by A. J. Downey
“Yeah, well, glad you trust the lot of us enough to let us help you.”
He retreated for the door and I nodded faintly. That part had honestly been the hardest for me. Still, it hadn’t been lost on me that these men had taken a leap of faith with me. Taken me in after knowing I would willingly rat out The Suicide Kings, which just wasn’t done in the MC world. No matter how altruistic the intent behind the action may or may not be. Good intentions didn’t keep you alive in this world.
The Sacred Hearts had taken a big chance on me, letting me live, setting me up here without expecting anything in return. I scraped my bottom lip between my teeth and sighed, bending carefully back over my drawing. The least I could have done was give them equal measure for equal measure but still, it wasn’t lost on me, even with how much my back stung and pulled, that the three brothers of the Sacred Hearts had done me more of a boon than I had Revelator by making those wedding rings.
I heard the door open behind me.
“Forget something?” I asked. I had grown too confident, it would seem, let a false sense of security settle in over the last several weeks; it was a mistake that I recognized too late, and only when a man’s large hand fitted over my mouth. I was dragged back hard into a barrel chest and the smell of sour alcohol and stale cigarettes stuffed my nose.
“Now what would you be doing here, Coon?” Griz growled in my ear. His breath was beyond fetid, more ashtray and booze as it poured over me, the stench of body odor adding to the mix as he hauled my slimmer and much weaker frame off the stool.
The buttons on his denim cut dug painfully into my raw back, but still I twisted and fought and struggled, kicking and screaming muffled cries out from beneath his meaty palm. I tried to bite but couldn’t find purchase with my teeth. Griz laughed at me as all I managed to accomplish was slobbering all over the inside of his palm, the tang of metal and grease coating the inside of my mouth.
“Now where are your new little friends? Huh? I wanna see their faces when I blow your pretty little face off in front of ‘em.” I froze in his grip as the hard metal barrel of a gun pressed to my temple.
“See, now that’s better, Bitch. Now walk.” He shoved me forward with his body and I stepped as he instructed, his gait awkward as he walked with me and tried not to trip. He turned us to the side and kicked the inside crash bar to the metal door to the garage. The single door flew wide and bounced off the outside garage wall.
I swallowed hard and tried to breathe calmly, even as my heart raced. He pulled me out into the rich sunlight and I closed my eyes as the warmth touched upon my skin. The Sacred Hearts were outside waiting. I blinked slowly at Thirteen and his brothers lined up, guns drawn, marching across the grass towards the shop, towards me and Griz.
“Dani!” Thirteen called, “You okay!?”
I tried to nod but Griz’s grip tightened on my mouth and chin, forcing my head up and back against his chest.
“She look fine to you, Boy?” he roared and swayed on his feet some. I squeezed my eyes shut against the sensation it caused against my back, and tears started in my eyes.
“You just hang in there, Chica, we’ll get you out of this,” Dragon said kindly.
I opened my eyes and blinked, but the only person I could see was Thirteen. His expression was cold, shut down and murderous as he looked at Griz over my head. Then his eyes fell on my face and something in them softened. I blinked several times rapidly.
“The fuck you will!” Griz pressed the barrel of the gun into my temple harder and I shuddered. I opened my eyes and tried to communicate to Thirteen, my silent plea.
“Just what the fuck you want, Man?” Dray demanded. His dark eyes burning, a raging inferno; a maelstrom of anger, rage and hatred going on just behind the veil of darkness that was his eyes.
“Justice!” Griz roared, “Justice for m’boy! Retribution you sons-a-bitches! An eye for a fuckin eye.” Griz swayed on his feet again and it was obvious to anyone who had half a mind to put to it that he was drunk, high, or both.
“We told you what would happen,” Dragon intoned, “He did it anyways. Hurt a girl he had no business hurting.”
Griz spat, “A club whore! Weren’t no-one’s Ol’ Lady! Who the fuck cares!?”
“I do.” Reaver glowered and Dragon put up his hand in the scary man’s direction. Reaver stood, nonchalant, idly spinning an open switchblade between his long fingers.
