Page 2 of Elling & Jackie

Instead, he sat on a dead motorcycle, checking out a woman who would never dirty her pretty clothes with the likes of him.

A Portland Police car rolled by. He wouldn't be surprised if the employee of the hotel asked for help removing him from the property.

The cop continued past him. Impatient to go home, he tried starting the bike again.

Nothing.

Getting off the seat, he grabbed the handlebars and pushed the machine upright and toed the kickstand. There was no getting around giving his legs the workout of pushing the Harley on an upgrade until he could pop it.

A slight movement on the sidewalk grabbed his attention. He looked and found the hotel lady striding toward him. As she approached, he ogled the finer details. From the chocolate brown eyes below arched brows clear down to the bare legs.

"I found this in the supply closet. You can keep it. It's supposed to rain more tonight." She held a can of WD-40 out to him.

He tapped the kickstand and set the bike. His fingers curled around the can, and he glanced down. His heart hammered, spotting the small tattoo on the underside of her wrist.

Grabbing her hand, he turned her arm. He rubbed his thumb over the three-colored ribbon about two inches long. Green on gray with a thin line of black.

She jerked her hand out of his clutch and walked back into the hotel. He stared at the door. Maybe he'd imagined the meaning of the tattoo.

A beautiful woman, gentle in her approach, soft in voice, nice to look at, working at a hotel in downtown Portland. A woman, so far removed from associating with a biker, and yet...

He looked down at the can in his hand. She'd given him the solution to his motorcycle problem as if she was solving which shirt to wear with a pair of jeans.

Spraying the WD-40 in a damp ignition was an old biker's trick of dispelling the water in the starter. He looked back at the doors of the hotel.

It was late. He was in a bad mood.

The tattoo probably meant something else than he thought. She probably got the ink a couple of years ago when her girlfriends took her out for her twenty-first birthday and got drunk for the first time.

That had to be the reason why she wore the colors of Brikken Motorcycle Club.

Leaning over, he placed the can on the curb. Maybe she'd find it. Maybe she wouldn't.

But if there was any chance of her belonging to Brikken, he wasn't going to take something that belonged to them.

To do so would start a war between the two motorcycle clubs. Slag Motorcycle Club had already disrupted Brikken's schedule by letting them know they were being watched as they rallied around a semi-truck trailer full of stolen and chopped motorcycles going to Northern California every six weeks.

He started the Harley. The engine roared to life. Not wasting time, he pulled out into traffic and headed back to the clubhouse. Aware that if he was wrong about the woman, there could also be Brikken members hanging around.

Concentrating on the wet asphalt, the other drivers, and merging into the lane he needed to go over the bridge that spanned the Willamette River, his shoulders and neck grew tenser. By the time he pulled past the gate and entered the alley between the clubhouse and The Fire Ring, he wasn't sure the moment with the woman at the hotel happened the way he remembered.

He got off the Harley, opened his soft pack, and removed a small tarp and a couple Bungee cords. Making sure he gave his starter time to dry out and not cause him more problems, he wrapped the motorcycle securely.

Viktor, his MC brother, walked out of the shadows of the alley. "Expecting a storm?"

"I hope not. I was already caught in one. Damn starter got waterlogged." He gazed at the small group of Slag riders congregated at the end of the line of bikes. "Didn't it rain here?"

"The sky looked like it wanted to, but no drops fell." Viktor yawned. "I'm heading in."

"Where's Roar?"

Viktor lifted his hand and pointed. "At the bar."

He walked across the alley and entered The Fire Ring through the back door. Slag had opened the bar as a distraction for the illegal activities that went on with the members. If the police came or the federal agents wanted to press matters with the motorcycle club, they would have to go through a legit business where they'd find pristine records and an up-to-code building.

While the Feds squirreled away their time trying to find something to nail the club on, Slag made sure all their crimes were hidden.

He walked down the hallway, glanced in the breakroom, and lifted his chin at Heather, one of the Slag women and a server at the bar. Bypassing the kitchen, he pushed through the swinging door and stopped in the main room. The fire in the middle of the room flickered, casting shadows on the crowd of customers.

---