Fragmented

by Stephanie Tyler

  “Son of a bitch!” Jem roared from the other side of the window, where he was now being guarded by three nervous police officers, after he’d broken into the then-empty viewing room ten minutes earlier. He’d done so when he discovered that Danny was still roaming the police station, and Drea had been left by herself. He’d never thought Danny would be let into the locked room with her, or that police officers would stop him at the door and hold him at bay with guns. He’d almost pushed past them, but he’d be no help to Drea dead. “This was a motherfucking setup.”

  He threw a chair at the mirror—it cracked on his side, but before he could do it again, two officers walked in on Drea and Danny and arrested her.

  Danny walked out smirking. Jem dove for the door, shaking off the cops who’d attempted to tackle him. There was no way anyone was stopping him. Right now he didn’t give a shit. He was taking Danny down. He reached for the MC member now and Danny made a grab for his forearm, to block him. It didn’t work. The two men slammed against the wall together, Jem refusing to give up his grip. Didn’t matter that Ethan was jumping on his back, attempting to tear him away.

  He leaned in close enough for Danny and only Danny to hear him. “I will fucking kill you. Do you understand? It might not be today or tomorrow, but mark my words, I will end you.”

  He could’ve added, “If you don’t leave Drea alone.” But there were no promises on that. Not the way Jem felt.

  “You’re just jealous that I had her first. That I still have her.”

  Jem slammed his fist into the side of Danny’s face, immediately wiping that stupid smirk off it. His hand closed around Danny’s throat as a jolt of electricity hit his body. The Taser worked quickly, and Jem dropped to the floor in pain. Incapacitated.

  It didn’t matter that he was still in pain when he came to, and in a jail cell. It’d been worth it. And it wasn’t like he didn’t have a full plan B either. If Drea was getting put into a cell, so was he. Didn’t matter that they wouldn’t be in the same cell. He’d be close enough where he could make a friend and make sure someone was watching over her.

  He was pretty sure that the rest of the team knew what was going on. Ethan had better be working on some kind of bail for Drea, or the next throat Jem put his hands around would be his.

  For now, he stared up at the faces who were staring down at him. One of them was a bored-looking guard who’d been watching to make sure that nobody beat Jem up while he was recovering. Now that Jem had opened his eyes, the guard headed out.

  Two men leaned into him.

  “You okay, man? They really fucked you up,” one of the men said.

  “I fucking loved it.” Jem sat up. “Either of you know these guards?”

  “What exactly do you want to know about them?” the second man asked.

  “Anything that can get me in with them.”

  *

  The jail cell Drea had been escorted to was grim and dreary, but somehow infinitely better than the interrogation room had been. One, because it was open-bars all around, which stopped her claustrophobia cold. Two, Danny was nowhere to be seen.

  Anything else, she could handle.

  It was crowded in here. There were some empty cells, but she’d been put in here purposely.

  A quick furtive sweeping glance of the cell netted her a look at several women, most likely arrested for solicitation. They wouldn’t give her much trouble. But the two in the corner? Yeah, they been eyeing her from the time the guard put her in here.

  “Hey, baby—what’s going on?” one of them said to her, and began to amble over like they were best friends. Drea braced herself but didn’t get up from the bench.

  “Just waiting to make bail,” Drea told her with a hard look.

  “And here we were just getting to know each other.”

  The other women had started to get interested. It was better for them that they weren’t chosen as targets. But none of them knew how much pent-up anger Drea had inside her, especially after today. She knew that fighting in here wouldn’t help her case for bail.

  She also knew that she didn’t care.

  But she chided herself, because she knew that would be really letting Danny win. Her loyalty lay with Jem and with Section 8. So she forced herself to say, “I’m a doctor.”

  Because she knew that meant something, and in this world, in the world of criminals and the downtrodden, anything you could barter with mattered. This was only jail, not prison, but still. With her long sleeves covering her tattoos and her well-groomed appearance, they’d take her as an easy mark.

