by Joy Blood
“Come sit down, darlin’. Don’t push it,” he calls out from the kitchen table.
“Is there…does he have a…kid?” I scratch out as I set my plate down then seat myself in the chair across from him.
“Premo? Yeah. Little boy. ’Bout five now. He lives with his mama over in South Dakota. Only comes to visit once a month.” Premo. The name of the man whose bed I have been sleeping in hits me in the chest. When he was taking care of me a few nights ago, I yelled at him to leave and was nothing but rude to him in his own home. I haven’t seen him since. Maybe he won’t come back because I told him not to. But the truth is, I do want him to come back. I want to see him again.
“Oh,” I force myself to say when I realize no one has spoken for some time.
“Yeah. Boy had it bad for that girl. But she was in love with another man. Tale as old as time, that one. Now she’s married to someone else and just had a little girl,” he says, wistful. As I nod, the door swings open, and in walks the man himself, causing an involuntary shiver to roll down my spine. Premo. He freezes as soon as he sees me, then his eyes roll over every part of me unobstructed by the table. Shaking his head, he comes farther into the room, closing the door behind him.
“You’re up. Must be feeling good?” I nod, forcing another bite down my throat. I need water. Or a box to hide in. “Figure out what your name is yet?” he asks outright.
I glance back over to Doc, but he is already hobbling out of the apartment, clapping Premo on the shoulder.
“Thanks for the break, Pres. See you in a few.” He smiles, then nods a goodbye to me before walking out the door.
Wait, what? Inwardly, I panic, but force myself to stay in the wooden chair. Being alone with Premo after trying to tell him off, then him taking care of me, is not something I had prepared myself for. Yes, I might have wanted to see him again, but still, today? No. Not today.
“So, the name?”
“Sarah,” I tell him, knowing all too well he doesn’t believe me. He pins me with a stare before striding over to the fridge, reaching in to grab a bottle of water, then turning to face me.
“Nope. Not a Sarah either.”
“Is Doc part of the club too?” I ask in hopes to step away from the topic of my name. He lets out a sigh, then walks over to take a seat at the table across from me.
“Used to be. Now he is mainly retired. Only comes to help out if someone is in need of medical attention.”
“So, you are what? The boss of them all? How many are there?”
He lets out a chuckle. “Not the boss. We have a VP, Sargent at Arms, Secretary, and Road Captain.” The look on my face must give away that what he just told me might as well have been in a foreign language because he laughs even more. “There are more guys in the club, but those are the top rockers. We have some prospects too.” He winces slightly, but keeps explaining. “They may or may not end up patching in. Depends on if they are cut out for the life.”
“Do you have women in this club of yours, or are they not allowed?”
“There are women, but they aren’t members,” he tells me with a devious smile, then takes a swig from his bottled water. “Club whores.” He shrugs.
“Club whores,” I repeat dryly.
“Yep. Few of them stay at the clubhouse with the boys. Others just come to the parties.”
“Fun,” I respond sarcastically, then take another small bite of the sandwich, barely getting any ham or cheese with the bread. It sticks to the roof of my mouth, and I’m forced again to scrape it off with my tongue. I’m so busy trying to pry the bread off, I barely catch Premo’s question. I wish I hadn’t caught it.
“Do you remember what happened to you? Before I found you?” I pause in my quest, and the bread decides to take that time to dislodge itself. I slowly swallow it down, then glance up at Premo. He’s staring down at me expectantly, waiting for my answer. I don’t speak. Instead, I shake my head and place down the last couple bites, not sure I’ll be able to eat them. “I found you stuffed in a garbage bag.” My eyes go wide, and I shake my head.
“No.” I keep shaking, not wanting to believe a word he’s saying. A garbage bag? Why? How? An image of a large hand coming down on my face, pushing me farther and farther to the ground until blackness overtakes me assaults my memories. “You can’t just—”
“I found you before that,” he tells me, stopping my anger in its tracks.
“What?”
