by A. J. Downey
Would they rape me, or just kill me? When they killed me, would they draw it out? I suppose I should be grateful the demon from the lake run was dead. By the looks of him, he would have drawn it out, made it painful. I knew that he’d liked knives and, from all the blood on him that night, I bet he had made Sparks’ death long and slow. There wasn’t any doubt in my mind that they’d killed him and I was grateful to them for that. He’d deserved to die.
I wondered if I was going to meet the same fate. I mean, I had turned on my club and there were some things in the MC world, I’d learned, that were unforgivable sins across the board. Turning on your club was one of those things. I mean, if I were capable of turning on their enemy then I was capable of turning on them later down the line, and so it really only made sense to kill me. To make sure that wouldn’t ever happen.
The door opened and I looked up through my hair again, which had fallen back in my face. The blonde giant that had carried Thirteen into the clubhouse had opened the door and another man stood in the doorway in front of him. He wore a zip-up hooded sweatshirt, his hands buried deep in the pockets. I couldn’t see anything but his mouth and chin, the hood obscuring the top half of his face. That, and it was still dark outside, and so by default, it was dark in here too. I swallowed hard and tasted the bitter tang of fear. I guess it was time, then.
“Oh, now that’s nice,” the man in the hoodie said and he sounded genuine, not a trace of sarcasm in his voice.
“Reave, don’t fuck with her,” the big blonde warned. The man pulled back his hood and it stole my breath, I hissed and stiffened up and his lips curved up into this feral grin. He pulled his other hand from his pocket and stepped toward me, flicking the switch on his knife. He knelt down next to me and I closed my eyes.
The demon wasn’t dead, somehow he was alive, and I was going to die. I felt my shoulders ease as I accepted that this was the end of the line. I just didn’t have any more fight left in me at this point. I just didn’t. He touched my shoulder and ran his hand lightly down my arm to my cold and numb fingers. He massaged my hands with one of his warmer ones and I figured he was trying to figure out where to make his first cut. I waited for the kiss of his blade, for the sting, for the blood to start flowing, when whatever bound my wrists gave way.
The big man was suddenly there, arm curving beneath me across my chest, helping me to sit up. My shoulders cried out in agony, stiff and angry at suddenly having to move as I brought my hands from around my back. I met the wintery, sky blue eyes of the demon, who was smoothing the forelock of his hair down against his forehead. He crooked a smile at me.
“You remind me of my wife,” he said and I blinked. This thing had a wife!?
“Who would marry a monster like you?” I blurted, and he gave me a sad little smile.
“You don’t know me, so I’m going to let that slide. Mad respect, though, most people aren’t brave enough to call me a monster to my face.” His eyes were cold and distant, and I fought not to show any trace of fear.
“It’s not bravery,” I told him and the big blonde sighed.
“You okay?” he asked me. I looked at him next. He was their Sergeant-at-Arms, his name flash read Trigger.
“It doesn’t matter,” I told him truthfully, which made him frown, “Is Thirteen okay?” his eyebrows went up in surprise.
“Yeah,” the demon said, surprised, “Yeah he is, thanks to you.”
“Come on. Our Pres., he wants to talk to you and then you can go see Thirteen.” Trigger helped me to my feet, which was weird because they were both still numb. I shook out first one leg, then the other, and looked at the tattered remnants of the black bandanna that’d been used to tie my wrists. The demon had his hands back in his pockets.
“Were you at the lake run?” he asked me quietly as first the giant SAA went out the door, then me. He followed behind me closely, the demon did, and I nodded.
“Yeah.”
“Ah, okay,” he nodded and I think he was blushing. They led me out of the building and back across the grass, into a back door and down a dark hall, past bathrooms and I think more sleeping quarters, though I couldn’t be sure. The common room of the club looked like a bar, except there was a glassed-in room to one side. That room contained banks of video monitors and computer equipment. One of the monitors was the camera focused on the front gate.
There was a group of men all around a big table in the center of the room, and I faltered. The demon, his hands still deep in his hoodie pockets, lightly ran into my back as I stopped, and I jumped.
