by A. J. Downey
“Just what the fuck you into, Rocket?” I asked the empty air. One way to find out. I let myself through the gate and down the small brick alleyway. It emptied out into a courtyard, which surprised me. A small, bricked-in workshop sat in the corner of it, the windows dark, and a shiny padlock in good repair keeping folk out of it. An iron stair led to the open air second floor. There was only one door above the jewelry store, so I mounted the steps two at a time and went to it.
I pounded on the door, “Rocket!? It’s Red-Thirteen!” I called. There was no answer. I pounded on the door three more times with my closed fist. I felt suddenly gripped by a creeping dread.
I knew she was safe from my club, my real club. No women, no children. But I wouldn’t put it passed the sick fucks that were The Suicide Kings to have done something to her, to blame The Sacred Hearts. I gripped the door knob and it turned easily in my hand. I expected resistance when I pushed on the door, but there was none, it swung inward on well-oiled hinges. I set my helmet down carefully on the floor just inside the door and swept the dimly lit interior with my gaze.
Small, two bedrooms, maybe. Kitchen just to the left of the front door, hall leading to what looked like a laundry area and one bedroom on the left, living room space directly ahead, dining area directly through the front door and to the right. Another hall past the dining area. A darkened bathroom door, I could see the sink from here… Past that, I think, was a second bedroom. I slid my gun out from underneath my prospect’s cut and held it at the ready. It was quiet, and still. So very still.
“Rocket?” I called and there was a weak cough and a moan from the direction of the bathroom, past it, off to the right. My heart squeezed in my chest and a hot rage started to burn in my belly. If those sons of bitches sent me out here to bear witness to her dying… I didn’t want to finish the thought. I swept the apartment and, satisfied that there was no one there to jump out and take me down, I went for the last door. The one that held that weak feminine groaning.
I opened the door flush against the wall and what I saw… fuck me. I knew she’d been fighting a cold, but this was fucking ridiculous! She lay in bed, the blankets and quilts piled high. Her hair was matted and used Kleenex overflowed the small trashcan by her bedside, piling against the hardwood like a drift of snow. Her nose was bright red and her breathing was off, way off. It wheezed and rattled in her chest, I could hear it all the way from across the room.
I don’t think anyone had been out here to look in on her until I’d shown up today. I’d seen people at Death’s door, dropped more than a few in a heap there myself. And Rocket, she was fucking there.
“Oh, Jesus Christ,” I heard myself swear. I put my gun back in my waistband and pulled my cell out of my cut. I dialed Pig-Pen.
“What?” he demanded by way of greeting.
“Did you know she was sick?” I asked and my voice was edged with disbelief.
“What? Yeah, some cold or something, I told her to take care of it and stop comin’ around ‘til she did. None of us want that shit.” Pig-Pen sounded irritated, irritated!
“Sorry to piss on your parade, Boss, but it’s blown up into something much worse than that! I’m lookin’ at her right now and your Ol’ Lady is knocking on Death’s front door. I don’t know, Man, it looks bad.” I sat down on the bed next to her and smoothed back some of her hair which was lank with sweat. She was burning the fuck up.
“Fuckin’ deal with it,” he growled into my ear, “My bitch dies, I’m holding you responsible.” Was he fucking kidding me!?
“I gotta get her to a hospital then, Man…”
“No hospital! I ain’t paying for that shit. Fucking figure it out, Man, but no fuckin’ hospital,” he yelled.
“Alright! No hospital, I know a dude does house calls. Fuck me, Man… I got this. Might be a few days before I’ll know if she’s gonna make it.”
“She fuckin’ better or it’s your ass, Pretty-boy. She’s valuable to the club, it needs her.”
“Got it. I gotta hang up.” He did me a favor and ended the call for me. I pulled the burner out of my other pocket and hit send twice. I murmured to her while it rang through.
“Come on Baby girl, hang on for me; just hang on.” I pried up her eyelids but her eyes were rolled back in her head, nothing but white.
“Hello?”
“D! D I need Doc. I need Doc right fuckin’ now, Man!” I said into the line and there was a half-second of silence.
“You hurt?” He demanded and I heard him snapping his fingers in the background.
