Beard Mode (The Dixie Warden Rejects MC Book 1) Read online

  Text copyright ©2017 Lani Lynn Vale

  All Rights Reserved

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to beards. I love you.

  Acknowledgements

  Michael Stokes, when I first got into this business, I would look at your photos in awe, promising myself that one day I would get the chance to buy one of your photos. Now I am here, and I get to have one of your photos on my cover. Thank you so much. This photo has always been one of my favorites of yours.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  ***

  ***

  ***

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  ***

  Chapter 7

  ***

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  ***

  Chapter 14

  ***

  Chapter 15

  ***

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  ***

  Chapter 18

  ***

  ***

  ***

  Chapter 19

  ***

  ***

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  ***

  ***

  Epilogue

  ***

  ***

  ***

  Flash Birth

  ***

  ***

  What’s Next?

  Other titles by Lani Lynn Vale:

  The Freebirds

  Boomtown

  Highway Don’t Care

  Another One Bites the Dust

  Last Day of My Life

  Texas Tornado

  I Don’t Dance

  The Heroes of The Dixie Wardens MC

  Lights To My Siren

  Halligan To My Axe

  Kevlar To My Vest

  Keys To My Cuffs

  Life To My Flight

  Charge To My Line

  Counter To My Intelligence

  Right To My Wrong

  Code 11- KPD SWAT

  Center Mass

  Double Tap

  Bang Switch

  Execution Style

  Charlie Foxtrot

  Kill Shot

  Coup De Grace

  The Uncertain Saints

  Whiskey Neat

  Jack & Coke

  Vodka On The Rocks

  Bad Apple

  Dirty Mother

  Rusty Nail

  The Kilgore Fire Series

  Shock Advised

  Flash Point

  Oxygen Deprived

  Controlled Burn

  Put Out

  I Like Big Dragons Series

  I Like Big Dragons and I Cannot Lie

  Dragons Need Love, Too

  Oh, My Dragon (April 2017)

  The Dixie Warden Rejects

  Beard Mode

  Fear the Beard (3-30-17)

  Son of a Beard (4-27-17)

  Prologue

  Scooters are for men who prefer to feel wind on their vagina.

  -Bumper Sticker

  Aaron

  “You ready for this, man?” Truth asked me.

  I turned to Truth and glared.

  “Why are you called Truth again?” I asked him.

  He grinned. “I don’t know.”

  I rolled my eyes. The man did know, he just didn’t want to tell me. “Whatever,” I spat. “That’s just despicable.”

  Truth laughed and slapped me on the back.

  “Come on, fucker. You know you’re ready for our brand of crazy.” Truth tugged on my leather jacket, and I followed him. Reluctantly.

  I was always reluctant when it came to crowds nowadays.

  I lifted my fingers and ran the tips over my burned, scarred face.

  Fucking bitch.

  I can’t believe I let her do that to me.

  So stupid!

  Even now, a year and a half later, I was still kicking my own ass.

  Should’ve taken my mom up on the offer to stay in her house, hundreds of miles away years ago. Gotten away from my crazy now ex-wife before she went all psycho and fucked up my awesome life.

  “You coming?” Truth pushed.

  I nodded my head, took a deep breath, and walked into the hall with the rest of The Dixie Wardens.

  Taking a look around, I pasted on a fake half-smile and became the newest patched-in member of The Dixie Wardens MC-Alabama Chapter. Also known as The Dixie Warden Rejects.

  Chapter 1

  I’m just going to put an ‘out of order’ sticker on my forehead and call it a day.

  -E-card

  Aaron

  10 months later

  “New guy,” someone muttered behind me.

  I turned only my head to find Stone, the president, staring at me with hard eyes.

  “Yeah?” I asked him, dropping my bag on the floor and heading in his direction instead of out the door like I’d originally intended.

  “You’re here because you have a special set of skills that we need,” the leader of our band of misfits, Stone, drawled.

  I nearly laughed.

  “That sounds like a line out of a bad movie,” I muttered, wondering where he was going with this.

  He tossed me a glare and then yelled.

  “Truth!” Stone yelled. “Ghost! Get the fuck in here!”

  Ghost and Truth walked in the door at the same time, both of them turning to the side to walk through the standard sized doorway. Neither one of them gave up their ground and let the other go first.

  The moment they were inside, they both stared at Stone.

  “Ghost, hold Truth down so New Guy can give him the fuckin’ shot,” Stone grumbled.

  Ghost tackled Truth and wrestled him to the desk, then sat on him while Stone leaned back and watched.

  “No, motherfucker!” Truth yelled. “I don’t want it!”

  “It’s the fuckin’ flu shot, you dumb shit. Not a fuckin’ tracking device. Take a fuckin’ chill pill,” Stone grumbled, staring at the scuffle that was going down in front of him.

