TRIGGER: A Motorcycle Club Romance Novel Page 14

  And the whole way, I felt Trigger looking at me, looking at me like he wasn’t done keeping his promise.

  “Are we sure this kid’s gonna know what he’s doing?” said the man in the olive-green suit. He and his two partners sat at a table in the corner of the casino they owned. A scantily clad woman walked by carrying a tray of cocktails. The man in the dark purple suit snapped his fingers and she turned on her heel, leaning down, offering them the tray, a smile, and a generous view of her cleavage. The man in the dark blue suit took three drinks wordlessly, passing them out. She disappeared a moment later.

  “The boy in charge gives his word,” the man in the blue suit said. “They have a decent reputation.”

  “And the ringer?” the purple suited man asked, taking a long sip of his drink. He sneered slightly. “Are we really serving this shit here?”

  “If you wanted the good stuff, Jim, you should have gone straight to the bar,” said the man in the green suit.

  “He’s a moron. Thinks he’s going to ride this fight to the pro’s. He’ll give it a good show.”

  The three men were Jim, Frank, and Harry Cavatele. If there was a fight to fix, a horse race to rig, or a poker game to play, they were involved. Outside of their casino, a scummy place with a bad reputation in the heart of Reno, their side job was cheating at everything that could be cheated at. Combined, they net somewhere in the realm of ten million dollars a year, on a bad year. And they mostly had good years.

  No one messed with the Cavatele brothers. If anyone did, they were likely to wind up pushing daisies – or, if you can imagine it, worse.

  One of their heavies appeared and leaned down to whisper in Frank’s ear. The green suited man listened thoughtfully, a dour expression taking over his face. He thanked the heavy and called for his brothers to join them.

  Together, they crossed the loud, smoky floor of the casino, passing the slot machines (rigged), the black jack tables (rigged), and the roulette tables (rigged). Until they came to a Pai Gow Poker table, where one tipsy man was regaling his fellow players with his secrets to good luck.

  A rabbit’s foot, inside-out socks, and a kiss from a pretty woman. It appeared he had the first two taken care of, and was begging the young lady on his right to make the third a reality. But, judging from the sizeable stack of chips in front of him, he was in no more need of luck than a lonely millionaire’s favorite housecat.

  Frank laid his hands heavy on the man’s shoulders. The man, still with a wide, inebriated smile on his face, looked up agreeably. Frank mimicked the smile, though the man’s friendliness soon faded into fear. The Cavatele brothers had that effect on people.

  “I see you’re doing quite well tonight, friend,” Jim said, coming around to the man’s side, standing between him and the young lady he’d been trying to charm.

  “Ayup,” the man said with a gulp. “Just…just my lucky night is all.”

  “Isn’t that pleasant for you,” Harry said, coming in to the man’s other side, boxing him in completely. “Isn’t that pleasant for him, Frank?”

  Frank squeezed the man’s shoulders.

  “I’d say so, Harry. Wouldn’t you say so, Jim?”

  “I’d say so, Frank.” Jim reached over and picked up one of the man’s stacks of chips, letting them fall neatly back into a pile. He looked at the dealer pointedly, who hurriedly explained to the rest of the players that the table was going to close for a moment, and wouldn’t they like to refresh their drinks, or perhaps take a break for some blackjack? The crowd dispersed quickly, leaving the inebriated man and the three Cavatele brothers alone. Harry and Jim took seats on either side of him.

  “Let’s see if we can’t test that luck tonight, friend,” Frank said.

  “How about a little game? House rules? For every second that you don’t leave, we take back one of these chips?”

  “But…wait a minute…”

  “One,” Jim said, removing a hundred-dollar chip from the stack. Frank squeezed his shoulders.

  “You can’t do that, this is…”

  “Two,” Harry said, removing another hundred-dollar chip. Frank squeezed his shoulders.

  “I’m going to report you! I won this fair and…”

  “Three,” Jim said, removing another hundred-dollar chip. Frank squeezed his shoulders.

  “Alright, all right,” the man said, finally, trying to raise himself from his seat. “I’m going, alright? Just...”

  “Four, five, six,” Frank said, leaning forward and removing three more hundred-dollar chips. The pile left over was still a fair sum, but nothing the Cavatele brothers minded parting with. Frank stepped back and the man got to his feet, wheezing and wild-eyed.

  “You’re…you’re crooks! I’m going to tell everyone that you’re…”

  “We’re letting you walk out of here with a thousand dollars of our money and your kneecaps intact,” Jim said, rising to meet the man face-to-face. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you?”

  “The house always wins,” Harry said, rising as well. Red-faced and sweating, the man gathered his remaining chips and pushed his way through the brothers. They watched as he approached the cashier’s cage, stealing fearful looks over his shoulder.

  And then they returned to their table in the corner, gave themselves a toast, and continued drinking and talking well into the night.

  Trigger

  Well, if I was an even dumber man than I already am, I would have fought the guy right then and there.

  Or maybe that would have been the smart move.

  Who’s to say, when you’re talking about hindsight and all the world’s biggest could-have-been’s?