  As she’d suspected, the woman who’d approached her stared, her eyes lighting. “You know how to get me into the infirmary?”

  Drea paused before speaking. Trying to balance the safety of the infirmary staff with balancing her own was a tough one. In the end, she figured there would be enough guards in the infirmary to stop whatever this woman was trying to do. But first she asked, “What do you want to do in the infirmary?”

  “Really none of your business.”

  “You want help, don’t you?”

  The woman glanced around, then lowered her voice. “I’m pregnant. Don’t want to hang around here for days waiting for my case to be called. Just need a bed.”

  “They’ll test you, first thing.”

  “Always?”

  “I can’t promise this will get you out of a pregnancy test, but it’s worth a shot. Make yourself throw up. Then hold your right side and pretend you’re in a hell of a lot of pain.” Drea knew the woman wouldn’t want the prison staff to know about her pregnancy. If and when she got out, it would trigger a child protective services visit.

  Drea would make sure she told the guards this when she got out. But for now, it saved her own ass. Now she just had to sit back and wait for Jem to do the rest.

  *

  Jem sat in an interrogation room similar to the one Drea had been in. He’d made sure that she was okay in the cell—and he’d heard that she taken care of herself quite well—and that was the only reason he allowed himself to be put in here.

  Ethan was sitting next to him, and the FBI agents who interrogated Drea earlier sat across.

  “I want to know what happened,” Ethan demanded, his anger barely controlled and definitely not concealed.

  “It was a mistake—he asked to speak to his fiancée. The officer in charge didn’t know any better,” the female FBI agent said calmly.

  She was lying, of course. They all were. But motherfucking why was what Jem needed to know. So he pretended to be sane and rational, and he could do both of those things quite well when necessary. “So you’ll take them into custody?”

  “Danny is in our protective custody. He’s not under arrest.”

  “But he should be,” Jem managed through clenched teeth, and so much for sane and rational. Apparently, where Drea was concerned, there was no such thing.

  Good to know. Time for another plan B. And that consisted of lunging toward the FBI agent, because he didn’t care that she was a woman. Instinctively, she jumped back and Ethan grabbed for him, hissing, “Cut the shit, Jem.”

  And Jem did, if for no other reason that Ethan was as pissed as he was. And a former CIA man betrayed was a definite ally in this situation.

  Jem sat while Ethan remained on his feet, pointing at the agents. “We’re done here. You release her now.”

  “Or what, Ethan?” the male agent demanded.

  “Do you really want to find out?” Ethan asked in a cold, hard voice that made the agents both squirm slightly, just enough for Jem to know that Ethan did hold some real power, and the agents realized they’d fucked up.

  “We had nothing to do with Danny confronting her,” the male agent said. “This could’ve fucked up our case royally.”

  “Right,” Ethan said coldly. “Never mind that it almost fucked Drea to death, right?”

  “Look, we’re going over videotape now to see who let him in—there are a lot of cops in here that the MCs have in their
pockets. A regular officer would have no way of knowing their history. If Danny said that his girlfriend was locked in an interrogation room and scared …” The female agent held out her hands. “We’re not responsible for the cops’ behavior. We can’t control a police station and we don’t like meeting Danny here any more than you do. But this wasn’t part of our plan.”

  “You still made a deal with the devil. Now you can pay for that, but you won’t do it with my people,” Ethan growled. He motioned for Jem to follow him out of the room, and Jem did.

  As they made their way down to the cells, where Jem assumed Drea would be released ASAP, Jem said, “That’s never happening again.”

  “You can bet your life on it.”

  “No, Ethan. But you just bet yours,” Jem assured him. “Trust me on that.”

  “I know your reputation well enough to do so.”

  Chapter Twenty-four

  The guard motioned to Drea about thirty minutes after the woman had successfully pretended to have an attack of appendicitis. She’d been escorted out to the infirmary and Drea, now safely outside the cell, told the guard what was really going on.

