Game Changer (Hell's Saints Motorcycle Club)

by Marinaro, Paula

  Post Traumatic Syndrome occurred when the victims of the traumatic events could not get to the other side of it. When a poor soul did not get better a little every day but got a little worse and got stuck in the horrible, terrible place of the traumatic event.

  That was not us.

  Thank god that was not us.

  We were getting to the other side of it.

  We were.

  We definitely were.

  All three of us.

  Sure, we had the nightmares, we felt shattered and disconnected at times. There were periods where each of us still relived that horror in our minds until it numbed us.

  But we were crawling out of it.

  We had been through some shit, my girls and I. The event was proving to be a hard place to come back from, especially for Glory. Glory had suffered longer and more severely than we had guessed at. Even a month later, we were still learning about the abduction and what she had suffered at Gino’s hands.

  But each day the memories were met headlong and then pushed aside. We did that for each other. Even if it meant being hyper vigilante and stopping everything when those memories surfaced and fighting them together. We had that.

  Our feelings of safety and trust had been shattered and the trauma we had experienced from seeing Gino killed in front of us hadn’t left us. Seeing death close up like that changes you. You either found a place to reconcile and live with that change or you relive and relive and relive the trauma in your mind until it kills the spirit.

  Because my girls and I were survivors, we chose life. And we had to make that choice every day.

  One step at a time.

  And we hadn’t done it alone. We had been surrounded by love and support. We had been made to feel safe.

  When we had pulled up in front of the compound that night, Prosper had been waiting for us. It had been late and eerily quiet. No fire, no music, no shadow people tying one on in the fields. But the light had been on and Prosper had been in the driveway when we pulled up. He had opened the back door before we had come to a full stop and pulled me out of the car, held me tight and then looked me over from head to toe. His face dark and unreadable. Then he turned to Claire and did the same. He held her a long time and she wept into his neck.

  Jules had come up behind me and pulled me against him hard. His big arms wrapped around my shoulders. My back up against his. Glory was still in the car, wrapped in grandma’s afghan. I gave Jules a tight squeeze back, freed myself and moved to the car. Jules moved with me. When Glory saw him her eyes went wide and she shrank into the back seat. I turned to look at Jules through her eyes and I saw what she saw. A giant. A big blonde warrior with sharp eyes and a grim hard mouth. Assessing her, staring right back at her with shards of blue ice. I knew that look, I had been the recipient of that look and it had scared the shit out of me then. Now I knew it was the look of a trained Marine medic assessing for damage. Then I had thought it was the look of a seriously pissed off badass who might kill me.

  I placed my hand gently on Jules’s arm and said softly to Glory, “Honey, this is Jules. He is a friend of mine. A good friend, and a good man. He has some medical training and if you want, he can look at you and help you.”

  “Help me?” Glory croaked. Her voice cracked. And she licked her lips trying for moisture.

  “When was the last time she had something to drink?” Jules said to me, his eyes on Glory.

  “A few sips here and there, I was afraid to give her too much. Her pulse has been rapid and she’s been sweating then she gets the chills.” I told him.

  “Raine, get on the other side of the car so she can see you.” Jules was leaning into the car, filling the space between the dark night and a barely holding on Glory.

  I ran to the other side and leaned in to the car so Glory could see me.

  “I’m right here sweetheart.” I whispered to her.

  She turned her blank stare to me. Her hair was matted with blood and the side of her face where her hair had been pulled out was black and blue. Her one eye seemed even more swollen than before. The fist that had delivered that blow had done been a strong one, I knew that fist. My heart bled for her.

  “Honey, I am going to reach in and take your pulse. Is that okay with you?’ Jules was saying softly.

  Glory’s eyes were on me, well, the one that was not swollen shut was anyway. When I nodded she turned to Jules and nodded too.

  “That’s good honey.” Jules reached for her limp hand and held it in his.

  “Can you tell me your name?” Jules asked softly.

  “Glory.” Glory squeaked out.