“Easy, Dani,” and I startled that he knew my name, “No one’s gonna hurt you here.”
“Don’t lie to me,” I said tartly.
“He ain’t lyin’, Darlin’. C’mere and have a seat.”
The man who spoke was at the head of the table and patted an open seat to his left. He was probably in his late forties, early fifties, and had long black hair in a loose ponytail down his back and a neatly trimmed - but full - black beard. He was just barely starting to go gray at his temples and at the corners of his mouth which, was tipping his age slightly younger, not older, for me. He was Hispanic, and his deep, dark eyes burned like coal in his face.
The man seated to his right might as well have been the older man’s younger carbon copy, except for the beard. He was clean-shaven but his eyes sparkled with intelligence and burned just as fiercely as, what had to be, his father’s.
The demon put his hands lightly on my shoulders and steered me past the big Sergeant-at-Arms, and into the vacant seat. I tried not to look at the three men at the end of the table; Nox, Rush, and the unnamed man who had frisked me, tied me up, and thrown me into that room alone. Once I was seated, the big man at the head of the table introduced himself.
“I’m Dragon, President of The Sacred Hearts,” he said.
“I wish I could say it was nice to meet you but considering you’re probably going to have me killed and I don’t care anymore, I’m just going to stick to the truth from now on and say it’s really not,” I said with false bravado. I was scared as hell on the inside but if there was one thing I had learned while with the Suicide Kings, it was that scared didn’t matter. None of it fucking mattered. They were going to do what they were going to do and there wasn’t anything I could do about it. I was small and I didn’t have a weapon, and even if I did, I didn’t know how to use one and so what would be, would be. I just had my smarts to rely on and had to be more clever than them and …yeah… there were just plain more of them than there was of me.
I was sunk. I officially had nothing left to lose except for Thirteen, and I didn’t really have him to begin with. He’d been lying about who he was the whole time… but he’d saved my life and I had returned the favor. I owed no-one nothing, except myself, and so I would try to figure out a way to weasel out of this and if I couldn’t, then I would at least try to see Thirteen one more time to say goodbye. For some reason that was important to me.
Dragon and the rest of the table gave an incredulous laugh at my words and when the chuckles had settled down he got down to business.
“Archer, Rush and Nox,” he said and he sounded pretty stern. The three from when I arrived shifted in their seats. So the third one was Archer. Interesting. “I believe you owe the little lady an apology, Brothers,” and the look he gave them was hot enough to burn right through them.
Archer growled, “She’s got their VP’s name inked into her back, what the fuck were we supposed to think?” I flinched at his words and Dragon the younger, the name flash on his cut reading ‘Dray’, looked at me curiously from where he sat across the table. I shifted uncomfortably and a large hand fell on my shoulder. I startled and looked up into the SAA’s face, his silver blue eyes kind despite his hulking frame.
“Steady,” he told me, and everything about him radiated reassurance.
“It’s Pig-Pen’s ‘tramp stamp of approval’” I said bitterly. They must have seen it when they’d had me bent over the table. I sudd
enly just felt weary, bone tired. “I got lucky. He tried to brand me with an iron. Skid stopped him, so he had me tattooed instead. Not like I want it there,” I shrugged and new tears started. The humiliation, it just never stopped.
“What’s your story, Princess?” Dray asked, low and careful. Inviting me to talk, to make them understand. I studied him for a moment or two and, deciding he was sincere, I told them. I told them about Jared, about Pig-Pen claiming me, about how things were with The Suicide Kings, and about Thirteen. I looked at them all in turn.
“You almost got him killed, whichever one of you nailed Ace and Deuce’s cuts to the wall. Your little message? Taunting them? Gordy, he isn’t into the drugs like Pig. He isn’t stupid, he figured it out. That the only reason you would know about your brother’s cut and the score card was if you had someone on the inside. News flash for you, you’d already taken out the low ranking members of the club so that just left Thirteen.” I felt a rush of emotions, fear and frustration and just sheer anger at the situation.
