“You need me to stay until you’re done? I have a dinner date, but I can cancel. I don’t like you being here alone with that one. One of the guys should’ve stayed with you. Where’s that prospect that was hanging out here?” Nikki looked uncomfortable.
“Girl, I’m good. I sent him for pizza right before Flint got here.” I glanced at the clock. “He should’ve been back but maybe the guys needed him for something. I’ve got my phone, and we have the cameras. Besides, I know you’ve been waiting for this dinner forever.” She rolled her eyes when I waggled my eyebrows at her. She was having dinner with a guy she’d met when he came in for a piercing the month before. They’d been flirting back and forth since, and he’d finally asked her out.
“Those won’t do much good if something happens. And I don’t think the guys will be too happy that the prospect left you.” She bit her lip.
I rolled my eyes. “This isn’t some movie. He’s harmless, the prospect will be back soon and I’m going to finish then go home to my family. I’ll see you tomorrow. Get out of here.”
“Well, I’ll wait until y’all are back in there and I won’t make a big deal about my leaving,” she said.
“Okay, no problem. I’ll see you tomorrow then. Have fun tonight.” I winked at her, and she blushed bright pink.
The bell on the door rang. We both looked over to see my customer, Flint, entering.
“Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.” His smile didn’t reach his eyes as they skated over Nikki from head to toe.
We went back to my room, and another hour and a half later, I was done. I’d finished cleaning and covering it and had turned to grab the care instructions when I heard the chair creak.
The cold blade against my throat startled me so much I jumped and it nicked me. The warm dribble down my neck told me it had cut me deep enough for blood to run.
“I’d stay still if I were you,” he breathed into my ear, and I froze.
A million things were going through my head but none that I could grasp as a feasible idea to get out of this. Fear seeped from my pores, and it was as if he smelled it.
“We’re going to go out the back door really quiet-like. If you scream, then I might accidentally slip again. That would be a real shame, because I’d like to keep you around longer than I had your old man.” His chuckle was sinister and cold.
My stomach bottomed. I’d just tattooed the man who had been part of Lock’s torture. Nausea churned, and sweat beaded on my forehead.
“I don’t feel good,” I whispered, hoping to minimize my movements and to prevent him from having a knee-jerk reaction.
“The trash is right there, let’s go.” He continued to hold the knife to my throat as we carefully walked to the trash.
Once I reached the trash and he moved away enough to let me lean over to puke, I caught him turning his head away as vomit spewed from me. My phone was on the counter close to where I held on for balance.
With my next heave, I kept my movements slow, but placed my hand over it. Right before I stood up, I slipped it into the pocket in my dress. I’d never been so glad for fucking pockets before in my life.
“Jesus, are you fucking done? That’s so goddamn disgusting.” His lip curled, and I wanted to throat punch him.
“I’m pregnant, I can’t help it. My stomach is sensitive.”
“Whatever, let’s go.” He waved the knife toward the door, motioning me to go ahead of him.
“I need my purse,” I burst out.
He laughed cynically. “You think I’m stupid? Yeah, let me allow you to take your purse that probably has your phone in it? I don’t think so. Move!” He gave me a shove from behind, and I stumbled toward the back door.
His next shove had me on my knees in the doorway to the back employee parking lot.
“I said move! We don’t have that much time.”
There was a gray truck I’d never seen before running outside the door. Another man I didn’t recognize was in the driver seat.
“Get in the back,” he ordered. Once I was there, he took my hands, zip-tied them together, then zip-tied them to the child seat anchor. It forced me to sit somewhat sideways in such a way that I had no access to my phone.
Great.
“Let’s go,” he told the other guy after he was in the passenger seat.
We drove out of town to the next small town over. Lock and I had talked about going there to eat at a restaurant that the guys had raved about. We’d never made it, and now I wasn’t sure if I ever would.
There was a shitty old motel, and we turned in and parked at the end. This was getting worse and worse. My heart sank. All I could think was Lock was never going to find me.
