Belle View club was one of the most beautiful upscale places in San Francisco. Vibrant and had a big square bar with blue and magenta neon light straps in the counter body. Packed with people, the sound of laughter, good music and sex. Around every dark corner, there were heels hooked around hips accompanied by moans and grunts. A happy, care-free place for happy, care-free people.
I wasn’t one of those people, so I contemplated leaving at least ten times in the past fifteen minutes I’d been here. Coming tonight wasn’t even my idea. It was Perla’s. The P.E. teacher at the school. She’d called me and every female teacher that was doing the summer courses for a girl’s night out. No one should spend the summer with flunking teens in the morning and grading papers in the evening. So take off your underwear and meet me at Belle View. Your vagina needs air. Also tequila and a fat cock. Her words, not mine.
It was more than odd for me to accept the invitation. I never went anywhere. I always kept to myself. Someone with so many secrets to hide and protect had to. But I needed company tonight. I was tired of the ghosts that haunted my nights, dead and living. I needed a distraction, something, anything to keep my mind off Ty and the horrendous past. After the latest class at San Quentin, the recent distraction I’d been using had turned into a source of pain as well.
What did I expect? An honest criminal? A convict with honor and respect? Of course, he was a liar. Men like Furore said and did anything to get what they wanted no matter the consequences. They didn’t care what or whom they hurt or manipulate along the way. They don’t give a shit. I’d learned that the hard way. Why, for the love of God, just to get over a boy, had I allowed myself to get attached to a stupid fantasy when I knew it’d lead to no good?
And now that I was pretty sure Furore had an ulterior motive joining my class—this couldn’t be just about winning a bet—boy problems were the least of my worries.
What was he gaining from getting closer to me? Was he trying to find out whom I really was for him or for someone else?
The Cosmo I gulped didn’t warm the ice pit in my stomach. The idea of just packing my little, lonely, pathetic life and go start over somewhere else sounded more than tempting. I had nothing here to risk being found for…except a false hope my ratchet heart still clung to.
“Jo! C’mon, girl! Tell us what you think!” Perla yelled over the music.
I frowned. I hadn’t been listening to a word she, Laura, the Physics teacher, and Christine, the History teacher were saying. “About what?”
She feigned shock, putting a hand on her chest, eyes bulging. Then she, not so subtly, pointed at the bar where a man in a white T-shirt and a leather vest—a cut?—with full sleeves of tattoos on his bulging arms sat, downing shots. “If you don’t go, I will!”
“Go where?”
“Talk to him. See if he’s interested.” She giggled.
“Oh! No.” I shook my head rapidly. “You, by all means, have at it.”
“You shittin’ me? Have you looked at him? And the emblem on his cut?”
I narrowed my eyes to take a closer look. Our table was at the back, distant from lurking eyes, and I’d chosen the least visible seat to the bar. I couldn’t make the emblem from here.
“Take off the ugly shades, girl, to get a better look,” Christine said.
I pushed them up my nose, as if they were going to fall off, holding on to them more. “I’m photophobic. My eyes are very sensitive. The strobe lights will kill me.”
“That’s the emblem of the Night Skulls MC.” Perla saved me. “Ever heard of them?”
More than I should have. I just nodded.
“I think they used to own this place. They threw the wildest of parties at their compound.” She spoke about them as if they were gods. She didn’t know they were lying thugs that used and hurt people. “Back in college, I met one of them here. He took me to one of their parties at Rosewood and we…” She uttered strange sounds that were supposed to refer to sex. “His name is Dusty, and he is, hands down, the best I’ve ever had.”
“Oh my God.” Laura put down her drink. “Isn’t that their young hot president that took over when his father died?”
Perla nodded emphatically, sipping her cocktail.
“Fuck, I envy you, you dirty, dirty slut.”
“Isn’t he dead?” I blurted out.
They stared at me, their laughter deceased. Well, if it weren’t me to be the party pooper and kill the mood…
“I mean, they said the fire killed them all, but what do I know?” I pointed at the bulky man at the bar in an attempt to lighten up the conversation. “Which chapter?”
“Huh?” Perla hummed.
“The Night Skulls have chapters, like groups, all over the world. They’re global. Which chapter does he belong to?”
Christine grinned. “All knowledgeable about chapters and bikers and shit? Wait a second. Do you have bikers in your class in prison? OMG, you totally do, don’t you? That’s why you’re not interested in that guy. You have another at your disposal, don’t you, Miss Meneceo?” She made the last sentence sound dirty.
My eyebrows shot high. “I…um…as a matter of fact, some of the students are affiliated, yes.”
Perla gasped. “Do tell.”
“There’s nothing to tell. They are not as hot as you think they are.” I scratched my neck at the blatant lie. “What makes you think I’ll be interested in a biker anyway?”
“Maybe you’re not, but your vagina is.”
“She told you that over the phone?”
She laughed at my snarky joke, most likely because she was tipsy. Nobody laughed at my jokes. “She doesn’t need to. Every vagina is interested in a biker.”
There was a time when my heart leapt and my sex clenched every time I heard a motorcycle roar. Ty rode a bike everywhere, even to school. While his father was a member of the Night Skulls here—and died in that fire—Ty never belonged to an MC or had a cut, but he rocked leather jackets and rode like he did. There was nothing that took the edge off for me like when we used to meet outside of San Francisco—so no one we knew would see us—and he took me on his motorcycle and rode for hours across California.
