Man Of Steel Read online

  I headed for her bathroom to clean her up while she regaled me with tales of her adventures in the backyard with the new poodle I’d bought her. Her mother had bitched about the extra work when I bought the dog a couple weeks ago but that shit had gone in one ear and out the other. It was because of her that I couldn’t be here for my kid twenty four seven so whatever I had to do to make up for that shit she’d just have to suck it the fuck up.

  Deanna followed us around the house as I changed her clothes and showed my daughter how to lace up her shoes like a big girl. I could feel the anger coming off of her in waves but she knew well enough to keep that shit in check around my child. I pretended that her ass wasn’t there because really, what was there to say?

  We made it out of the house without incident and it only took me five minutes to talk Holly into leaving her pet home. The two girls started gabbing at each other and I felt myself settle. Holly might be too young to understand the significance of her father buying another woman a ring but I wanted her there. She was a part of all the important things in my life and this was no different.

  One of the things I loved so much about Lily was the way she accepted that fact and seemed to appreciate it herself. She knew that as much as I loved her, that little girl held a special place in my heart that no one else would ever reach.

  “I have a great idea, why don’t we get Holly a cute little ring of her own?”

  Huh?

  “That way she doesn’t feel left out.”

  “You want me to buy my three year old daughter a diamond ring?”

  “No silly, they make rings for little girls too you know. I just thought it would be fun and she can feel like part of what we’re doing today.”

  “That might actually be a good idea.” This way we can undermine any sabotage Deanna might have in mind. She has been known in the past to pull some shady shit to try to make Holly hate Lily. I never want to go through that fucking headache again.

  It wasn’t easy trying to convince your baby daughter that daddy loved her more than anything when someone else that she trusted had filled her head with bullshit. I’d had to put the brakes on my relationship with Lily for a few weeks that time. It was the first time I’d realized the lengths my ex would go to to get her way. After I’d convinced my little princess that no one was going to take daddy away I had had to work on smoothing that shit out. In the end it had backfired on her mother though, because their bond was now stronger than ever before.

  A three-year old diamond shopping would put your ass in the poor house, just saying. She liked the big shiny ones, typical girl, and Lily wasn’t much better. Lucky for both their asses daddy came prepared with the black card or there would’ve been some embarrassed people walking around that store.

  My places are doing well enough that I could afford to get my girl the ring she wanted. In fact we were doing better than I expected after the stories I’d heard about how long it takes a new business to be in the black. The money I was banking now made my cop’s pay look like child’s play even though as a detective and then later lieutenant that hadn’t been too shabby either.

  But these days, the kind of money I made could cover the four and five carat rocks my girls were mooning over. I know this was going to be a problem for Deanna now too, and I was going to have to deal with her shit in the coming weeks until things settled down again. Every time she thought I was doing something for Lily that I hadn’t done for her during our marriage she loses her shit, which makes no sense to me whatsoever.

  She never wanted for anything when she was with me, but she knows had we made it she would be able to live way above what she was now. The only reason she could afford to live where she did now was because of my daughter and she knows it.

  You see we live in one of those states that says if a man or woman is caught fucking around on their spouse, then that spouse pretty much gets to clean their clock in the divorce, basically she’s ass out. You’d think with that shit hanging over her head not to mention the fact that I won sole custody of Holly that she’d straighten up and fly right, but no. Every once in a while she shows her ass and gets slapped down.

  When my girls were through picking out their baubles and I’d fed them I ran them back home. Holly wanted to stay a little longer so I called her mom and dealt with her bullshit while I was on my way to a meet. Sid and Dwayne were on ice but that didn’t mean our jobs were done. One of the things you never see on the news or in the TV specials is the fact that these assholes have family and friends that believe in their innocence and are sometimes willing to go to great lengths to get them out of whatever jam they find themselves in.

  With the court date just days away the heat was on. We had a list of his nearest and dearest and there were eyes on the few we thought might be trouble. So far no one had done anything to raise any flags but there were whispers about jailhouse talk. One of the best grapevines in the world could be found in prisons across the country. I don’t know how these fucks pulled that shit off, but more than once they’d proven to have more information than those of us on the outside. As a cop I’d pulled on that thread plenty, now as an MC leader I had other uses for it.

  I run my crew like PD. I have a fugitive task force, a S.W.A.T. team and men and women in place who are trained to deal with victims of domestic violence and child abuse.

  Each team has a lieutenant who reports back to me, because since we keep expanding that’s the best way to handle shit. Every OP is run like a well-oiled machine and there’s no room for fuck-ups. If shit goes south, which it seldom does, and I have the need for protection for my boys, I call in Jake.

  Deke, D’angelo, Stryder, and their boys Marcel and Nate were waiting for me at the clubhouse. The house was more like a compound with a few buildings scattered here and there. There was a safe house for those severe cases when we were dealing with an especially vicious asshole who was set on total destruction.

