by Lana Grayson
“I’ll take care of this,” I promised. “I won’t let you get hurt.”
“What about you?” Rose paled. Every one of her freckles stood out on her cheeks, just like mine when I was a kid, except I had the sense to grow out of them. “Please, don’t do anything stupid.”
“Lock up behind me.”
The door closed. I waited for the click. The deadbolt and cocking gun sounded the same—a soothing promise of security. Seeing her gave me the courage. Rose was the steel in my bones and the fire in my blood.
I failed her while she was growing up. It only meant that now I’d give her the life she deserved. Her nightmares would end. Her pain would cease. And no one would ever threaten her again.
It was time to save my family.
Red’s text message was only a single word.
Sorry
It was the most frightening text I ever received.
Red didn’t apologize, for anything, ever. If my cousin made mistakes, he fixed them. That’s what made Red, Red. That was why he chose the MC over a medical career. He made his money fixing other people’s problems and redding up their messes.
It meant one thing.
Goddamn it, I was out of time.
For two days, I called in every favor, worked every contact, and traveled from bar to bar with nothing but a backpack and a couple hundred dollars to bribe people. My patented smile lost its luck after a series of questions that not only pointed me right to Temple, but nearly had me beheaded by a brother who abandoned his cut and gestured between his legs to find more information.
A couple months ago, I might have been tempted.
Now, the thought turned my stomach, chilled my spine, and lost me three hundred dollars to a bouncer to distract my pursuer until I was gone.
Brew didn’t answer my calls. I didn’t blame him, but I doubted he even listened to his messages. The local news reported on the death of Kingdom’s vice-president—spinning the story of gangland violence as police discovered more of Kingdom’s leadership face-down in the gutter.
Whatever war Brew hoped to avoid bled out in the streets. Temple controlled the region. It was only a matter of time before Sacrilege cut their veins too. Red’s ominous text signaled the end I knew was coming.
The shouting echoed from the hotel lobby. I deleted Red’s text and, with a hasty swipe of my hand, I wiped off the makeup covering the fading bruise on my cheek. It wasn’t fresh, but it still looked ugly.
Goliath pounded against the door. He didn’t wait for me to open it. His foot smashed through the wood as Sam called from the hallway. At least it wasn’t just Goliath, but it wasn’t like I trusted Sam.
Goliath’s shadow flooded the room with a menacing darkness. It wasn’t the first time I longed for Brew’s return, but it would be the last time I let myself think of it.
First, I had to save myself. No distractions.
Then, I had to figure out a way to keep him safe.
“Baby?” I covered my face with my hands. “Goliath! I’m so glad it’s you!”
I rushed from the bed and into his chest. The same leathered, open road scent of Brew shaded Goliath, but the undercurrent of beer and stale smoke lingered on his clothes. I burrowed against him anyway.
Goliath pushed me into the wall. He stormed through the hotel room and burst into the bathroom. The mirror shattered under his fist. He didn’t feel it, but I would later.
I let Sam pull me into a hug. He surveyed the bruise on my cheek as Goliath swore, ripping the remnants of the mirror from the wall only to toss it into the hotel TV. He kicked the bed and hauled the mattress over the side. The veins throbbed in his head, and he panted in his rage. I wondered what he popped. His pupils dilated, and he stared at me with pale, clammy skin, wiping the spit from his mouth.
“Where the fuck is he?” Goliath shouted.
I stepped into Sam. The flinch wasn’t part of my act.
“Where’s who, baby?” I whispered.
It wasn’t time to play dumb. Goliath seized me from Sam’s arms and yanked me around by my neck. I squealed as his thumb dug into my skin.
“Don’t play stupid, you fucking cunt! Where the fuck is Noir?”
“Dead!”
I hated the lie almost as much as the bitter dread that pitted in my stomach when I realized I might be right. Brew’s leather jacket rested on the table, unmoved from the last time I picked it up and was smacked by his spicy scent. I pointed at it, forgetting the image of the man who once wore it.
