Free No Angel by Jay Dobyns Page B

said, “That’s good. Shows your head’s not fucked.”
    The Hells Angels prospect came back with an armload of opened beer cans. He passed them out, Turtle nodded to him, and he stepped back into a ready position.
    Then Timmy came back with four hot dogs. He handed one to Carlos, who dug in. He handed me mine and Rudy his, this time careful not to step between him and Dennis or Turtle. I took a bite. It was juicy and crunchy. There was mustard on one side and ketchup on the other.
    “What the fuck is this?!” Rudy barked. He threw the hot dog on the ground and mashed it with his boot. “Motherfuck. You got grease for brains? I said sauerkraut. I repeated sauerkraut, fucknut. Get me another. If you can get this one right, then I’ll bump you up to burgers.”
    Timmy spun around and headed back to the grill. I yelled over my shoulder, “You got mine right!”
    “Mine too!” added Carlos.
    When Timmy gave him his second frank, Rudy held it up and inspected it like it was a model airplane. He nodded. He took one bite and said, “Good job. You and Pops can go get some food now if you want.” Timmy and Pops walked toward the grill.
    We ate our lunch and drank our beer and talked about Bad Bob and how happy we were to have received the blessing of the Hells Angels. I said it was an honor I’d never thought I’d know. Dennis said he’d heard good things about me. Rudy said Bad Bob was a good man. Pops and Carlos and Timmy stood back, eating hot dogs and drinking beer. Cruze excused himself. Dennis said Bob wanted to meet us. We spoke generally about Laughlin and the brawl. Then we said we had to get going and thanks for the food and letting us pay our respects. Catching a little break, Turtle asked me to sign a guest banner they had strung across the back of the tent. It read HELLS ANGELS NOMADS and had a five-foot-wide Death Head in the center. The request made me smile and relax. Would an Angel vet like Turtle ask someone he didn’t like or respect to autograph club property? No, he wouldn’t. I signed it “Love and Respect, Bird, Solo Angeles Nomads.”
    I felt pretty good as I rejoined the group. That’s when Turtle asked, “Hey, guys, what the fuck with your cuts?”
    And that’s when Carlos—with some embellishments from Pops—told them our bullshit story about Cricket’s mom again.
    We owed her a roomful of roses.
       
    THE RIDE BACK to Phoenix was a joke. Rudy’s bike took a dump and we paid some guy to haul him, his gal, and his bike home; mine coughed and wheezed and wouldn’t go faster than fifty since, bike genius that I am, I’d only opened the fuel petcock halfway; and Timmy, exhausted and dehydrated, continually wretched the day’s food and drink over his shoulder onto the road. He fought through it, never complaining, but by the time we got back, his right side was covered in dried-up chunks of hot dog.
    We regrouped at task force headquarters, a place we called the Pumpkin Patch, or just the Patch, on account of the Solo Angeles pumpkin-orange colors. It was a one-story warehouse in a metro Phoenix industrial park. The surrounding businesses included furniture companies and small software firms. We had an office up front that never had a secretary in it, and behind that, through a nondescript door, was operations. A dozen desks, twice as many computer terminals, a couple offices, a conference room, and a loading bay where we’d end up spending a lot of time tinkering with our lame-ass ATF bikes. An overused kitchenette and bathroom. Posters of pinup girls and a whole wall devoted to my college football career, which the other agents made endless fun of. We had space for a suspect matrix—basically a wall of photos and names—and stations for evidence processing and a safe. Over the course of the following year, the Patch would become the closest thing to home many of us had.
    Timmy cleaned up, Slats made coffee, and then we debriefed. Two main things came up. First, we had to put