by Loren, Celia
“Ace…” I hear Marcus murmur from the door.
Ace hits me again. And then again.
“Ace!” Marcus yells. My head rolls forward, my chin dipping to my chest. I hear scuffling in front of me and open my eyes to see Marcus’s hands on Ace’s shoulders. Ace reacts quickly, spinning around and grabbing Marcus’s shirt.
“The fuck did you think would happen?” Ace yells at him, and throws him against the wall. Marcus yelps in pain as he slams into it. He struggles to get up but Ace is on top of him. He punches Marcus once and Marcus tries to cover his face defensively. He’s in no condition to fight. Ace grabs the back of his shirt and yanks the door open, half-throwing and half-pushing him back into the bar area.
I hear a yell and the sound of a glass breaking before I lose consciousness.
Chapter Twenty-One
When I wake up, Ace is sitting across from me, staring.
“Finally,” he mutters, leaning back in his chair.
My vision is a little blurry, and I blink my eyes rapidly to try to clear it. I wonder how long I was out for.
“Where’s Marcus?” I murmur, as my head begins to pound.
Ace smirks at me. Even after what Marcus has done, I find myself hoping that he’s not dead.
I jerk my head up at the sound of a low rumble—maybe a motorcycle engine? I see Ace pause for a moment, too. But the sound passes quickly. I’m not even sure it was a bike, anyway. Ace smiles.
“No one’s coming, sweetheart.”
“Why haven’t you killed me yet?” I reply.
“Because you haven’t suffered enough,” he answers with a sickening grin. “Seems to me you’ve had a pretty sweet fucking life for a whore. You went from Rooster to fucking one of the Sons like it was nothing. And what did you get for it? Nothing. Everyone else suffered but you. You always acted like you were some fucking MC princess. Well, you’re not untouchable.”
He takes a lighter from his pocket and starts flicking it on and off. The flame jumps to life and then dies, again and again.
Bile rises into my throat and I force myself to keep it down, to keep breathing.
Someone is coming for me. I have to believe that.
“Those scars on my back…you’re a nurse now, right? I bet you can guess how I got them. Soldering iron. Over and over again until my tat was gone. I passed out before it was over.”
He presses his hips forward and takes a pack of cigarettes out of his front pocket. A wave of dizziness unrelated to my head injuries passes over me as he places a cigarette between his lips and flicks the lighter back on, holding it to the end of the cigarette. He takes a pull and the tip burns orange. He puts the lighter and pack back in his pocket, holding the lit cigarette casually in the corner of his mouth.
He stands up and walks over to me, taking the cigarette in his long fingers and releasing a plume of smoke into the windowless room.
“Ace, this won’t help any…”
“Let’s see how long you last.”
He brings the cigarette down onto my shoulder as he finishes speaking. I scream as he holds the burning embers to my skin. A hiss and the smell of burning flesh fills the air. I reflexively try to stand, to do anything to get away from the pain, but he brings his booted foot down onto my thighs, pressing me hard onto the chair.
Finally he pulls the cigarette away. I whimper, tears pouring down my face. I’m shaking in pain and fear. I watch him reach into his pocket and bring his lighter back out. He puts the cigarette back in his mouth. The flame is out now, extinguished against my skin. I gasp for air as my throat closes up. I can’t look away from the orange glow of the end of the cigarette as he relights it.
He stares at my face for a moment, then swings one leg over and onto the other side of the chair, straddling me, and sits down. He’s heavy, and I quickly feel my legs go numb. I try to pull my face away from his, but there’s nowhere to go. He’s far taller than me, and his beard is right in front of my eyes. It smells stale and musty. The cigarette is just millimeters from the top of my head.
He leans back a little, and then cups my face with one hand. I flinch and look straight ahead at his chin. He reaches up with his other hand and takes the cigarette out of his mouth again. I brace myself for what I know is coming next. He brings the cigarette toward my cheek and I frantically press my head in the other direction, but his hand is there, stopping me.
