Page 4 of Lawless
Oh. Well, at least there's that.
"How long have you been here?" I dumped two handfuls of chopped potatoes into a bowl, then emptied the bowl into the awaiting pot of boiling water on the stove.
"About three months." Gretchen hacked off the end of a carrot and brought it to her mouth, biting down with a loud crunch.
"And how's that been? Okay?" I helped myself to a carrot snack as well.
She chewed thoughtfully before answering. "I'm still alive. That's the best you can hope for in a world like this, right?"
With so many dying senselessly in the skirmishes over territory, and plenty more dying from treatable conditions due to the lack of medical care, I felt inclined to agree with her.
But I could still remember a time when people wanted so much more out of life. They wanted stable jobs, degrees from universities, families and friends who loved them, maybe even the occasional luxury like a vacation or a pet.
Then the Collapse happened and the world turned to shit. Humanity couldn't afford to focus on luxury and comfort if we wanted to survive. Mild-mannered family men, like my father, turned into ruthless killers out of necessity. Mom and I cried daily for months when Dad came home from the border skirmishes drenched in blood.
I wondered if the Steel Demons had always been fearsome bikers or if they had been normal citizens at one point, too. The Collapse seemed to bring out the worst in everyone. Self-preservation became the only goal at the forefront of everyone's mind, which ironically, only led to more widespread suffering.
For those that preyed on the weak and sought control in the most sadistic ways, the Collapse was an answered prayer. I heard horror stories of women being treated like cattle, rounded up in corrals and used for breeding. Others said slavery had returned in the territories that was once the South. No one could verify what was true or not, but those whispers made me grateful that being forbidden from receiving my nursing license was the worst that happened in East Texas.
"What brought you out this way?" Gretchen asked, dumping her bowl of chopped carrots into a separate pot of boiling water.
"I was hoping to find women's groups out west, or just a place I could be a medic without the risk of going to jail," I told her. "I got my nursing degree the same day East Texas got annexed. Women were outlawed from holding any kind of medical license within hours of me graduating."
"At least you got a degree," Gretchen mumbled. "I was pulled out of school at fourteen and sent to a girls’ camp. They said we didn't need to know how to read, write, or do math. Being a good, Godly wife was all that mattered and that's what they would teach us."
"Ugh." I shook my head, still disgusted by this jarring, new reality although I was no longer surprised. Girls’ camps were popping up all over the place, turning girls and young women into docile, obedient wives for men to purchase.
"How did you get out of there?" I put down my knife and stretched out my hand, my fingers cramping up from all the chopping.
She gave a sly smirk. "My ex-husband bought me, but pushed me out of a moving car right in front of this place when I almost bit his dick off."
"Holy shit! On the highway? It's amazing that you survived!"
"I knew to roll," she shrugged. "Just got a bit of road rash and a sprained wrist. And I've been here ever since."
I considered asking her if she wanted to go with me after I left in two weeks. We could keep heading north toward Canada. Women's rights groups were supposedly all along the border, taking in refugees. Gretchen could finish her education and with luck, I might be able to call myself a nurse again.
But I held my tongue and kept chopping. I just met this girl and wasn't sure if I wanted a travel companion for the next few thousand miles. The loneliness sucked, but it was better than waking up to having half of my supplies stolen. Lesson learned—I could only trust myself in this lawless world.
After a few moments of chopping and cooking, a sound like continuous thunder drowned out everything else. My stomach flipped over on itself, knowing it could only be a crew of motorcycles descending on the inn like a pack of wild dogs coming in for the kill.
"They're here!" Gretchen wiped her hands on her apron and ran to the large walk-in refrigerator. She returned holding two frosted glass pitchers. "Help me fill these up with ale? They like it cold and ready to drink first thing when they arrive."
I took one and followed her to the kegerator, noticing the tremor in her hand as she pulled the tap handle to let the beer flow. For as non-murderous as the Steel Demons were to this place, they apparently still scared the shit out of her.
And if she really did nearly bite the dick off the abusive man who owned her, seeing her tremble at the sound of growling bikes made me especially uneasy.
The Texas and Texahoma territories had their fair share of biker gangs, too, but none had a reputation as notorious as the Steel Demons. As I filled up my pitcher and followed Gretchen out to the lobby, I wondered if not dying by their hands was really the better option.
The front doors burst open with a bang just as we set the pitchers on the coffee tables in front of the couches. Raucous laughter followed booted footsteps as six tall, leather-clad figures entered the lobby, their mere presence commanding respect and fear.
The man leading them leveled his gaze at me. Gretchen and I had dropped off the pitchers and were scurrying back to the kitchen for more, but those catlike green eyes seemed to nail my feet to the floor.
Dark brown hair fell across his forehead as if tousled by a helmet. A straight nose sat above full lips that scowled cruelly at me. Dark stubble peppered an angular jaw and olive, sun-kissed skin.
It stunned me how handsome and young he was. Bikers didn't look likethis. They were old and grizzled with long hair and beards. Like scary, monstrous versions of Santa Claus.
With the way this man looked at me, though, I had no doubt he was capable of monstrous things.
