Could I call my parents? Would they help?
I only wish I could, but according to Duke, they’ve washed their hands of me. While I wouldn’t give much credence to anything uttered by him, I know it’s probably the truth. I may not know the details, but Duke used me to get revenge on my father. It’s all my fault I enabled whatever had happened by being taken in by his lies. As for my mother, she swears that a marriage vow once uttered can never be rescinded. I disobeyed once, when I divorced my cheating ex, and last time I saw her, she still hadn’t forgiven me. She definitely wouldn’t approve of me leaving another man, and if she knows I’m with child, whether or not she likes Duke, she’d insist that he be involved with his child.
No, it’s too dangerous. I can’t take the risk they’ve disowned me as their daughter and can’t rely on them to protect me from him.
“Sapphire, may I speak plainly?”
Lost in my thoughts, it takes a moment for me to realise I’m being addressed. Awkwardly turning my head, I focus on the nurse.
“Your husband did this, didn’t he?” Her lips are pressed tightly together.
“It was a mugging.” I parrot what I’ve been told to say.
She grimaces and ignores me. “If it was your husband, I can get you help.”
I’m already expecting a visit from the cops and I know better than to tell them something other than what Duke had suggested. He’s got some of their rank in his pocket. He boasts often enough about that, and how he could literally get away with murder.
“No one can help me.” I turn my head back the other way, not wanting her to see the tears of defeat in my eyes. Anyone offering assistance is likely to go the same way as Jude. Even if I could make an official complaint about him, he’d have to be convicted and put away if I were going to be safe. They might arrest Duke, but they wouldn’t arrest his brothers, and they, protecting their VP, would do whatever it took to stop me from testifying against him.
The nurse, though, isn’t put off by my dismissal. “There’s a group I’ve heard of that helps women like you get away. Women who can’t involve the authorities.”
“It was a mugging,” I stubbornly repeat.
“Sapphire. Your man was wearing his cut. He’s one of the Crazy Wolves. I’ve heard the rumours, hell everyone around here has. I can well understand why you don’t want to go to the police, but please, trust me, there is a way out.”
With embryonic hope, I turn back to her. “You’re taking a risk if you help me.”
She shrugs. “I won’t be doing anything but putting you in touch with the Freedom Trail. I’m sure, if they can, they’ll get you out of here.”
The Freedom Trail? I’ve never heard of them. But what could they do? “I’ve no time for anything to be arranged. And if they helped me escape, what then?” I’d still need to be in a hospital, and being moved to a different one wouldn’t help. Duke would still find me. Crazy they might be, but one asset to the club is a disgraced ex-fed, whose computer skills can find anybody.
“Just leave that to them.” The nurse is not at all put off. “If they help you, you’d be given a new identity. You’d be moved far away, and Sapphire Marshall wouldn’t exist anymore. You’d have a fresh start. Both you and your baby.”
I don’t allow myself to get excited, but I’d be lying if her words don’t give me hope and something to think about other than the desolation of my situation. There could be a way out? My eyes widen as the idea settles in my head. “Are you sure they’d help me?”
“Honey, you’re one of the worst cases I’ve ever seen. You don’t have to tell me this isn’t the first time he’s beaten you. You’re covered with scars and healed broken bones. They’ll help you, I’m certain.”
“He’s going to come for me tomorrow,” I warn her.
The short timescale doesn’t seem to put her off. “Then we’ll need to be quick. Please say yes, honey.”
Just one nod, one little rise and dip of my head, and that’s all it takes for her to beam at me.
As she disappears without delay, presumably to kick-start arrangements, I start to daydream about having help to get away. I don’t give a damn about changing my name or my whole identity. As long as Duke’s nowhere close, I’ll be free.
How could this work? I’m in no state to be moved. Not even by Duke. Under normal circumstances, a patient would expect the medical staff to explain my condition to concerned relatives, and said relatives would agree, the hospital was the best place for me. But Duke’s never been described as normal. Come morning, I know he’ll arrive and take me away. My future will comprise of little more than a cell and whatever medical care he deems necessary, and that only being provided by prospects again. Prospects who’ll have witnessed Jude’s demise and know better than to become friendly.
