Mace nods and looks thoughtful. “Satan’s Devils understand property patches all too well. If one of our brothers finds a woman he intends to spend his life with, and she’s of the same mind, she gets his tattoo. She’s proud as fuck to wear it. You know why?” When Shayla looks incredulous and raises and lowers her shoulders quickly, he continues, “Because it shows he loves her and so much more. She’s protected, not just by him, but all of his brothers. They’d die before anything happened to her. Anything happens to him? They’ll be there for her. It’s more than a wedding ring in our eyes, it’s more of a commitment.”
She stares at him for a moment, her eyes wide and disbelieving. “Does Violet have a property patch? She said she was married to your prez.”
“She does,” I reply. “She designed it, I did the ink.”
She looks dumbfounded that anyone would wear such a tat voluntarily. “My experience of property patches is different.”
I place my elbows on the desk, and my chin on my clasped hands. Watching her carefully, I tell her, “Vi loves her property patch as it shows she belongs to her man, and her man, as he wanted her to wear it, belongs to her. She’s got a leather cut with the same words on it. So, any fucker can see who’ll he’ll have to take on if he lays so much as a hand on her. Now, if someone wanted to remove or cover her tattoo, Demon would shred him to pieces.”
“Vi would probably help,” Mace puts in, to lighten the mood.
I throw him a quick grin before continuing, “A property patch is important shit. That’s not to say they’re never covered or removed. Relationships break down in all walks of life. A man might die, his woman might move on. But if a man still regards a woman as his, then the removal of the tattoo is as fuckin’ serious as a heart attack.”
“Why are you telling me this?” She’s gone tense. “Are you telling me you’re not going to help after all? That if Major has marked me as his, you think I should return to him?” Her hand goes to her mouth. “Oh, my God. Are you going to send us back?”
“No, no,” I say firmly and fast. “Mace told you what patches mean to us, as wanting someone to wear their name is a big deal and not done lightly. We view property one way, as something to be cherished, cared for and protected. Major obviously uses the word to show ownership. I will cover your tattoo, hide it completely, no ifs or buts about that, Shayla. But we do need to know who Major is. Helping you might bring trouble to our door, and we need to be prepared to face it.”
Her shoulders slump. “I’m sorry, I didn’t think about what it might mean for you. We’ll go—”
“Hey, hold up.” Mace waits for her eyes to come to his. “Trouble is what we live for, sweetheart. We just need to know who we’re dealing with. You think you can get your tat covered,” his hand waves toward the door through which Esme had disappeared, “hers too, then disappear into the night. What if Major finds you? Gets out of you where you had the work done? What if he’s circulating your picture around and someone has seen you coming in and out of here? Lands us with a heap of problems, trouble, and we don’t know where it’s coming from. So one, we need information to work with and two, I want to help you. I’ve got a feeling all of the club will have your back when you finally tell us what’s going on.”
She stares intently at him, then turns those eyes with such hidden depths to me. She shudders, an action which shakes her whole body. Then slowly, she nods. “I worked on the outskirts of Vegas. I went into town to drop off some paperwork for my boss. I knew the accountant, and when he asked me out for a drink, I went. By the time I walked back to my car, it was dark—”
“He didn’t escort you?” I butt in.
“No.” She seems surprised. “It wasn’t a relationship, just two colleagues socialising. I wouldn’t have expected it.” She shakes her head as if dismissing the very notion while I inwardly seethe. Doesn’t matter if the woman means something or not, she shouldn’t be walking the streets alone at night. A glance at Mace’s tense face shows he’s of the same opinion.
“Anyway,” she continues, “it was dark. Suddenly arms were pulling me into an alley, then something was put over my nose and mouth… When I woke up…” her eyes close, and Mace reaches out his hand to take hers. When she startles and pulls hers away, he holds up both palms toward her in apology.
“Sorry.”
“No, it’s me, I…”
“Just tell us the rest.” Her reaction needs no explanation.
