Hope (The Virtues #1) Read online

  The fear that Nick had been screwing with me, trying to scare me down to Bakersfield just to beg for something in person disappeared. He was in very real trouble, and as I heard him begin to stir from his drug-induced slumber, I hung my head between my legs.

  What was that line from The Sopranos? “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.”

  It took him almost ten minutes to realize I was there. When he did, I heard him groan and drag his body upright as if he was far heavier than his actual thin frame. Only then did I raise my head. His eyes were bloodshot, and his skin was a faded cream color. The huge bags under his eyes let me know he’d been out of it for a long time—days, maybe.

  The look he gave told me that he had no memory of his frantic attempt to contact me. I decided to ease into things.

  “Where’s Dad?” I asked.

  “Ironwood, I think.”

  Siblings always had a shorthand. When we talked about our dad, Nick and I knew that “where” meant what prison. I don’t remember hearing about him being out in the years I’d been away from my hometown, and I didn’t expect that to change.

  After a silence, I got to the point of the visit. “Do you remember calling me?” I tried to make my voice diamond hard, but the quiver was evident.

  Nick gave me the look that foreigners give you when you explain to them they are driving on the wrong side of the road. I could almost see the thought slowly making sense in his tired, abused mind. He finally shook his head.

  My frustration was wearing down the dam holding back my anger, “Goddammit, Nick. What the hell have you done?” I tossed his phone to him. It took an odd bounce off the dirty mattress and clattered onto the floor.

  “I see your dealer is done negotiating.” Back playing the role of the mother. Back to disappointment and anger. Back to the frustration of knowing nothing will change.

  Nick spoke up. His voice was hoarse, and I knew it had been days since he’d left the trailer. “Uh, yeah.” My brother cleared his throat. “I’m in some shit, Hope.” When he looked up, there was a sardonic smile across his face. “Good to see you, though.”

  I stood up, “Yeah, you too. I’m glad you kept the place up.” I headed out of the bedroom. Even with a nose accustomed to terrible medical smells, I had my limits.

  Nick was grabbing for a shirt to throw over his skin and bones body as I left, and he called to me down the hallway. “I think… I think I’ve got this under control. I’m just gonna get out of town for a bit until this money business blows over.”

  He came out into the kitchen, Casper in tow. I was leaning against the wall near the door. Nick reached up to a cabinet, letting a few gnats out. He shut it and turned away, hopefully embarrassed.

  I laughed at what he had become. The dam was broken; my emotions came pouring out over top of it. “ ‘Blows over?’ This dealer doesn’t seem like the type to let things ‘blow over,’ and besides, it isn’t like you insulted him or use the wrong salad fork. You owe him money. Debt doesn’t fade away. Debt gets you killed, Nick.”

  I hated using the mom voice, but it was necessary. He needed to know that he had fucked up badly, and I wanted to see him take some responsibility for that. Nick’s life was on the line, so I had no problem killing the buzz that was still churning through his poisoned veins.

  He could hear the anger in my voice. I wanted him to hear the anger in my voice. Nick had brought this on himself, and there was nothing I could do about it. He must have thought otherwise.

  “I have one idea, but you aren’t going to like it at all.”

  I stared at him, trying to imagine what his drug-addled brain was coming up with, “Well?”

  “Trask.”

  Dear God. One word. One name. So many memories.

  I snapped at him, “No. No way.”

  Nick replied, “Look, I know it’s been a while between you two, but he runs with the Rising Sons, a pretty big deal biker gang in this part of the state. They... you know... get things done. I bet if you talk to him, he might—”

  “You want me to just dig up my ex and ask him to protect you?” I’d lost control. My voice came in gale force winds. “It’s been ten years since we split up, and you want me to ask a favor? Jesus, Nick, that’s fucking perfect. Thanks for putting me behind the eight ball because of your addiction.” I knew there was no other solution, and even as I yelled at him, the reality sunk in that Trask was probably our only chance.

  “Nick, you selfish prick.”

  All of a sudden, there wasn’t a twenty-five-year-old druggie standing in front of me. He was the thirteen-year-old that I had punished for losing his lunch on the way to school. He was the fifteen-year-old that I had yelled at for stealing. He was the seventeen-year-old that I had tried to scold for getting arrested for drinking.

  He turned to hide the tears, but I knew they were there. Nick was never a strong kid, especially when he was getting told hard truths. “All right. I have no other fucking idea what to do. The cops in this town know me, so there’s no way I can go to them. I know you don’t have the cash, and I can’t get out of here without them finding me, so who the fuck knows?

  “Hope, I don’t remember calling you, and I’m sorry I wasted your time, but...” Nick turned back to me, the tears sliding past his cheeks. “But unless you have a better idea, I think this is goodbye.”