“You keep saying he’s okay!” I bit my lips together and reined in my outburst before I asked, “Can I see him now? Can I say goodbye or whatever, before whatever comes next?” Tears welled up hot and fresh and I had a headache from crying so much but truthfully, I hadn’t really cried much in the last three years, and I think that the dam had burst and that was all coming out now, too.
All of them looked solemn and the three, Archer, Rush and Nox, looked guilty as hell. They were receiving some downright hostile and unfriendly looks from some of the brothers around the table and I swallowed. I didn’t mean to start anything and if I managed to survive this, I was pretty sure I’d made an enemy for life from at least Archer. Nox and Rush I wasn’t so sure, they wouldn’t look at me, but Archer… If looks could kill, I’d be incinerated where I sat. Whatever had given him pause when Blue had given me water was gone now.
“Enough of this. She’s told you the truth about everything, I’m taking her back to see him. That’s just enough for one night. If it weren’t for her getting him here so quick we’d have lost another brother tonight!” We all turned, the doctor standing in the archway by the end of the bar where I’d been brought in from.
“Doc’s right and you are too, go on,” Dragon uttered and nodded at me. I looked around and stood up slowly. No one stopped me and so I carefully rounded the chair and slipped past Trigger, who made no move to grab me. I swallowed hard and drew closer to the doctor, who held out his hand to me. I bit my lips together to stop their trembling and stopped close to him but didn’t take his hand.
I didn’t trust any of them, and with a sharp ache in the center of my heart I realized that I couldn’t really trust Thirteen, either. I mean, could I? I followed the doctor through the labyrinth of doors to an open one that led into a bedroom with cool gray walls and a low bed, neatly made. Thirteen lay back on one side, shirtless, the covers pulled up to his ribs. A big, deep, ugly bruise, so deep a purple it was almost black, stained the center of his chest. High up on his right shoulder, a snowy square of gauze, a splotch of red at its center, was taped in a patch that just looked wrong.
The doctor waited by the door as I crept into the room. I knelt down by the bed at his side and slipped my hand into his where it rested at his side. It was warm, and his chest rose and fell in shallow, even breaths. I sobbed in just pure relief that he really was alive, realizing I hadn’t quite believed them when they’d said he was okay. That I’d needed this, needed to see it with my own eyes. I pressed my lips to the back of his hand as I knelt on the floor by his recovery bed, and then rested my cheek there. I just wanted to feel him.
He took a breath out of form from his original cadence and I looked up. His green-blue eyes were open and a slight smile curved his lips, “There’s my clever girl,” he said, then, “How you doin’, Rocket?” I laughed, brokenly.
“I’m okay,” I promised, and with him looking at me like that, I really was, because the way Thirteen was looking at me screamed two things at me: that he’d believed in me, and that he loved me, which I completely understood and finally had to admit to myself. I loved him, too. There was just something about this man. We connected on some deep sublevel of our beings. I hadn’t felt anything like it before and I was absolutely certain I never would again.
Some things were just worth the risk and whatever kind of rare connection Thirteen and I had wasn’t just worth a risk here and there, it was worth risking it all. He took his hand from mine and, wincing, smoothed it over my hair. I smiled at him, and he whispered, “Come up here and lie next to me.” I nodded and struggled to my feet. My body was as tired as everything else. A voice stopped me from the doorway as I went to round the bed.
“Brother, if you’re gonna have her do that, she might as well have a shower and get changed now so she can stay with you,” the Vice President had spoken and I was startled to realize that Thirteen and I had an audience.
“I don’t want to leave him,” I said.
“We can see that, Baby, and we’re uh… we’re trying here. So how about it? You grab a shower, get cleaned up, and we’ll bring the rest of your stuff in from your car.” I blinked. They’d gone through my car? I shook my head. Of course they did.
I worried my bottom lip between my teeth and Thirteen grasped my hand in his. His eyes weren’t on my face, though. They were on my wrist and the dents made from my bindings that still hadn’t smoothed out all the way.
“What the fuck?” he demanded and cast his eyes at Trigger.
“We’ll talk, Brother,” he said and Thirteen looked at me.