“When I came to, that’s when I met Major. He said I was now his to do with what he wanted. It was only the next day I was forced to have this tattoo. They restrained me, held me down, I couldn’t move. Then, he and his men raped me.”
She says it so coldly, so matter-of-factly. Rage boils inside as I crease shut my eyes, trying to avoid even thinking of the picture she’s painting. I’d imagined the worst and I’d been right to do so.
“Fuckin’ hell.” Mace’s hands are clenched as though ready to beat someone to a pulp. I watch him fight to hold himself together, eventually doing so enough to spit out, “He’s a pimp, and you were an unwilling part of his stable.” His tone is chilling, letting me know if he ever comes face-to-face with the man, Major will be in a world of pain he would be unable to imagine. I’ll be right there behind him.
Shayla sobs. “I didn’t make it easy for him. I fought, I was punished. I tried to escape, no chance, I was brought back. I kicked men in the balls, they retaliated.” She shakes her head and winces. “They used tasers so my skin wouldn’t be marked.” Her flat tone of voice as she pronounces her final words make goosebumps break out on my skin. “He broke me.”
Mace is likewise affected. Standing and turning, he bangs his fist against the wall. “Motherfucker,” he snarls.
Now she’s started, Shayla’s going to complete her story. “Once I was totally compliant, he put me to work. He’s a pimp, yes. A high-end one. He’d dress me up pretty, send me out with some of his men to pre-arranged appointments. Sometimes alone, sometimes with another woman. We had to do whatever his clients wanted. I was his property, as he told me time after time. I belonged to him, and being marked as I am, I could never escape him. I’m surprised he didn’t add his phone number and a ‘if found please return to’ address on the tattoo. Of course, I didn’t suggest that to him.”
“I can fuckin’ understand why you want that tat gone,” Mace turns and states, his face taut with rage.
“All his girls were tattooed?” It’s an obvious statement though I’d intoned it as a query.
She nods. “Yes. To show we belonged to him.”
“Was Esme already there?” I’m barely holding on to my rage at the thought that sweet girl had been through the same things as Shayla.
Her face twists. “No. She came later. I begged him to let her go. I said she was special, he called her stupid. She cried and cried because of the pain of the tattoo but didn’t understand what he’d done. She didn’t realise why all the men would tell her, you’re Major’s, but they just continued until she believed it. It broke my heart when she told me she was his. I’m Major’s, she’d say. And then, when she wouldn’t stop talking, she was tasered. Again and again.” She looks up and her eyes meet mine. “I begged him to let me take her punishment for her.” Again, that full body shudder as if remembering the prongs hitting her. “He took me up on the offer, but that meant if she spoke, we were both tasered... She does talk a little, but only to me, and only when no one’s there.” She looks up and meets my eyes. “He said it didn’t matter she had nothing between her ears, his clients would only care what was between her legs.”
Mace kicks the chair he’d recently been sitting in. “He’s fuckin’ dead. But he’s not going to go easy. I’ll kill him, revive him, and kill him all over again. He’ll beg to die before I’m finished.”
I let my eyes fall on Shayla. Mace is so angry, his rage coming off him in palpable waves. I’m concerned how she’ll be taking it and expect to see her cringing in her seat. But she’s not. She’s starin
g at him wide-eyed in wonder, as if he’s some kind of hero, truly comprehending for the first time that he and I are nothing like Major.
Although my wants and desires are the same as my brother’s, I’m trying to keep calm so as not to frighten her. I get her attention back to me. “How did you escape, Shayla? From what you said, it sounds impossible. So how did you get free?”
Slowly she blinks, as if having difficulty switching between Mace’s fury and my patient questioning. She provides her answer. “Esme was special. She was so clearly innocent. Major was waiting for the right time, the right man. I suspect he knew he’d get good money offering up her virginity. I hoped he’d never find someone so twisted…” Her face fills with pain. “They’d broken me. I’d given up searching for a way out. I’d become this obedient slave that did whatever I was asked to do. My life was over. I didn’t have the energy to try to escape anymore. I knew one day, one of the men I was given to was going to kill me, but even that was okay, and I hoped it would come sooner rather than later. Then Esme came along.” Her eyes flare as her mind takes her back in time. “I knew I had to try to get her out, even if it meant sacrificing myself. I couldn’t see how, but I was determined to do it. But no opportunity presented itself. I’d left it too late. He’d found a man who wanted her.”