“I wonder if it will go all the way through…” he muses, as though he’s conducting a scientific study.
The cigarette hits my cheek and my vision goes black with the pain. I can feel the heat burning through layers of skin as though it’s happening in slow motion.
Suddenly, the pain stops. I gasp for air, my breathing ragged. I realize Ace is frozen on top of me, head cocked toward the door, like a dog who’s just spotted a squirrel.
Through the haze of pain I’m in, I hear it, too. A faint crunch of broken glass.
Ace whips off the chair and stands behind me. At the same time, his arm snakes around my neck and pulls me to standing. A moment later, there’s a click, and I feel the metal of a gun barrel against the side of my head. He pulls me roughly to the right of the chair and then tightly up against him, so my body is covering as much of his as possible.
We stay frozen there. My eyes are trained on the handle of the door, and I’m sure his are, too. I’m unsteady on my feet, and even though his arm around my neck is constricting my breathing even more, I’m not sure I’d be able to stand without it. The sharp pain on my shoulder and face have spread to a general buzz of agony, a buzz that is almost deafeningly loud.
The door handle begins to move ever so slightly downward. It’s almost imperceptible.
“Not a fucking word,” Ace murmurs in my ear, tightening his hold on my neck.
The handle is pressed all the way down now, and the door begins to slowly open. I feel the gun barrel being removed from my head and can see Ace straightening his arm out toward the door. The door opens another inch. I don’t know if it’s Drifter behind it or not, but no Son is getting shot on my account.
“Don’t!” I scream.
The movement of the door stops abruptly and Ace immediately moves the gun back to my head. His elbow snaps in on my neck. I can no longer breathe enough to speak.
“Ace!”
I recognize Drifter’s voice immediately.
“This building is surrounded. You’re all alone here. There’s no way out of this for you,” he continues from behind the door.
“Oh yeah?” Ace yells back, his putrid breath blowing down on me. “I can think of one! And I’m slowly choking the life out of her!”
There is silence behind the door.
“What do you want?” Drifter yells back. “Just tell me what you want.”
Ace pauses. This definitely isn’t going according to his plan.
“You and your brothers back the fuck out of here! I take her with me. I’ve got a car on the street. We drive out of here together; I ditch her when we’re fifty miles down the road. You follow us, I kill her.”
“You’ll just kill her once you’ve gotten safely out of here anyway,” Drifter replies. “You need a hostage to get rid of? Take me instead.”
I see a pair of empty hands reach through the six-inch crack in the door. Ace stiffens, pulling me up so that I’m on the balls of my feet.
The door is pushed slowly open and Drifter’s body comes into view. He’s holding his hands up, showing Ace he’s unarmed. His eyes flick to mine momentarily, and then they’re back on Ace.
“I don’t want you,” Ace spits out.
“Take me and I won’t cause you any trouble. I know what I’m getting into. In fifty miles, you’ll shoot me. I know that. A man like me wouldn’t expect to die from anything else.”
I feel my heartbeat sputter unevenly in my chest. The idea of being without Drifter causes me more fear than anything I’ve felt so far tonight.
Ace loosens his grip on my neck slightly. I can tell he’s waver
ing. So can Drifter.
“You think Violet’s the one who pursued me? I went after her. She told me she was married, wouldn’t be unfaithful to Rooster, and I wouldn’t take no for an answer. We put an ankle monitor on her, she stole one of our bikes anyway to try to escape, to get back to him.”
That liar. He’s pulling elements of the truth out of what happened and twisting it to lay the blame on himself, to focus Ace’s anger on him.
“Take me,” Drifter repeats, and I can hear he’s trying to put all of his willpower into it, staring Ace down. “I know I’ll die. I deserve it. I won’t fight you.”
I hear his voice crack slightly on the last word. My Drifter.
Ace’s arm relaxes from my throat.
“No, no, no, no,” I beg as I gasp for air. “Take me.”
