by C. M. Marin
“Let’s say we barge in… Hell, let’s stay we only try to break through that gate, Nate. You know they’ll put a bullet in you before we even get to touch it. How will you be able to help her if you’re dead? We need help, and we can’t wait for it here.”
My back still pressed against the car, I spend another handful of seconds on the ground, motionless beside my brothers who came here for me.
Jayce is right. They’ll kill me. But not only me. They’ll kill my brothers, too, and I can’t let that happen. Camryn’s face popping right at the forefront of my mind, I inwardly promise her to come back, and then I inhale a deep breath through my nose as I nod to Jayce.
“Someone take my bike so I can call Grant on our way back. He’ll help.”
Grant is the president of a charter located in New Mexico. I trust him almost as blindly as I trust my brothers. The plus side is that he can be here with his men in a couple of hours if they hit the road now and drive fast.
“I’ll take it,” Liam says, leaving his squatted position near the back of the car.
That’s when I note the presence of two more SUVs sloppily parked on the sidewalk. My brothers all came. Those who were at the club, at least.
On that, Jayce, still hunkered down, glances on his right and shouts his command. “Back to the club.”
Liam and Melvin lead the way, their bikes roaring to life as I climb numbly in the car. Jayce joins me in the back seat while Ben sits beside Blane, who’s revving the car in reverse. The wheels squeal into the quiet night as my guts roil with the nauseating impression of abandoning Cam to a terrible fate.
We haven’t even left the town limits and my phone is at my ear.
Grant answers quickly. “Nate. All good in Twican?”
“Not exactly. I need help. The Spiders just took a friend of mine. She’s… I…”
Fuck. How do I explain how important it is they help me with this? How important Camryn is. Groaning because I can’t get a damn word out, I bristle in my seat.
“Jesus fucking damn Christ,” Ben seethes with irritation as he spins around and stretches his arms to snatch my phone right from my hand. “Hey Grant, it’s Ben. Camryn, the girl who’s been snatched, is Nate’s old lady. The fucker is just slow like that sometimes.”
What in the f…
“Okay, thanks, man,” he responds to whatever Grant said. “Here.” He hands me my phone back and turns around. “Twenty men are on their way.”
No other comment. And I don’t ask for an explanation as to what just happened. Clearly, he said what he said to convince Grant and his guys to help us. Though Ben never lies. Not to people he respects and who respect him, at least. He has a big fucking problem with lies. But why would he say that? He barely knows Cam, and I only got closer to her a couple of fucking days ago, for God’s sake. Besides, he knows I’m not into that old lady thing. And even if that were the case, I’m the last guy a girl like Cam would want to be in a relationship with.
Relationship. Fucking God. I don’t even know why those questions distract my mind from what matters. Cam’s safety is what matters. There’s no time for a pathetic introspection. There’s one thing that needs to be done, and it’s getting her back before I go crazy with images of what they must be doing to her.
Chapter 11
Camryn
Please, be here. Please, please, please…be here.
That’s the only thought playing on a loop in my head at the moment. Nate has to be here. I’m too weak to even contemplate going anywhere else to find him. I wouldn’t even know where anyway. His house is way too far away for me to go there walking.
No, he has to be here.
Besides this relentless hope doing its best to convince me I’m going to see him very soon, my brain can solely process the painful cold that’s been gripping at every inch of my skin for the past…I don’t even know. Hour? Two hours? Maybe more, I have no idea. And I had no idea the temperatures in the desert could get so low at night either. But the rain only made it worse, I suppose.
Two attempts are needed before I succeed in typing the front gate code of the clubhouse Nate begged me to memorize yesterday. Thankfully, the gate then opens despite my trembling fingers. I think it closes back automatically behind me, but I don’t glance over my shoulder to confirm my impression. I keep moving forward. Laboriously, but I keep moving.