  It only got Drea a brief nod, but it made Drea feel better.

  That woman would need to be monitored, for the child’s sake, both before and after pregnancy.

  When they passed through a locked metal gate, she saw Jem and Ethan. Relief coursed through her, and she signed some documents and took her personal belongings—her purse and a necklace—and she was a free woman again.

  Free being a relative term.

  Ethan and Jem were by her side, escorting her out of the building. Ethan stayed close and Jem’s hand clasped comfortingly around her elbow. It seemed like the longest walk, but being between Jem and Ethan helped her from feeling so vulnerable.

  If there was tension between Jem and Ethan, they didn’t show it. That was good—she couldn’t have dealt with it.

  She climbed into the second seat of the big black SUV with Jem next to her. Ethan drove, and the windows were tinted dark. For the first time in many hours, she collapsed and let go, sagging against Jem’s shoulder. She burrowed into him, and his arm banded protectively around her, his mouth to her ear, telling her to rest easy. Telling her that everything was going to be fine from this point onward.

  She dozed off and when she woke it was dark out and she was slightly disoriented. But Jem was next to her and that was all that mattered. She wondered if it would always be that simple, but just having Jem by her side would make things right. She’d be more than okay with that.

  Ethan stopped the car behind an old barn. She had no idea where they were, but it didn’t seem to surprise Jem at all. He urged her out of the truck without a word to Ethan, and she climbed into the passenger’s seat of a car parked there, a more nondescript vehicle. As Ethan and Jem talked in low voices, she glanced into the backseat and saw packed bags—her stuff.

  “Where are we going?” she asked once Jem got into the car, and he drove off in the opposite direction Ethan had driven.

  “The safest place I can think of, for the moment.” He rubbed her thigh, then took her hand in his, and she forced herself to trust him. She didn’t have much choice, and what had happened today certainly wasn’t Jem’s fault.

  “Are you angry at Ethan?”

  “He’s lucky I didn’t rip his head off and stuff it up his ass,” Jem said mildly. “But there’s plenty of time for that.”

  “What happened?” she practically whispered, because she didn’t really want to deal with it, but she needed to get it over with before they got to their new location (wherever that was).

  “Danny’s got deep pockets and friends wherever he goes. He’s playing a dangerous game and he’s fucking with the FBI. But they need him at this point. I believe they didn’t let him in to see you—Ethan said that the agents texted him a video of one of the supply room cops letting Danny into the room with you. Ethan told the FBI to get us out of jail. And I told Ethan he’s got a week to make this right. Because I was ready to go about this my way.”

  “The head-up-the-ass way?” she asked, with the first hint of a smile coming through. It’d been hours and hours since she smiled at all.

  “Exactly.”

  “Was that you? Outside the interrogation room?” She saw a muscle in his jaw work, but he didn’t say anything. Which answered her question. “You were under arrest too.”

  Still, nothing. She shook her head. That was why Jem hadn’t come to her earlier. He’d been in jail as well.

  Ethan had to bail them both out. “Did you start the riot?”

  Jem cleared his throat and said, “Let’s listen to some music.”

  “It was a big deal. The guards were talking about it. They said some crazy …”

  He grinned at her when she stopped. “And you didn’t think of me immediately?”

  She shook her head. “I thought … I mean, I figured they weren’t letting you in, or that Ethan was keeping you out.”

  “Honey, being in the cell was the best way for me to ensure that you were okay. It was the closest I could get to you without being with you.”

  “How’s that?” she asked. “Wait a minute—the guard that kept checking on us? Some of the women said that wasn’t normal, but fortunately, I didn’t know any better.”

  “Wasn’t normal. And yeah, she was my eyes.”

  “And what did you promise in return?”

  “Nothing major,” he assured her.

