by Ryan Michele
* * *
“I need you,” Rocco said into the phone as I looked at the time, one-thirty in the morning. You’ve got to be shitting me.
“Seriously? What have you gotten yourself into now?” I tossed the blanket off the bed and sat up. Ms. Janey was only two doors down, and if she heard me, I’d be going nowhere.
It was cute how she tried to impose rules like curfew. Normally I followed them, because I liked having boundaries and control. These Rocco calls, though, not so much.
* * *
That night he was in hot water, losing at poker to a bunch of thugs outside of Rebellion. I had to cough up money which I didn’t have and overdrew my account.
He’d better not be playing games this time and better seriously need me.
I parked my car, turned off the engine, and sat in the driveway, hoping Rocco would come out of the house and we could get the hell out of here.
This was off, though. I felt it in my gut. Fear traced up my spine at the thought of Rocco in that house and possibly hurting or worse.
Five minutes passed and no sign of Rocco. Getting out of the car, I slid the knife into my hand discreetly.
My chest felt tight and hands felt clammy as I walked up to the front door.
I wished I would’ve listened to my body screaming at me.
I wished I would’ve told Wrong Way about the attacks.
I wished I had told anyone where I was going.
Except I didn’t, and when the door flung open, my breath left me.
“Dad?”
It was him. Years since I’d seen him, but I could never forget that hate-filled stare.
* * *
“You stupid fucking cunt,” my father yelled at me. It repeated in my brain over and over again. I could never get it to stop. Whenever I did something he didn’t like, he called me a cunt. I didn’t even know what a cunt was, just that it was bad.
The blow came hard to my cheek, my body flying to the ground. Tears spilled out of my eyes as my hand went to my face. The burn was intense, but Dad didn’t have his ring on tonight, so at least there wouldn’t be a cut.
My mother stared blankly at me, a bunch of white powder on the table in front of her. I hated that powder. It always made her sleepy, not that she’d help me if she were awake.
But I wanted my mom.
The one who was talked about at school. She made dinner, read stories, and tucked you in at night. My friends talked about the stuff their mothers did for them. One even did a science project, and the kid got an A.
My mom didn’t know I existed until my father got in one of his raging fits. She never made dinner. She’d throw me a bag of cheese puffs, but that was as close as I’d ever gotten to a meal. She never read to me.
And tuck me in at night? No. Never.
My parents were of the mind that a child should not be seen or heard. Which was why I spent a lot of time upstairs in my room.
“Get up, you little brat!” my father screamed, wrenching my arm and pulling me up from the floor. I tried really hard not to cry out, but it hurt. He was so strong. Once he picked me up and threw me across the room and against the wall.
The only kind of man who could do that were the Hulk. At least that was what the boys at school said. I’d never met a Hulk. They told me he was big and green. If he was anything like my father, he was mean. No thank you.
My father dragged me into the kitchen by my arm. I tried to get my feet under me, but he was too fast. Too strong. Too fast. Too mean. That was my dad.
There was a cigarette hanging out of my father’s mouth, the smoke billowing up. It was a smell I hated. As he picked me up around my waist, the smell intensified.
My father grabbed my head as I looked in front of me. A sink full of water.
Dread and tears spilled down my face.
“No, Daddy! No!” I cried and tried to wiggle out of his arms, but his hold was tight.
“Shut up, you fuckin’ cunt. I told you to have the dishes done,” he barked, and I knew what was coming next.
I knew it, but I hoped it wouldn’t happen.
I knew the water would be hot.
I knew he was going to dunk my head in it.
I knew he wouldn’t stop until I stopped moving my arms and legs.
I knew he would wait until the very last second when I couldn’t get another drop of air in my body, then pull me out.
I knew it.
But there wasn’t anything I could do about it.
Nothing.
I was alone.
* * *
He reached out, grabbed my arm, and pulled me in. I was so dazed from seeing him that I didn’t pull out my knife. Big mistake.
“Goodnight,” my father said as something hard hit my head, and I collapsed to the ground.
23
Wrong Way
“What do you have?” Crow asked, stepping into my room at the clubhouse. I’d been digging since we got back, and we were holding off on church until something came up.
“Nothin’. I’ve broke into his bank statements, and nothin’ showed a business that was flounderin’ and needin’ to be moved. He has a huge nest egg and money put away for his children’s college. In all, he’s clean.”
“No one is ever clean,” Crow responded.
“I know.”
Crow moved. “Alright. Let’s get to church and get the two sworn in. Know you have shit to do, but we gotta get this done now.”
On a nod, we headed down for church.
“Any opposed?” Crow said at the front of the table in church. No one said a word.
True, we had shit going on, but this was important, for all of us.
A round of cheers went up as Ethan and Jimmy received their Ravage MC cuts. They earned them and proved their loyalty.
It was past time for them to get the leather, but with all the shit Lemon threw at us, we were a little hesitant to give our colors to anyone. We also realized, though, that we couldn’t hold others accountable for Lemon’s crimes and mistakes.
