Black Dogs Motorcycle Club: Full Series Box Set (8 page)

Jase
’
s
face turned red and he stepped towards her a few feet. Maggie was far too angry
to back down. She stood in front of him, shirtless and vulnerable, her pale
skin probably still bearing the red marks from the frat boy
’
s
eager hands and lips. In a bitter internal monologue, she hoped Jase saw them,
too.

“
I
don’t give a fuck about your pants and who might be in them. I have a job to
do, and I
’
m going to do it
whether you like it or not,
”
he
retorted
.

“
Keeping me from getting
dick is not your job,
”
said
Maggie, throwing her shirt over her head.

The muscles in his jaw clenched.
“
Well
it sure as shit isn’t
my job to
help
you get dick, either,
”
said
Jase.

Maggie rolled her eyes and pushed past him
just as the golden-haired woman and a round man in a dress shirt entered the
ladies room. The man gave Jase a shocked look.

“
Since you
’
re
on the clock, you can deal with this,
”
said
Maggie as she thumbed at who she assumed was the manager.
“I’ll
be waiting at the bar.
”

“
The hell you will,
”
said Jase. As she left the restroom, she heard him
speak to the manager.
“
I
don’t have time for this. Put it on the MC
’
s
tab.”

“
Look, you fellas are
great customers but you can’t just be busting up my equipment!
”
said the manager.

“
Did you hear me?
”
said Jase, his voice getting louder.
“
Charge
it to the fucking MC.
”

Maggie was halfway down the hall before he
caught up with her bee-lining for the bar. Jase grabbed her arm and began to
pull her towards the front door.
“We
’
re
fucking done with playtime, Maggie.
”

“
Hey, you bastard! Let me
go!
”
Maggie tried to squirm her way free, but Jase
’
s
hand was big enough to wrap nearly the whole way around her arm, and he was so
much stronger than her that it was laughable. She resisted as much as she
could, yet both of them knew he was going to get his way.

Jase dragged her outside and back to the
driver
’
s side of her SUV in the
parking lot before he finally released her arm. She instinctively rubbed the
sore spot it had left.
“
Get in, drive
home, or I will take you home myself.
”
He
pointed at her, then at the car.

“
What the fuck is your
problem, Jase?
”
said Maggie.

“You
’
re
my problem!”
Jase yelled loud enough that some curious
bystanders had begun to watch from the porch of the roadhouse.
“
You
always have to make things so fucking difficult, Maggie. You don’t give a shit
about anyone else or how they feel.
”

“
I make things difficult?
”
she screamed back.
“
No
one made you bust into that bathroom stall, Jase! You did that on your own!
”

“
I promised your father I would
make sure you don’t get your stupid ass killed, and I
’
m
going to keep that promise. I don’t give a fuck about anything else.
”
Jase lowered his voice and stepped up to her again,
backing her against the SUV door. He bent low to her face and she could smell
the whiskey on his breath.
“
I
don’t care who you fuck. I don’t care about you anymore, period
.
 But you
’
re
not getting killed on my watch. Understood?
”

More than anything else that night, Maggie
knew she would replay those last few lines in her worst dreams for months to
come.
I
don’t care about you anymore. I don’t care who you fuck. I don’t care about you
anymore.
She was just buzzed enough that she couldn’t
stop the pain from radiating out to pulse through her whole body. It must have
shown on her face, because for a split second, she saw Jase
’
s
expression soften, worried.

I
don’t care about you anymore.
She felt tears begin to
burn her eyes.

“
Yeah, I get it,
”
said Maggie. She yanked her car keys out of her pocket
and turned to climb in the SUV as Jase moved back to dodge the door opening.
She didn’t look at him again as she started the engine and headed out of the
parking lot.

Maggie let the GPS guide her mindlessly
back the way she came. The head-start gave her time to assess her surroundings
once she got back to her makeshift home. Drake was gone, but he had left a
six-pack of beer and a pack of smokes for her. She saw the outline of furniture
in the dark of the living and dining room, but didn’t investigate. She grabbed
two beers and the smokes and ambled into the bedroom, shutting the door behind
her. The bed wasn’t so much a bed as it was a brand-new set of box spring and
memory foam mattress that had been put on the floor. A new pair of sheets and
two pillows had already been made up.

