by E. C. Land
“For you are the Chosen, and you shall do as you are meant to and serve those of us who hear the Dark Lord’s words,” he says before starting his chants. God, this is gonna be far worse than I thought it would be.
“Get anywhere near my wife and I’ll kill you,” Badger growls as he yanks against his own restraints.
Chuckling, Casimir doesn’t respond to Badger’s words but rather moves around the room. I can barely see him as he makes his way to the closet. “Ally, I’ll allow you to decide which you get, the whip or the baton. Either way, you will have the neck cuff wrapped around your throat,” he states.
Clenching my teeth, I don’t give him the satisfaction of responding to him. I know he will only go with the opposite one and both of those have spikes sticking out of them. The neck cuff is no better as the pressure it puts against my throat will leave me panting for breath as it pushes against my esophagus.
“I see you would prefer me to choose then,” he laughs. I can hear the clanking of metal as he grabs what he wants and closes the door. “I made sure to bring all your favorites,” Casimir informs me as he kneels next to me.
Grabbing the neck cuff with both hands, with quick work, Casimir has it locked in place. “There we go,” he murmurs, running his fingers along the thing, trailing them down my body. “Now, the rest of our fun can begin.”
Standing back up, Casimir moves to the end of the bed.
“Leave her the fuck alone,” Badger growls, doing everything in his power to get loose of the shackles holding him in place. But what he doesn’t realize is the restraints holding him render him powerless. The only way out of them is either severing your hands off or the key that only Casimir has on him.
As my feet are freed from their binds, Casimir moves to my hands, which he only releases from the bed. “Get up, my sweet,” he orders while yanking on my arms, forcing me off the bed.
Dragging me the few feet he needs, Casimir lifts my arms above my head and latches them in place to the chain. Once he’s done, Casimir moves away for a moment to grab what would look like a wooded box to anyone who didn’t know what it was— a nail box. Depending on the severity of my punishment, he uses the lever on the side to change the length of the point.
“Go ahead and stand on the box,” he says, placing the box in front of me.
Blocking out Badger’s shouts, I do as I’m told. “Good girl,” he states appreciatively as he begins to adjust the lever. I try not to cry out as the nails begin to bite into the bottom of my feet.
The chain holding my arms slackens due to my standing on the nail box. However, Casimir makes sure to tighten it. “Now the fun can begin.”
“I can’t wait for my brothers to get here to kill you, motherfucker. It’s gonna be slow and painful,” Badger growls.
“They can’t save you two and the other women at the same time, can they?” Casimir retorts.
Turning his attention back to me, he grabs the ceremonial knife he always keeps on him and uses it to rip all my clothes off. Clenching my eyes closed, I prepare myself for what’s to come.
Please let Burner and my brother hurry. They saved me before, they can do it again. I just hope it’s not too late.
The whooshing of the whip flying through the air fills the room before the tiny spikes strike, breaking my skin. “One,” Casimir says as I cry out in pain.
Chapter Thirty-One
Burner
As I follow my brothers through the gate to park in the parking lot of the clubhouse, I can feel my gut twisting. Something is not right here. Shutting the truck off, I hop out and rush into the clubhouse, intending to head to my room to grab my back-up gun and knives.
Only when I step into the clubhouse followed by my brothers, my steps falter at the sight of two hooded figures holding Emerson and Lynsdey by their hair with guns pointed in our direction.
“You stupid motherfuckers,” Hades growls, taking a step toward them.
“I suggest you not come any closer,” one of them states, aiming his gun at Emerson’s head.
“Look, I don’t know who you think you are, but I’d suggest you let the women go,” Twister demands as he moves to stand in front.
“Or what, you’ll shoot us? I don’t fuckin’ think so, asshole. These two are Chosen, and they belong to the Dark Lord. Let us pass, and we won’t put bullets in their stomachs, killing the abominations they carry,” the other yells.
“You don’t get that gun off my ol’ lady, you’ll wish you’d died quickly compared to what I’ll do to you otherwise,” Thorn barks.
