Riding Dirty: Nine Devils MC Read online

  “My mail,” Joseph says, stepping into the office and picking up a plastic box with about a dozen pieces of mail in it. He removes the mail and puts the box back on the shelf. “Tim would pick up my mail along with the restaurant’s. He would just throw it in the box and I stop by a couple days of week to pick it up. He also lets me have a phone line here as well.”

  “You have your mail sent to the Goose?” she asks in confusion.

  “No. I have my own P.O. Box. Tim was just kind enough to pick up the mail each day for me when he went to the post office.”

  “And the phone?”

  Joseph smiles. “May I sit down? Let me explain what is going on then I think this will make more sense.”

  Rose smiles and waves him to chair. “Take a load off.”

  “Okay,” he says, settling into one of the guest chairs. “The Nines, we live off the grid. That means we don’t have phones, credit cards, bank accounts… none of that stuff. We deal strictly in cash and we don’t own any property. I mean I have a house, bike, and truck, but it is all in Tim and Melina’s name. Just like the phone and the P.O. Box. Those are also in Tim’s name, but they are mine. I pay Tim for these items and he takes the money and pays the bills.”

  “What are you, some kind of whacko?” she teases. “Who doesn’t have a computer or a telephone these days?”

  “I have a computer and a phone,” he says calmly. “The computer is at home and the phone is on Tim’s desk.”

  “That’s my phone. Well, I mean Tim’s phone.”

  “If you look, you see that button at the bottom? The line that is separate from the other two? That’s my line. It just happens to be ringing into Tim’s office. I could just as easily have it switched to ring somewhere else.”

  “So you don’t have a phone at home? No cell phone either?”

  “Nope. No cable television. No city water or sewer. I’m on a well with a septic system. The electricity for the house is billed to Tim Scholly.”

  Rose looks at Joseph. He had always had a problem with authority, but he is just weird now. “But you have a computer? How does that work?”

  “The Goose has Wi-Fi. So does every Starbucks and Panera in the country. Getting on the internet isn’t hard anymore.”

  “And if someone wanted to reach you?”

  “They know where I live. And if they don’t, I probably don’t want to see them anyway,” he says with grin.

  Rose thinks for a minute. “Well, that at least explains why I couldn’t get that damn ‘message waiting’ light on the phone to go out.”

  Joseph’s grin widens. “Yeah. Sorry. It’s not a perfect system.”

  “Why do you live like this?”

  Joseph looks at Rose, and smiles. She hasn’t changed a bit. She is still the raven-haired beauty that she has always been, but softened as she has matured, a change that makes her more beautiful still. But that quick and inquisitive mind is as razor-sharp as ever.

  “Because I want to. I don’t want the government to know every little detail of my life.”

  She stares at him a moment, then grins. “What are you? Some kind of outlaw terrorist or something? What have you got to be afraid of?”

  “No, and nothing. But the less the government knows about me the happier I am. Rose, you would be amazed and disturbed if you knew how much information about you is out there. If I wanted to, I could almost find out what you had for breakfast this morning. I don’t want my life to be that public. None of us do.”

  “Us?”

  “The Nine Devils.”

  “All of you live like this?” she asks in surprise.

  “To one degree or another, yes. For example, none of us has a credit card or a bank account. But not all of us are as committed to the idea of privacy as I am.”

  “What do you do for money?”

  “Ever hear of cash?” he teases.

  “You pay for everything with cash?”

  “That’s right. No bank account means no checks. If I absolutely have to send money somewhere I either wire it or get a bank check.”

  Rose is quite for a moment. “Joseph… what happened to you?”

  He laughs. He is used to this reaction. “Nothing has happened to me, Rose. But I want to live as a free man. I don’t want every aspect of my life dictated to me by some faceless bureaucrat that has only his own self-interest at heart. The best way I know to accomplish that is to… disappear.”

  She can certainly understand that. Trying to get Aguilar’s open was a study in bureaucracy and frustration as she fought her way through the red tape. “Seems pretty radical to me, but whatever,” she says, waving off his comment. “But you can’t keep your phone here. I don’t know what arrangement you had with Tim, but you need to work out something else.”

  Joseph nods. “Okay. But may I have a week as a courtesy? I need to work out other arrangements.”

  Rose is surprised he gave in so easily. “Sure. In fact, there is no time limit so long as you are working to get it changed over. Thank you for not arguing with me about it.”

  “Not my place. This is Melina’s business, which apparently you are running at the moment. If you say no, then that means no. I can find another person or business that will do it. I’ll take the post office key now if you like.”

  Rose rummages in the desk for a moment and turns up a ring of keys with two post office box keys on it. Neither is labeled. “Hmmm. Let me get your mail for you until you come in again. That will give me a chance to figure out which key is which. I’ll give you your key then.”