  Casper whined and laid down beside Nick on the kitchen floor. My brother and I stood in the family trailer, drowning in the tension between us. His solution was to get high and wait for his untimely death. It may have been fitting, but I didn’t want to see my brother go that way. I had done my best to raise him after my mother ran out on us. I wanted to see him succeed and beat the odds. I wracked my brain for any other solution.

  When nothing else came to me, I groaned. Nick had come up with the only solution that had any chance of succeeding: Trask. I hadn’t talked to him in nine years, and things had ended under bad circumstances, just like everything in my life. I knew where he was, and I knew where I could find him. A friend of a friend kept me up to date on Facebook, and no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t forget it. Trask Rivers was with the Rising Sons Motorcycle Club, and their haunt was a bar near the western edge of Bakersfield.

  My high school boyfriend and I hadn’t seen each other since he left for basic training a few weeks after graduation. Splitting up was hard, but we knew it was the only way to try and make better lives for ourselves. Trask had helped me escape from my life in the trailer park every day after school; something I could never fully repay. As I stood across from my doomed brother, I realized I was about to get deeper in debt with my old flame.

  “It’s a long shot—and I really mean that—but I could try and talk to Trask.” I thought I’d see some promise in his eyes.

  Instead, Nick gave me a maniacal laugh, “Perfect. Out of the frying pan. I guess I’d rather owe a renegade group of bikers than a renegade drug dealer?”

  Maybe the drugs really had fucked his brain up permanently. His stab in the dark idea was the best one, but even Nick could see how big of a long shot it was.

  “Hell, they might even be working together, I don’t know. Jesus, Hope. You think fucking him ten years ago is going to be enough for him to come to our rescue?”

  I made a conscious decision to un-ball my fists. My heart was racing. My father had hated Trask when I was in high school, and Nick had co-opted our dad’s feelings. Dad called him trash, the irony completely lost on him.

  My confusion over Nick’s comments couldn’t be contained, “It was your fucking idea! Want me to turn around and head back to school, then? Jesus, you’re a worthless junkie piece of shit, and you still think you’re better than Trask? He got his life together when you could barely string together a sentence! You don’t get to suggest someone and trash them at the same time.”

  “Calm down, Hope.” Nick stepped forward, but he must have seen the red in my eyes, because he backed away again. “I’m just saying, maybe he’s i
n on it, like… maybe he’s the muscle, or something. I haven’t heard good things about the Rising Sons, you know.”

  It was just like high school all over again. Sarcasm and disdain shot from my voice like a shotgun blast. “That’s what you heard?” I slowed my words down, trying to keep my blood pressure low. “Who’d you hear that from? Another junkie? Some dealer? If the garbage of this town think they’re bad, then they must be the devil’s minions.

  “You’ve got two choices: Nick: wait for Beezer to come back and kill you, or let me talk to Trask. Either way, I don’t think you have anything to lose.”

  He sighed. As always, he knew I was right and hated the feeling. “You’re right. I don’t have anything to lose.”

  I would have normally felt that warm glow of satisfaction, but in this case, being right meant I had to track down an ex, a biker, and a Marine all rolled into one. I wasn’t exactly afraid of him, but I was certainly afraid of what he would do to me. Trask had that magnetic personality that melted any ice I tried to put between us.

  Keep it professional. That was going to be my mantra.

  “I don’t have his number. I’ll have to take a trip. The last I heard, the Rising Sons were in that bar by the riverbed, the musical-sounding name.” It was on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn’t remember it. In high school, the bikers fell into several urban legends, but we stayed way clear of them. Our senior year, Trask was more and more interested in Harleys, but I never thought he’d join a motorcycle club. When one of my high school friends told me, shock hit me first, but then I tried to imagine him as a big, bad biker.

  “Yeah, I know the place you’re talking about.”

  “Thanks, Nick. So very helpful of you.” I gave him a sneer only a sibling could appreciate.

  Nick shrugged. “You know how to get there?” After I nodded, he continued. “Then it doesn’t really matter what it’s called, does it? If there’s a row of dirty bikes parked outside and Molly Hatchet blasting inside, I think you’re in the right place.”

  I had to smile. Nick did have his moments. “All right, all right. Get some shit together and find a motel or something. Keep your phone on, and I’ll let you know what Trask says.” As if the world was against us in every way, Nick’s phone chose that moment to vibrate and light up in his hand.

  He looked down at it, reading the text. Any warmth we had built between us vanished, and when he held it up so I could see the message, I understood why. I made the mistake of reading it out loud.

  “18 hours. Better have the cash. Don’t you go disappearing on me. Jesus, Nick. This guy’s serious.”

