I smoothed the silky fabric over my thighs as I pulled into Hephaestus Auto and Mechanics and turned off the engine. The garage was surprisingly large and thrumming with activity even at 7:30 in the morning. I spotted over a dozen men milling about the lot, working on cars or chatting over parts. The garage had a reputation all across Canada for being the best at automobile upgrades and motorcycle additions but I could never have imagined what a colossal venture it would be.
Suddenly, I was intensely aware of my run-down, fourth-hand Honda Civic. I pulled into an empty spot between some kind of Ferrari and a sleek black sports car with an insignia I’d never even seen before. I sat in my car, stroking the wheel absently to soothe us both as I took stock of the operation.
Hephaestus Auto sprawled across an enormous industrial lot that bordered the ‘good’ side of downtown Entrance from the seedier neighborhoods. The parking area was large and bracketed an undesignated pathway that led up to a small brick building that must have housed the office areas and reception. To the left were the garage bays, five huge caverns all currently open and filled with at least one or two cars. To the right was a little park area, incongruent with the asphalt jungle, verdant with a small garden and huge earthenware pots and troughs that held long grass and, in the spring, would probably bloom with beautiful flowers. Beyond that lay another long, low brick building with a huge black door studded with metal and very few windows. There was a super cool graffiti sign to one side of the door that showed a terrifying skull bracketed by huge charred and tattered wings with ‘The Fallen’ written in black letters across the top. I figured that it was some kind of clubhouse or meeting hall where they conducted all their criminal business.
My lips thinned as I thought about King’s part in all of that.
I’d done my research last night after an hour of lying in bed wired and unable to sleep. The Fallen MC was the premier source of BC marijuana in the province and all of North America. They ran into problems with gang warfare only in the southern states of America and California where they crossed territory with the Mexican drug cartels but otherwise, they’d cornered the market. They didn’t deal in other drugs, which I found kind of strange, and the rest of their ‘supposed’ criminal enterprises consisted of munitions dealing and money laundering.
I had been born and raised by older, conservative parents who didn’t believe in divorce. Then, I’d been married to a deeply reserved, repressed lawyer who felt about nothing so passionately as he did his own social standing.
I’d wanted to shed my old skin, those old connections, but did I really want to do a 180? If I took up with a biker, there was no chance William or my parents would take me back. I tried to tell myself that I didn’t care about that but I did. Even though they didn’t make me happy, they had been my entire life and I wasn’t ready to irrevocably emancipate myself from them yet.
I sighed deeply, steeling myself against King’s inevitable temptation. Just because he was the hottest thing I had ever seen—living or dead and that included Elvis Presley who was the original hottie—didn’t mean I would lose control around him and say, fall to my knees and beg him to bed me like I’d fantasized about in the longs hours without sleep the night before. No, I was a strong, independent woman.
Still, I flipped down the mirror to check and then reapply my deep berry lip stain before I got out of the car.
Before I could approach the reception area, an enormous man covered in tattoos from chin to finger tips, approached me with a crooked smile.
“Lost, lady?”
I swallowed back my unease because the guy was both scary and ridiculously attractive. His tattoos were all done in blacks as deep as his unkempt hair and long-lashed eyes, and they contrasted deeply with his porcelain skin tone.
“I’m looking for King. He told me to bring my car in for servicing.”
The stranger’s inky black eyes trailed the length of my car. His lips twitched but at least he didn’t laugh. “You sure he didn’t mean to send you to the dump?”
Shame rippled down my spine. “I’m sure. Betty Sue is all I can afford and she just needs… a face lift.”
“Thinking if you can’t afford a new car, you sure as hell can’t afford the facelift this piece of crap needs to stay running,” he told me.
I blew a huff through my lips and planted my hands on my hips. “Listen, that’s exactly what I told King but he wouldn’t listen to me. I’ll just get in my car and go then. I’m sorry we both wasted our time.”