  “Fair enough. It’s box 601. Thank you, Rose.”

  “For what?”

  “For understanding and working with me on this.”

  Rose grins. “Despite the fact that you are a whacko, we’re still friends, right?”

  “Yes.” Joseph pauses for a moment, his smile fading. “Rose, I’m sorry for what happened.”

  “What? Leaving me?”

  “Yes. There hasn’t been a day that has past that I haven’t thought of you.”

  “Sure…” she says, drawing the word out. “Why did you do it then?”

  “I had to get away. I couldn’t stay and live the way I was. I had… an epiphany, I guess you could say. I read Atlas Shrugged and I realized that I couldn’t live like that anymore. I wanted you to come with me, but I can understand why you refused.”

  “You left me because of a book?”

  “No. I left you because you couldn’t come with me. The book was just the catalyst that made me realize that we are all just slaves to society. I don’t want to be a slave, Rose.”

  She looks at Joseph impassively for a moment. “I think you must have been out in the Arizona sun too long and your brain has been fried. But whatever. So what have you been doing these the last seven years?”

  Joseph chuckles. “Nothing much. Went to Tucson and joined the Nines. Worked my way up. Last year, when I become President, we moved back here to Eagle Valley.”

  “Okay, but what did you do? You couldn’t just ride your motorcycle all day. How did you live?”

  “Worked odd jobs. Nothing to speak of. I don’t need a lot.”

  “And what do you do now?”

  “Same thing. But what about you? I understand your restaurant is the toast of Las Vegas.”

  “I’m doing okay. It was tough the first couple of years and I nearly went under at least a dozen times. Dad had to bail me out twice, but yeah, things are good now. But, like all restaurants, I’m only one bad review away from bankruptcy,” she says with a grin.

  “I’m glad for you, Rose. I always knew you would make it. Are you married? Have a family?”

  “No. Not yet. I have been too busy. You?”

  “No,” he says, then grins. “It is surprisingly difficult to find a woman that buys into this whole ‘dropping out’ notion.”

  Rose bursts into laughter. “I can imagine. I think I would die without my iPhone.”

  Joseph’s grin gets even wider. “Yes. I
have noticed that about a few of the women I have dated. The moment they realize they can’t call me, or me them—pfft—they are out of there.”

  “So no one special?” Rose asks.

  “No. Not since you.”

  She has mixed feelings about his answer. There is a slightly morbid satisfaction that he hasn’t found someone else, but at the same time, she is saddened that he is still alone. But then, really, is she any different? She has had lovers, but none have made her feel like Joseph did. “I’m sorry to hear that, Joseph. I really am.”

  His grin fades just a bit. “That’s life. You have to roll with the punches. So. Uhh… Rose. I need to check my messages. May I do that now, or should I come back? My food should be hitting the table pretty soon.”

  “You’re dining with us today?”

  “We all are. The Nine’s I mean. We eat here a couple of times a week. The food’s good, the prices are reasonable, and Tim is a good guy. Was a good guy,” he amends, and he looks at the floor.

  “Go ahead. Introduce me you your club when you’re done?” Rose asks, rising from her chair.

  “Sure,” Joseph says, brightening slightly. “I won’t be but a moment."

  CHAPTER THREE

  It doesn’t take Joseph long to take care of his messages and he escorts her to the seven tables they occupy. “Nines, this is Rose. Her family owned the Goose before Tim took it over. She is back helping out until Melina can get on her feet.”

  “The Rose?” a woman asks Joseph.

  Joseph blushes slightly. “The one and same.”

  “What does that mean?” Rose asks him.

  “Only that he talks about you. What you meant to him. I’m glad I have finally had a chance to meet you,” the woman answers for him.

  Rose is terribly flattered by the comment. “Whatever he told you about me, it was all lies,” Rose says, trying to cover her embarrassment.

  She quickly surveys the group spread across the tables. The only consistent thing about them is they all have on a Nine Devils jacket, jeans and riding boots. Beyond that they are as different as any group of people can be. They run the age gamut from perhaps her age of twenty-eight to a man and woman that appear to be well into their sixties. Some are clean cut, like Joseph, while others sport the stereotypical long hair and beard, and their skin color represents the entire human spectrum.

  “Somehow I don’t think so,” says the older man, grinning at Joseph like a proud father. “He certainly wasn’t lying about how beautiful you are.”

  Rose gives Joseph a push on the shoulder. “You charmer. So why are you guys hanging out with this loser?”

  The table become quite for a moment before the man answers. “Because we believe in his vision.”

  “What vision is that? The ‘living off the grid’ thing?”

  “That’s right. If you take a moment and think about all the ways government intrudes on your basic freedoms, it becomes disturbing. After California closed me down, closed down a business that had been in my family for three generations, I finally realized that I was working at the pleasure of the government. I’m not doing that anymore.”

