Ghoul (Royal Bastards MC: Cleveland Ohio Chapter Book 2) Read online

  Dad needed help, but I didn’t know how or what to do. Seeing the man who had always kept me safe now so helpless was unfathomable. He was so strong, the glue that held everyone around him together. I blinked my eyes hard, trying to force myself to wake from this nightmare, but despite how many times my eyes closed and reopened, the horrific event unfolding before me didn’t change.

  Move. I instructed my feet to carry me into the darkness to protect Dad as I promised myself I would do that night in West Virginia. He needed me to be his strength now, but my body didn’t listen. The only moving it seemed to be capable of was trembling with fear. I hated being so small and powerless.

  “Who do we have here?” A deep man’s voice filled my ears and released even more panic into my body. Once again, I told my feet to move, but they refused.

  “Don’t be afraid, I’m not going to hurt you,” he reassured me, extending his hand out to where I stood. His movements were slow, and his eyes full of genuine concern. A spider tattoo taking up the majority of the skin on his inner forearm was the only thing that seemed to hold my attention. Oddly enough, it brought me some comfort, despite the fear swarming within me. Dad had so many tattoos that most wouldn’t be able to count themI wasn’t just anyone, though. I was his daughter. Dad had thirty-three.

  “You like tattoos?” the man asked in a gentle tone, inching closer to where I was. My quivering head nodded slightly in response, but no words left my dry mouth. I had never been more aware of the beating of my heart than I was at this moment. Boom. Boom. Boom rang in my ears like the biggest drum in a marching band, and each time the sound happened, my chest tightened. The man’s face was hard to make out, and my legs felt like Jell-O. Warmth touched my face and trickled its way down into my legs. It only took seconds for everything to fade to black.

  Ghoul

  Warehouse

  Cleveland, Ohio

  Darkness wasn’t something I feared. No, I embraced every second of that cold yet somewhat comforting invitation. I gave up trying to keep the light burning inside. Such a torch would come in handy in warding off one’s own demons left twinkling within the background of my head. An eternal uphill battle, both mental and physical, was fought to get to this point of acceptance in my life. It took accepting my mental illness to be able to move forward. At least, that was what one of the many so-called PhDs who dissected me throughout my years had said.

  Now, I welcomed the iniquitous whispers as they penetrated my skull and put them to good use. When death crawled closer, and I began to smell all those lost souls surrounding me, I found myself most alive. I was a flawed individual, there was absolutely no questioning that. My insides were made up of too many fragmented pieces that were damaged beyond mending to ever return to normalcy…not that I ever truly knew it anyway.

  A sadistic smile of pleasure overtook my face as I nodded in agreement with Spider, President of our chapter of the Royal Bastards Motorcycle Club. “You got it, Spider.” His instructions were clear, and the plan pristine. I was to get answers by any means necessary.

  “Is that a problem?”

  “Not at all, Boss,” I reassured him, pulling a cigar from the front pocket of my shirt hidden behind my cut and secured it between my teeth. “My pleasure,” I added, cupping my hand around the tip and lit the end of the cigar. Gray smoke billowed outward from my lips and mixed with the dark blue sky.

  Using the tip of my worn black boot, I flipped the spaded end of the shovel upward and caught the handle with my opposite hand, not bothering to lift the metal from the ground. I loved to intimidate those who trespassed against us; it helped them remember the huge mistake they’d made when they had done so. The aluminum raked against the asphalt with each step I put between Spider and me.

  From the other side of the pitch-black warehouse, a frightened voice called, “Come on, man! Hello? Surely we can work something out!”

  I stifled the sarcastic laugh and tightened the grip around my smoke with my teeth. Our club wasn’t unreasonable, we approached every situation with a good amount of level-headedness. In fact, we put things to a club vote more often than not. This particular narc’s fate had unraveled long before I parked my Harley or had even gotten out of bed today. The potential ending to his story was written in a cliff-hanger as my brothers and I sat in church deliberating two nights ago. The time for bargaining had passed.