Now, the mention of bikers brought heartache, and every bike I saw was disappointed anticipation followed by squashed hope because Tirone wasn’t on it. “Well, mine needs to do something more vital and far less attractive. Excuse me, ladies. I’m glad Mrs. Williams isn’t here.”
Their giggles followed me as I made my way to the bathroom. After I was done, I decided I’d stay for one more drink and then go home. I was a fish out of water here, taking a part in a scene I only read about in books. Talking to some stranger in order to hopefully get picked up at a bar was never my plan. I was only here for the booze that would make me tired enough to go straight to bed. But the girls seemed to have other plans, and I had no intention to be included in them.
They were still talking boys when I returned, shooting gazes at the mystical biker, willing him to look their way, but he never turned his head.
“Do you remember that sophomore kid that rode a Harley to school? That boy is yummy.”
Laura was talking to Perla, but it was me who responded, my heart eaten in flames of rage and jealousy. “Wisely. His name is Tirone Wisely. Should we really be talking about students like that?” They shouldn’t be talking about him like he was a piece of meat. They shouldn’t be talking about him at all.
“C’mon. No one is listening,” Perla laughed. “Besides, he doesn’t go to our school anymore.”
“They say he’s slept with the entire class within five weeks. The fuck?”
“Can you blame them? He’s so gorgeous. Another few years, and I’d happily let him spread my legs and eat—”
“I’m going to get some air!” I said, louder than I should have. “It’s getting too hot in here.” I moved as fast as I could away from the table, and then tears wet my lashes.
The humid air hit my skin as I tried to even my breath. It felt like my lungs were going to crash and my heart was going to burst. It wasn’t the first time I’d heard women or girls talk about how sexy Ty was or the things they’d let him do to them. It wasn’t the first time I had to eat shit, keep my mouth shut about it and act like I wasn’t jealous or hurt over it. It was one of the many prices I was paying for being in a secret, forbidden relationship, but tonight I couldn’t bear it anymore.
I came here to get my mind off things, off him, for once, but this night kept getting worse. God, I wished I’d smoked. I needed to burn something instead of burning myself.
My eyes rolled heavenwards. “When will it end? All the pain and fear and loneliness, when will it end?”
I wiped under my eyes, convinced I should cancel that last drink and go home now before the night got any worse. Storming inside, I didn’t reach the door before I hit a human tank. It was the MC guy the girls were horny for. I didn’t know what he was built of, but it wasn’t flesh and bones like the rest of ordinary humans. His chest was so solid I felt as if I hit an unmovable surface. An exasperated huff streamed out of my lungs as I held my hands out in a rough apology.
“It’s my bad, doll. Had too many in there,” he drawled in a Southern accent, chuckled and went on his way.
Southern accent? Night Skulls cut? Did he know Furore?
I stood there for a few moments, following him with my gaze. His cut only said Texas. Should I ask him if he was from Houston? Should I just ask straight if he knew Furore?
What if he did? Who cared if a random man I met at a bar knew him? What would that piece of information be of any good to me? I shouldn’t care about bad Laius Lazzarini in any way whatsoever. Not even as a student because he never really wanted to be.
But what were the odds of having a Night Skull from Texas at a San Francisco bar on the night I was in?
Before my head rambled any further, the biker straddled his motorcycle and another pulled over by his side at the parking lot. My eyes tightened at the newcomer. I recognized that helmet.
Taking a closer look at the Harley, I gasped silently. As the biker took off his helmet, and his dark brown hair fell off his forehead, my heart skipped a beat.
“Ty,” I slurred, shuddering. “H-how?”
My head spun with the shock and vodka. I thought he’d left San Francisco. I thought he’d taken off with his family. But he was here. All this time, Tirone was in the city, and he didn’t even bother saying anything.
“What the fuck?” I hiccupped through the tears.
He wasn’t injured or sick or anything. He was smiling and talking to the other biker without a care in the world. “How? How could he just…?”
He forgot all about me just like that. He tossed me away like a whore he was done with. Even worse. At least, whores got paid for their services. Perhaps, they got a goodbye every now and then, too. I wasn’t even worthy of that. I was nothing to him when he was everything to me.
Shaking with more tears, I spun, wishing I’d been dead. I was supposed to be fifteen years ago, but I fucking lived. For what?
Go talk to him. He must have an explanation.
No. I wouldn’t make any more excuses for him. He had months to reach out and explain, but he didn’t. He chose to leave in that disgusting way. What was left to explain?
I moaned in silence as I dragged myself back in, thankful for the sunglasses that hid my pain from the world. Not that I cared anymore. Let them see. Let them know. Let them fucking find me and end my pitiful life.
But no. I’d live. I’d find a way to forgive myself and start over. No one was worth destroying myself. I’d survived for twenty-three years. I’d survive some more because I wouldn’t let any of those fucking bad guys win.
I grabbed my purse and headed out with one thought in my head. I had to leave and never come back. Nothing tied me to this city anymore. A clean slate was in order. For that to happen, there was something I had to do first at San Quentin.
