Kaeden

by Naomi West

  “Fee!” she sobs. “Fee called me!”

  “Wait, what?” I almost shout. “Fiona called you? When?”

  “Ten minutes ago. I don’t know, recently. Then all the men went running. They had my cell phone hooked up to some sort of machine.”

  “Oh fuck.” I reach into my pocket, where the key to the cabin ought to be. “Oh fuck.” I should’ve locked the goddamn car, should’ve hidden the phones better … but out there, in the middle of nowhere, I was more worried about keeping the shit out of the cabin instead of playing hard to get to. “Okay, listen. You need to go to this address.” I take a scrap of paper from my pocket and a pen and quickly scrawl down the location of a safehouse where she ought to be hidden. “Don’t call anyone. Don’t do a goddamn thing except go there as quick as possible, all right?”

  “Will you save her?” she moans as I walk back toward the exit. She follows close behind, but I can’t wait around making sure she gets there safely. What a fucking mess.

  “I’ll die before I stop trying to save her. You can count on that.”

  I run back into the street, my head splitting with the absurdity of it. I clench my fist, gritting my teeth when I think about Fiona going into the car and grabbing one of the burners, calling her friend. How could she be so stupid? But then, I should’ve told her specifically what could happen if she used the phone … and she thought her friend was safe now; she had no reason to think otherwise. No, this is my fucking fault. If Fiona dies, her blood’ll be on my hands. And just when everything was getting simpler between us, just when I was starting to wonder if maybe a screwed-up man like me could love, or at least something close to love.

  “Fuck!” I growl at the same time as my bike growls to life.

  The dusk is long this time of year, but by the time I reach the forest the night is dark, and darker for the clouds that cover the stars and the moon. Out here, with little artificial light, it’s almost pitch-dark. I ride my bike slowly the closer I get to the cabin, being careful about the noise, and then, a hundred yards out, I climb off and creep through the forest with the rifle slung over my back and my pistol at my side. I need more weapons, but all my good weapons are in those specialist metal cases. They’re not getting inside without the key or a shitload of explosives, but that doesn’t matter since they’ll have their own weapons.

  “Fucking motherfucker,” I whisper, imagining what it’ll be like to wrap my hands around Reaper’s throat and squeeze and squeeze until there’s no squeezing left to be done. “Fucking piece of shit. Fucking animal. Touch my fucking woman. Touch my fucking woman and see what happens, fucking prick, asshole, fucking monster.” I stop and lean against a tree, telling myself to calm the hell down; if I go in like this, I’ll just get her killed.

  When I reach the cabin, I see that there’s nothing I can do with my current setup. About twenty men stand in a circle around the warehouse, with no doubt more inside, all with rifles. I haven’t even got enough ammunition to take them out … as if that’s the only damn problem. Part of me knows that this’d be a good time to go after the MC; the defenses’ll probably be lesser now, what with so many men being here. But at the same time that’d mean abandoning Fiona. I ponder the choice for a while, and then, from the cabin, Fiona screams, “Fucking pig! Fucking pig!”

  That makes my mind up. I turn away, feeling like a traitor, and run back to my bike. I ride through the forest quicker than I’ve ever ridden through terrain like this, not caring when the bike bucks and shifts like a bull. I ride back into the city, hating myself for having to leave her, and eventually come to Clint Morris’ house, a detached place on the outskirts of the city, not too far from the forest. I found out where the old fella lived the day after the mess at the clubhouse, reckoning I might need a favor if it came to it. Outside of the club and the brothers, there aren’t many men who’ll help me.

  “It’s you,” he says, standing like a soldier with his hands behind his back. He’s on the porch, sipping a whisky and staring at an old black and white photo. “You okay, son?”

  “No, old man. I need your help. It’s war, old timer. It’s fucking war. I’m willing to pay you fifty thousand dollars.”

  His jaw hardens. For a second, I think he might tell me to get off his property, in which case I’ll have to take what I need. But then I see that his jaw is hardening because he knows exactly what war means. “Tell me.”

