When I was able to get through my morning without being stopped by Slasher or any of his men, I really started to worry that I had been caught. Gimpy gave me a ride as usual, but he was quiet the whole way. Usually, he tried to flirt with me or something, but he was preoccupied this morning. I got off his bike and looked back at him warily, but he was already roaring out of the parking lot. I ran inside and to the locker room, quickly stashing my stuff. I had just five minutes before I had to clock in and I was determined to find Adam. I didn’t want to page him in case one of Slasher’s guys was in the hospital watching me. I raced down to the physical therapy wing and pushed through the doors to see Adam sitting at his desk going over paperwork. I took a deep breath and sighed in relief.
“Ali? What’s wrong?”
He stood and walked over to me, placing his hands on my arms and rubbing them lightly.
“Nothing. I was just worried.”
“Is this about…” He looked around to make sure no one could over hear us. “Is this about Slasher? Did he do something?”
“No,” I said with a shake of my head. “I thought he suspected something last night and I was worried that he knew that we had been meeting.”
Adam’s jaw clenched and he took a step back. “I wish you would go to the police. They could help you.”
“I can’t. He’ll kill my son.”
“He’ll kill you if he finds out that you’re taking self-defense classes.”
“The only way he’ll find out is if someone tells him and since you and I are the only ones that know, that doesn’t seem very likely.”
“How many more times are you going to let him smack you around before you decide you’re ready to leave?”
“Adam, if I’m not ready and I can’t get away, I’ll get myself killed. Who would protect Axel? I have to be sure about this.”
He nodded and ran a hand over the back of his head. “I know. I just wish there was more I could do.”
“You’re doing plenty. Do you know how much you’re risking by helping me? The Blood Devils don’t mess around. If they found out about you, you’d be dead before me.”
“I’m not worried about me. I can take care of myself.”
I bit my lip and wondered if I should tell him my plan. It was probably safer if he didn’t know, but I didn’t want him to worry either. “There’s going to be an initiation soon. Within the next few days. Slasher always throws big parties the night before. I think that might be my time to slip out. We might be able to get away if they’re all wasted.”
“If you get the chance, you run and you don’t look back. Cash only.”
“I know,” I said, taking a deep breath. “I don’t have much, but it’s enough to get me where I need to go.”
“Are you going to tell me where that is?” he asked.
I shook my head. “I’m sorry, but it’s better if you don’t know. If we make it there, we’ll be safe.”
“So, what? I shouldn’t worry if you don’t show up at work in a few days?”
“Just pray that I actually made it out and I’m not at the bottom of the lake,” I said with tears in my eyes. Adam had been so good to me and I hated saying goodbye to him, but it was the only way. I would miss him so much when we left. He had been my rock over the past two years.
“I know I can’t hug you or anything. Just be safe. Call me if you need me and I’ll be there for you.”
I nodded and took a step back. “I have to get to work. Be careful,” I said as I spun around and ran back to clock in. I prayed like hell all day that nothing I did would ever touch Adam. He was a solid guy and had done more for me than I could ever have hoped for. One day, I would find a way to let him know that I was okay and that I appreciated all he had done for me. If I made it out.
✯✯✯✯✯
“Tomorrow’s the big day!” Gimpy said in excitement as I climbed on his bike.
“What are you talking about?”
“Tomorrow, your boy becomes a man. A real member of the Blood Devils. Slasher’s pretty fucking excited.”
My insides churned and I almost threw up right there. I knew that he was planning an initiation, I just didn’t know it was for my own son. I couldn’t let that happen. We would have to leave tonight. There was no other way. No matter what happened, I would get my son away from Slasher once and for all.
I was in a daze the whole way back to the house, trying to think of something that I could do. An idea struck me, but it was dangerous. If my plan worked, there was every chance for escape. There was also every chance that I wouldn’t make it out of the house alive. I had to try. I had to pick a fight with Slasher and make sure that he beat me up. It was the only time that he left me unattended. If I was beaten too badly, he would get high with everyone else and forget about me. It was my last chance and I had to take it. One way or the other, I was leaving this place tonight, either on my own or in a body bag.
I walked in the house and immediately searched out Slasher. I had to do it while I was still good and pissed and had the nerve. I stomped into his office, flinging the door open. His eyes whipped up at me and he scowled.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing? You fucking know better.”
“You can’t do this. I won’t let you. Axel is not joining your little gang of drug runners. He’s going to college and he’s going to make something of himself.”
“He’ll do what I say and that’s final. How do you think it would look to the guys if all their sons joined and mine went off to be some pussy lawyer?”
“I don’t care what they think. He won’t be a part of this life anymore. You really want to force your son to kill someone?”
He stepped around the desk and was in front of me before I could even blink. His fist shot out and cracked me hard in the cheek. I fell to the floor, whimpering in pain. It hurt like a bitch, but this was what I needed. Slasher lived by his own set of rules and he did whatever he had to in order to keep people in line. I’d seen more people killed over the past seventeen years than anyone should have to. While I once was a naive seventeen year old girl, I now lived with the realities of the gang life.
