Tank
Chapter 1
Kirsty
2017
“Seriously? Are you kidding me right now?” I growled over the phone to the woman who had denied me yet another job. “You are supposed to be a consultant. You told me you wanted me as you had hundreds of clients and not many technicians. How has that changed in only a few months?” Karen stuttered on the phone. “Well, Miss Brooks, our clients aren’t needing as many technicians as they did when I first met you.” “When I first met you, you promised that if I signed up with your agency, you will have work for me daily. I’ve had 2 days in 3 months. That isn’t acceptable. I graduated top of my class from MIT. I am the best computer technician you will ever see. If your clients” I held my hands up and made quotations with my fingers, knowing damn well she couldn’t see, but just needing emphasis, you know? “knew about me, I can assure you, they would want me. I don’t think you are telling your clients about me though because you want me to stay at your agency. Well anyway, I don’t care. Take me off your books, I’m done working for you.” I hung up the phone with a tap of my finger. Not as liberal as hanging up used to be when you could literally slam the phone down, but whatever.
I sank back down on to the floor, noting the pile of ‘final notices’ that kept landing at my door every morning. What the hell would I do now? I was assured that with my qualifications and references, I would have my pick of any job I wanted. That didn’t happen though. I met Karen during a job fair through college. I graduated MIT last year, as I said before, top of my class.
I grew up in Ohio. I had the perfect family, my momma, daddy and big sister, Hannah. Then one day, when I was 7, my mom just up and left. I had no idea she was unhappy. My daddy started drinking all the time to get over my mom leaving. He was awful when he drank. He would blame my sister and I for my mom leaving, after about 2 years, my daddy started to hit us. We never had food in the house, and we were hungry all the time. Teachers started commenting, asking why we were so skinny. Nobody stepped in though. One of Hannah’s teacher used to bring in extra sandwiches for us both every day when she realized we didn’t bring food to school. She then made sure to fill in the forms for us to get school dinners.
Hannah left school when she was 16 and I was 11. She didn’t go to college because she needed a job to feed us. Nobody would hire a kid who dropped out of school though, so she ended up selling herself. I didn’t find this out until I was 15 and it was too late. My beautiful big sister had to sell herself to men to put money on our table because my useless fuck of a father couldn’t keep a job and would rather spend his benefits on drink than he would food to feed his kids. Hannah was struggling. She was 17, and broke. One of her clients introduced her to heroin. She ended up being addicted to the shit. She died when she was only 19 of a heroin overdose. I was 14 and lost the last person on the planet who actually gave a shit about me.
I left home shortly after that. My fuck head of a father didn’t even care when the police came to inform us of Hannah’s death. I couldn’t live there anymore. I moved out shortly after, preferring to live on the streets than with him.
That was where I met Eric. I was 16 and been living on the streets for almost 2 years. He was 19, so a little older than I was. We had a lot in common as he was homeless for a few years, after leaving home after his mom’s abusive boyfriend beat him badly when he was 15.
Eric met a man when he was 16, who helped him turn everything around, he gave him somewhere to live, paid for him to get set up. Eric then found a job and decided to study in the meantime. He was now a computer technician. Eric invited me to stay with him, at first, I thought he wanted me to have sex with him, but that wasn’t the case. Eric was just kind. He would come back to the tent I lived in every day. He would bring me soup, sandwiches, bottles of water and hygiene products. I started to trust him. He didn’t want anything from me. One day, he invited me to stay with him. I would live with him for 1 year and get my life sorted, I would get a job and study in the meantime.
I found a job at the local mini market and studied to be a computer tech like he was. I used to enjoy working on the computers in school before I dropped out. Eric would let me use his computer when I wasn’t working, and he would help me. We grew closer and then one night, he kissed me. We started a relationship, and it wasn’t long before I lost my virginity to him. We fell in love and everything was perfect. Then he had a visit from his mom. She had finally dumped the abusive boyfriend and needed Eric’s help getting back on her feet. He decided to move back to Florida, where he was from, to help her. He gave me the apartment, but I couldn’t stay there without him.
So that’s my back story. I could dwell on it and be ‘woe is me’ but I won’t. Living on the streets taught me how to be resilient, it taught me survival skills that I would never have had. I never witnessed any murders or rape, and I met a lovely bunch of people who genuinely cared about me. I decided to apply for college. I took all the exams I had missed in high school, on an online course, and passed them all with high marks. I applied for some of the best schools and local community colleges too, just in case I wasn’t accepted into one of the top schools. It was a few weeks later when I was accepted to MIT. So, I packed my stuff, moved out of the apartment, and went to live in Massachusetts. I moved back to Ohio after I finished college, aged 20.
