The information also led to a hotel room, filled with over a dozen young girls who now, thanks to Grace, would have a second chance at a normal life.
I was proud of her, sure. My heart was fucking bursting with pride.
Even more so, knowing what she had gone through to get to where she was. Knowing what it must be bringing up for her, so soon after those memories were already haunting her once again. The wounds were fresh again, after all the years she had worked to heal them.
My heart ached for her, to see her on television, her eyes empty and sad as she took the award, and then promptly denied having any real role in anything.
She was painfully humble.
And so fucking beautiful that I wanted nothing more than to go to her and bring her back home with me.
But I couldn’t. So I let the time pass, and I turned off the television whenever the news came on. I avoided the papers, and everyone around the clubhouse knew by now not to mention her name around me if they didn’t want their head knocked off.
She was a bit of a celebrity, though, even here. Cherry was in awe of the fact that she was a cop and still hadn’t said a word to anyone about any of us. She had earned the respect of every single member of the club by being able to keep her mouth shut when it counted.
She had my respect for a whole lot more than that.
And that’s why I left her alone. That’s why I didn’t go to her, even thought I knew she was in pain, and it fucking killed me not to. She didn’t need me to save her this time.
She had saved herself.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Grace
I pulled my car up to the side of the clubhouse, the only car amongst the dozens of Harleys. It was early. The morning light broke through the trees above me, and I smiled wistfully, inhaling the heady pine scent that I remembered so well.
I walked through the front door, and it was quiet. Several Gods were sleeping in various spots on the floor, their mouths open, snoring, still wearing their cuts. Bottles of beer were knocked over, the smell of the stale beer puddles next to them filling my nostrils, overpowering the pine trees outside. Tiff was curled up in the corner next to Slade, and I spotted Cherry sleeping alone on a couch along the wall.
I was taking a huge risk here. Showing up unannounced. Early, when I knew he might still be asleep. When I had no idea if he would even be alone.
It had been two months since I said goodbye to him. Two of the longest months of my life.
“Well, hello there, Sam! Or, Grace, I guess?” Doc was in the kitchen, standing in front of the fridge, a beer in his hand even at this early hour.
“Hi, Doc!” I replied. His wild hair, his sweet demeanor, his crooked smile warmed my heart. “I’ve missed you!”
“How are you feeling, hon?” he asked.
“I’m feeling pretty good, Doc, thanks,” I replied. “Is Ryder around?”
“Still sleeping,” he said, gesturing towards the hallway.
“He alone?” I asked, hopefully.
Doc chuckled.
“Far as I know,” he said. “He’s been pretty down and lonely since you left.”
“Thanks, Doc,” I replied, kissing him on the cheek.
I tiptoed down the hallway, leaving Doc in the kitchen and the people in the living room undisturbed.
I took a deep breath, and peeked inside.
He was still asleep, his chest rising and falling under the sheets, the sunlight streaming in over his naked shoulders. The sight of him took my breath away.
I had been yearning to see him again, feeling completely lost without him these last few months. He was the first thing I thought about and the only thing I continued to think about the entire day.
I was grateful we had saved all those girls, sure, but the victory was empty without Ryder by my side. Now that I knew he existed, that our love existed, there was no way I could be happy without him.
I was determined to find a way to have him in my life. I knew that couldn’t happen if I was a cop.
Eventually, the solution came to me - in a dream, actually.
Another visit from my dad, the only person in my past who had ever been good to me. As good as he could. As good as he knew how. He, too, had escaped the hell of living with my mother and her sons. All she ever did was cheat on him, and he endured it as long as he could. And then, when he couldn’t anymore, he simply left. Just like my sister did. And just like I did.
We all just had to go through hell first.
I blamed them both for leaving me behind, but eventually, I understood. My dad didn’t know what had happened to me, he could only work with what he knew. If he had known, I’m certain he would have whisked me away.
But things didn’t work out that way. They were what they were.
I came to accept them.
Just as I had come to accept Ryder. Now, all I needed to get him to do was accept me, too.
“There’s more than one way to skin a cat,” my dad had said to me in my dream. I wasn’t sure what he was talking about, but after a few days of it lingering in my head, I understood.
After much contemplation, and many meetings with my Captain, I decided to quit the force. I convinced them to keep me on as an outside consultant, but I would no longer be a police officer.
I was beyond delighted. Relieved. If everything went as planned, then maybe, just maybe, everything was going to be all right after all.
I entered Ryder’s room, quietly walking over and sitting on the edge of the bed next to him. His blue eyes flew open, and widened when he saw me sitting there.
“Hey,” I said, smiling down at him. “Remember me?”
EPILOGUE
They walked hand in hand along the moonlit path through the dense forest. It was dark, quiet, the soft sounds of various forest critters echoing through the trees. As they pushed through the tree line, they approached what had quickly become their favorite spot.
After six months, it had become a habit to visit after dinner every night, wandering out to sit next to the rushing creek, listening to the sounds of the night as they talked about their day. Some nights they kissed for hours under the moonlight, and then there were the nights when they weren’t able to wait until they got back home to make love and Ryder took her right there on the fallen pine-needles.
