***
“Duke, Duke, Duke. You should never taste the merchandise,” Dominic whispered.
He tapped on Amanda’s door, but no one answered. When he stepped into her room, it was a replica of Felicia’s room.
He glanced around the place, searching for anything that might bring him closer to Duke. His eyes shot across the room, searching for anything that would tell him more about the woman who Duke favored. Why she was Florin’s favorite?
His eyes were drawn to a card shoved into the side of a mirror between the metal frame and the mirror itself. He closed the door behind him and walked further into the room.
“What is that?” he whispered to himself.
He pulled out the card and stared at the familiar logo. “This is from the bar by the beach. What is this doing here?”
He read the name on the card. “Leon Weber.”
He closed his eyes and held the card close. He took one smell and was able to distinguish between two scents—the person who was the owner of the business card and Amanda’s. In some odd way, he felt that he might be one step closer to the first horseman—Duke Mathias.
Dom shoved the card into his pocket and took one final glance around the room before he left to meet Palo.
He walked out the front door of The Zoo and headed toward his steel horse. Four angry Vypers had just confronted Palo, and Dominic was at his side in a matter of seconds.
Palo glared at the man who stood in front of him. “Move out of the way, Coda.”
“Look what we have here. Palo, you piece of shit, you are a hard man to find sometimes. You don’t call, you don’t write. But you do owe me money.”
“I don’t owe you shit. You rigged that fight, Coda. Everyone here knows you set me up.”
“Are you calling me a liar and a snake?”
Palo looked down at the emblem on Coda’s jacket—the one with the snake coming out of the mouth of the wolf. “Hey, if it fits.”
“Fuck you. It doesn’t matter whether I did or didn’t. You owe me and I’m going to collect my money.”
“Come on, Coda, we have a truce. You know that.”
Coda chuckled and glanced back at his Vyper boys standing behind him. “The Vypers and the DOD have a truce. My boys and I are Vypers, but I don’t see any DOD here, not anymore.”
Dom uncrossed his arms from his chest and in a rough voice he said, “Why don’t we have one more fight then? Me and your big buffoon there.”
Coda looked back at his boys again and laughed, pointing at Dominic. “And who the fuck are you?’
“Your ugly ass mother.”
The smile wiped from Coda’s face and his mouth turned into a scowl. “If we win, I get your rides over there. I want that black and chrome Harley.”
“Let’s not stand on ceremony, bitches!”
Palo leaned in and whispered in Dominic’s ear. “Bitches?”
“I saw it on TV,” he said from the side of his mouth.
Coda nodded. He turned and patted his man on the back. “Rip off this loser’s face, Toothless.”
In front of The Zoo, in the parking lot, Toothless and Dominic agreed to an “everything goes” fight. Although Dominic was fast on his feet, and strong in most cases, against Toothless, he couldn’t bring the three-hundred-pound beast to the ground.
Toothless moved fast for his weight, but that wasn’t what stopped Dominic from bringing him to his knees. It was like punching a bag of cement when Dominic threw his strength into his punch. He’d never experienced anything like it.
After the two of them went back and forth repeatedly, Dominic finally decided to semi-concede. He stopped punching and he leaned over, taking in a long breath of air.
Everyone watched intently. The next moves were crucial to who would win this fight.
Finally, Dominic reached into his pocket and pulled out the keys to his chrome baby.
Palo put his hand on Dominic’s shoulder. “Don’t do it, man, you can take him down.”
Dominic didn’t say a word to Palo. He sighed and addressed his opponent. “Here you go.” He threw the keys in the air. When Toothless reached up to catch the keys, Dominic pulled out his knife and threw it toward Toothless’s hand, severing his index finger.
Toothless screamed. “Fuck! My finger!” He brought his hand to his face and watched the blood spurt from his index stub.
“What the fuck?” another Vyper said, fearfully backing up and falling over one of the bikes. “That motherfucker didn’t even move. Did ya’ll see that?”
Dominic watched all of them scramble to get away while Toothless continued to stare at his severed finger, screaming profanity and bleeding all over himself.
His blood teased the vampires’ senses and aroused Dominic’s desires to rip through his neck. Thankfully, he had just drunk from the woman inside or he would have forgotten about the vampire bounty slayers and taken that man as dinner and dessert.
Palo and Dominic still hadn’t moved. Dom was on high alert, ready to attack at any given moment. But he would wait for that egotistical bastard to make his next move, if he was man enough to do so.
“That’s my trigger finger. You cut off my trigger finger!” Toothless leaned down and picked up his limp, severed finger from the ground, and in a state of shock, he tried to push it back in place on his hand. Tears ran down his face as he held his hand out to his comrades standing on the sidelines to show them the damage.
Dominic finally turned to Coda. “Now, where is our money?”
“Fuck you, you cheated.”
“Whether I did or did not doesn’t matter, you owe me.” Dominic repeated Coda’s words from earlier.
Coda backed up and pulled a gun out of his waistband. He aimed it toward Palo and Dominic, ready to pull the trigger. “Silver bullets, bitches,” he whispered in a trembling voice.
A tall confident man stepped out from behind the crowd. “Easy, Coda.”
This man was different from the others. He was their leader—there was no disputing that. His posture was perfect, his eyes haunting. He was an old soul.
Toothless slowly maneuvered toward that man. “Shane, look.”
Shane was wearing Vyper colors. He put his arm around Toothless and directed him to another man. “Tiny, take Toothless to the hospital and have them fix his finger.”
Coda lowered his weapon and addressed Shane. “These two are trying to scam me.”
Shane nodded. “Palo.”
Palo stepped forward. “Your son owes us money.”
“That true?” he asked Coda without turning to look at him.
“They cheated. They—”
“Enough!” Shane put up his hand. “Did you clear a collection with me?”
“No, but…”
Shane pulled out a wad of cash from his front pocket and handed it to Palo. “Will this cover it?”
“Yeah, that’ll do.”
Fearlessly, Shane walked up to Dominic and glared at his statue-like pose. “No colors? You’re a nomad?”
Shane’s hand rested on his weapon at his hip. Something told Dominic that this man didn’t need to use a weapon if provoked. There was a level of mutual respect—a respect that they shared.
Shane reached into his pocket and pulled out another wad of cash in an old-style money clip. His eyes never left Dominic’s. The crowd around them was silent, only a slight sound of music from inside the club floated through the air.
“My apologies for my son’s bad judgment.”
Dominic glanced down and instead of Shane handing him money, he handed Dominic a business card. “I don’t know what actually went down, but bring your bike by the shop anytime, we’ll service it for you,” Shane said. His neatly combed dark and gray hair was too short to cover the scar across his cheek—a scar that ran from his ear to his mouth.
Shane turned and walked toward his men. “Let’s go, the party’s over. I’m guessin’ the pigs are on their way. We don’t need any trouble.”
/> Dom and Palo watched Shane and his club leave. Once the Vypers had started their bikes and maneuvered out of the way of theirs, Dominic ran his hand over his chrome baby.
Palo stood in the center of the parking lot with a grin, counting the money they’d just made.