Red Eyes MC: Books 1 - 3 Read online

  Until she found the next guy to seduce. And then the cycle would repeat.

  I was jealous of her in a way. She was gutsy, and she went after what she wanted without thinking about the consequences. There had been more than one bar brawl over her. But more than that, she was free to do whatever she wanted with whomever she wanted. Things just weren’t like that for me.

  I finished brewing a large pot of coffee and poured Nicole a mug of it. Then, looking around and deciding that we were ready for business, even though business hadn’t started showing up yet, I poured a second mug for myself and leaned against the counter across from her.

  “You need to come out with me sometime,” Nicole said, not for the first time. “You never come out with me.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You know I can’t,” I said. “I’m still trying to get my father to let me get my own place, and he’s not going to agree to that unless he sees absolutely exemplary behavior from me in the meantime.”

  Nicole laughed. “A couple drinks isn’t going to make you any less of an angel,” she said. “I know you. You’re so prudish, you’ll—” She broke off what she was saying as the bells above the door chimed, a sign of someone entering. I gave her one last look before turning my attention away.

  “Good morning!” I greeted. Martha and Bobby were two of our regulars, and I loved watching them together. “Just sit yourselves wherever.” I knew exactly where they were going to sit. They had their favorite booth, tucked over in one corner, with a good view out the window.

  I brought over two mugs and the pot of coffee. “The usual?” I asked.

  “Yes please, dear,” Bobby said, winking at me.

  “So how are the two of you this morning?” I asked.

  “Doing just fine,” Martha said, patting her husband’s hand. “You know, Bobby is going to be singing in the barbershop quartet on Friday!”

  “I heard a rumor of that.” I grinned at the two of them. Martha had actually bragged about that, herself, the last three times that she’d been in there. She was excited for her husband, though, and I appreciated that.

  “Martha, if you keep talking about it like that, you’re going to jinx it,” Bobby said, shaking his head. But he couldn’t hide his proud smile as he turned toward me. “And Martha has cracked the code for the best apple pie,” he said. “I don’t know what the secret is or if you could ever replicate it, but we should get you the recipe.”

  “I’d love that,” I said, even though I wasn’t much of a baker.

  They went on for another couple of minutes, each telling me about everything the other person was up to and then telling me all about the family, with an emphasis on the grandchildren. It was a ritual that we repeated often enough that I almost felt like I was part of the family. There was just something about the two of them, so honest and open with me. Something about their love made you feel like you were standing in a bubble of warmth as long as you were next to them.

  “And what about you, dear?” Martha asked finally. “You got yourself a man yet?”

  It was another part of our routine. I laughed and shook my head. “Not yet,” I told her. “You know I’m holding out for someone as perfect as Bobby here.”

  “Oh, fiddlesticks,” Martha said. “Bobby wasn’t always perfect. I molded him into the man he is today.”

  “Absolutely not,” Bobby grumbled. “If anything, I molded you into the woman you are today!”

  I giggled and shook my head. “Holler if you need any more coffee,” I said to them, heading back toward the counter and leaving them to enjoy their coffee together in peace. When I got back to the counter and put the pot of coffee down, I looked back over at them. They were talking quietly, holding hands, their eyes twinkling like they were still besotted and on their first date or their honeymoon. You would never know the two of them had been married for coming up on sixty years.

  “Always making friends with the old folks,” Nicole said when I came back to my own coffee. “How are we ever going to find you a date?”

  I raised an eyebrow at her and looked around sardonically. “Well, it’s not going to be in here,” I said.

  Nicole gave me a look. “You know we get plenty of good-looking customers in here. Maybe not right now, but it happens. And you’re always off helping the geriatrics.”

  I shrugged. “It’s not like I can do anything about it, even if I meet someone good-looking,” I pointed out. “Better that I leave them to you.”

  “You have got to stand up to your dad one of these days,” Nicole said. I gave her an incredulous look, and we both laughed. “Yeah, okay, that probably wouldn’t go so well,” Nicole sighed. “But you can’t live with him for the rest of your life.”

