Jericho

  JERICHO

  The Barringer Brothers Series

  Tess Oliver

  JERICHO

  Copyright© 2015 by Tess Oliver

  Cover Design by: Nikki Hensley

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  All Rights are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Other books in the series:

  Rain Shadow Book 1

  Rain Shadow Book 2

  Rain Shadow Book 3

  Rain Shadow Book 4

  Rain Shadow Book 5

  Gage

  Cash

  Seth

  Jericho

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  The Barringer Brothers

  Other Books

  Tess Oliver

  chapter 1

  Jericho

  A swirling display of red and white lights highlighted the sign for the Candy Strippers Club. Jacko and Reed were right behind on their bikes. I lifted my hand to point left and turned into the parking lot. The place was tucked deep in between massive pines with only squirrels and owls and whatever the hell else lived in the forest as neighbors. It seemed like a strange place to have a strip club, but since it advertised full nudity and, less blatantly, paid dances, which was code for a good old fashioned lap dance, a remote, off the main road, location was probably best. It wasn’t exactly the kind of establishment that could be propped up in the center of a busy city.

  The isolated location hadn’t stopped people from coming. The parking lot was packed tight. There was a row of bikes parked out front, a few respectable machines, a Dyna Super Glide like I was riding and a couple of Street Bobs like Jacko and Reed were on. A particularly sleek black Road King caught my attention like a hot blonde in a string bikini.

  I wasn’t expecting to run into any other clubs. The guys and I had ridden to Tahoe to meet with our newest prospective business partner, and he owned Candy Strippers. He’d told us to stop by on our way into town and check the place out. Our Bedlam cuts would be our tickets in the door. He assured me, we’d be treated right. I hadn’t actually met Gamble yet, but he was offering good money in exchange for security. The job worked perfectly for the direction I was taking the club in.

  Jacko pulled off his helmet. His shaved head and ugly-ass ear plugs looked extra shiny under the parking lot lights. “What the fuck, Richo?” He stared at the bikes parked in front of the shabby brick building. “This place looks like a piss hole in the middle of Snow White’s forest.” He stared at the line of bikes. “And it looks like half of the seven dwarves are already here.”

  Reed parked his bike and took off his helmet. At twenty-eight, Reed was one of the veteran members of Bedlam. I was four years younger and wearing the president’s patch, a patch I’d tried hard to refuse and resist, but my dad’s legacy with the club had made me the top choice to replace Dreygon Sharpe. After his reign of terror and eventual death, the club had fallen into a clusterfuck of confusion. There were some long months when I’d even seriously considered leaving the club for good. But the other members wanted me to stay, and after growing up in the Bedlam compound, with not much else to add to my resume except drinking and an extreme fondness for women, I’d decided to stick it out. Once they handed me the president’s patch, I decided things were going to change.

  Reed walked over to the bikes. He always looked as calm and harmless as a librarian, although a massive librarian with a lot of facial hair. But he could change into a fucking bull on steroids with a finger snap. I liked having him at my side.

  “Which club?” I asked Reed.

  His beard swung back and forth like a fuzzy pendulum as he considered it. “Given our location and the fact that not many bikers ride Road Kings, I’d say the Northern Devils.”

  “Shit. Gamble didn’t include this in the invitation,” I said.

  Jacko hung his helmet on his handlebars. “Well, Richo, when you make business dealings with a man who has a cheesy name like Trace Gamble, I imagine you can expect all kinds of carnival acts to follow.” He clapped his big hands together. “But who cares as long as there’s naked pussy along with it. And I’m hungry for it, so let’s go.”

  Jacko had spent most his life with his dad near Reno, but, like me, he’d grown up in the club. My dad had died on the interstate while riding his Harley, but Jacko’s dad, another highly respected club member, had taken a far less impressive exit from this world. Like so many of the older club members, it had been cigarettes and liquor that had gotten him in the end. I was fifteen when my dad had a fatal fight with an eighteen wheeler. My mom had left the club life long before. Dreygon Sharpe, the Bedlam president, took me in, and I spent the rest of my teens and early twenties in his strange, harsh world behind tall stone walls, Dreygon’s compound. Dreygon had been like a grandfather to me, but his madness had eventually caught up to him and he went full psycho. The people I grew up with, my makeshift family, were the only people I knew and loved. But Dreygon killed Gunner, chased off Cash and scared away Evangeline, or Angel, as everyone called her, except me. To me, she was Evie, and there was no one more important in the world to me than her. I had been madly in love with Evie since we were teenagers. But she’d found true love with Luke Barringer. And her life had changed dramatically with Luke. I was heartbroken but happy for her.

  Two big, thick-necked dudes stopped us at the door.