  I explain the situation to him as quickly as I can. “I can’t get to my goddamn weapons,” I tell him. “Please tell me you’ve got more’n a hunting rifle.”

  The corner of his lip twitches. “I won’t say I’ve waited for a day like this to come, son, but I will say that a soldier always ought to be ready for battle.”

  “And are you?” I walk up the porch steps and put my hand on his shoulder. “Are you ready, old man?”

  “Come on.” He turns, suddenly full of life, and marches into the house. I follow him through a home that looks like it was decorated by a lady, with an urn over the mantle and a photograph of a pretty older woman hanging over that. He smiles sadly at it when he sees me looking, and then takes us to the basement. Down the stairs, to a locked gun cabinet. The biggest gun cabinet I’ve ever seen.

  “I guess that’s a yes, eh?” I say, as he reaches for the key.

  22

  Fiona

  “What sort of a stupid bitch are you?” Reaper says, pacing up and down the room with a wide grin on his face. He’s tipped the table over and tied me to it with long, taut ropes, my hands to the upper legs and my ankles to the lower, sprawling me out uncomfortably. Otherwise the room is empty; I guess he wants me all to himself, which sends painful chills through my body.

  “Eh?” he goes on. He spins the knife against his forefinger, not seeming to care when blood drip, drip, drips onto the floor. In fact, he seems to like it, grinning strangely with each twist. “You called her. I told the boys to set that shit up just in case, but I never thought you’d be that stupid. You fucking called her. Ha! And now look where you are, you stupid cunt, right where you belong. Oh, stop it with that struggling shit, Fiona. I know you like it. It’s like I told you; girls with dyed hair are sluts, every time. Pink-haired girls are the worst of all. I bet you’ve sat around wondering what it’d be like to be kidnapped and tied up, and then …”

  “You’re a fucking pig!” I scream, pulling so hard on the ropes that the table shifts. “You’re a fucking pig! You hear me! You pig fuck! You evil piece of—”

  As quick as a loaded spring, he leaps across the room and brings the knife to my throat, pressing the cold metal again my skin. “I don’t like it when whores try and act like they’re better than me. I really, really don’t. My bitch of a mother was just like that, you know. I guess I can tell you since … well …” He glances at the door. “But that all depends on what you give me,” he says mysteriously. “But what was I saying?”

  “You called your mother a bitch,” I whisper, trying to move as little as possible. The cold metal stops any chance of struggle, of fight. It’s all I can do to keep myself from trembling so that the blade doesn’t slip across and open me up.

  “Ah, that’s right.” He leans back, removing the knife. Then he gives me a look that dares me to scream at him again. I don’t. “She had a chip on her shoulder because my father left her before I was born, but what did she expect? She was a whore; I found that out later on. She would stand on street corners dressed like a slut, waiting for strangers to pay her fifty bucks to defile her. To defile her!”

  He kicks the wall; the whole cabin quakes. “Then she had the nerve to call me a freak when she found me watching videos online. I’m the freak? Me? Ha! So do you know what I did to her, my sweet mother?” He stops pacing, turns to me. “I tied her to the bed and stripped off her clothes and opened her from lip to cunt, a straight line right down the middle of her body. It was the most gruesome murder those poor detectives had ever seen, and idiots they were, they had families. It wasn’t difficult getting awa
y with that, not for a man who knows how to use violence. That’s the thing, Fiona. Some men let violence use them; some men …”

  He trails off. “Anyway. You’re going to tell me where Silence is, or I’m going to do what I did to my mother, to you, but worse, much worse. I did her a kindness, really. She was a junkie, a joke, a pathetic excuse for a woman. What about you, eh? Are you ready to give yourself up like that?”

  “Kaeden will kill you,” I whisper, forcing the tears out of my voice. I can’t let this man see me cry; I can’t let him think he has power over me. Even if he does. Especially if he does. “You know he will.”