Don’t get your hopes up, I tell myself. I’m out of my mind if I think I can escape.
But I’ve got to try.
And do it despite the pain I’m in. What’s far worse is the worry about the new life I still can’t believe is growing inside me, and what would happen if Duke ever found out about his impending fatherhood. Either of his possible reactions would have horrific consequences. Like before, he might kick the baby out of me, or he’ll decide it’s time to be a dad, and look forward to having an heir. A child I wouldn’t put past him to take away from me.
What’s certain is I’ll be little more than an incubator, having no influence on how my child grows. A son would be groomed to follow in his footsteps, a daughter, well, her future would depend on how best she could be used. My baby, like me, would be nothing but his property.
If this Freedom Trail offers a way out, I have to take it. Alone, I’ve no chance, even if I wait until I’ve healed. I’ve been trying to escape Duke for five years, but he’s never given me sufficient freedom to make a successful attempt. When I’m allowed off compound, I’m always escorted.
If he takes me back, it will only be a matter of time until he puts his fists on me again. Now I definitely can’t risk it, not least because I know I’m only alive as they decided to help me. Only a few more minutes without the correct treatment, and I might have died. But most of all, I now have a baby to think of. A child who could be killed along with me.
The cops come to see me, but like Duke had instructed, I lie. It was a mugger. They took my bag. No, I didn’t know who, they came up behind me. Something inside was crying out for the cops to see through my lies, but if they did, if that was a glimmer of doubt I saw in their eyes, they dismissed it as a domestic dispute between husband and wife.
After them, a stranger comes to visit me, a middle-aged woman, whose eyes are sharp. In soft tones she explains what using the Freedom Trail will mean. I’ll be unable to have contact with friends or family or anyone from my current life. No problem, I reassure her easily. Duke’s kept me isolated. I’ve had no contact with friends for five years, and any which I thought would show pity for me, I wouldn’t risk putting up against the man I so foolishly married.
I’ve been lonely throughout my ill-fated marriage. I can cope with more now. To only worry about myself, to be able to concentrate on growing my baby, seems a luxury to me.
When she leaves, satisfied with my response, I wonder how my disappearance will be accomplished. Whether I’ll be caught. Whether Duke will get wind of my plans. Whether he’ll turn up and kill those trying to help me.
In the end, my worries were in vain. It goes smoothly, showing I’m certainly far from the first person they’ve helped. I’m moved in the dead of night. On a gurney, I am wheeled out of the hospital and into an ambulance. It’s not the normal type, but one painted black.
Doped up on painkillers, I’m only vaguely aware of the apology that I’m being transported in the same way as they would a corpse.
I pass out for most of the journey, and when I come too, see sunlight streaming through windows of yet another hospital. It’s light and airy, and I take it as a premonition, a sign my future is looking bright.
Duke must be out of his mind with rage, but I don’t want it confirmed. I know he’ll desperately be trying to find me. A man like him won’t let his property go lightly. But the image of him, tearing the hospital apart in an effort to find me, I try to wipe from my mind. He’ll be beyond furious.
My fear he’ll succeed taints my sense of victory, and the stress can’t be good for the baby. I try hard to chase all thoughts of my possible failure and his likely success out of my mind, putting my faith in the group of people who assure me, they’ve successfully liberated people like myself before.
Determined I’ll do nothing to rock the boat, I do everything they ask, follow every instruction to the letter just to make sure that I and my baby are safe.
Do I feel remorse it will never know its father? Hell no. I’ll make up some excuse, some fiction, whatever light it paints me in, having already decided father unknown will be written on the birth certificate. I’d rather be thought a whore than leave a trail for anyone to follow.
I’m Sapphire Marshall no longer.
