by Laura Avery
“How do you want to play it?” Snake looked shocked. “There is no how do you want to play it. We give them the fucking girl. Are you joking?” He took a few steps closer to us. “It’s not even a question. We don’t even know anything about this bitch and you want to risk all the brothers for what?”
I spun around. “I’d watch how you talk to me if I were you.”
Snake rolled his eyes but took a step back anyway.
Blaze stepped between us. “Look, tempers are high. Everyone’s a little worked up right now, which is why The Misfits only gave us until dawn to figure this out. They don’t want you to have time to think about it.”
He was right. Blaze was always right. Most people didn’t believe that he was part of an MC at all. Not ruthless enough. But they underestimated him. I’d seen him do what he had to when the time came.
“I don’t want to give up the girl,” I decided. “She’s mine.”
Snake threw his hands up in the air. “Are you joking? She's yours? You just met the bitch!” He pulled on his beard in frustration. “What the hell is the matter with you?”
I pushed Blaze out of the way and yanked Snake toward me, pushing my nose against his. “Challenge me again. Go ahead. Do it. I want you too.” Snake looked back at me. I could tell he wanted to say something, wanted to tell me I’d lost it but he knew better. I had a way of accidently letting my gun off on someone when they challenged me.
Blaze tried to pull me backward but when I didn’t budge he settled on pulling Snake away instead. Snake was always trying to challenge me, always trying to act like he knew what was right. I would be bitter if a guy half my age had taken the spot as vice president over me, too.
But I couldn’t let that bother me.
I couldn’t let that affect the way I treated him or before you knew it you were doing that with everyone and they thought they were in charge when I was the one who ran the day to day and made the tough choices.
The choices no one else wanted to have to make.
And I didn’t want to give the girl up.
I just didn’t.
And I knew myself well enough to know that wasn’t going to change.
Snake mumbled something to Blaze and Blaze shook his head.
I was a little sick and tired of this.
I had made my choice.
“Snakes right,” a voice behind me said. “The girl needs to go.”
The three of us swung around.
I immediately felt Blaze and Snake stand up straighter.
“Hello, Son.”
I gulped. “Hi, dad.”
***
GRACE
I pulled on the ropes for about the one millionth time, trying to get at least one of my hands free so that I could squeeze the other one out and make a run for it.
It was no use, though.
Just like the times before nothing happened, the knots aren’t anywhere near looser. If anything, they seem to be growing tighter. How could I have been stupid enough to get myself into something like this?
The door handle jiggled and my heart leaped in my chest.
He was back.
But Cutter doesn’t come into the room, instead, a small girl with dark hair and tan skin does. She shut the door behind her, not fully paying attention to anything besides whoever she was texting on her phone.
She took a few steps toward the bed and looked up.
And then she let out a high-pitched scream.
“HELP ME!” I shook my hands back and forth. “Please!”
The girl looked startled. She was about the size of my pinky. She opened her mouth then snapped it back shut again. She looked down at her phone and started typing in a number.
“No!” I begged. “Please! Don’t call the cops! Just let me go!”
The girl ignored me, bringing the phone to her ear and bouncing back and forth uncomfortably. “Come on, pick up.” After a few seconds, she let out an annoyed sigh and clicked the end button. “Damn it, Cutter,” she mumbled to herself before letting her eyes rest back on me.
The little hope I had escaped from my body as I realized she wasn’t going to help me. She was one of Cutter’s girlfriends, she was there to fuck him and do whatever the hell he said. She wasn’t going to look out for me.
“Who are you?”
I shook my legs against the bottom of the bed. “Please untie me.”
She looked me up and down helplessly. No doubt taking in my messy appearance. “Is this… is this some kind of weird fetish thing you and my brother are playing around with?”
Her brother?
She was Cutter’s little sister!
I hated the part of me that took satisfaction in the fact that she wasn’t a girl he was messing around with. I didn’t have a right to feel happy about that but I did anyway.
Fetish?
She thought I was tied up like this so Cutter could do things to me?
The idea was thrilling but not the case.
“Yes,” I lied. “We were trying something new out but then he got a phone call and had to go handle some business and… and the ropes are so tight.” I tried to jiggle out of them again. “This was a mistake. I know he’s really into it but…”
The girl put her hands over her ears. “Ugh, enough, enough!” She looked like she might puke. “Like I want to hear about the sex games by brother likes to play.” She moved closer to me. “I’ll untie you if you agree to stop telling me the details of what you two do on your own time.”
I nodded frantically. “Yes, yes, just please hurry.”
She made her way over to me and started working her small hands around the knots. “I don’t know why he always brings girls up here. It’s so gross; I mean Blaze is like our brother. Who could have sex in their brother’s house?”
Something about the way she said brother made me feel like she was trying to convince herself more than she was trying to convince me. I was pretty sure a blush crept into her face at the mention of his name as well. I rolled my eyes, now definitely wasn’t the time for her to be worrying about her crush on her older brother’s best friend.