  “I don’t live with him,” I said.

  “Not technically,” Nicole said, rolling her eyes. “But close enough.”

  What Nicole didn’t understand was that even moving across the city wasn’t really going to change things for me. Right now, I lived in the mother-in-law unit next to my dad’s house. But the real problem wasn’t bringing guys back there; it was the fact that everyone in Las Cruces knew who my father was and that no one wanted to mess with him. Or more specifically, to mess around with his daughter. And I couldn’t exactly blame them for that.

  I loved my dad. He was nothing but sweet toward me. But no one else ever saw that side of him. If I was going to get tangled up with anyone, he would want it to be the “right” sort of people. I couldn’t just pick out whoever I wanted. And I definitely just couldn’t pick up some random, good-looking guy that I met at the diner.

  Nicole sighed. “At least promise that we can have a girls’ day again soon,” she said. “I need a manicure stat.”

  “Now that I can do,” I said, grinning at her. A couple more customers came in, and I got them seated and brought them the breakfast menus. My good mood had wavered a little, though.

  The truth was, I wanted to be able to go out with Nicole. To go to bars and have fun. To not have to worry about anything worse than a hangover the next morning. I was an adult. I deserved to be able to live my life however I wanted to. Dad just didn’t seem to understand that.

  It was partly just that he was protective of me. He was afraid that if I went out and got drunk, something might happen to me. That someone might try to use me to get back at him for something. Sometimes, though, his protectiveness bordered a little too closely on controlling. It was like he didn’t trust me. I wasn’t stupid. I knew his reputation. I knew what might happen to me. I’d be careful.

  Regardless, I couldn’t seem to convince him of any of that.

  3

  Will

  Marcus gave me some time to wash the grime of the road off me before hauling me off to that new business we were supposed to check out. I wanted to put it off until tomorrow, but as Marcus reminded me, it would look better to Ray if we got on this right away, and right now, I could use all the brownie points I could score with Ray.

  I couldn’t seem to get my head in the game, though. I kept thinking about how nice it had been to make my own schedule over the past few weeks, to stop when I wanted, eat when I wanted, and go where I wanted.

  “Marcus, did you ever see yourself doing this for the rest of your life?” I asked as we walked.

  Marcus gave me a weird look. “The fuck, man? It’s like you go away on some big bike trip and suddenly you think you own the world.”

  “It’s not that,” I protested. “Just, there’s more to life than enforcing, isn’t there?”

  Marcus glanced pointedly around, reminding me that we were in public, where anyone could overhear. “Lock it up, man,” he said gruffly. “We don’t have time for that kind of talk.”

  What he really meant was, you never knew when Ray or one of his informants might be watching. I knew the guys in the club, of course, but Ray had other sources of information, guys he paid to do his dirty work, to make sure that no one was bad-mouthing him around town.

  And I supposed, from a certain
standpoint, my comment about there being more to life than enforcing could definitely make Ray a little wary. It could almost sound like I was planning a revolt, like I wanted to take over the MC for myself. No one knew what I had gotten up to on that cross-country trip of mine. I could have been making allies in other places.

  It was almost laughable. I would never do something like that, not to Ray. Not to the family that had taken me in when I had nowhere else to turn. Not least of which because I wasn’t interested. But the thing that kept it from being laughable was the unspoken threat of what Ray would do if he thought I was one step away from going rogue. He’d have to make an example of me so that no one else would try it.

  I fought not to shudder. Ray might be getting up there in age, his beard streaked liberally with gray, but I still wouldn’t take him in a fight.

  We arrived at the new place, the Mercantile, and while Marcus browsed around the shop, I went up to the counter, leaning against it and putting on a jovial smile. “Good afternoon, neighbor,” I said.

  “Good afternoon,” the man greeted, just as friendly, tipping his hat at me. Roger, according to his nametag.

