Blood & Bones: Ozzy by Jeanne St. James
Chapter Five
The rumbleof the motorcycle stopping in front of her seeped into her chest. It was that loud, that deep, and it got her blood flowing once again.
While she had changed into more appropriate clothing—a pair of jeans, a cotton V-neck top, and some well-broken-in, low-heeled ankle boots she had thrown into her suitcase at the last minute so she could hike the Pennsylvania Grand Canyon on Sunday—she realized it had been almost twenty-four years since she’d last ridden with her father.
She missed it and missed him…
She had also pulled her hair up into a simple, tight twist, hoping that would be good enough to prevent too many tangles.
Ozzy shot her a breath-stealing, sexy grin after slowly checking out her attire. She guessed he approved. If he didn’t, she was sure he’d make his opinion known since he didn’t seem to hold back on voicing it.
He tipped his head, which was now covered in what her father used to call a skullcap since he never wore a helmet, either. And, unlike now, back then she couldn’t remember if it was legal to go without one.
He also wore some sort of clear glasses to protect his eyes and dug into that vest to pull out a smaller pair. He held them out for her.
She donned them, grateful for the protection, used his shoulder for balance and straddled the seat behind him, which was raised a bit higher than his. But he was right, if she didn’t hang on tightly, nothing was stopping her from falling backwards and getting road rash, if not badly injured or even killed.
“Closer. Wrap your arms around me and don’t fuckin’ let go.”
She shimmied herself forward until she was close enough to be glued to the patches on his back that she wanted to check out in the light.
She grabbed onto his narrow hips, but he quickly grabbed both of her hands and planted them on his gut instead so she was embracing him tightly. “Don’t wanna lose you,” he grumbled, then hit the throttle, shot out of the parking lot and onto Main Street.
As they rode through town, she closed her eyes and remembered herself when she was a child, holding onto her father just as tightly as he took them through a maze of back country roads.
Halfway through their rides, he would stop in some random town and grab her an ice cream cone or a hamburger with French fries before they headed home. Those rides were the only time she put her books down willingly.
All her father had to do was show her his Harley key by shaking it in the air and excitement filled her.
She really missed him. She also missed her mother.
She blinked back the sting in her eyes and simply breathed in the mid-August night air as the motorcycle roared down a couple of side streets before Ozzy steered his “sled” down a dark, narrow alley.
He slowed it to a stop, then crab-walked it backwards into a line of similar motorcycles.
When the bike finally went quiet, she said, “Wow, you really do have VIP parking.”
“Got connections,” was all he said as she unwrapped her arms from around his waist and he helped her dismount.
She glanced around and had no idea where they were or what kind of “joint” they were entering since there were no signs out back. Well, except for one on the door that said, “Employees Only.”
As she wandered closer to the building, he quickly dismounted and called out, “Hang on.”
After grabbing her wrist and tugging her back to him, he dug his fingers into her hair, pulled the elastic hair band and dug out any pins, this time not throwing them over his shoulder but offering them to her in his open palm. “Gonna need these later.”
She tucked the items into her front jeans pocket and then followed on his heels when he strode over to the steel rear door of wherever they were and opened it for her. “Where are we?”
“Bar called Crazy Pete’s.”
She frowned at the familiar name. She remembered hearing about this bar since it had been around when she was a kid. In fact, her father used to go there regularly to hang out with his buddies.
She also remembered asking him once why his buddies never came over to their house to hang out and why he always met them elsewhere.
Her father had only said, “Best that way,” and never explained further.
“I can’t believe this place is still around.”
He turned toward her, holding the door open, and waited. “Still around.”
The sound of the band playing inside could be heard with the door closed but now that it wasn’t, it seemed really loud.
Extremelyloud.
She also heard raised voices of people just trying to be heard over the music.
She stepped inside and instantly had a flash of regret for coming here. This wasn’t her type of scene. But then again, she had to remind herself that Ozzy wasn’t the type of guy she hung out with, either.
Right now she was far out of her comfort zone. Even more than earlier at the class reunion. The only difference was, as opposed to the high school gym, no one would know her here.
He grabbed her hand in his and tugged her along the packed, dimly-lit, short hallway, and with every step they took, the noise became louder and the bass of the music began to thump more intensely in her chest.
