Point of Redemption

by Stacey Lynn

  So while my thoughts were on missing them and finding Faith, taking her far from the hell she’d lived in for the last several years, I wasn’t paying attention to Daemon and the other brothers in the clubhouse.

  Daemon pounded the gavel, declared the voting done, and men I’d known for practically my entire life began slapping my shoulders, handing me my leather vest.

  I gripped it in my hands. Only then did I realize my hands were shaking.

  I said nothing as I took it.

  There would be no Prospect patch for me. Apparently putting a bullet in their old President allowed me to skirt that step in becoming a member. Not that most of them hadn’t known me my entire life. Not that I hadn’t heard at least a half dozen of them remind me over the last ten days that no one blamed me for my father’s death.

  But still, I stared at the cut as if it was the final step in me returning home. Returning to a life I had never wanted to be in, but knew it was where I would always end up. Now I was done fighting it.

  It didn’t make it easier to slide the soft black leather over my shoulders, though.

  “I know what you’re feeling,” Daemon said. His voice was low and quiet. All the men were gone from the chapel room besides the two of us.

  My fist tightened around the cool leather. “Do you?”

  “You think I didn’t feel the same shit when I did this same thing five years ago?”

  “Fuck,” I choked out, shaking my head. I stared at the leather, and then at Daemon, a small grin on my lips. “The fucking shit we do for our women.”

  Daemon walked by and smacked my shoulder, pushing me out of the chapel room into the living room. “First shot’s on me.”

  He nodded toward the shot glasses already lined up on the bar and the men already filling their glasses from the tapped kegs.

  He had insisted the club needed a reason to party. We’d been running ourselves ragged for the last two weeks trying to find Faith, coming home from overnight rides where we hadn’t slept in over twenty-four hours, completely exhausted. My frustration and fear grew every day.

  But he was right. The men needed a night off. Most of them were still reeling from Bull’s betrayal and with the uncertainty of Sporelli and Black Death retribution chasing them—us—the mood had been somber.

  And if they wanted to do it on my behalf, I’d let them fill me with shots and cheap beer until my own head could fucking settle down and maybe, finally, be able to sleep for a night.

  “We’ll find her,” Daemon insisted as we stepped outside.

  The men cheered and raised their glasses.

  A shot glass filled with tequila was pressed into my palms by Jaden, followed by a slam to my back.

  “Drink up, brother!” he shouted, and all the men yelled again. I took in the room. The room that was filled with men I had once considered family. Where the older men had always been like uncles and pseudo-fathers, and the younger ones like brothers.

  I slammed back the shot and faced Daemon.

  “We’ll find her,” I agreed. “But it better be fucking quick.”

  Then I was yanked into the madness, filled with shot after shot. Beer after beer. I played pool, and I got my ass kicked at darts.

  Liv tried—and failed—to get me to smile.

  Jules showed up and avoided Jaden while he scowled and stared at her in the corner until she left.

  And then I passed out in my new room in the clubhouse. The room spun in the darkness.

  And through all of it, all I could think about was where the fuck was Faith. And knowing that if when I found her she had any visible injury on her at all, there would be more blood on my hands.

  “You going for a ride with me?” I asked Finn, the quiet Australian, as I slid onto a bench to him outside. Xbox and one of the twin prospects—Jimmy or Johnny, I had no clue—sparred inside the boxing ring.

  A muscle in the man’s jaw jumped. He was quiet. I hadn’t spoken to him much, but under his quiet, watchful eye, for some strange reason I trusted the fuck out of Finn even if I didn’t know his story.

  “Where to today?”

  My hands balled into fists. I had no fucking clue. I only knew I had to get out from behind the caged walls and into open air, and then hope like hell someone, somewhere, had seen Faith.

  “Headed West, I figure. If Cain has her, he’ll head toward where they have other Charters in Colorado.”

  Finn was quiet for a beat before he ran his hand down his face. “Why the fuck not?”

