Rusty Nail

by Lani Lynn Vale

  I woke up, heart pounding as I relived my worst nightmare. Again.

  “Raven!” I cried. “Nathan!”

  “Shhh,” Peek said, his Irish brogue causing me to turn my head to the side to see him.

  He looked banged up as hell, and there was something wrong with his right arm.

  My eyes slid down the sling to the neon green cast that was encasing his arm.

  “What the fuck?” I breathed, voice raw.

  It felt like I’d smoked a pack of cigarettes, and all I could smell was smoke.

  My head was pounding, and I was fairly sure I couldn’t feel my feet.

  Was it normal to feel like you were floating?

  Peek reached forward and pressed a red button beside my bed, and sweet soothing relief started to flow through me.

  “They’re okay,” Peek said softly. “Everyone is okay.”

  My eyes closed.

  “Okay,” I said. “Fucking great.”

  My eyes closed of their own volition

  ***

  Raven

  I swallowed as I looked in on Nancy, smiling as she talked softly to her grandson about why her eye was black.

  “That horse just jumped up and caught me good, right in the noggin,” she said to him.

  I backed out of the room, thankful that she was okay, and waved at her granddaughter as I left.

  Her granddaughter waved back, and I closed the door firmly before rounding the corner and heading to the next room.

  I was making my rounds.

  Six of the seven members of The Uncertain Saints MC were in the hospital, and five of them had been admitted.

  Peek and Mig being the only two who weren’t occupying a hospital bed, five rooms in a row.

  Then there were Nancy and Xavier, although they weren’t Uncertain Saints, who were also occupying the same floor.

  It was like a fuckin’ reunion for the sickly.

  “Everything okay?” I asked Annie, who was standing outside Xavier’s room.

  “Yes,” she breathed. “How about yours?”

  I nodded my head. “Wolf’s still in and out. Nancy is awake and talking. Apparently, she never saw a thing that happened. She woke up on the floor with her granddaughter standing over her.”

  Annie breathed out roughly. “Xavier told us that he got an email from his father, except it wasn’t his father, it was Agent Fry sending him a picture of his father who was dead.”

  “Goddammit” I growled. “That guy needs to fucking die.”

  Annie nodded her head in agreement. “Peek was released and is in Wolf’s room from last I heard,” she said. “And the rest of the ladies are in the rooms with their men. All have received the green light that they can go home after they’re sure the concussions haven’t done any damage.”

  My head dropped and I rubbed the back of my neck.

  “My brother’s about two seconds away from checking himself out AMA,” I said. “Against medical advisement. Seriously. I don’t know what’s wrong with him.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with him,” my brother said from behind me, dressed in street clothes that I had no earthly idea how he got by himself when he could barely stand up straight.”

  All of the men had concussions. All had at least one broken bone. Wolf, however, being the hero of the group, had the worst of all the injuries.

  He had a broken arm to match my broken arm. He had a broken tibia. Seven broken ribs. Burns on twenty percent of his body. A concussion. A shot to the head that they were watching closely. Gunshot wounds to his belly. Oh, and he had a kidney injury that they were watching closely due to a concussion blast when the grenade went off.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” I asked him, putting myself between him and Annie, which also happened to be me putting myself between him and the exit of the floor.

  “I’m going down to the county jail.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Because I’m looking to make a better acquaintance with ex-agent Josh Fry.”

  I grinned.

  “You won’t find him at the jail,” I said. “Mig got to him before the cops could. Said it was his jurisdiction, and that was that.”

  “Hmmm,” Raphael said, grin getting larger. “That’s too bad for him.”

  “I need your help.”

  My brother, surprised that I was willingly asking him for anything, turned to face me fully.

  “Anything.”

  “If you’re bound and determined to see him, I have a favor.” I looked over at Annie, then back to Raphael. “I need a ride to where they’re holding him.”

  ***

  I can’t say that the next two hours were among my finest moments.

  In fact, I would say they were some of the darkest moments in my life.

  Once we’d arrived at the clubhouse, Raphael had worked his magic and got me time with the Uncertain Saints prisoner.

  Mig hadn’t been willing to give it to me at first, but when Peek showed up two minutes after we’d arrived and told Mig to allow me to have the time, he’d done it. Albeit unwillingly.

  And I say prisoner lightly.

  He was in the kitchen of the houseboat, plastic sheeting underneath his feet as he sat tied with his hands behind his back.

  “Get him up for me. Put him in the seat so I don’t have to bend down to see his eyes,” I swallowed. “And then leave.”

  “Raven…” Raphael hesitated. “You know I can’t do that.”

  I raised an eyebrow at him.

  “Sure you can,” I said. “All you have to do is put him there, and leave. Easy peasy.”

  He shook his head. “Wolf would literally kill me.”

  I smiled at him.

  “If you do this for me, I’ll forgive you. I’ll let you back into my life. I’ll stop ignoring your calls and texts. Everything you always wanted. Just do this one thing for me,” I said pleadingly, knowing he’d do it.

  Raphael looked at me, contemplated it for point two five seconds, and then grabbed Josh Fry by his throat, and immediately punched him in the head to knock him out.