Rock.
That was the type of music the band was playing.
She was surprised she actually recognized the song. They were playing Who Do You Love by George Thorogood. It also sounded like the whole bar was singing along.
He didn’t stop moving once they hit the open area of the bar and she realized just how packed the place was. Where the crowd stood near a low stage, the only lights were shining on the band itself.
She took a quick glance at them but quickly realized she had to watch where they were going because Ozzy was like a draft horse pulling a wagon. Her being the wagon. She wanted to do her best not to trip over her own feet, or someone else’s, and not face-plant in front of what might be a hundred people.
He didn’t stop until he got to the crowded bar and instead of wedging himself between two patrons to get the attention of a bartender, he pulled her around to the end, flipped open the hinged section of the bar that kept customers out from behind it, and yanked her with him into the area where those customers were forbidden.
“Stay here,” he said close to her ear so she could hear him. His warm breath made her loose hair tickle her ear. Between that and his closeness, it caused a shiver to shoot through her.
He released her hand, shot her a look that clearly said not to disobey his order to stay where she was and he moved down the back of the bar to talk to one of the bartenders who was busy hustling his ass off serving customers.
He wasn’t the only one. She blinked to make sure she was seeing correctly, but all three men behind the bar were wearing the same vests as Ozzy’s.
Or at least, sort of. Two of them didn’t have the same patches on the back. They didn’t have top patches and their bottom patches said PROSPECT instead of PENNSYLVANIA. But the large center insignia was the same.
Was Crazy Pete’s some sort of biker bar? Had it always been one?
“Hey there,” came from her right and a little too close for comfort. She turned to see a guy standing not even a foot away, near the end of the bar. The only thing separating them was the hinged portion Ozzy had dropped back in place once they were both behind the bar.
“Hello,” she politely answered back, then shot a quick glance to where Ozzy was having one of the bartenders, a really handsome man with dark hair and an equally dark beard, pour two drinks. Shay noticed the patches on the back of the bartender’s vest didn’t say PROSPECT like the other two. His were exactly like Ozzy’s.
She quickly glanced around to see how many people in the crowd wore similar vests.
None that she could see. Just the men working.
Weird. So, was it a biker bar, or was it just a bar where bikers worked?
“What’s your name?” the tall guy shouted over the music, leaning even closer.
“I’m here with someone,” she answered. Usually saying that got some men to back off.
His eyebrows pinned together and he frowned. “Just asking your name. And just because you came with someone doesn’t mean you’ll be leaving with him.”
Clearly her go-to technique didn’t work with this guy.
“You’re really hot.”
Suddenly she was experiencing déjà vu. It was taking her back to dancing with her drunk classmate earlier. “Thank you?”
She turned away and before she could take a step to put more space between them, he grabbed her arm and yanked her back. Not so gently, either.
What the hell?She jerked her arm but his grip tightened. “Let me go.”
“You one of those biker bitches?”
“I—”
Two drinks appeared on the bar next to her and she felt a furnace at her back. “Yeah, she’s one of those biker bitches and you know what happens when some ass-wipe touches a biker’s property?”
Ozzy’s growled response had her holding her breath. She didn’t want to be caught in the middle of some unnecessary fight.
“No, what happens?” the guy had the nerve to ask.
The fingers gripping Shay’s arm were ripped from her and the man screamed as Ozzy twisted those same fingers in a direction that they normally shouldn’t go.
Suddenly, the bartender who made their drinks was flanking her other side. “Problem here?”
“This fucker’s touchin’ somethin’ that don’t belong to him,” Ozzy informed him calmly while now cranking the man’s whole hand in an awkward position.
“You’re going to break my hand!” he shouted with a grimace.
Shay read the name “Dodge” on the front of the bartender’s vest when he turned toward her to ask, “He ask if he could touch you?”
Shay shook her head. “No, I told him to release me.”
Dodge turned back to the man. “Sounds like you touched somethin’ that don’t belong to you, then.”
He glanced toward the front of the bar, raised his tattooed arm above the crowd and waved someone over. In less than thirty seconds, a tall man, also wearing a vest, appeared out of nowhere. He had a noticeable scar along his jawline that separated the wiry hairs of his beard. He also had a faded tattoo of what might be a teardrop near his one eye. Wasn’t that the sign of someone who had committed murder?
