VENGEANCE: Snow and the Vengeful Reapers

CHAPTER 1 DOC “No, no, no, you cannot sleep here,” Nestor declares. His Greek accent is heavier than usual with irritation. “It is the same as I tell the bikers. I do not care where go you. But it not be here unless you pay for the f*****g room. I say this always. But when I come to bar after long night of working, who do I find?” The answer to that question is me. I was so exhausted after cleaning up the bar area. I either forgot to set or slept through the alarm that’s supposed to wake me up twenty minutes before Nestor emerged from his office at 6 am to let all our upstairs guests know they have to go. “Uncle Nestor—” I begin. “Do not call me uncle. I am not real uncle to you.” Nestor glares at me from underneath bushy gray eyebrows, which come nowhere close to matching his ridiculously black Reagan hair. And he might stand a couple inches shorter than my five foot eight, but he becomes the very picture of an immovable obstacle when he folds his arms over his barrel chest. “You only call me this when you are trying to get me to bend my rules. And my rules are rules for reasons.” I let out a frustrated huff of air. Nestor is literally the only member of my family who feels that way—probably because he’s right. He’s not my real uncle. He’s my sort of stepuncle. The older brother of Cosmo, the Greek mafioso, and the last in the long line of terrible guys my mother got serious with before her death. That’s the only reason Nestor lets me work at his super-illegal unnamed topless roadhouse, despite me only having A-cup breasts. So, still creepy—but maybe less so because we’re not actually related by blood. I clamp my lips and put my voice on its sweetest setting. “I didn’t mean to break your rules. I was just trying to catch a little nap before I begin the coffee service and clean the rooms.” “You come to roadhouse to clean f*****g rooms at the mornings. That is our deal. You are lucky I let you work in here with such small t**s—and have your coffee service on top.” He jabs an index finger in the air. “I am saint!” I have to pinch my lips even harder to keep from pointing out that real saints don’t have to go around declaring it. Instead, I let him know between clenched teeth, “And I’m grateful, it’s just—” “Then act grateful!” He cuts me off before I can explain why I’ve had to throw down a sleeping bag behind the bar. “Do your job right. Do not steal or take advantage of me. That is family weakness from your mother, and I gave you this job because you said to me you are trying to do better than her. This breaking of my rules is not better.” My cheeks burn under his censure. Being called out for acting like my mother is even worse than getting chewed out by an attending in the emergency department, where I just finished my second to last rotation. And my head swims with guilt because he doesn’t know I’ve been sleeping here for nights plural—not just the one time I got caught. “You’re right,” I say instead of defending myself or begging him to let me keep using the floor as an overnight bedroom. “I overstepped. I’m sorry, and it won’t happen again.” The hard gaze he uses for dealing with outlaw bikers and flaky roadhouse waitresses with much bigger boobs softens a bit. “No more naps here. You go home to the house my brother gave you between shifts from now on, okay?” “Okay,” I agree instead of explaining why I didn’t think that was an option. What’s the use? I know how the world works—especially the underworld I was born into. Nothing is free, and at the end of the day, nobody wants to help you unless you have something to give them in return. And I have nothing. Every dime I earn here and nearly my entire paycheck from the hospital goes toward paying back my staggering student loan debt. There’s nobody in this world you can depend on but yourself. How many times have I learned that lesson? Whining to Nestor won’t change that hard fact. Focus on the plan. My four-word mantra seals my lips shut. And Nestor claps his hands together like we’re all made up. “Okay, and look, you have a customer wanting coffee. I will leave you now. Do not forget to drop off my ten percent before you leave for the day.” I turn around with a shiny roadhouse smile to welcome my first customer of the very early morning. But my heart stutters when I see who it is. Des-E. The sight of him hits me like a too-quick gulp of coffee. My belly fills up with a scalding-hot heat that spreads everywhere. And my face burns while my too-small-for-this-place breasts swell in a way I can only hope he doesn’t notice. He looks particularly mountain man-y this morning with his huge broad shoulders covered in flannel and the Ruthless Reapers leather vest—or "cut," as I often hear them calling it. I've noticed a lot of his MC brothers switch to full jackets in the winter. But not Des-E. His tanned skin hints at south-of-the-border ancestry, as does the dusky black of his long biker beard. But I guess he doesn’t mind the cold. “Good to see you this morning,” I say, pulling down the Keurig I bought for this extra income stream, along with the dark roast Colombian pods I know he prefers. “I’m a little behind. Just give me a moment to get everything fired up. Sorry…” He doesn’t respond verbally to my apology. But his eyes burn into me like two pieces of coal as I fill the Keurig’s water reservoir with the water g*n. So, you know, the usual. The rest of the Reapers call him Des-E—short for Desert Eagle—something to do with the kinds of guns he prefers to carry, I think. You know, stupid guy stuff. But I think Silent Death would have been a better road name. He almost never talks, and he’s a killer. You can tell just by looking at him. But he doesn’t look at me like he wants to kill