“What you give a fuck for? Weren’t nothin’ but club pussy! Not worth a man’s life, not worth my boy’s life! Raised him m’self…” Griz started some nonsensical mumbling and his grip loosened on me marginally. I breathed out and swallowed hard, making eye contact with Thirteen, pleading with him with my eyes to do what needed to be done regardless of the outcome for me. Griz had lost it. Lost it completely and he needed to be stopped.
“Not the point. Girl didn’t belong to him, Man,” Revelator spit on the ground like he had a bitter taste in his mouth.
Griz pressed the muzzle of his gun harder into my temple and I closed my eyes. I opened them to Thirteen’s calm gaze. He stared into my eyes, while his brothers held Griz’s drunken attention, and mouthed at me to hold still. I closed my eyes again and did as my lover asked. I held very, very still as the men argued back and forth. Griz became more agitated.
“Okay Coon, I’m gonna move my hand, I don’t want to hear no bitching or caterwauling, just giving you a chance to tell your man there bye before I blow your pretty fucking head off. No screamin’ you hear me?” I nodded against his hand and finally he took it from my mouth.
“I love you.” I bit my lips together and looked at Thirteen beseeching him with my eyes before saying out loud, “Shoot him, please shoot him!” my voice cracking.
“You stupid cunt!” I felt rather than saw Griz’s arm draw back to hit me with my back to his front like it was. I closed my eyes and braced for the blow and -- POW!
The gunshot rolled out into the open air, loud and strong, echoing back from the wild blue skies. Something coated my face and globbed in my hair, warm and sticky and wet. I was still tensed and Thirteen was suddenly there.
“Don’t open your eyes Dani, don’t open your mouth!” his voice was tense and strained and I did what I was told when all I wanted to do was drop in a heap and give over to the panic splitting my chest, cracking me wide and vulnerable. When was it ever going to stop?
Chapter 27
Red-XIII…
I was laying in my bed staring at the ceiling when it went off. A loud buzzer in the common room, loud enough to wake the fucking dead. I bolted from the bed and threw on some jeans and a tee. Tugging on my last boot as I hopped on one foot in the hallway, I watched Ghost and Trig climb up the access ladder to the roof. I caught Reave by the arm, who was adjusting the Velcro strapping on his body armor as he went by.
“What the fuck is that, Man?” I demanded.
“Perimeter breach, someone hopped the fence somewhere. Tripped a motion sensor.”
Data called from the fish bowl ops room of his, “I fucking got it man! He’s going into the garage!”
“Fuck, Dani!” I moved, Blue falling in to step beside me, handing me a gun. I took it and the rest of the guys fell in with me as we poured out the back door, but it was too late. He was edging out of the shop’s single door, Dani pressed to his body, a gun pressed to my woman’s head.
“Keep her calm Man, we gotta wait for an opening for Trig and Ghost to do their thing,” Reaver murmured under his breath before we drew near them. I swallowed my heart back into my friggin’ chest and, with it pounding, advanced with my brothers across the grass.
Griz stopped short and did he ever look like fucking hell! Clothes dirtier than usual, and all out of sorts, hair in a wild halo around his head, coming loose from his ponytail, which was skewed off to the side and hanging over his shoulder. His eyes were so bloodshot you’d swear the whites were pink to begin with and they bounced from one to the other of us so erratically – dude had to be on something. Th
ere wasn’t any way that he was any kind of sober.
He had one massive, dirty paw over my girl’s mouth and Dani’s cornflower blue eyes were so wide in her paler than usual face, it made my heart fucking bleed.
“Dani!” I called out to her, “You okay!?”
She tried to nod but Griz tightened his grip, pulling back on her head. Her slender throat worked in a swallow and her eyes squeezed shut before she opened them, leveling me with her gaze. Her expression was beseeching but I knew my girl, my woman…
“She look fine to you, Boy?” Griz roared and swayed on his feet, jolting Dani, who swayed limply in front of him. She might as well be a fucking rag doll and I seethed with anger. Her eyes glimmered wetly with her tears and her expression spoke clearly to me.
Don’t worry about me… Kill him, just kill him.