  “Glory, do you know what day it is?”

  Glory’s eyes filled with tears. She thought for a minute.

  “He took me on Wednesday. I don’t know, I don’t know…..” Her voice trailed off.

  Jules eyes grew hard for a moment, but he hid it. For Glory’s sake, he hid it.

  “Glory, honey, look at me.” And she did

  Jules had a penlight in his hand and was looking at Glory’s one open eye.

  “That’s good, sweetheart.”

  But Glory had retreated back to her safe place.

  Jules brought his big body fully into the car then. He kept a light hold of her wrist and felt her heart race.

  “Glory, baby, stay with me.” He squeezed her hand lightly and Glory made the effort to refocus.

  “We need to get some fluids in you, and I want to give you something that will help you to relax. Will you let me do that for you?’ Jules had moved closer to Glory and was kneeling on the seat beside her.

  Glory seemed to be mesmerized by the soft voice and the close warmth of the big man next to her. Still, she turned to me again. Again, I nodded to her.

  “Okay.” She whispered to him.

  “Okay.” Jules whispered back.

  He helped her out of the car and when her legs buckled under her, he took her into his arms and carried her to the kitchen house.

  The distant roar of something oncoming and fast was sounding up the roar. I knew that sound. I wanted to run to that sound and keep running until the source of that sound enveloped me and covered me in the pure joy of it. I wanted to drown in that sound.

  The roar grew louder and louder until it was upon me. Until that roar zoomed up the long drive and shattered the black of the night sky with light. Until that roar stopped two feet away from me, got off his bike and wrapped me in his arms so tight I almost stopped breathing. I felt the warmth and safety of a love so deep that I knew if I let myself feel it and I lost it, it would shatter me. But tonight I let myself take that risk. Tonight I laid myself bare and basked in the warmth of his arms and the strong beat of his heart. Tonight I opened to this man.

  Diego held me to him high off the ground as if he was trying to keep me away from anything but him touching me. The minute my foot lightly touched the ground, I went down. Hard. I heard something pop and a blinding pain followed. I passed out in Diego’s arms.

  I woke to more blinding pain. Jules was standing over me and holding a leather strap in his hand. What was this? My mind could not wrap itself around it fast enough and I opened my mouth to scream. Diego clamped his hand over it and I saw his face come into sharp focus above me. Past him I saw the inky night filled with thousands of stars. He was saying something about my kneecap and he used the words dislocated. Then he said something about Jules and putting it back in place and biting down. And pain just for an instant. And did I understand?

  He put a leather belt in my mouth between my teeth and told me to bite down hard. As I did I felt something excruciating happen in my knee. The stars went out of the sky and I lost the night. I was out cold. Again.

  Diego picked me up and brought me inside and he didn’t let me go. Not that night, or the next day or the night after that.

  Jules had given me some welcomed pain killers and a light sedative to help me sleep. My head hurt where that bastard Gino had dragged me by the hair and I could not put weight on m
y knee. I was worried about Claire and Glory.

  After he whisked me away to Prosper’s rooms at the kitchen house, Diego had let no one but him near me. Claire had forced her way past the sentry once to assure herself that Diego didn’t have me in some weird hostage situation. She was looking exhausted and I know that she wasn’t sleeping because she told me. Pinky and Prosper were keeping her at their house for the time being. She gave Diego a dirty look when he told her he “wanted me to rest now.” She left but not before she told him he had one more day of this protective bullshit and then she was either coming to get me or bringing me to a real doctor to look at that knee. My little sister had some sass.

  The third morning, Claire and I met for breakfast. I watched her for signs of drug use and she watched me for signs of broken bones and concussion. After about fifteen minutes of that we ate in relative comfortable silence. As was the case in the mornings, the brothers were off and it was quiet. Jules made us something light and we ate about a quarter of whatever it was. Neither one of us paid much attention to the food. But the coffee, that was heaven. We both refilled our coffee cups then went outside to sit in the sun and drink them.