me. At least not in the literal way. I think about those trashy biker romance novels some of the other roadhouse girls pass around. I picked one up once during a slow shift, and it was so ridiculous. The heroine was kidnapped as part of some kind of turf war. And not only was she stupid enough to fall in love with the criminal biker who was holding her hostage, but she also claimed the s*x made her feel like she was dying. As if that’s a good thing—which I’m sure it isn’t. I mean, pretty sure anyway. When Des-E stares at me like this, it makes me feel…I don’t know. Kind of squirmy below my belly button. And sometimes, before I can stop myself, I wonder what it would be like with him, so big and heavy on top of me. If he made me come—highly doubtful with vaginal penetration alone—but if he did, would it feel like I was dying? Would he kill me in a good figurative way? Stop. You’re off plan, Allie. I make myself refocus on keeping my hands steady as I shove a paper cup underneath the Keurig’s funnel. “Where are your boys?” I ask, glancing toward the stairs instead of looking at him. I always keep myself from staring at him for fear he might see how much he intrigues me. He, however, never bothers to do the same. Technically, Des-E is his own biker. But he’s part of a three-person enforcement crew for the Ruthless Reapers made up of him, Hyena, and Vampire. And everyone—even the roadhouse waitstaff—calls them Vengeance, as if they’re a three-headed hydra, not three separate men. And they don’t do much to dispel the one entity notion. They’re always together. They come into the roadhouse together. Consult with the Reaper co-presidents together. And, apparently, kill together. They’ve got a reputation for ending Reaper enemies in horrible, gruesome ways that make other bikers whisper about them like campers telling horror stories. I’ve seen entire gangs back down with just one collective look: a lethal head tilt from Des-E, a slit-eyed glare from Vampire, and a cold smile from Hyena. They also take girls upstairs together. Only new girls ever try with them individually, and they get shot down every time. Those newbies quickly find out what everyone else working at the roadhouse for longer already knows. You can’t just have one member of Vengeance for the night. You have to agree to take on all three. This is why there’s absolutely no reason for me to feel nervous underneath Des-E’s intense stare. It’s been years since I turned them down the first time. But my answer to sleeping with not one but three criminal bikers remains the same. Hard pass. Nothing in my current five-year plan involves letting myself get derailed by having relations with one outlaw biker—much less three. So why does my body light up with ideas it shouldn’t be having whenever any of them look at me? Why does my core squeeze like its searching for something? Something only they can give me. I try to break the silence again—more to raise my thoughts from below my waist to above my neck, where they belong. “Should I make Hyena and Vampire their usual too?” Des-E nods. One down and up of his chin, as if that’s all the communication he can possibly spare. So, I guess I’m truly on my own for conversation. I decide to concentrate on my massive where to sleep problem. I’m using all four weeks of my vacation from the hospital to study for my upcoming boards to become a certified ob-gyn and work at the roadhouse. My hope is that I’ll get the bulk of my flashcards memorized and earn enough in tips to finish paying off my massive student loan debt, just like my current five-year-plan states. That way, I’ll be debt free when I finish my residency in June and sit for my boards in July. And for the first time in my life, I won’t owe anyone anything. I’ll be able to cherry-pick a job that dovetails nicely into my next five-year plan of finding a husband and starting a family while I work reasonable hours at a small practice. Yay for future me. But working here for four weeks straight means I’ve lost easy access to the Nashville Baptist on-call room and all of my other secret crash spots at the hospital. And that conversation with Nestor was a too-close call. Lately, I’ve been sleeping and studying in one of the empty upstairs rooms when I’m done cleaning the makeshift brothel on the second floor. But with Nestor suspicious of me now, there’s no way I’ll be able to get away with that without getting fired by the man who only wants to be my uncle when I’m doling out ten percent of what I make slinging coffee at the bar. I work my way down the list of other options. Hotel, until my supply closet at the hospital opens back up? Too expensive. Outside at one of the Latham County campgrounds? Too cold. And I’m not sure there are even buses that go that far outside the city. I have to walk for twenty minutes to the nearest stop and take two buses just to get to my place in Nashville. A women’s shelter? It’s in the low 30s this weekend, so the shelters will be overrun. Plus, there’s probably an assessment to get in, and there’s no logical way to explain why a resident would choose a shelter over a hotel room. I could lie about my background. But Nestor was wrong about me. I’m not like my mother. I refuse to tell lies just to get what I want. This is my pride. My issue. My own fault for trusting the wrong family member. And the thought of taking a bed from someone who really needs it—no, I can’t do that. But I also can’t stay at the roadhouse. Or justify the expense of a hotel. Or go home. What am I going to do? That question echoes through my mind as I pull Hyena’s coffee—light roast French vanilla—off the Keurig stand. And it feels unanswerable. Which is why I nearly drop the cup when Des-E asks, “Hey, you need a place to stay?”