by K. J. Dahlen
The scent made her lightheaded and she felt dizzy as everything swirled and tilted around her.
~* * * *~
Halo caught her in his arms and quickly dragged her out of sight. He quickly bound her hands with a narrow rope and carried her deeper into the wooded area. Out of sight of the clubhouse but not too far away, was a truck and as Halo got to the truck, Fury got out and helped him put her inside. He quickly wrapped a gag around her mouth and helped Halo lay her carefully in the backseat.
Halo glanced over at Fury. “For the record…I don’t like this. I don’t like it at all. Jr. is gonna kill his old man over this woman and you fucking know it.”
“I know it but he’s our boss and we’re just following orders,” Fury agreed. “Bones is like a dog with a bone about this. He just won’t stop.”
“Did you see their faces?” Halo asked. “He’d better get his answers and take her back before they realize she’s gone or he’s gonna have more than just Jr. looking for him. The President of the Sinners MC was there today. He’s gonna start a war with this shit.”
“Yeah, between the Sinners and Satan’s Spawn this could get ugly.” Fury nodded. “Let’s get her to him, so we can get her back to where she belongs.” Fury started the truck and they took off for the warehouse where Sam was staying. A few minutes later, he carried her into the warehouse and to the small room Sam was waiting for her in. He laid her on the small metal bed and took the gag off her. He left her hands bound for now.
The room was small and the only furniture in it was the small metal bed Cassie was lying on. Sam sat on a folding chair and waited for her to wake up. He had a beer bottle in his hand and he stared at the woman his son was going to marry a few hours ago.
When two of his men joined him, none of them said a word. Sabbath and Raine sat on the floor, backs against the wall, waiting for her to wake up. The only one that wanted to be there was Sam.
When Cassie began moaning and moving around, Sam put his empty beer bottle on the floor and moved closer to her. He knelt down beside the bed and waited for her to open her eyes.
Cassie groaned as she woke up. She tried to lift her hands but she couldn’t. Opening her eyes, she saw the concrete walls around her and she began to panic.
“Hey, settle down,” Sam ordered. “I’m not here to hurt you.”
Cassie scooted back on the bed as far as she could go but it wasn’t far enough. Her belly got in the way and she brought her hands up to protect herself. “What the fuck do you want?”
Sam leaned forward. “I wanted to get to know you better.”
Cassie sneered. “Go to hell, you bastard.”
Sam frowned. “You aren’t exactly in the position to talk trash to me girl.”
Cassie twisted and tried to loosen her hands but the rope got tighter and the bite began to burn her skin. “What did you do to me?” She moaned. “Where am I?” She glanced around the room in panic. Sweat beaded her forehead and she looked terrified. She tried to pull her wrists apart but the ropes wouldn’t give. Sweat rolled down on her forehead and the side of her face.
Sam frowned as he watched her struggle. He turned and grimaced at his men. Turning back to Cassie he said, “I’m not going to hurt you, so stop struggling.”
By this time, Cassie couldn’t hear his soft spoken words. The inability to get herself free along with the concrete walls around her had plunged her deep in her worst nightmares. She began throwing herself back against the wall behind the bed.
Sam got to his feet and motioned for Sabbath. “Cut the goddamn ropes before she hurts herself!”
Sabbath came towards the bed and flipped open his knife.
Cassie saw nothing but the knife coming for her. “No!” she screamed and brought her hands up to protect her belly. She hit the knife and sent it flying, cutting her arm in the process. She didn’t seem to notice the blood running down her arm as she curled herself up in the corner of the bed.
“What the fuck is she doing?’ Sam asked his men.
Sabbath reached for the knife again and tried to get close enough to cut the ropes on her wrists. She screamed again and tried to kick out at him. This time, the knife came down on her side.
She screamed again and Sabbath backed away. He turned to Sam and said, “I’m not going near her again. She’s crazy.”