“I don’t think so,” the one holding Lynsdey says, causing her to scream in pain as he tightens his hold on her hair.
“Where are the other women?” Horse murmurs quietly from behind me.
“I don’t know, but we need to get these fuckers away from Em and Lyns now,” Rage grumbles under his breath.
“How about you all just step aside, and we’ll be on our way?” the first one states, lifting his gun from Emerson to wave it in our direction.
Behind them, I notice a small figure coming toward the mouth of the hallway. Oh shit, is that . . . yep, Kenny lifts her bow up and aims it at the head of the man holding Emerson. Before anyone can move, Kenny releases the quiver, and the arrow sails through the air, sinking directly into the side of the asshole’s head.
The guy immediately drops to the floor, taking Emerson with him.
“Fuck,” Hades growls, moving for her as Thorn jumps for the other guy, snatching Lynsdey from him as Rage takes the fucker down, and Horse goes to Kenny.
I move toward Rage as he holds the man’s arms behind his back. “You think you can come in here and take my brothers’ ol’ ladies? I don’t fuckin’ think so,” I growl into his face before turning my focus to Twister, who’s looking on with what my brothers and I call his death glare. “Prez, I think we should deliver his head back to his master the way Casimir left our prospect’s for us.”
“I think that’s a damn good idea considering these two walked into our house, threatened our women, and thought they could take two of them away from us. I don’t fuckin’ think so. Take him outside away from the girls and cut his fuckin’ head off with one of the rusty saw blades,” he says before darting off to check on his own ol’ lady.
Fuck, I don’t need this shit right now. We need to get out of here and find Ally. I start to follow Rage and Dragon when Emerson screams bloody murder. Turning to look at her, I see her hunched over, holding her stomach. Shit, her water just broke.
“Fuckin’ motherfucker caused Em’s water to break,” Hades growls as he kicks the man lying on the floor at his feet. “Damn, I need to get her to the hospital . . . fuck, Ally and Badger. We need to get her, but I can’t leave Emerson.” I know he doesn’t want to choose between his ol’ lady and helping to rescue his sister and our brother. If he could do both, I’m sure without a doubt he’d do it, but Em needs him more than we do.
This whole thing is a complete colossal fuck up, and it’s only getting bigger.
“Don’t worry about them. We got this. You and Thorn take Emerson and Lynsdey to the hospital. We’ll get your sister and our brother back,” I say, trying to reassure him.
“Thanks, man,” Hades murmurs as he lifts his wife into his arms and rushes her as quickly as he can out of the clubhouse with Thorn carrying Lynsdey right behind him.
“Come on, brother, let’s get these two fuckheads out to the shed and rip their heads off so we can deliver our gift while getting your woman back,” Rage mutters as he starts for the door.
“You two able to handle this,” Horse grumbles as he holds a shaking Kenny in his arms.
“Yeah, VP, you take care of her. Give us about ten minutes, and we’ll be ready to leave. I’m not taking any longer than I need to. Ally needs me and our brother does as well,” I state as I lean down to grab the dead man’s feet and drag him out of the clubhouse.
“We’ll be ready for you two when you're done,” Twister says as he walks bac
k into the main room with Izzy in his arms.
“I can’t believe these fuckers had the nerve to try to bypass our security system. Thank fuck I’d installed an alarm in the main room that connects to the rest of the system. What I don’t get though is how did they get a hold of Emerson and Lynsdey. The only thing I can think of is they didn’t hear the alarm. Fuck, this shit is gonna bug the living hell out of me until I look at the security feed to find out how they got their hands on those two women,” Gadget rants, more to himself than anyone as he and Dragon follow behind. He’s never been one for letting things go without finding out the five W’s, as he calls it.
“You can do that when we get back. Let’s get this shit over with, so we can get our family back,” Dragon mutters.