  “Do I?” He laughs. “I had no clue I knew that. What a fucking revelation. No, little girl, your man isn’t riding into save you. So the best you can do right now is give me something that’ll make me want to keep you alive for a while longer. I’m not big on ten counts, so I’ll give you three, two, one …”

  “Wait!” I scream, when he moves toward me with that animal-like speed again.

  “Wait?” He kneels, poised to slit my throat, the knife aimed right at me. “Go on.”

  “We’ve gotten close since we came here,” I say, which is true. What a twisted monster reality can be: finding new meaning in life the same day as it ends. “He tells me things now. He says he shouldn’t, but … I guess everybody needs somebody to talk to, right?”

  “What did he tell you?”

  “He’s going to El Paso to get backup. That’s where he is right now, riding down there. Apparently the Red Death have contacts down there.” I shrug, wincing as the ropes remind me that shrugging isn’t a good idea.

  “Who’s he meeting with?”

  “Damien Jones,” I say, the name appearing from the ether. “He’s a small man, older. Kaeden said he has a scar on the left side of his face that makes his lips look weird, like a longer smile or something. Kaeden saw him get it in a street fight; that’s why he told me about it.”

  Reaper narrows his eyes at me, and then takes a step back. He walks to the door, talks with a man there, and then returns. “If you’re lying, all you’ve done is bought yourself a few minutes, maybe half an hour. Half an hour with me, girl. Is that what you wanted?” He sits down next to me and casually places his hand on my leg, grinning. “I don’t think I’ll kill you right away when we find out that you’re lying. Can I tell you a secret?” He smiles, almost like a young boy. I swallow bile. His hand creeps up from my shin toward my knee. “I haven’t lain with a lady in five years. Five long years. Tonight is the anniversary. I promised myself one year, and one turned into two, and two … but five is a nice round number, isn’t it? I think I can give myself a break now.”

  “You’re disgusting!” I hiss, when his hand grips onto my thigh. “You’re a disgusting animal. I’ll die before I have sex with you. Do you understand me? I’ll die!”

  He lifts the knife, aiming the handle at me. I flinch away as he brings it down … and then, from outside, a man lets out a carnal roar. The cabin judders as somebody falls against it outside. There’s a pop-pop sound, too, like a firecracker but not as loud. Reaper lowers the knife and springs to his feet, jumping for the door.

  “What the fuck is happening out there?” he shouts.

  “We’re under fire, boss! They’ve got a fucking silencer! We’re searching the trees now—”

  “Get to cover!” he snaps. “Get to cover right fucking now! And quick, some of you, get in here!” He opens the door a crack and about six men come running in, barreling after each other, some of them so close they trip each other up. Two of them have blood-covered faces and another one, a large man with a tribal tattoo covering most of his face, is missing the lower half of his right arm. Blood spews from it.

  Reaper slams the door after them and then spins on me with gritted teeth. “What is this?” he snarls. “You better speak up, girl, or there’ll be …”

  The man with the missing arm drops to the ground, so suddenly that the men around him leap away. For a moment they look like scared children, not like big terrifying bikers at all. Reaper looks down at him for a second and then a man to his left drops just as suddenly. Then I see it: bullet holes in their heads; holes in the wall, too. Bullet-shaped holes.

  “Get to the girl!” Reaper snarls, and then, all at once, the remaining men leap at me, smothering me with their bodies. The scent of whisky and blood shrouds around me as the men hug close to me, all of them panting heavily, their breath washing over my face. I close my eyes and swallow more and more bile, feeling as though a million tiny insects are crawling over my skin. “You fucking whore,” Reaper whispers, his hand gripping onto my wrist. “You fucking bitch. You’ll pay for this. You and that fucking bastard.”

  23

  Kaeden

  I look down the infrared scope, which lights up the men surrounding the cabin like a Christmas tree. There’s too much disturbance right now to spot Reaper and Fiona, who must be inside the cabin. But I can fix that pretty damn quick … I continue my count to one hundred, which me and the old man agreed on. When I reach ninety, I turn off the safety and bring my finger to the trigger. Ninety-five, ninety-six … One of the men falls like a load of bricks, and then the panic of under-siege men takes over. I guess the old man’s one hundred is less than mine.