  “We’re guests of Gamble’s,” I said.

  One of them, who looked as if his nose had been rearranged more than once on his face, peered down at my cut. He paused, but I suspected it was more for drama than anything, a little warning that he didn’t want trouble. Then he motioned for us to go inside.

  “Now this is better,” Jacko said. The outside of the building was definitely hiding the adult paradise on the inside. The place was surprisingly clean. Shiny wood tables made a pattern beneath the stage. Gleaming glass bottles of every type of drink lined the mirrored wall behind the bartender’s counter. The stage was broken up into three distinctive parts, with different colored lighting on each. Three beautiful girls were dancing, two with just a thong and pasties and one completely nude. Jacko and Reed headed straight to a front table like two kids heading for the candy counter.

  I stopped by the bar to order us a pitcher of beer. We’d been on the road for three hours. My throat was parched, and I was growing tired of grinding grit between my back teeth. The bartender was a sturdy looking woman who had nearly as many tattoos as me. She walked up with a surprisingly sweet smile. She waved her hand toward my president’s patc
h. “You’re Jericho?”

  “I am.”

  “I’m Pepper.” She had a strong handshake. “Gamble told me to set you boys up with whatever you’d like.”

  “Great. A pitcher of your best beer and three glasses. And thanks.”

  She smiled again and looked at me for a second. “A polite outlaw. And damn pretty too. I’ll get you that beer.”

  I leaned on the counter and glanced around the place. Gamble was into a little bit of everything, some shady and some legit. The strip club, while many would argue was not exactly a respectable business, was completely on the books. And from what I’d heard, he was generous with his employees, a generosity that I hoped would flow our direction. Gamble ran a string of small, off the beaten path, casinos on the Nevada side of the lake. He’d been having trouble moving money between them. Even some of the armored car services he’d hired had failed. There was a lot of quiet, deserted mountain road between his places, and he needed security. After looking at the books, Rick Jacobs, the club treasurer, and I had decided to cut off some of our sketchier ties and move toward slightly more respectable business opportunities. Providing security to companies who needed it had become our new path to money. It also kept the club cool with the police. The Bedlam bikers loved the club life, but we also liked hanging on to our freedom. And jail time cut severely into that freedom. You couldn’t ride down Interstate 80 with your fucking hair on fire and bugs smacking your teeth if you were doing time in orange coveralls. Connections had brought Gamble and me together in a phone call, and we’d decided to meet and talk business.

  Jacko and Reed were beaming from ear to ear as the girl on the stage directly in front of them did a nice turn and dip. I turned back to the counter, and my gaze swept past an open door that led to an office. A woman, early twenties at most, was leaning against the doorjamb with a phone against her ear. It was pretty dark in the place, but she might as well have had flares shooting off around her. She had long, dark blonde hair that was wild and looked as if she’d just gotten out of bed, a look that I was especially fond of particularly when the face and body beneath were just the type I wanted to wake up next to. And this girl was that type— all the fucking way. She definitely looked like the kind of girl that would leave your balls aching for more.

  She stared at me while she was talking on the phone and then turned and walked away in tight jeans that showed off an ass I would not soon forget.

  I took the pitcher of beer to the table. Jacko leaned in as soon as I sat. “Reed was right. It’s the Devils.” His eyes flickered to a table on the other side of the room. “Their president, Rook, is the leathery old dude with the red beard. He’s the one who rides that spiffed up Road King.”

  I poured myself a beer and leaned back with it.

  Reed peered over the brim of his glass at their table. “Something tells me this might be their hangout. They’re looking at us like a swarm of wasps who just moved in on their hive.”

  “Relax,” I said. “The last thing we need is to start something in Gamble’s club. Then we’d be on his shit list instead of his payroll.” I turned toward their table, made eye contact with Rook and lifted my beer glass in a silent greeting.

  Tight jaws made their way around the circle of men, five of them in all. Rook then returned the greeting.

  Pepper came over with another pitcher. “Figured you boys were thirsty from the long ride. Thought I’d set you up with another.”

  I smiled up at her. “You’re a doll.”

  A pink blush crept up under the black ink on her neck.

  “Hey, Pepper—” I sat forward, and she leaned down to hear me over the clamor of music and talking. “Do our biker friends across the way come here a lot?”

  “Rook and the guys? Yeah, that’s their table, and the girl up there with the silver pasties is Rook’s girl.”

  I nodded. “Bring them a pitcher of beer on us, would ya?”

  “You bet.” Pepper left.

  Jacko drained his glass and sat forward. “Now why the hell would Gamble tell you to show up to another club’s hangout?”

  “Not sure. Might have been on purpose.”

  Reed lit a cigarette. “You think he’s testing us?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “Guess we’ll find out.”