“He’s dead! Like you said, baby! I had to get away from him, and...and...”
Goliath tossed me to the floor, ripping open the coat and checking the pockets.
“I did it,” I said. I pretended. I suffered. “See? He’s gone.”
Sam sighed in relief. “Noir’s dead?”
I nodded but didn’t stand. “He was stronger than me. I had to...I had to surprise him.”
Goliath’s pupils dilated more. “You fucked him, didn’t you? You goddamned whore.”
“He wanted me to.” I pointed to the bruise on my cheek. “I refused him, Goliath. I swear. I fought him, and he beat me, but he gave up.”
“Did you want it?”
“You’re my one and only.” My stomach churned in deceit. “I promise. I’d take a beating over hurting you.”
Lies, lies, and more lies, but the festering truth wouldn’t help anyone, least of all me.
“Can we go home, please?” I asked. “I’m so scared. I just want to sleep this all away.”
“Yeah.” Sam took the jacket from Goliath. “Let’s get you back. Shit’s not safe here, Martini. You gotta hunker down for a while, till all this blows over.”
“What’s happening?”
“Nothing you need to worry about,” Sam said. “Club stuff. Let us handle it.”
That’s what I was afraid of. They couldn’t handle any of the trouble they were already in, let alone the host of problems that would come when whatever remained of Kingdom learned Brew was alive.
Or if Temple realized just how close they were to finding him.
Goliath jerked my arm too hard. I yelped, but he didn’t care. Sam took my things and slammed the door shut, hiding the evidence of Goliath’s tantrum and the sparking remains of the television. The hotel asked no questions as they hauled me outside. Enough women came and went on the backs of bikes to not warrant a second glance.
Except his wasn’t the bike I came in on.
And it was the last time I’d let myself ache for that rider.
Riding with Goliath was not nearly as safe as Brew. Speeding over a hundred miles cramped my back and weakened my arms. I held onto Goliath because I had no choice. He liked the feel of my body pressed against his, and I liked not smashing myself onto the blinding asphalt.
Returning to the bar was like returning to the scene of a crime I didn’t commit, except I had no alibi for the blood on my hands.
Or the blood that wasn’t on my hands.
My home was no longer familiar, and the darkness seeped through the empty bar and halls. I shivered. It wasn’t just the chill of the night. Justice came swift in the MC, and the silence didn’t promise anything but bloody retribution.
I had to delay them. The bar was empty, but I offered to pour a drink for the men who so daringly rescued me from Noir’s clutches.
Sam apologized and declined. He didn’t look at me. I wondered how he managed before.
Goliath pushed me past the counter. He herded me up the tucked away stairs to my apartment. The door was locked. He kicked it open with a foreboding profanity.
It was going to happen.
It wasn’t like I hadn’t expected it. Goliath had been hard ever since he bled over my hotel room. Roughing up a room excited him. Riding with me clutching his back made him feel strong. I had no idea what he injected in his veins, but it was powerful enough to veil the pain of his bleeding knuckles and blur his mind into a haze of violence.
It fed his desire.
I didn’t let mys
elf think of Brew.
“Been a while, baby.” Goliath stared at me, his blue eyes rimmed devil red. He rubbed his erection through his jeans. “I missed you. Take your fucking clothes off.”
He missed parts of me. I stiffened. He didn’t give me an opportunity to rest after the trip. Didn’t ask me if I was okay or if I wanted something to eat or time to gather my composure. Instead he drove me backward.
I tripped over a pair of shoes tossed in the middle of the floor as he forced me to the bed.
“I’m tired.” I gave him a smile—my first, last, and only weapon to wield against the monster. “I’ve been through so much, baby. I think I need to rest.”
“Too tired from doing your fucking job?” Goliath sneered. He slashed a hand through the air. My bookshelf pitched to the ground. “Too tired from bailing out the club and doing what you should have done before we fucking told you? You could have killed him before. Instead you made us look like pussies.”
I shook my head. “Baby, I swear to you. I did everything you asked.”
“You fucked everything up.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry.”