The big knife was in his hand when he opened my door, and I shrank away from him.
“I’m just cutting the ties—for now.” He leered.
It was impossible to swallow. A fricking boulder was caught in my throat, and my mouth was so dry my tongue stuck to the roof. The other guy had gotten out and opened the door to the room.
Once I was cut loose from the truck, he grabbed my arm and dragged me to the room. As inconspicuously as I could, I glanced around in hopes of cameras. Nothing.
“Get on the bed,” the man I knew as Flint ordered.
“Look, I don’t know what you want, but I’m sure there’s another way to deal with this.” The thought of what he might be planning was making me ill.
“Get on the fucking bed,” he ground out as he held the knife in my face again.
“I need to go to the bathroom.”
“You’ll be fine,” he insisted.
“No, I won’t. Hello, I’m pregnant. I’ll pee on the bed if I don’t go now.”
“Jesus fucking Christ,” he bitched. “Go, but I’m not taking those off yet, so make do.” He nodded toward my zip-tied hands.
“Fine.”
When he followed me to the bathroom, I stopped and glared at him. “I’m not peeing in front of you.”
“Then you’re not pissin’, are you?” His snide reply made me want to punch him in the eye.
My bound hands motioned around the bathroom from the doorway. “Do you see any windows? Where the hell am I going to go?” I asked him in exasperation.
“She’s not going anywhere, for fuck sake,” the other guy started to say, but Flint cut him off.
“Did I ask you?” he sneered.
Clenching his jaw, the other guy shook his head. It gave me a little bit of hope that maybe he might be an ally if he didn’t agree with what Flint was doing.
“That’s what I thought.” He turned back to me and snapped, “Go, but make it quick.”
“Fine.”
Able to go in by myself, I wasted no time wadding my dress up then sitting down. I needed them to hear me actually peeing. Thankfully, since I’d gotten pregnant, I could go at the drop of a dime.
Seated on the toilet, I worked my phone out.
As fast as my thumbs would move, I tapped out a message to Gunny. I was afraid if I sent it to Lock he would lose his shit and come in half-cocked.
Me: I was taken. Video feed at shop. Motel in next town. Two
That was as far as I got before Flint yelled from the other side, “Two more seconds and I’m opening the door!”
Afraid he would burst in before I could finish, I hit Send. “I’m working on it! It’s not that easy with this dress and my hands bound!” Asshole, I added silently.
That little bit was better than the nothing I’d be able to send if I got caught. I’d try again later.
It was harder to get the phone back in my pocket with my hands together that to get it out, for some reason. I was able to do a cursory wipe and was pulling up my panties when Flint barged in.
Before I could so much as blink, he’d grabbed them and ripped them off me. The force with which he pulled nearly made me fall over.
“You won’t be needing those,” he whispered in my ear, and my skin began to crawl. “Now get your sweet ass out o
n that bed unless you want me to bend you over right here.”
Silently, I shook my head and returned to the bed with the threadbare comforter. There was no way in hell I was lying on that thing. I grasped it and jerked it to the bottom of the bed, uncaring if it fell to the floor.
Watching him out of the corner of my eye, I crawled on the bed, then curled up in the fetal position. I’d no sooner set my head on the pillow than he was jerking my legs down by the ankles.
“What are you doing?” I screeched.
“Hold her leg,” Flint ordered. The other guy complied, but I saw distaste flicker in his eyes. I’d have thought I imagined it if he hadn’t then given me a look filled with apology and regret.
Flint yanked the leg he held out and looped something around my ankle, then tied it off to the bed leg. The whole while, I tried to kick and pull free, but I was no match for his strength. He cinched it down tight.
“Tie that one,” he instructed the other guy before tossing the strips of fabric or whatever he was using to him.
“I’m not tying her to the fucking bed. You do it.”
I thought Flint was going to go ballistic, “You fucker. You’re gonna find yourself in the ditch before you wear my patch if you don’t learn to fucking listen.”
