‘He can’t get away with that,’ the Führer answered. ‘He’s old enough to know what the patch means to us.’
‘Someone his own size,’ Teeth said, before looking down at Dante. ‘Hey Dante, you wanna defend the club’s honour?’
Dante had sloped off to the corner of the room with Joe and was startled to find everyone looking his way. ‘Eh?’ he gawped.
Teeth ducked down beside Dante and spoke in a whisper. ‘Martin’s a head taller than you, but he’s skin and bones. You can take him easy. Will you get up there and fight for the honour of my Brigands patch?’
Dante didn’t know how to answer. Teeth was one of his favourite grown-ups and he’d normally do anything Teeth asked, but it wasn’t exactly normal for an adult to ask you to jump into a ring and beat up another kid.
Dante’s dad, Scotty, crouched down opposite Teeth.
‘We’ve got to do something to satisfy the Führer,’ Scotty explained in a whisper. ‘You know what his temper’s like. If we let him deal with Martin, the boy’s gonna end up in hospital with his skull caved in.’
Dante looked warily at Teeth. ‘So you want me to go easy on him?’
Teeth shook his head. ‘The little prick spat on my patch. He deserves some pain. I just don’t want the Führer killing him.’
Dante looked left and right at the two men he admired most in the world. ‘OK, I’ll fight him.’
Ever since his outburst, Martin had hung back at the far side of the ring looking increasingly scared. He’d seen his dad dragged off the ropes, but had no idea what was coming next until Teeth dinged the bell at ringside. By this time there were nearly forty people in the room.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Teeth shouted. ‘Following the desecration of my beloved Brigands patch by the skinny young chap now cowering on the far side of the ring, I’m pleased to say that cool heads have prevailed. The honour of defending the Brigands Motorcycle Club will be taken up by someone his own size. Namely, young Dante Scott!’
Most of the crowd was drunk and cheered noisily as Teeth lifted Dante into the ring and his dad led a chant in his name. The ring felt huge and its height gave a strange sense of isolation.
‘Kill the geek, Dante,’ Sandra shouted. ‘Smash his brains out!’
‘Put your fists up, Martin,’ Joe shouted. ‘Stop being a pussy.’
Everyone was yelling something, except poor Martin who stood on the far side of the ring with his arms at his side. Dante’s brain ran at full pelt. Two things occurred to him. First, he wasn’t wearing gloves, gumshield, or any other safety equipment and nobody had laid out any rules. Second, he thought about school and how his teacher made kids shake hands and sit together for the whole of the following lesson if they got in a fight.
Dante felt like he lived in two different worlds. The world of his mum and his teachers, where you weren’t supposed to swear or fight and always had to be nice to everyone. Then there was the Brigands’ world, where men sold drugs, stabbed snitches, got drunk, stole cars and found it perfectly acceptable to stick you in a boxing ring and tell you to beat the crap out of another kid who’d spat on a jacket.
‘Stop stalling, Dante,’ the Führer shouted. ‘Wipe the floor with the skinny prick!’
Dante stepped away from the ropes and saw Martin backing into the opposite corner of the ring. Getting cornered is the worst thing a boxer can do, but Martin had never boxed in his life and held his arms crossed meekly in front his face.
Dante closed fast and threw a punch. He was surprised by how swiftly Martin dodged and he thought – almost hoped – that the fight would be more even than everyone assumed. He followed up with a Karate kick and his trainer sank deep into Martin’s undefended stomach.
The crowd shouted wildly as Martin stumbled sideways. With everyone cheering him on, Dante got a taste of bloodlust as the older boy hit the ropes and bounced back towards him. He pounded Martin’s face and stomach before an especially satisfying blow hit the squishy part of Martin’s nose.
Blood spurted up Dante’s arm and across the front of his T-shirt as Martin’s legs gave out. The crowd was going insane and Dante felt wonderful and terrible at the same time. At the front of the crowd, Sandra was jumping up and down and screeching, ‘Kill him, kill him. Scramble his brains!’
The amount of blood was shocking, but all the cheering made Dante feel like he was king of the world. Martin was sobbing and clearly had no intention of getting up, despite a few unsympathetic souls telling him to be a man and find his feet.