  “You been messin’ with my piece?” Brock said. He was big, huge, with yellow teeth and a nasty scar that kind of looked like a crucifix. His knuckles were about as battered as my own, but he had the words love and hate tattooed across them. What a fuckin’ cliché, I thought with a decent amount of spite.

  “What are you talking about?” I spat back, knowing full well what he was talking about. But man, I’d heard the way he’d been talking to Cass (or, rather, yelling), and him calling her his “piece” was just making me madder. Goddammit woman, I thought, you know you deserve better…

  “I’m talkin’ about the way you had your eyes glued to my girl,” he said, moving a pace forward. It was all I could do not to match him. He was so big, you could tell he looked at me like a tarantula looks at an ant: easy target, almost too easy to bother with. That pissed me off, too. Guys like that were too confident for their own damn good most of the time, and just loved running their mouths, begging for a fight.

  “I was just talking to her,” I responded with a shrug, hoping to stoke the flame with a good dose of nonchalance. My hopes came true.

  “You know her? You know her enough to be talkin’ to her with them eyes all up and down her body?” the big man asked, his muscles flexing slightly.

  “Not a bit,” I said, knowing that Cass would get into trouble if I told him the truth, but still not willing to back down from this asshole’s little pissing party. “All I know is, you got a big damn mouth, and I don’t like ugly sons of bitches with big damn mouths.”

  His nostrils flared. He stepped forward again, fists raising slightly. I stood my ground, but for a moment I worried I’d gone a bit too far; we had plenty of time in the ring to flesh this out between us.

  Except…

  Fuck.

  If you didn’t believe me saying I was stupid before, you have to now. In my shock over seeing Cass again, and my anger over hearing Brock yelling at her, I’d totally forgotten that this wasn’t some normal fight. I wasn’t supposed to come out of this on the up-and-up. I had to let this stupid bastard clobber me. Fuck.

  “Listen here, you squirrely little prick,” he said, getting up so close I could feel his hot, stinking breath in my face. The thought of that mouth on Cass’ was enough to churn up all the vinegar in my blood. “That’s my woman, and I’m gonna talk to her however the fuck I
want. You treat your girly boyfriend however you want and let me treat my woman how I want. I don’t take lip from half-pint fags or stupid cunts.”

  “Whatever, big boy,” I said through gritted teeth. “But for the record, I never met a real man who felt the need to talk to a girl that way.”

  “Well now you met me, there’s a first time for everythin’,” he said, backing up slightly, confident that he’d won. “I’ll see you in the ring, cocksucker. You better bring your losin’ shoes. I coulda gone easy on you but…”

  At that, he smiled at me, his rancid teeth an eyesore if there ever was one. My stomach clenched around itself. Just my fucking luck, I thought as he finally turned and disappeared into the trailer. My first time throwing a fight and…

  Before I could finish the thought, I saw her one last time, just her eyes, peeking at me from around the curtains. Just like a damn spear through my heart, it all rushed back. All those tender moments, even before we ever slept together, when she was my best friend in the world, my only friend, so sweet and kind. And again, the idea that anyone could treat her as less than a damn princess, could look at her face and say anything but how beautiful it was, baffled me and enraged me all at the same time.

  And then she was gone. And I was there alone in the middle of that shitty trailer park, with five hours to go before I’d have to face that filthy motherfucker again, and let him take me down even though I knew I could beat him given the chance.

  As I slammed my way back into my own trailer, which I was sharing with Reign, he looked up at me with alarm.

  “Oh shit,” he said over his sandwich. “I take it that didn’t go so well?”

  It had been his idea for me to go make nice with my opponent in the first place. He figured that it’d be harder for someone to go all-out in a fight like this if they shook hands with the guy first.

  “That’s putting it lightly,” I growled, ready to beat a quick retreat to my room. I didn’t want to have to go other the nasty details with Reign. I wanted to fall asleep until the last possible minute, so as to be alone with my thoughts for as little time possible.

  “What the fuck? We had this all set up, what the fuck happened? Was he some kind of fuck-ass? Is he going to fuck you up?”

  Reign’s questions demanded answers, but when he saw the look I shot him he made the wise decision to leave it be. Shrugging over his sandwich, he kept his eyes on me as I made my way to my side of the trailer.

  “Just…we can deal with it, you know, if you have a bad feeling about this,” he said. “I can talk to some people…”

  “Don’t worry about it,” I grunted, pushing open the flimsy door. “I’ve got it covered.”

  Laying in the dark, poorly-lit room, I tried to sleep but couldn’t. I kept seeing Cass’ eyes through the curtains, hearing the bastard scream, thinking of how our bodies had once fit together in a seeming perfect circle.

  Eventually, sleep did come. But with it, came dreams. Dreams that turned my sheets into a sweaty mess. I dreamt of that morning, ten years prior, when a man had led Cass into a bar on a rope. Except the man wasn’t her father this time, it was that nasty son of a bitch she was hooked up with.

  And as he yanked her around for the last time, it wasn’t Steel who got the bullet, it was Brock. But even as he looked down and saw the blood pooling on his shirt, he stayed standing. He moved towards me. He smiled, yellow teeth all sharpened to points, his eyes becoming strange and reptilian.

