Chapter Thirty-One
Grace
TRIGGER WARNING: This chapter contains depictions of graphic sexual violence including gang rape. This can be upsetting to readers. Please use your judgment before continuing. Your mental health is more important than the story
Following the shootout and kidnapping...
The sound of angry voices hung on the edge of my consciousness. My head pounded, but when I opened my eyes, my body stiffened. I couldn’t see. There was something over my head, and everything came flooding back.
The look on Karlyn’s face when I told her what I had planned to do. The call from Beck that Maureen was in labor. The sound of the window breaking as a bullet went through it into Johnny’s chest.
Johnny!
His voice was barely a whisper as he told me to run. Only, I couldn’t move. My knees were locked in place until the back door opened and men rushed in.
The sound of terror pierced the small shop, and my body shook when I realized that it had come from me. Men I didn’t recognize rushed forward, grabbing my arm. As they pulled me toward the back, I screamed again. I clawed at the iron grip that held my wrist.
I dug in my heels against the wooden floor, praying the others would come in and save us.
I knew they were out there. But the sound of gunfire told me they weren’t coming.
There were too many enemies and not enough Shadows.
This was my fault. I never should have left, but I let my emotions, my anger, and my pride get the better of me.
This was what he was afraid of. This was why he was so controlling. He’d known they would never stop coming for me. Now they were here.
My hand shot out, trying to hurt the man who dragged me.
It was no use. I knew I was no match for them.
But I fought just the same. Leaning over, I bit his hand.
When he let go and pulled his hand back, I took my shot and tried to slip away.
I didn’t get far before another one grabbed me.
When I screamed again, he punched me in the face.
The next thing I knew was darkness.
Even awake, all I saw was darkness. But the metal beneath my body, and the way the vehicle jerked to a stop, was all I needed to know that I had lost the battle.
I quickly closed my eyes as the hood was ripped from my head. I tried to pretend, tried to make them believe I was still unconscious. But the feel of a large hand roughly grabbing my breast told me they didn’t care if I was awake or not.
Something told me they might not care if I was even alive.
“This is the bitch I want,” a rough voice from years of smoking said. Another hand grabbed my legs, pulling me across the floor, then throwing me over his shoulder.
As he carried me away, I heard the sounds of a struggle. I opened one eye in time to see Karlyn punch one of the men. And another man, taller, bulkier than the others, slapped the back of his hand across her face, knocking her to the floor.
The door closed before I could hear or see anything else. My body was tossed onto a bed, and all thoughts of Karlyn disappeared as the man in front of me, a president patch on his cut, sneered down at me.
His leering gaze told me my fate. I didn’t have to guess. I knew that look. I’d seen it on Freeway’s face when he came to our house. He’d drag my mother to her room while I sat in front of the television listening to her screams.
The same screams that I knew would be torn from my chest in a matter of moments. Tears filled my eyes as I thought of my mother, and the secret she never told anyone. The experience we were about to share. I had truly become my mother.
I scurried back against the headboard, a desperate attempt to stave off what I knew was about to happen. Lying to myself that I would survive this. That King would find me.
Save me.
Protect me.
The irony of what I was begging for wasn’t lost on me. The thing I had been fighting him on for years was the one thing I wanted from him now. I yearned for his possessiveness and unforgiving need for control.
“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” The president laughed as he grabbed my ankles and pulled me back. I flipped myself over onto my stomach, kicking at him, my hands grabbing the blankets on the bed.
My fingers tore through the worn material as I frantically sought purchase. I reached out for the headboard as a hand slapped my ass. The force caused me to wince, my hand drawing back, and I lost any chance of pulling myself away from my tormentors.
I sobbed as my clothes were ripped from my body until I lay on the bed. Bare for their eyes to look their fill. Exposed to the many men that surrounded the bed as the president, named Skinner, ordered, “Tie her up.”
Ropes bit into my skin at my wrists and ankles as the men rushed to do their president’s bidding. All hoping, I knew, to be offered a piece of the prize that lay before them.
I stared at the ceiling as I futilely pulled at my bindings. All the while knowing that my fate was sealed. Even if I was able to loosen the ties, I had nowhere to run. I didn’t know where we were, and there were too many men to escape from.
I closed my eyes tightly when I heard belt buckles hitting the floor. Tears spilled down my cheeks with each resounding thud as the men removed their clothing. I tried to close my legs, but the ropes that secured me to the bed were pulled tight, preventing me from moving.
I prayed that maybe, just maybe, if I couldn’t see them, I wouldn’t feel them. It was a foolish prayer; one I knew would go unanswered.
Laughter rang through the air as I cried out when rough hands squeezed my breasts. Calloused fingers invaded me, and I screamed as the untrimmed fingernails tore at the delicate skin between my legs.
“She ready for me, Striker?”
“Dry as a fucking bone, Prez.”
“Just the way I like it.”
