Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
RYANN
“Little dove,” Victor smirks, stroking my cheek, “I said you would be brought back to where you belong. Your new owner’s looking forward to taking you to your new home at daylight.” He leans forward a bit, getting close. “It’s going to be a good thing for you. This one wants one girl to stay in his bed and bear children for him.”
My stomach coils and tightens at the very thought. A chill rushes down my spine, and I want nothing more than to get out of these restraints and run. To get away from this man and the rest of them.
Victor isn’t the only one in the room.
I woke up not ten minutes ago to find myself restrained, hands over my head, my feet barely touching the ground. In this position, there’s no getting out. Not with the way they have my hands cuffed.
Behind Victor were several men, all of them shielded in the dark. Victor had been on the phone at first, speaking to the Bishop himself. Or that’s what I’m assuming, considering he’d said the name right before ending the call.
“What, got nothing to say?” Victor snickers, sliding his hand from my cheek to tangle in my hair. “It’s a shame your new owner asked that you not be harmed in any way. He didn’t want you bruised or used.”
I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from saying what I really want to him.
“Now, as for your friend, Gianna, the Bishop has decided he intends to keep her for himself for a while. That is once we can get our hands on her. She’s a slippery little thing. We know she’s at the clubhouse now. We intend to get her, but getting you took precedence.”
“Right,” I manage to get out through gritted teeth.
“It’s a shame Bishop ordered no causalities. I’d have loved to have seen those men dead. They’re a pain in my ass. Have been for quite some time.”
My heart nearly stops at the mention of the men dead. Images of Sabotage going to his knees. He’d been shot. Fear for Sabotage washes through me, and dread that I’ll never see him again has me nearly buckling.
I want to cry.
I want to escape.
I want to find my way back to Sabotage.
With him hurt, there’s no way he’ll be able to come for me. I remember the shots fired.
It’s all I can do to keep from sobbing, but I won’t let these men see me break.
They might have sold me to someone new.
The club might not get to me. I’m sure they know by now I’m missing, but they won’t know where to find me. I don’t even know where I am or how long I’d been out before waking up.
If I can’t get out of here before dawn, I might as well seal my fate to death because I won’t allow anyone to touch me or force me to carry their children. I won’t go through that again.
It was hell at the hands of ‘Master’, but he hadn’t even gotten close to what we’d seen him do others. He was a nightmare. I saw them raped and tortured. I saw them give birth, crying and pleading for their lives, and for the child’s. In the end, when he was done with them, he’d killed them. I don’t know what happened to the girls, but the boys were all in foster care now. I knew Fawn checked in on them often.
She was the fixation that started it all. Wherever she moved, we were all moved as ‘Master’ and those who helped him also followed and stalked her.
It’s all I can do to block Victor and the others out of my mind. To escape into my head where they couldn’t hurt me. Not mentally, that is. Or more than they already have.
Images of Sabotage going to his knees, the look of fury in his eyes, keep playing on repeat.
I want to know that he’s okay and that he’s not hurt.
I want to tell him I’m sorry.
If I hadn’t gone out the back . . . none of this would have happened.
It’s my fault, and I hate myself for it.
Victor’s phone rings again, and he moves away from me to answer it. I can hear him on the phone, but he keeps his voice low enough I can’t hear what he’s saying.
Long moments later, a window shatters, and again, all hell breaks loose when something is thrown through and lands on the floor. A flash bang goes off, and my ears ring sharply. There’s no way to shield them.
Through the commotion, I can hear Victor shouting orders.
Behind me, men storm in, and I can’t see them as much as I can hear them. With me being restrained in the middle of the room, I’m right in the middle of it all. That is until Sabotage comes around me and wraps his arms around my waist. Behind me, I feel someone reaching up and unlocking the cuffs on my wrists.
“You . . . you . . . you came for me,” I whisper, shock overwhelming me to the point I can’t think past him being here.
“Told ya, gorgeous, I wasn’t lettin’ you go,” he growls and sets me on my feet. “Now, stay behind me so we can get the fuck out of here.”
“Okay,” I agree, nodding a bit more than I should.
Sabotage gives me an accessing look before spinning around. I immediately grip a hold of his cut and stay on his ass, with him right in front of me.
I keep my eyes on his back, doing my best to block out the gunfire and the shouting. It’s bad enough my ears are still hurting.
In the end, none of it matters.
Not the gunfire.
Not the shouting.
None of it.
Because Sabotage is here. He wasn’t hurt like I thought he was—no wounds in sight.
I don’t know how long it takes, but by the time Sabotage makes it outside with me, the ringing of the gunfight ceases, and nothing but groans and a few grumbling words could be heard.
“You okay, baby?” Sabotage asks, reaching behind him, gripping my wrists, and pulling me around to face him.
I take the opportunity to look him over as he does the same to me.
“I thought they shot you,” I whisper, not seeing anything other than a few bruises starting to form.
“They did,” he mutters, grips my chin, and lifts until I’m meeting his gaze. “They hurt you?”
“They couldn’t hurt me because my new owner didn’t want my body marred before he was to get me,” I blurt out and immediately wish I could take my answer back and just say yes to being okay.
“They sold you?”
“Yes,” I confirm with no more than a breath.
“Then it’s a good thing those men in there won’t be breathing much longer,” Sabotage remarks, letting my chin go and twists, keeping an arm around me. “Viking, do me a favor and burn the bitch to the ground.”
“That’s the plan. First, gotta make sure we got them all. I want this shit done,” Viking mutters.
“Bishop isn’t in there,” I tell them. “I heard Victor on the phone with him. He also gloated how Bishop was going to make Gianna his when he got his hands on her. But getting me was an immediate must. Oh, and that in taking me, there wasn’t to be any causalities.”
The air around me becomes thick with tension. So thick I could barely breathe through it, and we were outside.
“Right.” This came from Ice, who nods curtly and snarls. “Sabotage, you get your ass back to the clubhouse. Let Sabrina actually stitch your ass up. We’ll finish up here and meet you there.”
“Tell her to meet me at my place. My woman ain’t staying in my room at the clubhouse until that bed gets replaced,” Sabotage remarks tersely.
“Whatever,” Ice snorts, “I’ll make the call.”
“Appreciate it.” Sabotage grunts and says something else, but I’m still stuck on what Ice said before about him needing to be stitched up.
“Stitch you up?” I twist to meet Sabotage’s gaze. “How bad are you hurt?”
“They got me three places. Two are grazes, the one in my side, it’s a bit more than a graze, but it ain’t gonna kill me.”
“You were shot, and still you came for me,” I whisper more to myself than him or anyone else.
Sabotage reaches up and strokes my cheeks with both hands. I don’t miss the slight wince in his gaze. “Nothing I wouldn’t do to get you back, gorgeous. I’d fuckin’ die to bring you back where you belong.”
Tears swell in my eyes, and I wrap myself around him, being as gentle as I can be. I shove my face in his chest and allow myself a moment to just let out a shuddered breath.
This man, I fell for him two years ago, even when I was scared to be around men. Now, I know I’m more than just falling. I’m completely and utterly in love with the man. As much as I want to scream it at the top of my lungs, I need to get him back to the clubhouse and see to it that he gets bandaged and patched up. Later though, I’ll tell him.
We’ve got time. They came for me, and killed those who threatened me. Most of them, that is. If there were a few still breathing, they’d take care of those men as well.
I could live with the knowledge. With them dead, the threat of me being taken again is at a dead end. Or at least, I hope it is.
At least for now, it’s over, and I’m going home. Home with Sabotage.