by Kay Maree
“Ya ready Mav?” Timmy called over his shoulder.
He was Maverick back then, he didn’t get named Executioner until he became the sergeant at arms, it was Timmy who had bestowed him with the name. It had been X’s father’s name before his, so X was proud to wear it. X nodded his head and stepped up to where Timmy stood with his giant arms folded across his expansive chest. Looking at Martino, X could see that he had already had a going over, obviously at the hands of his father. Martino’s eyes were almost swollen shut and some of his teeth were at his feet. His lip was busted.
“Martino, I want you to meet the Executioner’s boy. The girl that you decided to take, the girl that wasn’t yours to take, she was Mav here’s girl. The bible says an eye for an eye, isn’t that right Martino?” Timmy sneered.
Martino lifted his head and looked over to where X and Timmy stood. He pulled his head back, before spitting a globule of blood and phlegm at the feet of X. Timmy, shook his head and sighed.
“Wrong thing to do, Martino. Go ahead Mav,” he said.
X stepped up to the chained man, who lifted his head and looked at X with swollen eyes. He curled his lip and sneered, “she had a nice tight pussy, until I was finished with her. By the time I was done she was so loose after she had my whole fucking fist in her.”
X growled and slammed the knife into Martino’s shoulder. Martino howled in pain and his head slumped forward. X slid the knife back out of his shoulder, causing Martino to scream again. X’s pulse spiked with excitement, it was a euphoria that he had never experienced before, even sex, this gave him a different thrill. Not a sexual thrill, he wasn’t hard, but by fuck he enjoyed himself.
They tortured Martino for four hours, before X’s father put his shotgun into X’s hand, “now son, the reason we use a shotgun rather than a pistol, is less ballistics. A bullet will always leave a trail, if we use the shotgun, the pellets are harder to get evidence from.”
X raised the shotgun and tucked it into his shoulder. It wasn’t his first time shooting a gun, he just had never shot a person before. He held the gun steady and looked down the barrel. With one eye closed he lined up the center of Martino’s head, and pulled the trigger, feeling the kick against his shoulder. Martino’s head snapped back as the back of his head exploded into the air and the front of his face became a mass of meat and sinew.
“Great shot son,” his father crooned, before taking the gun from his hands.
X grinned like a loon at his father. In that moment he felt closer to his old man, than he ever had. Nothing like killing some fucker to bring family closer together.
CHAPTER THREE
Lolly had given up trying to talk to X as he got lost in his head and navigated the memories that flooded his brain. When he snapped back to reality, he saw that she was bouncing on one of the guys who they called Satan, her head thrown back and her lips parted in passion. Some days X couldn’t believe the debauchery that went on in the club. However, then there were days like when his dad had died or when Blaine’s father passed on, that the club pulled together and debauchery was left behind, while they grieved. This family was the only family he had.
“Fuck, Blaine, Gannon, X,” Arsen the prospect called from the front doors.
Their heads all snapped up to where Arsen hollered. Blaine stood, gently placing Angel on the seat he vacated, Gannon didn’t give the girl he was with quite the same decency as he popped his cock out of her mouth and shoved it still hard into his jeans. They went to the door that Arsen had walked back out of. When he reappeared, he had a naked girl in his arms, she was unconscious, her head slumped back, her face unrecognizable under all the bruises. Her hair was matted with blood and she was barefoot.
“Shit, is she one of ours?” Gannon asked beside him.
X searched the girls face, he couldn’t place who she was, he shook his head and sighed, reaching out and taking the girl from Arsen and leading her back towards his room. Memories flooded his mind of finding Bree in the same condition, he had to steady his breathing and allow his heart rate to reduce as he was assaulted with the awful thoughts, throwing back to fifteen.
“Doc, we are going to need you on this one,” he called as he left the main bar and headed down the hallway to where the bedrooms were situated. X was the only one that currently lived at the clubhouse. Not because he couldn’t get a place of his own, he just felt more comfortable there.
