Shattered & Scarred: The Sacred Hearts MC

by A. J. Downey

  “You seriously thought that you could send your new friends to beat him and that there wouldn’t be any consequences for you?” Maynard asked, he was stalking across the living room at me.

  “Well, I’ve been sent to collect you.” He said coldly.

  My throat closed and I tried to push my options through my fear and into the front of my brain. My phone was on the dining room table. Ethan’s handgun in our bedroom end table. I went for the gun, darting to my right and flinging myself at the night stand but Maynard was too fast and had me around the waist in no time. He flung me into the dresser, my hip bouncing off the wood, sharp immediate pain radiating out from it.

  His hand shot out and he grabbed me by my face, fingers digging into my cheek, thumb into my chin, shoving me back against the wall between the dresser and closet. Tears started in my eyes partially from pain but mostly from my anger. I was not doing this! I would not die today! I thought about Ethan about having a life with him and anger twisted my heart. I was my own person and I would be damned if Chadwick would take that away from me anymore! I gripped Maynard’s wrist with both of my hands and looked at him. I laughed coldly.

  “Oh you think this is funny do you?” He seethed and cocked back his fist. I jerked my head to the side with everything I had in me and his blow glanced off my cheek, raking along the skin, the majority of the force behind the punch being taken by the wall behind my head.

  I screamed in rage and fought. Twisting and kicking in his grasp I raked nails down his arm and scratched at his face and he dropped me. I slid down the wall and darted low past his legs but he was ready for it and drew back his leg. He let fly a vicious kick to my ribs and the air whooshed from my lungs. My chest locked down and I curled into a ball on my side and fought to get air into me. I crawled across the bedroom floor fire lancing into my side, licking along my ribs and Maynard laughed coldly. I wrapped myself in my anger, reveled in my fury as he stood over me.

  “Where you think you’re going Ashton?” he asked me, the arrogance in his voice grating against my nerves.

  He hauled me up by my hair and I shrieked my hands going to his in an effort to disengage him.

  “For weeks you’ve been a pain in my ass. I thought sending those cops he bought would scare you back to him. I was surprised when that didn’t work so I figured I needed to get you alone but you always had one of those Neanderthals with you.” He picked me up by my hair and flung me onto the bed.

  “So I hired a couple of men to get them arrested but good help is so hard to find these days. They underestimated the bikers.” He put his hands on his hips and looked down his nose at me.

  “Where were you all weekend?” he demanded and I wheezed a laugh. For once I wanted to tell the truth.

  “Fucking those two Neanderthals on a lake run.” I rasped. He went still, like a snake in the grass.

  “Oh Ashton…” he said, advancing on me, I drew my legs to my chest curling into a ball…

  “Chadwick has no use for damaged property sweetheart. This might be beyond some time spent in a locked room.” He said and reached for me.

  I let fly with both feet and caught him squarely in the chest. I kicked with everything I had in me and I caught him off balance he stumbled backwards and tripped over his own feet landing on his ass.

  I scrambled for the bedside table and got my hand around the gun when he pulled me backwards. By some miracle I held onto it and I rolled, he loomed over me and sneered.

  “You don’t have the nerve!” That’s where he was wrong. I pulled the trigger and the world erupted in a cacophony of sound and heat and burning gun smoke. Maynard flew back and slumped against the wall between the dresser and closet.

  I scrambled for the dining room and my phone. I set down the gun and with shaking fingers took up my phone I was shaking so bad I just tapped the screen until it started ringing, I didn’t even know who I was calling.

  “Ashton?” a male voice asked.

  “Help me! Please help!” I said desperately, “Maynard broke down the do…” I didn’t get the rest of the words out because fingers wrapped into my hair and I was being dragged to the ground.

  I screamed and shrieked. I could hear the buzz of someone’s voice faintly on the phone but I didn’t know who I had dialed…

  Maynard was straddling me, “You missed!” He screamed and his hands circled my throat squeezing. I fought, clawing at his wrist and felt something dig painfully into my ass.

  Reaver…

  I slid a hand under me and pulled out the switchblade. Maynard was straining and I was choking and kicking and fighting but I was too small he was too big. I couldn’t breathe!