Whether it was or wasn’t, he was one scary looking dude.
“Scar here’s gonna escort you outside,” Dodge told the drunk.
Scar? Shay guessed that fit the man. But it was kind of like her classmates calling her Shy instead of Shay. While the name fit her at the time, it was only used to be mean.
“I’m not ready to leave yet. My friends—”
As soon as Scar grabbed the man by the front of the throat—with a grip that didn’t appear close to being gentle—Ozzy released the man’s hand and said, “Have a great fuckin’ night, asshole, and don’t come back. Get this motherfucker out of here,” he ordered Scar.
The man stumbled as Scar steered him by the neck back in the direction he appeared from.
“Is he the bouncer?” Shay asked no one in particular when she finally found her words again.
“Somethin’ like that, darlin’,” Dodge answered her, took his time checking her out, then jerked his chin up at Ozzy like he approved and headed back down the bar to return to his job.
Once Ozzy’s sharp gray gaze swung from Dodge back to her, he asked, “You good?”
“I’m… fine. You didn’t have to do that. He was probably just drunk.”
“Don’t matter.”
Shay should remind him that he had touched her earlier in the day without asking when he unpinned her hair and also unbuttoned her blouse.
But she doubted he’d consider that the same.
How ironic that at that very moment, the band began playing No More Mr. Nice Guy by Alice Cooper. It couldn’t be more fitting for the man standing by her side. Or the scarred man who escorted the drunk out the front entrance.
She bit back her snort. “Well, thank you for saving me from having to make small-talk. I did enough of that earlier. I decided earlier tonight that if the conversation isn’t going to be genuine, I’m going to pass on it.”
He turned his gray eyes from the front door, where the two men disappeared, to stare at her. For a second, she thought he could see right through her, right into her very center.
“Never gotta make small-talk with me. You got nothin’ to say, then say nothin’.”
Well, then… She kind of liked that policy of his.
“You shoot pool?”
“No.”
“Wanna learn?”
She shrugged. “Sure. Are you good enough to teach me?”
His lips twitched. “Sweetheart, I can teach you a lotta things.” He tipped his head to the two drinks sitting on the bar. “Grab your drink and stick close.”
He opened the hinged section of the bar and she ducked under his arm but waited for him to secure it back in place. Once he did, he grabbed his glass in one hand, planted his other hand on the small of her back and steered her through the thick crowd, using his body to clear a path.
The crowd got thinner the further they got from the stage and he directed her into a better lit area behind a half-wall. In that semi-enclosed area were two occupied pool tables. Also, the music wasn’t so deafening.
As soon as one of the players spotted his vest, the man straightened and said, “Hey, brother, you want this table?” He held out his hand like he was waiting for Ozzy to clasp it and do the shoulder bump like he’d done with Dodge behind the bar.
“Yeah, but ain’t your brother. Finish your game, then I want the table.”
The guy didn’t seem to take offense at Ozzy ignoring his outstretched hand. “Do you want to play doubles?”
“Nope. Finish your game,” he repeated, “then I’m takin’ the table.”
The other man nodded and didn’t argue. Him and his friends went back to playing as Ozzy moved them over to one of the high-topped round tables that the current occupants quickly emptied as they approached and he set down his drink.
She glanced at her own, then lifted it to her nose and sniffed. A Jack and Coke? She tentatively took a sip and was glad when she didn’t just swallow a mouthful because it was strong. As light as the color was and with what it tasted like, it was probably fifty-fifty.
Wine was her drink of preference. If she drank anything harder, she usually liked it to be a ratio of more soda to alcohol.
It finally hit her that she did something really damn stupid. She accepted a drink from a man and she hadn’t watched it being made.
Damn it.
Why did she trust Ozzy? She only met him this morning. And, worse, he clearly was a biker and bikers were known not to be so trustworthy, right? She remembered seeing them a lot around town while growing up. They all seemed rough and obnoxious, even bordering on violent.
On the other hand, why would he bring her all the way here to a public bar only to spike her drink? If he had nefarious intentions it would’ve been easier to do something to her back at the motel. Where there were a lot less witnesses.
His whispered, “It’s safe,” near her ear had her start. She looked up and his gray eyes held something in them that she hadn’t seen yet. A little disappointment possibly.
