Page 22

Tusk

W e get to the hotel and meet up in Siege’s suite. I immediately get them some drinks and snacks because it looks like they were being intentionally starved, maybe as a punishment for something. They are quick to accept cold drinks and guzzle down a couple each before they slow down enough to eat. This whole situation is making me furious. This is the kind of shit Harper had in mind to do to my Brittany.

Siege sits the three of them down on the sofa in his suite, and we start asking them questions.

First of all, Siege asks, “How old are you?”

The boy answers, “We all just turned eighteen. My sister and I are twins.”

“What did you do to piss Bishop Harper off? Why did he lock you up?”

They all glance at each other. The boy stammers, “They didn’t like me and Christy dating and locked us up. My sister, Ember, came looking for me, and they got her too.”

Something about his demeanor feels off. I think he’s lying to us. “Are you sure that’s what happened?”

His eyes get big, and he nods.

Rigs, who is always the insightful one when it comes to human behavior, says, “You know that we’re not religious. Whatever you did to piss off your church won’t piss us off. We literally don’t care what you did.”

The redhead’s bottom lip quivers as she speaks. “It was all my fault. I wasn’t careful, and my parents found my diary.”

“Ember, no. Don’t tell them.”

She does anyway. “I had a crush on Christy, and my parents found out. They sent me to this camp. Christy was worried about me and confessed to Bishop Harper that she thought about kissing women.”

“Let me guess,” Siege grumbles. “They sent her to the camp too.”

I ask, “Didn’t your parents object?”

Christy explains, “Sure, they did, at first anyway. Then Bishop Harper convinced them that the devil was consuming our souls and that if we were allowed to stay at home, we would corrupt all the other kids we came into contact with.”

“How long ago was this?” Although I ask the question we’re all thinking. I know before I even ask, I’m not gonna like the answer

“That was almost two years ago,” Ember tells us.

Rigs speaks up again, “None of that explains how you ended up being locked up in your church’s basement.”

Ember glances at Christy before revealing, “It was a program for underage teens. We aged out of the program. Our parents didn’t want us back because the camp couldn’t pray the gay away.”

I ask, “So, all three of you were locked in that basement just for being gay?”

Ember glances at her brother, who looks miserable. “Cecil isn’t gay. He got locked up because he wouldn’t stop raising hell all over town looking for me.”

“Not that it did any good. The bishop is a very well-respected person in our community. He’s best friends with the mayor. Nobody would listen to me.”

Rigs asks the hard question, “So the Bishop never tried to touch you in any kind of inappropriate way? Nothing like that going on, right?”

They all begin shaking their heads before he even finishes the sentence. Ember states with quiet dignity, “I don’t think sex interests him. He never talks about it like some preachers do.”

Christy states helpfully, “I was raised in the church, and I’ve never seen or heard him flirting with a woman.”

Well I guess that was something. Though my thoughts go back to Brittany. If Harper wasn’t interested in sex, then what did he want with her?

The redhead gathers her courage and asks some questions of her own. “Why did you break into the church and trash it tonight? Why did you rescue us?”

Siege shoots Rigs a quick glance before answering their question. “Harper tried to abduct a woman associated with our club and her baby. She is Tusk’s old lady. We rescued you because it was the right thing to do.”

Ember looks momentarily confused. “I don’t believe he would try to take another man’s wife or an innocent child. The only woman he ever talks about is his Eve, but I don’t think she’s a real person.”

I tell her, “She’s real alright. She’s my Eve, not his.”

All three of them gape at me. “You’re the one who took his Eve?”

“She’s not his Eve and never was his, and I didn’t take her. She ran away from him. I met her five years later. We’re together now. She had my baby, a little girl. Brittany ain’t never coming back here, and he needs to get that through his hard head.”

“Bishop Harper says Eve was his gift from God, his promised one. He made it sound like she’d been taken against her will, and he was moving heaven and earth to get her back. He told everyone that she was in great danger, and we should all be on the lookout for her.”

“Well, I’m sure Brittany would be happy to meet with you and tell you all about her story.”

“Women don’t run away from our church. Sometimes they get thrown out for being unable to resist evil.”

“Jesus, girl, you’ve really been drinking the Kool-Aid. My old lady is not the only one who ran away from the church. Her grandmother ran away as well. I’ll bet a lot of other people did too, but it’s probably hushed up to keep up the pretense of you all being one big happy family. I guess they don’t teach you that kind of thing in Sunday school, do they?”

Her brother finally speaks up. “Of course they didn’t. I knew though, because I’m on the internet. My sister might be naive, but lots of us know what bullshit Harper is spewing. They just don’t talk openly about it. I had to learn the hard way what happened when you cross him. You end up locked in a room in the basement.”

Rigs, Siege, and Zen begin dumping our bags out onto the floor. Siege tosses one of the thick packets of money on the coffee table in front of the teens. “You kids have suffered enough. That’s your get-the-hell-outta-Dodge money, compliments of the Savage Legion MC. Now, come sit with us while we try to organize this information. Tell us everything you know about the church, Harper, and the kind of things he’s said about his Eve.”

The boy picks up the money and flips through it. “Alright, we’ll help you find Harper and then go our separate ways.”

We separate out all the paperwork into one stack, all the flash drives into another. Zen uploads all the information from the flash drives into his cloud. We pile the money to the side, and I get tasked with counting it all. Siege examines the gold bars and then the coins and jewelry.