  “Say, Roger, you’re new to the area, aren’t you?” I asked, already assessing him. He was a bigger man, but nothing compared to Marcus or me. I didn’t recognize him, so this probably was just a blunder on his part. He didn’t know the rules. Hopefully, this would be easier than I’d expected.

  “I am new, yeah,” Roger said, his eyes glancing over toward Marcus, who was still roving through the store. He narrowed his eyes. “Something tells me you two aren’t here just for friendly chitchat.”

  I laughed. “You’re exactly right,” I agreed.

  Roger shrugged. “I already paid up if that’s what you’re here for.”

  I raised an eyebrow at him. “You shouldn’t go blabbing about that kind of thing, Roger,” I said. “You wouldn’t want to say something like that to the wrong kind of people.”

  Roger snorted. “You guys are the wrong sort of people, aren’t you? You’ve got MC goons written all over you. Two huge tattooed guys wander into my shop in the middle of the day and walk around like you own the place? You’re not fooling anyone.”

  I frowned. “The thing is, if you know who we are, you know what we can do to you,” I said. “And yet, you’re still lying to us.”

  “What do you mean, lying to you?” Roger asked, folding his arms over his chest. He was starting to get defensive, and I sighed inwardly. I didn’t want to have to rough the guy up, but it was starting to look like I might have to. Idiot. He could have just pretended he didn’t know the rules and we would have cut him some slack. Lying wasn’t helping anything.

  “What I mean is, you say that you’ve paid, but we haven’t received any money. Ray isn’t very happy about that.”

  “Who the hell is Ray?” Roger asked, looking confused.

  I raised an eyebrow at him. “The head of the Red Eyes motorcycle club,” I said. “I thought you said you knew the rules around here. Ray is the president of the most powerful MC in the state.”

  “So what you’re saying is that I have to pay off you as well as the Unknowns?” Roger asked, sounding aggrieved. “Jesus, maybe Las Cruces wasn’t the place to open a store.”

  “The hell are you talking about?” I asked, feeling suddenly flat-footed. I glanced over at Marcus, wondering if there was something I had missed in my absence. “Who are the Unknowns?”

  Roger stared at me for a moment, looking like he couldn’t tell if I was serious or not. “They’re the other MC. They told me they were the most powerful dudes around.” He shrugged. “Swung through here just a few days ago demanding cash payment in return for not running me out of town.” He eyed me up and down. “Gotta say, you two are a lot meaner-looking than the last lot. That’s why I figured you were here for the money. Things were getting more serious or something.”

  Marcus joined me next to the counter, leaning casually against it as though we were really there just to chitchat. “Anything else you can tell us about these Unknowns?” he asked pleasantly. “How much were they trying to charge you, anyway?”

  Roger looked between the two of us, and I could see the debate happening behind his eyes. I decided to nip that in the bud right away. “We’re still going to charge you the same as we normally charge, no matter what you say their rate was,” I informed him, looking at my nails. “Although maybe, just this once, we could give you a little discount for being so… informative.”

  “We’ll need that cash, today, though,” Marcus said smoothly, writing a number down on a slip of paper and sliding it across the counter. “But don’t worry, we’ll take care of that little problem with the Unknowns. Show them better than to mess around on our territory.”

  Roger was silent for a long moment. “And if I don’t pay up?”

  I put my hands on the edge of the counter and pushed myself up until I could get my boots on the scuffed top. Then, I hopped down next to Roger. I crowded him back against the wall, pushing my forearm into his neck with just enough pressure to make him cough a little. “I don’t think you really want to mess with us, do you, Roger? I think you’re a pretty smart man and that you know exactly what you’re dealing with. You don’t want any trouble with this nice new store of yours.”

  Roger continued to stare at me and then gave me a little push. I went with it, backing off but staying behind the counter with him as he silently went to the cashbox and took out the money, counting it out carefully and discreetly. He handed it over to me, and I handed him fifty dollars back.

  “A little discount for being so cooperative,” I said, grinning at him and clapping him on the back. I vaulted back over the counter.