Drifter ignores me, keeping his eyes trained on Ace’s, but he turns his face toward the open door.
“Back up to the sidewalk across the street!” he shouts. “We’re coming out!”
I hear movement within the bar as the rest of the Sons clear out, and then silence. Drifter looks back to me, a well of sadness in his eyes. I feel my heart beating so loudly it’s like my entire body is one giant pulse. Even though Ace’s arm is now around my shoulders, I feel like I’m choking more than ever.
The thought of being without Drifter is too much for me to bear. I feel like I’ve found myself with him; how could I keep going if he isn’t there?
Memories of the last year with him flood over me. Making love with him, quiet mornings eating our cereal on the couch, taking walks with Scout and Kalb, his smile when he opens the front door and sees me in our house, him teaching me to fight.
Him teaching me to fight.
My body is shaking, I can barely stand, and my hands are still cuffed, but I have to do something. If I fail, the worst thing that will happen is that Drifter or I dies, and that’s going to happen anyway. I try to breathe a little deeper but my throat feels like it is closing up on me, even as Ace drops his arm and begins to move his gun to focus it on Drifter, his new hostage.
Now or never.
I throw my body toward Ace’s arm, moving it away from Drifter. At the same time, I kick back as hard as I can with my right leg and nail him in the crotch. I hear Ace grunt and Drifter’s eyes widen.
Without hesitation, he launches himself at Ace. I fold my body over Ace’s arm to keep his gun pointed down and away from Drifter. The gun goes off in Ace’s hands just as Drifter slams into him. The force of his body knocks Ace away from me and onto his back on the floor.
I try to go to them, to help Drifter, but my knees buckle beneath me. No, no, not now. I can’t pass out now. But I feel my panic attack in full force, rising to constrict my throat, and I can’t seem to get a full breath in. My heart feels like it’s exploding in my chest as my vision blurs.
Drifter and Ace become a whirl of arms and legs as I collapse on the ground.
Chapter Twenty-Two
When did I come in to work? I wonder, as I look around the familiar hospital room. And why am I laying down on the job? I’m usually very professional. I wiggle my toes underneath the sheet at the bottom of the bed.
I reach to pull the blanket off of me, and am surprised to see an IV in my arm. I look up to the open doorway of the room, and spot Drifter and Dr. Green a few feet beyond it, shaking hands. Now I know I’m dreaming.
Drifter turns away and walks toward the doorway, his face down. He looks so pale and drawn. It’s an expression I’ve never seen on his face before. He runs his hands through his hair and looks up.
We lock eyes and I see a wave of relief wash over his face. He hurries toward me and takes my face in his hands, rubbing his thumbs over my cheekbones and leaning his forehead in to rest against mine.
“You’re awake,” he whispers. “How are you feeling?”
“Ice chips?” I manage to rasp, and I see him smile and reach for a plastic cup next to the bed. I try to reach for it, but he gently pushes my hand away and brings the cup to my mouth, delicately tipping a couple of pieces between my lips.
I look toward the sun streaming in through the thin window curtains as the ice melts on my tongue. My memories of the night before begin to come back and I frown. I glance over Drifter’s body, searching him for injuries. He shakes his head at me.
“I’m fine,” he assures me.
“Ace?” I ask.
“Definitely gone this time,” he grumbles, looking down to his clenched fist on the bed.
I reach my hand up to touch my face and he takes it between his rough paws, stopping me.
“There are some bandages…I don’t think you should touch them. And Dr. Green said you probably have a concussion, that’s why you passed out.”
I shake my head. “No, I just hyperventilated. I was having a panic attack. Though I guess I did lose consciousness earlier. Did it take you long to find me?”
“No. Not after I listened to your voicemail.”
“Then I can’t have been out for very long. That’s good.”
I take a deep breath and relax against the pillow behind my head. Drifter glances at my hand, still held in his. The silence stretches on as the happiness of being safe fades and we both remember the place we were in before it happened. The fight, and all the small betrayals leading up to it.
