Page 11 of Spyder
“She understands girl speak,” Domino says. “Can’t argue with that.”
“You are both so full of shit.”
The three of us share a laugh, but my insides are suddenly roiling. The last I’d heard was that Bellamy had moved to Colorado to start a new life for herself. After her dad died, her entire life fell apart and she needed a fresh page. I understood and was happy for her. Sort of. But to know that she’s back is throwing me for a total loop. That is literally the last thing I expected to hear today.
But I’m saying it’s a bad thing. In fact, I’m pretty intrigued. I’d like to see how the last decade or so has treated her for myself.
Chapter Five
Spyder
My bike rumbles beneath me, rattling my body from head to toe. Some people don’t like the feeling of being on a bike. They say it’s too jarring. They say it rattles their bodies too hard. But I like the feeling of being on my bike. I enjoy that jarring, rattling feeling that shakes your body good and hard.
To me, it’s a comforting feeling. To me, it’s the feeling of being free. The feeling of being able to wake up one morning and just go. Anywhere. I can point my bike in a direction and just ride. And for no other reason than just feeling like it. That’s the feeling of being truly free. It’s a feeling that, sadly, most people don’t understand. And even fewer get to experience.
We take the road out to the edge of the town. It’s the part of town the more upstanding citizens of Blue Rock like to pretend doesn’t exist. It’s the more rural section of town. The poorer section of town. Acknowledging there are people who aren’t as well-off as they are would be an affront to the rich, snooty pricks who make up the Blue Rock Bay elite. The ones who think they own the town and control everything that happens within the borders.
What none of these pricks understand, or at least pretend to be ignorant to, is that they aren’t the power in Blue Rock. We are. The Pharaohs. We control the town, and we protect it. We make sure the streets are safe, and we make sure none of the problems other cities have, namely with drugs running freely, happen here.
Domino waves to get my attention and then flashes the hand signal that tells me we’re here. We pull to the curb and turn off the engines of our bikes. I sit astride mine for another minute and look around. The neighborhood is old and run-down. Most of the houses are small craftsman style and are in dire need of a coat of paint and some repair. I see more windows that’ve been broken out than ones that still have glass in them.
The lawns I see are all little more than dirt, and the few fences fronting the houses are busted. There are rusted-out cars in driveways and more up on blocks on the lawns in front of the houses. The poverty around here is evident, and you can practically smell the desperation.
In the distance, a dog barks and is quickly answered by another. The sun beats down on us and I feel the beads of sweat rolling down the back of my neck, slipping under the rib of my T-shirt, and then down my back. I take my helmet off and then my gloves, stuffing them all into my saddlebag. I look over at Domino who’s casting a suspicious eye around the neighborhood.
“What’s up?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “Nothin’. Just gettin’ the lay of the land.”
I look around, searching for whatever seems to have caught Domino’s attention. He’s on alert for something, I can tell. All around us, I can almost sense the people in the houses. They’re watching us. It feels like everybody is holding their breath, waiting for the storm to pass.
We’ve had to deliver messages to this part of town before. In fact, we’ve had to deliver messages to this very neighborhood before. People around here know that when they hear our bikes, they better scramble for cover because we’re not coming for a social call. When we come, it’s because somebody’s in deep shit. And today, the person in deep shit is named Peter Wells.
“Gray house,” Domino says after checking his phone.
“Pretty sure that was white,” I reply.
“Yeah, well, maybe he should slap a new coat of paint on,” he replies. “Or just wash the damn thing.”
“Not everybody’s as particular about their home as you, brother.”
Domino grins at me. “All I’m sayin’ is have a little pride in your place. That’s all. Is that so hard?”
I chuckle and shake my head. Domino is pretty uptight about some things, but he’s nowhere near as Type-A about shit as Monk.
“You ready to do this?” he asks.
“We’re all dressed up. Might as well dance,” I reply as I get off my bike.
We start across the street, heading for Peter Wells’ house. I know we’re here to do a job and that I should have my game face on, but I’m having a hard time getting into character. The news he broke to me earlier still has me feeling off-kilter and I can’t get the thoughts of Bellamy out of my head.
Knowing that she’s back in town has my heart and my brain turning somersaults inside of me. It’s crazy, considering how long it’s been since I last saw her. And let’s be real here, it’s not like the last time I saw her, we were friends. We were barely acquaintances.
“Hey, did Bellamy really ask about me?”
Domino casts a sidelong glance at me, a smirk curling his lip upward. “Really? You’re asking about that now?”
I shrug. “I just want to know.”