“Not me, Dani… Coon. She’s real sick, man.”
“She OD?”
“Naw, she doesn’t do that shit, this is something else. She had some kind of a cold.” I put my other ear to her chest and listened.
“Jesus Christ, is that her breathing?” I heard Dragon cry.
“Yeah. It’s bad, D it’s real bad and she’s fuckin’ important to these assholes. She does something - I dunno what yet but their VP said it’d be my fucking ass if she died so whatever it is, it’s big.” The phone switched hands.
“R.T. It’s Doc, tell me what’s happening and describe her symptoms, I’m throwing some shit together now.”
“Uhhh she’s burning up. Her breathing sucks, Man, it’s like she’s not getting enough air. She was fighting some kind of cold the last few weeks and I think it snuck up on her and laid her out.”
“Is she conscious?”
“Hell to the motherfuckin’ no, Man, and I can’t get her to wake up! It’s freaking me out!”
“How long she been like that?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know Man! Uh, Pig said he hasn’t seen her in a few days, she could have been like this that long, or longer for all I know.”
“Alright I’m on my way, you gotta get her cleaned up. Strip the bed and get some fresh sheets on it. Can you do that?”
“Yeah, yeah, I can do that!” I said.
“Where you at?” he demanded. I rattled off the address and description of where we were at, and dropped the phone on the bedside table.
“Come on, Dani. We gotta get you cleaned up, Babe.” I threw back the blankets and winced. Most definitely she’d been here a couple of days. The girl was ripe. She moaned and her brow furrowed but she was so far fucking out of it, it was unreal. I strode into the bathroom and hit the taps, waited for the water to heat up, and started the tub to filling. This was going to be messy and graceless but I didn’t give a fuck. I stripped my shirt over my head and tossed it over the top of the door. I’d need something dry to put her in and I didn’t know where any of her shit was. Doc would be here inside an hour so I didn’t really have time to go fish for anything other than bed linens.
I went back to the bedroom and stripped her out of the oversized tee and the panties she’d been sleeping in. I kept talking to her, hoping it would somehow make what I was doing better. I doubted it very much, though. The girl had been violated six ways to Sunday by the SKMC, and I was just another set of male hands taking liberty at this point.
“I’m so sorry, Rocket. I’m so sorry, Baby, I didn’t know. If I’d known I would have been here before it got to this. Hang in there for me, girl. Just hang on,” was mostly what I said, or some variation thereof. I got her into the tub as it slowly filled with water, shutting it off when it got to a certain level. I made sure there was no way she could slip under, and went to the next thing on Doc’s list.
I stripped the bed fast and bundled the dirty linens up, flinging them down the hall towards the washer and dryer. They could live there for the time being, in a heap in front of the two machines. I tried the closet and - jackpot! Some fresh ones were folded on the top shelf. I pulled them down and made the bed. I took a couple of the top blankets that hadn’t been against her body and put ‘em on the bed. The bottom two joined the pile in front of the washer and dryer. I pulled a couple of old quilts out of the closet and finished up the bed quick, and returned to the bathroom. She hadn’t moved. Her breath
ing sucked just so damned bad that her lips were almost blue. I grabbed a clean, empty saucepot off the top of the stove. It’d have to do.
I washed her carefully and used the pot to wet her long hair. I washed that, too, carefully shampooing and rinsing. She moaned and coughed and weakly tried to struggle throughout my ministrations, but what really threw me was when she started speaking French in a quiet, broken, pleading tone of voice.
“Se il vous plaît pas, se il vous plaît laissez-moi mourir.” She repeated over and over, and I didn’t have a fuckin’ clue what she was trying to tell me.
“Man, Rocket. I don’t understand, Babe. English. Please, Baby, tell me in English…” but it was just more of the same thing over and over again. Se il vous plaît pas, se il vous plaît laissez-moi mourir, over and over again.
I pulled the plug and the water siphoned down the drain on the tired, old, but clean tub. I started the tap and, an arm curved around her back and shoulders, held her up and used the pot to give her a final rinse. I shut off the water and snatched the large towel from the bar, wrapping her in it awkwardly. I got her back up and into my tee shirt by propping her on the couch out in the living room.
