Page 38 of Hostile Saint

“I need a blowjob,” muttered Dagger.

Lynx reached forward and punched his shoulder. “This Oprah session ain’t about you.”

“Clearly,” mumbled a horny Dagger. “I think I have blisters on my palm.”

It was shocking that a biker was insisting I get in touch with my feelings, but that reckoning was a needed one. That’s how I realized I wasn’t only excited to see Lacey… I was afraid to see Lacey. The last time I had seen her, we were both tragically immersed in a horrendous crime. About to see her again, that vile night was now rushing back to me in full force. I patted on my chest. “I… I… I—” My eyes slammed shut, trying to shut out what my mind kept showing in flashes.

When I didn’t continue, Lynx told me, “Do you realize you have yet to tell us what actually happened that night we found you?”

He was right. We had talked many times, but I hadn’t actually spoken of the details. Unknowingly, I had avoided that night with all my might. I was making tracks again, running away from one night that made the rest of my torturous life pale in comparison.

“Pup, you don’t even tell us about your nightmares.”

That caught me off guard, where this whole conversation was putting me. “Nightmares?”

He blinked. “You’re not remembering them?”

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Lynx looked out his window. “Jesus H. Christ. No wonder you never talk about them to us in the morning.”

Is that why I wake up to someone in a chair next to me? “What am I doing in my sleep?”

The mood in the car shifted. The energy became thick. It was as if each man present had strong feelings about whatever was transpiring during my sleep.

Dagger’s voice was very deep when he finally told me, “You keep screaming for her.”

Vice solemnly added, “You beg her to close her eyes.”

I opened my mouth, but no air flowed in. I think it all evaporated.

Without looking at me, Lynx finally said, “There’s a reason I needed you stronger before taking you to see Lacey.”

“So that I can climb the lattice?”

“No, kid,” he remorsefully replied. “We’re taking you to where we found you.”

My back slammed into the seat as if I were trying to climb out through the trunk—Trunk. My mind showed me Lacey in that trunk again, unconscious, her mouth with a washcloth trying to soak up all the blood… “I-I-uh, not sure I can.”

Tapping the edge of his tightly closed hand to his mouth, Lynx kept staring out the window. “Tate, part of what we—my club—stands for, is the principle of individual freedom. We believe in the right to live our lives as we see fit. As we believe every American has the right to do. We believe in the phrase, Don’t tread on me, that started during the Revolutionary War in the 1770s. In whatever way one chooses to view that flag now, in this day and age, it began as a patriotic symbol of independence when American colonists fought Britain for just that. Independence.”

He smiled with pride I was immediately addicted to. It spoke of what his club stood for. “You get too close to a rattlesnake, it will coil in warning. You choose to ignore the warnin’ and step on us? This motherfucking snake will strike. That motto has been ingrained in many of us Americans for hundreds of years. Our daddies,” he gestured to Vice and Dagger as an example, meaning his whole club, “taught us that everyone, no matter color or race, has that right to strike. That includes you, kid, no matter what your so-called brothers tried to instill in you. The reason I’m telling you all this is to explain why I will never force you to do anything. Nor will I judge you for not wanting to do something. But… I’d sure be proud as fuck if you chose to face your demons.”

Once again, that wise man had this young ignorant one stopping in his tracks. That speech made me realize I had a say where my next tracks were laid. That was empowering. I hoped no one ever tried to take that power from me again.

Lifting my chin and setting my shoulders back, I told Vice, “Take me to that fucking dirt road.” It was time for fresh footprints.

Was I scared? Fuck yes! But isn’t that what makes my decision even braver? I was willing to face a past that was god-awful. I was willing to look my demons in the eye and say, “Fuck. You.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Facing Paths

“Lacey is the only girl I’ve ever kissed,” I said, the only voice to be heard in the car. Lynx, Dagger, and Vice stayed eerily quiet. I don’t even think they moved, so as to not spook me from finally opening up. “The only girl I’ve done anything with.”

Never having seen mountains before, I stared at the Rockies off in the distance as I continued with, “I’ve heard that a guy’s ‘first’ can make him crazy for that girl. That she can get him to do anything for her.” In the glass, I suddenly caught a reflection of my eyes, eyes Lacey said reminded her of a deep blue river. “That’s not why I love her like I do. I know it’s different. I know this because… no boy would ever do what I’ve done for that girl.”

Speaking of long-time hidden secrets can feel like you’re blindly walking off a high cliff, hoping someone will be below to catch you. “The brothers were at college. We thought we were safe.” My clammy hands squeezed one another. “It was only two weeks ago, yet now I know I was foolish. Now I know that, deep down, I had always known we were never safe.”