In Chapter 49, Sheila’s pimp returned to the Cantina to collect his property, but it didn’t work out as he planned. On a crisp harbor night, his thugs were surrounded in the darkened parking lot and sent down the road by the well-trained Cantina Security Crew.
“This isn’t the end,” Dwight, the big black drug dealer spat as his crew backed into their flashy vehicles and departed the parking lot.
“I knew she would lead to more trouble,” Marko said as he turned on the outdoor lights and studied the perimeter of the Cantina lot. The crew handled security during this live drill perfectly, but what about the next time? That was New Year?s Eve. A month had passed and another year was in full swing.
The bad economic mixture and political upheaval in Washington spawned a dark cloud over the country and it filtered like forest fire smoke into a log cabin. Folks drank and pounded the bar with frustrated fists. Times were uncertain, but the girls bounced around the Cantina like cheerleaders at a playoff game, doing their best to keep the furious fans pumped up. Cinderella distracted the crew from Sheila’s previous plight with drugs, but Marko didn’t trust her or her presence in the restaurant/bar.
Drug dealing was gone from the premises. There were no shiny cars in the parking lot, no limousines or pimped-out big black guys wearing too many gold chains lingering around the Cantina making deals. Sheila moved in with another clean and sober girl and signed up for a computer class at the local community college, but she couldn’t keep her mouth shut. She never could.
She showed up at work one afternoon sporting a new tattoo. It was some sort of unfinished serpent slithering around her slender upper arm. Destined to be some devilish armband, it was covered in Neosporin ointment, clear plastic food wrap and medical tape. It was still in its outlined form but Marko lifted her arm and examined the slippery uncolored snake’s tongue that slithered out from between two razor-sharp fangs.
It was as if the gypsy woman turned over the wrong tarot card and it turned up disaster. Marko yanked the tender arm and pulled Sheila to face him. Her buttery blue eyes were clear as she batted them tenderly at him.
“Are you using?” Marko asked, his blue-gray eyes boring into hers.
“No, nothing,” she blithered.
“No pain killers during this,” he said lifting her arm abruptly. “I hope you’re not running your mouth in public.”
“No,” Sheila said. “I just took some Tylenol.”
“You know the rule,” Marko returned quickly. “If you fuck up or get caught using, you’re on the streets.” Heavy drugs were verboten in the Cantina.
She nodded, but didn’t respond.
“Where did you get this?” Marko asked softening his approach.
“Union Tattoo in Wilmington,” Sheila responded, and Marko cut her loose.
Sheila’s gaze danced away from Marko’s harsh glare. He never trusted anything to do with her, her past, her addictions, or her mouth. Bandit was too soft with women. He saw goodness in the worst cases. Marko watched for any sign of machination in women. He didn’t trust their knifing ways.
She was warned, and took on a somber countenance as she moved around the Cantina. Marko moved into the shadow of his security regime and watched. As the night wore, on he asked some of the bikers who roamed into the Cantina about Union Tattoo.
“It’s over by the Longshoremen’s hall,” Frankie said while mopping the galley slick tile deck.
“It’s okay,” Buster said. “I’ve been there. I don’t think anyone sells drugs around there.”
“Big five runs that place,” Clay said. “He’s a family man trying to make a living. There’s no foot traffic in that town behind the harbor. It’s dismal over there.”
As the evening closed, the Cantina shut, and a few Pedro riders fired up their bikes and rolled down the quiet streets for home or to find an open coffee shop. Marko took Nyla aside.
“I need to know the next time Sheila is headed to that tattoo parlor in Wilmington,” Marko said.
“Sure, Marko,” Nyla said in her gleeful tone. “I’ll find out.”
About a week later, during shift change, just after a hearty rain over the Los Angeles Harbor, Nyla approached Marko.
“She has an appointment tomorrow afternoon,” Nyla said. “She’s been trying to recruit someone to go with her. She wanted one of us to hold her hand and keep her company.”