  I fought down the panic and managed to hit the button on the knife with my thumb. I felt the blade snick free and with a silent scream I brought it up, stabbing it deep into the side of him, I couldn’t see where. He shouted and wrenched to the side and the blade went with him.

  I dragged air into my lungs and twisted, flopping onto my stomach beneath him. I tried to pull myself away from him, towards the back of the loveseat, but his fingers tangled into my hair. I screamed and struggled and fought, thrashing back and forth beneath him. He wrenched back on my hair and my spine bowed until I thought it would snap.

  I screamed and kicked and fought as he dragged me to my feet, lifting me clean off the floor by my hair, a steel like band of an arm locking around my middle, pinning me to his hard chest. Tears of fury and fear mingled on my face.

  “Ethan!” I screamed as he dragged me from our apartment and down the stairs…

  Chapter 25

  Trig…

  The drive to the clubhouse was uneventful except for the nagging feeling that something just wasn’t right. The feeling swelled and persisted over the ten minute ride until I pulled up the steep gravel drive in a thoroughly pissed off mood.

  “Hey Trig.” Reaver greeted as I went in the front door and I nodded.

  “What the fuck we doin’ here?” I asked.

  “Beats the hell out of me.” He shrugged and we went into the chapel. Dragon and Dray were at the table and we took our seats.

  I set my phone on the table and watched another couple of minutes tick by while we waited for Doc.

  “Sorry I’m late.” He said and slid into his seat. Reaver swung the door shut behind him.

  “What’re we here for?” he asked.

  Dragon sighed.

  “Dray wants to step down as VP.” He said and my eyebrows went up.

  “Given what happened at the lake,” Dray started, shifting in his seat, “I don’t think I’m fit to be VP, leastways until I get my head on straight.” I frowned and wondered if the kid was feeling okay or if I’d knocked him harder than I thought.

  “Put it to a vote?” Doc asked quietly.

  “All in favor of me stepping down as VP… Yay.” Dray started it off.

  “Yay.” Doc.

  “Nay.” Me.

  “Nay.” Dragon.

  Reaver opened his mouth but my phone buzzed violently across the table. Ashton’s smiling face came up on the caller ID screen and I frowned. Before anyone could tell me not to I hit the button for speaker.

  “Ashton?” I asked and her voice sent a shot of fear and adrenaline straight to my heart.

  “Help me! Please help!” Her voice was tinged with desperation, and swamped with a whole lot of panic. “Maynard broke down the do…” but whatever she said was cut off by a terrified shriek.

  “You missed!” a voice snarled and the phone clattered then thumped. We could hear them struggling and all of us rose as one.

  “Ashton!” I screamed.

  “Forget it man let’s go!” Reaver said and I scooped up the phone and vaulted the table. We poured out of the Chapel and went for our bikes.

  We drove like mad men, breaking every speed limit, running red lights… It didn’t matter. We arrived at the apartment just as a black Cadillac Escalade pulled out. Dragon and Dray peeled off to follow it, Doc, Reaver and me, we went for
the apartment. The front door was dented and the frame splintered. My gun sat on the dining room table and blood spattered the dining room carpet into the living room.

  “Ashton!” I screamed and went back into the bedroom. A fist sized hole was in the drywall about head height for my girl but she wasn’t there. The smell of gunpowder hung heavy in the room and I looked up, there was a bullet hole in the ceiling. She’d gotten off a shot, thought she’d hit him and gone for the phone in the dining room. She was always leaving her damned phone on the table…

  “Bathroom clear!” Doc called.

  “Ashton’s room clear!” Reaver called.

  “Let’s go.” Doc said. I snatched my Glock 23 off the table and stuffed it into the back of my waistband under my cut.

  I shot a text to Dray and my phone pinged back almost immediately.

  “Highway 23.” I said and we went.

  “They’re headed for the ‘burbs.” Reaver intoned.

  “Back to her fucking husband I bet.” Doc muttered.

  This was beyond fucking ballsy. The guy had to be fucking certifiable. We rode out, the three of us. I plugged my headphones into my phone and into one ear so I could listen for any other incoming info.

