Page 65 of Iron Hearts

There was a certain appeal to that, I must say…

We worked our way up the A1A and I just enjoyed the ride. The thrum of the bike and the air washing over me as we ate over the miles of asphalt and pavement rushing beneath the tires; it was like being reborn in a way.

We pulled up outside the customization shop, inside a gated side lot, and he parked the bike. I got off first after he tapped my knee twice, and he walked the bike back into place in an angle parking job against the wall. It looked like there were already some people here, judging by the other bikes parked along the wall on this side of the lot, and a few parked against the fence across from us.

He gently took my fingertips into his hand and led me by them toward the gate we’d ridden through.

We walked around the front of the building, past the locked door to the front office, and to the other side of the building that faced the water, climbing a set of steps to the second floor, where we stopped at the locked door there, as Striker fished through his keys. A loud burst of laughter from above us had him looking at me and shrugging.

“Sounds like the clubhouse door is open, I was just stopping at this one by default. C’mon, up we get,” he took my hand again and led the way up the next flight of steps to the next landing. He dragged open the glass door that was blacked out with paint on the other side of the glass, making the logo for the Royal Bastard’s MC pop, which had been painted on first, in loving detail.

We went inside, and the inside was a world away from what I thought it would be! I expected something like the Iron Horse. The wood worn and carved into roughly. License plates and bullet riddled street signs tacked to the ceiling and walls… but no, this place was…fancy.

The whole floor up here was open, and the spaces divided by flooring. While the majority of it was a glossy worn hardwood reminiscent of an old warehouse, there were other sections finished with pride and a loving care.

There were two red velvet topped pool tables over in one corner, with black-and-white chess board patterned tile underneath them.

Between the pool tables and the bar was a stretch of what looked almost like a bowling alley floor, with three lanes that led to three dart boards.

The bar on the left had a wide expanse of standing space between it, and the cluster of couches and recliners on a black, red, and white large geometric patterned throw rug, that sat in front of a wall with a painted rectangle of white. A projector mounted to the ceiling pointed that way.

There were wires running from it, to a cabinet by the door we’d come in through, and on the other side of the cabinet that rested against a short expanse of wall was another doorway leading to an open-air, but covered deck where we could hear laughter and voices.

There was a man in a black leather vest with no patches at all on it, front nor back, stocking the bar and doing the general bartending duties.

I asked Striker curiously, “How come his vest has no patches?”

“Aw, that’s Adrien, he’s just a hang-around. If he ever does move up to Prospect, he’ll get a bottom rocker that says ‘St. Augustine’ and a top rocker that says ‘Prospect’ until he earns his colors.”

“Oh, so a hang around is like a pre-prospecting period?” I asked.

“Exactly right,” he said.

“I’d always wondered about that,” I said. “I’ve seen guys riding around that had vests like his – but didn’t know the difference between it and a prospect.”

“Well, today you learned,” Striker said with a grin and he tweaked the end of my nose making me wrinkle it and grin back.

“Let me give you the ten-cent tour,” he said, and led me further into the room.

Ceiling fans spun above our heads, moving the air, and it was surprisingly cool inside despite the open big windows out to the deck. The open areas didn’t have any glass in them. In fact, the only thing that separated them from the open deck was a stone slab counter and these built-in metal stools on either side.

There were rolls of what looked like clear vinyl that zipped or snapped down securely in case of colder temperatures, but it looked like they didn’t come down too often.

Striker led me opposite that direction, to our left and stopped short of the big area of sectional, couches, and recliners.

“This here is where we watch sports, fights, and occasionally do movie nights,” he said. “That door leads down the stairs to the offices where you found me the first time you came around.”

“Oh! Okay,” I said, nodding.

“Over here is the bar.” He threw some chin to the Hispanic guy behind the bar. I couldn’t guess if he was Spanish, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Mexican – or any other Latin American or other country, and here in Florida, some could be touchy when it came to their origins. Like, don’t youdareaccuse a Cubano of being Puerto Rican or vice versa. Them could be fighting words. It was much safer to just ask or keep your mouth shut until they outright said where they were from. Guessing was just rude.

“Adrian, I’d like you to meet my lady, Rarity,” Striker said and the man behind the bar gave a charming smile and nodded his head in my direction.

“Nice to meet you, Rarity,” he said.

“Nice to meet you, too,” I said.

“Get you guys a drink?” he asked and I smiled and said, “I’ll take a hard seltzer if you’ve got one.”

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