  We talked softly and for a long time. We speculated about Glory and her past and wondered if there was someone we should be calling. Jules had her in a room in the back of his, which was kind of like the make shift infirmary for club members. Not kind of like, was, I corrected myself. He had everything in there. Syringes, vials, a defibrillator, a set up for IV’s and the fluid to hang. He had crutches and slings and antibiotic ointments. He had three locked cabinets and two locked apartment sized refrigerators. The place was amazing. I knew Jules had been a medic but that didn’t give him access to the stuff he had. Not by a long shot. For maybe the thousandth time I speculated about Jules, but this time I didn’t have to speculate alone. Claire had some theories of her own about the Viking.

  Claire had peeked in on Glory just like she had on me, but every time she had done so, Glory had been asleep. She and I were going to try again today. I was still woozy from the pain killers and sleeping pills. Conversely, Claire was wired. She shared with me that she was afraid to take anything to ease her because she was desperately afraid of a drug relapse. So she was up most nights afraid of nightmares. My sweet sister told me that she replayed that awful feeling again in her mind when she realized that I hadn’t come out of that damn house.

  We didn’t talk about seeing the back of Gino’s head blow off. I couldn’t think about that. I couldn’t think about the bits of gray matter I felt crawling all over me sometimes when my world was still. Claire looked like hell. She hadn’t slept at all in the past two days. Not closed her eyes once. I could see the dark smudges under her eyes and the hyper vigilance on her face when she took in her surroundings. This was not good

  That’s when I knew I had to get my shit together and help Claire work passed this. While I had slept on peacefully in a drug induced state safe in my man’s arms, I had left Claire out there. Again. I had better compose myself and fast. No more pain killers or sleeping pills for me. My knee was feeling better and if I couldn’t sleep I would make myself some warm milk.

  Diego was in my bed every night. Really nice. It was really nice. I had to be careful of my knee because in certain positions it hurt like hell. But I didn’t want to sleep alone and Diego hadn’t wanted me to. So that first night we spent some time getting comfortable. To keep the pressure off my back (which was still sore from being dragged across the floor) I settled on my side with my knee elevated by a pillow placed between it and the mattress. My knee was comfortable but I wanted the warm assurance of Diego’s body so I tried to wiggle in closer to him. He wrapped his steel arm around and whispered tightly against my hair.

  “Babe, you got about a half a second to stop pushing your ass against my dick, then I’m gonna throw you on your back and bury myself deep in you, fucked up knee or not. I really don’t want to hurt you babe, but you gotta stop.” Then he pulled his crotch away from me but held on with his arms tight.

  Today was the first day he had left me. He left on club business right after the sun came up. He kissed me hard and whispered that he would be back later.

  I felt an emptiness that I did not want to feel when I woke up hours later to find him gone.

  Claire and I continued getting better and so did Glory. She had been in pretty bad shape and there was a lot she wasn’t ready to talk about. A lot. And she looked bad. Her eye, when she could finally begin opening it, had been shot through with bloody lines. Her hair hadn’t been pulled out in clumps like I had originally thought but that bastard Gino had taken a knife to her and had systematically hacked it off. About a week into her convalescence, Dolly and Pinky had come a calling on Glory. Dolly had a rolling suitcase with her that was filled with airbrush cosmetics and a variety of hair cutting scissors, curling irons, straighteners, and other tools of a cosmetologist’s trade.

  Glory looked wary at the thought of anyone coming at her with a scissors so Claire and I volunteered. We each had our hair trimmed and layered and blow dried. Dolly applied makeup to us expertly and it was a really fun afternoon. Glory hadn’t felt ready to leave the sanctum of the infirmary to meet the dynamic duo that was Pinky and Dolly so they came to her. Glory’s voice was still raspy from the strain of screaming in the days Gino had kept her imprisoned. She wasn’t talking much but she was smiling. And once we all turned to her because we actually heard her giggle at something that Pinky had said about Dolly’s choice of bright blue eye shadow back in the day.