“I don’t want anyone to go with her,” Marko said. “I’ll keep an eye on things.”
For the last couple of days, when the sun broke over the harbor and dried the streets, Marko rode to Wilmington. He traversed the streets and familiarized himself with the dark area behind the harbor. It was one of the smaller harbor towns crammed between Long Beach and San Pedro on the east and west, and bordered by Carson and Torrance on the north. South was the harbor and Terminal Island. Once home to the Long Beach Naval Shipyard and still the home of the federal prison, the island was rapidly becoming a container parking lot of cranes and docks.
Wilmington was as flat as any land-filled area. It once housed a canal, which was long gone. Most of Wilmington was zoned M-4 for manufacturing, with only two commercial streets, Broad and Avalon. It was basically a 90-degree grid of streets running toward the port or parallel to it.
Wilmington housed the only two strip joints in the region. There was another one just over the border in Long Beach, near West Coast Choppers. These joints, and the Long Beach blues clubs were Dwight’s territory.
He was the pimp/drug dealer for the region. He fed everyone in town drugs and women, from the cops to the low-lifes. He was the Man, and he felt it with impunity. He lived and breathed the street existence. Life was all about deals with cocaine and speed, and street respect. That meant he could pick on you, but you better show respect, or he would take care of it. It was the oldest extortion line in the bully book, but he played it daily on the streets of Long Beach and Wilmington. The mayor of Los Angeles lived in San Pedro. Dwight steered clear of the coastal community passed the Vincent Thomas Bridge.
Marko rode his stretched-out black FXR toward Wilmington past the Harbor Division of the Los Angeles Police Department headquarters on Harry Bridges Boulevard. He parked his bike behind the Maya Restaurant and walked inside to grab a bite and watch the Union Tattoo Parlor. It was a block down, and the sun was fading quickly as the Saturday clock ticked close to 5:00 on a winter afternoon. The full moon danced into the royal blue sky like a beacon to the werewolves of life.
Marko ordered a cactus and avocado chicken burrito, with a verde sauce poured over the massive plate of food. After he ordered, he stepped to the window and looked down the street. It was cluttered with longshoremen parking their cars in lots and along the narrow streets and walking briskly to the hall to check on jobs. In a corner of the main parking lot, a number of black brothers operated a makeshift barbeque, but they didn’t just serve ribs. Longshoremen could munch on a tasty sauce-soaked sandwich, buy drugs, or pay for a blowjob from a harbor streetwalker.
The action took place in the open under an open awning next to a picnic table. The girls giggled and follow customers to their cars. In 45 minutes, thousands of union dockworkers came from all over the Southbay to pick up jobs, and then they returned home to Long Beach, San Pedro, Carson or even Palos Verdes Point before returning to the harbor for their shift. It’s a strange tradition, and Marko watch the area become cluttered with activity, then virtually empty and desolate as the sun went down.
He watched as Sheila rolled up on the ’69 XLCH and parked it out front of Union Tattoo. She seemed light on her feet as she bounced inside the shop. Marko stepped out the front door of the Maya Restaurant and could hear Sheila’s mouth running as the tattoo parlor door shut. He scratched the back of his head and stepped back inside to finish his hearty burrito and drink a Corona. He had no preconception as to the evening’s outcome.
The sun set and the moon was beginning to turn the night indigo blue as Marko departed the closing restaurant and moved to his second darkened vantage point across the street. He moved quietly and stealthily. No one saw him or knew where he went, but he had a visual over everything.
Sheila bobbed into the tattoo parlor, gleefully anxious to have her skin art completed. A counter separated the waiting area from the tattoo operation cubicles. Day of the Dead art hung from the walls along with tattoo flash. Books of tat customer photos lined the counter.
“Hey,” Sheila buzzed from the waiting area. “Where’s the action. It’s Saturday night, party time. Bandit’s place is too somber for me. I need some lively action.”
Big Five poked his head above the divider. “Hang on,” he said, “I’ll be just a minute. Have a seat.”
