by Eve R. Hart
He let go of my mouth but didn’t fully release me as he waited for whatever he’d given me to take hold.
“Hold on, boss.”
The warning was short before the wheels screeched as the car jerked to a stop. Gunshots rang out but were barely heard over a loud popping noise that pierced my ears. The car lurched forward a tad and then I cringed as the sound of crumpling metal filled the air around me.
Oh, God!
I was going to be sick. And while I should have just let my mouth fall open as the bile rushed up my throat, I feared the consequences that would follow. So I swallowed it back down and screwed my eyes closed as tight as I could.
Then we were moving again. It was clear the only damage that had been done was to the bike and whoever happened to be riding it. I cried silently for whoever it was. I was the reason for all of this. I was to blame.
Then, before I could think any more, the pills took over and my eyelids grew heavy. I didn’t try to resist it. It was better if I was asleep for whatever was to come.
The world came back to me slowly. The thing that hit me right away was the smell.
Piss.
Shit.
Vomit.
And the metal tinge of blood.
It all filled my nose at once, causing me to choke and cough. I didn’t want to open my eyes. I didn’t need to see my surroundings to know where I was. And while I hadn’t been in this exact room, I had spent plenty of time in his old one. I knew what fucking happened in this room.
The dull thumping in my head turned into a loud pounding as I attempted to lean over and empty my stomach. My arms moved to brace for impact but didn’t go far. I shook them again as vomit dribbled down my chin. I was fucking cuffed to the wall that was propping me up. As I wiggled my fingers, I found them cold and numb. I had been here a while and as I thought that, the ache in my shoulders made itself known.
This was it.
There was no escaping.
This would be my end.
“You’re not even worth the trouble. I took you from your father because I could. Because I had to set an example. It had to be known that if you owe me then you will fucking pay. And I will take my payment any way I can.”
Savage was angry like I’d never heard him before. He was losing it. His control. His empire. Everything that he’d spent years building. He could sense it was coming to a close and it was showing.
I smirked, because what else could I do. If he was going to kill me I sure as fuck wasn’t going to let him know I went out broken in the end.
His ring sliced my lip as he backhanded me. I fought against the urge to puke again.
“You…you…” His tongue clicked as his fingers danced over whatever items were spread out on the table. I couldn’t see them but I had a pretty good idea what was up there. “You just couldn’t be a good girl, could you?”
A sick laugh bubbled up out of my chest.
“Fucking whore. That’s why. You’re a fucking whore,” he said, taunting me as his dark eyes blazed with anger. “That was the whole problem. You can’t punish a whore. Because no matter what, no matter how much you acted like you didn’t want it, my punishment was always a reward for you.”
The inner workings of a fucking sick man, right there. I turned my head away from him, unable to stomach his eyes any longer.
“You acted like you weren’t there, like it didn’t bother you every time I fucked you. And for the longest time, I thought I was close…so close to breaking you. Now, I realize I wasn’t. You couldn’t be broken because there was nothing to break. You went limp because you wanted to hate it. Every. Fucking. Time. But you didn’t. It was like getting a gold fucking star for you.”
His steps grew louder as his feet brought him closer to me.
“I will find a way to break you. Then I will send your unrecognizable body back to him. If he’s still alive that is. Maybe I’ll send it to the club. Add it to all the things they have failed at. Let them know who’s king. Me! I’m the motherfucking king!”
As the knife sliced through my thigh my body jerked against its hold. A fire burning pain shot up through my leg as I screamed through gritted teeth. He slowly pulled the knife back and his evil smirk filled my vision.
“Savage,” Burke’s voice called out. I didn’t take my eyes off of Savage but I could see Burke’s body leaning halfway through the door out of the corner of my eye.
“Vice,” Savage snarled not looking away from me. “I said not to fucking bother me.”
“We got a problem. Two of the guys are missing from their posts, and I can’t find Little Davey. Crane said he took off with the other two, something about some chick messing with the keypad on the front gate.” Burke said calm and collected.
“Fuck!” Savage roared and the knife went flying across the room and hit the opposite wall. I watched as it hit the cement and bounced a few times.
“You will fall,” I said. “I may not be here to witness it, but it will happen. And when you do…” A crazy laugh filled the air and it took me a second to realize it was coming from me. “It will be slow and painful and every fucking thing you deserve.”
I spat at him because clearly, I had gone insane.
His fist reared back and I knew the blow was coming. The pain radiated through my head only for a second before the world went black.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Axe
“He’s out,” Ellie’s soft voice whispered as I stood in the doorway to my room.
Neiryn was asleep in the middle of my bed, and even though Ellie had said she would watch over him, I was having a hard time taking my eyes off of the little guy.
“Axe.” Her tiny hand landed on my arm. “Go, take care of things. Reagan will be here soon and she will sit with him. Okay?”
“Yeah,” I grunted.
Loch and Reagan were on their way to the clubhouse. This was one meeting that he couldn’t miss and he wasn’t about to leave Reagan behind.
Marshall, our small ass town’s sheriff, had called and pulled some strings. Ethel’s room had two guards posted outside of it, you know, just in case.