“Bitch, you don’t get a say in this. Unless you want to end up at the bottom of the river, you’ll keep your fucking mouth shut.”
I gathered up the bloody spit in my mouth and did the only thing I could think of. I spit in his face. His eyes turned molten as he grabbed me by the hair and yanked me off the floor, throwing me onto the desk. I scrambled to get away from him, but he was faster than me. I should be used to this by now, but it never got any easier to take.
His hands gripped my waist as he tore open my pants and pulled them from my body. I kicked and thrashed out at him, but it only angered him more. A backhand to the face sent me sprawling off the desk and across the floor. Before I could curl into myself, he kicked me in the stomach. I barely had time to register the pain before he kicked me again. I felt something crack and gasped for breath, hoping that I would live long enough to protect my son.
When his foot connected with my jaw, I was done fighting. I laid there like a limp rag as he punched me and kicked me a few more times. I could hardly breathe and my whole body ached. When he dragged me across the floor, I whimpered and tried to beg, but nothing would come out of my swollen mouth.
I felt my panties torn from my body and his erection pressing at my entrance. I let my mind drift as he roughly shoved himself inside me and remembered better days when Chris had been mine and we were planning a future together. His rough thrusts brought me back to the present and reminded me that Chris was no longer a part of my life. It didn’t matter. I would see him soon if I could get through this.
“You’re a dried up whore,” he said, slapping my face. “You ever wonder why I didn’t want you anymore?”
I didn’t care why he had stopped coming to me so often. I was just glad to not be assaulted repeatedly by him.
“I should just fucking kill you,” he hissed as he shoved himself ins
ide me one final time. “You’re not worth the fuck.”
He pulled out and shoved himself back in his jeans, stomping out the door. I laid on the floor, bleeding and broken. When Slasher had first taken me, I had thought that our son would always keep me protected from the worst of his anger, but I was wrong. He didn’t seem to care at all that I was his son’s mother. In fact, it seemed to anger him that I was attached to him at all. If it weren’t for my son, I would pray for death. I was close to it at this point. Being in the medical field, I knew that he had just beaten me badly, but that was what I had planned on and it would save me in the end.
I laid there on the floor for a good half hour until I finally decided that I had to drag myself upstairs and try to clean myself up. It would be painful and getting away wouldn’t be easy, but I had to get Axel out of here. I had to be sure that he didn’t turn into a murderer, and there was only one man I knew that could stop this train wreck.
✯✯✯✯✯
By the time I was able to drag myself off the floor and back to my room, I almost passed out on the bed. I had been living with Slasher since he grabbed me from my home the day after Chris left. My parents had assumed that I had run off with Chris and when I tried to see them, they took one look at my burgeoning baby bump and turned me away.
I hadn’t wanted to be with Slasher, but he wasn’t someone that you walked away from. The few times I had tried to run, he beat me so bad that I couldn’t move for weeks. So, I stopped trying to run and focused on a way to make myself useful to him. I convinced him to let me go to nursing school, telling him that I would be able to help out more when his men were injured and I would be bringing in income for him.
It had worked and I focused on that as much as possible. I thought that I would be able to stash at least some money away, but he had quickly rid me of all my money. He knew what I was trying to accomplish and made it very clear that he would kill Axel if I attempted anything. I had done my best over the years to stay away from him, but there were still times that just my presence angered him and he would take it out on my body. At least a few times a year, he would beat on Axel, just to prove to me that he would do it.
Moving off the bed as gingerly as possible, I knelt down on the floor and cringed as my bruised knees pressed into the wooden floor. I took out the loose floorboard and pulled my life savings from it, stuffing the $500 in my pockets. It was all I could collect over the years. I took a few dollars here and there when Slasher would leave money in his pockets. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to get Axel and I to Chris in Pennsylvania. A few weeks ago, I had done a search on him and found out that he was working for a security company and that he was a retired Marine. I knew that Slasher wouldn’t wait long for Axel’s initiation, but I hadn’t realized it would happen tomorrow. Now, I would have to get to Chris as fast as I could. I had been putting it off because Slasher had been watching me closely, but now that he had given me a good beating, he wouldn’t bother with me for days, assuming that I was too weak to do anything. I had counted on this. I had prayed for this. It was my once chance to get help.
Slasher’s crew was having a party and by midnight, they would all be passed out downstairs, completely unaware of anything going on around them. I soaked in the tub, trying to ease the pain in my muscles before I ran. It helped a little and allowed me to at least move without intense pain. I popped as many pain pills as I could and put together a small backpack with a change of clothes and grabbed the burner phone that Adam had given me a few weeks ago. By the time it got quiet downstairs, I was ready to go. I crept downstairs and saw everyone was passed out or too high to give a shit what was going on. A few of them had needles sticking out of their arms. This life was the worst and it was time to get away.