“I’m so sorry, Violet,” he whispers. I glance up, and see a tear running down his cheek. I’ve never seen him cry before. “I should have believed you…about Ace, about Marcus. I promise I’ll be better from now on, I’ll be the man you deserve.”
“Drifter, you already were,” I reply, exasperated. “You just can’t keep secrets from me anymore. It’s poisonous.”
“I just…I don’t think you’ll be able to love me anymore,” he whispers.
“Do you have so little faith in me? In us?” He glances up to meet my gaze. “Besides, I’m already lying in a hospital bed, how much worse can it get?”
He smiles a little and sighs, then stands up to close the hospital room door. He returns, and pulls a rolling stool up to the side of the bed and sits, then takes my hand again. He stares down at it, running his fingertips over my knuckles.
“Well, after my parents died, Marcus and I were put into separate foster homes. There aren’t a lot of people that are willing to take in two kids at once,” he begins.
He tells me about how their homes started up close together, but then they were placed farther apart. How he ran from the first home where the foster father hit him, and then was placed somewhere worse. And how he finally ended up in a small town in Oregon, staying with the Ralstons.
He talks about how he always told Marcus he would take care of him. When he turned sixteen, he’d legally be able to move out on his own, and Marcus would be able to stay with him.
He tells me how he met Flint through his high school shop teacher, and had his first real kiss at their clubhouse in Oregon. I smile as he describes Liz through his eyes then, beautiful and intimidating as hell. How Flint told him that he could have a future in the club, and how he suggested joining the military, and how he finally felt like he had a goal in life.
And then how Marcus showed up out of the blue, a little after his sixteenth birthday, expecting him to follow through on the plan they’d always discussed. And how he had turned his back on his scared little brother.
“He didn’t talk to me for two years after that,” he says, clearing his throat, his eyes still on my hand.
“Did he go back into foster care?” I ask.
“No. Our case worker would give me updates on him now and then. Not that there were a lot of changes for him. He was put into juvie from there, then into a group home where he stayed until he ran away, at fifteen. He called me for money after that. He was living on the street, and I was in the Marines. I saw him a couple times in between tours when I was still living back in Oregon, but not after Flint came here and brought me with him.”
“You kept sending him money?” I ask.
He nods.
“I wanted to keep him off the streets. I thought it was the least I could do.”
“When I was sixteen, my friends and I would try to sneak into those slasher movies, like Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer…” He looks at me in confusion. I close my eyes, trying to gather my thoughts. “Sorry, what I meant was, that’s what I was doing when I was sixteen, that’s what kids that age do. But you were worried about planning the rest of your life, and being a parent to your little brother.”
He frowns. “I don’t understand.”
“You were just a kid. Maybe you felt like a grown-up then, but have you seen a sixteen-year-old recently? I mean, they’re still children in a lot of ways.”
“Sixteen or not, I was all he had.”
I tilt my head to the side, considering. “You know how in airplanes, they say in the event of an emergency, you’re supposed to put on your own oxygen mask before helping the people around you? That’s what you were doing. You weren’t in position to, probably weren’t even capable of, helping him at that point. You were barely surviving yourself.”
“You don’t hate me…” he says slowly.
“Of course I don’t hate you!” I burst out. “I mean, I’m mad at you! Really mad. I’ve never been this mad at you, but I don’t hate you. I love you, don’t you know that?”
“It’s hard, sometimes…I know it…up here,” he taps his head. “But sometimes not here,” he says, moving his hand down to his chest.
“Drifter, at what point, I mean, let’s say, just for argument’s sake, that what you did was wrong, or immoral, or unfair, or whatever you’ve thought it was. At what point did Marcus’s life become his own responsibility? “
He shrugs, staring at the floor.
“You thought of him as a kid for so long...but he’s an adult now. All the choices he made are his own responsibility. All of them.”