Teeth symbolically held his Brigands jacket aloft and rang the bell at ringside.
‘Honour restored,’ he shouted, before looking at the Führer. ‘Are you happy with that, boss?’
The room went quiet as the Führer considered his reply. ‘My boy got what he deserved,’ he nodded. ‘I’ll settle for that.’
Teeth looked relieved as he stepped into the ring. ‘Could someone get me some ice for Martin’s nose, please?’
As Dante ducked between the ropes to leave the ring he found the Führer standing right in front of him.
‘Sweet-faced little bulldog,’ the Führer beamed, as he gave Dante a quick hug and slipped a ten-pound note into his palm. ‘You gonna wear a Brigands patch one day?’
‘Sure,’ Dante said, as the other Brigands gathered around, saying stuff like you saved the club’s honour and taking it in turns to shake his hand.
Two metres behind, Teeth had Martin sitting up. The boy’s nose dripped blood on to the wooden boards. As Teeth held a handkerchief over a split lip, Martin kept saying thank you because he knew he’d have come off far worse if his father had done the beating.
Joe chased his friend as Dante walked away from the ring, looking at the clotting blood spattered up his arm as he crossed into the deserted bar.
‘You were lethal,’ Joe said enthusiastically. ‘When my brother’s nose burst! Oh man, I wish I’d been allowed to do that!’
Dante kept walking silently, until he was out in the night air facing a line of bikes.
‘You OK?’ Joe asked uncertainly. ‘He didn’t even hit you, did he? And you got a tenner off my dad.’
‘Just shut up a minute,’ Dante said, as he tried getting his head straight. He felt really confused and if Joe hadn’t been standing there, he probably would have started crying.
2. ANIMAL
It was eleven by the time they left the clubhouse. Dante strapped on his helmet and locked arms around his dad’s waist as the V-twin engine rumbled to life. Some Brigands ran beautiful bikes with custom paint and expensive chrome components. Scotty preferred what’s known as a rat bike.
His twenty-year-old Harley-Davidson Softail had clocked 178,000 miles and was finished in matt grey, streaked with rust. The leather seat was cracked so bad you could see the springs inside and only Scotty’s love had kept it running, long past the point where it would have been cheaper to buy a replacement.
The Scott family lived amidst farmland a fifteen-minute ride from the clubhouse. Dante loved riding with his dad, especially after school pickups when he got to put on a cool leather jacket and a crash helmet while his mates clambered into people carriers. But it was two hours past bedtime, the roads were near deserted and the whole way home Dante was scared that he’d drift into sleep and fall off the bike.
Scotty didn’t want to wake his other three kids, so he cut the engine and freewheeled down his front driveway. The house got a lot less love and attention than his Harley. The driveway was badly overgrown and the kitchen light shone through a boarded window that Dante’s brother Jordan had smashed with a cricket ball several months earlier.
Scotty pulled up under a car porch next to a stack of kids’ bikes. Dante yawned as he stepped off the Harley and unbuckled his helmet.
‘Kitchen light’s on,’ Scotty said. ‘Your mum’ll be waiting in ambush. Whatever you do, don’t tell her about the fight.’
Dante raised an eyebrow as he unzipped his leather jacket. ‘I know, Dad, I’m not stup
id.’
‘Oh!’ Scotty blurted as he saw the dried blood all over Dante’s T-shirt. ‘Take that off.’
‘It’s freezing,’ Dante complained.
‘Hurry up, before she comes out to see what we’re up to,’ Scotty said, as he put his key in the front door. Dante pulled his shirt over his head, but he had no pocket big enough to tuck it into so he threw it behind a shrub as his dad stepped into the hallway.
Dante’s mum, Carol, stood in the kitchen doorway. She wore a pink dressing gown and slippers, but a tattoo of coiled snakes ran from her ankle up to her left knee and marked her out as a biker chick.
‘Don’t give me a hard time,’ Scotty begged, giving his wife pleading eyes as Dante pushed back the front door.
Carol was angry, but kept her voice down because eleven-month-old Holly was sleeping in her parents’ room at the top of the stairs.