The guy stubbornly held my leg but refused to tie it. Flint reacted like lightning striking. One second, he was holding my leg down. The next, he was up and punching the guy in the face. The other guy stumbled backward and crashed into the cheap dresser before falling into an unconscious heap.
It looked like it hurt like a motherfucker.
Flint didn’t pay him any mind, as if he expected the guy to bow down and kiss his ass after that. Maybe he normally did. While I had a second, I was trying to get loose.
“Don’t be stupid. You don’t look stupid, but then again, you are married to one of those fucking Demented Sons.” His voice was deadly calm, and the knife was pointed at the curve of my belly.
Oh God.
“I could carve that bastard right out of you while you lay there and bled out. You better learn real quick who’s in charge, and it ain’t you,” he said with deadly calm.
Pulse racing at an unhealthy rate, I stilled.
With an ice-cold laugh, he gagged me, tied my other leg, then cut the zip ties and tied each wrist to the legs at the head of the bed. The cold blade of his knife trailed from my ankle up the inside of my leg. It reached where my dress had bunched up and pushed it further until I was exposed and unable to cross my legs or do anything to cover myself.
Utter helplessness washed over me, and I started to slip into a quiet place in my head.
“What I’ve Done”—Linkin Park
I’d started dinner on the grill, Presley was playing, and I was watering Raiven’s flowers on the front porch. She’d wanted them, but couldn’t ever remember to water them, so I tried to do it for her. I wasn’t even sure if she knew I did it or if she thought we had magic fucking flowers.
Five bikes pulled parallel to the curb and didn’t even bother to back up. Smoke had Mattie on the back of his bike. Everyone jerked off their helmets. Mattie climbed off, rushed up the steps, gave me a shy smile and a quick wave, then went inside. She was a quiet kid, but a good kid. Presley adored her.
Gunny approached my front porch where I stood watering. Styx was hot on his heels.
“Hey, big brother, what’s up?”
“Raiven here?” He’d stopped at the base of the steps.
“Well, hello to you too. No, she had a late appointment. She should be home any second though.”
When his eyes closed and his head tipped slightly forward, I had a bad feeling.
“Gunny? What the hell is going on?” Dropping the hose on the porch with a thunk, I stormed to the sidewalk where he stood. “Gunny! Tell me. What is going on? Why are you all here?”
“I got this, Gunny.” Smoke placed a hand on Gunny’s shoulder. Gunny clenched his fists, ground his teeth, and turned away to push his fingers into his hair.
“Lock, I need you to keep a clear head. We were going to take care of this without you because I felt you’d be a loose cannon. Gunny insisted. Viper has Raiven. We’ve tracked them down to a shithole motel in Bertram. We’re heading over there, but if you can’t keep a level head, I’m ordering you to stay here.” Rage turned my vision to red.
He ordered me?
“Lock!” Gunny had stepped up and was holding my wrist in a punishing grip. Looking down, I realized I’d pulled a pistol out of the holster on my belt.
“If you want to go, let’s go. Mattie has Presley. She knows to lock the door. But you leave that here,” Smoke demanded.
A reptilian smile was my answer. “Sure.” I handed that one over to Truth. I still had two more on me.
I didn’t waste another second before I was in the garage backing my bike out and closing the door with my remote. “Let’s go.”
They all rushed to their bikes, pulled on their helmets, and started them up. Flipping protocol the bird, I raced out of my driveway. The brothers caught up to me quickly, and Smoke pulled up beside me.
It took us mere minutes to get to Bertram. At the first gas station, Smoke signaled for us to pull off. When we stopped, I demanded, “Which hotel?”
That’s when I noticed no one was wearing their cut. Not even me. Then again, I’d been doing stuff at the house; I’d had no reason to wear it and I wasn’t in a frame of mind to grab it. That was precious time wasted. I only had my helmet on because it’d been hanging on my handlebar.
“We leave the bikes here or they’ll hear us coming. Check is over there. We’re getting in the SUV.” He nodded to the black SUV to the side of the building.
