J Speaks (L & J 2) (2 page)

Burns’ part
of the deal: I kept my land. The developers never came back. Burns used his army to save my Gramps’ land. My land. End of story.

One might think my situation was better because I was in my family home, my hometown, away from Burns and St. Louis. And I guess that part was good.
Missouri Mayhem wasn’t an MC. There was no brotherhood, no old ladies, no festive gatherings. There weren’t even girls, really. The clubhouse became a business. Burns’ business. Key members had rooms on site, but the rest had houses and pretended to have real lives. Some still went to the shop and worked on a bike or a car here and there, but that was just another money funneling system. Most of the places MM members “worked” were fronts. Nick had it all set up. It looked like the club was managing legit businesses with real employees. If anyone looked close enough, they’d see these businesses were making more money than they could account for. No one was going to point that out to the IRS though, so Burns continued doing his thing. He paid us well, and no one complained. End of story.

So why was I a hot mess when Elle came aro
und? It was the “disappearing.” I don’t know how many men I’ve killed. The first few were brutal on me. I felt like the eagle I’d tattooed on my shoulder had talons that were digging into me each time I pulled the trigger. I prayed to Gramps and the spirits that the stupid fuckers would pay up so I didn’t have to off them. After fifty bodies, I think I lost count. I shot ‘em, and Skinny cleaned it up. He was usually the mouth too. I was there as the muscle and the trigger puller. Skinny dealt with the actual “disappearing.” He’s a twisted mother fucker, and his methods varied. He told me at first, but I eventually told him he could keep that shit to himself. Acid, fuckin’ cutting their limbs up, a god damned tree shredder. I didn’t need to hear about his Dexter shit.

I’d given up on life.
On me. I was damned. I was empty, despondent, just a body existing on this planet. I should’ve never left Gramps in the first place. I should’ve never gone to St. Louis.

So when I saw the golden eyed goddess though the window at Eight Oh Eight the first time, I knew she would never be mine. She would never love me. Accept me. Not be d
isgusted by me. How could she?

I’d been aimlessly looking out the window, lost in my thoughts when I saw her for the first time. If the dealer I’d just dealt with hadn’t brought his money, I’d be making threats I would possibly have to carry out. But he paid, so I was free to wander to the window and gaze out at all the carefree people living it up. She was s
tanding at the back bar with someone. Her friend was talking to a guy, and Elle was talking to the guy’s friend. He was trying to step to her, and whatever he was saying must have been bullshit, because she was checked out and staring at the window. I knew she couldn’t see me, but it felt like her eyes bore into me. Her stare was far from vacant as I studied her from head to toe. There was something about her that I couldn’t take my eyes off of. I stood there, captivated by her, trying to figure out what made her glow in a room overflowing with women? I’ll never forget that night, as it was the night I started watching for her every time I was at Eight Oh Eight. Sometimes I went there on my off Saturdays just to see her.

Fuck
, she was so beautiful. Sometimes I’d watch her for hours at the window. Creepy. Yeah. Whatever. It was all I had. I couldn’t bring a woman around my life. I was a monster. Funny thing was that I wasn’t a monster before I became a killer. Sure, I was aggressive at times and got into my fair share of trouble before I left Gramps, but I learned how to keep a lid on my rage. How to keep my cool. Something that I’d later realize I needed in order to handle Elle.

I loved it when she wore heels. She stood a head above the rest
, and she wasn’t shy about it. Some tall girls were always trynna be shorter. They slouched. Not sexy. Elle, never. I could tell she loved being tall. She wore her Amazon height with pride. There was a blonde that usually came with her, and they were always tall together. They were in heels or sneakers together. Tall or not, Elle stood out.

Yeah, she had fucking amazing hair. Hair I wanted to shove my hands into while she rode me. Hair I wanted to wrap around my hand and pull on while I took her from behind.
Hair I wanted to find strands of on my pillow. Fuck. That hair. The body, yep, that was bangin’ too. Every sweet curve begged for my hands’ touch. And the sexy librarian glasses just topped it off. I wasn’t the only guy in the joint who noticed. I’m sure all the guys were diggin’ the glasses, and having dirty fuckin’ thoughts about her in those glasses and nothing else while they jerked their shit just like me.