“Grab a shower, take one of my tee shirts from the drawer. No one’s going to hurt you...” I snorted and he scowled. “Anymore,” he amended. “Hurry up, I want you back here with me where I know you’re safe.”
“C’mon. I’ll stand watch while you’re in the bathroom if it makes you feel better,” the demon gave me a wink and a mock lecherous grin. I scowled and quailed on the inside but it must have showed some, his expression went cold.
“Wow, never quite had one of those reactions to one of my jokes before. For serious. I’ll make sure you’re okay,” he waved me forward towards him and Thirteen gently shook my hand and let go, urging me to go. I took a reluctant step away from him.
“Dani, Baby, I know I haven’t been exactly honest about who I am and shit, but have I ever lied to you?” he asked me. I looked down into his very serious face and shook my head.
“I promise you’re going to be okay. Go with Reaver, he’ll make sure you’re left alone and then he’ll bring you right back here. I promise,” he said. I nodded and went towards Reaver, the demon sent straight from hell. He smiled at me and held out his hand, a switchblade resting on its palm.
“This is my new very favorite knife. I gave my old very favorite knife to my best friend’s girl a long time ago. I just got used to making this one my new very favorite knife but it looks like you could use a bit of trust and an insurance policy, so I’m going to give my new very favorite knife to you. Okay?” he said and I met his eyes with mine, blue on blue. I plucked the knife from his palm and gripped it tightly with my fist. He smiled and it was a slightly haunted and sad thing, and I got my first inclination that maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t as monstrous as first impressions led me to believe.
I gave him a tentative smile back and he turned sideways so I could go past him, out into the hallway. As we moved across it to what was presumably a bathroom, I heard the Vice President say, “He makes friends in the weirdest fucking ways sometimes,” which made me smile for real.
Chapter 15
Red-XIII…
I watched Reaver lead Dani across the hall and, with just about every reserve of strength depleted, I gave up my bravado which I’d been putting on for her benefit and laid my head back down. Trigger and Dray brought in a couple of chairs and sat down by the bed. We only had a little time before Dani got back and I wanted to know…
“What. The. Fuck?” I growled out.
Dray sighed, “Doc saw her and it was a good thing he did, too. She was jumping up and down screaming and crying and laying on her horn outside the gate, but nobody heard shit, we were all inside. Doc happened to see her on the camera and said he knew who she was and to let her in. He gave us the 4-1-1 that she was the Suicide Kings’ girl you’d called him in to help, and Archer, Rush, and Nox went ‘own fucking program’ while we were tied up helping you.”
Trig picked up when Dray left off, “Dragon got a call that you’d been taken out and where to find you, he took Duracell and Ghost and were out going for the overlook when she showed up. And then it took me and Dray to get you in where Doc could look at you. Reave was passed out, Dis was following Doc’s orders, and Archer, Rush, and Nox were left to deal with Dani. We had our hands full with you and they weren’t hurting her...” I stopped him.
“She doesn’t look unhurt to me, you see her wrists?” I demanded.
“Yeah, okay, fair enough,” he conceded.
“Finish the fucking story, Man,” I demanded and Dray picked up.
“They locked her in one of the unfurnished rooms out back and posted up outside the door. They wouldn’t let anyone near it until Dragon got back. Wanted to put it to a vote on what to do with her. We didn’t know what happened, you were out and we had nothing to go on until we could talk to you. She was alone in the room and we figured her being locked up wasn’t the worst thing that could happen until this entire shit show could be sorted out.”
He had me there, but just because he was right didn’t mean I had to fucking like it. Trig pressed on, “We fucking argued like a motherfucker but these guys are still new to our ways, so we tried to give them a little leeway. They finally agreed to let Blue in with some water because the dude doesn’t say shit anyways.” That was the truth.
“By the time Blue came out, my dad was back with Duracell and Ghost, with your bike by the way.” That made my lips twitch, she would have been a bitch to replace but honestly, she was just an object, a thing, if anything had happened to Dani… Dray must have read the look on my face because he didn’t dwell on that finer point too long.