by Stacey Lynn
Streets became parking lots, lined with every type of motorcycle and crotch rocket ever created. Live music filled the streets and didn’t stop for an entire week.
Local police brought in back-up officers from all over the state. They were smart, too. They had tents and temporary clubhouses set up around the perimeter. Each true motorcycle club was separated from their rivals and enemies, and placed closer to either clubs they didn’t have relationships with or who they were known to ally alongside in case of quarrels. Law enforcement did their best to squelch any turf wars and fights, allowing it to be a safe place to gather.
It was insane. It was loud. It was a non-stop party. And it had always been my favorite summer trip to take with my parents.
Other than the one or two fights during the week, or the occasional killing, it was generally a safe place to stay.
Unfortunately, Daemon had clearly forgotten because we had argued about it for the entire trip. I had wanted to be healthy enough to ride my bike out, but it wasn’t possible. Instead, we drove his Mustang, and two of the members had hauled our bikes in a trailer. We left with everyone else, and spent the eleven-hour trip they’d force themselves to make in a day, cocooned between the entire club of bikers with my dad in the lead.
Once we arrived, Daemon’s protection grew worse which led to our loudest argument since we’d arrived three days ago.
I was exhausted. I was a sweaty mess. And I had spent too much time with a shadow at my back, not being able to go wherever the hell I wanted, whenever I wanted.
I was sick of it.
“I have my gun,” I growled at Daemon and leaned into him. We were at the Nordic Lords’ tent. The music was blaring in the background. Everyone was wasted. Everyone but me, that was, because Daemon had somehow, unilaterally determined I wasn’t allowed to drink. “I’ll be fine. I just want to walk the streets and shop.”
Daemon shook his head. “Not without taking someone.”
“Fine, I’ll take Finn.” I grinned sarcastically. “He can even help me in the dressing rooms.”
“Don’t push me, Liv.” His cheeks flushed red in anger at the mention of another man seeing me naked. But what did he expect me to do? Be okay with the fact that I’d had someone shadowing me every second of every day for the last week?
“Oh, I’m allowed to be alone for that part? Shit, Daemon! What in the hell is wrong with you.” I slapped my hands against my thighs and stormed out of the club before Daemon could stop me.
I heard him following me. Even with the noise of conversations, bikes grumbling in the distance, and the crowds at the far end of the rally cheering on the live daytime music, I still heard Daemon’s boots stomping on the pavement.
He grabbed my hand and tugged, spinning me around. “Take a guard.”
“Come with me,” I said quietly. Something was going on. I knew it was club business, but I hated being kept in the dark. Daemon had barely been around for the last three days saying he had meetings and ‘shit to attend to’. I was tired of being alone.
He huffed out a breath and his hand let go of mine. His eyes never wavered from mine as I watched him decide. Finally, with another exasperated puff of air, he nodded once. “Give me ten minutes.”
“Fine,” I bit out. Screw that! All week long, I had to wait for other people’s time frame to match up with mine. I wanted to shop. “I’ll stay here and wait.”
Daemon finally dragged his eyes from mine and looked around. Determining the parking lot that held our temporary club was safe enough of for me, he pointed a finger at me. “Don’t leave.”
“Fine.”
He scowled at me and shook his head. I knew he hated when I said that word. With another doubtful glance in my direction, he turned heel and stomped back to the tent and probably to a dark, back corner with my dad so they could plot whatever they were plotting. As soon as he was gone, I hopped the three-foot high, makeshift fence and crossed the street.
I just wanted to shop. No one was coming after me, and the streets down by our tents were lined and filled with clubs that we got along with, Devil’s Angels and Mayhem Riders being the two largest. I knew Nordic Lords had dealings with them in Colorado and on the West Coast, but I never bothered asking what.
I strolled the outside vendors lined against the curbs and watched everyone stumbling in and out of the bars. It was the middle of the afternoon but people had probably been drinking since the sun rose, if not before. I must have lost track of where I was because once I turned a corner, I suddenly realized the clothing and logos hanging from the vendors had changed from Mayhem Riders and NL gear and suddenly all I saw was Black Death shirts.
Shit. I spun around, intent on heading back to where I was supposed to be before Daemon could find me and lay into me again about the dangers, and bullshit about waiting for guards, but I froze.
Faith was across the street and someone—a guy wearing a Black Death cut—was roughly grabbing onto her elbow and yanking her down the street with him. Her eyes were wild with fear and I knew she didn’t want to go wherever he was pulling her. Her feet tried to dig into the pavement but he just pulled her harder and then I saw him angrily whisper something into her face. Even from across the street I could see his spittle fly and Faith wince as it hit her.
Gross, I thought. Then a shadow was at my back.
“Shouldn’t have walked away, Liv.” I jumped and spun around. Finn stood behind me like the soldier he was and glared at me. “Daemon’s pissed.”
I threw my hand to my chest, scared from the sudden noise. “Finn,” I breathed out. I turned back to Faith. “What’s going on with Faith? Why is she here?”
It didn’t make sense, although nothing did with Faith anymore. I had thought we were re-establishing our friendship but I hadn’t heard from her since I was shot.