It was more though. There was more to Elle than just how she looked. More even than how she walked. Like she owned the room.
Yeah, she was confident, but she didn’t come across as a bitch like most chicks who knew they were attractive. There was more to Elle. I knew that just by watching her from the window. It was her golden eyes. It was like they held a secret bit of information that would change a man irrevocably. Fuck if I knew what that information was, but I sure as hell wanted to find out. I knew her routine. She made her entrance, walked around the club, got drinks, hit the back bathroom to probably puff, and then made her way to the dance floor.

Ah, the dance floor. Those were my favorite times to watch her. She closed her eyes and let go. It freaked me out
the first time I saw her do it. I told Rock to watch out for her. As scary as it was, it was beautiful too. She was beautiful, lost in the music. She wasn’t about being sexy or trynna get some guy to buy her drinks or whatever. She wasn’t a slut or a gold digger. When she danced, I think it was just her up there. I think she wasn’t even at Eight Oh Eight anymore. She went somewhere else. Maybe to Gramps realm. Ha!  He’d love to hear that.

I loved it when her friend would be with a guy. It seemed the
blonde talked and flirted with more guys than Elle. She got stuck with the dude’s bro. Sometimes I would see this look in her golden eyes, like the first night I saw her. It seemed she’d stopped paying attention to what the guy was saying, and was all in her head. I would’ve killed a thousand men to know what she was thinking during those times. What was going on in that mind of hers? What was working behind those eyes?  I knew the lines mother fuckers in the club threw out. I’d seen her shoot down guys many times. I don’t know what she said, but it must’ve been sorta nice, because it didn’t seem like the guys got shitty with her, something I saw frequently. Lots of girls were bitches when they shot down a guy. The guys would get loud with the girl, requiring a bouncer to step in and break the situation up.

Elle didn’t get
rude with the guys, or so it seemed from the window I watched through. She’d say something back and grab the blonde. They had each other’s back. For that I was thankful. A few times I almost went down there, but Elle and the blonde always handled their business. From my vantage point, I could see all the girls up in the club, and most were bitches, tricks, hoes, or hood rats. From the floor, I doubt anyone saw how different Elle and the blonde were from the other women. But I saw the whole picture, and I saw they were so far above the rest of the chicks in that place, not to mention they weren’t half naked like most of the other women. You could say they were over dressed, as in too many clothes on! They were as classy as you could get in a hip hop club.

Elle shined, and i
t was so fucking sexy. I ain’t gonna lie. I jerked my shit in the bathroom upstairs a few times after seeing Elle dance or shut down a guy. I didn’t even know what she said, but watching it was enough to let me know she was smart. Street smart, but book smart I imagined too. She was street, but she also had learned to carry herself with some level of grace. She wasn’t a hood rat. Far from it. No, my Elle shined, and brought the only bit of light to my dark and empty existence.

So that was my life. Fuck. My life. It all turned upside down the minute she walked into Checks. God, had she been dressed like she did at Eight Oh Eight, in heels or
sneakers, I might’ve not felt like someone had punched me in the chest, taking the air right out of me. No, she walked in with a couple guys, all in Applebee’s shirts, hat on, hair shoved under it, and fucking reeking of French fries. In that moment, she became a hundred times sexier. She
really
wasn’t a bitch, gold digger, or a hood rat. She worked a legit job. And in a fucking kitchen no less. I’d been a bus boy once before, and the kitchen was no joke. Those dudes were hard core, if they were any good that is. If they weren’t, they got the boot.

Seeing Elle at Checks, I knew she was different. She was more than just what I saw at Eight Oh
Eight. I doubted she was some baby’s mama, or a bitch who just wanted a man to take care of her. She was real. I mean
REAL
.