“Did he have her?” Mace sounds like he’s hanging on by a thread.
“No.” A small smile crosses her face. “Major thought he had me in the palm of his hand by then, and Esme would do anything I told her. So he paired me up with her, explaining that I go with her. I think he thought I’d tell her to do whatever the man asked. He didn’t regard me as a flight risk, or not so much as he’d done earlier. There were two of his men with us, but they didn’t come into the bathroom I’d told them we had to use. Oh, they’d checked it and thought the window was too small, too high to get out of.” Her face twists, half in triumph, half in something remembered that wasn’t so pleasant. “Desperation makes us do anything, doesn’t it? A busted leg had to be better than what was planned for us, for her. I went first, landed winded but not broken. Major was right. She did whatever I told her. She jumped too. Landed on me, but she was unharmed. We ran.” Another twist to her face. “Well, she did, I hobbled.”
I exchange a look with Mace. Fuck, but they were lucky. I’m relieved Esme had been saved from the worst, but gutted what happened to Shayla, and more than a little impressed at the fortitude she’d shown.
“They must have searched for you,” Mace rasps. “How the fuck did you keep out of their clutches?”
“We hid, in a dumpster, both of us clinging to the other. Esme knew, somehow she knew to keep quiet and still. We stayed there for two days. There were rats, food rotting around us. But still, she stayed mute, clinging to me, knowing enough that she shouldn’t move or give us away. Not even when a drunk pissed on us.”
Mace is pacing, when he reaches each wall, again he bangs his fist against it.
“When I thought it was safe, we emerged. My posh dress was discoloured and torn, Esme’s hair ratted and her clothes unrecognisable. Under cover of darkness, I moved us to the worst part of town. We were so disgusting, even the dropouts avoided us. We lived rough. I pretended Esme was my daughter. I managed to scavenge food and scrounge some clothing from a charity store. Cleaned us up and knew we had to put distance between us and Vegas. So we hitchhiked. Got dropped at a truck stop, and I… I did what I had to do to get us a long-distance ride out of Nevada. We stopped off in one place then another and eventually ended up in Colorado.”
“You still living rough?” She doesn’t look like it, but then, she’s resourceful.
She shakes her head. “No, I managed to get a job waiting tables, enough to get a dump of a one-room studio, but it works. All I wanted was to save up enough to get rid of this tattoo, firstly because with it, there’s always a chance the wrong person might see it. Secondly,” she looks up and meets my eyes, “I won’t ever belong to a man again. I’ll never be property. Ever.”
“You safe?” Mace suddenly swings around.
I wouldn’t need to be a mind reader to know what he’s thinking as his thoughts are probably along the same lines as mine.
Her quick look down gives us the answer neither of us like, but then she straightens her back. “The diner’s not too bad. Andy, the owner, keeps a shotgun under the bar. The apartment is cheap, and not in the best part of town, but it’s better than living rough.”
Her eyes that I thought were so haunted now also seem tired.
Mace looks like a taut elastic band to me, as if he’s going to snap any moment. I can read the signs, so I’m not surprised when he mumbles something about needing to be somewhere, then opens the door and walks out.
Chapter Twelve
Mace
I left Shayla with Liz for two reasons, the main one being I couldn’t stand to be in that room anymore. What I’d heard about her was enough by itself, add a cute kid like Esme into the mix and it becomes so much worse.
I don’t know who this Major is, have never heard of him before. That’s what had gotten me so uptight, that I couldn’t jump on my bike and go deal with him myself. I’ve an enemy to fight, and I’ve no idea who he is or where he’s to be found.