He pushed me on the bed, ripping through my shirt and yanking my jeans off when I delayed too long. The belt yanked from his jeans. The sudden exposure raked me in shivers.
I was cold. Vulnerable. Naked.
He didn’t care.
“You’re gonna be real sorry you fucked up.”
I didn’t have time to brace for it. The leather rose and fell before I was ready. The familiar strike landed too close to my face and lashed too much of the metal buckle against my shoulder. Goliath reared back again before my cry ended.
So it would happen like this then.
I counted the strikes. Ten and he usually unzipped his pants. Fifteen and he’d jerk himself off, slowing the blows while he fisted his cock each time I sobbed a frantic apology. He rarely got to twenty—too overwhelmed with lust and too drunk with power to let a helpless woman go without another form of punishment.
I waited for the adrenaline rush to wash over me, to protect me from my foolishness as the desperate shield to my own bad decisions.
It didn’t happen.
I waited for the rush of anxious desire, the swell of whatever was broken inside me that responded to Goliath’s aggression.
It never surfaced.
The part of me that wanted danger chipped away in the shattering blows of the belt.
Goliath seized my thigh. It wasn’t Brew’s heated grasp that pulled me closer as we rested in bed.
The pressure that trapped me against the squeaking mattress and grunting man wasn’t the tender brush of air that caressed my skin when I offered myself to Brew.
Goliath’s breathless profanities weren’t the frustrated confessions of a man overwhelmed and struggling against his urges.
Brew praised. Goliath insulted.
Brew pleasured. Goliath hurt.
My body once didn’t know the difference. Now was a terrible time to recognize the truth.
Goliath rolled off of me after only a few minutes.
The dark hid my shuddering, but his thick arm wrapped over me, trapping me against his clammy, heaving skin and a bed coated in the unforgiving scent of his sweat and taking. The night claimed him in a quick sleep before he hardened enough to take more.
The exhaustion and drugs would capture him until morning, but I didn’t move. His arm stuck over my welted skin, heavy and fat with the mixture of brawn and undisciplined strength. He smelled of sweat and staleness, clung to me as oppressive as a July without air conditioning, and snored his satisfaction like a greedy animal content from its rutting.
Fuck, did I hurt. My back. My sides. My arms. Other parts. The adrenaline wore off, and the tears remained.
But now wasn’t the time for pity and rage.
I made a plan. An escape. I checked off what I needed, what was around to grab, and a safe place to run to tend to my wounds and regroup.
Nothing would stop me. I was going to leave. If he was lucky, I wouldn’t rip out his throat first. If I was lucky, I’d be given the opportunity to squeeze the air from his lungs.
We didn’t rest for long. Goliath’s cell rang, and he kicked me in the knee, forcing me to stiffly move so he could get his phone from the nightstand. The green florescence from my alarm clock blinked that it was early enough. I winced as I grabbed my fallen shirt and headed for a shower.
His profanity stilled me. I threw the shirt over my head as he pitched the phone into the wall.
“You fucking cocksucker!” Goliath dove at me. The drugs hadn’t worn off, and he fell hard against the floor.
I didn’t have time for panties. I slid the denim over my bruised ass and tried to run just as Goliath’s fist connected with my gut. The hard, metal rings patrolling his fingers sliced against the reddened flesh of my side, right where the belt had bitten and bled.
I fell. No pretending this time. No submission. Just pain and the tickling realization that something had gone utterly wrong during the night.
His fist twisted in my hair, and he hauled me to my feet. The apartment door crashed against the wall and ripped from the hinges. He dragged me across the floor and shoved me through the entry.
I didn’t move fast enough. His foot connected with my spine. I screamed as I tumbled down the stairs, crashing against each step until I struck the bottom. My arm twisted under me. Better than my neck, but not by much.
This…wasn’t how it normally happened.
This was worse. Much worse.
“Get up, bitch.” Goliath rolled me over and slammed me on the bar. “Stay right fucking there.”
My vision blurred like I sampled a bit of everything from the alcohols behind me. Goliath shouted for the lights, and the building lit up.