  He grabbed me up and though I pushed with all my strength at his chest, it was as though my blood had been replaced with liquid lead, my limbs too heavy to move, paralyzed as he fell on top of me, thrashing and punching as I called out her name, struggling to overcome him, knowing I could if only – if only – if only –

  When I woke up, my fists were already clenched. And my mind was made up. And it was time to head down to the ring.

  Reign kept his mouth shut as I stalked through the trailer, grabbing my helmet wordlessly. As the boys gathered around, eagerly discussing the after party, I wasted no time pushing through them to my bike. Taking my silence as, perhaps, being “in the zone”, they followed behind jovially.

  Reign slipped a few pills into my hand before we took off – “for the pain,” he said. I nodded, glad that my face guard hid my eyes from him. My leather vest felt heavy, too heavy, the weight of my cut like a symbol for everything I was about to do, everyone I was about to let down.

  But I could live without the club – or, rather, I could die at their hands for the havoc that would soon be wrought. I couldn’t live knowing that I had a chance to show that sick motherfucker what happened to men like him, exactly what he deserved.

  I was an agent of karma, at that point.

  The venue was exactly as I expected; a low-level shithouse saloon with a secret side entrance to a dingy basement. This was a no-formality sort of fight, no dressing room to pump myself up in. No tape on the knuckles. No robe that would be dramatically thrown from my shoulders as I rose to the fight. No, this crowd only wanted blood, and they wanted as much of it as possible. Showboating was for the pussies on pay-per-view. This was grit and dirt and cardboard boxes flattened down, still stained with last night’s sweat and violence.

  The crowd itself was full of men who looked like they could have been in the ring. Even our rowdy group quieted as they entered the smoke-filled room. The talk of strippers, shots, and white lightning could wait for after business was done. Here, there was money to be made. I made my way through the crowd, Reign close at my side, shrugging off my vest and pulling off my shirt as I went. The ring itself was just some dirty ropes tied to weighted poles, with a stool in opposite corners.

  He was already there when I slung myself over the rope.

  And behind him, Cass, barely visible in the dim light. Her eyes were wide as she looked at me; I saw them drift down to my chest, where her hands had once traced the skulls there. Now, between the skulls, a rose bloomed, faded with age and the poor ink available in prison.

  I spit to the side, the sight of Brock filling me with rage. I remembered that dream, how helpless I’d felt, and tested my fists, raising my arms a few times, feeling the strength in them, needing to dispel that powerlessness forever. The murmurs in the room grew louder. Reign whispered to me, and I felt my heart wincing.

  I was lying to him. I hated lying to him. But I didn’t have a choice. I followed his eyes, saw the three men he was staring at. They didn’t look so dangerous, in their stupid old-fashioned suits, but something told me they were harder than they looked. Maybe it was the ring of stone-faced men who surrounded them, looking ready to fuck shit up if things went south.

  They must be the fellows expecting to make it big on this fight, I thought, a shard of doubt slicing through me. I had twenty men behind me, twenty men who’d die for me in an instant, twenty men who relied on me to not screw this up.

  I’m so sorry, I thought, eyes closed as Reign whispered to me some more. But when I opened them again, fixing his stare in mine, I saw that all my lies had already failed.

  “Trig,” Reign said, leaning in closer now. His eyes were steady on the three men in the stupid suits. “If you’re thinkin’ of something stupid, you best just tell me now. I mean it, man.”

  I opened my mouth, but the words never made it out. I saw, in a flash, Cass’ smiling, freckled face, all brightly lit in sunshine on a nice day we should have had a million of, but never did. I’d fucked up before. I’d fucked up everything. I was fucking everything up again. And then the bell rang. And it was too late.

  I rose and made my way to the center of the ring. The crowd around us began to holler a bit, thirsty for blood.

  Shit, wait, no, man, this is wrong, I suddenly thought. I can find this guy and fuck him up after, I know where his trailer is, I don’t have to screw everything up for us…

  He was inches away from me now, our heads bowing close together. He smelled like sweat, his yellow teeth displayed in a sick smile.

  “
Bet you wish you hadn’t fucked with that cunt now, do ya, punk? She’s gonna be spreadin’ her legs for me tonight, bitch. One man’s property…”

  Oh, fucking hell, I thought, and before I could stop myself my hand was buried in his midsection, his eyes popping open in surprise. The crowd roared as he reached out, grabbing my shoulders. I could feel his weight on me, but it was like nothing compared to the rage that blinded my eyes and fueled my blood.

  Grabbing him around the waist, I rushed him into the ropes, screaming at the top of my lungs. In the slight bounce of his bulk against the ropes, we separated, but only for an instant; my fists flew to his face, his hands coming up to shield himself, but not fast enough. I felt one eyebrow crunch under my knuckles, his chin clacking as I hit him with an undercut.

  For a moment, the red blindness passed, and I saw his stunned face sliding downward slightly; behind him, right in front of me, Cass stood with her hands over her mouth, horror in her eyes. She was wearing a purple dress that ended just above her knees. And everything, after I saw her, seemed bathed in purple.