Property of Fang (Kings of Anarchy MC: Minnesota #3)

One

JENNA

“What do you mean she isn’t breathing?”

I frown at the disruption to my dreamworld, refusing to open my eyes after I finally found the ability to sleep in this fucking hellhole.

“I mean, there’s no goddamn air going in or out of her lungs, dumbass.”

I don’t blame Nandi for snapping at Kathy. The initial statement was pretty black-and-white. But then again, things get rather topsy-turvy when you’ve been stuck in the same damp room with the same group of traumatized women for days.

Something shifts against where I lie on my side on the unforgiving concrete, pressing against my mid-section. “Are you sure?” Kathy hisses under her breath. “Maybe she’s a shallow breather?” Guessing the weight is her leg, given her voice sounds as though she kneels over top of me.

“Look at her fucking lips,” Nandi growls through undoubtedly gritted teeth. “Do they look alive to you?”

Fuck it all. I’m awake now. Might as well see what the commotion is about. There are eight women down here—including me—and at least two are addicts forced into a rapid detox. Whoever they argue about, I’d wager the woman is more than alive—just in a dead sleep after a night of withdrawals.

“Whoever it is that you two bitch about,” I snap, rubbing my index finger in the corner of my eye before cracking them open, “I’m sure she’ll be awake in no time with the ruckus you make.”

Kathy rears back to sit on her heels, hands fisted atop her thighs. Her pale blue eyes are wide with an impending meltdown, which wouldn’t be great considering her fingertips are still raw and bloodied, nails split, from a small lapse in sanity yesterday.

I lift an eyebrow at her. “Have you felt for a pulse?”

Nandi sighs. “Of course, we fucking have.”

“Then why are you two arguing about whether she’s breathing or not? Surely that would have told you if she kicked the bucket.” I push up to sit, and twist to see who Nandi fusses over.

Oh, shit. My head swims, stomach plummeting when the memory of last night’s events comes back in sickening 4K clarity. No wonder I slept so well. Yeah. She’s dead. I don’t have to touch her to know.

“See,” Nandi snaps at Kathy, gesturing to my state of shock. “She understands.”

“Would you three shut the hell up?” Darla rolls away from the wall to face our small committee, wild curls matted in a nest around her shoulders. “Unless you want to add to the body count.” She glares at the stiff woman beyond us. “Whatever happened to her, she deserved it.”

I mean, she’s not wholly wrong…

“Fuck this shit.” Nandi scuttles to the other side of the small room. “She creeps me out.”

Kathy glances to The Kid—a mute girl, all of eight or nine years old, curled against Eleanor’s side. The latter stares at us with blatant frustration. “Whatever you do,” she whispers, “move her so The Kid doesn’t see.”

“Is there anything we can throw over her?” Nandi asks, looking about the musty room.

I glance to the cinder block walls and then up to the timber sub-floor over our heads. “Sure,” I sass. “I’ll just tear one of the curtains down. I’m sure they won’t mind.” The only thing that filters light through the tiny square window high above the body is cobwebs.

And bars. Crudely welded bars. Probably added by whoever decided to move us here.

“Do you always have to be such a smartass?” Eleanor snipes.

I shrug. Saves acknowledging my true feelings about the situation.

About how badly I may have fucked up.

“You’re all a bunch of sooks,” Darla grouses, rousing herself from her sleeping position to crawl over to the body.

Give her cheeks some color and warmth, and you’d almost think Mary-Beth were having the best damn dream of her life. The tiniest smile tugs at one side of her pale, pillowy lips. The sight irritates me more than it should. Even in death, the woman mocks me with the truth.

“Give me a hand, will you?” Darla shoves her forearms beneath Mary-Beth’s right shoulder to scoop her up.

“What are you going to do?” Nandi drops down beside her and does the same with the woman’s hips and legs.

“Roll her so that her back is to us.” She heaves a breath and does as she said, positioning Mary-Beth with Nandi’s help so that her lifeless face is concealed against the wall.

I glance away when Darla fights Mary-Beth’s stiffening arm to adjust it over her side more naturally.

Kathy looks as though she’s ready to vomit.

“At least when The Kid wakes, it’ll look as though she’s just asleep.” Darla moves back to her position and tugs one of the stained and torn blankets from the stuffing of her makeshift pallet. “Here.” She tosses it to Nandi. “Cover her body with this.”

Pretty sure what they gave us to sleep on are dog beds, considering the inadequate size.

“What are we going to tell them when they come downstairs?” Eleanor asks.

“Nothing,” I say, snapping out of my reverie. “All they need to know is that we thought she was still asleep, too.”

She scoffs. “Yeah, because they won’t ask questions when they see that or nothing, right?” She nods to the back of Mary-Beth’s head.