“Do you remember waking up in the hospital? Maybe the assholes who caused that gash on your head?” I wince at the anger flowing through his words. Not anger at me, but for the men who hurt me. I know what he is talking about, but now that I know it was him who brought me to the hospital, I don’t know how to feel about what is happening. I remember strong arms wrapped around me, carrying me, a voice ringing in the back of my mind, an angry voice. Then I woke in a sterile room wrapped in a hospital gown. I got out of there as fast as I could and didn’t look back. It’s after that things start to blur again. A garbage bag? How did I go from a hospital bed to a garbage bag?
“I—”
“It’s fine. You don’t have to answer. I should have brought you here that night, but…shit, I don’t know why I didn’t. Figured you would be fine at the hospital. I was wrong. Found you weeks later stuffed inside a damn black garbage bag.” His hands make tight fists, so tight, they turn white, and even underneath his beard, the ticking of his jaw is visible.
“What—What day is it today?” I find myself asking, even though I don’t want to know. There isn’t a calendar on the fridge or wall, and the clock inside the room only has the time. I didn’t even try to find out what day it was when I woke up in the hospital. I just took off out of there as soon as my eyes cracked open.
He takes in a deep breath as if to calm himself. “It’s the twenty-second of May.” At first, the date doesn’t register. It only sounds like an echo in my brain.
May. Twenty-second.
May.
Twenty-second.
“And where—where are—we?” I force out the next question, each thump of my heart making its way to my throat.
“We’re in Larrmier, Idaho,” he tells me slowly, as if I might just die right here on the spot. I might. I thought it would be good for me to hear when and where I am. But May? Idaho? How the hell did that even happen? “Hey, you’re turning white. You need to get back to bed?” I shake my head and push myself from the table, taking off into the bedroom to be alone. I can’t talk to him anymore. Can’t look at him. The door swings open so hard, it hits the wall, but I can’t bring myself to care. My mind is forcing me to remember.
The pain.
The hurt.
The betrayal.
The cruelty.
I can’t cope with any of it. I want my hit. I want that poison shot through my veins so I can forget. I don’t want to feel this anymore. My body doubles over, and I expel my sandwich into the toilet bowl I have become all too aquatinted with. Shaking my head, the memories come back piece by piece, taking me down without remorse.
“You have to, baby. One more, just like the doctor said.” His hand grips mine too hard. All I want to do is shake it away, scream at the top of my lungs for him to leave, tell everyone what he is.
“I can’t. I can’t. Please don’t make me do it.” Tears fall down my face as I force my body to work how it’s supposed to. How it’s being forced to.
“No!” I fall back onto the cold floor of the empty bathroom clawing at my arms for relief, but find none. “No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.” I curl up into a ball, wanting to be taken from life more than ever before.
Fifteen
Not wanting to give her a minute to process the information, I follow after her as she rushes to the bathroom. When I walk in, I find her on the floor, curled up, clutching her knees to her chest while still scratching at her arms, leaving harsh red marks in their wake. I bend down to grab her, but she doesn’t make it easy. She tries fighting me off, kicking and clawing a
t me to escape whatever trance she’s in.
“I can’t. Please don’t make me do this!” she yells, tears falling from her wild eyes.
“You don’t have to do a thing. Just let me get you into the bed,” I tell her evenly, wrapping my arms around her struggling form enough to lift her off the floor and carry her to the bed. I don’t take the chance of letting her go. Instead, I keep her in my arms, applying pressure to her torso to try to stave off the panic attack she has fallen into. She doesn’t relent. She kicks and screams at the top of her lungs, calling me every name she can think of and trying her best to claw my arms open.
“You can’t keep me here!” she yells, and I make a mental note to bribe the other tenants to keep their mouths shut if they hear this incident…or any others she might have.
“Got to breathe with me, baby,” I sooth into her ear, right along the shell. “Calm down. Feel me breathe.” I take in a deep breath, then let it out. Over and over again, until she starts to do the same, her inhales and exhales syncing with mine. “That’s it,” I praise as her body begins to relax into mine. She goes limp, her head falling back on my shoulder.