“Okay, Babe. Almost there.”
She was so fucking out of it. So weak she couldn’t even hold her head up. She’d stopped speaking and that death rattle in her chest got worse and worse the more time that ticked by. I tipped her against my shoulder so I could pull my shirt down in back and that’s when I saw the tattoo. Rage, hot and immediate, surged in the center of my chest. ‘Pig-Pen’ was scrawled across her lower back in black, spikey script reminiscent of the anarchy ‘A’. The son of a bitch had branded her, but he couldn’t fucking take care of her.
I was just pulling the blankets on her freshly-made bed up over her lap when Doc shoved through the apartment’s open front door. I pointed my weapon out of habit and he raised his hands, his medical bag over his shoulder.
“Just me,” he said, then frowned. “Where’s your shirt?”
“On her. Hurry the fuck up.” He came into the bedroom and I moved aside, shoving my weapon away. He stuck a thermometer in her ear, one of the kinds they use on kids, and made a growling noise.
“103.2.” He took her pulse and shook his head, jerking his stethoscope out of his bag and sticking it in his ears. He pulled blankets down and put his hand up my shirt and listened to her chest. I was about to get twitchy about him leaving it there too long when he pulled it back out and covered her up to her armpits, leaving her arms out from under the blankets.
“Without x-rays to confirm, I have to guess pneumonia. I brought IV fluids and a broad spectrum antibiotic. You’re right, she’s in miserable fucking shape. I’m gonna get an IV started. You might as well settle in, Boy. You’re gonna be here a while, and so am I.”
I nodded and let Doc do his thing. I started the washer with her sheets and the shit I’d stripped off the bed. It was gonna be a couple of loads.
“R.T.!” he called.
“Yeah?”
“Bring me that coat rack I saw in the dining room, need somethin’ for an IV stand.”
I brought the rack, which held only one coat, and set it up by the bed. It was one of those old fashioned ones made out of a thick and rich wood.
“Grab me a coat hanger from the closet there,” he said. I did as I was told. I could tell he’d done this back-alley medicine shit a time or two before. It didn’t seem like he was improvising so much as using some tried-and-true methods. He hung the IV bag on the hanger, and the hanger on the coat rack, and messed with the tubing leading into Dani’s inner arm. She was so fucking pale. Her skin was almost translucent, the veins standing out almost neon on the inside of her forearm. The same place where she’d written on me where I could find the pain medicine she’d left me.
“This the way they treat their women?” he asked me.
“Just the ones that’re valuable to them. Swear to Christ they treat the sluts better. Those bitches can leave.”
He smoothed some of her hair back from her face and looked her over.
“She’s a knock out,” he observed.
“Yeah. Different, too. She’s smart, doesn’t use. I don’t know what she does for them but whatever it is, it’s important.” He nodded.
“You been protecting her?” he asked.
“No. Not as much as I want to. It’d blow my cover, but I’m beginning to not care so much about that right now.” Doc turned cold hard eyes on me.
“You better care,” he said and I nodded, catching his meaning. I wasn’t any good to her or my club dead, and we still had work to do. There was a long pause in conversation as we both retreated inside our own heads.
“Rev really kicked your ass,” Doc said flatly, breaking me out of my thoughts. I turned and saw his tired blue eyes roving my fading yellow bruises, the flat, shiny, pink scar on my cheekbone.
“Dude doesn’t know any other way to do it,” I said with a shrug.
“Ain’t that the ever loving truth of it?” he asked.
Indeed.
“How much longer until we can start really being the hunters versus the prey?” I asked.
“Sure we should be talking about any of this in front of her?” he countered.
“She isn’t out?” I asked, surprised because she looked like she was out fucking cold.
“Were you?” he shot back and I palmed the back of my neck, chagrined.
“Fair enough, Old Man.”
“Who the fuck you callin’ old, Boy?” he smiled but it was still weighted by his loss and his grief over his Ol’ Lady. I stared down at Dani. If she died I was going to own Pig and the lot of them into next week. She took care of me at risk to herself, it was more than time I manned up and returned the favor.
