Page 38 of Fury
In front of me, the procession stopped, a crowd gathering around the hole in the ground. The mud was slippery underneath me, countless footsteps over soggy grass and saturated ground, making the footing treacherous, particularly for heels. And that heel sunk. Fast. I teetered, losing my balance, keeling over to one side, my arms flailing, hands finding nothing to hold as air slipped through my fingers. The grip on my upper arm hurt, but it didn’t falter. Another arm scooping me around the waist and pulling me upright.
“Steady there, lass.” The accent was thick Geordie, but it was almost as if someone had rounded the vowels off a bit more, softened it. “Wouldn’t want Fury’s lass rolling around in that mud. Someone’s head would roll.”
“Fury’s lass?”
“Aye. Don’t take a genius to work it out.”
“What? How? I don’t even know you?” I stuttered pathetically.
“Knew it.” He smiled like he’d won a competition.
“I’m sorry, you are…?”
“Viking.”
“That’s your surname?”
“Everyone knows me as the Viking. Or V.” The man shrugged, an arrogant smile pulling at his lips.
“You’re one of these Northern Kings, then?”
The blond biker shook his head.
“No. I’m not one of them.” But he offered no further explanation. And no further words. Turning his head to watch the coffin lowered into the ground, his face passive, not emotionless, but no one emotion discernible.
“Nice to meet you, Heidi,” he blurted. “Gotta go.”
“What? It’s not finished.”
But he was metres away from me already, an unmarked black biker jacket moving further and further into the distance.
I watched him go, disappearing bit by bit, people moving around me as the rain fell again. A drizzle at first, intermittent heavier drops threatening us with the main event. The air had grown colder, the very first gusts of a wind whipping around my legs, driving the mizzle at me.
“Thank you for coming, doll,” his voice was the quietest I’d ever heard it. No commanding arrogance. No hint of any other undertones.
“I…err…you’re welcome. Fischer Family Funerals would like to offer their condolences.”
His lips pushed together, a flash of darkness across his face, but lifting as quickly as a passing cloud in gale force winds.
“It was a good funeral,” he murmured. “As funerals go.”
I squeezed the hand that lay at his side, his skin cold to the touch.
“They’re never easy, are they?”
“No doll, they’re not.”
I wanted to frown at him for the words he used. Tell him never to call me that again, but I bit my tongue, my eyes focused on his, at the sadness that swirled deep within them. He’d never shown me that before. Always the boyish charm, or pure unadulterated biker jerk. But right now, he was sad, and vulnerable, and the most handsome man I had ever set eyes on. Fuck.
The first engine started up. A gentle roar from where we stood. But suddenly they all started in unison, the collective of growling engines sending the roosting crows up into the air in panic.
“We’re going back to the clubhouse for the wake,” Fury half-shouted, raising his voice to battle with the deafening tone of the engines. “You should come.”
“No. Thank you. Lots of work to do.”
I smiled faintly. Fury’s face did nothing at all. Not the slightest flinch of a reaction. Instead, he nodded and turned away from me. And this time, I watched the badge on the back of the bike jacket. The three crowned skulls laughing defiantly at me as he left.
My heel sunk again, and I wobbled. But now I was alone in the middle of a graveyard, with no one to catch me. Sticking my arms out to the sides, I pulled carefully, releasing my heel and tiptoeing across the mud until I safely made the concrete beyond. The carpark was abandoned, the last car pulling out onto the road and the rumble of bikes completely gone. I needed to get back to work and there was no way I was walking even to the main road in these heels. I glanced down at the black patent leather, the edges now smeared with mud and strands of grass. Fuck.