Chapter 2

"Hey, Michelle." Mad Mike showed he was not quite as insensitive as he usually pretended to be by calling Michelle by her Christian name as Rick had just done. Of course, she'd just been elevated in rank, or at least in their estimation, by becoming the old lady of a full member. "You had a call a couple of minutes ago. This chick asked me to tell you to call Melissa at work, she said to tell you it was something very important." Michelle looked positively radiant; she understood as well as Rick did that by using her Christian name Mike had just given her his tacit permission to drop the trashy road name of Sleaze she so obviously detested.

She cheerfully took the phone Mike extended to her and dialed a number from memory. She spoke pleasantly to someone for a moment then she asked the person to hold on as she covered the speaker with her free hand. "It's my best friend, Melissa; I worked with her in the emergency room downtown. She knows I run with bikers so she called me as soon as she went on break to tell me who got shot; she thought I might possibly know them."

Larry jumped right into that interesting conversation with both of his big feet. "We already know the names of the Maniacs who got shot, find out if she knows anything at all about the ones who brought them in. As badly injured as they were, there was probably a fourth shooter involved, because someone had to have driven them in. If there was, we've got to get them, too. This is not only a matter of principle, Michelle. It's downright survival!"

Michelle spoke at some length with Melissa and then she tightly covered the mouthpiece again. "She said she heard one of the wounded men call the biker who brought them in 'Chico'. She gave me a good description of him; she said he's around thirty-five years old, he's about five feet and eight inches tall, and he's Hispanic. He was so nervous and agitated that he was almost running when he left the hospital just before the police got there."

"Ask her if this Chico had a teardrop tattoo under one eye." Mike told her. She spoke into the phone again then she nodded her lovely blonde head affirmatively at them. "Yeah, that's got to be that fuckin' Chico Mendoza, he's one of their senior members."

Larry said. "That stupid Cubano; he knows we can't let him get away with shooting one of us! Okay Foxy, tell this broad Melissa to forget we asked about this, but she can remember that we owe her a big one. We always make it a point to repay everyone whether they help us or hurt us. In fact, here's several of my cards, give one of them to her the next time you see her and hang on to a few for yourself."

Michelle spoke briefly to her friend again, and then she reached over and hung up the phone. As she stretched gracefully to accept his cards she asked Larry, "What is all this stuff about the teardrop tattoo? I've seen them on a couple of hard cases before, but I never had any ideas about what they meant."

"Michelle, I'm going to level with you. We don't usually let the chicks know about heavy things like this shooting that just happened, but you've been caught up in the middle of it already. The tattoo identifies a man as a shooter who has done time for murder. I don't understand why anyone would get one; it singles you out for the cops and for potential enemies like us. From what I've heard about this macho little dude he was trained in Cuba as a jungle fighter."

Rick felt almost like an anxious teacher's pet in grade school as he responded to Larry's statement. "I was qualified in Nam, Cambodia, and Laos as a jungle fighter..." He had always sworn he'd quit volunteering for tough assignments someday, but this was something both he and Snowman were uniquely qualified for.

"Me, too." Snowman eagerly bought in. "Me and Slick met up in Nam. We were Snake Eaters, Green Berets. Then we got recruited for work in Laos and Cambodia for the spooks, the C. I. A. I never underestimate my enemy, but as far as training and experience go, we far outclass any soldier ever trained in Cuba. Slick showed you a sample of what he can do against an assault squad of three or four average shooters in that little firefight this evening."

"We all know how capable you both are, Snowman." Larry roughly grumbled. His craggy face creased deeply as he pondered the situation. Several others of the Bros who had been with Snowman in dangerous situations spoke up loudly in support of him. Larry raised his beer can in his big right fist; he sighted over it appraisingly at Rick and Snowman. "I'd say it's settled then, we could call in some talent from out of town, but that might fuck up things even more; it takes a great leader to know how to delegate authority. Snowman and Slick will decide how they want to handle this fuckin' Chico. The rest of us will hang tight and back them up only when and how they ask for it. Now that we're all in agreement on this, somebody break out some more booze and let's party down."