  There was a bike shop where some of the guys were getting a business off the ground, a repair shop, a gaming hall and a few that needed to be kept under wraps from my former colleagues. I had no problem whatsoever with that shit, I’d seen first hand how much the system didn’t always work, and where the holes were that needed patching.

  With that in mind I’d been the one to spearhead our little operation here when it came to security and our weapons cache. Everything was registered according to the law, well that’s my story anyway, what the fuck. I have a daughter to protect there’s no way I’m leaving that shit in anyone else’s hands. If the law doesn’t want their criminal element being taken out by vigilante justice then they should keep their asses off the streets among decent citizens. If they’re out here fucking up shit then they can deal with the consequences.

  I’ve drawn the line at out and out murder, though I have no problem maiming a fucker and putting him out of commission for life. Sometimes I find that that’s even worst. This way they get to live with the error of their ways. For the sheer viciousness of Dwayne’s attack on Stephanie and the others that they’d found with his handiwork, I was willing to turn off my conscience. Evil like that needed eliminating there was no rehab for that kind of wicked.

  “You guys got everything in order?” To a man they nodded their heads letting me know that they were ready. We all learn from experience and as time has gone by we’ve learned what to expect from the type of element we’re dealing with. There isn’t much a man won’t do to retain his freedom and Dwayne had proven that he was willing to go to any lengths to keep his. Too bad he had chosen to rape and try to murder a little girl in my backyard.

  Now that that kid had survived having her throat slit and being left in a field like trash to draw her last breath, he and some of his misguided pals were seeking ways to finish her off before she could testify against him. The piece a shit hadn’t left much behind in the way of DNA or anything else that they could use in court, so this poor little mite was faced with the added horror of picking him out in a court of law.
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  “Any word on Sid and his nuts?” I gave Deke a look, which I knew wouldn’t do any good, to which he shrugged his shoulders and took a swig of his beer. “He’ll be fine, I thought we were here to talk strategy.”

  Hardheaded little fuck, he was as cold as they came but somehow had a heart of gold when it came to kids, in fact I think he might be Holly’s favorite person, after her old man that is.

  “Okay then, moving right along, we have twenty strong for Tuesday but we can easily double that number if there’s a need. Five inside and the others outside surrounding the place just in case this asshole carries through with his threats. I want someone on the roof across the way, that should be Nelson he’s got the best arm.”

  “He’s already been tapped Blade, this isn’t our first time at the Rodeo.”

  “I know that Stryder but we all know each situation is different and must be dealt with accordingly. We can’t leave any stone unturned.”

  “By the way Cowboy is getting antsy, says looking at that fat fuck day in and day out without slitting his throat goes against his creed.”

  “Tell your brother to cool his jets Deke.”

  “Fine, but I don’t see why we can’t just off the fuck right now and be done with it.”

  “Because Stephanie needs her day in court. She might not think so now but believe me one day in her future she’s going to be happy as fuck that she played a part in putting her tormentor in prison. The fact that he’s never gonna see another night after the case is over is neither here nor there, she needs this shit.”

  We have a system where when dealing with some hardcore criminal we try to get one of our guys on the inside. Usually they’d get picked up on some minor bullshit that will bring nothing more than a slap on the wrist for a few months at the most. They take turns when it comes to that shit and luckily we don’t have to do it too often.

  After the rumors of Dwayne’s long reach from behind bars got back to me I had come up with the idea of sending up Cowboy and I’ve been regretting that decision ever since. He’s not much better than his little brother and keeping the both of them leashed was damn near a fulltime job.

  “Besides Cowboy isn’t going to do him and he knows it, we already had this talk remember?” He just gave me his cynical ass grin and kept his mouth shut. It was a hard thing to go from being a cop sworn to uphold the law to calling hits on men but I could live with that shit. Any man who could rape a baby girl and slit her fucking throat didn’t deserve to live end of story.

  I didn’t lose any sleep over the shit I did these days, my conscience was clear. I don’t rush to judgment and I give everyone the benefit of the doubt, but once the proof is there and cannot be disputed then yes, I take matters into my own hands. And if my guys were honest with themselves they’d admit that it was for that very reason that they’d approached me in the first place. My reputation had always preceded me. I had more citations for going hard on a perp that it was a wonder the brass hadn’t fired my ass years before I quit. Now I don’t have to answer to anyone, I do shit my way and one Dwayne Smothers was a dead man walking. He was just not going to be dealt with by Cowboy, the bloodthirsty fuck.

  “Who’s got tonight?” I took out my little electronic gadget that I used to keep track of shit. When we were running an Op, everything had to be in place, every detail seen to so that there were no missteps. Since Dwayne had let it be known that he was willing to kill Stephanie so she couldn’t testify we had had to amp up her security more than ever before. Jake had come in handy there, since we had no jurisdiction it wasn’t easy for us to get a man in the classroom with her, but Jake had planted one of his guys there for a little added support for our girl.