“Hurry,” I told her.
She looked at me suspiciously.
“It really hurts,” I added.
She kept working and finally one of my hands came free. I helped her pry the other knots out and after what felt like hours I’m able to move about freely.
Thank you, Lord.
I glanced at the door. I needed to get out of there. But where was I going to go? I barely remembered how we had gotten up here since I was kicking and screaming the entire time. I was sure to get lost, not to mention Cutter and the rest of his buddies could be just around the corner.
Or what if I bumped into them on the way back to the room?
“Um, were you planning on waiting for him to come back?”
“No, Yes. I mean I don’t know.”
She laughed. “It’s okay, my brother tends to have that effect on people.”
I bet he did.
She pushed her long dark hair out of her face and started digging through a bag by the bed. She pulled out a few guns and set them on the bed like it was no big deal until she emerged with a bag of pretzels a few seconds later. “Blaze always leaves random junk food in the room for me, he knows I have a major sweet tooth. I’m Heather by the way.”
I didn’t miss the way her eyes lit up when she mentioned Blaze again.
“Grace,” I told her without thinking.
She held out the bag of junk toward me but I shook my head. “Look, I’m not sure waiting is the best idea. I mean, no offense, but my brother has probably already forget about you. He kind of only has a one track mind and if the brotherhood needed him I doubt he will be back anytime soon.”
It struck me as odd the way she talked about her brother. Like it was no big deal that he would leave a girl he was messing around with tied up in his room while he went off with the club, forgetting about her completely.
But I figured s
he was used to it, Cutter treating girls like dirt.
And she probably thought I was okay with it, too. Like all the girls her brother messed around with had an understanding that it wasn’t going to be a serious thing. That it was going to be on his terms completely.
And they probably did.
“Right,” I said. “Well, it was nice meeting you.”
Her phone started buzzing on the bed and I glanced down at the screen, seeing Cutter’s name on the caller ID. If she picked up that phone it was game over. Even if I managed to run out before she told him what was going on he would be back here within seconds or one of his brothers would be.
No, I needed the head start.
“Oh, there’s Cutter now.” Heather reached for her phone.
I grabbed it off the bed.
“Hey!” She looked confused.
“I’m really sorry,” I told her, meaning it.
“What? I…”
And then I grabbed one of the guns off the mattress and whipped her across the head with it, sending her flying over onto the ground and knocked out cold.
And then I ran as fast as I could.
Chapter Seven
CUTTER
I had been in better moods in my life. The second my father came around everyone ignored whatever it was I was saying. What was the point of being the Vice President of the most powerful club in the state if every decision I made had to be run by my father?
I wasn’t a little kid anymore.
I was a man.
“You know he’s just doing what he thinks the right move is, Ash.” Blaze took the steps two at a time ahead of me. “He doesn’t even know her but he knows she’s not worth a full on war right now. The Misfits aren’t the only ones the feds are looking at, you know?”
“Don’t try to make me feel better,” I mumbled, dragging my feet behind him. “And don’t try to justify him stepping on my toes as usual either. Besides, it’s not about the girl,” I lied.
“Uh huh,” he said. “Sure it’s not. I see the way you look at her.”
“It’s not! If we start giving in to their demands after all this time they’re going to think that they can get away with it all the time.” We shuffled down the hallway toward the door to the room I stay in above the bar.
“Uh huh, uh huh,” Blaze said, still humoring me.
“And how do I look at her?” Curiosity got the best of me.
“Like she’s your cub and you’re her papa bear and she shouldn’t make a move without your permission.” Blaze chuckled and pulled his leather jacket closer to his body. “It’s almost too cute to handle.”
“You’re such a tool.” I shoved him in the back and he stumbled a few feet, laughing. “Like I said it’s not about her. She’s just some girl who ended up in my way.”
Blaze stopped in front of the door. “Look, I get that you not being able to have her makes you want her even more but we need to handle shit. We can’t get caught up in who’s right or wrong or why we should or shouldn’t keep her. Your father has spoken, and he’s still the President, Cutter. That means until you take over officially that we have to do what he says in the best interest of the brothers.”
“Whatever.” I ground my teeth together. “Let’s just get this over with.”
“Are you sure you don’t want me to handle it? She’s not exactly the calmest girl in the world when it comes to you being around.” He raised his eyebrows, referring to the huge tantrum she had thrown earlier when I was tying her to the bed.
The whole thing had been pretty hot, to be honest.
I wouldn’t mind tying her up in some other ways if it wasn’t for her mouth always going off. She had that whole good girl thing going on, that was for sure. I thought being around my brothers she would be a little more comfortable around me but you can tell she’s not fully comfortable with her sexuality.
Which made her even more of a turn on.
I could just imagine doing things to her that she had never even heard of, things that would blow her mind. The visual is too much to handle and I feel my cock start to twitch with excitement in my jeans.
Too bad she was about to belong to someone else.
“No, I want to do it.”