For her not trusting him?
Maybe.
She lifted the glass to her lips and took another tiny sip. “It’s just really strong.”
“Want me to get you another one?”
She shook her head. “I’ll just drink it slowly.” She glanced at his. “If yours is just as strong, I’m worried about you driving later.” And also me falling off the back of your bike if I get loopy.
“That’s later. This is now.”
Well, that was true. The man certainly didn’t mince words. But she’d still keep an eye on how much he drank. If he tossed them down like water, she’d call an Uber to be safe.
“Hey, let me see your stick,” Ozzy called out to one of the guys leaning on a cue stick as he waited for his turn to shoot.
Without hesitation, he handed it to Ozzy who lifted it, closed one eye and looked down the cue stick the same way he’d look down the barrel of a gun as he slowly turned the stick.
She knew nothing about the game of pool. “What are you checking for?”
“To make sure it’s straight. Nothing more useless than a warped stick.” He handed it back to the guy. “Give that to my girl here when you’re done.” He turned back to Shay. “Well, a pig.”
Huh? She was still stuck on the “my girl” part. “A pig what?”
“Is useless.” He grinned. “The badge wearin’ kind not the one that makes bacon. Can’t live without bacon.”
“A good BLT is comfort food,” she agreed.
His grin widened. “Kinda got worried you’d say you don’t eat meat.”
She didn’t hide her grin when she shot one back at him. “I eat meat.” Then she rolled her lips under as heat flicked at her cheeks.
He barked out a laugh. “Good to hear it ‘cause I got a—”
Whatever he was going to say, which Shay figured was crude, was cut off by one of the pool players shoving a cue stick at her. She automatically took it.
“All yours, brother,” the man said and slapped Ozzy on the back.
The grin Ozzy had been wearing was now nowhere to be found. His gray eyes turned to cold steel. “Told you already, ain’t your brother.”
The man raised both palms up in surrender, laughed nervously and backed up. “You’re right. Sorry, man.”
The four men who were previously playing at the table Ozzy had claimed, quickly gathered their things and filed out of the billiards area. A couple of them kept glancing back over their shoulders as they did so.
With four of them and only one Ozzy, why did they act scared of him?
Maybe it had to do with the fact in the bar were five bikers, at least from what she’d seen so far. Plus, Scar, now standing at the front entrance, facing the crowd with his arms crossed over his chest, looked like the type of man who could kill you without thinking twice, then brush his hands clean as he left you right where he dropped you.
He looked like the kind of guy who, when he said, “Don’t make me kill you,” you took that to heart and did everything humanly possible so he wouldn’t kill you.
“All right,” Ozzy muttered, “gonna rack my balls.”
Her attention went from the disappearing men back to him. “Your balls?”
“The balls.” He shot her a wicked grin.
She took another sip of her strong whiskey and soda and watched the man move around the table collecting the balls and putting them into a wooden triangle rack. As he did so, she studied the patches on the back of his vest.
She remembered seeing those types of vests around town before her father disappeared. Manning Grove used to be full of men who rode motorcycles and wore those very same vests.
Then one day, she never saw anyone wearing them around town again.
Until now.
She always wondered what happened to all those men. It was like a magician snapped his fingers and they all mysteriously disappeared.
Ozzy carefully lifted the wood rack and left a neat triangle of pool balls at one end of the green felt covered table.
He went over to a rack hanging on the wall, carefully chose a stick and came back over to where she was sitting. In one hand he had a small cube of blue chalk. He grabbed her stick, chalked the tip and then did his.
“I’m gonna break. As we play, gonna teach you the rules of Eight Ball to start.”
To start? Was he planning on turning her into some sort of pool shark? She came here with him on impulse tonight but she had no plans on hanging out at bars or pool halls in the near future.
“Rules are simple. Gonna explain them as we go.” He picked up his drink and she watched his throat undulate as he sucked it down like it was water.
His stomach had to be lined with cast iron.
He took his stick and went to the end of the table where he’d placed the solid white ball, leaned over and very expertly “broke” the cluster of pool balls, forcefully scattering them.
Even though one went into a side pocket, he came back to her instead of taking another shot.
“Now you.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing.”