I didn’t move until Reagan tapped me on the shoulder. If she was there then that meant Loch was there, which meant it was time to get started.
“I’ve got him,” she whispered in a tired voice.
“How’s Ethel?” I asked almost afraid to hear the answer. I needed some good news right then and anything other than that might only break me.
“She’s good, Axe. She’s going to be sore for a while and she will probably curse the weather when it rains because of her hip. But she will be fine.”
“Thank fuck,” I breathed out. “Thanks for this.”
“Just go get her back.” With that, she patted me on the chest as her other hand wrapped around me in a weird, awkward side hug.
I drew in a deep breath, my eyes on the tiny, sleeping form on the bed. Then I blinked and made my way down the hall.
Calvin had been shot in the arm, but it had gone through-and-through. It was going to hurt like hell for a few days, but he’d live.
As for Brand, well, he was busted up pretty fucking bad. But that dude knew how to handle a bike, that was for fucking sure. I couldn’t say that if I’d been in his position, I would have come out as lucky as he did.
Brand walked out of the med room with a hard limp. His face, arms, one leg, and the right side of his back were torn up with road rash. His shoulder took the worst of it and thank fuck Patch covered that shit with a ton of gauze. Patch had been in there over an hour just picking shit out of his scrapes.
Brand gave me a chin lift as he tried to shake off his pain.
Chris followed right behind him out of the med room. His face looked white as a ghost.
“You alright?” I asked and Patch chuckled from inside the doorway.
“No,” Chris said then swallowed hard.
“Thanks for the help, man,” Patch said in Chris’ direction.
“Yep
, anytime.” He ran his hands through his hair and looked at Brand. “And by anytime, I mean never again.”
Brand slapped Chris on the back then his face turned into a pinched grimace of pain.
“Sorry about your bike, brother,” I said as I gave him a sad smile. I could see the sorrow cloud his eyes, not only was that thing his baby, but it was a huge reminder of his past.
“I’ll see how bad it is,” he said then sniffed. “But right fucking now we got shit to take care of. I’m sorry, man.”
“Not your fault.” It wasn’t. It was mine. I had failed and this was life’s way of telling me I’d never be able to save anyone. I was worthless. Just like my dad had always said.
“Let’s just get her back and then you can beat yourself up all you want,” Brand said, his hand descended on my shoulder and he gave a firm squeeze. It was like the fucker was in my head. Then again, it was probably written all over my face. “I got your back, brother.”
I snorted.
“Um, you can hardly walk without that ugly as fuck pained look taking over your face. How the hell you gonna have my back?” I tried for a joke to lighten the mood. But what I had said was very true.
“Don’t fucking care,” he said, flashing me a smile and his stupid fucking dimples made him look like a damn kid. “I can still shoot and hobble.”
“You’re a fucking idiot, man.” I shook my head.
That fucking guy. In all honesty, it made me smile. It made me proud. This club was full of good men. Men that had each other’s backs no matter what. Even if they were barely able to stay standing.
“I just…” Chris said shaking his head. “I won’t even try to talk him out of it. I know it won’t do any damn good.”
“True.” I laughed. “Here’s your keys, man, thanks for letting me take it. But I don’t think you should leave. Reagan’s in my room down the hall.” I pointed for good measure.
“Alright.” He took one last look at Brand, shook his head, then worked his way down the hall.
“The fuck’s up with that?” I asked.
“What?” Brand said, slightly confused. Though I had an idea he knew what I was getting at. “Two dudes can’t be best friends without people thinking somethings going on?”
I grunted. It wasn’t really any of my business, and honestly, I didn’t care either way.
“You know, come to think of it, I’ve never really seen you with a pussy.” My lips twitched. I was just giving him shit. Although, it was the truth.
He eyed me trying to figure out if I was messing with him or not.
“You a virgin, Brand?” I asked not completely aware that my brain to mouth filter was in off position.
“No, asshole, I’m not.” His cheeks held a pink tint to them but it didn’t feel like he was getting defensive. “Not that it is any of your business, I’m just not a fan of sleeping with random women. Especially ones that just about everyone I know has been in. Not that I’m judging. It’s just not for me.”
“Hmm,” I said taking in his words. Hell, I could respect that. “I’m just messing, brother. And for the record, I couldn’t give a shit what you like. You’re still a brother to me.”
“Allison has turned you weird,” he said his eyes unsure as he took me in. “I mean like normal weird.”
I laughed.
I fucking laughed.
There was that damn word.
Normal.
“Let’s go,” Bocca’s voice called out from the end of the hall. “You, too, Brand.” His head jerked in the direction of church.
“We’ve got this, man. It will all be okay.” He slapped my back and did his best to walk down the hall like he wasn’t in pain.
“Now,” Cal said starting the meeting, “I know Axe wants to go ridin’ off right now. And while I partly agree with him, I want to take a moment to at least get some sort of plan together. We don’t have enough time to call in all those that said they’d help. But I did call the other chapters and told them to gear up. Let’s get everythin’ out on the table and fuckin’ figure this out.”
