“Dick.” I turn my head and watch him stride toward the door, chuckling.
The men are all loading up for something big. They spent an hour in Church earlier, where I assume they were making plans. Us peon prospects don’t get to know any of it. I look across the bar at Crow, who they’ve got bartending. All the rest of the club head out to their bikes, the Nomad included. I see Sly and North walk out together. Then Chaos and Bash.
Crow leans on the bar near me, his arms folded.
“You know what’s going on?” I ask.
“Nope, you?”
“Nope.”
I long for the day that patch is on my back and I’m privy to all the club’s business. Right now, I still feel like an outsider, and that feeling sucks.
***
It’s 8 p.m. Saturday night, and I’m picking up the payoff from the two gas stations at the edge of town when I get a text. I collect the payment, and head back out to my bike before I check it.
Kami: I cut myself and I can’t get the bleeding to stop.
Fear shoots through my body as I put the phone to my ear, calling her back.
She answers after four long rings and images of her passed out on the floor flood my brain.
“Hey.”
“Christ what took you so long to answer. You okay?”
“Yes, but the cut’s deep. It won’t stop bleeding.”
“What happened?”
“I was in the garden, trying to get one of the broken tiles up to replace. I was loosing daylight, and getting frustrated so I used this pointy skewer I found and it jabbed into my hand.
“So it’s a puncture, not a cut?” That can be serious.
“I guess so.”
“I’m on my way, babe. Keep pressure on it. Okay?”
“Okay. Hurry, I don’t feel so good.”
I hang up and haul ass across town, roaring up the drive and taking the steps two at a time.
She’s sitting at the kitchen table with a bloody dishtowel wrapped around her hand. There are tears in her eyes when she looks up at me. “I’m sorry.”
I squat and take her hand, unwrapping it to examine the wound. “What are you sorry for?”
“I’m such a bother to you.”
“Babe, you’re not. Now hush.” It’s deep, and blood seeps out. I wrap it back up. “Can you stand?”
“Yes.”
I tuck her under my arm and guide her to my truck, loading her up and shutting her door. I grab the money from my saddlebag and dash around to the driver’s side, then rip off my cut and stash it and the money bag behind the seat.
I drive us like a bat out of hell to the nearest emergency room, which is in Hendersonville.
When I bring her inside, there are only a few patients. I sign us in and they pass me a clipboard with paperwork to fill out. I curse myself for not having an insurance plan, and swear to God, I’ll get one first thing next week. Since Kami’s my wife, any policy her mother had on her is no longer valid. It kills me to mark down uninsured, and I feel like I’ve failed her. The woman behind the counter takes the papers, and both our driver’s licenses and makes copies. She hands them back and she looks up at me after she sees the insurance information and the signed line where I agreed to pay for the services out of pocket.
“We’ll need a six hundred dollar deposit on the bill, sir.”
I pull out my wallet, and drop my bankcard on the counter. Surprisingly, they take us back to a curtained off area almost immediately. A nurse examines Kami’s wound and soon a doctor appears.
I’m in the way, and move back while they work at cleaning it and stitching it up.
The doctor glances back at me, and asks, “You mind giving us the room, sir?”
I look at Kami.
“I’m okay,” she says.
I’ve got her purse under my arm, and I don’t want to leave her, but my phone goes off with a text. “All right. I’ll be right outside.”
I’m out there almost forty-five minutes when two cops show up. One moves toward the emergency bays and the other approaches me.
“Can I see some ID?”
What the fuck? I sigh, and pull out my wallet, handing it over. “What’s the problem?”
He lifts his chin to a chair. “You just sit down and shut up until I tell you, understand?”
I drop in the chair, knowing he’s got nothing on me.
The two officers confer and come to stand in front of me. “Girl says she’s your wife.” He lifts his chin to the purse. “Says the license is in her bag.”
“Yeah, so?”
“The hospital staff was concerned this might be a case of abuse or trafficking, especially considering the girl’s age on her ID.”
“It’s a fucking puncture wound.”
“Yeah, maybe you stabbed her with an ice pick or something.”
“Are you fucking serious with this shit?”
“Can you prove she’s your wife?”
I dig in the bag and pass over the folded up license. They examine it.
“Guess she’s tellin’ the truth,” one says to the other. “Yep. Judge Barlow signed it, just like she said.”
The other passes it back, mumbling to his partner. “We got nothing on him. She claims it was an accident.”
“All right. You’re free to go, but she comes back with anymore accidents, and I’ll haul your ass in so fast your head will spin, understand?”
I take the license and go find my wife.
Twenty minutes later, with a prescription for painkillers in hand, I load Kami back in the truck.
She looks over at me. “Everything okay?”
I jam the truck in gear. It’s now almost 1am, and Centerfolds closes in ten minutes. I’ve still got to haul ass back to Uprising. “Just peachy. You okay hangin’ in the truck while I make the rest of my pickups?”
“Sure. I’m fine.”
I read the script. I don’t have time to fill it, so I dig in the glove box and come up with a bottle of the same shit. I shake one out. “Here, take this.”
She pops it in her mouth and grabs the water bottle from the console and chugs it down. Complete trust in what I give her. It makes my heart swell that she doesn’t question what’s in the bottle, knowing I’ll never hurt her or give her something that would.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Kami—
Saint climbs out of the truck, and slips his cut back on, then he leads me into the strip club, and I’m so excited I get to finally see the inside.
We walk through the door, and my excitement deflates as I realize the club is closing and the shows are over and the lights are turned up. Still, at least I get to see the interior. There’s a main stage and another smaller stage, and also some tables that look like the girls must dance on top of them. I barely get a moment to take it all in before Saint is pulling me toward the bar on the right.
There are a couple of girls counting out their money down on the other end.
Saint leans and talks to the woman behind the bar, cleaning up. “Where’s Aspen?”
She smiles at him and jerks her head. “Back in the office.”