Maggie undressed and sprawled out, cracked
a beer, and lit a cigarette. Tears from crying on the drive home had stained
her puffy face with mascara, but she was too tired, and too hurt, to bother
herself with washing it off.

She heard Jase
’
s
bike pull up and park in the drive; heard the front door open and close
quietly; heard the sounds of heavy footsteps and the squeaking of springs as
Jase, her quasi-faithful protector, made himself comfortable on her newly
delivered couch in the living room.

Maggie smoked and drank for another hour,
trying to forget how close Jase was, and how far.

~ FIVE ~

At
exactly 7:13am, a beam of sunlight strong as a laser came through a window and
sliced across Jase
’
s
sleeping eyes. He woke with a start. Half his large body tumbled onto the floor
before he could gather sense of his surroundings. The room was empty,
unfamiliar, and distant. The light was all wrong. Was he still wearing his cut
—
and
his boots?

The night fit back together in pieces.
Maggie
’
s couch, in her weird
little house: that was what he had just fallen from. The light looked wrong
because he wasn’t in his bedroom. He remembered trying to stay up on watch for
as long as he could the night before, but Maggie
’
s
place had no television, and his smart phone died an hour into his night. The
couch was uncomfortable as hell. He was surprised he managed to fall asleep on
it. Jase stood and most of the muscles in his body began to scream in pain,
thanks either to the dinky couch, or to his rampage the night before.

Shit…
he
thought, as memories began to rise in his mind like alligators from a cloudy
bog. He was sure to get an earful from Beck about kicking in that bathroom
stall door at the roadhouse; one of his old buddies was the owner. He tried to
conjure the state of mind he had been in when he did it, but it was like he had
been possessed by some crazy emotional haze. He wasn’t the kind of dude to kick
in doors looking to defend his claim to a woman. He had never wanted for women;
he had never had to fight for one.

Jase realized that he was admitting to
himself that Maggie had been right. He
was
jealous. The sight of Maggie
in that den after all these years had been one kind of pain. The sight of some
other dude
’
s hands all over
her, his lips on hers - that brought a whole different version he had been
completely unprepared to face.

One of the hardest years of his life had
been the one after Maggie left him. So much drinking, drugs, mindless sex
…
a few stints in County for picking fights just so he
could feel alive. It had been a hard, slow climb out of that abyss. He
’
d
sworn off everything but pot and booze and smokes; he got his physical
aggression out at the gym; and he didn’t bother wasting any more time with
long-term women. When Jase felt lonely or hot, he would find a solution to that
temporary problem, and then go back to his normal life. He had found a sort of
peace this way.

And he had actually fooled himself into
thinking he was healed from feeling things for her.

Jase felt a headache pulsing quietly at the
bottom of his temples. He groaned to himself and tried to stretch some of the
tension out of his body. Down the hallway, he heard the creaking of a door and
the sound of socked feed padding on hardwood.

Maggie came from around the corner. He
could tell she was fresh out of sleep. She always had a look like a grumpy kid
whenever he used to wake her up too early. Her curls were still a little wild,
and Jase saw the dark trails of makeup swirled around her eyes. She wore the
t-shirt from the day before, but her legs were bare; she only had on her dark
blue underwear. The moment was as pleasant to his eyes as it was upsetting to
his heart.

Jase said nothing. He hadn’t had time to
even consider what he would say to Maggie after last night.

Maggie had one arm wrapped around her
belly. She held out the other, handing Jase her phone.
“It
’
s
for you.
”

Jase looked instinctively at his own phone
on the floor and remembered it was dead. He took the phone from Maggie. She
turned immediately and shuffled back down the hallway to her bedroom without
another word.

Jase put the phone to his ear.
“
Yeah,
this is Jase.
”

“
Where the fuck have you
been? I
’
m supposed to be
able to check in on you!
”
It
was Henry.