“I can’t,” Sheila spat. “It’s time to rock ‘n’ roll.”
Two other girls sat in the waiting area, quietly watching Sheila’s every move. One of the girls was hot to the core, with long nylon-encased legs slithering from fuck-me spiked heels to a minnie skirt that left little to the imagination. Her waist was two-hands narrow and her massive boobs bubbled over her tight leather top.
“Hey sister,” she said in a tone like warm maple syrup poured from a glass jug. “What do you have in mind for tonight?”
Sheila turned and eyed the two strippers dressed to the nines and getting primed for Saturday Night. Sheila’s bright blue eyes lit up like a kid spotting Santa on his porch.
“It’s been so long,” she said and moved between the two tarts. “What’s up ladies?”
“What do you have in mind?” the sister said and uncrossed her legs seductively, then crossed them again. Sheila watched and jiggled her store bought boobs, as if to say, “I can play.”
The other girl was also hot, but shorter and not so flamboyant. She got up from the couch.
“Excuse me,” she said. “I’m going to powder my nose.”
“Save some powder for me,” the sister said and placed her hand on Sheila’s thigh.
The other girl made her way to the back and the restroom.
“I’m Christy,” the sista told Sheila. “What’s your name?”
“Sheila,” she said and extended her hand.
Christy took her hand and placed it on her boob. Sheila rolled toward her and they kissed. It was like electricity flashing through her body. She immediately felt wet.
“Are you getting a tat?” Christy asked shoving her hand under Sheila’s blouse and playing with her boobs. “We could have so much fun.”
“Big five is supposed to finish my snake,” Sheila gasped as Christy twisted one of her nipples and licked her lips.
“Do you need a pain killer?” Christy. “Or you could just think about me licking your pussy. Could you hang on for that?”
Christie ran her hand over Sheila’s boobs and down her tummy. She unbuckled her belt and popped open the button on the top of her denims. Before Sheila could think, the girl’s long fingers were playing with her clit, while Sheila watched Christy’s massive boobs jiggle, nearly exploding from her snug leather halter.
Suddenly the other girl reappeared.
“We gotta go,” she said abruptly and snapped her cell phone closed. “Maybe you could come down to Show Girls in Long Beach when you’re done.”
Sheila didn’t know whether to climax or die.
“We need you girls at the Cantina,” Sheila said.
“It’s off limits,” Christie said, getting to her feet in one fluid, sex-filled motion. She turned, leaned over, kissed Sheila, and pulled one of her boobs free. “Care for a taste?”
Sheila scooted forward in her chair and surrounded this soft torpedo with her fiery hands. She gingerly leaned forward and engulfed Christy’s nipple in her mouth and kissed for all she was worth.
“This ain’t right,” she muttered, as she relinquished the mound of softness. It was returned to its leather prison and the girls strolled out of the parlor.
“We’ll be waiting for you, baby,” Christy said as her bubble-butt departed.
Sheila sat back as if the rug of life was suddenly pulled out from under her. Big Five stood at the back of the parlor watching in amazement.
“I don’t know what those whores were doing here,” he said. “They didn’t want tats.”
“I don’t care,” Sheila said.
“You don’t know them?” Big Five asked. “They seemed to know you.”
Marko watched from across the wide boulevard and thought to himself, life is all about choices.
Sheila sauntered to the back of the parlor, set her jacket on the chair and sat in the old ’50s dental chair.
“What the hell is going on with you?” Big Five asked as he prepped her for his craft.
Sheila was suddenly quiet. She usually bubbled with effusive enthusiasm and couldn’t keep her trap shut.
“They tried to give me pain killers,” she said.
“Do you need ’em,” Big Five said. Tats ran up his neck as if a spider weaving a web up and old abandoned wall.
“I don’t know,” Sheila said. “I mean I don’t know what’s going on.”
“You’re clean and sober, right,” Big Five said.
“Yeah,” Sheila said. “I have been for four months.”
