by K. L. Savage
He hated me.
He hated me so much, he sold me to the Ruthless Kings in Jersey so he could finally have a pay day. I’m just done.
I hate living. I hate going day by day and never feeling like I do enough. I’m tired of feeling like a stain in this world. The Earth will still spin, people will move on, and Eric will see he’s better off. It’s not like we talk much anyway. I only ever talk to any of the Ruthless Kings when I go to the clubhouse for school breaks.
Everyone avoids me.
It’s like I’m a disease, some sort of plague, and no matter how hard I try, I can’t wash it off.
I’m not sad about dying. I’m sad about trying so hard to live a good life when nothing good ever comes of it. Everywhere I turn, it’s another hit I have to take. It’s life, but you know what I’ve learned? Life isn’t supposed to be this hard. It isn’t supposed to be a constant struggle. It shouldn’t be about trying to get away from the abuse all the time. It’s supposed to be filled with some love, with moments of happiness. I see people living good lives, like the people in the club, laughing, holding hands, having fun, and I’ve never had that.
I’ve always had this looming shadow following me, and it has fed off me for far too long.
Life. Isn’t. Supposed. To. Be. So. Hard.
It’s a chant I repeat in my head every day when I’m swallowing my anti-depressants. Pills that don’t even work.
Obviously.
“Jo—” Eric is interrupted when the door opens, and a doctor with big eyes enlarged by his glasses walks through the door. The top of his head reflects under the light, like he freshly polishes it every day for it to be that slick and shiny. Eric rubs his lips together in a firm line, annoyed the doctor took this moment to walk in to ruin the … whatever this was. He releases my hand and scratches the side of his cheek, the new stubble coarse against his fingers.
“Ah, Ms. Davis. It’s good to have you with us.” He opens the medical chart and hums, then crooks his head to the side when he reads something he understands. He has hair growing out of his ears and nose that needs to be trimmed. He seems to have hair everywhere but on his head. “You gave everyone quite the scare, you know. The waiting room has been full of bikers since you were admitted. I have to say, they are a caring bunch, no matter their appearances.” His voice is old Southern, reminding me of a wealthy man who grew up in Georgia who has sweet tea with his dinner every night. His eyes land on Eric, and that’s when he notices the cut Eric is wearing. “Why, you don’t look the type to be a biker; you lot are surprising me at every turn.” He places the stethoscope in his ears and lays the circular part against my chest, moving it right and left to listen to the different sides of my heart.
Eric rolls his eyes as if he isn’t satisfied with the old man’s technique, and it makes a smile tickle my lips. If I remember one thing about Eric, it’s how peculiar he is about how medicine is practiced.
“I’m going to have a counselor come up and do a consult. I think it’s important that you have therapy. Especially since you are pregnant. You need to be on bedrest for a few weeks. A lot of stress has happened to your body, and I cannot guarantee you won’t miscarry. I can’t believe you haven’t, to be honest.”
“Wait. Back up. Stop!” Eric’s face has gone pale, and he stares at me in pain, despair, hurt, regret. So many emotions are playing in his eyes. He scrubs both hands over his face and drops his arms at his side. “You’re pregnant?” he says on one long breath.
I look away, ashamed. I try not to cry, but seeing the disappointment on his face, the one person I thought would always be there for me, hurts more than I expected.
“I see,” the doctor says. “I’m sorry. I had no idea it was a surprise for your fiancé. I’ll give you two some privacy. I’ll be back to give you more pain meds that are safe for you and the baby.” The doctor pats my shoulder, and his big eyes try to look comforting, but they just remind me of bug eyes.
Fiancé? I don’t understand why the doctor would think that, but I’m not going to argue about something so trivial right now.
His shoes squeak as he walks out the door. He makes sure it’s closed behind him to give us privacy. The tension is tight, nearly suffocating, and when I manage to make myself look at Eric, he’s still staring at me, baffled.
“I… There’s a lot you don’t know, Eric.”