“You just hang in there, Chica, we’ll get you out of this,” Dragon said, his voice low and even but my eyes, my heart, my very soul was being held against Griz’s dirty denim cut looking at me with wide eyes, frightened but absolutely sure. Purpose glimmered in her gaze where it was locked to mine and I felt my chest rise and fall, hard, a crushing weight making it tough to get enough air as I half listened to my brothers argue with the fucking shelled-out, drugged-out, crazy as fuck man who had a hold on my woman.
“Okay Coon, I’m gonna move my hand, I don’t want to hear no bitching or caterwauling, just giving you a chance to tell your man there bye before I blow your pretty fucking head off. No screamin’ you hear me?” I focused then as Dani nodded faintly, a jerky up and down against the resistance of his fucking hand on her mouth.
“I love you!” she blurted, and her eyes held such a longing and desolation that I would gladly burn the whole fucking world down. Again with that pleading look. I felt myself shaking my head. No. Not only no, but hell no! I wasn’t letting her go, but my woman’s lips were moving again. Her perfect fucking lips. And she shouted, “Shoot him! Please shoot him!” her voice cracking on the plea.
I took a step forward but Reaver grabbed my arm down low, his hand above my wrist. I looked down just as Griz shouted…
“You stupid cunt!” he drew back his arm with the gun, intent on clocking my woman in the back of the head. He was going to fucking pistol whip Dani! Without thought, with a singular purpose, I lunged just as the bright summer day erupted in a riot of sound and Griz’s head exploded. Dani cringed, knowing, expecting a blow to land, and her eyes and mouth squeezed tightly shut is the only thing that saved her from getting a mouth and her eyes full of the man’s blood.
The whole world slowed down, I screamed her name as I covered the distance between us and when I touched her, when I pulled her into my arms, against my chest it was as if the world let out its collected breath and everything returned to a normal speed.
“Don’t open your eyes Dani, don’t open your mouth!” I told her, Blue grabbed the garden hose and dragged it towards us.
“Cold Baby, this is going to be cold, I’m sorry. I got you Dani, I got you, I always fucking got you…” I kept talking as she shuddered and shook in my grasp. Her hair matted, her face awash in Griz’s blood and heavier, wetter things. Dani cried out and I felt the shock myself as Cell turned the crank on the faucet and Blue aimed to get the worst of it off.
My brothers were milling around us, all of them trying to help as the cold water soaked our clothes, soaked our skins and sluiced through Dani’s raven dark hair. The icy water puddled at our feet running red then tinged pink as it crept towards the grass.
“Good enough!” Doc declared, “Get her in the house, hot shower, soap and water.” He ordered. I didn’t care; I picked her up, her slender arms wrapped tight around my neck and shoulders, her face cold against my neck. I carried her into the club, Reaver and Blue our vanguard, sweeping out in front of us.
They got the tap going as I set Dani to her feet on the bathroom floor, and then it was a flurry of hands, stripping wet cotton off of the both of us. I didn’t care; I wanted him off of her as much as she did. Dani started to shriek, started to scream when the clothes came off, and I couldn’t blame her for that either. Too much, too many people, but I held her fast to me and I wasn’t letting go and I honestly needed the extra hands.
“Dani, Baby, it’s okay, shhh, Baby it’s all right. It’s me, it’s Chris. Thirteen. I got you, Baby, just come on and let us help…” she cried, limp in my arms against my chest as I got both of us into the bath. Reave poured some of her sweet smelling shampoo into his palm and Blue appeared from somewhere I hadn’t seen him go, with a pitcher.
I held onto Dani while my brothers frantically washed her hair, the shower spray gentler way down here at the bottom of the tub, stopping all together when Blue thrust the pitcher under it to fill. Dani continued to shiver despite the heat from the shower, her face buried in the side of my neck as her slender body shook.
“Head back, Baby Doll,” Reaver implored and, her eyes still squeezed shut tight she went with his subtly urging fingertips and Blue rinsed her hair. She started to calm with every pitcher full of water that sluiced through her hair and across her skin, rinsing her clean, the water going from a faint pink to running crystal clear as it swirled down the drain.
