Page 61 of Riding Free

We should have gone straight home. Exhausted or not, we should have slept on the side of the road or some shit, because being here like this is not what I had planned at all whatsoever.

Hippie has been holed up with some clubwhore for two fucking days. I haven’t even fucking seen him. At this point, he could be dead for all I know. I’m ready to leave, and I’m about to drag his ass out by the ankle, which I would have already done had I not seen something yesterday that caused me pause.

The pause doesn’t have anything to do with him, more with the club here.

We’ve got a fucking problem.

A big one.

And I’m not quite sure how to handle it. I also don’t want to get involved in anything right now. So I want to get the fuck out, talk to Hippie, talk to Dare and Wrath, then figure out whatever needs to be figured out. Maybe it’s all nothing.

This club isn’t operating the way it should be. They’re hiding something, and it becomes clearer with each passing hour. Hippie doesn’t see it because he’s dick deep in cunt, but I see it—crystal fucking clear.

They aren’t burning buildings. They aren’t contracting. They’re dealing drugs. Which, to be fair, doesn’t really mean much of anything. Not every club does exactly what we do, and not every club follows the same moral compass as we do, not that ours is all that great these days. I sure as fuck don’t have a pedestal to stand on and preach from on morality.

But it’s not just dealing dope. I’m pretty sure they’re cutting and packaging it in their basement, and using outsiders to do it. But I haven’t been able to get down there to check.

“How long you planning on staying?” a deep voice rumbles from above me.

Tipping my head back slightly, I look up to the man standing next to the table. Lifting my beer to my lips, I take a pull, giving myself a few seconds before I have to answer him. I need to think about my words and choose them carefully.

Setting my drink down on the table, I tilt my head to the side, my lips twitching into a smirk before I speak. “You ready to get rid of me already? There a reason for that?”

My smile doesn’t fade. It doesn’t need to. I am dead fucking serious and trying to get a read on this brother, on this club. He reaches out for the chair across from me. The sound of the legs scraping across the concrete floor hurts my ears, but I don’t let him know that. I keep my expression completely emotionless and motionless, staring straight ahead as I wait for whatever he’s going to throw at me.

“We pay our dues to the original chapter. That’s all anyone needs to know.”

There it is. And they’re not paying their dues, because that shit is reported and they’re supposed to pay a percentage. That percentage they pay goes toward property purchases for new club start-ups, and also a slush fund in case it’s ever needed for any club.

“Yeah?” I ask. “Do you?”

“We do.”

“So if I call Cake, he’s going to say you’re in completely good standing here. Nothing to see, nothing to do, nothing to worry about?”

I didn’t have taking down a bullshit running chapter of the Iron Flame on my list of shit to do today, but here we fucking are. He lifts his hands and places his palms flat on the table. I’m not sure if this is supposed to intimidate me, but it doesn’t.

Keeping my face void of all emotion, I watch him. His eyes dance as he looks into my own. There is a moment of silence, then he clears his throat and leans forward.

“We couldn’t get contracts. All these techie hippies coming here have money. They aren’t drowning in debt, at least not enough of them.”

I find that somewhat hard to believe. They’re all about keeping up appearances and shit, but what the fuck do I know? I’m pretty sure it’s all just an excuse at this point.

“Until…”

He dips his chin in a single nod. “Until we get them hooked on coke and hookers.”

“Are you shitting me?” I ask in a hiss.

He leans back in the chair, chuckling before he continues, his gaze never leaving mine. I’m not sure if he’s trying to convince me of his shit or himself.

“This isn’t Vegas. This is Seattle. These fuckers are a bunch of tech nerds who now have more money than they know what to do with. They got the hot wife, the two-point-three kids, the yellow lab in the yard—but they’re finally the big dog, and they want to feel like it.”

I think about that, and I’m sure if I were someone who hadn’t been smoking weed, drinking, and fucking clubwhores since I was fourteen years old, I would feel differently about the world and what it has to offer.

“So you have a ring of coke and hookers just waiting to be called in for them?” I ask.

He shrugs a shoulder. “Something like that. It’s all digital. Since that’s their thing. They get the supply and the high they crave from the drugs and the pussy, then they come back. And keep coming back.”