Chapter 9

Ven

R age, Amy, and I are set up on a ridgeline a few miles from her grandfather’s farm. I’ve got three drones in the air and I’m teaching Amy how to use hers. She’s a fast learner and catches on almost immediately. I’m keeping my mom’s advice about letting Amy help in the forefront of my mind. But whereas my mom likes to get into the thick of the action, I don’t want Amy to have to deal with those assholes anytime soon, so this way she can help, but at a safe distance.

I reach over and pull up the lever that controls the altitude. “Keep it high in the air until you see movement on the ground. You don’t want it to get tangled in trees or powerlines.”

She playfully smacks my hand away. “Don’t worry. I’ve got this. It’s just like playing video games.”

I gasp at that comparison, but Rage just laughs. “She ain’t wrong about that, brother.”

I give Rage an irritated glance before responding, “My mom sent you fresh croissants. I was going to give them to you, but I might leave them in the storage compartment on my bike.”

Rage calls his drone back and sets the controller down beside it. “Give me your keys or I’m breaking into that storage compartment, now.”

I smother back a smile and toss him my keys.

He immediately asks, “Did your beautiful maman ask about me?”

I reach out to snatch the keys back from him, but he dodges away, laughing. I know the fucker is only teasing but he still gets under my skin. “I hope you choke on them,” I mumble under my breath.

“Don’t be like that, Serp. You know Rage is only joking around with you.”

My head snaps up because she used my mom’s nickname. “No one but my mom calls me that.”

She shoots me a mischievous grin. “Your mom and me. I’m your old lady, remember?”

I kind of like her calling me Serp. It feels right. “That’s fine, but just when it’s you and me. Not in front of anyone else, especially Rage. He’s way too far up in my fucking business anyway.”

“What’s with the snake theme in your family?”

“Maybe it started with her name, the Melusine of French folklore was half woman half snake, she always loved serpents, especially her petit Serp,” Rage says with a mouthful of croissant.

“Like you know anything about my maman,” I throw back.

My friend shoots me a smile, “Well, Siege, Rigs, and I stopped by there for lunch one day on the way back from a biker rally. Your mother was real nice to us, so if I’m passing, I always drop by to say bonjour to Meli.”

“You fucker. Stay away from my mom,” I mutter.

“Calm the fuck down, you degenerate fuck. I’m not after your mom. If anything, I wish she were my mom, since I never had one.”

I instantly regret my words, even though I was only joking, all the brothers love my mom, “Sorry man, I never knew you didn’t have a mother, that sucks. I hope she didn’t break out the photo albums.”

Rage’s face lights up. “Yeah, Meli has them on her phone. She showed us pictures of your worm farm from when you were five, your little boy pajamas with cute little worms all over them and even that bad ass boa constrictor you had when you were in high school. She told us all about how your worm obsession bloomed into a full-blown obsession with snakes as a teen. She said when you were a tween you got all embarrassed about your real name, and that’s when she started calling you Serp.” My friend pauses, and I wait for it. “Serge,” he says with a grin.

“There’s nothing wrong with the name, Serge,” I protest. Now I’m an adult I don’t mind it so much, but when I was a kid, I’d get teased all the time and wished I’d had a normal name like Kyle or Brandon. I say, “She named me after her favorite singer, Serge Gainsbourg.”

“Never heard of him,” Rage mutters as he takes another mouthful of his croissant.

“That’s ‘cause you only listen to that country shit,” I bite back.

“Stop deflecting, bro. I’m sure Amy wants to know all about your childhood,” Rage says as he gives me a wicked grin. Bastard.

I turn away from him, feeling some kind of way about my mother sharing all that with my club brothers. Though, at the end of the day, she’s just a proud mom so I can’t really blame her for wanting to share my childhood photos with my friends. Besides, Rage probably egged her on. He can be quite a prick when wants to be.

A short silence spins out between the three of us. Amy is the first one to speak. “That’s a really sweet story, adorable in fact. I was obsessed with being a safari guide when I was little. My mom put huge tropical stickers on my walls so I could pretend to be exploring the jungle. I had it in my mind that I could ride lions, panthers, and giraffes like people did camels and elephants.” I glance over at her to see she’s shaking her head. “It took me years to understand I couldn’t ride every wild creature in the jungle. I remember crying about it.”