As we enter the shed, it doesn’t take us long to have both men’s heads severed and put into a burlap sack we kept in here for the women. Well, more for Cleo. She got a wild hair up her ass one day and bought a bunch of them to put in flower pots to make the outside of the clubhouse look better. I’ll never understand her reasoning, considering she doesn’t even have a green thumb. The woman is hell on wheels in the kitchen, but gardening, fuck no.
Shaking my head from the nonsensical thoughts, I follow my brothers out of the shed and toward one of the vans we keep parked off to the side of the lot. Twister and Horse are already inside, waiting for us. “The girls okay?” Rage asks as he closes the door once we’re all in.
“Yeah, the rest of the girls had locked themselves in our rooms when they heard the alarm. Emerson and Lynsdey were outside and didn’t hear it because the two of them were behind the clubhouse. They’d only just gone inside to grab a drink when those two fuckers grabbed them. None of them knew Emerson and Lynsdey were outside until Kenny heard their screams and took it upon herself to play hero,” Horse grumbles as he relays how fuckhead one and two got ahold of the women. “Fuck, I love that woman, but sometimes I want to strangle her. I mean, who the hell uses a hunting bow to kill a man?”
“Kenny evidently,” Twister snaps as he puts the van in gear and floors it through the gate. Yeah, he’s fuckin’ pissed. “Only my damn sister would think to use the bow she hunts with to protect her friends.”
“Well, the woman is definitely the real-life version of that chick in the Hunger Games movie she likes to watch,” Horse mutters.
“I don’t care what she is as long as she doesn’t have to do it again,” Twister states.
“You and me both,” Horse says.
“I’m hoping once this Casimir fucker is dead, we don’t have any more problems. We’ve had enough to last a lifetime,” Dragon snarls.
“Agreed, let’s make this asshole suffer,” I grumble through clenched teeth.
Closing my eyes, I send a prayer to whoever could possibly be listening to protect my Firefly until I get there. She’s been through enough, and when I get her back, Ally’s never leaving my sight again.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Ally
“Have you had enough yet?” Casimir asks as he drops the whip he’d been using against my back. I don’t know how many times he hit me with the thing, but I do know my entire body feels like it couldn’t take much more.
With the neck cuff still in place, I’m unable to respond or even shake my head in any way. So instead, I give Casimir the best glare I can when he steps in front of me. “Ahh, I see you haven’t. How about I change the level on the nail box for you?” he suggests.
God, please don’t. I’m exhausted from what he’s done so far, I don’t need him to do anything else to me.
“No?” he chuckles when I do my best to protest without opening my mouth. “But I think you can take so much more.”
“Leave her the fuck alone. You wanna torture someone, torture me, douchebag,” Badger screams. He’d been doing that the entire time while trying to get free. The only thing he’d succeeded in doing, however, is knocking his chair over and all Casimir has done is ignore him the entire time.
Doing the best I can, I follow Casimir’s movements as he reaches over on the bed and grabs the ceremonial knife he always keeps with him. Coming back toward me, he holds up the knife and begins to chant. He chants so loudly, my ears begin to hurt.
A crashing thud from somewhere upstairs interrupts him. Glancing up at the stairs then to me, Casimir laughs hysterically right before he shoves the knife into my leg. “I don’t want you to bleed out too quickly. Since it seems my men have failed me, I want those bastards to watch you suffer,” he says.
Tears stream down my face as my vision begins to blur. I’m so exhausted from all the pain. I just want it all to go away. Closing my eyes, I start to let myself give in to the temptation of the dark abyss of nothing when the door at the top of the stairs slams into the wall and several different thuds can be heard racing this way.
“Son of a bitch.” I know that beautiful voice— Burner. “You’re a dead man,” he snarls. I don’t have to open my eyes to know what’s going on. I don’t have to stay awake either.
Burner’s here and that’s all that matters.
“Get her down from there,” Horse orders someone.
“Be careful with her. She’s standing on nails,” Badger says.
“What the fuck? Alright, hang on, Ally. I’m gonna try not to hurt you,” Dragon rasps softly. “Gadget, you loosen the chain holding her arms up.”
“You got it,” Gadget says.
