Nomad Kind of Love Read online

  Nomad Kind of Love

  Prairie Devils MC Romance

  by Nicole Snow

  I: Broken (June)

  To find a knight, first you need a dragon.

  My dragon came in columns of snorting engines and leather jackets emblazoned with a roaring bear. It reeked motor oil, cheap tobacco, and hard violence from every savage nook and cranny.

  It arrived on the morning of my eighteenth birthday, the day everything I knew and loved was burned to cinders, including my soul.

  Rather than becoming a bright young woman, I became a dark shadow.

  Lost. Forever broken. Emotionally murdered.

  They ruined me, and made me believe I was wrecked beyond redemption. They infected me with their evil, and I waited for it to finish me. Inevitable, right?

  I thought so, but then I met him...

  “What the fuck!”

  I jerked up in bed when I heard the words. My father's startled cry shook the entire house.

  Clara was rustling beneath me on the bottom bunk, just as rudely awakened as I was, struggling to figure out what was going on.

  My ears prickled, and I listened to the conversation just a short walk away.

  “Don't act so fucking surprised to see us, Spinner. Did you really think we wouldn't find out?”

  A chair was knocked back and hit the floor. My stomach convulsed with terror. I could practically see my father being jerked out of his seat at the kitchen table by some roughneck in leather he called brother.

  “Find out what? What the hell are you looking for?” Dad made a noise like he'd been punched. “Oh...you stupid motherfuckers...you think it was me...”

  “Let him talk,” the gruff voice boomed from the kitchen.

  “This is about the shipment that went bad in Boise, yeah? You think I put a fucking bug on it? You think I'd work with pigs? Vulture...brother....what gives you the right to break into my own house and call me a fucking rat?”

  Deadly silence. Nobody answered my Dad's agonized plea.

  Beneath me, Clara sniffed tears sticking her throat. The club had always scared her, and she practically hid whenever the huge, barbaric looking men my father gave his life to showed up to visit.

  Then the silence broke. The whole house rattled with the sounds of the kitchen turning upside down, a man struggling, and not very well.

  Their numbers subdued him. He never had a chance.

  I shook my head, mouthing my worries while the clatter went on.

  No, no, no...what the fuck have you gotten yourself into, Dad?

  My heart was racing, but my legs still worked. The racket stopped.

  The voices were lower, and I climbed down from the bed to get a closer look.

  Clara whimpered again behind me. I threw my head over my shoulder and saw her holding up her trembling hands, silently begging me not to open the door.

  I did it anyway. I had to know what was going on, what was happening to Dad.

  “I didn't fucking do it, Veep! Come on! You've got to believe me. Oh, God...not that. Vulture, you've got nothing. Nothing, and you fucking know it!” Dad's words flitted between horror and defiance.

  “Shut the fuck up, rat!” Vulture howled, slamming his fist into soft flesh. “Just shut up a minute. You think we'd break down your fucking door over nothing? How fucking stupid do you think we are, boy?”

  Dad snorted. His breathing became a gurgle. I pushed the door open a little more and forced one leg into the hall.

  “Nobody rats on the Grizzlies, Spinner. And any bitch who does gets exactly what he deserves.” Heavy footsteps fell on the floor as the man spoke, as if he were circling his prey.

  “I get it. I really do. You wanted out. You wanted to ride off into the sunset with the family you've neglected for ten years. I can respect that.”

  “Then...why? Why're you doing this?” Dad's voice sounded shakier than ever. Exhausted. “What the fuck do you want from me?”

  “You know nobody leaves this MC alive. There's only one retirement package we offer. And sadly, brother, you don't get any say in it. Not after you ratted out half a mill in smack to the Feds.”

  Dad screamed again, roaring like a cornered animal, but he was cut off just as fast. More shuffling, boots pounding kitchen tile, and then a sickening crack. Dad's screams were muffled by what sounded like a big block of ice being knocked around in a metal sink.

  I gasped. I was frozen in our dingy hallway for what felt like an hour, but it must've been no more than a minute or two.

