“Frank,” Larkin said, “what did you do?”
Larkin held a gun leveled at Daddy’s head. I could barely understand what was happening.
“Mind yourself, Larkin,” he snapped.
“Drop the belt, Frank. Come with me.”
“Fuck you.” He hit me again.
“Don’t hit the girl again,” Larkin said, cold as he could be.
Daddy just laughed and laughed. “Stop me.” He hit me again and again.
And Larkin put a bullet into his skull.
One second Daddy was hitting me, and the next there was a loud roar in the room and Daddy collapsed onto the floor, red spilling from his face.
Larkin swooped me up in his arms.
“It’s okay,” he said. “It’s okay, Janine. I got you.”
He carried me outside, put me on the back of his bike, and took me far away.
I never went home after that. There was talk of finding me a foster home, but Larkin decided to raise me himself. I never understood why a single man running one of the most violent motorcycle gangs in the country wanted a little daughter for his own, but Larkin took me in and kept me safe.
He gave me a life, gave me a home. In return, I gave him and the Demons Motorcycle Club my full and unwavering loyalty.
I grew up in the club. I was Larkin’s little girl, though most guys knew the real story. As far as they were concerned though, I was off-limits. I wasn’t just another club whore, although sometimes I tried to pretend like I was.
Because maybe it was safer that way, if I was just another normal girl.
Living with the Demons MC taught me one important lesson, though: Nothing was safe, not ever, and you better learn to take care of yourself.
2
Clutch
You didn’t become a top enforcer for the biggest motorcycle club in the whole Austin, Texas area without cracking a few fucking skulls.
To put it fucking mildly.
I came from nothing. My momma named me Jonathan but I earned the name Clutch. Even as a little boy, I loved all things with a motor, especially bikes. I got my nickname when some asshole neighbor kid said that I worked on motorcycles so much I was becoming a clutch.
I kicked that kid’s ass and then I took the name as my own.
My dad ran off when I was a baby, leaving me and my momma alone to survive. She had her own problems, mostly booze and pills, but she tried. She worked two jobs and whored on the side to earn her drug money. She kept the whoring a secret for a while, but as I got older, I figured things out.
I was left to figure things out for myself. I got a part-time job when I could and got real good at stealing from the rich kids at school. I saved up everything I had and bought parts at the local junkyard to work on my bikes.
When I found the Demons, it was like coming home.
I was eighteen. I just left home, rode my bike out to Austin with nothing but a duffle bag full of clothes and some money in my pocket. I found them on that first day and never left again.
It wasn’t easy joining the Demons. I had to hang around the bar they used as their clubhouse for over a year before someone invited me to pledge. The man who sponsored me, his name was Leopold. Big guy, old-timer, member of the council. He took me under his wing, taught me everything he knew. I pledged and eventually was the only pledge of the guys I started out with to make it into the Demons.
Leopold lived long enough to see me wear the Demon patch. He died a few days later of a heart attack.
Like I said, Leopold was a big man.
From there, I worked my way into the club, did what I could to earn their respect. I moved up through the ranks because I wasn’t afraid of violence. I did what the club needed done, cracked skulls and killed other violent men. The club was my life and my family. The club was everything to me.
Later on, I found out that my momma died, killed by one of her sex clients. The guy stabbed her to death because he couldn’t afford to pay her after he used her up.
That was five years ago, five years after I joined the club. Now, ten years since I was a little eighteen-year-old kid, I knew more than I could ever have guessed, done some things I never imagined I’d do.
I had no dad, no mom. My only family was the club, and that was all I needed.
I still remembered the first time I saw her.
I was a pledge back then, brand new to the place. I was sitting at the bar getting drunk with Leopold and two other guys I couldn’t remember anymore when she walked in that door.
Long legs, long blond hair. Beautiful, absolutely fucking beautiful, and every guy in the place turned and looked.
“Ah,” Leopold said. “There she is, the little biker princess.”
I looked at him. “Who is she?”
Leopold grinned. “You don’t know?”
“Tell me, Leo.”
“That’s Janine. She’s Larkin’s adopted daughter.”
“Shit,” I said, looking at her again. “She’s gorgeous.”
Leopold laughed. “Look away, kid. She’s out of your league. That girl is royalty. Ain’t no pledge in the world ever going to touch her body.”