Dirty Side Down (Knights of Hell MC) Read online

  This is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons--living or dead--is entirely coincidental.

  Dirty Side Down copyright @ 2014 by Daisy Schwartz. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.

  DIRTY SIDE DOWN

  Flora tightly gripped the handlebars of her Harley, a trill of excitement rolling through her. She loved nights like this. Nights when the Miami heat covered the city in a blanket of humidity and forced the general population to stay indoors with their air conditioners blasting. It was as though the city had given itself to her. The road ahead was dark and quiet with the exception of taillights in the distance. The crisp sea air blew off the bay and cooled her. To the west, the city hummed invitingly, as if to say, Come to the party. However, tonight, Flora couldn’t.

  It was nearly ten o’clock, and she didn’t want to be late. She kicked down on the gear shifter of her motorcycle, rolled the throttle back, and banked a hard right onto Brickell Avenue, heading straight into the heart of downtown. As she cruised down the street, passing Miami’s most vibrant bars and restaurants, Flora became acutely aware she was being watched.

  She rolled to a stop at the red light and glanced to her right. Sure enough, in the neighboring lane, a middle-aged Latino man dangled his arm out his open window and shouted something in Spanish. To Flora, it sounded like an insult, as well as a compliment. She steadied her gaze straight ahead and actively ignored her neighbor.

  Flora had always had that effect on men. However, it was not due solely to her choice of dress, which often included black leather corsets and cutoff shorts that hugged the contours of her hips at smoldering angles. Nor was it due to her sultry mane of long, black hair, which seemed to be as wild as she was. Men were drawn to Flora despite the revealing garments she wore. They were drawn to the glimmer of innocence behind her eyes. It was as though she hadn’t yet been hardened by the cruelties of life, though she had certainly survived some. It reminded men and women alike, that no matter how old they got or how difficult life became, there was still a reason to trust, to see the good in others, and to hold true to a greater dream.

  As the light turned from red to green, Flora fixed her gaze dead ahead and hit the gas. She was almost there, and she could already tell this would be a night to remember.

  Suddenly, from the left of her periphery, another biker swung out into her lane. The bike would’ve hit her broadside, but she swerved and kicked down on her brakes, avoiding the collision. A car horn suddenly blared loudly from the opposite lane. Her body tensed up, and her heart raced. She glanced over her shoulder. A vehicle was mere inches away, but she managed to glide back into her lane, narrowly escaping another accident.

  The reckless biker gunned it, swerving between cars until he almost disappeared into traffic. However, Flora pressed a heavy foot on the gas, locked her eyes on his taillights, and thought, Right on time.

  Keeping a distance between them, she followed the reckless biker, as he weaved in and out of traffic through downtown and cut east onto a rowdy side street. This strip was where the local bikers hung out and was notorious for being the home of southern Florida’s roughest criminals. If a fight broke out here, it wasn’t reported. Plus, fights that broke out here often ended fatally.

  The reckless biker pulled his motorcycle into a cluster of bikes right outside a dive bar called O’Malley’s. Flora pulled up across the street and idled her Harley. A sense of unease grew in the pit of her stomach, as she watched the biker dismount his hog. He was a tank, well over 6’4”, muscular, and covered in tattoos. He opened the bar door and vanished inside. It was time.

  The plan was to get as close as possible to the guy, get him talking, and find out what he knew. She knew he was only one piece of the puzzle, but it was a piece she needed. She couldn’t move on without it.

  He was involved with a motorcycle club known as the Knights of Hell. However, it wasn’t just a club. It was a cover. They had been laundering weapons up the eastern seaboard for decades, and no one had been able to take them out. They were an ironclad group and operated flawlessly. If someone in the clan got arrested, it was always on an unrelated charge, a bar fight, a domestic dispute, a minor violation of parole.

  These guys were experts at what they did, and they were experts at intimidation. People in the neighborhood didn’t want them here, but when something went down and they had the opportunity to point a finger, nobody would. They were afraid to talk, because everyone knew that running guns wasn’t the worst of their offenses. They were capable of so much more.

  Flora turned the key, and her Harley fell silent. She took a deep breath and tried to calm her nerves by reminding herself that he was not a major player in the clan. She wasn’t ready to infiltrate the major players. She didn’t know enough, and it would be too risky. This guy was only one of the low-rung minions who did the grunt work for the gang. However, that meant he knew about all the dirty deeds done by the higher ups since he was the guy cleaning up after them. If she could get him to trust her, then she would eventually find out what happened to her brother.

  As she crossed the street and approached the bar, her heart started pounding. She stopped suddenly then placed two hands on her torso, just under her breasts. She was sweating too much, and it was causing the skin under her bustier to become slick. She thought, This could be a problem.

  She looked back across the street at a black van that had pulled up, just behind her bike. She knew that she’d better get in there, so she smoothed her hands down the front of her body, took a deep breath, and opened the door.