  “What’s your story, anyway?” I asked, although I didn’t expect an honest answer. Daemon and Jaden had both told me no one knew why Finn had left Australia and headed toward the States. Even more confusing was how he ended up with a bunch of outlaw motorcycle men. Murder was my first guess. Not that I was in a place to judge him for it.

  Finn swung a leg over his bike and narrowed his eyes on me. “You ever run from something?”

  I arched an eyebrow. He shrugged. “Then you know what it’s fucking like to be asked about it.”

  I gave him that play, but still I said, “Yeah, but I came back.”

  He started the engine on his bike, and at the same time shouted over the rumbling sound, “I won’t.”

  I gave him that play, too. The man was a silent broody mystery, but hell if I didn’t also agree that we were all entitled to our own secrets. I carried enough of them.

  He followed me as we pulled out of the club and I waved a see you later to whatever twin wasn’t in the sparring ring. Someday, I’d learn their fucking names.

  The sun was brutal as it beat down on our arms. It heated me through the black vest that had somehow become a natural part of me over the last few days. It was two hours into our drive when my phone began vibrating in the front pocket of my jeans.

  I ignored it at first, lost in the familiar silence of what it was like to be on a bike again. Daemon had fixed me up with his old one as soon as I declared I was staying. I’d get my own someday soon, but for now, it worked.

  Eventually, I could no longer ignore the incessant buzzing against my thigh, so I waved my hand and signaled for Finn to pull over at the next rest stop exit.

  When we did, my phone buzzed again.

  I clicked it open and snarled almost immediately.

  “Want your woman?” A slightly accented voice that I could place rumbled through the phone.

  I hit the speaker button and watched Finn’s eyes widen.

  “Who the fuck are you?”

  The man laughed. It was recognizable and my blood boiled instantly.

  “Sporelli? You fucking shit.”

  “Calm down, son, my men just got her.” He paused and my pulse increased. “She’s hurt.”

  Fuck! “How bad?” I asked through the choking sensation in my throat. Faith was hurt? When I found Cain or whoever was responsible for hurting her more than she’d already been hurt, I’d kill them with my bare hands.

  The asshole almost sounded compassionate. His voice softened. “She’ll live.”

  Which didn’t fucking help me. At all.

  I growled. “Where is she?”

  “Not close, yet,” he said. My hand clamped onto the seat of my bike. What the hell was he playing at? “But you’ll see her soon.”

  “What’s your game?”

  The asshole sounded like he was smiling. And suddenly, I knew I was fucking tired of the guilt of killing people. Some people, like Bull and now Angelo Sporelli, simply deserved to die.

  “Consider her collateral,” he said. “You’ll get her when I get my first shipment delivered to the Cities. Should be arriving in your ports later tonight. Don’t screw it up.”

  And then he was gone. I stared at Finn. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “Apparently not, man.” He shrugged like this was no big deal, like it didn’t matter that Faith was being held by someone we were supposed to be working with. And it still begged the question of where in the hell Cain was and Faith’s mom.

  I d
idn’t have time to answer all the shit in my head.

  I picked up the phone and called Daemon.

  There wasn’t an inch on my skin that didn’t hurt. My back felt like it’d been ripped wide open all over again. I tasted dried blood on the corner of my lips. My right eye was so tender it made opening it difficult.

  My shoulders, shackled to chains and cuffs above my head, had lost any sensation days ago. My legs down to my toes could barely support my position as I tried to balance on my tiptoes to alleviate the stretching in my shoulders.

  I needed a bed. Soon.

  I needed a shower even worse. Hair matted my face. Every time I tried to blow my hair out of my eye or off my cheeks, my lips ached and my chest burned.

  I had screamed so much over the last several days ever since the man, that I later learned was from a Colorado Charter of the Black Death, had thrown me into their van at the rally. My throat was so sore.

  I needed water and food. More substance than the tiny plastic cup of water I was given a day and small bowl of chicken broth and noodles. Based on the numbers of times I’d been given food, I estimated I’d been gone for two weeks.