  My phone pinged about five minutes later with a location. Sure as shit it was her husband’s swanky neighborhood up in the hills.

  We met up with Dragon and Dray a few streets over in a semi deserted cul-de-sac under development. Their jackets and cuts hung off the handlebars of their bikes. Reaver, Doc and I did the same. I pulled a red and black checkered flannel out of my saddlebag and put it on over my short sleeved gray Henley. The flannel hid the gun riding at the small of my back.

  “He got her.” Dragon said, eyes dark.

  “Saw him carry her into the house, she was out like a traffic light.” Dray added.

  “Was she bleeding?” Doc asked.

  “Didn’t look like it, but he sure was.” Dray said and sounded impressed. Dragon was on his phone while I shot a text out over mine to Derek.

  “So what’s the plan?” Reaver asked me, he pulled on loose fitting track pants, the kind with the snaps on the sides over his jeans, he had thigh sheaths strapped on over the denim and a brace of knives in a tactical like vest over his tee shirt. He was going all out. He pulled on a slightly oversized zip up hoodie over the tee and vest and voila, he looked like any typical jogger. He wore running shoes all the time anyways. He pulled the hood up on the hoodie, hiding the teardrop tattoo at the corner of his eye.

  “The plan is I’m goin’ in there and gettin’ my girl.” I said.

  “Does this mean we’re doin’ this old school?” Dray asked.

  “Fuck yes we’re doing this old school.” Dragon pulled out his weapon and checked it I pulled out mine and sure enough only one round missing. Reaver pulled out a knife and tested the edge.

  Dray was in a tee shirt and cargo pants, he put on a baseball cap from some landscaping business from one of his saddlebags and made sure his hair was tucked up into it. I blinked at him.

  “Hopefully the rich folk are stereotyping correctly today.” Dragon chuckled.

  “How many the douchebag keep on hand?” Dray asked.

  “Only the one that I know of,” I said, “But that’s why I texted Loyal for backup. We need to do some recon.” I asked Reaver, “You and Dray?” I looked at each of them in turn. They nodded.

  “You sure you want to do this?” I asked all of them.

  “Does the Pope shit in the woods?” Reaver asked with a grin and Doc laughed.

  “Pretty sure a bear does, Pope just wears a funny hat.” Dragon said.

  “Oh, well… fuck yeah! Does that answer your question better?” Reaver said and I smiled. He was half fucking cracked to be making jokes at a time like this but he’d always been that way.

  “Let’s get to creepin’ and hope that none of the neighbors are nosey.” Doc said.

  Reaver and Dray nodded and went out on foot. Around the time that Derek pulled up in his truck, the first text from Dray buzzed in my hand.

  Dray: 3 ttl 1 in frnt 2 in back.

  Three guards, one in front two in back. My phone buzzed again, Reaver this time.

  Reaver: Ashton, 2 fl mstr br

  “Ashton is on the second floor in the master bedroom, Dray says there’s one guard in front, two in back.” Dragon snorted.

  “Dumb shit ain’t he?” he asked.

  “Who the fuck cares?” Derek asked. “We picking them off?” he asked.

  “No I want you to provide cover. Gonna try to do this non-lethal but if shit goes sideways I want you covering my six. Don’t fucking shoot me.” I said. He gave me a one fingered salute. I knew he was a good shot, I was just better, that’s all.

  “Get in the truck.” He said.

  Dragon and I got in back, laid down and he threw a tarp over us.

  “Be ready Doc.” I intoned, and he said,

  “Always am boy.” And he got in the driver’s seat. The truck started and Doc drove us close to position. Doc would stay with the truck and drive. Derek would take up position to provide cover. We’d do our best to do this ninja style. We found a suitable spot for Derek up on higher ground and he bailed out. I handed him the soft case holding his rifle and he made tracks.

  The drawback to rich neighborhoods is that people like us look totally out of place. On the plus side, rich people like their privacy and tended to surround their houses with fences and shrubs, neither one of which really did a whole lot to keep people like us out if we really wanted in but provided lovely cover once we were.