  Rose notices that almost the entire group is nodding as the man speaks. “Closed you down? How?”

  “My grandfather opened a plating company in the forties. We did plating for various hot rod and automotive companies. The state finally regulated me out of business.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Rose sympathies. “I own a restaurant in Las Vegas. Believe me, I know about regulations.”

  “Rose, you don’t know regulations until you are in California and own a business that uses ‘toxic’ chemicals,” the man says, making quotation marks in the air with his fingers. “Nobody wants to pollute the environment, but the regulations… they got to be just ridiculous. I finally couldn’t operate anymore and had to close down. I had to lay off thirty-five people. That was the hardest thing I have ever done.”

  Rose can feel the man’s pain. To be regulated out of business like that would be terrible because you would lose everything, unable to continue to operate and unable to sell. Before Rose can say anything else, the food begins to arrive and she fades away as the wait staff begins to pass out plates and refill glasses.

  “They come in often?” Rose asks Tonya after the meals have been served.

  “Oh yeah! They are my favorite customers! Gail and I, we always split up waiting their tables. They are great. They don’t make a mess and if you give them good service, they tip good too.”

  “And they don’t cause problems?”

  Tonya and Gail both smile. “Absolutely not!” Gail chortles. “They are some of the most polite customers we get and the only time they complain is when they have a reason to. Which we never give them of course.”

  Rose pulls at her bottom lip, thinking. Motorcycle clubs have such a poor reputation—perhaps undeservedly so, if how they are welcomed in the Goose is any indication. “They always come in for lunch?”

  “Naw… could be any time. Normally breakfast or lunch though,” Tonya says before stepping away with pitchers to refill drink orders.

  Rose watches as the Nine’s eat, talk, and laugh, thanking Tonya and Gail as they scurry about filling glasses. To be so odd, they seem so… normal.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The next day Rose closes the Goose after the breakfast rush so that the employees can attend Tim’s funeral. She rides in the family car with Melina, trying to be strong for her friend as Melina stares vacantly out of the side window.

  Rose looks about as family and friends gather. Many she knows, at least in passing—a lot she does not. Tim must have been very well liked considering the number attending his service. As Joseph speaks of Tim, Rose can no longer hold her tears. His soft-spoken eulogy seems to come from the heart and he has to pause several times to collect himself.

  After he finishes speaking he rejoins Melina and holds her hand, perhaps taking strength as much as giving it. Several others step forward to speak after Joseph but none have the eloquence that he did.

  As the mourners begin to pass by Melina and her family, offering their support and sympathy, Rose hangs back, not wishing to intrude. She spends the time gathering herself and getting her emotions under control. To help herself she looks about the cemetery, trying to focus on the landscaping and not the heart-wrenching sadness on Melina’s face. As she does, she notices that there appears to be a group of men, some of which she recognizes from the Nines, stationed around the mourners. She slowly turns, not wishing to draw attention to herself by looking wildly about, but the phalanx of bikers surrounds them… and they all appear to be inconspicuously watching away from the group gathered about Melina.

  She searches faces until she locates Joseph, and another member of his club, standing respectfully behind Melina, far enough back to not be in the way, but close enough to be at her side in an instant. But what captures her attention most are their eyes. Their eyes are hard and constantly moving, peering at each person as they get close before moving to the next person in the line. Rose watches the silent drama play out, Melina and the rest of Tim’s family apparently unaware of the silent guardians at their back.

  After the funeral, Rose leaves Melina at home in the comfort of friends and family and returns to the Goose to reopen for the soon-to-arrive dinner crowd. Throughout the evening, the more she thinks about the scene at the funeral, the more she is convinced something is going on. Something more than just Tim Scholly being gunned down in cold blood.

  ***

  “Melina? Are you okay?” Rose asks as she quietly shuts the door to Melina’s house behind her. It is just after eleven and she is exhausted from her long day and the emotional toil of attending Tim’s funeral. She is ready for bed, but seeing Melina staring blankly at the television screen as monster trucks rampage around an arena worries her.

  “What? Oh, hi Rose. I didn’t hear you come in.” Melina focuses on the television for a moment before making a face and clicking it off
. “You look beat.”

  Rose flops into a chair, glad to be off her feet. “Yeah. Now I remember why I only serve dinner at Aguilar’s.”

  “You should let one of the others open or close. You don’t have to be there all day.”

  “I know. And I will. I can’t do this for long. Eighteen-hour days get real old, real fast. But I have to see what goes on for myself before I can know what to do.”

  Melina smiles sadly. “You sound just like Tim.”

  “I should. Dad taught us both.” They sit quietly for a moment before Rose speaks again. “It was a beautiful funeral, Melina. Tim had a lot of friends.”