Rage just stood there staring at us. Finally, he sighs. “You two had the best moms in the fucking world and probably don’t even realize it. My mom ran off with her drug dealer the day after she pushed me out. I spent my entire childhood fucked in the head about that. It made me a very angry person.”

Amy wrinkles her face in an expression of confusion. “You absolutely didn’t deserve that, Rage. Some women are garbage. Just make sure you pick a better woman than your father did.”

Rage just shrugs because he’s too emotional to speak.

“Since my mom likes you so much, I’ll share her with you,” I say with a grin.

“You what?” Rage looks confused.

“You know, like a surrogate brother.”

His eyes light up. “Are you serious?”

I grin at my club brother, “Yeah, she’s always trying to mother every damn guy she runs into. Why not you? We’re club brothers, so why not real brothers?”

“I know you’re joking, but that sounds great.”

His voice was so hopeful, I didn’t want to do anything to blow it for him, so I just said, “No joke, bro. But you gotta stop calling her beautiful and shit. It creeps me out.”

Suddenly, like a record scratch, Amy clears her throat. “You two are something else.”

I throw open both hands, careful to keep a hold of my controller. “What?”

She gestures at us. “So, the two of you are just going to decide between yourself to split your mother’s attention right down the middle and assume she’ll be fine with getting a bonus son.”

Rage’s expression closes down, and he balls the remaining bit of croissant into his fist. “It was just an idea,” he mumbles in a faint whisper.

“My maman always wanted a houseful of kids, but it didn’t work out. Trust me, she’ll probably be flattered.”

Rage speaks up again, “And she might get bonus grandkids one day. A good mom can never have enough love from the kids in their life.”

Again, the hopeful tone of his voice really gets to me. So, this time, I decide to do something about it. I call my drone back, which we’ve been doing every thirty minutes or so to take a break.

Pulling out my hunting knife, I motion for Rage to come closer. I make a shallow cut along my palm, barely drawing blood and jerk my chin to him. “Blood brothers, your turn.” He pauses for a moment, and I add, “You’ve seen my medical notes, you know I ain’t got nothing contagious.”

We’ve all seen movies where people took a blood brother oath, so Rage knows exactly what I’m offering him. His eyes are glistening when they lift from my bloody palm to look into my eyes. He pulls out his pocketknife and makes a similar shallow cut. We press our palms together and I say, “From this point forward, you’re my blood brother. Everything I have is half yours for the asking. I’ll spill blood to protect you and yours, always have your back, be the first to speak at your wedding and make sure you get a proper funeral when your time comes.”

Rage hoarsely repeats the oath and when we pull our palms apart, we are true blood brothers. Suddenly, Rage is calmer. “I don’t know whether you know this or not, but you’re the only family I have in this world.”

Fucking hell, I didn’t know all his family has passed or run off on him. I feel like a shitty friend for not realizing. I give him a nice hard thump on the shoulder. “Well, just so you know, no take backs. My mom has dinner every Sunday night and you’re invited.”

An uncertain smile pulls at the corners of Rage’s mouth. “Do you think your mom is going to accept me that easily?”

I shrug, feeling certain she will jump at the chance. “She always wanted to give me a brother. When I joined the Savage Legion, I told her that I had over thirty brothers. She said it wasn’t the same. I think she wanted me to have someone like you, someone who always had my back and such.”

“I hope that turns out to be true, I really like you and your mom.”

I wipe my palm on my jeans and scoop up my controller while I’m down there. “You’re family.”

Rage tosses the wad of croissant into his mouth and picks up his controller as well. “Well, let’s find these fuckers. Then we can get a coffee.”

I glance over at Amy to find that she’s sniffing. I rush over to her. “What’s up, sweetheart?” I don’t see anything wrong, but sometimes you can’t tell by looking.

She steps out and wraps her arms around me. Okay, she’s hugging me. That’s cool and all but the part I don’t is why. If I knew that, I would be able to get more hugs later. I wrap my arms around her and hold her tight. “Whatever happened, we can fix it,” I tell her.

She shakes her head. “It’s just that the two of you are just such good human beings. The way you stepped up for each other was really beautiful. I never thought guys had such deep and profound feelings.”

