Page 10 of Greased

“So why did my name have to be changed? I need a start to finish explanation. None of these half truths.”

My father sighs as he sets down his roll. Clearly he isn’t turned off his food like I am. Rhodes certainly isn’t. The guy is on his third round.

I keep my eyes on my father as I wait for something. I watch as he collects himself. This cool kind of persona coming over him. He eventually looks up at me, resigned.

“My father – your grandfather – was the previous president of The Thunderbirds. Originally they started out as a motorcycle club. But my father wasn’t happy with just rolling around on bikes and running the couple of small businesses he had. He wanted more.”

My eyes widen and my mouth drops. What. The. Fuck.

He nods and continues, “At first it was things like selling drugs, weapons and laundering. But it was never enough. He was greedy. Eventually the opportunity fell into his lap to step into the prostitution game. Once he had a taste, he became hungrier.

“I wish I could say that’s where he stopped but I can’t.” He looks up at me and a raw pain fills his gaze.

I know that whatever he is about to tell me will change the entire trajectory of my life. I can feel it in the air. This kind of live static. An omen for what’s to come.

I hold my breath waiting for the inevitable bomb that is about to drop. My father looks to my mother. Her eyes are glazed over slightly, tears blur her irises as she looks back at him and nods in resignation.

He looks back at me, directly in my eyes as he delivers the brutal blow, “He sunk his teeth into the skin trade.”

I gasp, sitting up straighter as I look between both my parents in complete disbelief. Anger floods my system, threatening to boil over. Nausea clenches my stomach as a million and one images float through my mind.

I shake my head, “No.” I manage to gasp out but it’s only a whisper.

Tears stream down my mother’s face as she nods. If I had tears left to cry, I know they would be flooding down my face, but there’s none left. Nothing but gut-wrenching grief.

“My twin brother, Clinton grew up to be exactly like my father. Nothing but a ruthless savage. He was in his element with the trafficking rings. He ran them like a fucking ring master at a circus.”

I shiver at the image. My entire being fills with hatred for a man I don’t know. Or alas don’t remember.

“There was a standoff one day against us and a rival gang. We had already been climbing the ranks for years. We were involved with international organisations like the Bratva and the Cartels. Other gangs were envious and there was always someone who wanted to take down the big guys. My father was killed during this skirmish. I was next in line to take over. His heir.

“Clinton hated it. We had never gotten along, him and I. He was always jealous. The hatred only grew when I took over. The love my father and Clinton shared for the rings was never shared with me. I hate them. They make me sick.”

Relief fills me hearing the clear animosity he has for them and their… activities.

“Together with the majority of the leadership, we stopped all activity with the skin trade. Clinton was furious. There was a situation andhe left. We completely cleaned the club out. Anyone that wanted to be a part of that shit was removed.”

I can’t help but shiver at the wordremoved. Even though I agree wholeheartedly with whatever underlying meaning and actions that word has doesn’t mean it doesnt give me the fucking heebie-jeebies.

“Things were good for a couple of months. We still kept our toes in drugs, weapons and other side businesses. One of the guys got word of a new club that had begun taking women off the street and selling them to high rollers. A couple of the guys and I began investigating them. At every turn just as we got a new lead, a road block came up. For months we tried tracking them until, eventually, we got an in.”

My father shakes his head, the ghosts of his past haunting him to this day. He lifts his head up but instead of looking at me, he looks at Mum. They communicate something between each other.

“It’s okay, Ren. They need to know. They deserve to know the full truth.”

I look sharply between the both of them as if I can read their secrets off their face alone. I feel my heart as it starts to race.

My father stays silent as he fights with himself. It’s my Mum that breaks the silence.

“I was taken off the streets one night when I was walking home from work. I had just moved to Los Angeles for a gap year. I thought I would do some travelling before coming home and working out what I wanted to do with my life. I didn’t hear the car as it pulled up behind me. I barely felt the needle as it stabbed into the back of my neck.”

I gasp, covering my mouth as I look at her in disbelief.

She swallows roughly as she looks between Rhodes and I. I don’t turn my head to gauge his reaction to the revelation but I see his hands grip the table, his knuckles turning white in my periphery.

“I woke up in a cage. It wasn’t even big enough for me to stretch out completely. I was stripped bare of all of my belongings. Left in just my underwear. Men would come around and occasionally give us stale bread and cups of water. Just enough to survive.

“Once a day we were taken to relieve ourselves. Then thrown straight back into the cage. They held me and twenty other women for months. Not once did any of us see the light of day.

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