His lips, the ones she would love to reach out and touch to see if they were as soft as they looked, curled at the ends. “Yeah, that’s why I’m gonna teach you.” The creases at the corners of his gray eyes also deepened.
She got off the high bar stool, took her pool stick and followed him.
“Pick a ball and a pocket. You hit a solid ball into the pocket, you’re playing solids. You sink a striped ball, then you wanna hit all the stripes into the pockets. Once all of your balls are pocketed, the goal is to be the first one to sink the eight ball.”
“If I sink the eight ball, then I win?”
“Yeah, sweetheart, you sink that eight ball before me you’re the fuckin’ winner and I’m gonna buy you another drink.”
She was amused at the thought of her ever winning a game she never played before and knew nothing about. He could cheat to win and she wouldn’t even be aware of it, but she played along, anyway. “Maybe I don’t want a drink to be my prize.”
“Whatya want?”
Good question. She stared at his lips again. “I’ll decide once I win,” she murmured.
His nostrils flared and his eyes became heated. “Thinkin’ tonight’s a good night to fuck up my winnin’ streak. ‘Cause thinkin’ if I lose, I’m still gonna be winnin’.”
“I didn’t say what I would want yet.”
“Don’t gotta say it. Saw it on your face.”
She quickly hid her desire to kiss him and pretended she wasn’t thinking about pressing her lips to his at all. “You’re seeing things.”
He snorted and shook his head. “Time to take your shot or it’ll be mornin’ before we ever finish this game.”
Her mind read all kinds of naughty thoughts into his words, whether they were meant to be that way or not. She turned and stared over at the pool table and the scattered balls.
“Bend over.”
This time she didn’t question his command. She leaned over and held the stick like he had. She pointed it at the white ball. “I hit the white one, then it hits another one to send it into the pocket. Sounds easy.”
“Yeah, right. Simple. The white one’s called a cue ball.”
She felt his heat against her back before she felt the press of his body. He leaned his chest into her, tipped her over a little more and placed her right hand where it should be on the handle of the cue stick. “You’re a righty, so gonna use the thumb of your left hand to steady the stick when you shoot. Everyone’s got a different technique but we’ll start off with this one first. Once you figure out what makes you more accurate, stick with that no matter what anyone else tells you.”
He showed her what to do with her left hand and pointed to where she needed to hit the chalked end on the cue ball. Then he practically wrapped himself around her back and controlled her motion, murmuring in her ear, “Gonna take it slow and steady, yeah?” He put his hand over hers and slid the stick back and forth, using the back of her thumb to steady it. “Back… Forth.”
His low murmured words in her ear caused a flare of heat to shoot through her and land in a place that had been ignored for far too long.
“Back… Forth.”
Holy smokes! Her nipples had become aching points. Her pussy had begun to throb. And she held her breath.
“Concentrate on the spot I showed you. Look at the pocket where you want to send that striped ball.”
She could listen to him whisper in her ear all damn night.
“Visualize it. Gonna sink it in that hole there.”
Yes, please!
His crotch was now pressed tightly to her ass and when she finally breathed, it was ragged.
“Steady, sweetheart.”
Good God, she was about to come in her pants. Forget pool. She wanted to play another game instead. One that didn’t involve clothes and included a lot more whispering. Maybe a little screaming, too.
“Is that your belt buckle or you?”
He pulled the stick back one more time, then shot it forward. The tip of the cue stick hit the white ball and sent it spinning down the table. It knocked into another ball which sent a few more scattering in various directions.
But none of them dropped into a pocket.
Not that Shay cared. Because what was pressing into her ass she now knew wasn’t metal. No, it was all Ozzy.
Hot, heavy and hard.
Holy freaking smokes!
She sucked in a slow breath, trying to cool the lava running through her veins, waiting for him to release her and step back.
“Nice shot for your first time.”
“It didn’t go in the hole.”
He made a sharp noise that sounded like something had gotten caught in his throat and slowly straightened. “Not yet. It will.”
She shivered at what she thought was a double entendre and gripped the cue stick even tighter in her fingers.
“Can’t be all tense when you shoot,” he said, leaving her where she stood and going back to grab his stick and her drink. He came back, stepped toe to toe with her, and tipped his face down. “Gotta relax. This will help.”