When I finally make it to the front door after vanquishing the last few steps of this haul from hell, I fall half-bent on the floor, my bare knees hitting the hard cement, just as I get close enough to grab the doorknob. I manage to gather the right amount of strength to turn it, but my hand hurts from the banal gesture. My fingers feel like they could easily break with the small, shivering pressure I have no choice but to put on the round, cold metal.
For a frightening second, it hits me that the door could be locked, which would force my body to produce some more strength to knock on it loud enough. But then it creaks open slowly as I’m still on my knees, unable to find a way to stand back up.
The profuse light assaults me even before I’ve passed the threshold entirely, my eyes struggling to adjust as they pinch on their own. It’s weird because from what I can remember, the club isn’t the most luminous place I’ve ever been in.
Despite my tired, quivering body, I manage to enter completely while still rambling inner prayers to find Nate here. I blindly try to give a push to the door to close it, but I miss my goal as I somehow find a way to fall even lower, landing on one hip as my right shoulder harshly bashes into a hard wall. Even through a wince of pain, my eyes try to do a quick appraisal of the place, but my head can only lift up enough to see dark jeans and black boots thumping on the floor as barked curses ring above me. The large boots of whoever is rushing toward me get closer, and soon the door is slammed shut on my left.
“Prez!” the guy now standing in front of me barks loudly.
I think it’s that prospect I helped with his cooking. Melvin.
“Hey, you with me, Camryn?” he asks me, his voice much gentler than the one he used to call out to Nate. “Where are you hurt, sweetheart?
His squatted position allows me to see his face now. I was right, it’s Melvin.
“C…cold. Nate.”
I thought I’d warm up quickly once I made it here. The air was quite hot in here the other day. But it doesn’t feel like the cold is going to be willing to let me breathe anytime soon. Again, it probably has something to do with the fact I’m thoroughly soaked. Or that I’m only wearing a thin top over my panties. My teeth grind, and my knees are so tightly brought up to my chest that they dig up into my ribs, only worsening the pain I feel there.
I want to see Nate so badly I’d wail if I hadn’t already cried every tear in me while lost in the desert and trying to find my way back to him.
“Prez!” Melvin yells again, thankfully after glancing over his shoulder.
My head is killing me, too.
“Cam!”
My name on Nate’s lips is mixed with a guttural growl, but it’s a sweet sound to hear anyway. My gaze shifts up extremely slowly, but my chin can’t mimic the motion as it sticks to the top of my hands covering my scratched knees.
As more loud steps pound on the floor, I wish this night hadn’t seen me ending up wearing so little. But there’s very little room for self-consciousness in me. All I want is to see Nate, and when his strong features replace Melvin’s, I exhale quietly.
“N…Nate,” I force a whisper out. “I…so c…cold.”
“Someone finds a fucking blanket!” someone barks from somewhere in the room.
“Are you hurt at your stomach, Camryn?”
Nate’s voice is much quieter than the other one, but it’s also filled with anguish. Both of his hands hover over my body, just inches of my mostly bare skin, but his palms never make contact with it. It’s as though he’s scared of touching me.
“Cam, I need you to let me see your stomach,” he adds in a gentle yet commanding tone, which
makes me realize I haven’t answered him.
Since he seems so adamant about seeing my stomach, I stretch my legs out, though at an incredibly slow pace again. The smallest movement is still coming with a sharp pain, making me fear that my bones will break if I attempt to move faster.
As soon as my legs are outstretched in front of me, Nate slightly tugs my top up.
“Doesn’t look like it’s her blood, but that bruise on her ribs looks nasty. Something could be cracked,” someone with a voice that sounds familiar says.
A gasp escapes me when Nate’s strong, thick arms circle me right before he lifts me from the floor with very delicate gestures. “I’ve got you, baby,” he soothes against my ear once he’s standing with me in his arms.
My head leans instinctively to go rest on his shoulder, and my eyes close as he speaks again, this time a little louder and to someone else. “I want Doc here, now.”