  Nick knew things were bad. “If Trask says no, get out of here. Don’t come back to Bakersfield for another ten years, and don’t even waste a thought on me. You did everything you could, Hope.”

  I wanted to say something, but what was there to say? Nick had a moment of clarity. If Trask couldn’t help me, I had no idea what else I could do. Nick would be on the run, and I’d be making sure Beezer didn’t set his sights on me. All I could do was push all the bad blood and family drama aside and wrap my arms around my younger brother.

  He was swaying and unsteady as I hugged him, and all those motherly instincts kicked back in. From thirteen on, Nick was my responsibility, and I wanted to do anything and everything to keep him from harm, even if that meant putting myself in harm’s way.

  I couldn’t get those memories out of my head. As I drove toward the biker bar, the airy happiness of high school romance came rushing back to me. Trask and I had met sophomore year when he made it a point to sit behind me in algebra. Each day, he’d lean forward and tap on my shoulder with a light touch. Sometimes he forgot his pencil, other times his notebook.

  Every day for a semester, he’d lay his finger on me and ask for something he’d forgotten. On the last day of class, he told me that he’d forgotten my number, handing me a blank sheet of paper and a pen. It was a good line, and it worked.

  Trask was a quick learner. After spending almost every day together after school, he’d drop me off at the entrance to Cherrywood Court. My father was overprotective in an “I don't like her, but she’s mine” sort of way. Trask was kind to me, but had a temper. He would often get upset thinking about my home life. I would always soothe him by talking about the future; our future.

  The first time we made love was on Avila Beach the summer before our senior year. Afterwards, we laid on the hood of Trask’s car and talked about our future. Maybe we both knew then, but we kept the act up to hang onto our momentary happiness. It was Grease without the music. We were rough and tumble, and we had one year left for our young love to burn hot and fast.

  Back in the present, the wind blew my loose, dark curls around in Layne’s car, and I tried to imagine him in the Navy. He had the body for it, for sure, but Trask was always his own man. He’d worked all through high school, and the jobs he loved the most were the ones where he was trusted to work hard and alone. His aunt and uncle were proud of his work ethic.

  Familiar landmarks jumped out at me through Bakersfield. Some buildings were gone, others worn down by time. I passed my high school, the road that led to Trask’s old home, and the empty lot that used to be a pizza place where I got my first job. The town was filled with memories, good and bad.

  My trip down Memory Lane was soon replaced as my panic dragged me to Hell. In the decade since Trask and I broke up with all the emotion and angst teenagers can muster, our worlds had become radically different. I was close to having Dr. in front of my name, and from what I’d learned from old friends, Trask had become something like an action hero. We seemed so similar in our senior prom pictures, but I doubted that we’d look or live anything alike anymore.

  The buildings began to get sparse as I reached the edge of town. The bar was just off the Kern River, which was nothing but a dusty, rocky riverbed this time of year. As the road narrowed, leading eventually to the West Coast, a building began to come into view. It could have passed as a warehouse if not for the large neon sign advertising the place.

  I said the name out loud, baffled that I had forgotten it. “Los Bandoleros” shone like a rebel’s beacon. The green and white neon lit up the gravel parking lot below. I saw the reflections bounce off of the chrome and paint of at least twenty motorcycles parked in the familiar tilt.

  I knew I was way out of my league as I pulled Layne’s Toyota into the parking lot. I was only one of three cars there, and the other two were classic muscle cars. This was a biker bar through and through. I was a hundred-and-ten-pound med student with no tattoos and one ear piercing.

  Fear gripped me as I sat in my friend’s car. What if Trask told me to fuck off? What if he wasn’t even there? What if no one helped me?

  I held my breath and counted down from ten. I had to go into the bar with confidence, because I knew I’d get eaten alive otherwise. I was going to have to use the old ER trick, “fake it ‘til you make it.” Smile through the fear, and act like you owned the place. Asserting dominance was hard when you were small and looked like you still couldn’t drink, but I’d been getting better. I had arguing with uncooperative patients during clinicals to thank for that.

  After the count, I let my breath out slow and deliberate. I crossed my fingers that Trask was there and that he would hear me out. As I stepped out of the car, his last words hit me hard like a bad news breeze.

  Ten years ago we stood before each other, and he told me, “This is it, Hope. You and I are over, and I don’t think we’ll be seeing each other any time soon.” His voice was trying for that soothing tone, but it was more like being read a prison sentence. What he was really saying was we were going away for life. I knew it then, and until yesterday, I had accepted that. Trask was well aware I wanted nothing to do with Bakersfield and my old life. Despite the fear slithering through my head, I couldn’t wait to see the look on his face when I walked into the bar.