by Luna Maye
“I had time to dig this nice little pit for you while I waited and watched.” Ah, that explains the shitty construction. “You made it too easy to find you. Prancing around town like you had nothing to fear while I moved in and out of your precious compound without anyone so much as lifting a finger. That bitch of yours was so naïve, bringing my man a key as soon as he started dropping hints they might be together forever, the poor bastard.”
Mina’s heart froze as soon as he mentioned the keycard. The lipstick, the towel, all of her premonitions that something was wrong or that she was being watched were this sleazy scumbag in her room, fondling her things? She felt like she might be sick and not just from his incessant commentary and her raging headache from the pistol-whipping.
“We’ll stay here until the coast is clear and then I’ll meet up with some very angry old partners of mine to take you to a nice, comfortable new home south of the border.”
Of course, as if she hadn’t already spent enough of her life serving undeserving assholes like this bastard, now she would be expected to do it for free.
“How did you even escape the raid? I know you weren’t just that much smarter than everyone else.” Wait, maybe taunting him wasn’t the best move.
“Quiet bitch. Someone had to go into town for more booze and food, so off I go. Old Rico was always ordering me around. ‘Barry do this, Barry do that.’ Like a stupid naggy wife.”
Ugh, this dickwad’s name was Barry? If there ever was a time to embrace a road name, this guy should have taken the opportunity.
“But once I got back to the club and found it empty with bloodstains all over his favorite chair, I started to miss the old bastard. Heard the leader of a pansy-ass ladies club up in the valley set the pigs on us. And here you are, the perfect little pawn to help me get my revenge and make nice with the cartel all in one pretty little package.”
Mina steeled her spine and made the decision in that moment to fight like hell until Victor and the Honeys could find her. This sicko was not going to turn her over to the worst humanity had to offer over a misplaced feeling of loyalty to a man who’d raped her friend. Just as she made her decision, she faintly heard the sound of tires scraping across gravel somewhere below them. That must mean they were in the hills and a road cut through nearby. She could work with that knowledge.
When the Iron Legion jerk above her heard the car, he threw himself into the hole with her, shoving a thick rag into her mouth as a gag before she could call out.
His hands were grimy as he pressed down hard over her lips. He smelled foul, like weeks of stale sweat and cigarettes. As his body forced her deeper into the dirt and his fingers covered much of her nose, she felt trapped. Her breathing accelerated and he pushed even harder, crushing her into the hole. She thrashed against him, fighting him as hard as she could, when suddenly she heard voices coming from the road. They were faint and far away but they were voices and at this time of night in what she deduced was a remote area, they could only be looking for her.
She pushed harder, kicking out against the man and trying to scream out against the gag. If she could just make enough noise, maybe they would hear her, come for her.
“Quiet, you filthy whore.” He struck her hard, in the same area of her temple as before. The pain overwhelmed her and once again she descended into darkness.
Victor always enjoyed the safety and anonymity of the dark. When his pararescue squadron performed rescue missions it had softly blanketed them, easing their descent and cloaking their operations.
When he moved into the Chama Valley, the quiet lull of nighttime had become a whole other entity. Stars shone brighter here, breezes blew sweeter and in the last week the dark often meant Mina in his arms.
Tonight however, the darkness only served to ratchet up his anxieties and test the limits of his quickly evaporating control. He paced back and forth furiously on the dirt logging road in the hills about five miles from the compound. His fists clenched to the point of pain and his feet, still embedded with rocks and debris, ached in the soles of his borrowed sneakers, but none of it compared to the pain in his heart.
He loved her, should have protected her and yet she was alone in the darkest night he’s ever seen with a psycho intent on her destruction.
“Victor, you need to stop pacing. You’re only wearing yourself out and this guy isn’t going to be able to get past us. There’s only one way in and one way out, he probably won’t even attempt it until morning.” Isabel was right, the narrow, thickly wooded base of the canyon east of the club provided the perfect hideout for Mina’s captor, but it also had only one road running through it. As soon as they saw the direction the motorcycle was moving, Victor called his co-pilot Cal, who was on a scouting trip for the lodge on the opposite side of the canyon, and asked him to watch the far east side of the road for anyone coming or going.
At their base camp closer to the club, Isabel approached him, firmly pulling on his shoulders and bringing him from the road to their little encampment in the trees with Shelli’s car. She sat stoically behind the wheel, her blank gaze frequently scanning their surroundings, the road leading up to their location. After setting up a few natural barricades and laying the spike strips, Reina moved her precision rifle to a higher position on the side of the bluff so she could avoid the trees for better coverage of the road. She promised to text them if she saw or heard anything they might miss in the distance.
As he sat down on the ground with a heavy thump next to Isabel, she pulled a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket and offered him one. He hadn’t smoked since boot camp, and normally would only be tempted if he’d been drinking, but he accepted the calming draw of nicotine might ease his anxiety a little. He needed to be prepared for war come morning, not antsy and tense.
He leaned over to accept her light and then watched as she lit one for herself. Isabel was a beautiful young woman in her own way, with glossy raven-black hair and luminous eyes. She had been stone cold tonight, a voice of reason in the midst of his panic. All of the women here with him were warriors in their own right. Even with all of his training he would be lost without them.