  “But why would Gamble want to start a brawl in his own club?” Jacko asked. “Not that I’m in the mood for a brawl.” He leaned back and stared starry eyed up at the redhead making love to the stripper pole. “My cock’s been hard since I walked in here. I’ve only got one thing on my mind right now.”

  “What’s that?” Reed took a hit on his cigarette. “Your right hand?”

  I laughed.

  “Fuck you, Reed,” Jacko snarled. He lifted his hand. “Besides, I’m a leftie.”

  chapter 2

  Roxie

  I closed up the receipt books and rubbed my temples.

  “Roxie, did you see that man?” Pepper was an ex-marine and she had an extremely tough exterior when it came to men, but she looked like a blushing school girl as she walked into the office.

  “What man?”

  “Oh, come on, when I was filling a pitcher of beer, I saw you standing in the doorway on the phone. You were looking at him too.”

  “Oh, yeah. I was looking at him. Trace was on the other end of the call asking if the Bedlam guys had come in yet.”

  She put her hands on her hips and cast me an irritated glance. “Now, Roxie, I know you are with Trace Gamble, but you’re not completely immune to other men, particularly when they look like that guy. Shit, I haven’t reacted like that to a man since that retired navy seal walked in here with shoulders so broad he had to turn sideways to get in the damn door.”

  “That’s true. I haven’t seen your tongue wag like this for a long time. Why don’t you go out there and flirt with him. He’ll be around for awhile. I think Trace is going to hire him on as security.”

  She waved a hand in dismissal. “I’m not good enough for a pretty piece of eye candy like that. He’s more suited to someone like you, but we all know you belong to Trace.”

  “Bullshit. He’s not good enough for you, Pepper.” I walked over and hugged her. Pepper was one of the only true friends I had in my bizarre, sordid life. “I’ll bet you’d get bored of him fast. Guys like that are usually clumsy and selfish under the sheets.”

  Pepper walked out muttering something about being willing to give him a try anyhow.

  I finished my water bottle and got up to get an apple from the little office refrigerator. Something told me it was going to be a long night. Pepper had been completely right about the man being nothing short of breathtaking. But knowing Trace, the slick bastard who basically owned me, he had something planned for the black haired Adonis in the MC cut. The guy looked like he could definitely handle anything that came his way, but Trace always took pleasure in unfair fights. Inviting them to the Candy Strippers Club, the place where the local bike club always spent Friday nights, had to be part of Trace’s scheme.

  I was done with work for the night. Keeping books for Trace’s business adventures was the only part of our ugly little deal that I didn’t mind. It made me feel like I was doing real work and that I was part of the real world. But I wasn’t. I was a game piece in Trace Gamble’s fantasy world, where he was king and everyone else was a pawn. Not that he didn’t treat his loyal people well. He always paid fairly as long as you remained true to the Gamble creed of never crossing the boss.

  At first, our arrangement hadn’t seemed too awful. Trace Gamble was magazine model handsome and oozed charm, or at least that’s how I’d first seen him. But slowly, as the shiny layers peeled away and I got a good look at the man beneath the sparkly veneer, I knew I’d made a pact with the devil, a pact that I saw no way out of. And this semi-prisoner life had hardened my heart to men, any man, even the heartbreaker sipping beer in front of the stage.

  I should have taken off. I should have just headed back to the lake house. But something
told me that I shouldn’t leave Pepper and the girls alone tonight. Barron and Luther, the club’s bouncers, were on until closing, but my intuition was hinting that a shit storm was brewing beneath the otherwise calm atmosphere in the club.

  Trace had stayed conspicuously away for the night, but I had no doubt that he was keeping track of things. More than likely, Barron was in on whatever he had planned and, faithful lap dog that he was, Barron would keep Trace abreast of any situation. Of course, this was assuming that there would be a situation. It was entirely possible that I was imaging the entire problem scenario. But knowing how Trace did things, probably not.

  chapter 3

  Jericho

  Two pitchers into the night, Jacko had gotten what he wanted, a highly creative lap dance. He gave the lithe blonde a twenty, and she shoved it in her g-string, kissed him briefly on the lips and disappeared into the dressing rooms. Jacko, it seemed, would still be having a date with his left hand.

  The brunette, who Pepper had mentioned was Rook’s girl, kept a sweet smile trained on me through her entire dance. It hadn’t escaped Rook’s notice. The last thing I wanted was to start something with another club. Wars and rival fights were not high on my list of priorities for Bedlam. Dreygon and some of the old cronies had taken those days with them to the grave. A war would mean there was something important worth fighting for, territory, or the murder of a club member. A cute brunette, no matter how hot, was not worth it.