To the swathe of matted hair, thick with dried blood. I shift my attention to the floor. To the matching patch almost indiscernible amongst the dark coating of dust and dirt. Fuck.

“Whatever you decide,” Mila says in a whisper, joining the conversation as she huddles in the far corner. “You better do it quick because the creep will be down soon.”

“How do you know that?” Nandi grumbles. “You’ve been asleep yourself.”

“If you’d all shut up for a minute,” Mila retorts, “You’d hear them. Like I do.”

The room falls silent as we all attune to the dull but definite noises coming from the topside of the floor over our heads. Soft, as though muffled by carpet, but undeniably the footsteps of one of our captors as he heads for the other side of the house.

To where the front door is.

Which leads him outside and to the entrance of our cellar.

“Damn it.” I scoot backward until my spine hits the wall and then turn my body away from Mary-Beth’s head, hugging my legs to pretend that I try to doze a little. “Get your shit together, girls.”

The footsteps quiet for long, painful seconds as he presumably crosses the grass. My heartbeat echoes in my ears. What if they figure it out? He couldn’t. How would they know what happened? Relax, Jenna. This shit probably happens all the time.

The screech of the cellar door hinges plucks the taut wire of my nerves.

Mila’s eyes widen, her gaze held fast to mine as the guy drops heavily down the wooden stairs, one painfully slow riser at a time.

Eleanor closes her eyes and feigns sleep—arms around The Kid—but not before landing me with one last bitter glare.

I don’t get a chance to check on Nandi or Darla; the bolt slides on the far side of our narrow doorway with an ominous scratch.

I drop my lids, soften my face, and fake sleepiness. All while watching the floor before me through the tiny lash-filled gap I leave open. Socks. A pair of worn, woolen socks step into the room, threadbare jeans dragging the floor behind them.

“The fuck you hens squawking about?”

Shit. It’s the older one of the two who drove us here.

“Any one of you bitches gonna answer me?”

Easily over six feet, he’s broad yet unfit, sporting a sizable belly under his shirt. I don’t doubt the aging guy could still inflict a hell of a lot of damage if he wanted to, though. All a person needs is enough rage to be capable of inhuman things.

I roll my body off the wall and lift my head, doing my best not to acknowledge Mary-Beth in my periphery. “Nobody said anything.”

The guy spins toward me and bends to meet my gaze, hands braced on his knees.

I choose to focus on the dirt under his short nails rather than look him in his sunken, cruel eyes.

“Bullshit.” His meaty palm meets my forehead, and he shoves me back, narrowly missing cracking my skull against the wall. “I heard you bitches talking.” The guy straightens and looks around the room at each of us, a silent threat passing through the group. “You making some plan to escape?”

“And how exactly do you think we’d manage that?” I say. “Through the tiny, barred window? We’re not that stupid.” Call it a death wish, but I can’t resist challenging him every time he shows his drawn face down here.

“Stupid enough to get yourselves stuck here.” Asshole smirks, knowing he’s got me with that one.

“It was probably me that you heard,” Eleanor blurts, defusing the building tension. “The Kid had a bad dream, but I got her back to sleep before she woke anyone.”

His shrewd gaze lands on The Kid’s blonde head, the young girl somehow still oblivious to the danger in the room. “Didn’t sound like no kid’s voice.”

“That’s what it was.” Eleanor holds his gaze, jaw firm. “I swear.”

He shifts focus to Darla. “That so? Is she telling me the truth?”

Arm linked with Mila’s, she nods. “I’d take her word for it. Not that I’d know for sure since, as she said, she got her settled again before any of us woke up.”

“Then why are you all awake now?” He shoves Kathy in the back with his toes. “You awake, too, bitch?”

Her frightened eyes find mine before she shutters them again, lips pressed tight.

He kicks her in the lower back again. Harder. “I said, are you awake bitch?”

She whimpers, but says nothing, faking rousing from sleep instead.

“And you.” He steps toward Mary-Beth. “You fucking lying around being lazy too?”

I swear all the air leaves the room with our collective inhale.

Six sets of eyes watch the man as he stands over Mary-Beth’s body, canting his head to look her over. “You gonna wake up for me too, sweetheart?” He pushes her in the butt with the sole of his socked foot.

Her body rocks forward—arm and face pressed awkwardly into the wall—and doesn’t shift back.

Shit. Nobody could stay asleep in that position.

“Mary-Beth,” I say with an edge of frustration to my tone. “Wake up.”

Eleanor lifts an eyebrow at my weak performance. The Kid wriggles by her side.

“Come on.” Our captor leans down to grab Mary-Beth by the shirt. “Get up.”