  We had knowledge of the area, or at least some of the boys did, from when the MC served up Chaddy-boy his ass whoopin’. It made this shit a lot easier but right now anything could be happening to Ashton. I let the calm creep in and take over. Chadwick Granger didn’t know it but some really awful shit was about to go down in his world.

  We weren’t the kind of MC people were used to seeing on popular television series. We didn’t go into neighborhoods with guns blazing, wearing our cuts advertising to the whole fuckin’ world what bad ass mother fuckers we were.

  No we did shit quick, clean and quiet with as little flash as possible. Doc pulled up to the curb behind the Granger mansion and lifted the tarp on that side and pretended to root around in the back of the truck for something. I heaved myself up and over the side under the cover of the tarp and knelt like I was tying my shoe.

  My phone buzzed.

  Reaver: Clear

  I scooted out up over the curb and I stood up and walked down the side walk like I’d been there all along. The street was clear, peaceful even. The sky was clouded over and threatening rain which worked to our advantage. Sunny skies meant more people out and about. The other bonus on our side was that it was late morning/early afternoon. Folks were out at their jobs, so we really only had to worry about nosey housewives and retirees. This neighborhood… Housewives were the real danger.

  A bird chirped off to my left and I cut my eyes in that direction. Reaver’s cold blue gaze glittered out at me from the shrubbery. I stopped, pulled a piece of paper out pf my pocket and made like I was checking an address and moved forward. I turned the corner and cut sideways into the bushes and made my way back to his position under the cover of the thick shrubs and trees lining the back of the property.

  He unzipped his hoodie and I ditched the red and black flannel. The red was too eye catching. I shoved it under the leaf litter and shrugged into the hoodie. Glad I’d gone with dark jeans that morning.

  “How’d you get her position?” I asked.

  “Watched him carry her up.” He said with a grimace. “She’s in rough shape.”

  Fuck, fuck and double fuck.

  I looked through the line of trees and the back of the wrought iron fence. There were two men in suits and glasses standing near the pool. My phone buzzed.

  Derek: In post. Got a bead on 2 in back.

  I flicked my thumbs across the touch screen, hit send and
made sure the message went through to all recipients.

  “Show time.” I muttered and Reaver gave me one hell of a nasty grin. We slipped on wraparound sunglasses and pulled bandannas up around our noses and mouths, mine was just your generic black, no flash no designs but Reaver was always go big or go home. He looked at me and nodded, the lower half of his face covered by a black triangle of cloth silk screened in white with a skeleton’s rictus grin, one of the damned eye teeth embossed in gold.

  Whatever man…

  We stood up and pulled ourselves over the fence.

  “Hey you!” one of the men shouted.

  Hey me… it was fucking on!

  My boots hit the ground and my hand found my piece at my back, the man who’d shouted was going for his and it was like the world slowed down. Reaver let a knife fly at the one reaching for his gun to aim at him and my weapon was out and pointed at the one I had to deal with.

  “Put it down.” I said. The other suit was holding his wrist, Reaver’s small throwing blade protruding from the back of his hand. The man looked pale and I heard a sharp snick as Reaver freed another blade from his vest. It never ceased to amaze me how freaking fast that bastard was.

  The hired suit with his gun trained on me cut a sideways glance to his partner and raised his weapon skyward, hands up and out. Reaver went and disarmed him first and then pulled the other man’s gun out from under his arm.

  “Pull it out!” The guy said, voice high and a little frightened.

  “Nah, have ‘em do it at the hospital. Don’t know if I hit anything important.” He said and tossed their guns into the pool eyes sparkling in that way that told me he was smiling.

  “We aren’t getting paid enough for this shit.” The one I was trained on said and I could tell he was pretty much done. He looked about two seconds from wetting himself. Civilians then. Reaver punched the walking wounded in the face. Hard.

  The guy went down like a ton of bricks and Reaver pulled out a pair of cuffs from the back of his vest. I tried not to laugh. They were the fuzzy pink kind for sex.

  “C’mere junior.” He said and I jerked my head at the guy I was trained on to do what he said.