It angers me that there are men of his ilk who think they can steal women and own them. I’m not naïve. I know it goes on all the time, but to come face-to-face with someone pulled off the street just because they’ve a pretty face and a body that men would like to fuck is abhorrent to me.
I’m also annoyed at myself. While I can’t put myself in the mindset of a man who’d fuck a kid like Esme, what was it I thought when I saw Shayla for the first time? That I wanted to sink my dick into her. After hearing her story, I hated that I, too, had seen her not as a person but as a body. The only difference between me and Major is that I like my women willing.
It’s pulled me up and made me think twice. Most women to me mean little more than having tits and asses which turn me on, exactly what I’d thought when I first saw Shayla.
Shayla’s story had gotten to me. Sure, she had the assets which made my cock stand to attention, but as I listened, it wasn’t her physical attributes that had me listening to her. It was her bravery, her loyalty. She had stood up for that girl, offered to take her fucking punishment, and risked everything to save her from the future Major had planned for her. She’d done what she had to, to keep them both safe. Her resilience in simply surviving was admirable.
I’ve never thought of giving a woman my property patch, but I live with men who have. It’s in our bylaws that we mark our women, but I’ve never seen anything wrong in that. To us, our property is something to treasure, to love and protect. Any of my brothers would be fooling themselves if they thought ownership worked one way. I’d often joked, the old ladies had their men by their balls, but it’s true, when brothers fall, they go down hard. If anything happened to the woman who wore their patch, they’d be devastated. We all know Heart’s story, the man in the Tucson club whose old lady was murdered. He very near followed her into the grave, such was his desolation at her loss.
Some clubs might treat property differently, but not us. Some clubs pass their women around, but again, not us. For a pimp to kidnap and hold women against their will, that thought fills me with disgust.
I pause for a moment outside Vi’s station. What fucked up kind of man would take a girl like Esme? Who the fuck would destroy that kid’s trust, seeing her not as a sweet child, but as an opportunity to make money? It’s way beyond my imagination, which brings my thoughts back to Shayla. She’s fully grown, but just thinking about what she’s been through makes me feel physically sick. I may torture the sweet butts, but only sensually, never, ever, would I use a woman who didn’t want it, or said no to anything I proposed and meant it.
Hitting the heel of my hand against my forehead, I realise it’s only my refusal to force myself on an unwilling woman that separates me from Major or his clients.
Shay
la’s reactions, her nervousness around me and Liz, showed how greatly she’d been damaged. I’ve no idea what she was before, but suspect she knew of the darker side of life only from stories in the newspaper, never expecting to be living it herself. Men were viewed as potential boyfriends, maybe future husbands. Now she knows intimately that there are men who take without giving, who hurt, just because their innate strength means that they can. She was denigrated as something less than human, her own thoughts and feelings meaning nothing at all.
How does someone come back from that? How can Shayla live with what she was forced to do? She gave up. But wouldn’t we all, if every escape attempt failed and was followed by punishment? When it mattered, she proved she’s a special and resourceful woman. She got away and took Esme with her.
Is she really safe now? Or is Major still trying to find her? Property. For the first time ever, I think of that word with distaste, the meaning of her property patch one hundred and eighty degrees away from what we believe it stands for.
I want to find Major, kill him, and make sure she’s out of his clutches forever. It’s become my nightmare, as well as hers, to think he might ever take her back.
“Mace?” Vi’s standing at the doorway that leads to her station. She jerks her head, inviting me in. It sounds like it hasn’t been the first time she’s called me.
“Yeah?” I cough and try again when only a strangled word comes out. “Yeah?”
“Are you alright?” The prez’s wife steps forward and looks up at me, her eyes dark and concerned.
I shake my head. “Their story, Vi. It’s bad.”
“Kind of guessed that from the tat they’re both wearing.” She would. She’s seen the dark side of men herself. “Will you come here a moment, Mace?”
Satan’s Devils MC -Colorado Box Set: Books 4-6 Page 89
