Chapter Four
They dragged the dark-haired woman across the yard, kicking her legs and thrashing her body.
At least someone had the sense to tie her up.
She was like a wildcat caught in a trap.
Terrified. Dangerous. Out for blood. What the club was going to do with her, I didn’t know.
I didn’t make those decisions. I did as I was told.
Whatever that was. And I did it gladly. These were my brothers.
If we were told to take a life, we did. No questions asked.
Well, not many. I liked to know who I was killing.
Why I was ending their lives. Because that would direct how I did it.
Slow and painful or quick and all businesslike.
She would be no different, if and when the time came.
But I still watched the angry, hissing woman yanked towards me, and listened to the jeers of the men in the club.
Men with blood pumping in their veins and cocks, yelling out what they were going to do to her.
The death of a brother did a funny thing to the club.
To the men. It stoked anger and fired up retribution.
And we didn’t care who answered for it. So why did I feel a bubble of anger each time one of those men grabbed his crotch and insinuated what he was going to do to the blindfolded woman paraded past them?
She was just payback. A life for a life.
It was the MC way, after all, even if she strictly speaking, she wasn’t a King herself.
Her life would be taken as they had taken one of ours.
She must have sensed the opening of the building approaching as suddenly she burst with energy once more.
Forcing her weight against the men holding her, pulling and kicking, throwing her head into the surrounding air as she thrust it in any direction to hit someone.
The crowd of bikers surrounding her cheered, and it sounded like a goal had been scored at a football match.
The woman’s effort intensified, battling against the hold of the men.
Only this time her aim caught as she spun hard, flinging her bound wrists over her shoulder and catching Tommo square in the nose.
The pussy fell to his knees, letting go of her, clutching at his face.
She swung the other way, hoping to connect but getting nothing but thin air instead. The other man stepped away from her too, more concerned for his face now that his brother was on the floor with blood running through his fingers.
“Fucking bitch broke my nose,” Tommo groaned from his knees.
The woman hopped around on two bound legs, escaping blindly, but going nowhere.
“Fuck’s sake,” Skinny bellowed. “Someone fucking get hold of her.”
Men moved forward. Desperate to get their filthy hands on her.
The first touch. Hoping they’d get the chance to slip them somewhere else.
The woman stumbled, teetered sideways and fell onto her shoulder.
The yelp from her throat came out involuntarily.
The sign of real pain as she landed heavily.
I pushed through the men surrounding her, who’d pulled her to her feet as she tried to fight them off again.
“Fuck!” another shouted. “She fucking bit me.”
The surrounding bikers wrestled her back onto tied feet, diving and ducking as she flailed her arms.
“Fuck’s sake,” I grumbled, barely audible over the commotion in the yard. “Out the fucking way,” I ordered.
The men cleared my path, and I waited for the swing of her arms, stepping underneath the arc as she threw them towards me, and ducking.
I pushed into her with my shoulder, the momentum sending her over the top of me.
And then I stood, the screaming, fighting woman pounding on my back with the heels of her tied hands.
“Get her inside, Chase. I’m fucking bored with this shit now,” Dougal’s Scottish tone instructed from my right-hand side.
*****
She hung heavily from the winch lowered from the ceiling.
The tips of her toes dragged on the floor, her arms stretched above her, cable ties binding her hands and slipped over the big metal hook.
She would wobble every few minutes, tiredness making it hard to support her own weight on the very end of her feet, her head sagging forwards momentarily.
“What we doing with her now?” I asked Skinny, who stood smoking on my left-hand side.
“Dougal wants her videoed. Send a message to the Kings that we’ve got her.”
“Who is she anyway?”
“Fury’s sister.”
“Fuck,” I groaned.
“What?”
“You know how fucking wild this is going to get? Thought she was just a club whore or something.”
“You reckon the Kings would let a random woman ride with them on their own bike?” Skinny chuckled.
“She rides?”
“Aye, Chase. A fucking Busa.”
“A Hayabusa? You sure?”
“I chased her fucking down on it. She was pretty fucking fast too. Took us twenty miles to catch her. Reckon she would give you a run for your money.”
I shook my head. No one in this club could outride me.
Not anymore. And there was no way a woman could.
I looked again at the woman hanging from the winch, at the tight racing leathers, the material straining around the arms as she wobbled.
Her lips pursed, resistant, stubborn, in control.
For now. But the Rats would break her down.
Bit by bit, we’d rip her apart. Because Mikey needed to be avenged, and I didn’t care who it was hanging from the ceiling, dangling in the middle of the floor for all of us to see.
The factory lights flicked on everywhere.
Bright white light illuminated her body, scattering her shadow in all directions.
The woman winced. Sensing the light even behind the blindfold tightly wedged over her eyes.
The men in the room hushed. No one speaking.
The whirr of voices stilling and silence swooping in to take its place.
The woman’s head snapped up, turning left and right, looking and searching and seeing nothing.
Dougal stood in front of her, mobile in hand, the camera running, capturing her strung up and hanging from the winch hook like a piece of meat. Exactly how the Rats would treat her.
“Got one of yours here, Indie,” his Scottish tone drawled.
The woman’s head pricked up, her blindfolded eyes staring straight at the spot where he stood.
“You killed one of ours today, Indie. You know the rules. An eye for an eye…” Dougal glanced over his shoulder, nodding at Skinny.
The gangly vice president sauntered over to the woman hanging from the winch.
He smiled towards the camera, flashing a mouth of gaps and marbled teeth, then reached round behind her, grabbing her plait and yanking hard.
Her head snapped back, her throat bared to the president she couldn’t see.
The woman kicked out again, flailing her legs, her weight sinking onto her shoulder blades.
“Fucking stand still,” Skinny hissed, pulling the knife from its sheath on his waist.
He placed the metal against her throat. The woman stilled, recognising the feel of steel against her throat. Her chest heaved a breath. Steadying herself or preparing for another fight, I wasn’t sure.
“We’ll gut her throat to cunt,” Dougal continued, the camera moving down her body then moving back to where Skinny held the blade against her. “But not before we’ve all had our fun with her.”
I pushed my lips together, watching her intently. She didn’t react in fear; her face scrunching up like she suddenly had a bad taste in her mouth. And then she exploded wildly, like nothing I’d ever seen before.
Skinny hadn’t been ready for her. Too fixated on parading her for the camera. The heel of her boot connected hard with his knee, his leg twisting out from under him, before he hit the floor like a blown-up high rise. The Vice President yelled, then groaned, grabbing his kneecap.
“Fucking bitch,” he pushed out through gritted teeth.
The woman on the winch stilled, tipping her chin up defiantly. She couldn’t see where the rest of us were. But stared straight at us, anyway. Then her face pulled, transforming, and the smile broke on her lips, wide, animated, smug.
“Don’t just fucking stand there, Chase. Help me up. Bitch has busted my knee.”
I crossed the floor slowly, struggling to keep my eyes off the hanging woman. Dougal turned the phone off.
“I’ll have to fucking edit all that now,” he grumbled, fumbling meaty fingers over the handset.
I scooped the Vice President off the floor and back onto his feet, Skinny groaning. The woman beside me was still, the smile dissolving from her face, replaced by tension, and a hint of anger. Skinny’s knee stuck out at a weird angle, a funny lump protruding through his jeans.
“Fuck,” I breathed. “Ya knee’s dislocated, brother.”
“Aye, I can feel the bastard.”
Above me, the smile returned.