  I shoot quickly and efficiently, but always make sure that I don’t clip anybody who’s Fiona’s height. I know it’s not above him to put her out there and make me kill her; that’d be a goddamn treat for him, bragging rights for the rest of eternity. The man who made a Red Death kill his old lady. Since I have to steer clear of the shorter orange shapes—which is all these bastards are in the scope—some of them manage to run around to the side of the hut, and some even manage to get in. I take out two, firing right through the walls of the cabin. Then I spot her, with her arms spread strangely; she must be tied up. Before I can fire another shot, the pricks all leap on her.

  “Fuck,” I mutter, quickly changing magazine. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” If I shoot now there’s a chance I’ll hit her, dammit. I stand up to a crouch position and shoulder the rifle, take out the submachine gun, and approach the cabin. When I’m about halfway there, the front door busts open and Reaper comes out with a gun to Fiona’s head, her body pressed right in front of his so that any shot could mean death for her.

  “Fun’s over!” Reaper calls into the dark. “This is it, Silence. If you keep this shit up, I’ll end your girl! You hear me? I’ll fucking end her! Do you think I’m fucking around?” Fiona screams when he grabs her hair in a bunch and twists it. Outlaw logic says to stay hidden, since he isn’t doing anything too bad to her. But that scream … it tears right into my bones, splitting my head in half worse than a bullet.

  “All right!” I roar. I drop my guns and then stand up and walk toward them with my hands raised. “Just don’t fucking hurt her, you bastard.”

  “Keep walking!” Reaper shouts in return. “Come into the light.”

  There isn’t much light: just the headlights of a nearby bike and the weak glow that comes from the open cabin door. The men from behind the car emerge, which means there are nine still living in total. They step over the corpses and join Reaper, grinning like mad jackals. They think they’ve got me now.

  “You had your fun,” Reaper says. “But this is it, Silence. The games end here—”

  “You’re a goddamn coward,” I tell him, walking up to the group until I’m only a few yards away. Fiona gives me a panicked look; I give her what I hope is a calming one in return. I have a plan, I tell her silently. Trust me. She nods quietly. A conversation just between us, lost to everybody else. When did we become so close? But we are; seeing her like this, I can’t deny it. I quietly hate myself for all those times I pushed her away.

  “You hear that?” I growl, turning back to Reaper. “A fucking coward.”

  He looks at me for a long moment in disbelief. Then he looks down at the corpses at his feet, laughing grimly. “You’ve either got one set of stones on you, Silence
, or you really are about the dumbest motherfucker I’ve ever laid my eyes on. You’ve had your fun, played your little trick—”

  “You try and make these fellas believe you’re tough,” I interrupt, standing with my shoulders wide, staring at Reaper and Reaper alone. “Maybe it works. Maybe you fool them into thinking you really are somebody worth worrying about. But I know the truth. Without hostages and backup, you’re nothing. What about it, fellas?” I address the men but still stare at him. “You ever seen this bastard fight a man, really fight him? I’ve never seen a man so big act so goddamn small. Hiding behind guns; hiding behind women!”

  The men look uncertain, glancing at each other, but mostly they just look angry.

  “What do you think’ll happen?” Reaper laughs. “You can bully me into giving up my advantage? I’m not an idiot, Silence. If I fought you, I’d probably win. If I shoot you in the head, there’s no probably about it. You’re a small man and—”

  “You’re the small man!” I snarl, lifting my hand into the air. The men flinch, but settle down when they see it’s empty. “What do you think, eh? That I’d make threats without being able to back them up?” I slice my hand through the air. At the instant my finger is pointing at the fella on the far right—I purposefully pick the one the furthest from Fiona—he drops to the ground, a bullet taking him right between the eyes.

  “Bastard!” Reaper roars. “He’s got a fucking sniper! Fucking coward! Tell him to stand down, or I’ll gut the girl!”