Dutch and Tank eventually join us. They spent the better part of the night doing recon on Harper’s house. We carefully plan the break-in since he lives in the city.

Cecil offers, “I know my way around his house. We used to have Bible study there when I was younger. I could show you how to get in and where his study is.”

“What do you want in return?”

“You already paid in cash, but it would be safer if we caught a ride out of town with your club rather than risk being seen buying bus tickets.”

“Do you feel like it’s pretty safe? Does anyone live with him?”

“He lives alone, and once we get inside his house, we’ll pretty much have the run of the place. Harper has always been secretive and carries a large briefcase around, acting like it contains top-secret military nuclear codes or something.”

“I think he’s into all kinds of shady shit.” It takes me a second to realize that Cecil already knows this because Harper probably did shady shit to him.

I finally announce, “I counted sixty-three thousand, four hundred and eighty dollars.”

Dutch gathers all the money up and locks it in his and Rigs’ storage compartments on their bikes. Siege stows the gold and jewelry. Zen takes responsibility for the paperwork, flash drives, and the hard drives he pulled out of all the computers in the church.

Siege announces, “Why don’t you and Tex give the girls your key cards? They need a room with a door that locks. You two can crash on the pull-out bed in my room.”

I’m not happy with this option, but to tell the truth, it’s the right decision. Tex and I toss our cards to the girls, and I tell them, “The room number is on the card. There’ll be a brother standing guard outside at all times. Whatever you need, tell him. He’s responsible for coordinating with the rest of us to get you food, clothing, hygiene products, or whatever else you need.”

Siege picks up three of the burner phones and lays one of the club’s reloadable credit cards on top. “This card has five hundred dollars loaded on it. Use it to top up your phones so we can all stay in contact. When your phone is operational, get with Zen, and he’ll give you contact information for the rest of us. Use whatever is left over to get yourselves clothing. If you leave shopping up to the brothers, I don’t think you’re gonna be happy with their fashion choices.”

Ember smothers back a smile. “Thank you. That’s very generous of you.”

Siege rolls his eyes, “It’s a pittance compared to what our club made on this trip. I’d be more generous, but I’m worried that we’re gonna have to bribe a rival club if we want to get to him.”

Her eyes get big. “You’re really going to go after Bishop Harper?”

“He’s got a lot to answer for, don’t you think?”

“Yes… yes, of course he does. I hope and pray you catch him and put a stop to him exploiting naive members of his congregation.”

“Thanks for the offer honey, but I don’t think we’re gonna need hopes and prayers because we’ve brought down tougher men than Harper before.”

Cindy jumps up. “Don’t underestimate him. He’s a snake in the grass.”

Siege replies, “Thanks for the warning. Why don’t you girls get some rest? We’ll meet up around noon tomorrow. One of the brothers will be by with breakfast around eleven in the morning.”

After they leave, I tell Tex, “I’m gonna go take a walk and clear my head.”

He laughs. “No, you’re not. You’re gonna call your old lady and have phone sex.”

I punch him playfully in the shoulder and try to get him in a headlock. He shoves me towards the door and starts pulling out the sofa bed. Just blowing off steam after today feels like a godsend.

A soft, feminine voice comes from behind me. “Want to take a walk with me?”

Whirling around, I stare at Ember. “No. And you should be inside, not out in the open.”

She starts backing away. “I just wanted to talk to you about something.”

Schooling my expression, I take a deep breath and tell her, “Look, I’m about to crash out for the night. My brain is mush. Catch me in the morning, and I’ll talk about whatever you want.”

Her expression brightens. “Thanks. I’ll do just that.”

When I look down at my phone, I notice the time. It’s late and I don’t want to wake Brittany and the baby. I send her a quick text and shove the phone back into my pocket and head inside. Tex’s big body is taking up the whole pull-out bed, so I lie down on the floor with a throw cushion.

Cecil is lying on the other side of the room. “You okay, man?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“My sister says that she wants to follow in the footsteps of Eve. Do you know what that means?”

Shit, that was clearly what Ember wanted to talk to me about tonight. “I guess she wants to do all the things Brittany did when she ran.”

“But why would she want that? I don’t understand,” he laments.

I sit up and clear my throat. “Think about it for a minute. I saw how elaborate that fuckin’ church was. I’ll bet you had all kinds of rituals and ceremonies. That’s what your sister grew up with. It’s what she’s used to. There isn’t a lot of ritual in an average person’s life. She’s drawn to following in Brittany’s footsteps because it feels like a ritual that will set her mind free from all the guilt, shame, and loss she experienced at the hands of Harper and the church.”

“It still seems weird to me that she would go looking for rituals to replace the ones that ruined her in the first place,” he says.

“Yeah, that’s because you’re more mentally balanced than your sister. She needs a good therapist, not more and better rituals. She just hasn’t figured that out yet.”

“I suppose you’re right,” he adds morosely.

I lay back down but can’t resist telling him, “You might be more mentally balanced than your sister, but you’ve got your own problems. The biggest one is understanding that you can’t save your sister. Right or wrong, she’s gonna make the decisions she thinks are best for her. She’s gonna make mistakes and learn from them. You gotta let her make her own mistakes in life, or she’s never gonna grow as a human being.”