The headache pulsed.
“Sorry,
boss. I’ve
been with Maggie all night, like you
asked. She
’
s fine. I just
left my charger in my saddle bag last night.
”

“
For god
’
s
sake, Jase—“

“
It won’t happen again.
”

“—
things are not fine.
There was a shooting.
”

Jase froze. He turned to look towards
Maggie
’
s bedroom.
“
What
happened?
”

“
Someone tore up Hot
Tamales last night just after midnight.
”

Jase slumped back onto the couch.
“
Jesus
Christ.
”

“
Take Maggie to the
clubhouse and make sure it
’
s
understood that she remains there. Then I need you to meet me and the sheriff
at the club.
”

Jase got off the phone with Henry and
rushed down the hallway. He knocked on Maggie
’
s
door.
“
We
have to go, now. Get dressed.
”

“
What? It
’
s
like seven in the morning! Fuck off!
”
came
her muffled reply.

“
Maggie, there was a
goddamn shooting. Will you do something without a fight, for once?
”

There was quiet. Then he heard her
rustling out of bed with a grumble. He waited impatiently until she emerged,
dressed, her hair pulled back in haste, huge dark sunglasses obscuring her
eyes. She stayed silent and brooding as she followed Jase to the SUV, which he
insisted on driving to the clubhouse. She smoked in the passenger seat and
didn’t look at him. She didn’t put up a fight when he dropped her off and told
her to stay in with Tommy and the others. Like a fed-up zombie, she simply
shuffled off wherever he pointed without a word. He didn’t have time to analyze
it.

The police had set up their tape and crime
scene equipment by the time Jase arrived. The sheriff worked often with the MC
on issues of mutual interest, and no doubt Henry had gotten a call as soon as
signs of the Black Dogs were found on-scene. Jase found Henry and Beck
conversing with the sheriff on the porch. They brought him inside to show him
the scene. It was surreal to see the dance hall from the night before flooded
with daylight and dust; the floor scattered with shoes and cups and overturned
tables. Blood from the victims still hadn’t been cleaned up.

“
Witnesses put this at
three or four guys, career criminals from the sounds. This type of thing isn’t
usually for first-timers,
”
said
the sheriff. He read slowly off a small spiral notebook he always kept in his
pocket.
“
There
was a lot of chaos, but multiple people seem to think they were targeting
groups with bikers in cuts. Bartender says they were definitely looking for
something, but they never once asked for money or the safe.
”

“
Do we think it was a hit
out on the Black Dogs?
”
asked
Jase.

Henry shook his head.
“
A
few clubs were here, so it
’
s
possible. But this was also very sloppy, which our enemies tend not to be.
”

“
We must have just missed
it
…”
said Jase, more to himself than to anyone.
If
I hadn’t
kicked that bathroom door open and
started that fight, would Maggie and I have still been here when the shooting
happened?

“
What
’
s
that now?
”
asked the sheriff.

Jase said turned to Henry instead,
ignoring the sheriff. 
“
This was for
Maggie, I can feel it. We were here last night. She wanted a drink. But we
didn’t
…
we didn’t stay long.
”
He
couldn’t help but avert his eyes, no matter how much of a tell it was. He was
still boiling with shame.
“
Maggie
gets back into town, and this happens? That
’
s
no accident. Someone knew we were here.
”

Henry and Beck exchanged heavy glances.

“
You didn’t see anything?
”
asked Beck.

“
The place was packed, but
no, there was nothing suspicious. A few parties, plus the usual Friday night
crowd
…
no one hassled us or seemed out of place.
”
Even as the words came out of his mouth, Jase doubted
himself. Had he really been on point last night? Had he taken good stock of the
crowd, or had he been far too focused on Maggie? Did someone tail them to the
bar and he missed it, too busy rehearsing angry speeches in his mind?

“
Well, that complicates
things,
”
said the sheriff.
“We’ll
need to talk to your daughter, Henry, if you think she
’
s
a target here.
”

Henry looked unhappy about it, but he
nodded anyway.
“She
’
s
at the clubhouse. Let me go speak with her now, and then I’ll have her come
down to the station.
”

As the men piled out of the roadhouse,
Jase took one last look around. He made himself memorize the pattern of the
blood spatter on the floors and walls. He wanted them to be a stark reminder
that his job for the MC came before anything
—
before
his feelings, and before Maggie
’
s.
Otherwise it was likely to be her blood spatter he was memorizing next.