IN A REALLY screwed-up sort of way, outlaw motorcycle gangs mirrored the Boy Scouts. The bikers earned patches to wear on their cuts, their denim vests. Each patch or “rocker” symbolized an accomplishment they’d achieved. Dirty, ugly achievements like having sex with a cadaver, armed robbery, rape, murder, and even assaulting a police officer.
Two of the young Visigoths wore new cuts without any patches. They had everything to prove. The older one with the long brown hair, his cut hung heavy with soiled patches, supervised the other two. He would bear witness to their accomplishments. The young ones would want to make a good show for the older one, and that made the situation that much more dangerous.
They all got off the bikes and stood in a group. The CHP officer stayed too long in her car calling out the stop. If she wanted any chance at all of controlling the situation, she needed to get out right away and start giving orders before the Goths had time to develop a plan and work up their nerve. Patrol tactics 101.
I got out and moved around to the shoulder and stayed by the rental.
The CHP got out. She looked to be about five-one or -two and weigh a hundred and twenty-five with all her equipment on.
The old biker with the dirty brown hair and one of the young ones looked white-Caucasian, but overly tanned to the point of looking Hispanic. The third one took his helmet off to show curly red hair. He wore his gunfighter handlebar mustache bushy and untamed against a dark complexion. He didn’t look ugly like the other two; his angular features and his freckles made him handsome in a boyish kind of way. He displayed an innocence that didn’t jibe with his costume or with the men with whom he rode. All three stood at least six feet and weighed in at a buck-eighty at a minimum. Any one of them, alone, would be a handful for the officer.
As soon as she got to the front of the patrol car, the group of bikers started to move on her. She froze, hand on her gun, and pointed with her other hand. “Please step to the shoulder of the road.” Over the roar of the traffic on the freeway, I could barely hear her.
Hundreds of cars zipped by, all those drivers unaware of the disaster unfolding on the side of the freeway.
The bikers didn’t obey but instead continued to step closer to her. I didn’t have any doubt. They were going to take her on. I ran a few steps up to the side of her car. The older biker saw me and hesitated. The young bucks followed suit and stopped. The CHP officer chanced it, took her eyes off her threat to look at what had caused the bikers to react.
I held up four fingers and mouthed the words “Code-Four?” to let her believe that I was a cop, and at the same time ask if she was okay.
She barely moved her head, indicating she wasn’t Code-Four, the fear plain in her eyes yet not in her expression. I moved up to the front of the patrol car and stood three feet from her, about six feet from the bikers.
She yelled to the bikers, “I won’t tell you again, step to the shoulder of the road, and I want to see some ID.”
The two young bikers looked at the older one for guidance. The older one locked eyes with me. “Who the hell are you?”
“I’m just the guy standing here on the side of the road, trying to keep you honest.”
“You better step off, nigger. You don’t want any part of this.”
I shifted my footing, taking a combative stance. “Not gonna happen.”
“Move to the side of the road. Do it now,” the officer said.
No one moved for a long, fat moment.
Then the old lion took a step toward us, his hand on the side of his belt under his cut.
“He’s got a ball-peen,” I said. “I saw him use it on the VW.”
“I know, I saw it, too.” She drew her gun and pointed it at him center mass. “Show me your hands. Do it now. Do it right now.” Her other hand moved down to the top of her radio and pushed the red emergency button. Her action changed the whole game. Now every cop in a twenty-mile radius would be responding Code-Three to assist her.
Except that we stood on the side of a busy freeway without easy access, not with all the traffic. Backup would take longer than normal.
Too many cops would arrive in minutes. When they came on scene, they’d ask for my ID. One of them would surely recognize me from all the bulletins put out over the last two years. The FBI wanted me for kidnapping and various other felonies. I’d walked head-on into a no-win situation. I couldn’t leave and I really needed to get out of there.
The older biker smirked at the officer. “What, the split tail’s got the balls to drop the hammer on me? I don’t think so. Take her, Dirk.”
The young one called Dirk hesitated, then leapt forward, hands outstretched, shoulder down. I took two quick steps to intervene, planted my feet, and gave him a roundhouse right. He saw it coming, dodged a little, but not enough. My fist struck right on his ear and skull and vibrated up my arm. I followed with a quick uppercut to his chin that landed solid, jammed his teeth together, and mashed his lips. He stumbled, shaken to his core. He went to one knee to shrug it off.
The older biker, at the same time, took hold of the young redheaded biker and shoved him into the fray. Both junior bikers acted as cover so he could make his move on the officer.
The redheaded biker shoved hard into me. My footing ended up out of position from the punches I’d just thrown. He hit me at waist level. I backpedaled. We landed on the hood of the car, his chin close to mine, his breath minty fresh. He flailed his arms, trying to slug me, inexperienced. I took hold of his ear and pulled with everything I had, while I watched, helpless to intervene, as the older biker made his move on the officer.
The older biker swung the ball-peen high and wide. The officer, distracted for a brief moment with the fight on the hood of her unit, saw the assault too late. The hammer came down on her arm, the one holding the gun. The bone snapped with a crack. The gun flipped in the air. The older biker watched it as it fell to the ground. If he got to the gun, the bad guys would win with smoke and blood and two broken bodies left to die on the side of the road.
I kneed the redheaded biker in the belly again and again as I yanked on his ear.
The officer yelled, not in pain but in anger over the loss of her weapon. She charged, shoving forward, her head down, her good arm cradling the shattered one. She torpedoed her head right into the older biker. He saw the move, chuckled, and sidestepped her. He swung the hammer again and caught her on the back of the head.
She dropped to the ground face-first, absolutely still. Her breath puffed the dirt.
I shoved the kid off me and dove for the gun down in the grit and broken asphalt.