~* * * *~
“She isn’t crazy, she’s scared to death, you fucking dummy!” Raine told the other man. He stepped forward and knelt at the side of the bed. “Honey, please stop. I don’t want you to hurt yourself any more than you already have.” His voice was low and quiet.
“He was gonna hurt my babies,” Cassie whimpered.
“No honey, he wasn’t,” Raine told her. “He was going to cut the ropes on your wrists, so you could get free.”
Cassie looked down at her wrists. The skin around the ropes were raw and bleeding. The rope was so tight her hands were turning blue. “I can’t feel my hands. Why can’t I feel my hands?”
“The ropes are too tight.” Raine explained. He picked up the knife from where it had fallen on the bed. “Can I cut the ropes?” he asked. “I’m not going to hurt you or your baby. I just want to help you get your hands free.”
Cassie stared at the man in front of her. Her sense of panic was still there but his voice was calming it down. She nodded as she held out her hands to him.
Raine cut the rope and laid the knife down carefully on the bed. He didn’t want the girl to panic again. Carefully, he took one of her wrists and pulled the rope loose. Then he did the other wrist and when he was done, he took note of how bad the injury was. He looked over his shoulder and asked Sabbath, “Can you find my first aid kit?”
Sabbath nodded and left the room. When he returned, he tossed the kit to Raine and kept back.
Raine opened the kit and pulled out a gauze pad. He began cleaning the blood from her wrists.
Cassie watched him with distrust in her eyes. She wouldn’t acknowledge the pain as he cleaned the wound and dressed it.
After he was done with her wrists, he began cleaning the cut on her arm. When he was finished with that, he looked at her. “I need to see the cut on your side. It’s still bleeding and we need to see how bad it is.”
Cassie studied him for a moment then lifted her eyes to the other two men in the room. She picked up the knife and held it in her hand. Her panic was still there but not as strong as it had been. She glared at Deke’s father but kept her eyes on the other man as well. The knife in her hand was the only thing she had to protect herself and she wasn’t giving it up. “If my babies are hurt, I will kill you.” She snarled at Sam.
“Babies? As in more than one?” Sam queried.
“Babies, as in more than one.” Cassie confirmed with a glare. “I’m having twins in a couple of months.”
Sam quirked an eyebrow. “Twins don’t run in our family. Are you sure those are Deke’s babies?”
“They do in mine,” Cassie told him.
Sam leaned back against the wall. “So how did you meet Deke?”
“That’s none of your business, is it?”
“I think it is.” Sam growled. “He is my son.”
“And if he wanted you to know he would have told you,” Cassie informed him. She ignored the pain in her side as Raine cleaned the blood away. She hissed slightly and pulled away from him but Raine pressed the gauze to her side harder. She wouldn’t take her eyes off the two men standing there. She looked pale and her eyes were dilated.
“I’m sorry but I need to stop the bleeding,” Raine apologized. Opening another package of gauze, he pressed it to her side again. He threw the bloody gauze to the floor in the pile he had already started. Blood quickly soaked through the new pad and Raine had to open another package. He turned to Sam and shook his head. “I can’t get the bleeding to stop.” Turning to Cassie he said, “I need you to lay down. The bleeding won’t stop as long as you’re sitting up. There’s too much pres
sure on the wound.”
Raine pulled her down to lay flat and she tried to fight him off but found she didn’t have the strength. He turned to Sabbath. “Get me some clean towels or something heavier than this shit.”
Sabbath disappeared for a moment. When he came back, he shook his head. “There isn’t anything clean here.”
Raine turned and stared at Sam, ‘Then we need to get her to a hospital. She’s bleeding bad enough to warrant medical attention. If they can’t stop the bleeding, something is gonna happen to those babies and you don’t want that. Deke will kill you the way it is.”
Sam nodded. “Fine, you take her and you stay with her until she gets medical attention.” He turned to leave but turned back and snarled, “Don’t you let anything happen to her or those babies.”