Saffie was the name I used to go by until I became a precocious teen and insisted on everyone using my full name. Even my parents never refer to me by my childhood nickname, and Duke’s never heard it. I suppose there’s some comfort when I hear it used after so many years, some sense of returning to a time when things were easy, and I’d felt safe. When my only worry was would I be forced to eat peas yet again, where I’d misplaced my favourite toy, or whether the teacher would yell at me for forgetting my homework. Everything was so much simpler before I became an adult.
Jones is my new surname, something so common it’s hard to be traced.
It takes two weeks for me to become fit enough to cope with what lies ahead. When I’m asked where I’d like to be located, I don’t much care, but if the choice was mine, I’d prefer California. Safe, warm and vibrant, or so my tortured mind paints it to be.
The Freedom Trail is a well-oiled machine and take pains with preparing me for my new life ahead. I’ve become well versed in the use and exchange of passwords to make sure anyone helping me on my way are who they say they are. I listen carefully, ultra-cautious—it isn’t just me in this now.
Finally, armed with only a small suitcase of donated clothes, I travel across country partly chauffeured by strangers in cars, and then left to my own devices to complete my journey by Greyhound, mysteriously finding tickets ready at every stage, and arrive at my final destination with my new ID and details in hand.
Somehow, miraculously, it had all gone to plan, and I successfully found my way to San Diego where I got into a cab and headed for my new address.
My apartment is small, clean and nice—a perfect place to stay and bring up my child. I’ve also been set up with a job, one suitable for skills I don’t possess. I’d gone from my parents to a marriage where I was a trophy wife, and from there, lived off my settlement until I’d met Duke. I’d never worked in my life. Although I think I must be capable of something better, stocking supermarket shelves is about all I’m qualified for.
It’s when I compare the amount on my paycheck to the rent that I need to pay, I realise I should have insisted on going to a cheaper state. How could I prepare for the birth of my baby while putting food on the table and a roof over my head? Skimping on food isn’t an option. I have to think of the new life inside me.
It isn’t long before I realise that if I’m to buy the vitamins and healthy food that’s recommended to nurture my child, I have to move to save money. In the back of my mind, I think having an address not even the Freedom Trail know of might add an extra layer of protection. I’m constantly terrified that Duke will find me, unable to shake the impending sense of doom.
Of course, cheap is never perfect and I know the place where I end up isn’t the ideal situation. It’s cheap, and that’s all that matters. Inside my apartment, I have all that I need. Outside? Well, I’d worried about that as soon as I moved in. But so far no one’s bothered me, seemingly uninterested in a pregnant woman, who drives the cheapest car she can afford. On my part, I ignore the drug deals which go on day and night, and the fights I have to evade when I pass.
It's not much, but it’s mine, and allows me to put part of my salary aside to cope with what lies ahead.
Days pass, weeks go by, and I can’t hide my pregnancy now. Despite its simplicity and monotony, I enjoy my job. I like the boss I work for. Shelly is understanding and spotted my condition early on, and now she’s set me to work on the tills which isn’t such physically demanding work.
Life without Duke is perfect, and not a day passes when I don’t thank the Freedom Trail and the anonymous people who helped me. At the back of my mind though, I can’t shake the worry, that somehow, some day, Duke will find me. I take every precaution, keeping to myself, using cash to pay for everything, friendly enough when coworkers chat to pass the time, but wary of getting close to anyone. When leaving the apartment, I disguise my appearance as much as I can.
Do I grow more confident as time goes on? Not really, though I try to put my fears aside. That’s not easy, when a loud male voice speaking too loudly can make me startle and kick off a panic attack.
Introspection does me no good, neither does revisiting the past and bemoaning how I got here. Instead of thinking of myself, I force every thought to be for the precious cargo I carry. Instead of looking back with regret, I look forward to when I will hold my child in my arms.
I sing to my baby at night, stroke my stomach as I go about my life, living only for him or her.