  When she entered the bar, the stench of piss and bleach filled her nostrils. The air was hot and stagnant, and worse, the bar was crowded. She pressed her way inside, squeezing between bikers. One of them blew smoke in her face. Another shoved her from behind, though accidentally, so she continued deeper into the bar. Her gaze darted through the crowd, searching between all the faces for her man, when all of a sudden she felt a rough hand grab her wrist. She whipped around in a panic and tried to yank her arm free, but she discovered she couldn’t. It was the reckless biker who had her in his grip.

  Though her mind was racing in an absolute frenzy, she concentrated on hardening her expression into a stone cold stare. However, he didn’t back down. His black eyes returned the glare, as the corners of his mouth twisted into a wicked grin.

  “You’ve been following me,” he said, which caused her heart to nearly jump out of its chest. Still, she held strong and didn’t waver.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  Flora pressed her lips together refusing to respond. Tightening his grasp, he dragged her by the wrist through the crowd and towards the very back of the bar. There, an immense man in biker gear stood, with crossed arms, directly in front of a closed door. The bouncer stepped aside and the reckless biker pulled Flora into the room.

  She wanted to run, kick, and scream. She thought, Who knows what will be waiting for me on the other side, or who? Yet, she remained calm, determined to get through this.

  Unlike the chaos of the bar, the back room was quiet. A few men were seated on a couch to her left. They cleaned the dismantled pieces of firearms, while sucking on cigarettes that otherwise hung loosely from their lips. To her right a middle-aged biker chick counted cash, as a man beside her squeezed his hands into her chunky thighs.

  Flora turned her gaze straight ahead and lock
ed eyes with a man who stood dead ahead of her. His looks were arresting, but he was not much older than she was. He leaned casually against the back of a desk, without taking his piercing blue eyes off of her. The reckless biker pushed her forward and explained how he had caught her following him.

  By Flora’s calculation, the blue-eyed man didn’t necessarily seem concerned by what he was hearing. His gaze lingered on her until the reckless biker finished, after which the blue-eyed man cleared the room of all its occupants. Only Flora remained.

  For a moment, it was completely silent. He stared at her, and she returned his gaze, despite the immense fear that grew in the pit of her stomach. Her breath quickened, afraid for what could come next; yet, Flora found herself slightly intrigued by this man. She studied him, as he took a few steps forward. His swagger was undeniable. Then, instantly, she had him pegged. He was one of those guys who knew exactly what he looked like and knew his looks could attract any woman, no effort required. As a general rule, Flora had always avoided his kind. Though, with this one, she had to admit that between his height, broad shoulders, and muscular posture, he appeared to be the perfect combination of strong and relaxed. He was smoldering; yet, his features, the deep-set eyes and straight mouth, gave him a distrusting look. It was as though he had been hurt in the past, scarred by something.

  “What’s your name?” he asked.

  “What’s yours?” she responded.

  He smirked, then stepped in close to Flora and gazed down at her, causing her heart to race even faster. She looked back at him with every intention of keeping up her tough facade, but instead her body softened. It was his proximity to her, and she found herself drawn to him.

  She thought, Is this his strategy? Is he waiting for me to decide that what I really want to do is please him? The best she could do in the moment was pray that her poker face was holding up.

  He finally answered her, as he said, “Terry Brandt.”

  He stepped in even closer causing Flora’s chest to heave in anticipation of what he might ask, say, or do next. She couldn’t seem to steady her breath, and the room felt hot.

  “Tell me your name,” he said softly into her ear, which both thrilled and terrified her.

  Suddenly, she thought, Is my body yearning for his? That would be unbelievable, yet standing only inches away from him causes my stomach to flutter.

  Her thoughts were spinning out of control, yet she knew she had to respond, to say something, to keep the conversation going and try to get back on course with the plan. So, she shook the feeling off and reminded herself that a man like this, a criminal, was not going to bring her to her knees for any reason.

  Just as she began to open her mouth, without warning, Terry grabbed her and pulled her close. She gasped, but he ignored her. She flinched, assuming he was about to hurt her, but instead his hand was gentle, as it slipped under the bottom edge of her bustier and firmly slid up her stomach. Then, just under her breasts, his hand stopped. Her body quivered until, suddenly, she realized what he was doing.

  Crap, she thought, it is all over. Terry sharply pulled his hand out from under her top. In it, he held a long black wire, the end of which had a tiny microphone bulb. It was her surveillance mic, so she knew that her cover was blown. Terry put the wire, bulb first, into a bottle and watched as it submerged into beer.

  “Who’s listening at the other end?” Terry asked, as he released her from his strong arms.

  “Miami Metro,” she answered.

  “Are they in my bar?” he asked.

  She shook her head and said, “In a van outside.”

  “So, you’re a cop?”

