liked being the center of attention and didn’t like sharing the spotlight.”

“Were you a performer with your father as well?”

Blade shook his head. “He started to teach me blade throwing, but I could see him holding back, probably afraid that I would outshine him on stage. Like I said, he didn’t like being overshadowed.”

“Clearly.”

On either side of the chair stood two neatly dressed Asian men. Both were perfectly identical. Both had shaved black hair, both dressed in the same black and red suit—even though it was hotter than hell’s ass outside—both holding matching swords at their sides.

Were these the crazy Asian assassins Nikolai had told them about when they first arrived in Vegas? Apparently, the twins had taken out a fleet of Asian mobsters at the age of sixteen, using only a razor blade and a training sword.

Fact or fiction? That was the powerful thing about stories; once they were heard, you never stopped wondering.

“So, do you have a name? Or do I keep referring to you as the creepy Latin dude?” Blade asked, eyes still locked on the right assassin.

“Everyone calls me Raz,” the man said, grinning at Blade and adding another disturbing image to the growing pile he was sure would haunt him in his dreams for years to come.

“Wow, you must be quite the leader bringing together Latino and Asian gang members. Talk about a deadly crew you got going here,” Blade complimented.

In his experience, Latino gangs and Asian gangs were some of the deadliest he had ever encountered. They were smart, organized, and ruthless when it came to business.

Seeing both cultures mixed together in one unified crew was impressive and a bit scary.

“What can I say, I’m a natural born leader,” Raz said, giving Blade a cocky smirk.

What was the saying? Never trust a snake lying still in the grass?

Judging by the two deadly assassins standing at Raz’s sides, he got the feeling that Raz was pretty deadly himself. It took a certain level of madness to command the respect of two such notorious killers—if the stories were true.

It was probably better for his health if he stopped asking questions.

“Well, Mr. Raz, let’s hear this offer you’ve been dying to pitch me. Explain to me why it’s worth leaving the Shadow Vipers and coming to join the Cyanyd Kings.”

The man’s grin was the stuff of children's nightmares.

“Did you bring your blades?”

A cold chill ran down Blade’s spine.

“Yes, of course. My babies are with me all the time.”

“Good. Now we’ll see what you are made of.”

The crowd behind him erupted in another enormous cheer.

Before he even had a chance to realize what was going on, he was grabbed by two men and dragged backward toward the pit.

“What the?” Blade exclaimed as he was tossed down into the hole.

Inside the pit, two men dragged away the lifeless body of a young man who was bleeding profusely from his cracked-open skull.

On the other side of the pit, stood a large man chugging a beer with what looked like a short metal pipe sticking out of his side.

Raz appeared above the pit.

“Now we’ll see if you are worth all the trouble. If you can beat my best fighter, I’ll give you the privilege of joining my crew. If you end up dying? Well, then we will know that you are nothing like your father.”

Blade’s jaw clenched at the thought of being compared to his father.

Behind him, he could hear his opponent preparing himself for battle.

Was this what they did for fun on weekends? Battle it out like dogs in an illegal fight match?

“Are you really sure that you want me to injure your best shadowboxing student? It’s never good for one’s self-esteem to be destroyed by the new guy in front of his peers.”

Blade turned to face his opponent.

How long would he have to fight before Marcus and the guys showed up? The plan was to jump Raz and his crew shortly after he arrived. But it had already been at least fifteen minutes. Had something gone wrong? Had Marcus left him there to die?

No. Marcus would never do that. Or would he? He was sticking it to his little brother after all.

Stepbrother.

Marcus never made that distinction. As far as he was concerned, both he and Ace shared the same vagina and penis in their creation. They were brothers, and that was that.

Pulling out his trusted blades, Blade ran them against each other, feeling the cold steel vibrate between his fingers.

He loved that feeling. It was as though the essence of the blades flowed through his body.

Accepting the vibrations into him, he felt his mind pull away, and a sense of calm rolled over him.

The man standing before him was a beast. He was about two heads taller than Blade, with big, bulging tree trunks where arms should have been.

The words “Smash. Me, smash little man” came to mind when Blade thought about how he might sound if the beast ever opened his mouth and spoke.

Based on the vacant look in his eye, intelligence was likely not one of the man’s strong suits.

Well, if the man was only used as hired muscle, intelligence was probably not high on the list of job qualifications.

Sliding his blades against one another, Blade assumed a defensive stance and waited for the beast to come at him. He wasn’t going to start throwing blades before he had a chance to assess the man’s fighting skills. Perhaps he wouldn’t need to resort to violence if the man were a weak fighter.

Slowly, the giant stalked toward him.

The crowd around them roared. Men, women, large, beastlike creatures that had no right to be called human.

Seriously, where was this gang finding its members?

Once the Defiler was only a few feet away, Blade got tired of waiting for the man to attack, so he decided to bring the fight to him.

Bad decision.

When Blade was within arm’s reach, a big, meaty paw wrapped itself around his neck. The next thing he knew, stars exploded in front of his face when something solid—perhaps it was a bus or a train—collided with his face.

Blade fell backward into the dirt.

Flashes of light continued to dance in front of his face as he wondered how one man could be so gifted with such a strong right hook.

And for that matter, why was the guy not fighting in UFC matches?

Or playing professional hockey? One body check from this beast-man would send any hockey player soaring through the air like a feather caught in an Easterly wind.

Also, what the fuck?

No man had any right to be that powerful.

Blade’s life flashed before his eyes as his body was picked up by Hercules’s twin brother and tossed across the pit until his flesh hit the ground, and he decided it was smarter to play dead.

No. He was a fighter! He needed to get up and show this punk-ass, steroid-pumping, gorilla-fucking, beast-god who was boss.

Digging his boot into the dirt, he struggled to get both of his legs under his body, then pushed up like never before.

Ow. His ankle. Fuck. Getting old really sucked.

You were also in a fight to the death only a week ago, bitch.