"Oh, one more thing, Larry." Snowman got everyone's attention again. "All of this shit about where me and Slick fought is still classified Top Secret, so now that you all know about it, we'll probably have to kill you!" This totally outrageous statement got a hell of a laugh from everyone.

What Snowman lacked in formal education, he more than made up for in physical ability and street savvy. Despite his relatively small size, Snowman was an extremely capable and deadly martial arts expert. Once, when they'd been on rest and recuperation leave in Thailand, Rick had sat in his chair and calmly sipped on his beer while Snowman had badly beaten three battle scarred Navy veterans who'd made the painful error of refering to him as "Shorty."

During their first tour of duty, the two of them had been the sole survivors of an A-Team that had infiltrated into Laos to assassinate a key General. The three-day running firefight they had endured to survive, as a company of some of Hanoi's most elite troops tried to track them down had forged a bond of mutual respect and friendship between them that wouldn't die! As soon as the intelligence reports of their exploit and the confirmation of their impressive body count had circulated around the headquarters of the Military Assistance Command in Saigon, they were recruited by the Agency for its clandestine activities.

The exhilaration brought on by the danger and the constant violence quickly became a habitual drug they could only continue to score by re-enlisting. After eventually being forced to rotate out of Asia several years later, they'd made it a point to stay in touch with each other. Rick had eventually moved to Houston, which was Snowman's hometown, when he'd gotten out of government service.

Michelle moved to sit in a nearby chair so she'd have room to work; she quickly hand stitched the member patch onto the sleeveless denim jacket Rick flew his colors on. "There, that'll hold them for now." She told Rick as she handed the "rags" back to him.

"Righteous! Looking good; thanks a lot, Babe." Rick thanked her as he put the vest back on. The other member's old ladies had begun gradually trickling in as they heard where their men were and then got the news a major celebration was in order. Most of them had already heard about the shooting; news of violence tends to travel damned fast among any tightly knit group of bikers.

Snowman was putting some major party goodies on the table out of one of his infamous Magic Pockets when Slut called in to report. She was one of Larry's ex-old ladies who had several rug rats by him. Slut had always gotten along with Larry after she left him because she'd never complained about him not paying her child support. Larry reciprocated and repaid her for her silence by not informing the police that Slut did a lucrative business in renting their curtain climbers to various strippers and whores.

The kids were used by these women to falsely prove they had dependents to scam the government out of food stamps and welfare. The children were otherwise treated very well and were usually generously bribed into giving their cooperation. They could all present Oscar winning performances at looking pitiful and grubby. The youngest girl seemed to have an unerring instinct about people. She could play on the emotions of the most street-wise welfare worker like an artist with a musical instrument.

If they started asking too many questions, she would piss her pants, cry pitifully, throw up, or simply stare hungrily at the workers. Her choice of these tactics depended entirely on her uncanny intuition as to which of these actions would be the most effective at the moment.

Rick had once heard Larry remark Slut was raising their kids like a bunch of fucking gypsies, but at least they were learning how to make a living. He did make her promise him one thing about the children, though. She promised him she would not allow them to grow up and be lawyers. Larry wisely thought of lawyers as a form of life considerably lower than green pond scum!

Slut told Larry she'd talked to one of the Maniac's old ladies and she'd immediately located him to fill him in on what she had been told. Larry listened closely to everything she had to report and then he asked her how the kids were doing. As soon as he hung up the phone, Larry loudly got everyone's attention and he announced the latest good news. The word Slut had been given was that Luger, the Maniac's president, had lost the lung that had been smashed by Rick's .45 hollow point.