Chapter 6
Dani…
I had two problems. The first was that I had to pee and the second… well the second was that I woke up. I was warm, too warm, and when I opened my eyes it was to look down the length of my forearm. The first thing to become immediately apparent? The white swatch of tape holding the plastic of the IV in place against my skin. The second thing? I wasn’t alone in my bed. A strong, muscled arm curved over the top of my waist, the back of my body snug against a hard body that was putting off an amazing amount of heat.
I searched my memory for who it could be and came up empty. All I knew was that I’d been so close to being free of the nightmare I’d been living and someone had pulled me back from the brink of that beautiful oblivion. I choked, and bit down on a sob, and whoever it was that had a hold on me jolted.
“Shhhh, s’okay, Dani.” The voice was warm and gentle and not Pig’s. Warm, soft lips pressed to my skin on the back of my shoulder, where the neckline of the tee I was wearing didn’t quite cover. I sucked in a breath and a broken cry of such crushing defeat escaped my mouth, and I doubled in on myself.
Why!? Why do you hate me so much!? I silently asked God, but as always there was no answer.
“Oh Baby, I’m so sorry.” The arm around me drew me back and held me close and I cried, broken and bitter at still being alive. I couldn’t cry forever, though, and my bladder was screaming for relief. I still didn’t know who held me fast but I’d learned a long time ago that who didn’t matter so much, especially when it came to the Suicide Kings. Though truthfully, whoever had me was being both kind and gentle, and it was a mark of how damaged I’d become that it was that which was scaring me more than being in a stranger’s arms.
“I’m going to let you go. You have to promise me you won’t rip out your IV. You promise?” the voice was familiar but the face that went along with it was eluding me. The arm locked around my middle eased off and I sat up abruptly, swinging my legs over the edge of the bed, my feet making contact with the old, worn hardwood of my bedroom floor.
“Easy, Rocket.” The voice soothed and I stiffened, turning my head slowly.
“Thirteen?” I asked, not quite believing. But sure enough, there he was, shirtless,
with his head propped in his hand, smiling that roguish smile at me.
“How’s my patient?” a grizzled voice asked from my bedroom door and I whipped my head so fast in that direction, to face the new possible threat, that the ends of my hair lashed the half-naked Prospect behind me.
“Who the fuck are you?” I asked. The man harrumphed.
“I’m yer doctor,” he said. He looked like one, sort of. Soft brown shoes, khaki Dockers, blue button down shirt… except his head was shaved and he had a gray and white handlebar mustache.
“Why thank you, Doc, for saving my life!” he mocked and I smoothed my long hair behind my ears, pulling it tight with my distress.
“I didn’t ask you to do that!” I snapped. He leaned a shoulder against the doorjamb and raised an eyebrow at Thirteen behind me. I stood up abruptly and swayed on my feet, black spots and weird color bursts flashing in my vision. I felt extremely light headed and Thirteen was just suddenly there, standing behind me, a solid wall of man at my back, his hands on my waist gently supporting me.
“Easy, Girl,” the doctor intoned. “You were so dehydrated we almost lost you, you got pneumonia, you’re weak; who the fuck knows when you last ate… You need to take it slow.” He sounded genuinely concerned and when I looked, his blue eyes had lost their hard edge.
“I really have to pee,” I said hollowly.
“K, c’mon, I’ll help you,” Thirteen murmured just above my shoulder. I looked up at him.
“How’d you know where I live?” I asked.
“Bathroom first, then there will be plenty of time for conversation. Doc?” The doctor came forward and gently grasped my wrist, turning my arm out.
“Keep it straight for me?” he asked and I nodded. He unhooked the line and capped the thing in my arm, with quick and sure precision. They’d brought my granddad’s old coat rack in here and my bedside trashcan had three of the empty saline bags in it. And the fourth one, hanging, was almost empty. No wonder I had to pee so bad!
I looked down at myself and frowned, I didn’t recognize the tee shirt I was in, but it was a puzzle for later. Thirteen was walking me out into the hall and I went with it, a little afraid of what would happen if he let me go. I felt so strange! He turned me loose just inside the bathroom door and shut it behind him, closing me into the small space by myself. I did what needed doing and washed my hands, grateful for the counter to hold me up.