  As the noise dragging behind in my shadow evened out with the smooth concrete, one solitary thought flooded my brain in response as I strode over the threshold, There was a very large possibility I was about to take this man’s life. I was voluntarily enlisting myself to drown amongst the forgotten and damned souls once again when my head was barely bobbing above the water as it was. This was something to label most as the unforgiven. However, it wasn’t trepidation forcing my veins to expand and collapse as fast as the rapids beneath Niagara. It was pure unbridled exhilaration.

  “I see the fire moving closer. What is that noise? Please, just turn on the lights, and we can talk about this man to man,” he frantically pled. His credulous mind, no doubt, spitting out ideas and working overtime as his fight or flight kicked into high gear, trying to bargain with me.

  “Ha. That’s not possible.” I half-heartedly laughed.

  “Wh-Why’s that?” he stuttered over his short statement, letting his curiosity get the better of him.

  “The way I see it is only one of us is a man.”

  “I know I shouldn’t have screwed you all over. Please, have mercy.”

  “No.” I shook my head, lifting the shovel from the ground, and inhaled so the embers would provide just enough light for me to aim. “You see, you’ve got it wrong. We are both weakened flesh on the exterior, but inside, we’re different.”

  “How?”

  I rolled my eyes in response and decided to humor the question. “Legend has it a ghoul can be created many ways. Supernatural phenomena would be one, like a disturbed spirit that possesses a person. But you want to know my favorite?” I paused, but not waiting for him to answer. “Another theory is that blood from a monster is injected into a person so often that they’re driven to insanity, and all that remains is the desire to kill.”

  He breathed out heavily, and at that moment, I swung the shovel as hard as I could against his shin. His guttural shriek filled the blackness we found ourselves in, and the sound thundered up through my body and into the heavens as I licked my lips with gratification.

  “You’re messed up. You. Are. Sick.”

  My head fell back as an unintentional chuckle passed my mouth, “You have no idea. Trust me. This is only the beginning.”

  “If you think they won’t find you, you’re an idiot.”

  “The devil himself couldn’t drag me away from here right now,” I assured him in a confident voice, aligning the metal with another inhale of smoke.

  “Please,” he begged, and I shook my head, knowing he couldn’t see me deny his plea, forcefully swinging in his body’s direction.

  Loud heavy metal music blasted into the emptiness; it was Spider’s way to drown out the man’s cries. My heart thrashed with anticipation, knowing what came next in the freak show was the execution.

  As the first light pulsated, my brain ticked along with the beat, and I nodded my head in rhythm. His irises glistened with horror in the intermittent flashes, and I dropped the shovel to the ground with a clatter. I wasn’t done, not by a long shot. This was what had landed me with my road name. Enjoyment washed over me. Other people cringed when they were put in the position I was tonight, torturing another human being. On the other hand, I would dive off the edge of a skyscraper with arms open wide to see what was on the other side, waiting. For it was only then that I embraced what I was truly birthed unto this world to be. Ghoul.

  Hazel

  Grams’ House

  Cleveland, Ohio

  2000

  “Dad!” I screamed, and my body shook with force as my desperation floated into the sky. He couldn’t disapp
ear from this world; I wasn’t ready to let him go. It didn’t matter how big these men were, I would stop them. There wasn’t another choice to be made. I wasn’t ready to live the rest of my life without him. I told my stubborn feet to run as fast as possible and jumped in front of him as the man swung the shovel. Nothing was as important to me in this world like he was, and I would do anything to save him. Horrific pain shot through the side of my body, and my eyelids jetted open.

  “Fuck,” I mumbled, rolling off my side and onto my back. Another nightmare of how I failed to save him.

  “Same dream?” Grams asked in a careful tone, stepping into my room and bent down to offer me her hand.

  “Basically.” I shook my head and scooped myself and my dignity off the floor, leaning my head against Grams’ leg as she sat on the edge of my bed.

  “Nothing you could have done would have saved him, baby.” She ran her fingers lightly over the top of my head and through the strands of my hair. It was pointless to argue with her, knowing I’d never win, so I didn’t say anything in protest.