  I wanted to close my eyes and never have to open them again. My life had sucked enough. When would I find my reprieve?

  Enough.

  I blew out a slow, shaky breath. The fractional movement sent a scorching flame of fire through my back.

  I tried to bite my teeth to hold back a sob as my broken body shook and protested against the chains that held me.

  I wanted to die.

  More than that, I wanted to kill whoever had tortured me.

  Cain had left after the first week leaving me alone with a prospect from Black Death, whose name I didn’t know, and another man who looked constantly wasted as he made his way down the stairs into the basement where I’d been chained to a metal pipe above the stained and thin mattress since the day I’d arrived.

  Fortunately, the bruise on my cheek and over my eye had begun to heal, although it still pulsed with pain. The back lashings were courtesy of Cain being pissed he’d been stabbed in the street fight and the fact that I’d tried to fight against him when he first showed up.

  I knew he wouldn’t like to be spit on. But by the time he showed up and I’d already been chained to a metal pipe for three days, I no longer cared about pissing Cain off.

  The only question I didn’t understand was why.

  I was so sick and tired of being a pawn. A moveable chess piece in a game where I had never understood the rules or why I was being forced to play.

  For years, I figured Cain simply wanted to beat me down to nothing. I never understood why. He was harder on me than the other girls who came to him willingly. Even the ones I knew that weren’t given an option, none of them had been beaten as harshly as me.

  It had always seemed to give Cain a sick pleasure in the pain he seared into my skin.

  I was so tired of it.

  Every night after the sun set and I was left alone in a damp basement with water dripping down the foundation when it rained, my resolve grew stronger.

  The next time I saw Cain I’d kill him.

  And I wouldn’t bat an eye while doing it.

  Hatred had filled my veins, keeping me warm in the cold and damp room. I wrapped it around me like a thick, fleece blanket until I was secure in the knowledge that regardless of what Cain did to me, he would never succeed in breaking me.

  My back thrashed in shock and pain ripped through my wrist connected to the handcuffs as a loud banging sound came from the floor above me. My head snapped to the door as I screamed out in pain from the sudden movement.

  A blast filled the air. Gunshot. The sounds continued while the heavy weight of bodies dropping and footsteps pounding on the thin wooden floor above me shook the pipes above my head.

  Apprehension filled me. Gone was the hatred that had just warmed me. My body chilled at the sound of soft but quick footsteps tapping down the staircase to the basement.

  To where I was.

  Ryker. He saved me.

  I shook the thought from my head. He wouldn’t have come to save me. He had his own family. I had tortured my mind with recalling the words he had spoken on the phone in the hotel room. It only served to make me stronger.

  I could survive this alone. It was how I would end up when I was done.

  And yet, still, as the doorknob twisted and opened, disappointment flickered in my mind when the man in the doorway wasn’t him.

  I stared at him directly in the eye, not ashamed at all that I was barely clothed in underwear and a bra. Surprisingly, Cain hadn’t touched me in that way. None of the men I’d seen over the last two weeks had come close to me. That didn’t stop their roaming eyes from leering over every inch of my naked skin while they checked on me. And it didn’t stop them from gazing on my body in the middle of the night when they took me to an outdoor restroom—the only time I was allowed to use a real restroom or clean myself up. Based on the few lights that flickered while I was ushered quickly in an out, I figured I was in some type of resort.

  “You alive?” the masculine voice asked. It held a hint of big city accent. My fingers tightened against the chains above my head.

  The devil you knew was always better than the one you didn’t.

  “You hear me?” he asked again, this time, his feet slowly trudged into the room.

  I nodded and slowly lifted my head. When I did, I saw a slight, thin smile. He had the decency to keep his eyes on mine as he moved closer to me. He was short with black hair slicked to the back of his head and eyes as dark as his hair. His skin was tanned, and his muscles lean.