Bishop, the rival club's bad ass sergeant-at-arms would definitely never ride again, and the surgeon's prognosis about his even being able to walk was very guarded. Grimy, who had been one of the club's charter members, was still in surgery and he was reported to be hanging on to his life by a slender thread. The rest of the near leaderless and disillusioned Maniac members were still in hiding. The Maniac Motorcycle Club, which had warred with the Desperados since their conception, was on its way out!

Rick and Michelle sat at the dining room table with Snowman and his old lady, Cat Woman. Cat was a small, dark haired, pretty woman who worshipped the very ground Snowman walked on. They were already making a few rough plans for finding Chico. "You both know I've got a lot of good connections around town who'll be happy to help." Cat told the men. Cat worked part time for her dad; he was a bail bondsman who had bonded out most of the bikers in town at one time or another.

"That's great, Cat." Rick commended her. "We'll see what we can find out about him the first thing tomorrow morning." Rick glanced admiringly at Michelle; she was watching him intently as he continued. "Snowman, we've got plenty of firepower in our arsenal, but I've been thinking about digging up some of the stash of plastic explosives I smuggled back into the world from Nam."

"Righteous. I haven't played with that stuff much since we dropped that bridge out from under that fuckin' reinforced company of North Vietnamese regulars. Man, did those poor troops look shocked or what?" Rick and Snowman both laughed until they literally had tears in their eyes.

Michelle and Cat looked at each other and shook their heads in mutual astonishment. Michelle was the first one to speak. "What kind of men are these two anyway? They're talking about going to war, and it's like they're really having fun now."

"If you think this is something, just wait 'til you get to know them better." Cat retorted. Rick immediately hoped that her answer didn't strike Michelle as being overly patronizing. It seemed to him that the girls had liked each other when they'd met for the first time a few moments before and he hoped they would be friends. His unjustified fears were blown to the winds by Michelle's next statement. "I think I'm about to try to do just that, if I can drag Slick away from his war plans for a little while!"

Michelle stood and pulled on Rick's arm until he uncoiled from his chair and came to his feet. "I've got something classified Top Secret I want to show you in the bedroom, Soldier!" Rick thought Michelle had a hell of an idea. He'd had a hard on ever since he first laid eyes on her, but he was surprised and was definitely turned on by her own display of audacity. He bent and smoothly lifted her over his shoulder in a fireman's carry. Actually it was a modified fireman's carry, because firemen rarely grip the person they're rescuing by a handful of one cheek of their ass.

Michelle squealed shrilly in excitement as he lifted her and Rick's Bros whistled and yelled to show their unanimous approval of his macho move! Rick carried Michelle into the bedroom and locked the door behind them. He carefully laid her down on the bed, and then he sat down beside her and kissed her as he began taking off her clothing with both of his suddenly clumsy hands. She responded feverishly to his kisses as she helped by unbuckling his belt and unzipping his Levi's.

Rick rolled away from her to finish stripping off his boots and clothing. She cleared the deck for action with few wasted motions; she threw her clothing to the floor. Her body was even more voluptuous nude than Rick had even imagined. She was already breathing rapidly as Rick stretched his hard body out beside hers and then took her into his arms. They kissed again and his tongue explored her mouth once more. She sucked on his tongue and reached for his hard prick at the same time.

She erotically stroked his erect prick in time with her strong suction on his tongue and his hands roamed over her body as if they had a will of their own. He first cupped her heavy breasts as he thumbed her nipples into hardness and then he stroked the soft mounds of her sweet ass. Rick ended their kiss and he began licking and sucking his way down her cheeks and neck to her big breasts. She moaned and held her breasts to his mouth with her small hands as he suckled first one, and then the other of her turgid nipples for a moment.

Rick had learned a long time ago that sucking a woman's nipples deeply into his mouth and against his palate the way a baby suckles its mother gives the woman the most stimulation possible. He felt Michelle's voluptuous body shudder as his mouth left her breasts and he slowly kissed his way across her smooth belly to her wet center and then licked and sucked at it with his mouth. She clenched her legs in ecstasy and immediately began to quiver and shudder violently.