  I picked up the syringe from the table, similar to the one I’d used to give everyone else their flu shots with, and stabbed it into the meat of Truth’s arm.

  Truth bellowed in rage, and I flipped the guard up on the syringe before tossing it into the trash can.

  “Done?” I asked Stone. “I have to get to work.”

  Stone nodded.

  “Yeah, thanks.” He nodded. “Have fun at the nuthouse.”

  I grunted something unintelligible, causing him to laugh.

  “Don’t sound so excited,” he laughed.

  I flipped him off and walked out the door just as Ghost was letting Truth up.

  “Why you gotta be such a big motherfucker?” Truth growled. “If you’d been anyone else, I’d have gotten aw
ay.”

  “Why do you think I called Ghost instead of anyone else?” I heard Stone’s amused reply.

  I snorted and headed to the bag of trash that I’d abandoned, but stopped to fish out my phone from my pocket when I felt it start vibrating.

  “Hello?” I answered as I picked my bag up once again and started heading out for my bike.

  “Yo, fucker,” Booth, my brother, snapped. “When are you coming home?”

  I snorted. “I’m not.”

  “You are, too. Or I’ll fucking drag you here,” he countered. “You can’t miss the birth of my kid. I’d hate you forever.”

  I chuckled. “She have the baby yet?”

  “Not yet,” he said. “Soon. Maybe as early as next week if it doesn’t happen before then. Monday at nine they are inducing her whether she’s ready or not.”

  I swallowed as I thought about going back to the same hospital I’d spent a lot of shitty days in, and shook my head. “I’ll be there. What time? It’s not going to happen right off the bat.”

  “I don’t know,” he grunted. “Be here midafternoon.”

  I tossed the bag of garbage in the dumpster as I continued on my way to my bike.

  “I’ll be there. Kiss Masen for me,” I ordered as I straddled my bike.

  “Will do,” he promised. “See you soon.”

  Booth hung up and I pocketed my phone.

  “Brother again?” Ghost asked.

  I turned to find the creepy fucker directly behind me.

  “Yeah,” I confirmed. “Why?”

  He shook his head.

  “Only time we see you smile is when you’re on the phone with him or his wife,” he said, sounding all philosophical and shit. “Just wondering.”

  With that he walked away, disappearing around the side of the clubhouse as if he’d never been there at all.

  Leaving me to drive all the way to the prison, wondering what in the hell had just happened.

  Had I just made a friend?

  Ghost was one to talk. I didn’t think I ever saw him smile either.

  ***

  “’Bout time you got here,” Tyson grumbled. “This has been the shittiest day from hell.”

  I snorted.

  “Tell me how you really feel,” I mumbled, putting my lunch in the fridge and headed to the desk where Tyson was still kicked back and watching TV.

  “I just did,” he groaned and dropped his feet. “There were fights early this morning.”

  “There are fights every day,” I countered.

  I worked in a minimum-security prison with felons. Felons who had medical conditions that prevented them from being housed with the other criminals in general population, otherwise known as genpop.

  Did that mean they couldn’t fight? Hell no.

  They fought constantly, and if I had to guess, it was even more than normal felons seeing as these guys were treated like little toddlers who couldn’t get around.

  “This day was different, and it’s visiting hour in thirty minutes, so it should be nice and fun for you,” he laughed.

  I rolled my eyes.

  Visiting hours usually meant that one or two fights would break out over something stupid.

  “Fucking wonderful,” I muttered.

  Once I secured all of my belongings in my locker, I walked to the oldest time clock in creation and clocked in, dropping my time card in my slot beside the clock itself.

  “What time do you get off?” I asked.

  “As soon as Richards gets here…speak of the devil.” Tyson stood so fast his face went white.

  “What was that about?” Richards grumbled as he walked past everyone.

  “I’m ready to blow this hellhole,” Tyson informed everyone as he walked to the time clock. “This place is a fucking nuthouse today, and it’s not even nine in the morning.”

  Tyson and Richards were guards, while I was a medic.

  I didn’t have to go out and do the dangerous stuff like they did. No, I got to stay in the infirmary, watching television and doing whatever the hell I wanted, while they had to break up the fights and got their toes run over by wheelchairs.

  “Yay,” Richards said as he closed his locker. “Exactly what I needed today.”

  I ignored the rest of their conversation and went directly to the infirmary to relieve the other medic, an older gentleman named Hoss.

  “Hey, Hoss,” I called as I made my way into the room. “You’re free.”

  Hoss stood, grinning.

  “Thank God,” he mumbled. “Tyson tell you this place was a freakin’ madhouse?”

  I nodded my head.

  “He did,” I confirmed.