Life had settled into a somewhat normal routine for them. Whatever normal was. Ryder had insisted he couldn’t leave the clubhouse, and Grace had moved in. The constant partying had taken some getting used to, but she enjoyed the moments like this when she got to be with Ryder alone and away from his club.
They had begun building their own cabin not far from the clubhouse. It was in the beginning stages, but soon they would have their own private house, where they could get away from the club anytime they wanted.
As for the club, they had welcomed her with open arms. Even Cherry had apologized. She seemed to look up to Grace now, even confessing that she, too, was a survivor. They had become fast friends, and Grace almost felt like she had a new family.
It was comforting.
Riot had become her right-hand computer guru, helping her set up stings in the chat rooms that held so many predators just looking for the next thirteen year-old girl they could lure away from her home and take advantage of. Once she had hooked one, she got the Bureau involved and turned the information over to them.
Grace was able to do the job she loved, and be with the man she loved, all at the same time.
Everything was working out perfectly.
Tonight, Grace and Ryder sat on the rock by the creek, while Oliver, the owl, perched in the branches above them. He followed them out here every night, and Grace had eventually named him. Ryder wasn’t still wasn’t quite sure what to make of him, but he tolerated his presence. Not that he had much of a choice in the matter, though.
They didn’t mind. He was a reminder of the past, and that was just fine.
“Do you wish you had never remembered?” Ryder asked her, as she l
eaned into his arms. He wrapped them around her, pulling her in close to his chest.
“Not for a moment,” she replied, settling into his loving warmth, the familiar scent of leather comforting her like a soothing lullaby.
“You have to remember where you came from to appreciate where you are.”
***THE END***
☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼
CHAPTER ONE
Lacey
Some dates are more memorable than others.
“So, you’re Lacey?” the handsome, middle-aged man across the table from me, asked.
“I’m whoever you want me to be,” I replied, smiling sweetly at him.
He chuckled, nodding his head, stretching out his arms and placing his hands behind his head as he leaned back in his chair. An air of confidence exuded from his large frame. Light threads of silver wove through his black hair, his heavy hooded eyelids squinting as he laughed.
“Monty said you were eager to please,” he said, his smile, while it might have been charming and playful to any other young woman, was sickening to me.
I didn’t reply. Not with words. Instead, I winked at him slyly, a half-smile forming on my red-painted lips as I slipped my stiletto off under the table, and trailed my black-stockinged toe along his ankle. I slipped under the slacks of his Armani suit, slowly inching up his leg. It worked every time.
It shut them up.
I hated hearing them talk. And most of them loved the sound of their voice more than anything else they were paying for. They thought they were so charming. So smart. So entertaining. So fucking important.
To me, they were none of that. They were boring on the best nights, and downright abusive on the worst.
I played along. I played the part perfectly - the pretty girl that knew how to pretend you were fascinating during dinner and, even better - how to pretend you had the biggest prick she had ever seen at your hotel room afterwards.
I knew how to follow the rules. Because I knew what happened when I didn’t.
After hours of small talk over an outrageously extravagant dinner, my companion paid the check, and we walked down the street that led to his five-star hotel. When he said he wanted to stop at the corner store, I figured he was buying condoms.
But not this guy.
No.
He bought a dozen eggs. And a bottle of wine. Sure, the eggs were odd, but I was trying not to overthink things.
When we got back to his hotel, the first thing he did was open the wine and offer me a glass. I accepted, downing it quickly and asking for more. He refilled my glass as I sat on the sofa. He sat next to me, each of us silently sipping the dry, red wine. It was painfully awkward, and I tried to make small talk again to break the ice.
“So, you live in Seattle?”
“Yes, I do. I’m the CEO of Puget Energy. I’ve known Monty for two years now. He’s a very…efficient…politician.” He sipped his wine, and looked over at me.
“Yes, he is,” I replied. He was also a very efficient prick, I thought to myself. Monty Patterson had been the mayor of Seattle for two years now. He just so happened to be my pimp and owner, also. And he had been for four long years before he even ran for office.
“Does he treat you well?” the man next to me on the bed asked.
“Of course,” I lied.
He nodded, staring out through the glass door that led to the balcony of his room and overlooked the bright lights of the sprawling Seattle skyline.
“Do you like eggs?” he asked. He rose to his feet, and I watched him with confusion as he began to undress.
“Eggs? I’m not very hungry…after that dinner we just had and all…” I said. What an odd question to ask, I thought, especially as he began to take off his clothes.
“There’s something about them, you know?” he said, as he loosened his tie. “I love their texture. So smooth. So round. So solid. And yet, so fragile. Delicate, even.”
“Um, sure, I guess so…” I wasn’t sure what he was getting at, but he wasn’t paying Monty fifteen grand for me to think.
“More wine, Lacey?” He stood in front of me in nothing but his silk trousers and black dress socks. He was in good shape, I had to give him that. Thick, curly hair covered his muscular chest and the six pack that he was obviously very proud of. The hair tapered down into a thin line that disappeared into his pants.
