Page 2 of Jazz

“Who is she, Skinny?” someone behind me asked.

“Not sure. But not an ol’ lady. Kings had them all as pillions and protected. This one wasn’t protected,” he answered, stale cigarette smoke breath dusting over me. “Who the fuck are you, then?”

“Fucking bad news if you don’t take your hands off me.” I growled under my helmet.

Around me, men laughed.

“Well, in that case, we’d better find out who you are, then.”

“Get her helmet off.”

Someone took their hands from me, pulling off their leather gloves. Good. That was one less person holding onto me.Icy fingers fumbled under my neck, searching for the fastenings, touching far too much of my skin. And then the black helmet was yanked upwards, the inside scraping off my nose, making my eyes water, icy air rushing to freeze on the slightest hint of moisture on my skin.

“Well, she’s worth a fuck, that’s for sure,” Skinny observed, the rest of his friends chuckling again in response.

But Skinny was too busy looking for approval over my right shoulder from his biker mates to notice the movement of my shoulders. Not until my fist hit him right in the middle of his throat. The wiry man staggered backwards, an odd choking noise coming from him. Half a cough, half gagging. The other hands relaxed on my arm, and the chuckles around me cut off like someone had turned the volume off.

I shrugged free and bounded forward. Two steps. Three steps. Four. And then I hit something hard. Like the arm of a tree. My head hit the crumbling road, rebounding and hitting it again. When I opened my eyes, blue sky and greying clouds circled above me, swirling and lurching like I was on the Waltzer. Voices filled my head again, fuzzy and far-off. Then the clouds disappeared, obsidian black taking over my eyes, the voices around me fading away.

Chapter Two

The shower pounded on the glass behind me, the room filling with steam, droplets forming on my bare skin where they condensed in the chill of the surrounding air. The skinny rectangular window above me only let the darkness spill in, a black void, and night beyond that.

I glanced up. The man in the mirror looking back at me grimaced, wrinkles forming on his forehead, thick brown hair almost obscuring one dark eyebrow as it covered weathered skin. His brows furrowed as he stared, a deep rivet between his eyes.

Running a hand through my hair, the man in front of me copied. He was tired. He closed his eyes.

Images flashed through my mind. The angry roar of the Harleys, the workhorse of bikes. Heavy, strong, powerful. The road vibrated underneath them as we sat on their flanks, boxing them in. Following our instructions. Keeping them where the Notorious wanted them. The Kings. One of the most feared clubs in the North East, and, for the first time in my life, I was pleased we showed no colours.

I pinched my nose, the sound of water splashing angrily behind me. Wasted. Washing down the plughole while I stood at the sink watching the reflection. The man who’d watched his friend die today. The man struggling with the white-hot anger burning inside of him like a poker eternally condemned to the furnace. He chewed on the side of his mouth, thinking. Planning. Hating.

A truck had been coming the other way. He hadn’t stood a chance. I watched him disappear under the wheels, and when he came out the back of it, he was in two halves. That side of the carriageway had screeched to a halt. And we should have kept going. All of us. Together. That had been the order. But I dropped off the accelerator, some irrational hope that there was something I could do. In the end, I was just thankful he was dead, even if his insides were smeared onto the tarmac. Bile rose in my throat again. Burning and acidic. I dived for the toilet.

The shower pulverized my face, water changing temperature. Hot to cold. All the warmth washed down the plughole as I stared into grey tile. The steam in the bathroom grew less and less dense, condensation clinging to the mirror, lines of water sliding down onto the sink top and pedestal. And now, with the hot water totally used up, I stood underthe freezing cold stream cascading down over my back, concentrating on the sting of the cold and not the visions playing over and over in my head. The cold dampened the anger raging inside my chest, fighting the flames of wrath like a fire hose. My heart slowed; my breathing followed. And there in the icy cold spray I found solace. And calm. For the first time in hours. The vice around my chest loosened. The grip on my heart released. I could breathe. I could think. And I could feel something else. Pain.

He’d not just been my brother in the club. He was my best friend. The man who’d scraped me off the proverbial road. The one who’d wrestled me away from the consuming darkness. And I watched those fuckers all but throw him under the wheels of that truck. His body hadn’t stood a chance. Ripped apart and splattered on the tarmac. Not even his heavily armoured racing bike suit could save him from the wheels of that twenty-six tonne truck.

Bile burned my throat again. The embers of the flame almost sated, reigniting. Flooding my stomach with a tidal wave of rage. The roar filled the bathroom. Deep. Resonating. Angry. Painful. The feelings inside me were alien. I’d never felt it before. Never tasted the putridness of loss. He was gone. Mike. My best friend. My wing man. My brother. Gone. Dead. Just like that.

Something hot rolled down my cheek, obscure against the freezing cold beat of the shower. I swiped at it with my knuckles, biting the inside of my cheek, and then I shut off the flow of icy cold water. The bathroom plunged into silence. Not one sound. Apart from the pounding of my heart and the rasps of my chest as I swallowed at the tears, begging them not to fall. Begging them not to make me vulnerable. I’d never been vulnerable, notsince he picked me up. Not since he introduced me to the Rats. He found me a family. Mike. And now he was gone.

A noise. A mechanical chirp. A phone. Somewhere in my apartment above the bike shop, my mobile rang. I pulled the towel resting on the heated rail. The gentle softness and warmth wrapping around my waist, water slowly dripping down into the soft, fluffy cotton. The bouncing of the ringtone stopped. Then started again. Deep in the belly of my apartment. I followed the sound, my footsteps drying into the thick carpet with each step.Skinny. I hit the green button, pushing the device against a soggy ear.

“Chase?”

“Here,” I grunted.

“We’ve bagged ourselves a Northern King!” he spat excitedly.

I breathed. My insides bubbling.

“We’ll make them pay, mate. I promise you that. You coming down?”

“Aye. To the clubhouse?”

“Nah, mate. Warehouse.”

“Right. Won’t be long.”