  Adrenaline shot through my system, nearly making me pass out. I forced myself toward the kitchen.

  God help me, I did, having a terrible idea what I'd find. The smart thing would've been to stay quiet like Clara wanted.

  Unfortunately, my twin sister had the brains in her family. I was just a stubborn bitch, too damned curious for my own good.

  Not that it would've saved us.

  I realized there was no saving anyone, least of all my father, when I burst in on them. Two greasy men looked up in surprise.

  One of them held a dagger in his hands. It dripped the same red gore as the stuff smearing the floor around their feet.

  The pair of boots between them was completely limp, the pair belonging to Dad. He was slouched halfway into the sink, head beneath the facet now broken and smeared rusty red.

  The third guy, a bigger, even greasier bastard I'd seen before, saw me and smiled.

  “Well, if it isn't little Juney Boo-Hoo.”

  He began moving toward me, too fast and confident for me to turn away. I couldn't do anything except stare at my father's limp body. His blood echoed as it swirled down the drain.

  Two goons held him by the shoulders. If they held him up so I could've seen his face, I know I would've screamed at the mangled mess that was left. Steady blood dripped down his sides from where their dagger had torn into him, spilling blood all over the place where we had family dinners a lifetime ago.

  “Don't worry, darlin'. This shit with daddy's got nothing to do with you. We're gonna take real good care of you and your Mom.”

  Vulture clapped me on the shoulder. It wasn't friendly or comforting in any way. His dirty fingers squeezed, a rough pinch twisting my nerves.

  I screamed and screamed. Mom came plodding down the hall, rubbing her eyes and pulling on her ratty gown. Clara was right behind her.

  “Vulture? What the hell are you doing in my house at the ass crack of –?”

  She pushed past me and stopped in her tracks when she saw Dad's body. The thugs holding him shifted their weight uncomfortably. One man released my father's shoulder and he slumped into the sink, like a dummy with its strings cut.

  “Holy shit! Holy fuck! What the fuck? George!”

  Another hand was on my shoulder, this one nearly as tight as Vulture's. Clara's scream started and almost deafened me. Mom joined us, falling to the floor, tearing at her matted hair as she wept and howled.

  “Damn it, we need a little order here!” Vulture roared. “Scoop. Claws. Get your asses over here! Bitch is gonna wake up the dead if she keeps up that shit.”

  His rough hands found my throat and pushed me to the wall, and then he yanked on Clara's hair. She tried to run, but it was no use.

  The men who killed Dad were on her, taking over when their boss released us. They pinned us against the wall, muscular hands like irons we couldn't hope to wriggle out of. Vulture snarled, turning on Mom, who'd crawled across the room and was reaching for Dad's old cell phone near the busted screen door.

  “Make sure those little cunts behave! I'll deal with this.”

  Vulture's boot stomped the phone out of my Mom's fingers. She writhed in pain, falling back and grabbing at her knuckles. He hovered over the phone, slammin
g his foot on it again and again. Its fragments spiraled into the bloody pools near Dad's limp feet.

  “Oh, God. Oh, oh – Jesus!” Mom spat, fell on her side, huddling in a fetal position.

  I closed my eyes. Vulture was right over her, and he was going to kick her. I realized for the first time this animal was going to kill my whole family, including me.

  “There, there, baby. Everything's gonna be all right, Jenny-Ray. I told you already, my beef's with your asshole old man. Not you and your kids.” The evil softness in his voice made my stomach turn. “Lookie, girl. I brought you something to take the edge off...”

  The man holding me started to laugh. I opened my eyes, looked past him, and my heart stopped.

  Oh, fuck. He thought of everything. It's really over for us now.

  Vulture kneeled next to my mother, a nasty smile on his face, holding a small syringe he'd taken from his pocket. He twirled it between his fingers the way a bully would tease a hungry dog with meat.

  “You want this, baby? There's plenty more where it came from at the clubhouse. Here, let me slip it in...find a good vein on you.” Mom jerked, wrinkling her face with sobs.