  “Detective,” she said.

  How did he know? It is as though he smelled it on me. Flora’s heart dropped, as the magnitude of the failure sank in. It wasn’t only the tri-fold disappointment that would come with letting down her partner, the lieutenant, and the entire department that made this blunder an incredible blow. It was also the fact that she had been defeated, once again, in her effort to find her brother. The despair that these defeats brought with them ate away at her. She didn’t know how much more of it she could take.

  Abruptly, she looked down, as she fought back her tears. She didn’t need this guy to see her upset. After a moment, she placed her hands on her hips, tossed her hair back, and, once again, met Terry’s gaze with a hard stare.

  “It’s in your best interest to cooperate,” she stated firmly.

  There was that smirk again on Terry’s face, and the wider it spread the worse she felt. He was cool and confident because he knew Miami Metro had nothing on the Knights of Hell. If they did, then the clan would’ve been picked up by now and hauled off to jail, or at the least been raided with a warrant. Neither of those things had materialized; so, Terry had the luxury of kicking back, looking her up and down, and continuing to play the game.

  “Just what exactly do you think you’re going to find?” he asked.

  “A body,” she said, as she stared him down.

  Suddenly, Terry’s eyes widened, he stiffened, and the smirk faded from his face. She had caught him off guard, and she thought, Does he know something? Or is this the look of a man who is innocent? My gut tells me he knows something, but he’s scared. He turned away from her briefly, perhaps aware that his face might give him away.

  “Whose body?” he asked, facing the back wall.

  He looked concerned, as he turned back to Flora. She detected a glimmer of vulnerability behind his eyes, it looked like he was worried. If she pressed, she might be able to get something, but she had to hurry. By now, the guys in the black van had long since ruled out technical difficulties as a reason for why her mic had cut out. By now, they were thinking she was in danger, and any minute they would storm in to rescue her. She needed something from Terry. She needed something to go on, no matter how small.

  Flora also knew that she needed to connect. The vulnerability she saw in his eyes made her wonder if Terry wasn’t a little bit like her― tough, arrogant, and strong-willed on the outside, as a means to distract people from the damage inside. Do his wounds run as deep as mine? she wondered.

  “The body of Mark Daunt is what I’m looking for.”

  The confidence returned to Terry’s face, and his body relaxed; but, Flora wasn’t about to let him off her hook.

  “Do you know who that is?”

  “Doesn’t sound familiar,” he said, looking her dead in the eye. “Who is he?”

  Flora swallowed hard, praying that her voice would sound strong, but it came out faltering, as she said, “He’s my brother.”

  ***

  Flora slammed the bar door wide open and stepped out into the hot Miami night. The heat was unrelenting and the diesel smog from all the idling motorcycles wasn’t helping. When she broke free from the outdoor crowd and crossed the street, Flora finally felt like she was able to breathe.

  She had been way too emotional back there. She knew from experience that when emotions run high, the plan becomes jeopardized; but, she hadn’t been able to think straight. She knew that she should’ve never mentioned her brother. She thought, Thank God the wire cut out. If the lieutenant heard any of that, I would be ripped off this case faster than it’d take to start my Harley.

  Usually, she was a rock on stings like this. She was best known in the department for being cool under pressure and calculating in confrontations. She always got her mark, and her work always advanced the case. However, there was something about Terry that had melted her hard exterior.

  As Flora stomped all way over to the black van to face the music, she agonized over her foolishness. She didn’t have a connection with Terry Brandt, she had a crush, and it wasn’t the time or the place to be thinking with her heart. The fact that she ruined a chance to get one step closer to Mark, wherever he was, just because she was swept up in a momentary embrace, was unforgivable. Not to mention that it hadn’t been a real embrace. He had played her. He had used his smoldering good looks to disarm her a
nd get close enough to rip the wire off her chest. And the worst part, she realized standing outside of the black van, was that even though she was beating herself up over this, she couldn’t help but smile at the thought of Terry’s hands on her.

  The side door of the van slid open, and Flora hopped in. By the time the door closed behind her, she felt a sense of unease, and it wasn’t just the lieutenant’s disappointment weighing down on her. Something was wrong. The lieutenant, who sat towards the back, ripped off the headphones that hung around his neck and tossed them onto a ledge in front of him. He stared intensely at Flora. She found it impossible to meet his gaze. So, she looked down, grit her teeth, and braced herself to get seriously reamed out.

  “Detective Daunt, you did good,” he said. Flora was shocked. She looked between the faces of the other detectives in the van, but they didn’t seem happy. Alvarez, who was usually so upbeat it was irritating, now seemed somber. And Dowler, who Flora certainly felt closest to, seemed too afraid to look anywhere but at the lieutenant.

  “We ran the name Terry Brandt,” he went on. “The good news is that his prints were in the system, so we now know his history and the many names he’s gone by.”