  I opened my mouth to speak, but pain laced my vocal chords. I shut my mouth and nodded instead.

  The man cocked his head to the left and looked up above my head. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  I nodded again and the man frowned. His eyes flicked to the doorway before he quickly perused my body. His eyes flashed. Not in lust, but simple examination as if he was categorizing every mark on my skin.

  He raised a hand. “I’ll be back in two minutes, okay?”

  “Okay,” I croaked, and then winced from the one word that slashed like razor blades through my throat.

  He left. As soon as he was gone, my body began trembling.

  Free. He was getting me the hell out of the house and the chains and the pain. I didn’t give a shit if he was Satan himself; the man had just become my guardian angel.

  When he appeared, he returned with a large blanket draped over his arm. The blanket was worn and had seen better days—hell, probably decades—but I wasn’t going to complain. I might have sighed over the comforting item even though it was probably dirty and disgusting. Anything would be better than being stripped naked and strung up like a slaughtered calf.

  In his hand…. he held God. Or bottled water.

  “I’m Erik,” he said and walked slowly toward me. He untwisted the cap off the water bottle as a shadow appeared in the doorway.

  I jerked from the surprise of more company.

  “It’s okay,” Erik said. “Gio is going to get the cuffs off you.”

  For some reason, I stared at the stranger who talked to me in soothing tones. I shook my head. I had just put my trust in a stranger. No way was I letting more people see me.

  “It’ll be fine,” he clipped and pressed the water to my throat. I gulped it like it was the fountain of youth and I had just spotted my first wrinkle. “Drink slow.”

  I tried to listen, but I couldn’t. I inhaled the water and panicked as it dribbled down my chin.

  He pulled the bottled away, and I stared at the small plastic bottle with lust-filled eyes as he set it on the floor.

  “Thanks,” I finally said. The razors in my throat had diminished to pinpricks from the small amount of fluid. “Faith. I’m Faith.”

  He nodded once and moved to the blanket. “I know. You have a lot of men looking for you.”

  “Who?” I asked,
my breath increasing all over again.

  He seemed to sense my panic as the man named Gio entered the room. He looked almost exactly like Erik. I blinked at both of them. My toes walked me backward as far as I could to create distance. It was about two inches before the pain shot through my shoulders.

  “I believe the man’s name is Ryker?” He looked at me and raised an eyebrow.

  Ryker.

  I gasped.

  Gio spoke. And I watched him. It was then I took in their three piece black suits and black dress shirts beneath them. Black dress shoes on their feet. They were rich. They were Italian.

  I had no idea what that meant.

  “We’re here to take you to him,” Gio said. His voice was equally as quiet as Erik’s had been, as if I was a skittish rabbit.

  Which sounded about right.

  And what other choice did I have? Stay here and wait for someone to come back and beat me? The decent looking men in the suit who had brought me water seemed like the much better option.

  Erik and Gio worked together without speaking. Erik wrapped the blanket around my body as Gio worked on the cuffs.

  In what felt like hours, but was probably only seconds as my pulse beat against my chest, I was certain they could hear the ferocious pounding against my bones before I collapsed into Erik’s arms.

  He swept up my feet and they wasted no time clearing out the room. Gio placed the water bottle on my lap.

  I said nothing until we got upstairs. Neither of them did, either.

  Then I saw two dead bodies strewn across the floor.

  It was then I threw up all of my water. It spewed out all over my lap and onto Erik’s chest.

  I gasped once for breath before everything went black.

  A bed. I recognized soft, silky sheets pressed against my stomach and my breasts before I opened my eyes. My hands, clearly unchained, rested under a pillow.

  I sighed. It felt divine.

  My legs stretched out under the comfortable sheets before the pain in my back reminded me of where I’d spent the last few weeks.

  My eyes flew open. Without moving, I took in the room. It was gorgeous. And enormous.

  I blinked and shifted my weight. A lightweight sheet, thrown over my naked back raked against my lashes and I winced.