  “Well, good luck to you,” he called. “I hope your day won’t be as exciting as mine.”

  I hoped not, too.

  However, shit like that rarely worked out.

  And I was right.

  Four hours later, I was standing in the middle of chaos.

  “You have to do something for her!” the little boy screamed.

  “I will,” I muttered. “Stop screaming in my ear and let me look at her.”

  The little boy backed off only far enough that I could get down to my knees in front of the woman.

  A woman who was exceptionally beautiful… and, as it turned out, also my neighbor.

  “What happened?” I asked quietly, pulling back the bandage so I could get a better look at the source of all the blood that was covering her blouse.

  The woman stared at me with apprehension.

  “Rod didn’t mean to do it,” she informed me.

  Sure he didn’t.

  “Just tell me what happened,” I ordered.

  “I tripped over him and hit my head on the table,” she lied.

  I rolled my eyes.

  Sure she did.

  “You don’t believe me?” she asked, guessing by the look on my face.

  “I believe you,” I lied.

  She harrumphed, and I had to hide my smile.

  She was a cute little thing. However, every time she looked at me her face would get all scrunched up…kind of like it was doing now.

  She was a pixie.

  Short, small-statured, with a cute bob of blonde hair, she was everything that I wouldn’t go for.

  I would chew her up and spit her out.

  Her breasts, though…those didn’t fit with her tiny body. No, they were more fitting for a freakin’ Victoria’s Secret ad.

  Not that I was looking at her breasts…or the way the blood from her head wound dripped down between those beautiful specimens.

  “I’m fine, promise,” the woman lied.

  “Can you tell me your name?” I asked, bringing out my pen light and shining it in her eyes.

  “Yes,” she replied stiffly.

  I resisted the urge to laugh. Barely.

  “What is your name?” I repeated.

  “Imogen,” she responded reluctantly. “And let me go ahead and say that I’m a twenty-nine-year-old female interested in men. Single. The month is June. It’s one oh three in the afternoon…What else do you want to know?”

  My mouth twitched. “I definitely don’t remember age and sexual orientation being in my paramedic training as the litmus test to ascertain whether or not the patient is alert and oriented.”

  She glared.

  “I was trying to show you that I was in control of all my faculties,” she growled defensively.

  “I can put a couple stitches in this, but so can the hospital. Up to you,” I told her.

  “She doesn’t want you to hurt her!” the kid cried loudly.

  “Shhh,” Imogen held up her hand. “If it’s free, you’re more than welcome to poke me all you want.”

  Oh, I wanted to poke her all right…just not with anything that even remotely resembled a needle.

  But that wouldn’t work.

  I’d sworn off women. Especially ones that smelled lik
e commitment.

  “I can do it.” I stood and held out my hand. “Follow me to the infirmary.”

  The kid stiffened. “I’m going to stay here and talk to Dad…okay?”

  “Absolutely not,” Imogen declared, holding out her hand. “You’re not staying with him. Ever.”

  It was so final that even I knew not to try to change her mind. It was the words of finality delivered in the motherly ‘don’t even think about it, mister’ tone that women used when addressing their children—the one that told them that there would be hell to pay if they chose to disobey.

  The kid growled.

  “I am staying, whether you want me to or not!” the kid snapped.

  My jaw about hit the floor when he turned on his heel and started heading back for the man that I knew for fucking certain had done something to Imogen.

  “You will get back here, or I’ll never bring you back again,” Imogen snapped.

  The man, who wasn’t familiar to me since he’d never been to the infirmary before, hissed. “You can’t do that,” he said at the same time the kid screamed. “You can’t do that!”

  “I can, and I will,” she confirmed. “You are my charge until Clarabelle is back from deployment. You will act like a civil human being, or I’ll ground you and take your Xbox away.”

  The kid’s eyes narrowed.

  Before he could say something stupid, though, I interrupted.

  “You need to stop throwing a fit and get your act together, young man,” I pointed out, startling him. “This young lady is bleeding and could be suffering blood loss. I know damn well and good that you’re old enough to understand that she is hurt. So stop being a twit and get a move on so I can fix her up.”

  The kid’s face went red with embarrassment while the man’s face went red with anger.

  “Don’t go,” the man said to his kid, holding his hand out.

  When I noticed the kid hesitate, I said a few simple words.

  “Don’t bite the hand that feeds you,” I stated plainly.

  The kid, who appeared to be smart, showed he was smarter when he ignored his father and came straight for his aunt.

  “Let’s go,” he ordered. “If we hurry, then we can come back.”

  “Wrong,” I said. “He won’t be brought back out twice.”

  The woman had the nerve to elbow me as we walked down the hallway.

  Richards, who’d witnessed the entire debacle, pressed a button and opened up the bars that would allow us entrance to the infirmary.