After congratulating the two new members, there was a huge party where we got them both seriously drunk. It wasn’t even eight pm yet, but they were hammered. It was a rite of passage, and no matter what was going on, they deserved to have that celebration.
I made my way to my bedroom at the clubhouse and fired up the computers. There were two things on my mind.
One—the Senator. There had to be something; I just wasn’t looking in the right spot.
Two—was the IP address. It was nagging at me, telling me needed to figure it out.
After searching the Senator for a while, I changed over to the other, needing a break.
This damn loop was killing me. Scrubbing my eyes, I wondered what Hayden was doing, so I pulled out my phone and went through our text string, seeing the last one where she wrote Be safe.
That was before we left for the run.
I texted her. I’ll be over later.
We hadn’t spent a night apart except when I went on the run. Waking up with her was the best part of my day. Fucking loved waking up to that beauty. I should be kicking myself in the ass for not seeing it so long ago. It was time wasted, but looking back was pointless. Those months couldn’t be redone. We could only look at the future, and my future held Hayden.
A loud bang came to the door. “Yeah,” I called out, and it swung open wide. Phoenix was holding Ethan up.
“Man, can he sleep in here? He’s fuckin’ toasted.”
Ethan didn’t have a room yet, but there were other rooms in the clubhouse. But I was his handler, therefore he was my responsibility, at least for tonight. Then I was off duty.
“Fine, but I’m lockin’ the door and leavin’ in a bit.”
“Whatever. He didn’t have that much to drink.” Phoenix threw him on the bed, and Ethan moaned. Phoenix darted from the room like his ass was on fire.
“You puke in here, I’ll have your ass,” I warned.
He mumbled out some sounds then cl
earer said, “Not … drunk…”
“Sure you’re not.”
I went back to work, letting Ethan sleep off the booze. He didn’t normally drink much, and he was going to be pissed in the morning that he wasn’t waking up with a woman in his arms.
An hour and a half later and I hadn’t gotten any further. “This is hopeless.”
“What?”
I jumped at the sound, turning to see Ethan laying on his side, eyes open, but otherwise not moving.
“You good?” I asked him as he moved to sit up, his hand holding one side of his head.
“No.”
I turned back to the computers. “Then go to sleep.”
“What are ya workin’ on?” he asked, coming up beside me. He smelled of bourbon. Lots and lots of it.
“IP address. I get close to figuring it out, and then everything scrambles and goes into a loop.”
“They put a seven-nine blocker on it,” he responded, and I turned to him.
“A what?”
He grabbed a chair from the corner, swaying a bit, and sat. His head hung down for a moment then popped back up. Fuck, I needed him sober.
“Seven-nine blocker. It keeps you moving through the code only to end up doing the same code over and over again.”
“How do I cut it?”
His head fell back, and I got in his face, tapping the side of it hard. “Talk to me!” I demanded, and Ethan shook his head while I moved back.
“Find the code with the percent symbol. Delete the first eight symbols after it. Done.”
“Seriously?”
“Yep. I don’t feel so good. Woozy. I’m gonna lay back down,” Ethan mumbled as he stood up, then fell to the floor and rolled on his back. After checking he was breathing, I did exactly what Ethan said.
There it was staring back at me.
My chest tightened, and the ground fell away from my feet.
Betrayal burned deep.
I knew the physical address of this location. I’d spent nights there.
Hayden.
24
Hayden
My head was woozy as I opened my eyes. Blinking rapidly, everything came into focus. A hammer came down with a hard thud as screams filled the air.
Looking over through my haze, Rocco was the source of the noise as my father was taking a hammer to Rocco’s hand. His face was pale, his eyes swollen and bloodshot, and his body was tense preparing for the pain. Rocco, my carefree friend, was falling apart right in front of me. No. No. No!
“Stop it!” I screamed, trying to move finding myself, tied to a chair, my hands behind my back, and tape around each leg. Fuck. I rocked a bit, but I couldn’t go anywhere. “Just stop! What do you want?”
I fought to remember how I got here. Vaguely, my mind said I received a text, but everything was blurry. The outburst took my father’s focus off Rocco and directed it solely on me. Those eyes that hated me my entire life were now coming my way.
It was a gaze I would never forget. His scrutiny, hatred, and venom were still very much looking at me right now. A cold shiver slithered down my spine as all the old memories of being a child in his home threatened to come forward.
Three other men were in the room, each wearing fitted black suits with black ties. They had blank stares as if they were used to this level of violence on a daily basis. My father, though, looked like he was going golfing with khakis and a polo shirt; the only thing that stood out was that they were now covered in Rocco’s blood.
Fuck. That cut me deep. My father could hurt me, and I’d take it, but not Rocco.
Approaching me, my father smirked with malicious intent. He gripped my hair and pulled my head back hard, my neck straining painfully. A small gasp escaped me, but that was it. I knew better than to give him the satisfaction of my pain. I had to remain focused. I needed to figure out what was going on here and get Rocco out.
“All you had to do was break into Ravage’s system, and all this could’ve been avoided!” he spat at me, and I was seriously confused. With whatever was banging in my head, the pieces of the puzzle weren’t going together as fast as they normally did. It took a bit more focus.