I went back to Axel’s room and knocked lightly. When he swung the door open, I could see the way his eyes flicked to the bag over my shoulder and then the disappointment. He didn’t comment on my battered body. He’d seen it enough to know what had happened.
He looked so much like Chris when he was sixteen. He had the same dark eyes and the same stern expression when he was angry. It made me wonder how closely he resembled him now.
“So, you’re finally leaving?”
“We’re leaving.”
He shook his head and walked back to his bed, plopping down. “There’s no leaving this life and you know it.”
“I have some money set aside and I know someone that can help us, but we need to leave tonight before Slasher wakes up.”
“Mom, you know that Slasher will kill you if you try to leave. It’s not worth it.”
“Slasher wants you to be initiated into the gang tomorrow.” His eyes flicked up to mine and I saw the terror in them. He knew exactly what it took to be initiated into the gang. He also knew the consequences if he failed. “I won’t let that happen. Now’s our chance to run. Please,” I begged him. “I won’t leave without you.”
He looked defeated, but there was a spark of hope underneath that. Axel never wanted this life. He never liked Slasher and the beatings he had taken since he was a little kid had trained him to obey Slasher without question. But the idea of getting away from it all and starting over was one that I didn’t think he would resist.
“If they find us, they’ll kill us. Are you sure you want to do this?”
“I would rather die trying to get away than stay one more minute under this roof,” I said fiercely.
He didn’t waste another minute arguing. He grabbed a bag and threw some spare clothes inside, leaving everything else behind. We didn’t have much as it was, so leaving it wasn’t a hard decision. There was nothing that we wanted from this life.
I went downstairs first, making sure it was still clear. My heart thundered in my chest as I walked past each of the twenty members passed out downstairs. Usually, there were a few guys guarding the house, but on party nights, they sometimes joined in after the others were too wasted to care. Luckily, this was one of those nights. I waved Axel downstairs and together, we walked out of that house, not looking back once.
Anxiety crept over me with every step I took. If they realized we were gone before we made it out, I would be dead and Axel would have only one option. He would have to kill someone and become part of the gang. The further we got, the more my body tensed. It wouldn’t abate until we made it out of this hellhole and were safely on our way. Even that wasn’t a guarantee that we made it out.
We made it to the corner before my body hurt too much to go on. I handed the burner phone to Axel and had him call a cab as I sagged down on a bench. I hadn’t wanted to waste the money on a cab, but we would never make it out of there if we didn’t catch a ride. The cab arrived and took us to the bus station. The driver didn’t mention my bruises or even look twice at me. Around here, it was perfectly normal to see people walking around looking half beaten.
We made it to the bus station and as we bought our tickets, I made sure Axel pulled his hoodie up over his head to hide from the cameras. I pulled on a baseball hat and pulled it low to cover as much of me as possible. As I handed over the money, I couldn’t help but glance around to make sure no one had followed us. I bought tickets to Kansas, figuring it would be best if we zigzagged around the country first.
I didn’t breathe normally until the bus finally pulled away. I sagged back against the seat and felt the first tears of relief finally slip free. I gripped onto Axel’s hand in the seat next to me and squeezed tightly. It was finally over. We were going to get out of here and live life. We were going to be free.
✯✯✯✯✯
It took us four days to get to Pittsburgh. That’s where the last bus stopped. I didn’t have enough money to get a cab to the town Chris lived in. I had only five dollars left to my name and we hadn’t eaten yet today. It was closing in on night time and I didn’t know anything about the city, but I knew I didn’t want to stay the night here. I pulled out the burner phone and found the number I had stored for Reed Security and pressed send. As t
he phone rang, I sank down to the ground. My body was aching so badly and all I wanted to do was sleep, but I had to get to Chris. He was my last hope.
“Reed Security. This is Sebastian Reed speaking.”
I almost started crying when I heard the voice. I was so close. I just had to hang on a little longer.
“I need to speak with Chris McKay please.”
“May I ask who’s calling?”
Did I tell him my name? Was it safe? I didn’t know if I had a choice in the matter. He had told me never to contact him again, but he may not take my call otherwise.
My voice shook as I answered. “Ali. Just tell him Ali is calling.”
The silence stretched for a moment before he finally asked me to wait a minute. I prayed that he would answer. I prayed that he wouldn’t turn me away. I had no other options. If he didn’t help, my son would fall back in the hands of the Blood Devils.
“Who is this?”
“Chris?”
“Yeah. Who’s asking?”
I choked down a sob and took a deep breath. “Ali. I need your help.”
CHAPTER THREE
Chris
“CHRIS?”
“Yeah. Who’s asking?”
“Ali. I need your help.”
I’d recognize that voice anywhere. That was the voice of my angel that I hadn’t spoken to in seventeen years. I thought about her every day, but I didn’t allow myself to dwell on what she was up to. I was sure she had gotten married and was living the good life. When I left, I pushed her from my mind, but when the long nights got to me while I was stationed overseas, I let my mind drift to Ali and the life we could have had together.
Whiskey: A Reed Security Romance (Reed Security Series Book 7) Page 2