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After dealing with Karen, I jumped online to find a job. I was desperate now. I applied for everything I could find. I was on my fourth website when an ad caught my eye. ‘Needed… a computer technician for a few hours work a week… pay to be disclosed during interviews….’ A few hours a week were barely anything, but if it helped me get some money in, then at least it would be a start. I called the number given.
“Dom speaking.”
“Hello, my name is Kirsty Brooks. I am calling regarding the advertisement on the job page?”
“Ah, hello Miss Brooks. So, what qualifications do you have?”
I told him about MIT and the agency I had been signed up for. He wanted to meet me, he wasn’t too far away from me, so we arranged a face-to-face interview for the following day.
The next day, I was travelling to the café that I was going to meet Dom at. I was wearing my black pant suit and a pair of heels. I hated heels but they looked more professional, so I had to deal with them. I found the café Dom wanted to meet me at and headed inside. Right away, I spotted him. He was sitting in the back wearing a dark suit. He looked like he was in his fifties, dark hair, greying in some places. I could see he had kind eyes. “Dom?” I asked cautiously. He stood up, greeting me with a smile. “Miss Brooks, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” He held his hand out to shake mine. “Can I get you anything to drink?” He asked, “A coffee would be lovely, thank you.” I asked. He nodded and called the waitress over. “Two coffees please.” He ordered.
“So, Miss Brooks, let me tell you a little bit about the job first and then you can tell me if it sounds like what you are looking for.” I nodded as he continued. “You will only be needed for around 3-4 hours per week. It will involve general technician work, updating servers, certifying the computer infrastructure remains updated. Just general work that we need really, everything you would have done at MIT. The pay will be $100 per hour. What do you think?”
$100 per hour? That is a lot of money!
“I’m sorry, you did say $100 an hour, right?”
He smiled, “yes I did. I know you won’t have a lot of work and we may need you more than the 3 hours a week, which is why I want to pay more per hour so you will always be available. I am basically giving you a full weekly pay just for 3 hours work.” He explained. Wow, that is a hell of a lot of money for just doing what he asks. It makes sense that he needs me at his beck and call though. “Ok, when would I start?” I asked. “In the next few weeks.” I thought about it for a few moments. What would I have to lose?
“Ok Dom, I would love to work for you.”
“Excellent,” he smiled, shaking my hand. “I will be in touch.” He stood up and left the coffee house. I finished my drink and followed him, with an extra spring in my step.
Chapter 2KirstyDom called me 2 days later with a job. I was so excited, I had prioritized my bills in order of urgency, yeah, I’m a bit of a dork. Dom explained that he would send everything over via email. He sent it over later that afternoon and I quickly got to work. I had instructions not to call him once I had finished, he would see it himself.I only had one rule to follow, do not call him. He would be in touch with me. However, if there was an emergency, I could email him and ask him to call me. I did find that a bit odd, but I just assumed it was because he was constantly busy. I still wasn’t sure what he did and what his company did either, all I knew was that my job was ridiculously easy. I was sent a name and was told to dig up as much information as I could. First name sent to me was an Owen Reed, age 38 from New Jersey.I typed the name into one of the databases I used whilst in college
Chapter 3KirstyI had decided to do the extra work with Dom, the illegal kind. I desperately needed the money, and why the hell not? The bastard who we were targeting deserved it. Dom had told me about the other guy, didn’t mention a name, but it shouldn’t be too hard to find. I needed to know he was as good as I am. After a bit of digging into Dom’s search history, I found the name Ryan Cobain from Texas. Moved to Ohio for a job, that is how he met Dom. He also worked for the prick, Jackson.It had been three weeks since we started the whole thing. It was going to be the last time tonight. Dom said he didn’t need us anymore, which was fine. He had paid me $10k every time, which meant I had $30,000 currently sitting in an untraceable account. I would be able to pay my debts off and be able to support myself whilst searching for the next job.I was sitting at my laptop, waiting patiently for the ca