We stay like that for minutes, maybe hours, until her soft voice breaks the silence of the room. “I guess it was too much information all at once.” I nod my head in agreement. “I think you can let me go now,” she tells me. I find myself not wanting to but, reluctantly, release my arms from around her.
“It’s fine. It was a lot,” I agree, then watch as she scoots away from me and crosses her arms, her scarred hand squeezing on the same arm she keeps scratching at when agitated. “Why don’t you take a nap, yeah? Get some rest.” I nod when she does and start for the door, but her soft voice stops me in my tracks.
“You can call me Vera.” Vera. The name echoes in my head and makes me smile. I turn back to face her. “Now, that one I can believe.” I let out a soft chuckle and stay long enough to see her sink down into my bed, trying not to let that small fact get to me, before I walk out the door.
It doesn’t take long before Doc gets back and I’m able to leave, but it gave her enough time to fall asleep and for me to walk back and check on her. I may or may not have watched her sleep for a while. Not that I would admit it—not even myself.
“Last fucking thing you need to do,” I mutter to myself as I stride toward my bike. Starting it up, I let the rumble take my thoughts of the girl in my apartment away. The girl sleeping in my bed. The girl who has occupied my mind so much since she came into my life, I’ve started to think less and less of Ari.
Walking through the clubhouse, I catch all eyes on me and nod toward the chapel, indicating everyone follow. I don’t even wait for the door to shut before snapping at them. “What do we know?”
“Still haven’t found him, Pres. Not even sure where to start,” O tells me, giving me information about Nixon I don’t want to hear.
“They got a warrant out for his arrest, though. Ferg just told me this morning,” Wick says, making me regret coming to the clubhouse. I rub my temples, then drag my hands across my face and down my beard as I let out a long breath.
“There is no fucking way he did this, especially if she was carrying his kid. He had to have seen something. Maybe got threatened. Fuck!” My hands smack down onto the table. “Wick, find us a lawyer, crooked as a motherfucker. When Nix shows up, we are gonna need one.” I get a nod from Wick before he takes off out of the room, leaving O and Hank.
“We need to keep working on the complex. Pick a few guys to get going on it. Needs to be done by July.” They nod and start out the door, but I tell Hank to hang back.
“Something wrong, Pres?” I look him over for any signs he may be using.
“No. Just wanted to check in with ya. See if you had a lead on your stolen money.”
He shakes his head. “You were there, Pres. Pricks spent it all.”
“Yeah, just figured I would check. Need the club to float you some green ’til the next job?” I offer.
“Nah. I’m good. Thanks, though.” He smiles and backs away from me toward the door. “I’m headin’ to the complex. Should have’er done before the deadline. Everything seems to be going according to plan.”
“Good to hear.” He takes off from the room, and I tell myself maybe I was just imagining the light sheen of sweat on his forehead.
Then again, maybe I wasn’t.
Sixteen
My hands feel like they are made of sand paper as I reach up and rub the sleep from my eyes. I pause for a moment and look around the room, curious if Premo is still here. Nope. I get the same feeling that rushes through me every time I think of the man. A cross between panic and comfort. It scares the hell out of me and keeps that need to use bubbling to the surface. As much as I try to shake it away, tell myself I don’t want to go back to the foggy existence, there is always that voice telling me I can forget. The voice is winning right now as I peek out the bedroom door down the hall to where Doc is in his normal spot: asleep on the couch in front of the TV.
Every night, I step out into the hall and stare down at him as he sleeps, wondering if he would catch me if I tried walking out the door. Then, each night, I walk back to the bed and force myself to sleep, or just stare at the ceiling. Tonight, though, I go back to the room and dig around in Premo’s dresser, trying to find something that might fit. Bingo.