“Tell me, Jo. Stop leaving me out; stop making me guess. What’s going on?” He comes around the bed and sits in a chair, crossing his arms as he does. He isn’t happy with me. His legs are spread wide, his cheeks are red, and his lips are pressed together.
“I don’t know…” I let it all off my chest, hoping it will make me feel freer. “I just found out, and I didn’t think I could be a mom. I wasn’t ready. I don’t remember having sex, Eric. I haven’t had sex since before I was kidnapped. I only remember going to a party, and taking a drink from my friend. I don’t remember anything else. I swear, I don’t remember. It doesn’t mean I’m not held accountable, but I swear.” I lift my watery eyes to his. His fists are clenched on top of his knees, and his eyes are wide with horror. “I swear, I can’t remember. I don’t even remember finishing the drink, Eric. I don’t remember.”
“Jo…” His voice breaks as he comes back to the bed and wraps his arms around me. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying? If so, I need names. I need all the information you can give me. This is club business now.” He puts his nose against my neck and tangles his fingers in my hair. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there. I’ll never let anyone hurt you again,” he promises. “You aren’t alone.” He leans away, and I see the determination, the need for blood, and the honesty shining through his eyes as he cups my face with his hands. “You can count on me.”
My lips purse, and fire spears my eyes when the emotion doesn’t stop. “But I can’t count on me,” I admit weakly, but it feels good to say it out loud. A shaky breath leaves me when his hand falls to my stomach and his thumb rubs back and forth over it. I’m still not sure if I can be a mom, but the way Eric believes in me right now, he’s making me wonder if I can be.
“I’m sorry,” he says, pinching his perfectly groomed brows together. He lifts his hand away and rolls out of bed, sitting on the very edge. “I can’t keep it together.” He stands up and swipes his arm across the nightstand, shattering the lamp as it smacks against the wall. “Who touched you? Who made you cut your arms? Who nearly killed you? Tell me.” Eric kicks the chair, and it slides across the floor and then falls to its side. He drops his arms on the bed and grips the mattress. “Tell me!”
“No,” I answer.
He didn’t expect that answer because he straightens and scoffs, placing his hands on his hips. No one would ever think he would be part of a motorcycle club. I hear the guys when I’m there. They call him pretty boy because he has blue eyes and thick wavy hair. He doesn’t have tattoos, and he dresses nice, unlike the typical t-shirt, jeans, and cuts the other guys wear. Eric is usually in a polo and jeans, or khakis.
“Why? Why won’t you tell me who ra—”
“Don’t! Please, don’t say it. I can’t hear that right now, Eric. I don’t know if that’s what happened. For all I know, I got drunk, I had sex, and this is the consequence. Also, no one made me cut my arms; that was me. I wanted to kill myself. That isn’t on anyone but me.”
“You’d rather die than be a mom?”
I lay my head against the pillow and clear my throat. “No, of course not, but I’m not cut out to be a mom, Eric. Look at me. I’m under psychological evaluation. I have twelve-inch cuts down each arm. Part of me wishes I was still dead. A kid deserves more than that. I panicked! Did it influence the decision to cut my arms? Yes. I was scared. I’m still scared. I can’t take care of myself. How am I going to take care of a baby?”
He doesn’t say anything. There’s nothing to say.
He knows I’m right.
I wish like hell I wasn’t.
A few hours later, I walk out of the room
after she falls asleep. I lean against the wall, completely fucking drained. The ridges of the scars along my back start to itch from the stress of today, and I close my eyes, telling myself that my dad isn’t here. The wounds are old. They aren’t who I am.
Liar.
They made me the man I am today.
What I’d give to know the name of the man who took advantage of her. I want the entire story. I swear, if I find out that he touched her without consent, I’m going to strap him to my table and cut every inch of flesh like my father did to me.
“Goddamn it.” I scrub my fingers over my brows then rub my eyes. I’m so damn tired. The whole world is weighing on me. Well, maybe not the entire world, just Jo. The one woman who I thought I’d be able to date when she came home, but that’s not going to happen. Shooting my shot is out the damn window. She’s not going to want anything to do with me after what’s happened to her.