“Are you being tested?” Big Five asked as he poured colorful hues of inks is small disposable cups.
“I don’t know those girls,” Sheila said. “Why would they test me?”
“Maybe he knows,” Big Five said motioning toward the big plate glass window at the front of his shop.
A massive stretched limo pulled up and out stepped a giant of a black man dressed for the town in a white suit adorned with too many gold chains. His fingers glittered with diamond-encrusted rings, and his smile was as broad as a Cadillac grill, sporting a flashy gold tooth.
Sheila sat abruptly upright. “I get it.”
Dwight strolled into the parlor with another massive football sized giant following.
“Hey, baby,” Dwight said, and unbuttoned his coat.
“Hey, Dwight,” Sheila said.
“You’re in my territory, sweetie,” Dwight said, “and you owe me.”
“What do I owe you?” Sheila asked. She was alone in Wilmas, a dirt poor harbor berg. She had none of the Cantina family around.
“You owe me a couple of grand and a half-dozen blow-jobs, bitch.” Dwight lost his comforting air. He didn’t talk to women, he told women. “You made a choice coming to this part of town. You’re going to come with me after he’s done with your tat. You know the drill. When you pay me back, you can go work for anyone, but ya gotta pay your debt.”
Sheila slumped back into her chair as if someone let the air out of her tire. “I suppose you’re right.” She knew there was no way to pay this debt and escape.
“You goddamn right I’m right,” Dwight said, standing over her. He ran his big hand up her thigh and pushed it down between her legs. “Christy made you hot. There’s a lot of fun to be had on my side of town.”
Big Five flipped on his tattoo gun, and the buzzing broke the thick threatening air in the room.
“I need to get to work, sir,” Big Five said and leaned towards Sheila’s light-skinned arm. He pulled her soft limb close. Almost cradling it, he felt the tension in her muscles.
“How long will this take?” Dwight snapped at Big Five.
Big Five didn’t look up. He didn’t want to mess with the harbor town bully.
“Just an hour,” he said.
“I’ll be back,” Dwight said, and laid a 100-buck bill on the counter. On top of the bill rested a short vial filled with cocaine. “This should help with my baby’s art project. Treat her right and I’ll send you some business from time to time.”
“Thanks,” Big Five said and touched Sheila’s arm with the three-needle color set.
She jumped. She couldn’t relax. Her hands fidgeted.
“Take it easy,” Big Five said as the limousine sped away. “Let’s take a break. I’ll get you something to drink.”
He wandered to the front door of his shop and looked out at the empty street.
“Is this your motorcycle?” he asked. “It’s a classic.”
“It’s sorta mine,” Sheila said trying to take stock of her situation. “Bandit gave it to me after he cleaned me up. I was a mess. The Cantina has been my first real home.”
“What happens to the bike if you leave with that gangster?” Big Five asked.
“I suppose Bandit would send someone to pick it up,” Sheila said.
“Do you want something to drink,” Big Five said opening his fridge. “I’ve got waters, beer, or Jack Daniels. You know, life is all about choices. The choice you make today may change your life forever.”
“Yeah,” Sheila said, “and I’ve made some damn bad ones.”
“Seems you’ve got a basket of ’em flyin’ at you tonight,” Big Five said and pulled out a bottle of Arrowhead water and set it next to the fifty of whiskey.
Sheila could feel her skin beginning to crawl. She survived four months on the strict wagon, and she was proud of every day, but she was beginning to feel the vibrations of addiction creeping back. Temptation was driven to the surface by bouts of depression, and caused her defense mechanisms to founder. She was beginning to hunger for a shot of tequila, or something stronger. She knew one single blast would free her from the doldrums, but she was keenly aware of the downside.
She could feel herself grinding her teeth.
“We’re burnin’ daylight,” Big Five said. “The big guy will return soon.”
Sheila’s moist palms dripped with sweat. She looked toward the street, at the counter and the clear glass vile. She pondered the bottle of water and the fifth of Jack Daniels.
