HARD KNOX by Jaxson Kidman

the money and that was it?”
    “He left,” I said, trying to save
face. The money Danny had given to me was under my bed in a shoebox. “He got on
his motorcycle and left.”
    “What if someone saw more than
that?” Porter asked.
    My teeth started to chatter with my
lips shut. I was terrified. I knew the rage Porter had but I never knew the
rage he had after killing someone. It was spilling over, as though he wasn’t
done yet.
    “You don’t understand,” I said. “What
we went through.”
    “That’s what you want?” Porter
asked. “Some dirty mechanic biker?”
    “I never said that,” I said. “I was
helping him. He always helped me. When I was younger…”
    I saw Porter move his left hand.
    I had no idea if he was going to
hit me or kill me.
    So I snapped. My flight or fight kicked into overdrive and I swung my foot up, kicking Porter in the mouth.
His head snapped back and it gave me an opening to escape.
    I rolled to the right and jumped
off the bed.
    The door looked a mile away.
    It wasn’t like the movies though. I
didn’t make some last second escape and get away. That’s not how real life
always worked.
    Instead, Porter had a handful of my
shirt and pulled. I flew backwards from the door - now it looked two miles
away - and he had an arm around me. I thrashed and kicked before he let me
go and tossed me forward into the wall. I turned at the last second, my
shoulder taking the brunt of the hit.
    I turned, not knowing what to
expect next.
    “I should have known you were a
whore,” Porter said. He then closed in on me again. “But you don’t get away
with it that easily, Ana. You’re going to be my whore until I’m done with you.”
    This time, when Porter moved his
left hand, I didn’t try to fight back.
    I shut my eyes and braced myself
for whatever I had coming …
     

 
    chapter ten
     
    (knox)
     
    *NOW*
     
    I threw down an ace and then tossed
my cigarette to the garage floor and stepped on it. I put my hand to the middle
of the table and grinned.
    “You fucker,” Slam said to me.
    “Can’t help it,” I said. “I never
fucking lose.”
    “Fuck this,” Matteo said. He threw
his cards into the middle of the table. “I’m out of cash for the night.”
    “Saving his last twenty for the
titty bar,” Noah said and laughed.
    “Eat shit, Noah,” Matteo said. “Night’s
too young to blow my cash and not my load.”
    “Damn,” I said. “Those are true
words, brother. You should get that painted on a wooden sign and hang it above
your couch in the living room. You know? That would look good.”
    Now we all started laughing.
    Shit, this was what it had become.
Me and six guys, sitting, playing cards. There was a seventh chair at the
table, but it was left empty. I glanced to the chair, nodding with a deep sense
of respect. Our other boy, King, ended up on death row.
    Not to mention my old man was
serving a life sentence too. He wasn’t on death row but he had no shot at
parole.
    That’s what happens to a MC when
the ground gets shaken and breaks open. We had been set up a while ago and shit
just hit the fan. While things broke apart, the core of us stuck together. We
kept the garage open the best we could. Our repair work wasn’t the bulk of the
business.
    Protection was.
    We had contacts from Reno to
Tijuana, shit, all the way up into Washington state and into Canada. If someone
needed product moved and product protected to move, we were the guys to do it.
The Reap would live on. We had most of the PD in our back pocket and we still
enjoyed the outlaw rambling life.
    Still, it wasn’t the same without
my old man at the head of the table, right there in church, smacking the gavel,
bellowing orders at us.
    “Hey,” Ari said, “we got four cars
in today. Getting a little busy again.”
    “That’s good,” I said. “Just keep
the straight business straight and the rest underground. We’re doing fine,
guys.” I took my earnings and held them up. “I’m doing really