  She was partly right in one aspect, though. I did nothing, and he died. Everyone aware of what happened to Dad always told me it wasn’t my fault or that I was too young to do anything more than I had done. It was the same story everywhere I turned, except with different words. Some people told me how brave I was while it happened, or how lucky I was that I wasn’t hurt. I didn’t feel lucky or brave, the only thing I felt was hatred and responsibility. I was determined to make the man pay for what he did to Dad.

  They were all rewarding my failure with kind words as if there was the smallest portion of what had happened that I could be proud of. It was what people did, constantly worshipping the survivors of bad situations, but what they never mentioned was it was okay to be angry. Everyone other than Grams. When she told me exactly that, I had already seen three different therapists and been suspended from school multiple times. “It’s okay to be angry, but just remember to be angry at the right people. Not everyone was responsible for what happened, including you,” she had told me, and it was then I realized the truth in what she was saying. I didn’t need to hate the entire world for the loss of my dad, only the people involved.

  The thought of seeking revenge crossed through my mind almost daily. Sometimes, it was intentional, and when I was feeling particularly low, it served as a pick me up. Other times, I sat and dreamed up new ways to torture a man out of boredom. I had lost count of how many times the men had died by my hands in my fantasies. There were more than enough cliché sayings about revenge, but what you never heard was how methodical and all-consuming it was to merely put a plan into place. It had been nine years since my dad had been murdered, and I couldn’t do much when it happened, but I wasn’t the same little girl. I wasn’t the person I was when Gary Starcher, better known as Spider, approached me all those years ago. He didn’t hurt me, but he did take something away from me that I would never be able to get back—my dad.

  Of course, he didn’t do it alone. Actually, he wasn’t the one who murdered Dad, but that didn’t mean he was innocent, either. The man who killed my dad was thrown in jail as soon as the police found him. I didn’t learn his name until the day I had to appear in court and testify against him—Allen Blakely, also known as Ghoul to the majority of the world. They were both members of a local outlaw motorcycle gang, The Royal Bastards. Before my family’s life was so tightly bound with theirs, I had no idea that motorcycle gangs existed. Dad had ridden a Harley for as long as I could remember, and all the people I had met who rode with him were always nice to me. I had a lot of uncles growing up, but at the time, I didn’t know they weren’t actually blood relatives. In fact, one of my earliest memories was of Dad holding me on his lap as he revved his bike. The smell of exhaust on clothes was a comforting scent because it reminded me of him. At least, it used to be, now, it only made me miss him more.

  It was insane to think the man responsible for taking everything away from me was a mere twenty minutes down the road from us, rotting in prison. He was so close, and yet, I couldn’t do anything to him. I wished he was dead, and if he ever got out, I would make sure that was the only thing his future held. Death. I would take away any flirtation of happiness that found its way into his wretched life. It was only fair—an eye for an eye type of condition. Death didn’t always have to be personal; it could be accidental or a freak accident. Except with Allen Blakely, it would be very personal if I was ever given the opportunity. Every aspect of me ripping his life from him would be intimate and elegant, just as hatred and love were. Each took consideration for a person to feel them, but there was no doubt in my mind which one I felt for him. Spider was guilty by association, but somehow, I didn’t hate him as much. He could have done anything to me: gutted me, raped me, or hell all of the above. Instead, he chose to return my unconscious body and bike to our house. I never planned to thank him, but his life wasn’t as expendable to me as Allen’s was.

  “I know,” I quietly answered with the reply that was expected of me and took her hand in mine, pressing the back of it to my lips. “Mind if I skip breakfast this morning?” I looked up at her as her eyebrows quickly pinned together. “I don’t think my stomach can handle anything after that dream.” The tension in the creases of her forehead released almost as fast as it arrived.

  “Fine,” she breathed out heavily, a small frown appearing on her face. “Grab a banana on your way out?”