Then he’s moving, and I whimper weakly when a sore spot on my face rubs against the leather of his cut. But there’s no way I can hold my head up. The pain is shoved to the back of my mind anyway when someone places on me what must be a blanket. The soft, warm fabric feels nice against my cold skin, just like Nate’s body heat does, so I’m not sure why I’m still quavering in his arms.
“You can talk to me, Camryn? Say something,” he pleads, distress heavy in his murmur.
He holds me so tight I can feel the rushed pulse of his heart as he walks up the stairs.
Behind us, someone shouts way more forcefully, though I couldn’t say who it is. “Call Doc, check outside and lock down, now! Everyone stays put and ready!”
Nate’s pace stays even, not overly hurried but purposeful anyway, until we enter his room. Even with my eyes shut, I can tell that’s where he carried me. The smell of him, a captivating mix of leather and mint, floats around me. It’s comforting. After what I went through and what I did tonight, I’m stunned that something so trivial can comfort me. But it does. His smell and touch are greatly appeasing.
“Tell me something, baby,” he urges one more time.
This time again, I hear him clearly. My mouth just won’t find enough willpower, or strength, to open. It takes the blanket being removed from my still wet skin to rip out of me the ghost of a whimper. Then I’m jostled a little before I feel myself sitting―or half-lying, rather―in something as cold as I am. The sound of water flowing quickly resonates in the room, but it’s not the shower Nate turned on. I think he’s got a bath running. I’m in the bathtub, and he’s in it with me as my back rests against his front.
“You’ll be okay soon, just try to open your eyes, alright? You’ll be okay.”
His voice is a rasp of lingering anguish, and I can’t even reassure him.
Soon, warmth meets my skin as the water reaches my feet. A shiver courses through me from head to toe even though the sensation of the warm liquid slowly sliding up my legs is blissfully amazing.
While massaging my arms with his hot, calloused hands, Nate keeps whispering pleading demands for me to talk to him. I still don’t, but I soon start to feel better. The quivers have stopped being so wild they bordered on painful, and I focus on the water that engulfs my body more and more.
“That…” I mumble. “Feels…good.”
“Thank God, you with me, baby? Talk to me,” he implores, his embrace tightening even more.
When I spent the day here, watching him interact with his friends, I noticed how softer his voice was when I was the one he was talking to. It’s even softer now, though it’s laced with a panic I’m sure I could tame by speaking one or two more words to him. I wish I could, but I’m so tired, and it’s so comfortable to be held by him that I only want to stay here doing nothing but listen to the water flowing.
“Cam, please,” he insists with such a despair that guilt torments me for being so selfish.
I fight against the growing sleepiness so I can soothe him, but my attempt at reassurance ends up being no more than a string of weak murmurs. “Tired…really…I’m…it’s good. Tired…”
“I know, but please, I need you to tell me what…”
That’s all I hear of his question. Whatever he wants to know is lost to me as everything around me becomes black and silent.
Chapter 12
Nate
Blood splatters as I feel the skin on my knuckles split. The only reason my hand’s not broken is because the plaster wall yielded under the force of my fist colliding with it.
A furious storm brews inside me. It’s dark and powerful. My guts die to make those motherfuckers bleed as much as they die to barrel back into my room and shield Camryn’s body with mine until I know without a doubt that she’s safe. Until I can see straight again.
Walking away from her killed me, but when Doc arrived five minutes ago, I knew his job would be easier without me seething beside him every time I took in one more bruise spoiling Cam’s smooth skin. And there’s the exam I sure don’t want to witness. The one that’ll send me on a killing spree if the result is the one I’m terrified it’s going to be considering Cam showed up here with nothing but her panties and her top covering her shivering body. The exam that will tell me whether those bastards who will soon be six feet under raped her.
Every instinct in me urges me to bend over and hurl. Nothing can quell the fear and sickness that’s been rolling in my stomach since the minute I laid eyes on her huddled up on the fucking floor.
