Bad to the Bones(5)
“Who doesn’t? They’ve been groping each other all up and down Bargain Boulevard in front of poor old ladies and kids. They scream at anyone who’s offended that it’s natural and we’re the twisted prudes.”
“That’s the f*cking least of it. Because they give all their money to that cult leader when they join, even the richest lawyers are edging out the natives with their f*cking concession stands full of purple clothing, peanut butter and dream catchers. Lots of brothers from Fort Apache have been up in arms about these batshit Moonies crashing their own backyard.”
“They’re not Moonies. Fact, I think the leader is a white guy. He runs around like he’s from India, or so I’ve heard. Never seen him downtown or otherwise. But he’s a f*cking white guy. Looks like it on the T-shirts, anyway.”
“They’ve been on our radar ever since a huge shipment of Russian ladies and M-4s were intercepted by ATF down by Tonto Basin heading our way. ATF assumed it was us of course and gave Ford a raft of shit about it. And me being the sergeant-at-arms, all the crap lands on me. I’ve got to protect this club. ATF’s crawling up our ass, and we keep trying to tell them we’re just Harley fans and heavy equipment specialists. Run a weed dispensary, an archery range, everything on the up and up.”
Knoxie frowned. “But the iron was for the nutjobs?”
“That’s what we finally figured out. I shadowed them, ran some intel. Turns out they have their own little platoon of armed guards. They even wear berets like some kind of Aryans left too long on the tilt-a-whirl. Now we’re in ATF’s sights again because they’re building a new empire in our f*cking backyard. Heard reports about them selling Hell’s Minions pot and something even worse. You get any purples in your shop?”
“One. He wanted me to ink a grey wash of that fearless leader, but the only photo he had of the douche was a tiny one around his neck. I told him I work from photos when someone wants a portrait. So he went with a Buddha instead. Had me ink the words ‘I Will Confuse You’ under it. Didn’t make any f*cking sense, of course. So what’d Wild Man see?”
“You’re never gonna f*cking believe this. A few vans drove onto a butte up there and dropped off a ton of people, just left them in the middle of f*cking nowhere.”
“Maybe they’re having one of those vision quests.”
“That’s what I thought at first. But why would they be shooting at people who’re just trying to hallucinate about their spirit animal?”
Knoxie gaped. “Shooting? What the f*ck? They took busloads of people out there to kill them?”
“Well, check this. Wild Man thinks they were just trying to hasten them on their way, because they were shooting at the ground behind them as they ran, like some warped kind of hunger game.”
“Holy mother of f*ck. Did Wild Man talk to any of the people?”
“Well, he didn’t exactly want to stick around until he had backup.”
“Understandable.”
“So he called Ford, who knew I was at some ride detailer in the industrial section. And he knows I’m never without my Glock. So we’re going to just go scope it out, maybe talk to one of the people who were dropped off. They might have a beef with the cult. We need to find some leverage to use against these wingnuts.”
“You want to put these twatwaffles out of P&E?”
“That, or squeeze them for a payoff. If they’re on our turf earning green they need to pay the piper.”
“Running them out’s the best. There’s no room for more herbal essences around these parts. It’s already bad enough with that annual vortex festival attracting every head case between here and Jonestown. I always make a mint doing a lot of flash prefab tats of Grateful Dead roses, but three days a year is the most I can take of that shit. Turn here?”
“Turn here.”
They were silent for a few moments as Knoxie drove on the narrow road that led to a scenic area. Knoxie had a Glock in his glove box, so he wasn’t worried about any purple twatwaffles going off the rails. He was one hundred percent on the same page as Lytton when it came to the best interests of the Pure and Easy business community. Lytton had the Leaves of Grass to protect, and Knoxie had his Missing Link shop on Bargain Boulevard.
Lytton said, “You know, the Red Rocks Original is here for you, Knoxie. You’ve done us a lot of solids in the past. I want to extend our offer again to you. We’d welcome you with open arms in the club. You’ve been like a brother to lots of us for going on ten years now. You’ve been half in and half out that whole time.”
Knoxie had a feeling Lytton would bring that up again. The Bare Bones had been extending an invite to join their brotherhood for many years now, ever since he’d returned to Pure and Easy after several tours in the SEALS Special Ops. That had been Ford Illuminati’s unit, so already they shared much in common. Back in those days, it had been Cropper Illuminati who had offered to sponsor him. Cropper had died down near the border under mysterious circumstances, so Ford had taken over as President, continuing to extend the offer to Knoxie.
Knoxie had never joined The Bare Bones. He was similar to those men, but not. He thought it went against his straight arrow family man image. He knew plenty of Boners were diehard fathers and husbands. He just didn’t want to risk running afoul of the law when he had two children to pay for. As it was, he had never raised his family far above the poverty line with his tattoo shop, so that was all in the rearview now. Nicole’s main bitch was that she was forced to live in a shitty rental house in a bad area of town. Money was always tight, and things never seemed to get any better. Knoxie had failed Nicole on many levels, and when she moved out, he’d just plunged deeper into the mire. Might as well prove everyone right.