She took her drink from him and took another tiny sip, trying not to cough from the strong whiskey fumes.
She watched the man move around the table, consider his shot options and finally use his stick to point at one of the balls and then tap one of the pockets. A few seconds later that damn ball dropped into the exact pocket he’d pointed at.
Two shots in and she knew he wouldn’t need to cheat to win. But that didn’t mean she didn’t want to continue his lessons.
He continued to move around the table sinking two more solid color balls and when he finally missed, he grinned, downed the rest of his drink and set his stick aside. “Your turn.”
“Did you miss on purpose?”
“Why would I? That would be to your benefit.”
“Not sure that’s true,” she murmured as he came over, put his hands on her hips and moved her to the long side of the table.
“Gonna go for the nine ball. Got it?”
“Uh huh.”
“Set up like I showed you.”
After she stepped closer to the table, he put one of his legs in between hers and used his knee to widen her stance. Then, once again, he pressed himself to her, helped her hold the stick properly and repeated the same motion as earlier.
“Smooth and steady,” he murmured in her ear.
His voice made her want to squeeze her thighs together but his leg was in the way. And if she did that while it was still there, she just might end up humping it.
If she started humping it in this bar, she was throwing in the towel, ordering an Uber, going back to her room, packing up her SUV and heading toward the highway and was never showing her face in this town again.
“Keep the stick level. You don’t, you’re gonna foul by knockin’ a ball off the table. You do that and Stella will have my head.”
“Who’s Stella?”
“She runs the bar.”
“Oh.”
Once again, he helped her take her shot but she missed. The nine ball ended up bouncing off the corner of the pocket and heading in the opposite direction.
“Damn.”
“You’ll get it. Gotta start out at the bottom to get to the top. Those who try to start out at the top only got one way to go.”
Her lips twitched at his wisdom. “Down?”
Removing his thick thigh from between hers, he stepped back. Luckily that removed the temptation of wanting to hump it in public.
“Yep. How you get to the top and what you leave in your path also counts.”
Were they still talking about pool?
“Wise man,” she murmured.
When he didn’t respond, she turned and leaned back against the pool table, studying him as he slipped a hand into his vest, pulled out a small tin, popped open the lid and took out what looked like a homemade cigarette. He patted his jeans pockets like he was looking for a lighter, then he cursed when he couldn’t find what he was searching for.
She quickly glanced around wondering if he was just going to light a joint right there in the bar.
He went over to another high table nearby, snagged a lighter from the occupant, lit whatever it was and sauntered back to her.
She wrinkled her nose.
He turned his head away from her and blew out the smoke. “Ain’t pot.”
“No, I can smell what it is. And I was hoping you wouldn’t simply light up a… joint… here in the bar, but smoking is just a big turn-off for me.”
He took another long drag, then immediately pinched out the end and put the remainder back in the same tin where he’d pulled it out of.
“You didn’t have to do that.” Now she felt bad. She shouldn’t have said a word.
“You don’t like it, ain’t gonna do it.”
“Just because I don’t like it doesn’t mean you have to stop.”
“Ain’t gonna stop, just won’t do it around you.”
That was really sweet and thoughtful. “It’s only for tonight.”
He tilted his head and stared at her. Eventually he muttered, “Yeah, right. It’s only for tonight.”
“But thank you. I appreciate it.” She gave him a smile and made sure not to hide it from him.
“Now it was worth it,” he said, and turned to grab his empty glass. “Gonna get another.” He glanced at hers which was still two-thirds full.
“You can have mine,” she offered.
“Ain’t gonna drink it?”
“As strong as it is, it’ll take me the rest of the night.” And it was already getting late.
He slipped a cell phone from his back pocket and began to type on it. After waiting a second for a response, he then tucked it back away.
“Tater’s gonna make you another one. Mostly Coke with a splash of Jack.”
Again, thoughtful and sweet. “Thank you.”
“Ain’t nothin’.”
“Tater. That’s a weird name.”
“Short for Tater Tot.”
She bit back a laugh. “That’s not any better.”
“He don’t got a choice.”
She frowned. “Why?”
“‘Cause he’s a prospect and prospects are no better than dog shit stuck to the bottom of my boot.”
Well, then…
“So tell me… this Blood Fury. That’s a motorcycle club, right?”