‘A hard time!’ she hissed. ‘You’ve got a bloody nerve. Dante’s eight years old and he’s got school in the morning. Do you know the job I’ll have getting him out of bed?’
‘I’m sorry,’ Scotty said quietly. ‘I was discussing the development deal with the Führer and it just dragged on forever.’
Dante put his foot on the bottom step.
‘Wee and teeth,’ Carol told him stiffly. ‘Then straight to bed and keep the noise down. Everyone’s asleep up there.’
‘Can I get a glass of water?’ Dante asked.
‘I’ll bring it up for you,’ Carol said. ‘And where’s your shirt?’
Dante couldn’t think of an excuse so his dad butted in. ‘He got hot running around with Joe and took his shirt off. We had a look around, but we couldn’t find it. I’ve got to go back tomorrow morning and do some work on the bike. I’ll take a proper look in daylight.’
Dante found his mum’s fluorescent pink fingernail waggling under his nose. ‘I’m fed up with you losing things, Dante. If that shirt doesn’t turn up, the replacement’s coming out of your birthday and Christmas money.’
Normally Dante would have protested, but he was so tired he could barely keep upright.
‘Goddammit, Scotty,’ Carol said, as Dante crept up the stairs. ‘Two nights a week is all I ask and you can’t even bring him home at a decent hour.’
Dante was one of four kids, and their dirty clothes and damp towels were spread thick across the scruffy little bathroom. Along with puddles on the floor were his big brother’s mud-crusted rugby kit and sixteen-year-old Lizzie’s stash of deodorants and beauty products.
After a leak and a twenty-second excursion for his toothbrush, Dante headed down a narrow hallway and quietly opened the door of the room he shared with his brother Jordan. The thirteen-year-old snored, with a foot hanging over the side of his bed and his duvet mounded over his head.
Jordan was moody and Dante was likely to get a punch if he disturbed him, so he crept towards his bed. He took off tracksuit bottoms, undies and trainers with a single sweep and slipped on a pair of pyjama bottoms before straightening his pillow and rolling under the sheets.
*
Dante woke on his back with Jordan leaning over his bed. The older boy held the curtains open and peered through the window.
‘What are you doing?’ Dante moaned sleepily as his brother’s briefs hovered above him. ‘Get your damned nuts out of my face.’
‘Do you know that car?’ Jordan asked seriously.
Dante pressed the button on his projector clock making 02:07 flicker in red on the ceiling. As he slid out from under Jordan he heard men speaking downstairs and his heart quickened when he realised they were angry.
‘Maybe it’s the police,’ Dante said edgily, as he shuffled up to the window next to Jordan and looked down on to the driveway.
There were no streetlights out here in the country, so it was usually pitch black at night, but the living-room and kitchen lights were on downstairs and enough light escaped through the blinds to illuminate the outline of a Ford Mondeo and a customised Harley Sportster.
‘That’s the Führer’s bike,’ Dante said.
Jordan shook his head. ‘He drives a Sportster but that’s not his.’
Dante took pride in knowing something his older brother didn’t. ‘It is so. Remember the Barcelona run last summer? That’s the one he took when he couldn’t get his orange one running.’
‘You’re right,’ Jordan admitted. ‘And I’ve seen that Mondeo at the clubhouse before as well.’
As the two boys peered out, blurred words from the three men downstairs came up through the floorboards.
‘I’m gonna sneak down and listen,’ Dante said as he hopped off the bed.
Jordan grabbed his arm. ‘I wouldn’t. Dad’ll go ape shit if he catches you.’
‘I’ll be casual,’ Dante said confidently, as he pointed to the shelf beside his bed with his clock and a box of tissues on it. ‘Mum never brought my water up so I’ll just say I’m thirsty.’
Jordan let go. He was fond of his little brother, but he was also curious to know what was going on and it was no big deal to him if Dante got yelled at.
‘Just be careful,’ Jordan said. ‘Don’t hang around.’
The lights were on in the hallway and bathroom. Dante crept down in socks and pyjama bottoms. By the time he reached the hallway he’d worked out that the three voices belonged to his dad, the Führer and a big hairy Brigand who everyone called Felicity because he looked like some actress in an old TV show called The Good Life.