  Vulture tore her sleeve up and searched her arm. The damage left by old injections was everywhere, but after a few seconds, he slipped the syringe into a fresh channel.

  “Nooo Vulture...please...don't hurt me or my kidsss...” Mom's anguish turned to fluffy indifference, and then she slumped on the floor, occasionally twitching while she drooled and giggled.

  “Okay. We're done here. Make sure the cleanup guy gets the call before any nosy neighbors come knocking.” Vulture stood up.

  He looked over his carnage and lit a cigarette, inhaling the smoke deep. Pure bliss painted his face.

  “What about them, boss?” The man holding Clara tugged at her hair.

  “Get those little sluts on the bikes and make sure they keep their fucking mouths shut. The Missoula clubhouse has been pretty damned light on Prospects lately. Could use a few girls to do the grunge work...maybe even a few new whores. Never had twins before.”

  He lowered his cigarette and winked at me. That was when I floated back into my body and clenched my jaw, fixing my eyes on this brute, this murderer.

  No help was coming. My parents were dead, literally or otherwise, and the police wouldn't find us.

  Not here. This was Grizzlies territory, and the minority of cops who weren't paid off stayed away if they wanted to avoid a bullet in the back of the head one quiet night.

  Maybe Dad tried to do the right thing. But maybe didn't fucking cut it. If he'd truly helped the Feds, they hadn't given him any protection, or he'd been too damned proud to take it.

  He was dead, the badges got what they wanted with the drugs, and they weren't going to bail him out. Clara and I were completely and totally on our own for the first time in our lives.

  I raised my head, looking hard at Vulture and his henchmen.

  I don't know how or when, but my moment will come. You assholes think I'm a stupid, scared girl from a junkie house. You're right about the junkie part.

  But I'm not stupid and I'm not forgiving. One day I'll set this right.

  I'll keep Clara safe and bide my time. However long it takes to get out, and then see you as dead as my father.

  “Move!” The brute behind me – Claws, I think – pushed his fist into my back. “Don't bite while I get your helmet on and something soft in your mouth. You even think about screaming and we won't hesitate to throw you and your pretty sister off our bikes. Understand?”

  I looked up and met his dark eyes. The drying tears on my cheek left hot, rough salt behind.

  “Yes, sir. Anything you say.”

  Scoop, the man with Clara, laughed. “Jesus, that was easy. These girls must be hankering for a little excitement after being cooped up with their shitty parents.”

  A minute later, we were outside, saddled to the back of their bikes. Clara began to struggle as he gagged her. Scoop spread his palm and smacked her hard across the face.

  “Shut up, you whiny little whore. Do yourself a solid and keep quiet like your sister. Struggling's only gonna make this a whole lot worse. Don't believe me, then go ask your old man.”

  Hatred burned in my belly, and kept burning when they started their bikes. I didn't even look back at my old house one last time.

  My old life before that morning receded into dream. Ahead, there was a nightmare, and it was the only thing that mattered besides protecting my sister.

  “Juuuuune buuuug!” Vulture roared through the bar. “Hey, where is that piece of shit?”

  His buddies laughed. They were drunk off their asses, entertaining some mean looking creep in a suit. He had an accent that sounded Eastern European.

  I stayed in the backroom. Sometimes, if I pretended not to hear him, he moved onto the next distraction and forgot about me.

  A fresh bottle of Jack or a clubhouse whore to bite and fuck made me disappear real fast. Tonight, though, he was pretty damned persistent.

  I thought the Polish man's offerings would've kept them busy tonight. He brought several pretty girls with him who looked even younger than Clara and I.

  My sister was in the tiny room we shared, high off weed the new Prospect sold us. It took weeks of scavenging the tips we ferreted away in secret to get a couple joints. Yeah, we should've been using our little stash for better food than the slop they fed us, or maybe for an escape plan.

  A car, a hotel, something. We'd been prisoners at the Grizzlies Missoula clubhouse long enough for it to feel like home.