“She’s a fighter, Victor,” Isabel blew out a long draw of smoke, relaxing her back against one of the wheels of the car, her body in a low squat. “We knew one day this might happen, all of our girls have been in contact with some pretty bad men. She’s trained us for situations just like this. She knows how to survive.”
Victor nodded, it was easy to tell himself those things in theory, but at the moment his entire being just screamed Mine! Bring her back! over and over. He’d been reduced to a raging beast.
Isabel eyed him up and down, her gaze searching and probing as if she could sense his anger, his despair. “If and when we get her back, I need to know you won’t let this affect your relationship with her or her relationship with the club. I know you love her — any of us can attest to that — but I have to know if you love her enough to let her lead us, to share her with nearly 30 other women who come with their own drama and problems and still be content.”
Victor was a little taken aback. And hearing their conversation, Shelli turned to face him, as if she too was unsure of his answer. He took a deep breath, wanting to leave no further questions in their minds about his intentions with their president, or his future here, with her.
“How could I love Mina and ever consider separating her from you all? The Honeys are part of her soul, it’s the place she shines the brightest. One doesn’t exist without the other and I would never want it to. I’ve known from the beginning that Mina and you all are a package deal. I want you to know that I’ll love her and protect her for the rest of my life, but that affection, that dedication, extends to all of you and it has from the moment I knew Mina was mine.”
Isabel looked at him with an almost grudging respect, as if she knew he would say something similar to his declaration but she was hesitant to believe it. Shelli hopped down from the driver’s seat of the SUV, leaving her door
open and flew to him. Hugging him so hard it almost knocked his breath out of his chest.
She kept her head down, but when he wrapped his arms around her in a brotherly squeeze like he would for his own sisters, she whispered her thanks lightly in his ear, before pulling back and beaming up at him and Isabel.
“I love you ladies, but I’ve got to do something. We know close to where she’s at and if I can go out on my own, I think I can find her. I have to at least try.”
Shelli nodded, pride in his statements, his willingness to try, shining in her eyes. Isabel, ever the practical pragmatic one, was already thinking steps ahead.
“I’ll let Reina know you’re heading out and that way she can watch out for you, let you know if she sees any movement from up high.”
“Thank you guys.” He swung a backpack up on his back with as much gear as he could comfortably and silently carry, one of Reina’s rifles hanging by a strap over his shoulder and a pistol in a easy access holster on his hip. When he felt as prepared as a human setting out into the dark unknown possibly could, he turned to the girls to say goodbye.
“Nope, no words necessary.” Shelli held up a halting hand to him as he opened his mouth, her eyes alight with belief in his abilities and in her president’s desire to come home. “Just go get our girl.”
21
Mina
Mina awoke slowly, woozily, as if coming out from under deep anesthesia. Her limbs took time to respond, and her eyes remained closed until she managed to pry them open by sheer force of will. She guessed it was in the early hours of morning just before dawn. Enough dim light filtered through the trees for her to make out the walls of the pit and more importantly, her captor, slumped over against the far wall, asleep.
His sandy hair stuck up in filthy, greasy tufts all over his head and she finally recognized him as the same man who had come into Isabel’s shop. Now he was wearing a black leather riding vest over the same t-shirt he wore in town, a vest with Iron Legion patches. The name ‘Barry’ was stupidly traced with white thread over his heart. His gun was still grasped tightly in his hands, but he appeared to be sleeping soundly.
She scanned the walls of the pit, looking for anything to serve as hand or footholds for her to climb out. She didn’t have much of a sense of direction thanks to the darkness and being unconscious for her delivery to the pit, but she paid attention to the direction the voices headed the night before and if she could climb out, she could follow them.
Some jagged cuts in the firm dirt and a few loose tree roots looked like they would be sturdy enough for her to shimmy out the top of the pit, but she couldn’t decide what to do with the guy. If he woke while she was making her escape there would be hell to pay and she had none of her normal defenses, just her nightgown and not even any underwear. If she tried to take his gun or knock him out, there was a greater risk of getting hurt or shot in the process. She scanned the wall one more time, cocking her head to one side and gently running her hands over the roots and pulling on a few to test. They seemed firm and there were few rocks for her to disturb as she climbed. It would be light soon and he would surely wake up. If she was going to make a move, it had to be now.
Mina clasped her hands on the lowest root, hefting herself up enough to get her foot onto a deep cut in the dirt. Thankfully, smelly over there wasn’t a very sophisticated pit digger. She looked back over her shoulder to make sure he was still sleeping and she quickly forced herself up the rest of the way up the embankment. Her nightgown caught on sticks and roots so it had to be carefully freed every few feet to avoid knocking something loose. Her hands were raw, her nails ripped down to the quick and her head continued to feel like a full brass band was playing inches from her ear. By sheer force of will she hauled herself the eight or so feet to the top of the pit, but, her left hand grabbed hold of a too-lose branch lying on the ground above and it slipped through her fingers, crashing back into the pit with a loud thud. She scrambled, desperately trying to hold herself up and pull higher to escape the pit, but the momentum she lost along with the branch was killing her, and her arms started to tire. Just as she began to give up hope and she could faintly hear her captor stirring below thanks to the falling debris and the rising sun, a warm calloused hand gripped hers and pulled her easily from the pit.