I didn’t miss the look that Diesel briefly threw my way before his eyes cut to look at pretty much anything that wasn’t me. He was still pissed at me and honestly, I couldn’t blame him.
“First, Ethel is doin’ better. She woke up and had one hell of a story to tell. Have a feelin’ that Mercer’s boy, Steve, is now part of Savage’s crew. He was here lookin’ for info about Allison. Guess, Savage somehow got wind she was here, and as most of you know by now, he has taken her again.”
Cal let out a sad, heavy breath.
Mercer had once belonged to the club. His life took a wrong turn and he started getting heavy into drugs. That, in turn, brought out a nasty side of him, and after he roughed up one of the club girls, he was voted out. Then, his little girl went missing. Turned out, the girl wasn’t missing but dead and he had something to do with it. Needless to say, Diesel took care of him and now he was eating dirt God knew where.
I was trying to stay strong but inside I felt like I was crumbling. I felt lost and confused. I just wanted her back. No, I needed her back.
“So, we need a damn plan and we need it right fuckin’ now. Bocca, what you got on his place. That’s assumin’ he took her back there. It’s all we’ve got to go on, so we’re gonna have to go with it.”
Cal shook his head. It was clear that we were without a fucking clue right then. He was right, Savage might not have even taken her back to his clubhouse. For all we knew, he could have been halfway to Mexico with my fucking woman.
“I have no idea what kind of security this place has,” Bocca started and his eyes looked a bit distant. “But from what I can tell, he’s set up in an old warehouse. What the inside looks like? No clue. In other words, I have a location and there isn’t much around the place. Oh, there are two things that stood out to me. One, there is a trailer on the back corner of the property. And two, there is a room built off of the back of the warehouse. I can only imagine…”
“Alright,” Cal said as he rubbed his chin. “Entry points?”
“One on the front, dead middle, and one on the back. But the one on the back doesn’t lead to the added room. From what I can tell, the room has no outside access.”
“Brass and his chapter are ridin’ in soon. They are bringin’ all their SUVs and a shit-ton of guns. South Carolina is gonna meet us down there. And west Tennessee is gonna probably have to catch up at some point.”
My eyes met Cal’s and hope shot through me. It sounded like he was ready to ride right now. My face asked the questions my mouth didn’t dare to. I knew he was still a little pissed at me for the shit I had pulled earlier. One thing was for sure, Allison had definitely gotten under my skin. I would have never done that shit before.
“I’m workin’ on a strategy,” Cal spoke again, pinning each and every one of us with his stare as he spoke. “I’ll bring it to the table soon. I say we try like hell to get a few hours of rest. No sense in wearin’ ourselves out and goin’ in dead on our feet. We need to be sharp and ready for fuckin’ anythin’. Especially since we don’t even know what the hell we’re runnin’ into.”
The meeting broke. I knew I wasn’t going to get even a minute of sleep but I didn’t argue.
I didn’t say anything to anyone as I stumbled down to my room. Reagan was sitting on the bed, the light next to the side of the bed was on and she had a book in her hand.
“Hey,” I whispered. “Thanks.”
“You guys done already?” Her voice was soft but her face was full of worry. I didn’t want to talk about anything so I simply gave her a nod. “Okay, I’ll go find Loch. Let me know if you need anything.”
Another nod and I felt shitty that I couldn’t really say anything to her. My brain was going haywire and I couldn’t control my thoughts.
Neiryn was sound asleep on the bed. I would have given my life for him not to have to go through this.
As I took Reagan’s vacated spot I put my hand on h
is back. The delicate rise and fall of his chest gave me a small sense of calm. I didn’t fight it. I didn’t push it away. I simply sat there and enjoyed it. I knew in just a few hours I was going to be riding off into chaos. And I hoped like hell, I’d be riding back with the woman of my fucking dreams behind me.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Allison
The searing pain of my flesh being sliced open pulled me out of my unconscious state. And because my guard was temporarily down, I let out the scream of all screams.
For just a second, I gave him the satisfaction that he was looking for.
And I hated myself for it.
Savage bent down to my level, his dark eyes looking into mine and that evil smirk plastered on his face.
“Ahhh, there it is.” His maniacal laugh filtered through my ears as the ringing subsided. “There’s the fear. I spent years trying to bring that out of you again. I got a glimpse of it once and it wasn’t enough.”
He pulled the knife back slowly and I felt the blood rush down my thigh. I didn’t have to look to know that it was just a fraction away from the last one.
“I think that was where I went wrong with you. The shipping container.” He tisked and shook his head. “For some reason, being in there took the fear right out of you. But that look you got in your eyes when I took you from your pops. Mmm. That moment when you realized that there was no way out and you were so terrified that it locked up your whole body. Yes, that moment I will never forget. So much time wasted trying to bring that look back into your eyes.”
The air swooshed as the blade cut through it, right before it sliced into my arm. I gritted my teeth and tried to block out the pain. I woke alert, being stabbed would do that to you, and so he wasn’t going to catch me off guard again.
For a second, I wanted to give up. I thought about what I really had left to live for. I wasn’t sure if Neiryn had made it, or even Axe, but I knew that if my little boy had, then he would be taken care of.