A pair of blue and pink printed yoga pants. Women’s clothes. I wonder why he didn’t give them to me in the first place as I pull on the pants, then the gray sweatshirt they were laying on. It has some symbol I don’t recognize on it, but I don’t care. All I care about is it’s warm. Then I’m back out in the hall, tiptoeing down the corridor, wishing I found myself a pair of shoes instead of the three pairs of socks I pulled on to substitute. It doesn’t matter. I need to leave. Talking to Premo and finding out where I am and how much time has gone by has me needing to run as far away as I can.
Again.
The soft snores from Doc mingle with the infomercials as my footsteps fall light across the hardwood floor. When I get to the door, I stop and look back one last time before flicking the lock and stepping outside. Only…I’m not outside. I’m in another hallway lined with doors to other apartments. Crap. I was so ready to make a break for it. Carefully, I let the door close behind me, then dash off toward the small icon labeling where the stairs are. I pass an elevator, but don’t give it a second thought. I’m not taking my chances on waiting and getting caught.
My hands hit the metal door with as much force as my weak arms can muster, and it flings open with a squeak of the hinge. As quick as I’m able, I take the steps, my breathing getting harder by the second as I push myself farther down. I’m getting tired and still have more steps to go.
“Keep going,” I urge myself, taking once step at a time. My foot catches on the last step, and I stumble into the wall of the stairwell landing. “Ouch!” I call out, favoring my now tender shoulder. Just one more bruise to add to the others.
It takes me a few more precious minutes before I finally reach the bottom floor and push the door open. Instantly, I’m blinded by the daylight that forces me to crumble to the concrete floor. “Are you all right, miss?” someone asks from above me. They try to help me up, but I push them away.
“Fine. I’m fine,” I mumble, getting my balance once again and shielding my eyes from the high sun. I need to get somewhere Premo can’t find me.
It’s what’s best.
For both of us.
Seventeen
I knew something was wrong the second I stepped foot through my door. Doc out cold on the couch sawing logs that could wake the dead. The man probably hasn’t slept much in the last few days while caring for Vera.
Vera.
I bypass Doc, who doesn’t stir one bit, and dredge on down to my room where Vera should be—but isn’t. “Motherfucker!” I kick the closest thing I can find, which happens to be the door to my room. It doesn’t stand a chance against my steel toe boot and the anger coursi
ng through my veins. “Doc!” I stomp back to where he is, startling him awake. He rubs his eyes, then they grow wide at the sight of me looming over him.
“Pres?”
“Have yourself a good nap?” I growl. “If you needed a break, you should have said something. She’s gone. Fucking gone!” I know the old man doesn’t need me yelling at him. Vera wasn’t a prisoner, and the fact that she snuck out shouldn’t bother me as much as it does, but I’m still livid.
“Shit, Pres. I’m sorry. I didn’t hear a thing. I guess I didn’t realize how tired I really was.” He gets to his feet, favoring his cane more than usual. “But we couldn’t keep her here against her will, you know.”
“Fuck. I know.” Gripping the back of my neck, I stalk over to the kitchen to peer out the window overlooking the alley as if I might be able to see where she went. No such fucking luck. “Someone wanted her dead. If they find out she isn’t, they might just finish the job. Don’t want that shit on me.” I use that excuse, but deep down, wanting to keep her safe means more to me than I want to admit.
“Isn’t on you, Pres. We got her patched up and clean. It’s up to her after that. You know as much as I do they have to want it.” My teeth grind together, causing a twinge of pain in my temple. Of all the shit to be happening right now, I didn’t think I would have to deal with her running away. She even came clean and told me her name. Her real name. I thought we were getting somewhere.
“Fuck this.” I take off toward the door, wrenching it open.
“Where are you going?”
“She is weak as hell. Couldn’t have gotten far. I’m going to find her,” I declare, ignoring Doc’s shouted words as the apartment door slams behind me. No fucking way she’s going to end up in the morgue with a Jane Doe tag on her toe. Not while she has me in her corner.