Mina gasped as she scrambled up, trying to push herself as far away from her dark savior as possible, at least until she smelled a very familiar woodsy scent and found herself wrapped in Victor’s warm embrace.
“I knew you’d come,” she whispered excitedly, at least until she heard Barry roll over restlessly down below. “But we gotta go.”
“I love you Mina Corsi.” Victor pulled her closer into his chest for one last brief hug, before he hitched her up into a childlike carry, her legs wrapped around his hips from the front for the trip back. “I let Reina know we’d be incoming as soon as I saw the pit. You did so well getting out on your own.”
She clung to him, happy to feel warm and safe again in his arms. “I love you too,” she whispered softly against his neck as he started a slow run, navigating the steep terrain admirably for his load — her hanging from his front and the backpack and weapons hanging off his back. They were halfway to the road when they both froze, the distinctive sound of a motorcycle jumping to life echoing through the trees in the distance.
Mina prayed they could move fast enough to make it out ahead of Barry and Victor picked up his pace. Finally the woods started to fade away as they descended down the hill. When Victor came hurtling around a sharp corner, she saw something that made her heart stutter. His feet staggered a bit with the weight and the ungainly addition of the guns, but the sight of the large silver SUV in the distance gave her so much hope. Victor and the girls had been so close to her all along. As they drew nearer, she could hear voices getting louder and suddenly a petite red headed figure stepped out from the trees at the side of the road. Shelli. They had come for her and they’d waited through the night. Mina nearly sobbed with relief but she still had a ways to go yet. Her nightgown illuminated her in the early morning haze as Victor carried her toward her friends, but it was quickly becoming more of a liability than an asset as the loud roar of a motorcycle followed them around the bend. She barely registered Victor picking up his speed, his breaths heaving in and out, his chest shaking with every powerful pump of his thighs. Her fingers wound tightly together at the base of his neck and she squeezed for dear life with her calves and crossed ankles desperately trying to shift herself up and take some of her weight for him. Lifting up higher, Mina peered over Victor’s shoulder, only to see Barry getting closer by the second, kicking up dust and spitting gravel on the narrow road. He looked so furious it was almost funny as he sped after them and Mina almost had the urge to do something childish like stick out her tongue. Sucker. That is, until he started shooting. The first bullet kicked up dirt ahead of them, splashing Victor’s shins with gravel shards.
“Fuck! Keep your head down, Mina.”
Victor’s arms cinched her even more tightly to his body, his hands biting roughly into the flesh of her sides as he pushed forward harder.
“Just a little farther, just a little farther.” He whispered it to himself like a mantra and she could feel his energy flagging as another shot went wide into the brush on their right side.
“Shit, anytime now.”
They were only about 200 yards from their home base when she heard the throttle rev closer than ever before and she made the mistake of looking behind them. The motorcycle was bearing down but the road was rough and Barry was struggling to hold onto the bike and his gun. As her eyes met her captors, he raised the firearm, steadying it between the handlebars and she was suddenly staring down the barrel. At the same moment, Victor threw them forward into the ditch, wrapping himself around her body completely and as she heard the delayed echo of a shot going off. She screamed as dirt rained down on them and the sharp scraping of metal on rock filled the cold, calm night air.
“Vict
or, Victor are you okay? Did he get you?” But Victor didn’t answer because he was frantically searching Mina for harm.
“Oh god, he didn’t get you did he? Are you okay? Tell me you’re okay!” Mina turned her face to him and braced her hands around his face, meeting his eyes and when he looked at her with love and relief on his face, she broke. Tears streamed down her face and she squeezed him as tightly as her arms were able, letting his warmth and strength seep into her bones. She turned to look behind her, but Victor’s arms were like steel bands around her body. She pushed one down so she could see, only to be enveloped by four more as Shelli and Isabel ran crying to join in on his embrace.
“Oh my god, I love you all so much.” Shelli was crying so loud it was almost comical and Mina pressed a soft hand to the other woman’s hair, quietly giving her comfort. Over Victor’s shoulder, she saw Reina approach their huddle. She had a phone to her ear and she walked with confidence, her petite body completely covered in black tactical gear, a precision rifle slung over her back and a firm resolute expression on her face.
“Get me, Graves. I need to report a body.” Reina spoke into the phone in a commanding tone. “One member of the Iron Legion was missed in the raid and kidnapped a local woman. He was in pursuit firing a deadly weapon when I pulled the trigger. Uh huh. Uh huh. Four witnesses. Yes, sir.”
By the time she finished the phone call, all four of them were staring at her like she was a tiger in a glass cage. Deadly, but at enough distance to assuage their fears. Mina was the first to break ranks. She slowly approached Reina, the other woman looking at her with a mixture of relief and trepidation. Reaching out her hands, she took both of Reina’s into her own, her fingers rubbing the double H tattoo on the inside of her wrist.