  “I will.” I smiled, happy some things had remained the same, even after all of the chaos. Grams always tried to feed me, but her rules weren’t the only things that softened after dad was gone. She felt sorry for me, not that she ever told me this much. She had, however, told my mom over the phone on many occasions when she thought I wasn’t listening. For three years after Dad passed, she begged Mom to straighten her life up and be the mother I needed. After that, Grams didn’t give her any more chances, Grams got temporary custody granted to her and then filed for legal guardianship. Knowing how much she had done for me, most of the time, I tried not to give her too much grief. When Dad and I moved in with her, I was ten years old. Neither of us expected me to still live here on my nineteenth birthday, yet, here we were.

  “Happy birthday, Hazel Jane.” She handed me a twenty and squeezed my fingers within her palm. “Don’t get into too much trouble.” She articulated each word in a singsong manner, but anyone who knew Grams would know she meant every word that left her mouth.

  “Okay,” I simply replied with a small grin before heading downstairs. She never asked where I went every day, and I never told her. Honestly, I think she didn’t want to hear whatever lie I would give in answer.

  Ghoul

  The Clubhouse

  Cleveland, Ohio

  2001

  The stench of death wasn’t one that was easily forgotten. The human brain was a wondrous thing for some, and for others, a curse. The smell of a dead body was one that stuck with a person. It circled the nostrils and settled into the deepest part of the skull where the sinuses laid—unless you rubbed vapor rub beneath your nose. Even if you didn’t do that, it wasn’t the worst part of taking a life. The worst part was the violent malice of recollection. I was never prepared for the memories to flood me when they did. They were unexpected and always unwanted. The act of taking someone’s life never made me flinch, but bearing the weight of another’s psyche for the rest of eternity, was crippling. A soul wasn’t something that could be snuffed out as easily as flesh could. A person’s spirit lived long after their body was desecrated and hidden.

  The flashbacks were arbitrary; I could never predict when they would come or go. Somedays, they would burn brighter than any star claiming to be a planet. It would burn my retinas from the inside out, eating away at my sanity, leaving me to find any way possible to stop the burn. Other times, it could be described more as a mere feeling of uneasiness that would leave me with a blink of my eyes, returning to their crevice of origin.

  “Looks like your
enforcer is a little green around the gills, Spider.” Papa, the founder of the Tonopah, NV chapter coughed, taking a drag from the joint and passing it to the next brother.

  “You sure that’s the same kid who took out Stunner?” Hawk from our Ankeny, IA chapter spoke for the first time since he’d sat down with us, sitting up and taking two drags.

  I glanced at him from my peripheral vision and gave my head a slight shake. Hawk wasn’t that much older than I was, and he was calling me a kid. Fucker may as well have just turned and pissed on my boot.

  I heard the words they spoke clearly but didn’t bother to respond. Despite how hard I tried, I couldn’t convince myself I was where I was. Logically, I knew I was about six shots and countless beers into the state party our chapter was hosting, where I was the guest of honor. A new cold brew was in my hand anytime the last neared emptiness, and the open lot overran with a sea of pussy. I could have any girl here that I wanted or any number of them at the same time.

  Lucidities and sex didn’t hold much weight with me anymore, though. To me, I was in that dark warehouse with the man who I later learned was named Jacob “Stunner” St. Clair. I wasn’t sure what it was that set him apart from the rest. Nothing about him or the situation was much different from any other Spider and I had been in, at least that was what I thought at the time. We were convinced he was our rat. He was the newest hang-around to wander into our club, so it made perfect sense that he deserved every bit of torture he’d received. Thing was, perfection and sensibility rarely merged together, despite the old assumption. The verdict of his innocence still had yet to be proven, and ten years had added up between his death and now. He wasn’t the first person I’d killed or had assisted in taking their life. My sentence was supposed to be a lot longer than Spider’s, but he knew the right people. Our early release wasn’t something that he ever fully divulged all the details to me, but truthfully, I didn’t care. My body was overwhelmed with gratitude to be out in the fresh air, even if my mind was still locked up.