Suddenly, Rage was standing right beside us. “Of course we fucking do. Men have deep feelings. We just don’t cry and shit like that every damn time we get emotional.”

I whisper, “Too much. Back off, brother.”

“Oh, sorry about that,” he whispers back. “I’ll give the two of you some space, I’m gonna park up around the other side of the farm and get eyes on the woods.”

I can feel Amy trembling in my arms. At first, I think it’s from still being emotional. When she pushes her face back from my chest, I realize she’s laughing. “You two are just too perfect. Whatever woman ends up with you is going so damn lucky.”

Something about the tone of her voice rings true. No one has ever said anything like that to me before. And standing there, staring down into her eyes, I want that woman to be her so much it hurts. I don’t say that because I don’t want to scare her off or make her think I’m trying to get possessive. Unfortunately, I am getting possessive of her.

I hear Rage’s motorcycle engine fire to life and then the sound gets further away as I stand there looking down at Amy’s smiling face, her eyes are still glistening with emotion. Tucking my controller under one arm, I cup her lovely chin in my hands.

“Sorry if all the mushy stuff got to you.”

“Do you really think your mom is going to be okay with getting a surrogate son out of the blue?”

I smile at her. “Yeah, she’ll love it. I’ve seen how she is with Rage whenever we’ve dropped by the restaurant.”

“I’m glad about that.” She hesitates for a few seconds before asking, “So, what got you so interested in snakes?”

Pleased that this woman is so curious about me and my life, I half-jokingly suggest, “How about we trade kisses for secrets.”

Before we can even talk about it, she jumps onto her tiptoes and pulls me down for a kiss, and then another and then another. I’m taken aback as I didn’t expect her to do it—don’t get me wrong, her kisses are amazing, better even than I thought they would be and it’s something that I have been thinking about quite a lot since she came into my life. But something is tugging at the back of my mind. I’m lost in the kisses until it occurs to me that she’s paying in advance. I pull back, astounded that she lured me into disclosing my secrets so easily.

No wait, it was in fact my idea. She’s just using my own ideas against me. My maman is right, women are resourceful.

I press my forehead against hers for a brief second before pulling all the way back. “We should probably keep monitoring your grandfather’s farm. You can ask your questions while we work. How does that sound?”

Her pretty face lights up and I don’t think I have ever seen a more beautiful sight.

We sit on the edge of the ridgeline with our feet hanging over and activate our drones again.

“Your drone looks different from mine. Does it do anything special?”

I nod and tell her all about it, probably in more detail than necessary. “Yes, this is my newest drone, I lost my best one a while back. I switched out the motor for a more powerful one, so it doesn’t get blown around by the wind and it can accelerate and decelerate faster. It has a maximum flight distance of twenty miles, that means we can sit here, and the drone can fly way out of Las Salinas.”

“Wow!” she says, her voice full of admiration.

“Yeah, it’s a pretty cool feature. I’ve got one that can fly for sixty miles, but for today’s surveillance we don’t need that. This drone has an infrared feature to pick up heat signatures.”

“How do you manage to do things like that? Did you study mechanical engineering or something like that?”

“No, I’ve always liked tinkering with mechanical things. I might have been a fully-fledged worm and snake enthusiast as a kid, but I also liked to take things apart and put them back together again. My mother used to buy me old clocks, radios, and small appliances to tinker with, by taking them apart I could figure out how they worked.”

“I wish more than anything that we could pick up my mom’s heat signature,” she replies wistfully.

I explain the hard truth of our situation to her. “We have a better chance of picking up heat signatures at night. When it’s cooler, there’s more contrast between a human body and their surroundings. What I can’t do with the equipment I have is distinguish between men and woman.”

“That means if we pick up a heat signature somewhere suspicious, we’d have to go investigate in person, right?”

“Absolutely, fucking not. It means that me and my club brothers would go and investigate it. I won’t risk you turning up missing like your mother, or worse. Leave the daring rescues up to the men with fighting experience,” I say grudgingly.

“Okay, big guy. Don’t get bent out of shape. I’m not wild about being shot at anyway. Your mom suggested you teach me self-defense. Will that eventually be on your radar? If you’re not going to teach me, you have to be the one to tell her, ‘cause I’m not lying to your mom. She’s too nice.”