  Jake has a lot more involvement with us than most people know and that’s just the way we like to keep it. He handles the arrest and jailing of whomever we plan to send up for whatever undercover we’re working behind bars. I don’t know what happened to turn the hard-nose cop, we never discussed the shit, but I’m just glad that we’d found each other.

  Though Jake dealt more with gangs and drug trafficking, somehow our worlds always collided at some point. Fecal matter is still shit no matter what guise it wears and assholes always gravitate towards each other. He was doing his thing from behind the badge to clean up the streets and my guys and I were doing our bit from the backs of our bikes.

  Chapter 13

  I had everything outlined from start to finish on the screen as far as I could tell. There was a crew heading in from out of town to help with detail for the day of, and this weekend at Jake’s was supposed to be some sort of pow wow with the different chapters. We chose Jake’s or more like he chose his place because as he put it a group of rival MCs getting together in his town was not exactly his idea of peaceful.

  This little get together was my idea. Again my law enforcement training was kicking in, but as far as I can see it made more sense for all of us to put our heads together and do what the fuck we do. It was past time that we cleaned up the image and public perception of bikers anyway.

  When we first started doing our rides in support of victims of child abuse and domestic violence we had no idea that there would be others interested in getting onboard.

  The guys had come to me with a small contingent of men who had gotten the idea when one of their nieces had suffered at the hands of a known sex offender out on bail or some shit. When the perp had made threats and the cops had had their heads up their asses the guy had come up with the idea of getting his small crew together for protection. That’s where the Hellions of Steel had been born. I know, pretty clichéd name for a crew but it fits.

  By the time they recruited me they had already been on a few rides, but they realized that the shit was bigger than they expected. They needed organization and some kind of format. I came onboard first and foremost because they sold me on what it was they were trying to achieve and second because I was proud of these guys who’d been trying to come back from their criminal past.

  Not that the fucks were on the straight and narrow, every so often I have to knock heads together when they slip up and do some shit they have no right doing now that they had legitimate outlets available to them. But I guess it was a pipe dream to expect them to go cold turkey. As long as they weren’t peddling drugs I was okay with whatever the fuck they got up to.

  Now that the government had seen fit to legalize weed I had my hands full keeping their asses in check. There was already a grow in the works; my job was seeing to it that all the bylaws were followed to the letter. Other than that they had the bike shop business, and Lily had set up an online store where they sold shirts and other novelty items with the crew’s emblem.

  One of the sisters was into jewelry making and that shit seemed to be doing pretty good too, so I had no worries about my boys falling back into a life of crime. Things were on an upward swing as far as I could tell. I kept a tight rein on their asses since they’d somehow designated me as their leader, maybe because I was older or maybe because of my experience.

  Whatever it was it was a true testament to their growth that I appreciated their loyalty and friendships more than that of my former colleagues. These boys had come through the fire and were better men for it, I have to respect that. Now if I could get them to put aside their taste for blood all would be well in my little world.

  “Okay Marcel you’ve got lead tonight, my woman and I got engaged today so I need to at least seal the fucking deal before she heads south.” There was a lot of congratulations and backslapping before I could go on. I figured that was as good a way as any to share the news without getting sappy about the shit. “Okay can we get back to the matter at hand now? I don’t need you twits to teach me how to handle my woman.” They thought that shit was funny, young people always think they know shit.

  “Like I was saying Marcel you’ve got point tonight, please for the love of fuck keep this brood in line. Deke, you’re at the house, we’re getting close to D-day and I don’t know what the f
uck he and his pals have planned but we’re prepared for anything. Now Deke I’m singling you out because we all know you’re usually the one setting shit off. No assault weapons; if shit pops off and you have to throw down use the nine, but please for the love of fuck, no AKs in a residential area.”

  “Uh Lieu I’m pretty sure that was you last time that did that shit.”

  “That was different.” Like fuck it was, but the difference was that I had more control than this bunch.

  “How was that different old man?”

  “That fucker pissed me the fuck off that’s how. Now we’ve got everything else where it’s supposed to be and so far things are looking good. We’ve got that meet with the Hellfire crew and the others coming up.” I could already see the posturing starting, this could turn out to be the best idea I’ve ever had or the most fucked, we’ll see.

  “I expect you girls to be on your best behavior, no fuck ups, remember why the fuck we’re doing this okay.” They all nodded in agreement but I knew it was wishful thinking to expect to get these guys together in such close proximity without somebody getting stupid.

  I understand that my crew had had run-ins with members of other crews before and there was still some bad blood floating around out there. But that’s why the other three heads and I were coming together, to get something worked out where we could at least work together on this shit.

  I wasn’t asking them to clasp hands and sing old spirituals or some shit, just to put aside any grievances for the sake of the women and children we’d decided to protect. I was pretty sure my guys would be fine but it didn’t take much to get some of them going. And since this was taking place on what was basically their territory they might have their backs up if something went sour.