My stomach is in sickening knots. I don’t have the comfort in knowing what will happen with her tomorrow or the next day. I don’t know if she’ll want to keep the baby or give it up for adoption, but I know one thing…
She isn’t alone. No matter how she wants me—friend, lover, nothing—I am here. I’ll love that child like it’s my own. I never gave thought to having kids, and by the looks of it, neither did Jo. It’s her choice. It’s all her choice.
Jo has to choose to live.
Jo has to choose motherhood.
I can’t push it on her, or she will end up hating me before I can get her to fall in love with me. Even after all of this, I feel something with her that I want to explore. I want to prove that I can be there for her. I can be worth it. I can show her that she is worth it. I’ll help her find herself.
I’ll be her stepping-stone, her armor, the softness when she needs to cry. The first time I saw her, she was happy, smiling, took what happened to her with a grain of salt, but I fucking knew. I saw the shadows in her eyes, the pain she held, the mask she made sure no one could see through.
I could.
Pain notices pain.
Abuse recognizes abuse.
With every slash against my back, a memory played in her eyes.
The two of us, we are cut from the same cloth, even if she doesn’t want to admit it. I’ve had most of my life to deal what happened to me. Jo didn’t have that. She made it the best she could without asking for a damn thing. She still hasn’t asked, but she doesn’t need to.
“Are you okay?” Jo’s doctor’s aged voice grabs my attention. I open my eyelids, grainy with exhaustion, and stare into his big eyes.
“I’m fine. I just need a minute. Some food too.” My stomach rumbles, reminding me that I haven’t eaten since breakfast yesterday. I’m starving.
“She’ll be okay. I know it doesn’t seem like it now, but I’ve seen my fair share of cases like this in my time. You just get a feeling, a gut instinct about people, and sometimes I know when someone is too far gone. I don’t think she is.”
“Code Blue. Room 564. Paging Doctor Abernathy. Code Blue. Room 564. Paging Doctor Abernathy,” the woman blares over the intercom.
“Excuse me. I need to go.”
I watch him scurry down the hallway, disappearing as he takes a left in hopes to save a patient’s life. I miss that. I miss the codes in the hospitals and being rushed into surgery. I shouldn’t complain. I have enough work to keep me busy at the club, but it isn’t like this. I miss the rush of going into surgery.
Don’t get me wrong, I stitch up club members all the time, remove a bullet or two, but I never get to see a bad car accident. An accident where the body is mangled to the point that survival seems impossible, but then somehow, the person fights for their life, and it’s up to us to save them. It’s pressure, it’s anxiety, it’s terrifying, and I fucking miss that feeling.
At the end of the day, it’s hard not to feel like a superhero after the rush of saving a life. It’s usually short-lived because I’ve learned if there is someone who lives it’s because someone has died. There is a balance. That much I believe.
My phone vibrates in my pocket, but I’m too tired to answer, so I let it ring until it goes to voicemail. I turn in the opposite direction, away from the emergency room, and toward the vending machines. I pass a few nurses, some wearing pink scrubs, some blue, green, all color-coded differently to show which department they work in. A few check me out, and I give them a kind, half-smile in return, but I’m not interested.
I’m interested in the woman laying in bed, fighting her battles all alone. Maybe it’s because I know what it’s like—to be alone, to struggle, to feel that impending doom. She’s screaming on the inside, and the only person who can hear her is me.
I pull out my wallet and insert some cash into the machine. I punch the number for a questionable looking sandwich I shouldn’t eat, but I’m going to anyway. The silver spring uncoils, and right as my sandwich is about to fall, it stops.
“Are you kidding?” I slap the side of the machine to try to knock the sandwich loose, but it doesn’t work. “Of course, you’d take my money.” I bang my head against the thick plastic then kick it.
“You know, sometimes things need a gentler touch,” a sultry voice says from beside me.
I peer over my arm and see a short, curvy woman with beautiful long red hair, smirking at me. “Is that so?” I ask, only flirting in return so I don’t hurt her feelings. She’s wearing pink scrubs and on the left breast says her name, Mindy. She’s cute. Sane. Not fucked up.