“Nate.” Jayce clamps a hand on my shoulder, but the contact is brief.
He only said my name, but the question he has on his mind is easy to sense through his tone and the gravity of his voice.
My eyes stay locked on the damaged wall as I’m barely able to get the words out. “I don’t know yet.”
I don’t know if they raped her. No, that’s not the truth. Deep down, I do know. I do know what they did, but I’d rather pretend she didn’t go through that until Doc confirms the sickening truth.
“Did she say anything at all? The blood on her top?”
My head shakes slightly, anger flaring in my blood all over again.
There’re so many questions I need to have a fucking answer to. Who does the blood on her top belong to? Why does she have scratches all over her feet? Where did she spend the last hours? It makes no sense for the Spiders to have brought her back here, so she must have run. That would explain why she was drenched and freezing cold, at least.
“She only said she was tired. She dozed off not long after I started to warm her up in a bath.”
“This is seriously fucked up. I’m sorry I thought you were in the wrong about the Spiders tailing her, but she has no ties to them, Nate. Blane found fucking nothing.”
“There must be something,” I growl.
They took her for a reason. They want her, that much is obvious to me now. And I want to rip their spines out for even thinking of putting their filthy hands on her.
“She means something, right?”
I stiffen at this question I didn’t expect, but it only surprises me shortly. Before Camryn, no girl has ever crossed the threshold of my club with me, let alone holding my hand, so his interrogation is legitimate. I have no idea how to answer that, though. I’m not enough of a hypocrite to bullshit him and say she doesn’t mean a thing to me, but I’d also be lying saying I know what it is she means. I don’t get attached to anyone, ever. Yet the few strides I had to put between us feel like thousands of miles.
“Your hand okay?” he goes on, switching the subject when silence is all I offer him. “Doc should check it out while he’s here.”
Lowering my gaze to look at my bloody knuckles, I clench and unclench my fist a couple of times, proving it still works just fine. I don’t give a flying shit about my hand anyway.
“If they…” I blurt out instead of answering. “I’ll skin them alive, Jayce. I’ll start a war, I don’t fucking care. They’ll fucking suffer. All of them will pay painfully.”
“And we’ll be right behind you,” he
vows.
“This is my fucking fault,” I seethe.
“Bullshit,” he shoots back, leaning against the wall. “How could this be your fault?”
“It is because I didn’t insist for her to stay here. I should have.”
“You asked her to stay at the club?” he asks, surprised.
He knew I had been watching her house last night just as I had planned to do it tonight, but he didn’t know I offered her to stay here, at least for a while.
“She said no because she doesn’t understand this life,” I only say. “I should have made her understand that those people are more than sick. I just…”
Fuck, there’s no way I can confess that. Not even to Jayce.
I didn’t insist because I didn’t want Camryn to believe I was like them. Like the Spiders. I didn’t want her to feel forced to do anything she didn’t want to. I didn’t want to scare her off and watch her flee me like hell was on her heels. And now that’s exactly what she’s going to do as soon as she’s back on her feet. Or even before that.
The thought isn’t bearable. Rage unfurls in me when I think about not seeing her again. I don’t want to watch her walk out of my life like this past week hasn’t existed. I want to keep eating breakfast with her, and I want to keep talking to her. I want to keep seeing her smile. Hearing her laugh. I don’t want to let any of this go.
The quiet creak of my door has me whirling around just as Doc comes out of my bedroom, his head first bowed as he clicks the door back shut softly.
“How is she? Did she wake up? Did she say anything? Should I take her to the hospital?”
His head and hands raise in sync. “She’s still asleep. She went back and forth between sleep and semi-consciousness while I was examining her, but she couldn’t stay alert. And the only thing she mumbled was your name,” he tells me, and it’s taking every ounce of strength I possess to keep myself from spinning around and widen the hole behind me before going to her. At this point, I need to be in that room with her as much as I need to hear what Doc has to say.