Raine narrowed his eyes and snarled. “What a fucked up mess this turned out to be. Jr. is not gonna be happy.” He turned to gather her in his arms and felt the knife at his throat. Looking down at her, he could see the emotion in her eyes.
Hate blazed strong but there was something else there too. She looked scared to death. “Save my babies,” she whispered. “Please don’t let my babies die.”
“They won’t and neither will you,” Raine promised. He turned and found Sabbath standing there. “Let’s go, you’re driving.”
He carried her own of the warehouse and got inside the truck. With her on his lap, he waited for Sabbath to get behind the wheel. The few minutes it took for them to get to the hospital, Raine could feel the blood soaking from her wound straight through to his shirt.
When they got to the Emergency Room, he called out for a doctor. Nurses came running and he laid her on a gurney. She was whisked away to an exam room and Raine noticed she was fighting to stay awake. The blood loss worried him but when a nurse tried to take the knife away from her, she began fighting them.
Raine went to the nurses, “She won’t give up the knife. Its better if you let her hang onto it.”
The nurse shook her head. “We can’t, it’s a weapon that could cause harm to the staff here. We have to get it away from her.”
“Then let me try. She’s scared and hurt and not thinking right,” Raine assured her. He turned to Cassie and with careful movements, he approached. “I need you to let me have the knife. The nurses think you might hurt somebody with it.”
Cassie shook her head. “It’s all I have to protect my babies.”
“You don’t have to protect them here, no one here is going to hurt them.” Raine tried to reassure her.
Cassie looked up at him with confusion in her eyes. “But if I don’t protect them who else will? I don’t have anything to give them but protection. I don’t even know if I can love them like a mother can. I’m scared to death here. I need Deke. Can you find him and ask him to come here?”
Raine held her hand. “I’ll call him and he’ll come. I think that man loves you very much.”
“I think he does too. I don’t know why he does but he does. He’s so excited about these babies. He doesn’t understand my fears but when you grow up the way I did, the fear always wins. I’ve never had anything I could call my own except these babies. I have to protect them.”
A nurse came up to the gurney Cassie was on. “Hey there girl.” She smiled. “What are you doing here?”
Cassie turned her head and smiled. “Maggie, I’m glad you’re here. I got a cut on my side that won’t stop bleeding.”
“I know honey.” Maggie patted her hand. “I’m here to help but you have to give up the knife, so the doctors can see you.”
Cassie turned to Raine. “Will you call Deke for me? I really need him here.”
Raine nodded. “I’ll call him.”
Maggie smiled. “I already called. Deke is on his way along with Peaches and Paige and everyone else. They are very concerned about you.” Maggie began noticing her other wounds. She turned to Raine and asked, “What the hell did you do to her?”
“Halo tied her hands together and when she woke up she fought us. We weren’t going to hurt her but she didn’t give us a chance to tell her that,” Raine explained. “When we went to cut the ties she thought we were going hurt her or her babies and she put up a fight. She got cut by accident. We were never going to hurt her or the babies.”
Maggie snorted. “You’d better hope Deke believes that and nothing else goes wrong.”
Just then, Cassie screamed Maggie’s name.
Maggie turned to her and began checking her over. “What’s wrong honey?” She laid her hand on Cassie’s stomach and found it hard with a contraction. “Oh Jesus, not now,” she muttered. “It’s too soon.”
Cassie gasped. “I’m gonna lose them aren’t I?” she wailed. “I couldn’t protect my babies and now they’re gonna die!”
“No, they aren’t sweetheart,” Maggie tried to reassure her. “You and your babies are gonna be just fine. Pregnant women get these pains all the time. They’re called Braxton Hick contractions.” She took the knife out of Cassie’s hands and stepped back.
The doctors rushed over to her and began examining her side where the blood was still seeping.
As they wheeled her away, Maggie turned and glared at Raine. “You and your fucking boss better hope nothing happens to those babies or her.” She turned and walked the same way Cassie had been taken.