He cupped the smooth, firm cheeks of her marvelously shapely butt with both of his hands and hung on as she bucked against his face. When she finally calmed down a little, he rose over her to place himself between her legs. She frantically grasped him with both of her hands to guide him into place. Rick found that even though she was well lubricated, she was such a snug fit at first that he had to ease himself into her one short stroke at a time. As he carefully entered her tight, wet warmth, she began to quiver and convulse in another wild orgasm.

Michelle urgently clutched him to her with her smooth arms and long legs and met his every pounding pelvic thrust with an equal upward one of her own. Her long fingernails caused the muscles of his buttocks to tighten as she clenched him to her. Her exquisitely cushioned soft breasts provided a marvelous contrasting sensation as compared to her hard nipples as he rubbed against her with his own hairy chest.

A few moments of that wild ride were all Rick could take and remain in any semblance of control. Michelle came wildly again as she felt him stiffen rigidly and ecstatically spurt his juices into her for the first time.

Shortly after the door had closed behind them the sounds of muted moaning had come from the bedroom. These sounds were echoed merrily by most of the club members and their old ladies. "Oh Baby, oh Baby!" Mike cried out in a loud fake orgasm as the sounds from the bedroom reached a crescendo and then subsided. Rick simply held Michelle for a time, then he kissed her lovingly again and stroked her body. "Damn, Lady." He told her. "That was great, it was one wild ride!"

"Uh huh!" Michelle answered breathily. She luxuriously stretched out all of her abundant charms right in front of Rick as he looked on hungrily. She spoke lanquidly; "You didn't lie to me about the way you kissed all over, Baby! We're going to spend most of our time in bed from now on." The noise in the living room had begun to drastically increase in volume again. "But, right now we've got to go face the music from those silly bastards. Do you want the shower first?"

Rick grasped one of her small hands and placed it on his swiftly recovering manhood. "No Lady, right now I want to have you in the shower first!" When Rick and Michelle finally came back out of the bedroom, freshly showered, hand in hand, and with sated looks on both of their faces, they were met with the ludicrous sight of the club members lazily reclining all over the furniture and the floors. Every one of them was holding lit cigarettes, even the ones who never smoked. The Bros and their old ladies asked loudly in concert, "Was it good for you too, Baby?"

"Oh yes, Baby, yes!" Michelle's laughing reply was met with a roar of hilarity from the club. All the joking about the ongoing sex had made Snowman and Cat horny, so they were the next couple to reserve the bedroom. This time Rick and Michelle joined in on the same kind of free for all bantering that had accompanied their own lovemaking. At one point, Cat could be heard pitifully begging Snowman to go slow and easy so as not to hurt her.

One of the younger and more naive of the old ladies asked, "Do you think she needs any help? He must really be hurting her."

Michelle laughed with the others and then she calmly told the girl, "If you were to go into that bedroom right now, Cat would kill you, Girl!" Michelle was standing behind Rick's chair; she was carefully brushing and braiding his hair in a long coil. At the same time Rick was swiftly changing the barrels of his twin Colts for the spares he had stashed in his saddlebags. He did this to prevent any possibility the rifling could be matched to the bullets that had wounded the Maniacs. He kept one of the big Colts fully loaded and ready in its holster as he expertly broke down the other.

"That's a good idea, Bro." Mike said approvingly of his parts swapping. Rick was also swapping out his ammunition to thwart any possible analysis and comparison of the lead batch.

"Yeah, there's probably not any matching rifling grooves left on those soft hollow points after they mushroomed when they hit car parts and flesh and bones, but I've been told they don't need much for a positive comparison and I like to be certain. This way I don't have to dump a fine weapon, I just replace a couple of hundred dollars worth of parts. Luckily, Dana picked up my shell cases before the cops arrived so I don't have to worry about my firing pins, my ejectors, or my magazines being matched."