I wished it hadn’t.
I didn’t recognize the men, but the inverted crucifixes on their jackets shared all the secrets.
We spent days running from Temple.
And now?
Three officers stalked my bar, whispering to a sweating Sam and eying the hulking Goliath with one hand on their guns. My vision cleared enough to read the labels on their vests.
President.
Secretary.
Sergeant-At-Arms.
Son of a bitch. The man from the diner leered at me. The time on the road hadn’t been kind, and neither was the scrape of the asphalt from where he fell during our chase. He snorted, taking a look at everything Goliath just used and bruised. He didn’t care that I was hurt.
I didn’t either.
The very same men Sacrilege was supposed to assassinate held us hostage in our own clubhouse. Pain was the least of my problems.
Sam wasn’t wearing a shirt. They let him keep the sheet he slept in, but he wasn’t ready for this meet. Neither was Vet, stashed in the corner as he rolled against his own drunken stupor.
Temple’s president stepped forward—as old as Sam, greying, and thick with a greasy undercurrent of entrapment and violence. My stomach heaved so near him. Even without a word passing from his thin, goatee obscured lips; I knew everything he said dripped with deceit.
“My name is Toviel Aren,” he said with a nod of his head. “I’ll let you live if you answer a question.”
Like hell. He had no intention of letting me live. I didn’t agree, but he asked it anyway.
“Where is Brew Darnell?”
I forced my expression to blank. It wasn’t hard. Goliath clipped me in the lip and above my eye. The swelling was humbling.
“Who?”
Goliath launched at me. “Fucking cunt.”
The other Temple officers and Sam grabbed him before he struck me, though I tumbled off the counter and behind the register in panic. I hurried to my feet as a gun cocked and aimed for my head.
“You may know him as Noir.” Toviel gestured with the weapon. “Where is he?”
My stomach heaved. I licked my lips and tasted blood. This wasn’t good. I needed a
stall, a way to force some coherent thoughts through the panic. I offered him a sad, frightened quirk of my shoulders.
“You mean...his body?”
Toviel chuckled. “His body?”
I didn’t like his tone. My fingers laced under the bar. The shotgun I kept under the register had only one shell in it, and I wanted nothing more than to deliver the spray point-blank into Goliath’s head.
But that petty vengeance wouldn’t protect anyone.
I had bigger problems than ripping the cock off a man who abused me and lived to beat me when I was down.
Three Temple brothers lurked in the room. I could shoot one before they jumped me, but I had nothing to reload with. The gun had one shell, and I had no other options.
“Sweetheart?” Toviel didn’t mean it.
“I...” I hesitated. “He’s dead.”
“Dead? What a shame.” Toviel glanced to his brothers. They laughed. Sacrilege didn’t. “What happened?”
They bought my sweet and innocent act, but they’d rip my head off just the same. The game got harder. Ratting on Sacrilege was suicide. I had to pretend like I wasn’t supposed to say what really happened. Like I was covering for Goliath and the club. My only hope was that he’d reward my loyalty with a crack against Toviel’s skull.
I didn’t hold my breath.
“It was an accident,” I said.
“You can tell us, sweetheart.” Toviel’s leer left a grimy film over me. “We’re all friends here.”
He snapped his fingers. The slimy Sergeant-at-Arms pounded on the utility closet behind him. He jerked the door open and seized the man beaten and bound within.
Red landed on the floor, sneering at the Sergeant with a look that would finish the cut bleeding from his neck.
“Okay, Martini.” Toviel extended his hand, and the others crashed Red into a table. They were lucky Red’s arms tied behind his back. My cousin had a nasty right-hook. “One last time. Are you certain Brew Darnell is dead?”
I took a chance. “Yes. I…killed him.”
Toviel’s men scowled. Red met my gaze as blood poured from his nose. He shook his head—no.
Christ. That figured.
“Sweetheart, Darnell is alive.” Toviel took his aggression out on Red, slamming a fist into his side. Red immediately threw up.