  The old life Clara and I knew? A distant memory, if it ever existed at all.

  Now there were just days and nights serving these beasts and their buddies. The core members, all ten of them, were usually off doing club business. We tended to their guests when they weren't around. Cooking up burgers, serving drinks, and cleaning bathrooms took up half my reserve energy.

  The other half was dedicated to surviving another day intact and sane. Or sane as I could be under these shitty circumstances.

  By some sweet miracle, the club hadn't raped me or my sister. Not yet.

  But it hung over me, a horrible certainty. I marched to their orders, doing anything they said, just as long as it pushed back our grim fate by a few more hours, days, weeks.

  At eighteen, I wasn't a virgin. I had a few messy couplings with boys in high school. Of course, the washouts and junkies I gravitated to in my school's social cliques never interested me much beyond a quick fling.

  These men were a different. I wanted to retch every time I thought about their leathery skin wrapped around me. Being forced by Vulture and his men would turn me toward the nearest convent if I ever got out of here alive.

  “Juuuune! Get your sweet little ass out here! My friends are fucking impatient when they're smelling ribs. Got a guy here all the way from Poland, and he could eat a fucking horse – or whatever the fuck they eat in Europe.”

  I cringed. I couldn't wait in the storage room forever, stacking boxes of booze and sweeping. I came out, wiping my brow, and spied Vulture's group across the main counter in the middle.

  “Coming right up!” I yelled, running off to the kitchen before they could bark for anything else.

  “Peters, the guys are getting after me about their food...is it ready?” I tensed, eyeing the old cook.

  He turned, quickly piling meat that smelled like heaven onto a plate already heavy with fries.

  “Here you are, lady,” he pushed it into my hands. “I'm working on the next batch. Don't you worry. I know what these guys are like when their bellies are growling and there's nothing but whiskey in 'em.”

  We exchanged a brief smile. The man worked somewhere else during the day making the best barbecue this side of Montana. By night, the club brought him in for special events, when they had heavy deals on the table unfit for my greasy, haphazard cooking.

  “Thanks.”

  It took both hands to steady the heaping plate
of food. I walked it out slowly, carefully moving in the tall black heels they made me wear. The short skirt was riding up my ass, and I twitched in frustration, wishing I could pull it down.

  Nothing was worse than showing these dickheads too much. And the 'uniforms' they forced on me and Clara were meant to let everything hang out, to entice them into doing what we feared most.

  “Here you go, Mister Vice President. Or is this going to you first, sir?” My eyebrows lifted in surprise.

  Ursa, the sixty year old President of this MC was making a rare appearance tonight. It was easy to forget the Missoula charter had a head at all besides Vulture, the VP who ran damned near everything.

  President and VP looked at each other. A sly smile appeared on Vulture's face that made me shudder.

  Between them sat the Polish guest. He lifted his shot glass, knocked back the amber venom, and smiled right at me.

  “Very, very nice, my friends. I think I want to see your show after all,” the stranger said in his thick accent.

  “Over here, June-o. We're sharing this one.” Vulture lifted his hand and wagged me toward him with a finger.

  It was tough walking through the narrow space to where he sat. Claws, Scoop, and the rest of the little group certainly didn't push in their chairs to clear more space.

  “Here you go,” I said, leaning to put the food in front of the VP.

  Perfectly positioned. The fist he'd hidden under the table flew out, upending the plate and sending it soaring out of my arms.

  I screamed, shocked as ribs and fries rained down around me. Several big meat chunks plopped on my breasts, my shoulders, my calves, smearing me with barbecue.

  The men roared with laughter.

  I stood in quiet disgust, staring in disbelief as sauce and grease left hot trails on my skin and clothes. The Polish man was laughing so hard he had to blink back tears. The rest of the guys slapped hands, tossing out congratulations on a prank well done.

  Now, I understood. I was tonight's entertainment.

  No matter how much Clara and I settled here, they'd rudely reminded me the clubhouse would never, ever be home.