The memory settled in my gut like it always did; I pushed through it. Faith and the BD member were still arguing on the street. Then I gasped. My hands flew to my mouth just as, right across the street in the middle of the day, the man backhanded Faith.
My feet rushed across the street before my head told me I was being stupid and irresponsible. From behind me, I heard Finn curse.
“BD corner, now.” I heard him shout and I figured he was already on his phone, watching as I threw myself in between the people on the street until I was directly in front of Faith.
She had folded herself in two and crouched on the cement. One hand held her cheek and I could see blood dripping from her jaw.
I stood up, somehow feeling much larger than my five-foot-six-inch frame and screamed at the man. “What in the hell is wrong with you! You don’t hit a fucking woman, damn it!”
“Watch your mouth, Nordic cock sucker,” he leered at me and I hissed in a breath, disgusted at the shit and spittle flying from his greasy and drunk mouth.
I felt Finn’s hand on my shoulder. “Let’s go, Liv. It’s not our problem.”
My eyes widened in disgust at Finn.
“It’s Faith,” I said and crouched down next to her. My hand ran through her hair as she tried to get her balance. Her cheek was covered with a mix of blood and tears. She had a cut on her cheek from the asshole’s ring and her eye was already starting to swell shut. A drop of blood fell from her nose. “Are you okay?”
She squeezed her eyes shut and one of her hands gripped mine as I helped her stand. “I’m fine, Liv. You need to go.”
“I’m not leaving you here with him.”
She looked over my shoulder and wiped a cheek. “You need to leave.”
“Listen to the whore, little girl. Nordic Lords don’t own her. We do.”
I closed my eyes before looking at Faith. In the distance, I heard Finn speaking in a deep voice to the Black Death member.
I focused on Faith. “Let me clean you up.”
Her eyes were completely blank. “Go home, Liv. You can’t help me.”
The coldness in her words hit me as if she had smacked me herself. She couldn’t mea
n it. This was Faith, the friend who had helped me. The girl I’d always known.
“No,” I said, but my voice was breathless and full of doubt.
“You heard her,” the guy said and I felt his hand on my shoulder pushing me away.
I stumbled backward and hit Finn’s chest. From how he was standing, one arm wrapped around my stomach and his other bent behind him, I knew he had a hand on his gun.
“Don’t touch her, Mills,” Finn’s voice rumbled as he pulled me a step back. I tried to fight him, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t take my eyes off Faith and the man who had hit her. She let him hit her and she just stayed next to him. She wouldn’t look at me. Her eyes were fixed on the concrete.
From behind us, I heard footsteps pounding, and then I was being ripped from Finn’s arm. Daemon had both hands on my shoulders and he shook me, shouting at me. “What in the hell is wrong with you?”
I inhaled a breath and froze. Never had I seen this violent, angry side of Daemon. Never. He looked ready to kill. My blood ran cold as I stared at him.
“He hit Faith,” I said, and pointed to the man I now knew was Mills.
Daemon’s head shot to him, but the man smirked. “Our property, ours to treat however we want.”
Daemon’s hands tightened on my shoulders to the point of pain. I cried out and he loosened his grip, pushing me behind him.
“What did you say?” Daemon’s vicious growl had me almost cowering behind him in fear. How was anyone able to stand against him?
The man stood taller, perhaps braver now that more of his men were at his back as well. This couldn’t end well. A shoot out or fight on the streets of Sturgis and local police would be hauling the men to jail.
“You heard me,” he sneered.
“Listen here, Mills,” Daemon spit out and closed the distance between them. Every man in the circle straightened their backs and their hands went to the guns or knives I knew were inside each, and every, single cut. “She won’t be yours for long. And if she comes to us, with any little fucking thing harmed on any part of her body after this, we will take out every single one of your members who laid a hand on her.”
I watched Faith, wanted her to show some sort of thankfulness to Daemon for standing up to her, but she didn’t move. She stared straight ahead with a completely dead expression. Although how else should she feel, hearing people talking about owning her and trading her? My heart broke into pieces. I wanted to run to her and wrap my arms around her.
“I’d like to watch you try,” Mills said, glaring at Daemon. He was a huge man, but not muscular, just tall, fat, and sweaty. It made me want to puke, knowing he was allowed to manhandle Faith in such a disgusting way.
It hit me then that I truly didn’t understand what had become of Faith’s life. She had hidden so much from me when she said she worked at Penny’s. I wanted to hold her in my arms and cry with her. And if she wouldn’t, I wanted to cry for her.
As if sensing I was getting ready to run forward, Finn’s hand held me back. But I shook off his grip, probably because he was concentrating on the men, and I threw myself forward, shouting her name.
A man next to Faith jerked. In one second, Faith flew back cracking her head on the glass window behind her, and then all hell broke loose.
I was wrapped in Finn’s arm and he was rushing me away, but I heard the sounds of shouting men. I heard fists and swearing.
I had just started a fight to beat all fights at Sturgis. At least twenty men were involved. People were screaming in the streets and the siren sounds of cops were already filling the air as people shouted and chanted, ‘Fight! Fight! Fight!’ repeatedly.