X laid the girl down out on his bed, she was a tiny thing, not much taller than five foot. In comparison to his large six five, she was dwarfed. She was petite and underneath the blood he could tell her hair was blonde. Her eyes were swollen, she had a hard lump on her forehead and her cheek on the left side of her face appeared to be broken. On her hairline she had a large cut, and her left eyebrow was split. Her lips were bruised, cut and swollen. Whoever had done this to her had meant to hurt her, if not kill her.
“Where was she?” he asked over his shoulder to Arsen.
“Just behind the bin, I went out for a smoke and she was lying there crumpled in a pile. At first, I thought it was a doll or just trash, until I got closer and realized it was a fucking girl,” Arsen replied with a shake of his head, his voice was gravelly, and he sounded like he was struggling.
One decree the club had, is they might treat the women like shit, and not give them their hearts, they weren’t soft, gentle men, however, they would never lay a violent hand to a woman. It was true that X in his time, had, had to kill a couple of women. It wasn’t something he was proud of and their death always was swift. He ground his teeth, his anger and fury rising at the thought of the weak bastard that could do this to any woman.
“Get the girls in here, see if any of them recognize her? Maybe Hadley. We will need her or Angel to clean her up once Doc is done anyway,” X said giving directions to the prospects.
Doc straighten her on the bed, her ribs were bruised, and she looked malnourished, her hip bones were prominent and sticking out. She had been through a lot. On her wrists she had rub marks that looked like she had been tied up or chained and then on one of her thighs was the perfect boot print where some fucker had trodden on her.
“What the fuck?” X growled as he took in all her injuries.
“Well she doesn’t look like she’s been raped, at least not recently, so that is a positive,” Doc said as he pointed to her wrists and then her ankles, “however, wherever she came from she had been shackled, they are rub marks, and looking at her right ankle I’d say she wore that shackle for some time.”
“Shit,” Lolly said as she entered the room, “someone did her bad.”
“Do you recognize her?” X asked.
Lolly stepped closer and studied her face, as she bit her bottom lip in concentration and took all the girl in before shaking her head. “No, I haven’t seen her before, not around this club anyway. Is she going to be alright?”
“She appears to have a concussion, she has some really nasty cuts to her head, which looks like someone hit her with something heavy. I’ll suture her wounds and get her on a drip. She needs fluids, she’s dehydrated, and she doesn’t look like she has been fed in quite some time,” Doc explained.
“Right, well what do you need me to do Doc?” Hadley asked from the doorway.
The room was crowded with bikers and club whores as they all gathered to see if they recognized the girl or could help. This girl was a mystery. Not only as to who she was, but how the fuck she got to the club in the first place. It wasn’t like the club was in the metro area. They were right on the outskirts of town. If she walked from somewhere, she would have had to at least cross a major highway to get to where she was found. The fact that she was naked, she surely would have been seen and picked up, someone would have stopped. It didn’t matter how shit a town was, if you saw a bruised naked girl roaming the streets, you’re going to lend a hand. It didn’t make sense as to why she would have come to them, and in her condition, he didn’t think she would have successfully walke
d that far. X knew about adrenalin and the affect it could have on a person, allowing them to manage great feats but he didn’t think this was the case.
X looked around the room and chewed on his cheek. His brows furrowed as he tried to think of possible answers. “Who goes out there to smoke usually?” he asked.
Arsen raised his hand, along with Satan, Kyle and Daniel. “Did any of you see a car hanging about or anything out of the ordinary? I don’t reckon she walked here, not in this condition,” X said.
The men all looked between each other before Kyle’s eyes widened, “fuck man, there was a black SUV that drove past real slow when I was out there, that was like two hours ago. I didn’t think anything of it, you know what people are like, see a bike club patch and want to slow down to have a look.”