Chapter 4TankIt was around 9pm when Bella, Axel’s girl, came running through the clubhouse. Axel running behind her, shouting for Ink. One of my brothers pointed to Ink’s office, he was frowning at Bella and Axels’ behavior too. I sat up straight, something was up. Bella didn’t tend to flap like this. Her and Axel barged into Ink’s office without even knocking. Whatever it was, shit was serious.Ink came to the door a few minutes later and shouted for Buzz. Buzz had been upstairs in his office and was unaware of Axel and Bella’s panic. One of my brothers went and banged on Buzz’s door to tell him Ink needed him. Buzz then entered Ink’s office too.At this point, I had enough. I was concerned, same as my other brothers. I decided to find out what the fuck was going on. I heard the bikes first. Then I heard the gate being smashed open. “Everyone get down!” Ink ye
Chapter 5TankI had been in the hospital for four weeks now. It was driving me insane. My beautiful nurse, Jenny, was on her way to speak to the doctor for me to find out when I could get out of here. Jenny was a great nurse, and she was gorgeous too. I had asked her to go out with me a few times, but she just smiled and told me that she couldn’t as I was her patient. I knew that wouldn’t last forever though, the moment I was discharged, I was making her mine.The door to my room opened, and the doctor and Jenny entered. “Mr Wright. How are you feeling?” he asked. “I’m good thanks Doc. Just wanna get outta here now.” “I understand.” He picked my file up that was at the bottom of the bed and flicked through it. “Everything in here tells me you are healed now, but I just want to do a quick examine myself before I release the discharge papers. Shall we get started?”
Chapter 6KirstyIt had been six months since Dom’s arrest. I hadn’t heard from him since. I hadn’t heard about anything since then either. I had gone back to living my life. I had spoken to Ryan about a month after, he had told me what had happened to him, that he was also arrested but released without charge too. He told me to save his number in case I ever needed him, claiming he owed me one after I ‘saved his hairy ass’ as he so eloquently put it, making me laugh.I paid off my debts as I promised myself I would, using the money I was paid for working with Dom. It took a while before I wanted to access it, and even then, I only did small amounts each time. I assumed the police would still be watching me, so I didn’t want to do anything that would make them suspicious.I finally found another legitimate job two months after Dom was arrested. I was living in an apartment half a mile a
Chapter 7 TankJulia and I had been seeing each other for a few weeks now. It was easy, fun. She would call me up on her way home from work and ask me to meet her at her place. I’d fuck her, giving her the release she desperately craved, and then I would go back home. There were no sleepovers, no cuddling, nothing. It was brilliant.I was working out in the clubhouse’s onsite gym when I heard my name being called. “Tank!” “Down in the gym!” I called back to Axel. I still smiled every time somebody called me Tank. It reminded me of my mom and dad. I was a big baby when I was born, a 9 pounder. Solid. My dad would say I was built like a tank, and its stuck with me since.Thinking of my parents made me feel down. They died a few years back in a car accident. A truck hit them, the driver of the truck had just lost control of the vehicle. There was no foul play, just a case of wrong place,
Chapter 8TankWe drove back to my place in silence. I was beyond exhausted. I needed to make sure Julia was safe from now on though. I decided to have a few hours sleep and then go to the hardware store in town to get what I needed to fix the door. I worked security at the club and knew how to make places more secure. I knew Buzz had wired his place in computers and cameras, but that didn’t stop people getting in. I kicked myself when I realized I could have stopped them. Why the fuck hadn’t I already done this?I lay in bed for an hour struggling to find sleep. My mind wouldn’t stop racing. I was blaming myself and that was the wrong thing to do. I blamed myself when Wolf died and barely got out of that guilt alive. I wouldn’t have if it weren’t for Axel and my brothers at the club. And when my parents died, I blamed myself too. Why? I have no idea, but it helped me avoid the guilt at being the on
Chapter 9KirstyThe guy Ink told me he was sending was on his way. His name is Tank. Buzz called me to tell me about Tank, he is his girlfriend’s brother and one of his best mates. He also told me what had happened to him and Julia on the night that I spoke to him, I got a rose stapled to my door again that night, so Ink doesn’t think it’s the same 3 men who have been coming after me. Besides, Ohio is over an hour away from North Carolina by air. Jackson probably hired another group of men for them. The man who wanted to fuck me, Mike, had never so much as suggested violence, and never made any threats about hurting me, he just wants to fuck me. Then again, would he turn violent when he realizes I don’t have the money.I realized I was shaking when something grabbed my attention, pulling me from my thoughts. “You Kirsty?” a southern voice drawled. I turned slowly, coming face to face with a f