“Daemon!” I shouted. Finn’s arms held me tight across my stomach and he lifted me up so my feet were flying in the air. “Faith!”
“Shut up, Liv. You’re safe here and I’m not letting you go.” Finn’s growl in my ear didn’t help me. I stood there, fighting with everything I had until the cops descended on the street. Soon taser guns were being shot as I watched breathlessly, yet firmly entrenched in Finn’s alligator inked arms while men were pushed to the streets.
Cops shouted, Black Death and Nordic Lords Members hurled insults and threats, even as they threw their hands in the air and dropped to their knees like the cops commanded them to.
I watched Daemon raise his head and shoot a look of disgust and fury in my direction right before a cop’s boot pushed him to his stomach.
Finn held me back as all the men in the clubs had their hands thrown behind their backs and plastic zip-ties were firmly tugged onto their wrists. Daemon winced in pain as the cop tightened his plastic tie and carelessly yanked him to his feet.
“Fuckin’ hell, woman, you know how to start shit.”
If I wasn’t mistaken, Finn almost sounded like he thought the whole thing was funny. He pulled me back, further away from the crowd, but I watched as men were hauled into cars and into the back of two different vans. On the streets, paramedics worked on two bleeding men—both Black Death members, and I knew one was their Vice President, Cain.
Daemon nodded in our direction and threw his head in the direction of our tent right before a cop shoved him into the back of a van. Finn began pulling me away right as the doors were closed and the remaining cops began walking among the crowd, asking any observers for information.
It wasn’t until I was pulled away from the corner without giving a chance to tell the cops what happened, I realized I didn’t see what happened to Faith in all the madness.
Jail fucking sucked.
All she had to listen to was one simple, fucking direction.
Don’t move. Stay here. Take a guard.
All Liv had to do was pick one of them and do what she was told.
I hit my head against the cement wall behind me. It throbbed from the pain but I took it. It was either hit the wall or punch one of the other nine brothers crammed into a cell with me. We were fuckin’ lucky there was no way Switch could get pinned for the two guys who were stabbed.
Too fuckin’ bad Cain was one of the men stabbed. That was going to fuck everything up with the Sporelli bullshit when we got back home. No way would Hammer allow that hit to stand without blowback on us.
Fuck. I needed a drink. I needed food. I needed a shower, and I needed to stick my dick into something warm and wet to relieve all the damn adrenaline from the fight and stress.
Unfortunately for me, the one person my dick wanted was also the person I currently wanted to throttle and shake some sense into.
I understood the need for her to try to defend her friend. Hell, I would have, had I seen it, and I still wished Finn had taken care of the asshole on his own before everything went ass up.
But all Liv had to do was fucking listen to me.
Twenty-four hours sitting in a cell and I still felt as ragey as I was the minute the first punch was thrown. The first second I watched Liv try to handle a biker.
She had fire. She just needed smarts.
“This place sucks,” Jaden whined.
It never ceased to amaze me how men could turn to sissies when they were uncomfortable. I shoved Jaden against the cell.
“We’ll be out soon.”
“Not if the guys die.”
I shrugged. Whatever.
Switch grinned at me from across the cell, sitting on a bench at the far wall. The man might be old, but put a blade in his hands and he was fast as fuck. He probably would have slit them all if he would have had five more minutes to work.
We all snapped our heads in the direction of a loud metal door banging against the wall and closing. Footsteps came closer until four cops stood on the outside of our barred cell. Their arms crossed over their chests. They tried to look tough, but failed. There were ten of us inside. If anyone got out of line it wouldn’t be a fight, it’d be a massacre and it wouldn’t be my guys getting hurt again.
“Yes, sir?” I clipped out.
“You in charge?” One of them asked me. He looked like he ate more t
han his share of morning donuts and didn’t run nearly enough.
“I’m V.P. of the club, yeah.” I was sure he already knew this.
The cop’s eyes looked us all over before he nodded. He pulled out a key from his pocket and opened the cell doors. All ten of us stood and straightened our backs, rolling our shoulders.
“No one seems willing to press charges, and the men are going to live. You’re free to go.”
Halle-fucking-lujah. I nodded and clapped my men on their backs and followed them out the door. I needed food and a shower.
The sunlight made us all squint our eyes when we stepped outside the jail. Rapid City wasn’t large, but we were far enough in town not to be able to hear the Rally in the distance. We made our way to the black van Xbox was driving and climbed in.
“Thanks for the ride,” I told him and shut the door.
“No problem, boss.”
I smirked at him as he pulled out and headed us home. I wanted a shower and a soft bed. Two hours of sleep on a wooden bench, just fucking sucked.
“Bull said he’ll update you when we get there. Told me to tell you he’s got Liv chained to a bed. She’s hasn’t stopped screaming since yesterday.”
I grinned at that and closed my eyes. Liv was finally chained to a bed in my club and unable to leave. Laughing softly, I smacked Xbox on the chest. “Thanks, man.”
“Let me out.”
I grinned and crossed my arms. Xbox hadn’t been shittin’ me. Liv was as mad as a hornet. Her hair was messed up; strands falling from her ponytail and her mascara was smeared under her eyes. She was still wearing the same clothes she had on yesterday.