  “If you hear anything else of interest, you can find Ray at the Tavern most nights,” Marcus said casually. “He’s good about rewarding loyalty.”

  Roger shook his head, and I grinned. He wasn’t the kind of guy to want to get mixed up with trouble. Judging by his reaction to us, I had to wonder what his situation had been like wherever he came from, and if some sort of trouble was the reason he had moved to Las Cruces. He’d keep to himself as much as he could.

  Right now, we had bigger problems to think about.

  “Damn it,” Marcus muttered as we walked back out into the heat of the afternoon.

  “Can you believe the balls on them?” I asked angrily. “Going to one of the newcomers and just demanding money. What the fuck? If you’re going to challenge our territory, you could at least be upfront about it.”

  Marcus snorted. “They must know that we’d obliterate them if they were upfront about it,” he said. “We have to tell Ray about it, though. And he’s not going to be happy.”

  “What do you think he’s going to do about it?” I asked. “We don’t even know who the Unknowns are.”

  “Ray probably does,” Marcus pointed out. “He doesn’t always tell us everything he hears from his guys. I’m sure he’s been keeping an eye on them. Maybe that’s even why he wanted us to get to Roger sooner rather than later.” He was silent for a moment. “As for what Ray will want to do, I think it’s safe to assume that he’s going to stick us on it. Whatever it is.”

  “You’ve got to have some sort of idea,” I said, glancing over at Marcus.

  Marcus shrugged. “Haven’t had something like this happen in a while,” he pointed out. “Whatever it is, it’s going to have to be done delicately. Don’t need to be pissing off the cops, or things are going to get dicey for all of us.”

  I was silent, thinking about that. Finally, I shook my head. “Maybe if we show enough force right away, we’ll just, you know, scare them off.”

  Marcus laughed and slung an arm around my shoulder. “I wish that were the case,” he said. “But if they were going to be scared off that easily, it would have happened before they ever showed their faces in town. Ray’s reputation precedes him.” He paused, tugging at his beard. “Bet the first thing Ray does is send the twins out to make sure tha
t certain key alliances are still being honored.”

  Before I could respond to that, my phone started ringing. I rolled my eyes and pulled it out, expecting it to be Ray checking up on us or maybe the twins calling to heckle me. Instead, it was an unknown number from an area code I didn’t recognize. I frowned, debating ignoring it, but it could still be MC business. Or something to do with the Unknowns.

  “Hello?”

  “Is this William Kamp?” the man on the other end of the line asked.

  “Yup.”

  “Hi, William, this is Greg Townsend. I’m the executor of your grandmother’s estate. I’m sure you heard the news about her passing.”

  I slowed to a stop. “Yeah,” I said. I didn’t have any feelings tangled up in it. I had hardly known the woman. Couldn’t even remember the last time I’d seen her.

  “As you probably know, you’re her last living relative,” Greg continued. “I know it’s inconvenient, but I do need you to come to Texas, as the reading of your grandmother’s will is happening.”

  I tried to figure out how to respond to that. I wasn’t sure what Ray’s response would be if I told him that I was leaving on another trip. Especially not with this matter of the Unknowns hanging over us. He might need me. But then again, there were other guys in the club. He could use this as an opportunity to give Grant a little experience, or he could have the twins do their fair share of the dirty work.

  Besides, if I really wanted to do something better with my life, I needed funds. What if the old woman had left me something of value? I would be an idiot not to head down there and find out what it was.

  That was all not to mention the fact that the road was still calling to me. It would be a quick trip; I’d be back in time for the next weekly meeting. Not much could happen in a week, and anyway, surely Ray couldn’t get mad at me for heading to Texas for this. I wasn’t just taking off this time; I had a valid reason for leaving.

  “I’ll be there,” I agreed.

  “Excellent,” Greg said. “We can delay the reading until your arrival, but there is a certain timeframe that needs to be met.” I tuned him out as he started talking over the particulars.