The Billionaire's Secret Love Child(28)

She had worked late enough that, as she stepped into the bar, the sky outside was rather dark, the Sun just a bright line on the horizon to the west. Heads turned as she headed to the bar, sitting on a stool there and folding one hosed leg over the other.

She had come to recognize some of the faces, older men and women who came every day, or, at least, every Friday and Saturday like Sherry.

But there was a new group now, in the corner, seven or so men and a few women. One man seemed to be holding court, sitting at the head of a long table and downing beer from a massive glass stein. He was relatively young; Sherry wouldn’t put him past thirty while a lot of the men in Earl’s had thick gray beards that put them near fifty or even sixty. This man was clean shaven, or at least for a biker, which he clearly was, stubble grew in on his chin and upper lip, dark like his hair. He wore a black vest with nothing underneath, and as Sherry sipped at a beer and watched him, he turned, and she could see a coiled snake sitting atop a skull on the back of the vest. Other men at the table wore one as well, as well as one of the women, a thick girl with red hair.

The man saw Sherry, kept glancing in her direction, and Sherry was sure he was going to come up to her. But before he ever could, the night wore on, and a fight broke out.

There had been scuffles at Earls almost every night Sherry had been there, but this one was something more. A man in a vest with a different insignia came up to speak with the young man with the stubble. Their voices grew louder, and then fists were flying. Other men came to join them, and the whole place was nothing but yelling and fighting and punching.

A switchblade came out, and one man was stabbed. He fell back on wild feet, knocking into the bar, shaking it so violently that Sherry had to reach forward and steady her beer. Earl himself was behind the bar most nights, and he was a big man with a beard which fell almost to his belly button.

“Enough!” he roared. “No stabbing in here, you idiots.”

The fight stopped for a moment, and then one man yelled for everyone to go outside, and they did. Sherry had always been drawn to excitement, so she followed the brawl outside and stood near the front door with the other women. Almost every man in the bar had chosen a side and was fighting, and Sherry saw that even the man who had been stabbed was fighting once more, a hand clamped determinedly over his bleeding gut. The bikers were all careful to keep away from the row of motorcycles; that much was plain. But they paid no such respects to the cars in the parking lot. And as Sherry watched on in horror, the handsome man with the chin stubble lifted a fat guy into the air and slammed him onto her car. Her car. The windshield shattered.

Without thought, Sherry marched into the midst of the fighting and tapped the man with the stubble on his shoulder. He spun around, his fist raised as if to strike her. But when he saw it was a woman, he put his hand down.

“What do you want?” he snarled. “I’m busy here.”

Sherry saw that his name was sewn onto the lapel of his leather vest, or, at least, a nickname. Colt.

“That’s my damned car!” Sherry shouted. She had been with an abusive man for too long to be afraid of Colt.

“Get out of here, you’re going to get hurt,” Colt said, and he took her by the arm and led her back to the entrance of Earl’s.

“What about my car?”

“Why don’t you go order us a couple of beers, sweet thing, and when I’m done kicking ass out here, we can talk it over.”

And with that, he turned and dove back into the ruckus. Sherry fumed, but she did as the man asked. She went in and claimed a small table after ordering two beers, and twenty minutes later the cops had been called, the fight broken up, and a few men carted off to jail. Colt wasn’t one of them, even though the fight had started with him and the other man, and he came in and sat across from Sherry. She waited for him to speak, but first he took his beer and downed the whole thing.

“You only got me one?” he asked, smiling across the table.

“You broke my windshield. I can’t drive like that. I can’t afford to fix it.”

“Well shit, if it’s all just money,” Colt said, and he pulled out a thick wallet and tossed a couple of hundred dollar bills in front of her. “That should cover it. And I can give you a ride tonight.”

Sherry didn’t know what to say. Colt grinned and held his hand out. “I’m Colt,” he said. Sherry shook it.

“That’s a stupid name,” she said, and Colt laughed.

“It’s not my real name. It’s like the gun. Big, powerful.”

“You aren’t that big,” Sherry said. She felt annoyed by the man’s bravado, and she was even more annoyed that she felt a strong attraction to him.

Colt just laughed, but Sherry was pretty sure he flexed his muscles a bit as he did so. She couldn’t help but smile.

“You new here?” he asked her then. “I ain’t never seen you before.”

“Moved her a couple of months ago. I’ve been here every weekend. Where you been?”

“I like to ride,” he said, and he didn’t elaborate.

“That’s a fancy vest,” Sherry said.

Colt frowned as he looked at her, trying to decide if she was making fun of him or not. “You heard of the vipers?”

“No. Is that your club?”

“Yeah. My daddy started it. I run it now.”