I was talking with a couple
of MM guys who had come from St. Louis with new product. It wasn’t drugs this time. It was weapons. Shit that could blow your fucking face off. These weren’t hand guns or pistols. They were AR-15, sniper rifles, 240B and P90 automatics, grenade launchers, and plastic explosives. The kind of shit you
had
to get on the black market because you weren’t gonna find it on the shelf at your local gun retailer. And fuck the gun and knife show. This was some serious artillery. I wasn’t too happy about it, but knew there was nothing I could do. I was getting the intel from the guys at Checks, and then taking the merchandise to KC before the sun came up.

What struck me about Elle that
night was how the other guys regarded her. She wasn’t just one of them; they seemed to defer to her. It was fascinating. John John kept pulling me back to the conversation because I couldn’t stop staring at her. Next thing I knew, she was gone. I saw her later outside by herself, chillin’ like she owned the joint. Which I knew she didn’t because MM did. It wasn’t just Eight Oh Eight she owned. She owned any space she occupied. She pulled her hat down so I couldn’t see her eyes to get a read on her. I lost her again when her friends came out. Loud ass fuckers. She was still cool as a cucumber, despite her coworkers being all fired up about gettin’ fucked up. She wasn’t havin’ it though. I finally caught her eyes as she was getting into her car. She seemed startled, a look I’d never seen on her. We locked eyes for a moment, before she ducked into her car—before I could think too much about it. I didn’t even remember her car, I was so caught up in the look she had on her face. How did I miss a fucking Monte Carlo Pace Car?  Ratchet loved those. I knew all about ‘em.

I’d missed it
because I was no longer in this realm. Just like she got lost on the dance floor, I got lost in her eyes. The moon was full, and her eyes were so wide and bright underneath its light. I looked into those golden eyes for five seconds, that seemed like five days —before she ducked into the Monte and sped away.

Fuck. I was totally fucked after that. Before
, she was the intriguing girl from Eight Oh Eight who I thought of sometimes. OK, more than sometimes. But I knew it would never amount to anything. There was no place for her in my world. She was someone to think about and jerk off to.

After Checks. Fuck. She was all I could think about the whole ride to KC. I even forgot the merchandise I was moving
, I was so lost in her.

When I saw her at Eight Oh Ei
ght, that next time, I should’ve let it be. I should have. But I knew I wouldn’t. If I had it to do over again, I still would’ve gone to her. I’d spied her as soon as she came in the door. I knew her routine, usual arrival times (the later she arrived, the more fucked up she already was), and the pattern she and the blonde followed. When they deviated from it and she was alone at the bar, my feet had a mind of their own. I was just going to hang out by her. I just wanted to hear her voice. Yeah, yeah, yeah, fucking creepy, I know. But I was gone for this chick. I had to know more about her. Even if I’d never be worth two seconds of her time, I couldn’t help but throw my cut on the couch and head downstairs. She was a fucking magnet pulling my steel heart towards her.

I listened to
that guy hit on her, and the way she responded. Her voice was smooth and low. Not manly low, but not that high pitched tone some girls had. I swear those bitches drove me crazy. Some thought it was a turn on to talk like a baby. Nah, Elle’s voice was perfect. It was like butter. She could recite the periodic table of elements, and it would’ve sounded sexy coming out of her mouth. Unfortunately, what came out of her mouth crushed me. “I have a boyfriend.”  Of course she did. How could she not? She was hot, confident, and seemed smart. But where was this boyfriend? Again, I should’ve shut my mouth. I should’ve walked away. I should have ignored my dick that was making my pants a bit tight. Did I? Nope. Instead I pretended like I was surprised to see her, like I hadn’t been watching her for months. Like I wasn’t a fuckin’ creeper.

There was no way I could bring a woman like Elle into my life, or so I thought. That’s why I shouldn’t have asked her to keep it real. But damn, her answer,
When a woman keeps it real she is usually called a bitch. You aren’t going to call me a bitch now are you?
  Fuck. That was not what I expected to come out of her mouth. Not. At. All. And that just made me want her more. So of course, I promised not to call her a bitch. I’d fucking kill anyone who called her a bitch. I don’t know what I expected her to say next. I now know I shouldn’t have had any expectations. Anything can come out of Elle’s mouth. God, I fucking love that about her.