The thing I’m not is lonely. My years of being locked up and ignored serve me well, as I’m fully capable of amusing myself and not getting bored. How could I? I’ve access to a television and more books than I can ever hope to read downloaded on my Kindle. Reading becomes my escape. Where else can you find hours of pleasure for the price of a coffee?
Home from work, I cook and eat a healthy dinner, then settle down with a book. Finishing it, I purchase another by the same author.
Big mistake. To my horror, I’ve accidentally stumbled into a new-to-me genre, MC Romance. I read as much as I can before throwing the book down in horror. She’d gotten so much wrong. How can she write of respect for women when in a real MC there is none? And that clubhouse she was describing was nothing like my experience. I want to contact her and tell her how much she got wrong.
I don’t of course, I just put down the book and stop reading. I can’t afford to come out of hiding, even anonymously to someone on the internet.
But I read blurbs carefully from now on, watching out so I’m not lured in by such books again. MC Romance doesn’t exist, or not like the authors portray it.
But then, I rationalise, if fiction reflected real life, who’d want to buy it? Who’d fall for a cruel murderer, or want to redeem a man who makes his living abusing, buying and selling women?
Instead, I read books about mothers and babies, and lose myself in the fantasy of having a man in my life who’d accept me as a single mom. Then I realise I’m being stupid and would never be able to trust myself with a man again, and definitely not with my baby. I’ve made mistakes twice. How could I ever trust my judgement? As for sex, the thought makes me shudder. Duke had turned that act of pleasure into a nightmare, and I’ll be content to end my days never knowing a man’s touch again.
Moving my hand across my stomach, I promise my child that I’ll be everything he or she needs. It might be tough. I might not be able to provide a fraction of what I had growing up, but I’ll make up for it with love. That I have in abundance.
I don’t care who fathered it. My baby is mine, and nature be damned, my child will be shaped by his nurture, and I’m determined to do that right.
Weeks pass, but my fear that Duke won’t stop looking for me never fades. I shop only when I need
to, and apart from going to work, keep away from anyone who might want to make a record of me. Since coming to San Diego, I’ve not visited a doctor. I’m healthy, I don’t need one, but as time passes, I do wonder about my child.
I’m five and a half months pregnant now, and I’ve got questions. Is he or she growing alright? Is it moving as much as it should? I’ve had none of the assurances normal moms get, not since I left the hospital, and that was still early.
I read pregnancy books by the bucketload and follow all the advice. But is it enough?
I know I need to make sure, and I long to find out what gender I’m carrying. I don’t want it to be a surprise. I want to know whether I’m having a boy or a girl. Not that I’ve a preference for either sex, but I’d like to think of names and start to prepare.
I’ve been in San Diego three months, and Duke hasn’t caught up with me. I must be safe, mustn’t I? Veering between thinking it’s a mistake, and knowing I have no choice, coming to a decision, I pick up the phone and make an appointment. Then, I sit back and smile, my hand rubbing my stomach.
Soon, baby, I’ll know what you are. Then I can start planning our life together.
That done, I pick up a catalogue I got from a baby store, and start looking at cribs and other paraphernalia, a kernel of excitement bubbling inside me.
In three and a half months, I’ll meet him or her.
I can’t wait.
Chapter Five
Niran
It had been an interesting discussion with Kink last night, not that I really got what he was talking about. Sex was sex, wasn’t it? Some good, some so-so, but not very often bad—for men, at least, who normally get off, women, possibly not so much, if they go with the wrong man or mislead him by faking it.
I can understand why when you add love into the mix, fucking transcends casual sex. But love isn’t what Kink’s talking about. All that negotiating rubbish seems to take the spontaneity out of that shit. If you go to a sex club, don’t you want to get fucked? If you wanted conversation, you’d go to a bar. Still, I suppose as I made do with my hand last night, any sex with another party might be good right now. I seem to be going through a dry spell. Maybe it’s time to rectify that. Perhaps I need to go into town and see if I can connect with someone.
Avenging Devil Part 1: Satan’s Devils MC - San Diego Chapter #3 Page 4