“Absolutely,” I replied. Wine was one of my best friends on nights like these. Hell, it was my best friend every night. It made all the bullshit a little easier to endure. He filled my glass once more before leaving the living area and returning to the kitchen of the suite.
I looked around at the penthouse while I waited. I had a keen eye for nice furnishings, and this hotel had not skimped on their decorating budget.
I was used to nice things by now. Not that I had grown up this way, though. While my mother had desperately longed for a life filled with luxury, it had remained just outside of her reach. Not that she hadn’t gone to the dark depths of humanity to obtain it, that’s for sure. When you’ve sold your child to the devil, after a lifetime of using her for your own financial gain, well…you’ve reached a pretty dark place.
It’s not that my mother was evil. She was just stupid, heinously misguided and tragically poor. I had the misfortune of being the one child born to her, and consequently, the only chance she felt she ever had to acquire the lifestyle she had spent her life chasing.
The high life. The good life. The life of luxury.
As soon as I was born, she wasted no time trying to make money off of me. She signed me up with modeling agencies, took me to auditions for commercials for diapers, baby food and baby clothes. And once I could walk, the pageants started. I was barely able to find my way across the stage when she entered me in the first one.
It was the Regal Princess pageant for children ages one to three.
Unfortunately, I won.
And that little taste of victory spurred her on to enter me into every pageant she could find in Oregon, Washington, Utah and California. My entire childhood consisted of being primped, made-up, dressed-up and paraded around in front of a bunch of other equally dysfunctional mothers that lived their own fucked-up fantasies out through their children in some kind of sick competition with each other.
And of course, I went along with it. I was kid. It was all I had ever known. Some of my first memories include her being completely ecstatic about some part I had gotten. I craved approval. I was always that kind of girl. I didn’t know anything about rebellion. I didn’t know how to say no. It was all I had ever known. Hell, I didn’t even know saying ‘no’ was an option.
If I was being honest with myself, I would say it wasn’t an option. If I ever dared complain, my costume was too tight, my shoes were giving me blisters - the quick pinch of her fingernails on the back of my arm would quickly put me right back on track, and I’d suck it up.
Of course, that was when I was younger. As I got older, I knew something wasn’t right. While she was entirely concerned with my physical appearance, and coming across as the perfect, loving maternal figure when some one was watching - behind closed doors, it was as if I didn’t exist.
Left to my own devices, I could care less if my hair was clean, let alone the dress I was wearing. I was more interested in whether or not she was going to feed me that day or stay locked in her bedroom and forget about that one important task of being a Mom.
She was never a Mom. I don’t know what she was. I spent many years trying to figure out why she had me in the first place. She mostly resented me - that is, when she couldn’t use me to make a few bucks.
When I got older and stopped winning the pageants, the money dried up. She took it upon herself to find another, more profitable way of using me.
Which brings us right back to this room.
If she hadn’t sold me to Monty when I was sixteen, I wouldn’t be sitting here on this velvet couch, staring up at a strange man holding a dozen eggs in his hand, and regaling me wi
th their beauty.
“…and the pure whiteness of them is just beautiful, don’t you think?” Delicately, he lifted an egg from the carton, holding it up to the light. I was still confused. It was so much easier when they just fucked me, came within twenty seconds, and left me alone in the room for the rest of the night. Apparently, this guy had something else in mind.
“Sure, sure…” I mumbled through the rim of the wine glass. I eyed the bottle on the glass table in front of me, trying to determine if there was going to be enough left to get me to sleep. If this guy kept droning on about eggs, I might not need any help falling asleep at all.
He put the eggs in my lap, and stood in front of me expectantly. Had I missed something? I wasn’t being a good listener. I wasn’t earning Monty’s money very well tonight.
“I’m sorry, Drake, can you tell me what you want me to do with the eggs again?”
He was unbuckling his thin, leather belt, and he let his silk pants fall to the floor. He stepped out of them, and very slowly and carefully, folded them, taking care not to wrinkle the pleats as he placed them on the table in front of me. He smiled as he began talking again and he removed his black boxers.
“Well, if you don’t mind, I’d like to play a little game.” Standing in front of me with nothing covering his pale white skin, except his pair of knee-high black dress socks, he looked ridiculous.
“A game?” I suppressed a laugh as I watched him walk over and sit on the floor, his back against the wall. He spread his naked legs, his flaccid penis and balls flopping onto the floor like a slab of raw meat.
“Um…” This was new.
“If you could just take those eggs and sit across from me, please?”
“Sure, I guess…” I said. Always the good girl, no matter how fucked up or weird it was. I wanted to say no, throw the eggs at him, one by one, watch the bright yellow yolk run down his perfect body and run out the door, but I knew I wouldn’t do that. Monty was very persuasive when it came to my obedience. But hey, maybe that’s where this guy was going anyway.
RAW: THE ULTIMATE MC COLLECTION Page 13