  “I can just imagine.” She tucked her legs under her and realized she was feeling a little better. She’d told her story to the FBI and still, they didn’t believe her. She’d done her civic duty and she was basically called a liar.

  It actually made being a semifugitive much easier. And a bit more enjoyable. And maybe this was why Jem and the others had no problem with the moral lines they straddled. “Whenever I’m with you it seems like we’re running,” Drea noted.

  “Think you could get used to it?” he asked without a trace of sarcasm. She wondered if she actually had a choice, and then she wondered if she actually even wanted one.

  “Yes,” she said firmly. “Just keep me the hell away from those agents.”

  “Honey, that’s a given.”

  *

  The memories began plaguing him the closer Jem got to the bayou. When Ethan had suggested a safe place, Jem had choked at the idea that his childhood home was safe.

  But he had to admit that Ethan had a point. And he was beginning to hate that.

  No one would think to come look for them in a place no one had lived in a hell of a long time.

  He glanced over at Drea, sleeping peacefully next to him as he drove. He knew she’d had more than her share of childhood issues, figured she’d spent a lot of time in the school counselor’s office, but probably nowhere near as much as he had.

  He could easily picture himself in that goddamned stifling room on that sunny spring day, even at ten, already far too much for the fresh-faced man who sat behind the desk and pretended he could solve children’s problems. In most cases, he actually made them worse although he was well-meaning enough. But well-meaning almost got Jem killed the last time, and when the belt buckle had caught him on the hip, he’d known that it would leave a scar forever.

  But at the time, Jem hadn’t known the consequences of that particular visit, and so he’d relaxed in the chair and waited for the inevitable questions to begin.

  “Jeremiah, you’ve gotten into quite a lot of fights this year.” This new counselor’s name was Dave Davies.

  Really? Jem’d known his own parents were pretty bad, but hell, that was just cruel. “Less than last year,” he’d pointed out helpfully. “How many fights have you gotten into this year?”

  Dave Davies had looked startled. “I don’t get into fights with students.”

  “Heard you’re having an affair with the gym teacher—she’s hot.”

  “Jeremiah, this is completely inappropriate.”

  �
��But you want to know about my fights. My personal life,” Jem had pointed out. “That only seems fair.”

  Because nothing else in his life up until that moment had ever been fair, and in truth, he’d never expected it to be.

  But then again, looking over at Drea, who’d made sure her hand was touching his leg, even in sleep, he knew damned well that sometimes life did throw out a bit of fairness, and hell, he wasn’t letting her go.

  *

  Several hours later, Jem drove along the dusty roads in the Bayou Parish he’d last visited when they first met Grace. That had turned into S8’s first mission, and none of them had looked back. Something good had come from his old home, as he and Key had grabbed their father’s old Jeep and gotten everyone out of harm’s way.

  And then he and Key had burned the truck, blown it to high heaven, cursing their old man as they’d done so.

  He smiled at the memory, and suspected it might be his last smile for a bit. He pulled over and Drea looked confused, mainly because there wasn’t a house to be seen. “Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing, really. I’m just … not ready,” he admitted.

  She squeezed his hand and then she let it go, and he got out of the car and breathed in the humid, swampy air that immediately signaled childhood to his brain. Drea got out of the car as well, and he wasn’t sure how long he stood there, but Drea didn’t rush him, and he was content to let his memories drift like the scent of honeysuckle floating on a dull breeze.

  If he blinked too hard, he might find himself alone, in another time and place, and the time when coming any farther up this road made his head ache. He knew every hiding spot from here to the old house, every tree that could support his weight for a good part of the night. He’d bet that if he dared to go into the bayou just a little farther, he’d find the tatters of the old hammock he’d hung between two of the largest cypresses.

  “Katrina did a number on this place,” he said finally.

  She put a hand on his biceps. It was cool and reassuring. “We can find another place.”

  “Sure we can. But no one’s gonna think to check here.” He looked up the road again and back down at her.