Blaze shrugged. “It’s your funeral.”
He swung the door open and walked inside. I was only seconds behind him but I knew something was wrong even before I looked around. Everything was wrong and completely out of place.
The ropes were spread out over the bed along with a few guns and one of my duffel bags. Contents of the bag were spread all over the room and Grace was nowhere in sight.
“Fuck!” I said, slamming the door shut behind me.
How the hell had she gotten out of those knots? I had made sure they were so tight that even a grown man would have trouble getting through them. My eyes drifted around the room until they landed on a small pair of feet, sticking out from beyond the bed.
At first, I thought it was Grace but when I got closer I realized it was my little sister. Her hair was sprung out around her and there was a huge gash on one side of her head. A gun laid on the floor next to her. She was knocked the fuck out.
“HEATHER!” I kneeled down next to her. “Heather!”
Blaze was next to me within seconds, shaking her small body back and forth, trying to snap her out of it. “Heather! Wake up!” He sounded panicked which was understandable, Blaze had known Heather since she was born and she was just as much his sister as she was mine.
“Water,” I demanded. “Now.”
Blaze leaped across the room and swung open the small fridge; he grabbed a bottle of cold water and tossed it into my hands in record time. I unscrewed the top and poured a huge pile of the cold liquid over my sister’s pale face.
She jolted awake, spitting water back at us in every direction.
Relief washed over my body. Thank fucking God. I had kept my baby sister safe way too long to have some girl with an attitude problem take her out now.
Blaze moved his hands behind her head. “Take it easy,” he told her softly. “You don’t need to move right now. Just breath.” His eyes were searching hers, worried.
Heather choked up a few more gulps of water. “That…”
“Are you okay?” I put my arm on hers, trying to steady her.
She tried to stand up but ended up falling down on her knees again.
“Whoa,” Blaze said, putting her hand in his. “Just try and sit up. You don’t need to stand right now, you aren’t going anywhere.” Heather nodded and moved the upper part of her body forward.
She was shaking under Blaze’s touch, clearly out of it.
“That crazy bitch knocked me out,” she muttered, shaking her head.
“Heather?” I said slowly. “Are you okay?”
She nodded. “I’m fine.”
Blaze shook his head. “She needs to be checked out.”
Heather shrugged him off. “Stop it, I’m fine. I’m a big girl.”
“Clearly since you got knocked out by some girl you just met.”
Heather shot Blaze a nasty glare. “Shut up.”
“Tell me what happened.” I stood up and looked around the room.
“She… she told me you guys were playing some kind of sex game so I untied her. Then she knocked me out with one of your guns, I guess so I couldn’t tell you what had happened.”
Some kind of sex game? My cock twitched again.
“She knocked your sister out.” Blaze stood up, anger on his features. “This isn’t acceptable. She needs to be found and dealt with. Now.” His fists clenched up at the sides.
“No kidding.” I grabbed the keys to my bike off the dresser. “I’m going to find her. Can you…” I glanced at my little sister. I hated that I had put her in any danger; Grace was the last person I thought I had to worry about giving my sister any kind of trouble.
I’d underestimated her.
Blaze glanced down at Heather. “Go ahead, I’ll stay with her.”
/> “I don’t need to be stayed with,” Heather grumbled. “I’m not a baby.”
“Clearly you do,” Blaze looked her up and down, shaking his head. “How could you be so foolish? You never untie someone who’s bound to anything. Have I taught you nothing?”
I padded Blaze on the back. He could be bad cop this time. “Thanks.”
Blaze waved me off and I could still hear him giving Heather a lecture as I shut the door behind me. Okay, this little game Grace was playing was about to come to an end.
No more Mr. nice biker.
I was going to find her.
And make her regret ever trying to leave me in the first place.
***
GRACE
Okay, so I felt like an asshole for knocking Heather out like that but honestly, what else was I supposed to do? It was kind of every woman for herself at this point. I’m sure if the roles had been reversed she would have done the same.
I flipped on the T. V. for back round noise and flopped down on the bed. I was too worked up to pay much attention but it was better than the silence that filled in the spaces around me.
I didn’t know what to do or where to go after I left so I ended up at a hotel a town over. I wanted to go home and get some clothes and some of my stuff but I was too scared that someone would be waiting for me when I got there. And anything that would attract attention to my family was off limits so it’s not like I had a lot of options when it came to choosing where to go.
I felt so lost and confused.
No doubt Cutter had figured out what I had done by now. He was probably pissed off and looking for me so that he could hand me over in pieces to The Misfits. I don’t know why I even cared. Cutter was such a jerk, it shouldn’t matter if he was pissed off at me or not.
But somehow it did, somehow I still cared what he thought about me.
I shot up in bed and looked around, I’d heard something. Something faint but definitely something. I grabbed my gun off the table next to the bed and pulled the curtain back on the window.
The parking lot was black and silent, just like it had been all night.
I did another scan but still saw nothing.