They were arguing about the redevelopment of the clubhouse. Dante was only eight and didn’t know the ins and outs, but understood that the land on which the Brigands clubhouse was built was worth a lot of money. Some members of the chapter, led by the Führer, wanted to knock down the barns and build shops, restaurants and a block of apartments. A smaller group led by his dad said they liked the clubhouse the way it was and didn’t want to sell it.
It was risky standing at the bottom of the stairs where he’d be spotted through the archway into the living-room, so Dante moved into the kitchen. He quietly slid the toaster out of the way and leaned across the worktop to peer through the wooden slats in the serving hatch above the washing machine.
They didn’t have a separate dining-room, and his father sat at a small dining-table, the back of his head less than half a metre from Dante’s prying nose. There were documents spread across the tabletop. Felicity sat opposite, while the Führer stood up jiggling Dante’s Wrestlemania pen between his thumb and forefinger.
‘Just sign,’ the Führer said, his voice the calmest it had been since Dante awoke. ‘You’re the only one blocking this, Scotty.’
‘Bull crap,’ Scotty said, as Dante watched his head shake. ‘The vote was nine to four, two abstentions.’
‘Those guys are with you,’ the Führer said. ‘If you change, they’ll change. And the vote doesn’t matter anyway. It’s your signature that we need: president, vice-president and club secretary can authorise the land deal.’
The Führer leaned on the back of the couch and spoke louder. ‘You know how many palms I had to grease to get permission to build on that land, Scotty? Half the county council have had their houses decorated gratis; the mayor’s wife is wearing a three-K watch. All that came out of my building company, not club coffers.’
‘It’s just money with you,’ Scotty shrugged. ‘But what’s gonna happen to the club? We lose thirty years of tradition and spend three years without a clubhouse. Members will drift away, the chapter will die.’
The Führer gave Scotty the kind of silly boy look that Dante got off his Year One teacher when he poured PVA glue in his lap.
‘We’ll hire a church hall or a school gym,’ the Führer said. ‘And when the project’s finished South Devon will have the best Brigands clubhouse in the country, probably the world.’
‘The barns have got soul,’ Scotty explained. ‘Sure it’ll be swank, but you can’t buy history, you can’t buy class.’
Felicity interrupted, ‘Scotty, guys like me and Bi
g Ted need the money. We’re looking at two hundred grand for each full-patch member.’
‘Guaranteed, up front from Badger Properties,’ the Führer added. ‘Look around you Scotty. You’re living in a shithole. You can pay off your mortgage, fix this place up, buy a decent bike and still have enough left to take the kids to Disneyland or something.’
Dante had only previously heard his dad’s side of the argument: how the Führer’s plans would turn the club compound into a tourist trap, how the members would take their money and drift away. But the instant Dante heard the word Disneyland he flipped sides and wanted his dad to take the pen and sign.
But Scotty stood up and looked at his watch. ‘It’s two in the morning,’ he yawned. ‘We’ve been over this six, ten, maybe even twenty times. Everyone knows where I stand and now I’m going to bed.’
Dante grimaced as Mickey Mouse and a trip on an aeroplane vanished in a puff of smoke. Then he jolted and slid down off the cabinet as his mum crept up and touched his shoulder.
‘Nosey parker,’ she said irritably as she dragged her son towards the fridge-freezer. ‘You should be asleep. If you start up whining when you’ve got to get up for school in the morning I’ll make you damned sorry.’
Dante studied his mum’s expression. Sometimes she got so angry that you had to do exactly what she said or she’d go bananas, but he wasn’t getting that look and decided to play for sympathy.
‘I came down because you forgot to bring my glass of water.’
His mum took a tumbler out of a cabinet and slammed the door shut before filling it from the cold tap. ‘There,’ she said, as she passed it over. ‘Now scram.’
Dante reached the hallway as hell broke loose in the living-room. His dad shouted. Then the table grated across the floor and the Führer shouted back.
‘I’ve put my own sweat and money into this, Scotty. I’m not leaving this house until these papers are signed.’
‘You think you can bully me?’ Scotty screamed. ‘You don’t know me at all, do you? Get out of my house you short-arsed son of a bitch.’