Autopilot was driving me; I didn’t wait, I simply moved. If not, I might crumble.
Everyone piled in the SUV, and we drove on down to probably the shittiest motel in town. There were three vehicles parked out front, and I had to wonder what desperation drove the owners of the other two vehicles to stay there. It looked termite-infested and like something you could rent by the hour.
“This is it. Pretty sure that’s the truck we saw in the security footage,” Check said as we pulled in at the opposite end of the long, single-story structure.
Smoke gave instructions as we quietly closed the doors and grouped in front of the vehicle. “Truth and Check, you go around back and come up from the other side. Lock and Slice, go from this side. That way none of us goes in front of their window to tip them off. Gunny and I are going to go into the office to see if I can, uh, persuade the desk clerk to give me another key to my room. No one goes in until I get there. Let’s move.”
Expecting us to all follow directions, he entered the office. The rest of us moved into place.
Except I wasn’t waiting to see if he could get a key.
Fuck that.
As soon as we made it to the door, I waited until Truth and Check were at the left of the room’s window and Slice and I were at the right. Lifting my pant leg, I withdrew the pistol I had clipped inside my boot.
“Lock!” Slice whispered frantically. Looking him dead in the eye, I shook my head, telling him I wasn’t waiting and I wasn’t backing down. Making sure my gun was good to go, I took a step over and listened at the door.
What I heard sent ice running through my veins. Muffled sobbing, and a man cursing.
“Go get Smoke,” I told Slice.
Not caring if it was the right room, I stepped back and kicked. I’d ask forgiveness if it was the wrong one. The flimsy door burst open, and what I saw was worse than what I heard.
There was Viper jumping off the bed and wiping his face off. A pistol was in one hand and he pointed it at me. Undaunted by the barrel he looked down, I held steady aim at the motherfucker with his pants undone. “You are a fucking dead man.”
In my peripheral vision, Raiven was strapped to the bed with her dress shoved up. She was gagged and crying but shaking her head no as she stared at me with wide eyes. The fury
that swept through me nearly knocked me over.
“Lock, you’re just in time for the party. And you brought friends to watch too. This gets better and better. I figured it was only fair that since you got to fuck my wife, I should be able to fuck yours. She’s feisty. I like that.”
“You piece of shit motherfucker!” I yelled as I closed in on him. He simply placed his finger on the trigger and laughed in my face. Then he had me stopping in my tracks because he turned the gun on Raiven.
“I’m a motherfucker? I’d say that title goes to your—oh wait, technically they were my shitty in-laws.” He chuckled as if I didn’t have my loaded 380 pointed at his chest. He was fucking crazy.
At my narrowed eyes, he laughed louder. “You do know we caught up to you thanks to the information Letty’s scumbag parents gave us, right?”
“What?” Shock had me wavering. He shook his head, smirking.
“Oh yes, ol’ granny and gramps were quick to sell Stefano the info they’d overheard. They were at the gas station the morning you left Grantsville. They heard you talking about going to Omaha and then on to Texas. All he had to do was start asking around for where his ‘sister’ was headed. They jumped to the front of the line when they heard he was offering a reward for her safe return.” I wanted to shoot him in his sick, smug smile.
My finger touched the trigger.
“I wouldn’t if I were you.” The words were accompanied by the cold steel of a revolver being held to the back of my head. My gaze held steady on Viper, but a frisson of fear snuck down my spine at our situation. We were in public, which meant witnesses. If I shot him, it wouldn’t be considered self-defense. It would be vigilante justice. Then again, if I shot him, his guy who’d snuck in behind me would kill me and Raiven would be at his mercy if my brothers didn’t get him first.
“Neither would I,” said Slice’s voice from behind me, and I experienced some relief.
“Well, boys, it would appear we have a standoff on our hands.” The smug grin on Viper’s face set fire to my rage. My finger trembled on the trigger.
The guy behind me swore under his breath.
Lock and Load: A Demented Sons MC Texas Novel Page 24