  My brother’s anger and pain seemed to be exponentially larger than I’d thought, and I idly wondered if I should let him stay and witness what I was about to do.

  The ex-agent fell to the floor, his eyes rolling into the back of his head.

  Once he’d strapped him down to the table, his hands above it and the rest of him securely tied to a chair that was bolted to the floor, he left the room.

  I knew he wouldn’t go far.

  In fact, he was probably watching me.

  Raphael tied his arms with a scratchy rope to the table by a loop that was welded in the very middle.

  His feet were next, only these were attached to the metal chair itself by a pair of manacles that’d been welded to it.

  His head lolled, and I smiled at Raphael to let him know I’d be alright.

  “Thank you. You can go.”

  Raphael clearly didn’t want to leave me, but with one look in my eyes, he did so.

  “Yell if you need me,” he said, and then made his way out of the room before closing the door.

  It took ten minutes for Fry to regain consciousness, and in those ten minutes, I’d gathered my supplies.

  A groan from behind me had me turning to survey the man.

  His eyes trained on me, and it took everything in me not to punch the man’s face in.

  “What did you think?” I asked the man in front of me. “Did you think that I would just forget that you touched my kid? One who’d done nothing wrong, who was just the child of the man you perceived as a threat to your fucking livelihood?” I stepped forward. “I saw the marks on his chest when I took him to the hospital. Bruises on his ribs from where you kicked him before my brother could stop you.”

  The man, now ex-agent Josh Fry, sneered at me.

  “When the police come, you’re going to go to jail for wh
at you’re doing.”

  He knew just as well as I that this wasn’t protocol. The law was looking for him, undoubtedly.

  “Yeah,” I agreed. He was likely right. Would that change what I was about to do? Fuck no. “My brother’s been with you for months now. Did you know that?”

  “Not until tonight, no,” Fry said. “But I knew he wasn’t right when he wouldn’t fuck the merchandise, which should’ve been my first clue that something wasn’t right.” He grinned. “I used to show him pictures of me fucking the women. Some as young as fourteen.”

  I don’t know what came over me.

  One second I was staring at the man in front of me who was giving every detail of his last eight years, how he sold hundreds of women to men that purchased them to be used as slaves, and the next I just snapped.

  The cleaver that I was sure was for decoration rather than actual use was mounted on the wall over the kitchen sink.

  The moment I grabbed it, my body became numb.

  Taking the cleaver over to the man—no, filthy scum because the man didn’t deserve the title of a man—I reared back, cleaver in hand, and brought it down over the man’s tied hands.

  It imbedded in his flesh, went all the way to the metal table, and stopped.

  Dropping the clever on the table while Fry screamed, I looked at him dispassionately as the door to the room opened.

  “Let’s see how well you can touch people who don’t want your touch with no fuckin’ hands.”

  With that parting comment, I rushed out of the room, past my brother, and straight to the back door.

  I made it all the way to the side of the boat before I lost my lunch.

  Epilogue

  If a woman asks if she’s fat, there are multiple things you can do in this situation. However, ‘no’ isn’t adequate enough. You must also act surprised that she would even ask that question. As well, you should probably jump back as if she’d just offered you a grievous blow.

  -Words of wisdom

  Wolf

  1 year later

  I sat down on the metal bleachers and watched as Nathan came back up to bat.

  Marky Mark leaned at my side, content to watch his little friend play.

  Nathan looked over at me, grinned widely at seeing me sitting in my normal spot, and turned his head back to the game.

  “Elbow up, boy!” I yelled. “Eye on the ball.”

  Nathan nodded his head and lifted his elbow.

  I leaned forward and rested my hands around Raven’s shoulders, massaging them as I watched my boy bat.

  “He’s going to strike out,” I muttered. “He can’t keep his eyes off of you.”

  She giggled.

  “I’m not normally dressed in a dress,” she said. “I can understand why he keeps looking at me like I’m not me.”

  I chuckled and placed my head on top of hers.

  “Strike!” the umpire called loudly.

  “Get your head in the game, boy,” I told my son, who’d just today turned seven years old. “Watch what you’re doing.”

  Nathan grinned unabashedly and squared his hips to the plate.

  The next pitch, thankfully from a pitching machine this year instead of a coach, tossed the ball toward him.

  It was the perfect pitch, right in Nathan’s sweet spot.

  He waited, twitched, and then swung.

  The ball and bat connected, and for the second time this season, he hit a homerun.

  Only this time it was an in-field home run rather than an out-of-the-park one.

  “Run!” I bellowed getting up on my feet and jumping right along with the rest of them.

  Marky Mark was on his hind feet, front paws planted on the chain link fence beside me, in the action, too.

  “You really shouldn’t have come here in that dress,” Annie said. “You’re going to get it dirty as hell.”

  Raven shrugged. “Who cares? I’m never going to wear it again after today.”

  I grinned.

  “No, you most certainly will not,” I agreed, running my fingers down the delicate slip of a wedding dress. “You, Mrs. Wolfgang Amsel, will be hanging this up and never touching it for the rest of your life. You won’t ever be needing it again.”