X nodded his head; they weren’t unaccustomed to tourists that hear about the club and want to drive past to see the big bad bikers. It could have been nothing, but with the appearance of a beaten and naked girl, it made him suspicious. It did mean though that if someone dropped her there, they had to go through the gate that wouldn’t be locked yet, but still shut, dump her body before leaving again. Whoever was responsible for dumping this girl here, had some fucking balls.
Blaine came in the room, his face full of fury, his brows pinched and his jaw tight. “I just checked the cameras. She was dumped out of a black SUV an hour ago. The fucking thing had been driving up and down the street all night.”
X and Kyle exchanged a look, the SUV that he had seen, obviously was the same car that had dumped the girl. “Did you get a look at the driver? Someone we recognize?” X asked.
Blaine held up a grainy black and white photo that he had obviously printed from the security camera, “he’s got a cap on so it’s hard to see his face, but look, and tell me what you think? Is it one of the Iron Horsemen?” he asked.
X took the photo from Blaine’s hand and looked down at it, studying the guy in a cap that was pulled down low on his forehead, covering the top half of his face. He was obviously aware of the camera’s because he did his best to angle his face away from the camera.
“Is this the best shot you’ve got of him?” X asked.
Blaine nodded his head and sighed, “yeah, he knew the cameras were there, I’d say all his scoping he did allowed him to spot them. So, he was careful about us not to see too much of his face.”
X handed the photo over to Satan, who peered down at it and shook his head before passing the photo over to Arsen. The men passed the photo around before handing it to Hadley who growled.
“Fucker,” she spat.
X looked up at her with a frown, “that is Pitt Trussard, one of the sons of Gable,” Hadley said.
“Are you sure?” Blaine asked taking the photo back from her, “I thought he was dead.”
“No, they keep him pretty much locked up, he has disabilities, I’m not sure what, probably from inbreeding, but he is too sweet for this world. Gable hates him, I heard rumors that he feared the kid and doesn’t usually let him out of his sight, was it him that was driving?” she asked after explaining more about Pitt.
“He got out of the passenger side, the driver stayed in the car, and I couldn’t see who it was driving because of the tint,” Blaine replied.
“It would have been Hawk, he is the only one that Gable trusts with Pitt to take him out,” Hadley informed them. She was a wealth of knowledge, one of the many reasons that she continued with the club.
“Well, I’ve done all I can for now, but she is going to need care, I’m not sure how long she is going to be out for, but I’ll check her periodically to make sure she is alright,” Doc said, standing from where he had knelt beside the bed.
When X looked down at the girl, he noticed, Doc had set her up with an IV in her hand, pumping fluids into her body.
“I’ve set her up with some antibiotics also, it was lucky I had them on me, actually. Hopefully that will starve off any infection before it becomes a problem. Her head is a fucking mess. I’ve got pain killers, for when she wakes up. She is going to be in a whole world of hurt with the injuries she has.” Doc said before turning to Hadley, “would you mind washing her down and finding some clothes for her?”
Hadley nodded before she turned and left the room to gather water and washcloths.
“Do you mind if I leave her here, I don’t want to move her now that I have her situated?” Doc asked looking at X.
“Yeah man, that’s fine, I’ll crash in one of the guest rooms.”
“She doesn’t appear to have any broken bones, which is lucky, but she sure is in a bad way. If she is one of the Iron Horsemen, I’m not sure that she is related,” Doc explained.
“I didn’t think they let outsiders in?” Arsen asked looking down at the girl. His brow was pulled tight into a frown.
“No, I didn’t think so either,” Doc said with a shake of his head and sigh.
Whoever this girl was, was a mystery. All they knew was that Pitt had dumped her unconscious and beaten body at their door. X could only hope that she would wake up so that he could find out what her story was. This time he wasn’t going to allow what happened to Bree happen again. This time if this girl survived, he wasn’t going to let her out of his sight.