“Dani, Baby, look at me,” I murmured. She tipped her head up and met my eyes. Hers were still so wide, her damage showing way too prominent, and I couldn’t blame her. Every fucking time she thought she was safe for a minute… I sighed. Well, she was safe now. As safe as I could make her, but there wasn’t any way I could make her believe it. Not in the state she was in. I tightened my hold on her, rocking her absently, and her eyes slid shut. She tucked her head under my chin and let me take care of her.
Reaver stood up and backed away, “I think we got it all,” he said quietly and, shaking his head, unstrapped his body armor. He muttered something about it being fucking soaked and with a last glance at Dani held tight in my arms, both of us naked in the bottom of the tub, left the bathroom.
“You okay now?” Blue asked Dani softly and I blinked. Dude never talked. He was like the Silent fucking Bob to Duracell’s Jay. Dani blinked and nodded her head, a bit too rapid. She didn’t really have anything to be afraid of, or embarrassed, the front of her body, hell even her ass was hidden from view against my body and my bits were just as hidden by hers. Still I got her, her discomfort, and I thrust my chin at Blue to get gone over her head.
“Be right back,” he murmured and I looked down at Dani, she and Blue had their gazes locked and seemed to be saying something without words. Blue got up, his jeans and tee clinging wetly to him and he came back with a comb.
He used conditioner in Dani’s hair while I held her, and combed it through. Making sure that there wasn’t anything left. Nothing at all. Dani closed her eyes, her arms tightening around my shoulders as she let Blue do his thing. Something about having her hair combed by the silent brother calmed her. Put her at ease, and that in turn calmed me.
A final rinse or two and Blue shut off the tap. Reaver appeared in the doorway in fresh, dry clothes and handed Blue some towels. Blue had always struck me as a mellow kind of guy but this was weird. He closed his eyes and held open the towel and I asked Dani if she thought she could get up. She nodded and slowly let me go. Standing, she stepped out of the tub and into the offered towel, holding it around herself. I took the one Blue held out to me.
He studiously didn’t look at either of us. I wasn’t so much worried about that. I could give two fucks. I wrapped the towel around my waist and tucked it in so I could free my hands for my girl. I rubbed over the towel. She was still shivering but I don’t think it had fuck all to do with being cold. I drew her to me and gently patted her back dry through the towel.
“Okay?” I asked. She sniffed and nodded but still hadn’t spoken. Instead, she tucked herself into my side and arms around me let me lead her to our room.
“Thanks, Blue.” I muttered and, his gray eyes full of worry, he nodded carefully, staying behind in the bathroom as
I moved her through the hall. She relaxed, marginally, when we got into our room. A familiar space. I sat her on the edge of the bed and knelt in front of her. Her dark hair clung wetly to her face and shoulders, dripping on the bed. I dried myself off and did my best to sop the water out of her hair to keep it from dripping on the bed.
“You okay, Baby?” I asked, swallowing hard. It was starting to seriously freak me out, her not talking. She nodded her head, her clear blue eyes wounded, and I touched her face. A light touch, grazing her lips with my thumb.
“Did you see?” I asked softly. She shook her head, too rapidly, and I nodded sighing.
“I’m sorry…” she whimpered and I shook my head.
“Oh, Baby no, I just wish you hadn’t seen it is all. For you. Shhh, it’s okay…” I pulled her against my shoulder and let her weep.
Trig never missed, and Griz’s head had blown apart like a melon. Dani had just been too close, but it was the only shot, the only chance Trig was going to get. Some things were just so horrible there wasn’t enough brain bleach in the world to scrub the image out. Some things were just burned in there forever. Dani had more than her fair share of mental and emotional scarring and I vowed right then and there, as she cried it out against my body, that this would be the last reason she would have to cry for anything for a real fucking long time.
Chapter 28
Dani…
It took a while for me to settle, for the tears to subside as Thirteen held me. He held me sitting on his lap; my face buried in the side of his neck and my hair hiding my face until the strands were nearly dry. He rocked me, and just waited out the storm inside my heart, inside my head. It took a long damned time but he didn’t seem to care.
“I love you, Dani,” he murmured into the crown of my head, his breath warm, “I love you and this shit is fucking killing me. Seeing you hurting, holding you but not being able to do a damned thing else to fix it.”