My mother died four years ago, and my father moved out of state. I looked it up and kept tabs on him. Why in the hell was he back in Rebellion, and why did he have these guys with him? And why was he talking about Ravage? None of this made sense. Did he send me that email? Shit.
I decided to play stupid, give me a little time to figure out what in the hell was going on. “What are you talking about?”
He pulled my hair back harder, the strands beginning to pull out of my scalp, then he punched me right across the cheek. My head flung to the side, unable to move far because of his hold on me. I’d been hit before, but this was like nothing I’d ever felt. He had serious power behind his swing, much harder than I remembered. Fuck.
The dizziness took me over for a moment, but when my dad changed his grip on my hair to inspect his work, my eyes cleared a bit.
“You know exactly what I’m talkin’ about. That email that came to ya. I sent it. And you write back with a no? Fuck you, you little cunt.” He released my hair, but not before flinging my head to the side viciously.
Bastard. He called me that as a child as well. Go get me a beer, you little cunt. Those damn words. I’d thought I’d gotten rid of them, but having him so near had them all coming back in a rush. I felt like a ton of bricks were sitting on my chest as the memories tried to invade. Everything I worked so hard to push down was tumbling around in my head. All the boxes I had compartmentalized my emotions in were busting at the seams, threatening to send me toppling into a breakdown.
“Do it,” my father ordered, and one of the men went over to Rocco and pulled him up. My best friend groaned in agony. The guilt of causing him pain gnawed at me. If it wasn’t for Rocco’s association to me, my father wouldn’t be torturing him now.
“Wait. No! I’ll do what you want. Just let him go.”
God, did I just say that? I did. And I couldn’t break into Ravage’s computers. That would be something none of them would allow me to come back from.
The big man’s hand flew out, and a long metal stick appeared. He bashed in Rocco’s knee, sending him to the ground in a heap. Rocco laughed out loud to hide the pain and because this was Rocco, he’d never let a soul find his weakness. He was hurting, and I wanted to take that away.
“Stop it!” I yelled, the fear gripping around my throat and sucking the life out of me.
“You either do it, or I'll kill him. And believe me. I’ll make it hurt.”
I didn’t doubt that he would. We needed an out, but we were running out of time. My mind raced, but I couldn’t think clearly. My father was temperamental at best, so one wrong move and he would end Rocco without a second thought. My insides warred with what to do. Then it hit me. “I need a computer.”
There were none in the room. Maybe I could get them to take me back to my house. Then I could get Ms. M’s attention, and she could call Wrong Way.
He would help. I knew he would. He cared about me as I did him. Our bond together was growing each day.
Two of the men came up on either side of me and lifted my chair high in the air and started walking. “Put me down!” I shifted my body as much as I could, but it was no use. The huge barbarians were too strong, and when they sat me down, my stomach fell to my knees.
Computers. Three of them, all up and running.
Fuck.
That option was out.
Hands. I needed hands, and mine were tied behind my back. If he let me go there, I could grab my knife behind my back. I shifted a bit, and I didn’t feel it. Then I looked down at my thigh and foot. Nothing. Fucker took my knives.
My head pounded, my vision blurred, and I swore I had what felt like an elephant sitting on my chest.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
“You’re gonna get on here and download everything to this.” He set a piece of paper with what looked like a
n a3 cloud file. He had to know those were easy to trace.
“What do you want to know?”
“Everything you can get. Now we’re gonna unstrap your arms and hands. You try any fucking thing and your friend out there gets a bullet between his eyes.”
Just then I could hear Rocco’s cries of pain. He was breaking, and it was all my fault.
Fuck.
As if my father could read my mind, he pointed to the brute closest to me. “And my guy here knows computers, so don’t even try to send out any messages. He’ll shoot ya.”
Think. Think. Think.
What in the hell had I gotten myself into now?
25
Wrong Way
My bike couldn’t get me there fast enough as the adrenaline pumped through my veins. She wouldn’t do this. Couldn’t. The woman I’d come to know would never shit on a trust she was building with someone.
Unless she had an ulterior motive and it was all a lie. Could it have been?
She told me flat out trust was hard for her. So why would she dismiss ours? We were building something good, and she just crushed it. Why?
Crow, Brewer, and I parked our bikes and headed for the door. Grams’ lights were off in the house. Hopefully she was asleep and didn’t hear the bikes. I didn’t have time to explain anything to her. Hell, I didn’t know what to tell her.
Pulling out my kit, I picked the locks. We hadn’t gotten to the point where she’d given me a key, but I had her security code. As soon as the door popped open, Luna came barreling to the door, a growl on her lips.
As soon as she saw me, her growl turned to excitement. She jumped up on me, and I gave her a quick rub down. Both Crow and Brewer let the dog sniff them before going in.
“She’s not here,” I told them, knowing Hayden’s habits. One—she always left the light on under the microwave in the kitchen when she was gone. Always. And it was on. Another was, if Luna came barreling out, Hayden would be right behind her.