CHAPTER FOUR
Lyric
She was swimming in a quagmire of darkness. In the distance Lyric could hear voices but wasn’t able to make out anything they said. She tried to cry out to them, she opened her mouth, but her voice wouldn’t work. Panic gripped her, moving was like being stuck in quicksand. With every step she tried to take she sunk further. Why couldn’t she move? What was this place? She looked around trying to find something in the darkness that could help her. But there was nothing. The place was a void. There was no color, no shapes, nothing, just darkness and those voices that floated through the air occasionally. She couldn’t even be sure that they were voices, more sounds, but many different ones.
Lyric stopped fighting and trying to move, she felt her face and the wetness of her tears that were on her cheeks. How did she get to this place? Lyric tried to remember what had happened. She remembered the feel of the cold concrete on her skin, the chains that held her ankles and the rope tight around her wrists, chaffing the skin.
“Please let me go home. My father, he will give you what you need, but please let me go home,” Lyric begged.
She didn’t know that her father would have whatever it was that the men in front of her needed. She didn’t even know what it was that her father owed them. He was just a mechanic who came home every night to look after her and her brothers every day. Ever since her mother died three years previously, he had been their sole provider until her eldest brother Clint was able to help work in the shop. She was the youngest of four. Clint was four years older than her; Brenton was three years older and then Lachie was two years older. Lyric was only fourteen when her mother died of cancer, there was no warning, one day they went to bed, and the next morning she was dead. Lyric’s father explained that she had cancer, but had kept it a secret, so as not to worry her family.
The men that currently had her chained to the wall in an empty concrete room, with no windows had taken her from her home three days earlier. She was at home preparing dinner for her brother’s and father when the doorbell rang. She didn’t think anything of answering the door. Why would she? Her father and brothers were good men, they wouldn’t willingly put her in danger. However, the man with the voice of gravel on the other side of the door, punched her in the face, snapping her head back on her shoulders. Lyric’s knees buckled and she crumpled to the floor as she cried out in pain.
“Where are they?” the man growled.
Lyric looked up at him, he had grey hair that was shaved close to his scalp, he looked like he had lived a life of hard work. His muscles weren’t from working out in a gym. He wore a leather vest, that had a patch on the front reading president. The man reached forward and snagged her by her hai
r, Lyric cried out and tears sprung to her eyes with the burning of her scalp.
“I asked you a fucking question,” he growled.
Lyric’s eyes widened and she shook her head, what could she tell him? “My dad is at work, next door at the shop, Clint is out picking up car parts and is due back today, Brenton and Lachie are at the shop with dad. I don’t know what you are looking for,” she cried out in panic.
The man raised his hand and she braced herself for the blow that was bound to come, when it connected with her skin, Lyric screamed in pain. She felt her eyebrow split and blood begin to dribble down over her eyes.
“Dad just take her with us, if he wants her back, he will bring them to us,” another man spoke from behind the one that held her by the hair.
She looked over at him, his hair was long and shaggy, when he smiled down at her, his teeth were yellowed, and his green eyes watched her with lust. Lyric tried to shake her head, she had to fight, she had to get away from these men. She knew that her dad and brothers would be home soon, if she could fight long enough for them to get home, they would save her. She reached up and dug her nails into the man who held her, she gouged at his arm. He growled and flung his other hand around her throat, squeezing. Lyric felt the air cut from her lungs and her eyes widened with fear. She used all her strength, kicking her legs out, trying to connect with any part of her body. She heard the man grunt when one of her feet connected with him.
The other man wordlessly stepped up and raised his fist. The pain that exploded through her face overwhelmed her and as darkness took over, she felt herself be lifted and carried away from her home, away from her family and away from safety. When she woke, she was lying on a concrete floor, with metal shackles around her ankles and rope tightened against her wrists. Her breathing was coming in short sharp breaths. Her face hurt and she couldn’t open one of her eyes. Lyric had been stripped of the clothes she had been wearing and she shivered with the cold.