Raine followed more slowly. Sam had told him to stay with her and nothing was going to keep him away. He wasn’t sure he wanted to leave now anyway. He had to know if she was going to be all right.
CHAPTER THREE
Raine saw a nurse give Cassie a shot of something to calm her down. The doctor had removed her top and was now sewing her cut closed. Cassie’s face was blank and that worried him. He knew she was in pain but she wouldn’t let anyone see it and that wasn’t normal. He came up behind Maggie and asked, “Is she gonna be okay?”
She turned her head to gaze at him. “I don’t know. Right now, she’s blocking out her pain and worry but I know she’s scared to death.”
“So what’s her story then?” he asked.
Maggie shook her head. “That’s not my story to tell, if you want to know you’ll have to talk to Deke.”
Deke, Gator and Deacon walked in the room just then. He saw Raine standing there. Deke rushed over to him, hauled back his arm and let his fist fly forward. Raine took the hit. He knew he deserved it and more. He hit the wall behind him but stayed on his feet. Deke hauled him a few feet away and began asking questions. When he found out what he wanted to know he went back to the group, but his glare stayed on Raine.
A few minutes later, Paige, Max and Peggy, Reva and Marnie came in. They looked at Deke and then everyone stared at the doctor coming their way.
It was Doctor Peters and he looked shaken. “We got the bleeding from the cut on her side stopped and her other injuries don’t seem too bad, but I’m afraid she’s not in a good place right now. She had a few contractions and she’s afraid she’ll lose her babies. She keeps saying something about not being able to protect her own babies.”
“Is that a possibility? For her to lose them?” Deke wanted to know. His hands were curled into fists.
“I don’t know at the moment. I would say no if it were any other person but her.”
“What does that mean?” Paige asked.
“Cassie has told me some of her story and we talked about getting her some help but she didn’t want to talk any medication that would harm the babies. But if she falls into a deep depression right now, I don’t know if we can get her back. She might just shut down and never make it back and that wouldn’t be good for the babies.”
Deke turned to glare at Raine. Then he turned back to the doctor. “Is there anything we can do to prevent that?”
Doctor Peters shrugged. “The only thing I can think of is to give her a reason to come back on her own. We know she can do it, she just has to want to. Not only for her sake but for the babies’ sake as well. Her
mind is a fragile thing at the moment and only she can do this. She has been through a lot recently, too much for most people to handle.” He looked over at Deke, “But you have to give her a reason to stay with us. You have to give her a sound reason to feel safe. Whatever happened to her to bring this on brought out this fear, I didn’t see coming and I don’t think she saw it either.”
Deke nodded and went to her side. “Baby please don’t leave me. I need you.”
She stared up at the ceiling and when he took her hand, her skin was cold to the touch. Cassie didn’t acknowledge him in any way.
“You promised me you’d be my wife. I want to spend the rest of my life with you and our children. I can’t wait to hold my babies. I hope Jemmia has your red hair. Sam will be a good brother, I promise. He’ll protect her when they get older.”
When she didn’t move or acknowledge him, Deke leaned closer and kissed her. “Please baby, don’t leave me. I couldn’t stand it if you weren’t there for me. I love you so much.” He sat with her for a few more minutes then joined the others. Tears were rolling down his face and he seemed distracted. Running his fingers through his hair, he looked over at Deacon and shook his head. “I can’t get through to her. It’s like she’s not hearing me.”
Iceman, Peaches and Paige rushed down the hall. “What happened? Where has she been?” Peaches asked.
“My father decided he wanted to get to know her better,” Deke snarled. “He fucking kidnapped her and dragged her away from the compound.”
Peaches’ face paled as she thought about what could have happened. “What did he do to her?” she whispered.
“Raine said her hands were tied together because Sam didn’t want her to freak out like she did when Sabbath grabbed her,” Deke explained. “When she came to, her hands were tied and she couldn’t move. She opened her eyes to find herself in a small room with concrete walls.”