  Raven tossed me a grin over her shoulder. “I kind of like the sound of that.”

  “Of what?” Lenore asked as she sat down, Griffin sliding onto the seat beside her. “What’s with that look on your face?”

  I looked at Raven’s face and grinned.

  “She’s happy to see me,” I explained to Lenore. “She didn’t think I’d make it in time.”

  “I thought you’d make it,” she said. “You were, however, late to your own wedding and we had to move it to after the baseball game. How is that my fault that I can’t wipe the smile off my face?”

  “You know that you’re not supposed to see her or the dress before the wedding, right?” Tasha asked as she took a seat on my other side, Casten right beside her.

  “Yes,” I agreed. “But that’s a load of bullshit anyway.”

  “Oh, shit,” Hannah said, waddling toward me as fast as she could. “I’m so late. Did she hit yet?”

  I grinned at Hannah and her largely pregnant belly.

  “No, not yet. You missed Nathan hitting another home run, though,” I teased her.

  Hannah waved her hand in the air.

  “Where’s Travis?” I asked.

  Hannah’s eyes went haunted as she shrugged.

  “I came by myself. Shit, my vagina feels like it’s going to burst,” Hanna supplied as she took a seat. “Just you wait, Raven. This’ll be you in a few months.”

  I froze as I turned my smiling gaze, which dropped from Hannah’s face, to Raven’s stiffened body.

  “Raven,” I said carefully.

  “What?” Raven squeaked.

  “What is she…”

  “Hey!” Raphael said, jogging up. “What are you doing looking at my sister? You know that’s bad luck.”

  Raphael took a seat next to Raven on the bleacher below me, and threw his arm around her shoulder.

  “Hey, brother,” Raven cried, throwing her hand around her brother’s waist. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m being deployed,” he said. “I needed to come say goodbye before I left, and tell you that I won’t be able to make your wedding. Although I would have had you had it on time. Thanks for being late, by the way.” He glared at me, then returned his gaze to his sister. “Do you think that we can reschedule our camping trip in two weeks?”

  I squeezed Raven’s shoulders slightly, causing her to exhale. “Jesus, Hannah. I haven’t told him yet. Couldn’t you have been more careful?”

  Hannah’s eyes went wide. “How was I supposed to know? Everyone knows!”

  “Everyone but him!” She pointed a finger. “It’s your fault you know.”

  “What?” I asked. “Why my fault?”

  “I had it timed perfectly. You were supposed to come in. We get married. Then the photographer was supposed to get on camera me telling you that I’m pregnant,” she sighed. “You ruined everything by being late.”

  “Why does everyone know, then?” I asked.

  “She had a man drop it from the sky from a fucking plane. It was epic,” Griffin supplied. “Too bad you missed it.”

  I dropped my head to Raven’s. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be late.”

  “It’s okay,” she lied. “I understand.”

  “It wasn’t my fault, though.”

  She snorted. “It’s never your fault.”

  I showed her my arm.

  “The guy stabbed me with a knife. What did you want me to do? Come to the judge to marry you with my blood running down my arm?” I asked her, showing her my new stitches.

  “No,” she growled, eyeing the cut. “What I wanted you to do is take a fucking day off from crime fighting. The rest of the men in the club did. So you sho
uld’ve been able to.”

  I glared at Griffin, who had the nerve to laugh.

  “I swear I won’t be late to my next wedding.”

  She pinched the inside of my thigh, and I laughed as I pushed her forward.

  “Come with me for a second.”

  She got up, and I got my first good look at her wedding dress.

  “Follow me,” I ordered, grabbing her hand.

  She tossed her purse down onto the bleachers where she’d been sitting and pointed at Lenore.

  “Watch that, will you?” she asked. “It has our rings in it.”

  I snatched the purse, fished the rings out of it, and tossed it to Griffin, who caught it without taking his eyes off the game in front of him, “Take her car and the dog to our place, will you?”

  “Yeah.” Griffin grunted, eyes still on the game.

  “Where are we going?” she asked as I pulled her along.

  “To go get married.”

  “What?” she cried. “But no one will be there.”

  “You will. I will,” I said as I led her to my bike.

  She stared at me like I’d lost my mind.

  “What the hell, Wolf?” She tilted her head. “We’re gonna miss Nathan’s game.”

  “Nathan’s game is nearly over, and they were at the bottom of the inning. They’re practically finished.”

  She shook her head.

  “But…why the rush?”

  I pulled her until her front rested against mine.

  Pressing my throbbing erection into her belly, I made my elation known.

  “Because I need to get my ring on your finger.”

  “Why now? I want pictures!” she said stubbornly.

  “Because you’ve got my baby inside of you. You’re not wasting another minute without being officially mine.”

  ***

  Six hours later, I had her on her back in my bed.

  I was slowly working my length in and out of her, letting her feel all of me as I drove my cock into her.

  “Who do you belong to?” I whispered to her.

  “You,” she whispered back.

  “I fucking love you.”

  She smiled.

  “I fucking love you right back.”

  I lifted her legs to get as deep as I could and watched as my hard length filled her.

  Slow and steady. In and out.

  She was wet for me, so fuckin’ wet.