After that, all the voices seemed to flutter away as darkness takes hold, and I can’t hold on any longer. “I’ve got you, Firefly,” is the last thing I understand.
“Is she gonna be okay?” Burner’s booming voice is like a hammer pounding on my head.
“Yes, she will be okay. She’s lucky the knife in her leg didn’t hit a major artery and the marks on her back will heal with time. Now, the damage done to her esophagus will take a little longer. When she wakes up, try not to make her use her voice too much. She needs to heal first. If you’d like, we can get you a whiteboard and she can use it for communicating with everyone,” a woman says. I want to say it’s Connors, but I’m not exactly sure.
“That would be great,” Burner says, softer this time.
“If you need anything, just let one of the nurses know. I’m gonna go check on Emerson and Lynsdey.” Yep, that’s Connors.
“Thanks, Doc. They okay?” Burner asks. He sounds genuinely concerned. Did something happen to them?
“Emerson is doing great, exhausted but great. Lynsdey, they wanted to keep her here overnight for observation. Due to the high stress she went through with her pregnancy with the twins, it’s better safe than sorry.”
As the door closes behind her, silence fills the room over except for Burner’s footsteps, then the scraping of a chair. “I know you're awake, Firefly. Let me see those beautiful eyes of yours,” he whispers before I feel him grab hold of my hand.
Slowly, I open my eyes the slightest bit to test the brightness. Finding the lights are off, I open them even more as I turn my head the smallest amount to find Burner sitting next to me, looking completely miserable.
“Why . . .” I wince in pain when I try to talk.
“Don’t talk, baby. Your entire throat is fucked up right now. Until it heals, you need to use signing or write it down,” Burner says, lifting his left hand to cup the side of my cheek.
Shit, Connors just said that too. Ugh, this freaking sucks. Lifting my right hand, I sign, “Sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry about right now. Now is for healing. When you’re healed, that’s when we’ll be having a very long talk about you not listening to me when I said you go where I go or you don’t go at all,” he murmurs.
“Sorry,” I sign again as the tears fill my eyes.
“I know you are, baby,” he says, wiping the tears from my cheeks. “Just rest for now.”
A knock on the door causes me to feel as if I was gonna come out of my skin. “Shh, easy, baby. You’re okay.”
“Is it okay to come in?” Badger ask
s after opening the door a hair.
“Yeah, she’s awake.” Burner answers.
“Damn right,” Badger says as he pushes the door the rest of the way open. Holding Jordan’s hand, the two of them come into the room.
As Badger gets closer, I sign “Sorry” to him when I see the bruises covering his face.
“Don’t be, Ally,” he says, coming to my other side. Leaning toward me, Badger kisses my forehead, gaining a growl from Burner. “It’s me who’s sorry for not being able to protect you,” he states.
Without being able to use my voice and not knowing enough sign language to tell him, I merely shake my head in acknowledgment.
“Hades and Emerson had a little boy. They named him Alec,” Jordan says softly, changing the subject.
Giving her a smile in gratitude, I nod my head. No one besides myself and Connors knew what Emerson was having. She’d wanted it to be a surprise for everyone, including my brother.
Feeling my strength draining, I turn back to Burner and sign, “I love you.”
“Love you too, Firefly. Get some rest. I’ll be here when you wake up,” he says as he leans up out of his chair to kiss me against my lips.
Closing my eyes, I’m asleep almost immediately.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Burner
“Burner, have you had any sleep,” Badger asks after Ally falls asleep.
“Some,” I mutter, not taking my eyes off my Firefly. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to let her out of my sight again.
When I close my eyes, all I can see are images of Ally standing there on that box with her arms stretched over her head. It will be a long time to erase those images from my memory. Shit, I’ve seen some fucked-up shit in my life. I’d been there through them all from Kenny hanging in a room at the slaughterhouse, Lynsdey with her psycho stepbrother, Izzy and the black market auction. That’s not even counting what Cleo went through with her stalker and Connors with her ex-husband. Emerson’s was one of the worst, topping up there with Kenny’s.