Which is cool if you like that kind of thing.
I like my women to be a bit of a mess.
“Oh, yeah,” she says, running her hand up and down the side of the machine. She taps the top of the machine three times, then kicks the bottom, and then adds another whack in the middle.
“I’ll be damn,” I say, impressed. “Isn’t that fancy?”
“Just a thing or two you learn once you work here long enough,” she says, leaning against the wall and crossing her arms under her ample tits. Her eyes land on my name on my cut, and immediately I’m annoyed.
She’s one of those.
She’s a biker bitch.
“Thanks.” I wave my sandwich in the air. “I need to go.”
Her fingers dig into my arm as she stops me from walking away. “How about you and I go out sometime? I’ve always wanted a Ruthless King.”
You know what I find really annoying? Easy women. It isn’t because they like sex. I don’t have a problem with women getting their own. We have cut-sluts for a reason. I’ve had my dick sucked by a few, like Candy and Jasmine. Humans need touch, passion, sex. It’s natural. There’s no judgment. But I don’t like women who have an ulterior motive for their actions. Want to fuck?
Great.
You want to fuck but somehow figure out how to get in the club or maybe trap one of us? That’s my problem, and she has biker bitch written all fucking over her, especially with how she’s rubbing her nails up and down my biceps.
“No, thanks for the offer, but I’m taken.”
“She doesn’t need to know,” she purrs, biting her bottom lip into her mouth. She rubs her breasts against me, and I grab her arms and push her against the vending machine. Her mouth drops open on a moan, liking it a bit rough, but I’m not getting hard off this. I’m getting pissed the fuck off. “Yeah, I like that, Doc.” She emphasizes the C in my name. “Unlike this machine, I like it a little rougher.”
“Let me get something through your head, sweetheart.” I bend my head down and act like I’m about to kiss her. “I’m not interested. If you’re looking to become a cut-slut, you’re welcome at the clubhouse, and I’m sure there are a few guys there who would be happy to run a train on your ass. I’m not interested.” I let go of her arms and see the water pooling in her eyes. Everyone thinks I’m this great guy, head on straight, no temper, but I have the worst temper of all.
My fuse is short, and there has only ever been one person to sizzle it out with just her presence.
And it isn’t some whore of a nurse.
“You get me, sweetheart?”
Her brown eyes turn hard, and the lust vanishes. She has a few freckles dotting her nose, and her lashes are long and thick. She’s cute, but her personality seems to carry ill intentions.
“Your loss,” she snips, straightening her top and fluffing her hair.
I start to walk away, but the need to have the last word takes over. “Yeah, I highly doubt that,” I spit over my shoulder.
“Asshole,” she mumbles behind me.
Yeah, I’ve heard that before. I don’t care.
My boots pound against the hallway as I pass medical carts near a few closed rooms. I reach Jo’s room and take a minute to compose myself. I don’t want to be the guy with a bad temper with her. My phone vibrates again, and this time I don’t ignore it. I dig into my jean pocket and pull the damn thing out. My stomach drops when I see Reaper’s name.
“Doc, here,” I answer quickly and nod at another doctor who walks by, giving me a look that says he doesn’t like me standing outside of a room for no reason.
“Doc, we need you… There’s been a…” The phone goes in and out, replaced with static. I can hear screams in the background and another round of fire.
“Reaper? Reaper? What’s going on? What did you say?” I plug my right ear to try to hear what he says, but it’s static. “Reaper!”
“So many gunshot wounds. Get here. Now!”
I hear another round of gunshots before the line goes dead. “Fuck,” I hiss and hang up the phone. I run into Jo’s room and see that she’s sleeping. I don’t want to wake her, but I don’t want her to think I’ve left her either. “Jo? Jo, I need you to wake up. Jo, love, come on. Wake up for me.” I’m careful to only touch her shoulders, not wanting to go anywhere near her arms. Her beautiful green eyes open, and those dark lashes flutter like butterfly wings across the tops of her cheeks.
Fuck, she’s gorgeous.