  Pinky and Dolly visited Glory with us every afternoon after that. Glory didn’t say much and when we asked her if there was anyone we should call she sadly shook her head.

  Glory was a mystery that Claire, Pinky, Dolly and I ruminated over and not just a little bit. She was a beauty in the classic sense. Even in her battered state, Glory looked out of place at the MC. Glory had the silky blonde hair, peaches and cream complexion and pale blue eyes of a Ralph Lauren model. She reminded me of the photos I had seen of the ill-fated wife of John Kennedy Jr. Her beauty was classic. We were all dying to know her story but she contributed very little to any conversation that seemed to turn personal, and believe me, we shamelessly tried to steer that conversation towards the personal every chance we got.

  Pondering the mystery that was Glory served to keep my mind occupied. It gave me something to think about. It was something I could call up like a talisman to steer my mind from the image of the back of Gino’s head coming apart and landing in bits and pieces onto my bare skin.

  Eventually things started to feel better. With the help of Diego’s loving arms around me all night long, it was easier for me to face the day. He chased all my demons away and I loved him for that. Loved him for that. This could not be good for me on so many levels. I knew I would be taking a big chance if I took a gamble at love with a man like Diego. But I was beginning to think he might be worth that risk. I wanted to believe he was worth the risk. I wanted him. This man. This rough, tough, flawed, outlaw of a man. I wanted to be his woman.

  The first few days after the event he had been so worried and loving and attentive. And the attentive part was the best because we had talked. I was pretty sedated but in that place between sleeping and awake we had each other. We started off slowly, tentatively but then we seemed to move a long at a warp speed rate.

  Once those gates opened for me, I just didn’t stop. I told Diego things that I had never shared with anyone, some of them not even Claire. I told him about how hard I had worked to get into nursing school and how one sad case then another then another had broken my heart. He got very quiet then and listened hard. At one point the pain etched over his face was so deep I thought it might crack him in half, so I veered away from that subject quickly. I thought he was feeling that for me, that he didn’t want me to relive those days of witnessing the interminable sadness of it all.

  So because I was too self -involved, I didn’t ask him about it. I didn’t p
rod or question or gently lead him to full disclosure. I didn’t ask and I should have. I really really should have. Maybe it would have made a difference. Maybe not. But I wish I had asked.

  Diego shared too. Not all of his story, not the whole of it. Not even the most important parts of it, but he shared. He told me that he had first patched in with the Nevada Chapter near Pinky’s house and that is why he had known the brothers up there. He told me some funny stories about Prosper and Pinky’s wedding day and about the shit they put Reno through before patching him in.

  But it wasn’t all about the MC.

  Diego told me about places he had visited and places he still wanted to see. He talked about the how much he loved being on the open road and his first bike. He said he missed the hot dry heat of the desert and told me about a trip he took once through Mojave National Preserve.

  I told him about my obsessive love of maps and all things geographical. How I had gotten a world globe one year for Christmas and had studied it and researched each country one by one until I could name all the countries in Africa and Asia.

  Including their capitals.

  In alphabetical order.

  Then I named them for him. Diego smiled at that and just shook his head.

  In between that place of sleeping and waking when everyone else was dreaming, Diego and I became more than lovers. We became friends. Looking back, it’s when I fell in love. Really fell in love. For the first and last time of my life.

  Chapter 45

  Moving day. We were moving in to the mostly finished lake house.

  While Claire, Glory and I had spent the last few weeks, recuperating, recovering and regrouping. The brothers had been renovating. They had been clearing out and hammering and nailing and reinforcing and cutting and drilling and notching.

  And they were good at it.

  Glory had decided to stay. We still knew nothing about her. She never disclosed. She never slipped after a third glass of wine. She never blurted out a name or a place when she had her guard down. Maybe her guard was never down. I didn’t know. I don’t even know if she ever really even made a conscious decision or just rolled with it. There was no discussion. And on our part, we never questioned, we never asked, we never made it hard for her or uncomfortable for her to be with us.