The fingers inside me retreated, only to be replaced by someone rougher.
“She’s tight,” Skinner boasted. “King must be all bark and no bite if she’s still this fucking tight.
” Skinner pulled his hand back and placed it on my thigh as he kneeled between my legs.
He leaned over me to whisper in my ear. “This all could have been avoided if King had just given me what I wanted.”
Then, he slammed his dick inside me, as I sobbed. The laughter and cheers only roared louder, drowning out my screams as I begged them to stop.
My voice grew hoarse and my sobs stopped. I had nothing left. No tears, no voice. I lay there tied to the bed, staring at the ceiling as the men surrounded me.
Once more I closed my eyes, blocking out the sight of Skinner rutting inside me as his men played with their dicks.
Trying to disappear, to block out the horror, I thought of King.
I tried to remember the times he came to me in the dark, the conversations we shared, the trust we’d built.
Because for all my anger, I trusted him.
I loved him. I should have told him. Should have said the words when he did, but I let my pride get in the way. Now I would never have the chance.
No matter how much I tried to block it out, the sounds were inescapable. The grunts and groans of the men as Skinner thrust inside me, halting only once he came. Then, the feel of cum splashing against my skin as they all finished after their president.
“You get that?” Skinner asked as he pulled out of me.
“Every last drop,” one of his men boasted.
I opened my eyes and saw the phone in Skinner’s hand. I heard echoes of my own screams that would forever live in my head and realized someone had filmed everything that had happened to me.
“Send it over. I want that son of a bitch to know exactly what he’s getting back,” Skinner ordered. “Untie her and get her dressed.”
“Why we gotta give her back?”
“Because she’s leverage. Without offering her, I won’t get what I want,” Skinner said.
“Don’t we get a turn?”
Skinner turned to look me over, then looked at his men. “You have thirty minutes,” he instructed, then walked out of the room.
The men lined up and one after another took their turns using my body in a way that I never imagined. The pain and agony of the brutal assault not only broke my body, but my soul.
I knew if I survived, I would never be the same. Everything had changed now. My life in Diamond Creek was over.
Time passed in a haze of pain and humiliation as each man took his turn allotted by their president. When the last man was done, Skinner returned. He ordered them to get me dressed. Then loaded me back into the van with Karlyn.
I curled up in the corner of the empty vehicle. My arms wrapped around my legs, my head resting on my knees, as I silently cried. Karlyn moved closer and put her arm around me.
“You’ll get through this, Grace. I promise.”
Her words, meant to soothe, only caused me to cry harder.
I didn’t want to get through this. I didn’t want this at all.
But I deserved it. I’d been so stupid. This was Karma.
When I’d made my plan to hurt Steele by using King, I hadn’t thought about anyone but myself.
I hadn’t thought about the thousands of women who had been raped and never believed.
Or the ones too afraid to even tell someone.
I thought about them now, though, and I wanted to apologize to every single one of them.
Starting with Aspen. And Beck. She’d almost been raped last year.
I was so damn thankful she’d fought him off.
Whereas Aspen couldn’t remember her attack, and for that, I was glad.
I wished I could forget. I wished I could go back in time.
I should have stayed in New Orleans. I had a good life there.
I didn’t deserve to be their friend. I no longer deserved this life I’d built.
The van stopped and the doors opened. My body stiffened; I couldn’t take any more. I huddled back into the corner, trying to make myself smaller. Trying to hide somehow.
Two men climbed into the van and dragged Karlyn out. She was quiet, and I wondered if she’d resigned herself to her fate. How did she do that? I couldn’t understand how you could just give in. How someone could not care how they were violated and used by so many men.
When two more climbed in, I sobbed, “Please, no.”
The men laughed, and I tried to scurry away. They grabbed my arms, but I refused to give up. I refused to lay down and let them hurt me again. I kicked and clawed until one of them hit me. The punch stunned me enough that they grabbed me and dragged me into the night.
Karlyn was on the ground, her face a mask of anger as she glared at the man standing over her. My captors threw me on the ground, and I crashed into her. She put her arms around me and held me. I didn’t deserve her compassion. I didn’t deserve her protection, as futile as it was.
I didn’t know how long we sat there, Vulture’s gun trained on us. The sound of the falls was loud, but not enough to drown out the rumble of approaching bikes.
Skinner grabbed my arm and lifted me from the ground, while Vulture did the same to Karlyn. They dragged us closer to the edge, and I knew what their plan was. I knew I wouldn’t make it out of this alive.
I tipped my head back and looked at the night sky. Thousands of stars twinkled back at me, and I prayed that she was listening. I wanted to see her again. I hadn’t planned on it being this soon, but I knew she was waiting for me.
“I’m coming, Mama,” I whispered as I heard him scream my name. I saw him running toward me, the gun in his hand, and I silently begged him to aim it at me.
“I love you, King,” I said on a sob as Skinner shoved me and I tipped over the side into the depths below.