“That’s a damn fine motorcycle,” Big Five said and wandered to the front door.
He opened it to admire the classic lines, the root beer metallic paint, and traditional shape of the Sportster tank. Sheila could see the XLCH, magneto, kick-only bike glistening under the streetlights. That motorcycle meant so much to her. It gave her power to go wherever she wanted. It was the tool to her fight from addiction. It represented wealth, freedom, strength, and self-confidence.
Sheila stepped out of the chair. She moved to the counter like a lost rodent trying to decide whether to stay in its crib or chase the garbage truck. She picked up the vial and it buzzed in her palm, the crystalline powder dancing in the glass container. She threw it hard into a porcelain sink, shattering it.
“I better get the fuck out of here,” Sheila said. She grabbed the bottle of water and took a long swig.
The limo screeched to a stop and bumped the 1969 XLCH. It teetered and Sheila burst out the door to catch it.
“You’re not going to need that fuckin’ thing where you’re going,” Dwight said, exiting the rear door of the limo. “I hate bikers.”
The massive driver jumped out of the black stretch and reached into his jacket. Dwight grabbed Sheila, who was struggling to hoist her motorcycle, and yanked her onto the sidewalk.
“Enough of this bullshit,” Dwight snapped. “Come on!”
He pulled her toward the open limo door, when a crack filled the air, and his driver went down with a bullet in his left calf.
Marko stepped out of the shadows. He always remained calm, as if he knew all the chapters of life by heart, or all the cards in the deck, and which player had what cards. He walked deliberately across the street to the downed bodyguard and removed his weapon. Then helped him into the drivers seat.
“This man will need to see a doctor within a half hour,” Marko said, then rounded the car, righted the motorcycle, kicked the stand down, and stepped onto the sidewalk.
Dwight let go of Sheila with one hand and reached into his flashy jacket.
“Choices,” Marko said. “That’s a bad one. Before the weapon leaves the holster, you’ll be dead. You have other choices to make if you want to live and prosper.”
“Fuck you, biker; this is my town,” Dwight said and wrapped his big fat hand around the ivory pistol grip of a polished stainless steel, Colt 357 Magnum.
Marko, trained constantly with Richard Bustillo, who trained with Bruce Lee. As smooth as silk and as fast as a rattlesnake’s tongue, he pulled and aimed his Glock 30, subcompact semi-automatic 45-caliper pistol.
“We’ve dealt with you on two other occasions,” Marko said moving directly at Dwight with the weapon pointed between his eyes. “This is the last time we deal with you. You have a choice and less than ten seconds. First, let the girl go or you’re dead in five. Then we are going to deal with your future, man-to-man.”
Marko’s powder blue eyes never left Dwight’s. Dwight knew, instinctively and accurately, that if he flinched he was dead. Marko was less than a yard away. The clock was ticking.
“Okay,” Dwight said. Simultaneously he removed his hand from white satin jacked and let go of Sheila. Big Five stepped in and retrieved the girl, pulling her into the shop.
Dwight was a badass from way back. He was in his mid 40s and ran the streets for two decades. He knew how to judge a man’s skill level and his bravado. Plus he had the cojones of three big men. Big Five returned to the sidewalk as Marko set the Glock safety and tossed him the weapon.
“Thanks brother, she passed,” Marko said.
“I’m glad she did,” Big Five said as the weapon floated through the air and Dwight made a move.
Dwight flicked his right wrist and out popped a long stiletto knife. The blade glimmering in the night sliced like wire through cheese in Marko’s direction. Marko weighed as least 100 pounds less than the big man and was maybe three inches shorter, but Marko did not step back. He stepped just slightly to the side and pushed the flailing weapon passed him with his left and lifted the man’s fist with his right, driving the knife back at Dwight and into his throat.
Marko stepped closer, driving the knife to its polished hilt.
“I told you this was the last time we dealt with you,” Marko said. “Your choice, pal.”
Marko shoved the dying man inside the open limo door.
“Drive,” he said and shut the door.
