Page 7 of Knight
CHAPTER THREE
Knight
It had been one fuck of a day. I had been going since before the sun even came up. What I should have done was headed to my place, washed the day off, and passed out in my bed. But what I did instead was head to the bar. It was like I couldn’t help it. Maybe after such a shit day I just needed to be around my brothers for a bit. I needed some good company.
The day started off with me nearly avoiding an accident with a distracted driver. The bitch was looking at her phone as she pulled out in front of me. I had to swerve off the damn road to avoid shoving my tire in her bumper and ending up face first in her back windshield. Thank fuck I had been doing the speed limit and knew how to handle my bike. She didn’t even stop after she ran me off the road. I shouldn’t have been surprised, though.
One thing I’d learned about this town was that the insurance rates were high for a reason. People couldn’t drive for shit here. And forget trying to get anywhere when it was raining, it seemed a light drizzle turned people into clueless idiots behind the wheel. Oh, and I quickly learned that stop signs were optional.
Fucking idiots.
Truthfully, that had to be my biggest complaint about this town. Other than that, it was a good place to call my new home. At first, I wasn’t so sure about leaving the chapter I had been born into, but the longer that I was here, the more Wilmington grew on me.
So after I narrowly escaped becoming trunk splatter, I arrived at the docks only to find out that one of the shipping containers that held one of our own shipments had been lost at sea on the way here. That was not news I was thrilled to call the prez with, and by his tone, it wasn’t something he was happy to hear.
Then one of the cranes started to fuck up and eventually quit working altogether. Which was a huge problem because it happened to be a busy day for incoming. That backed everything up for the entire day. Granted it wasn’t really my job to handle the loading and unloading, but I still felt the need to make sure everything ran smoothly. And anytime something messed up, I was the first to put it on my shoulders, get in there, and try to get the situation handled as quickly as possible.
While we ran the docks, we hired a company outside of the club to handle the actual work. A few of the brothers did have jobs there, but it was separate from the club. That didn’t mean that we weren’t there patrolling all the fucking time. We wanted to make sure nothing slipped by us. So there was at least one of us there every second of every day.
I was tired and irritated, to say the least. I also could have used a shower and some fresh clothes. But I said ‘fuck it’ as I parked my bike and walked up to the door of the bar. It wasn’t like I had anyone to impress. Half the brothers were probably in the same state of cleanliness that I was currently in. And I could have given half a shit about the women that might have been there that early. I wasn’t there to pick one of them up, no matter how hard they tried.
Come to think of it, I couldn’t remember the last time I had taken someone home, or back to my room at the compound to be more accurate. It wasn’t like it mattered anyway. Sure, maybe I had been a little more on edge lately because it felt like my dick was going to fall off from lack of use, but something about the little satisfaction I’d had in the last few quick fucks left me feeling like my hand could do a better job.
Inside, I headed to the left after noticing a few of the brothers right away. I didn’t even stop at the bar, knowing whoever was behind there would bring me a beer. Ky gave me a chin lift when he looked up and saw me coming. I returned it as I parked my ass in the only empty seat at their table.
Brand and Charming were sitting there looking as tired as I felt. Blade, who wasn’t part of the club but worked at the tattoo shop with Brand, was lazily throwing darts with his back to the table.
Blade seemed to bounce all over, but it wasn’t uncommon to find him hanging here or even back at the clubhouse. He was one of the welcomed outsiders that no one questioned when he walked up into the place.
“What the hell you two doing here so early? Did you leave Sketch to watch the shop?” I asked with a ‘what the fuck?’ kinda look on my face.
“Nope,” Brand said and blew out a frustrated breath. “Fucking plumbing problems.”
The tattoo shop was in an old building that had seen better days. It was a work in progress and while they had done a pretty great job with it so far, it still seemed to have little hiccups every now and then.
“Had to close up shop. Can’t be sanitary if I can’t wash my fucking hands.”
Brand was clearly unhappy about having to miss out on business. He took that place seriously and I could see why it was such a big deal that he got his own place down here. Cal, the head chapter’s Prez, said it was the first thing we needed to set up, that it had been a long time coming for Brand. He took pride in Brand and after I got to see his work, I could see why.
Not to mention, that Brand was one hell of a brother. Stories had floated through the club about some of the things he’d done for the club. He was a good one and I trusted him to watch my back one hundred percent. He had only been with the club a few years but it was no surprise to me that he held the road captain patch after I’d learned his background and knew his loyalty.
“Yeah, and he thought it was a good idea to leave Sketch there to deal with the cleanup and handle the plumber,” Blade said with a loud belly laugh.
Blade was a guy I wouldn’t want to mess with. I was there the day we had the shop almost done. The sign was up already on the front of the building and this huge guy walked in the propped open door with a look that said ‘don’t fuck with me.’ He asked for ‘the bitch that ran the place’ and stood there with his feet planted wide and arms crossed over his chest. The place was filled with Paragons, wearing cuts and all, and this guy didn’t even so much as flinch as we all stood tall and surrounded him. Brand stepped forward and Blade stood there and demanded a job. When Brand asked him his name the only thing he supplied was ‘Blade.’ So that was who he was. Didn’t ask how he’d gotten the name but I had a good idea it had something to do with at least one of the three knives he had on him at all times. There could have been more, but the three were obvious. I, for one, had no need to find out if there were others.
Hisdon’t give two shitsattitude may have gotten him noticed, but his work was what got him hired. He was good and I had plans for him to do some work on me one day. That being said, Brand would be the one to give me my next ink.
I didn’t have much in the way of tattoos and I didn’t have plans to be covered in them. So far I only had three. I had a single deep purple and blue orchid on the back of my right hand. It was suspended in a thin circle filled in to look like a night sky, little yellow stars and all. That tattoo was my first and I got it not long after I’d left for college.
My next one took up the entirety of my inner bicep. A vintage looking pocket watch that was done in color surrounded by smoke done in grays and blacks. If you looked closely enough there were words floating around in the lighter parts of the smoke. Words that meant something to me. Ones that I used to whisper to someone long ago.
Then I had my club ink over my right shoulder blade. That one was given to me by Brand one night when I was still at Gray Fort. A bunch of us took a ride to Moon Hill and he offered to do one that night.
The shop was an upgrade from his tiny as fuck room back at Moon Hill. And once all the kinks were ironed out and word got around, I had no doubt the place would be busy all the damn time.
“Sketch can handle it,” Brand said as he tilted back his beer. “Hell, it can’t get much worse.”
The conversation continued around me but I was suddenly frozen in my chair. A sound from the past filtered into my ears and my chest tightened. I couldn’t breathe. Or blink. Everything went silent as the sound of my blood pumping filled my ears. One song. Hell, just the first opening seconds of that song had thrown me back into a past that I tried so hard to forget. Or a girl, rather, that I’d spent years trying to push out of my mind. A song that forced me back to when I was a kid spending nights outside under the star-filled sky out behind the compound. Dancing and laughing and living in the moment. Doing anything and everything I could to makehersmile. A song that not only reminded me of the girl that would always have a huge chunk of my heart, but also of what I’d lost.