“We’re definitely doing to work on self-defense. Until I’m convinced you have some hope of protecting yourself, I’ll stay right by your side. If I have to go on a mission, you’ll need to stay at the clubhouse where the prospects can protect you.”

“Yeah, that all works for me,” she tells me. I’m not sure I believe her because her tone is light and dismissive.

She follows up with, “So can I ask my first question?”

I decide to try to outsmart her. “Well, we both gave each other kisses, so maybe we could take turns answering questions to each other. It would be a great way to get to know each other better.”

Her eyes narrow on me but when I don’t respond she sighs. “Sure. Why not?”

Gleeful that I get to ask questions too, I quickly say, “Since this was your brilliant idea, you can ask the first question.”

She asks without hesitation, “Why worms? Of all the things that could have caught your notice at an early age, why worms?”

I hesitate to tell her the truth, so I go with a sanitized version of the truth. “I was in an accident once and they had to put me in an MRI machine. I was scared, but my mom told me to pretend I was a worm, and it was my special wormhole and that nothing could hurt me while I was safe inside it. It worked, and after that I started to get interested in worms. For my first science project at school I made a huge worm farm. Though all the kids teased me about it.” I pause, I don’t want to bring the mood down and tell her the real story, about how me and my dad were in his truck, and it got run off the road by a drunk driver, that I was seriously hurt, and my dad was killed.

Once I returned back to school after four months in hospital, the other children bullied me about having no dad anymore— because little kids can be cruel—and that to make up for having no friends I ended up fascinated with my worm community.

“So when did you move from worms to snakes?” she asks without missing a beat.

Since I was comfortable talking about that, I answer, although it was supposed to be my turn to ask. “Worms are invertebrates. At first, I thought snakes were bigger worms. Then I learned they’re in the reptile family and vertebrates because they have a spinal column. Once I learned they shed their skin, I was hooked. Eventually after a lot of bugging, my mom relented and let me get a pet snake, as long as I didn’t keep their food in the restaurant refrigerator.”

Amy’s eyes widen as she suddenly realizes what snakes eat. She swiftly moves on, “What happened to your boa constrictor? Rage said you had one when you were a teen.”

Glancing away, I respond, “He died of septicemia. I didn’t know he was sick until it was too late to save him.”

“That must have been traumatizing.” The kind and compassionate tone of her voice makes me feel vulnerable. “I was seventeen. It was awful because at that point I’d had him for coming up on five years.” I don’t tell her that I didn’t have a lot of friends back then, and my snake was the one I told all my secrets and fears to, the one I shared all my small victories with.

“That’s when you transferred all your time and energy to electronics. It’s hard to bond with a toaster or a clock, right? It was safer to pour all your time and energy into things instead of living creatures.”

Damn, this woman is all too perceptive. I’m saved from having to answer her question by my drone picking up motion below. “I’ve calibrated my drone to focus in on vehicle-sized movement.”

She leans over to look at my screen. “Where are you? I’ll bring my drone there as well.”

“Yes. Two sets of eyes are better than one,” I tell her. “I’m on the northern part of your grandfather’s farm about two miles from here.”

“Got it. Give me a minute to get there.” Within a few minutes, she alerts me that she’s near. “I see your drone.”

“Stay high. If they see us, they will shoot our drones out of the sky.”

“Really?”

I frown as I keep tracking the van down below. “Yeah, ask me how I know.”

“I see. That’s how you lost your old drone, right?”

I nod. I haven’t told her that I saw her grandfather’s dogs chasing her that day in the cornfield, I was worried it would make me sound like a creeper—and now that so much time has gone by, I’m worried how she’ll react. So instead I change the topic, “They’re branching off on a dirt road on the left. I’m going to note the GPS location so we can find it again later. Don’t let them out of your sight.”

“I’m on it,” she says with determination.

I get a lock on the GPS coordinates and then zoom out to follow her drone. We follow the van for what seems like hours, since her grandfather owns several thousand acres, that’s not surprising. We chat as we keep track of the van, excited that we might be getting somewhere with finding her mother. If not that, then maybe I can figure out where all these vans are going.