Chapter Twenty-Two
Leah
Of course, as soon as I walk in the door, my father is waiting for me, a living, breathing pariah. I feel myself folding in like a crumpled wad of paper tossed carelessly to the floor.
He comes at me, looming larger than his six feet, an insidious shadowy figure from the worst nightmare. He doesn’t have to fold his arms or even frown at me to instill terror in me, which sucks because I would like to think I am stronger than that.
Tomorrow night. Just hold out until tomorrow night. I repeat the words over and over, a litany in my head.
I force myself to drag in deep breaths to calm myself. I hold my head up high. I don’t want to show fear. I have realized that people like my father feed on it. They suck it deep inside of them, living off it like a regular person needs food and water to sustain them.
“You were with him.” It is a statement of fact because it’s obvious that I wouldn’t be anywhere else.
“Yes. I was.”
“And he believed you?”
I look him right in the eyes as I lie to him. I am, after all, his daughter, and this part of me should be good at it. The black parts that he put there himself. “Yes. Of course, he did.”
“You told him to meet you at the tower two nights from now?”
“Yes.” I hate that my father made me confess to him that it was my place, that he wrung the truth from me later that day in his office like I was nothing more than a wet rag.
“Seven, as we arranged?”
“Yes. I remembered all the details. How could I get them wrong?”
He laughs, and the pitch of it raises the hairs on my body.
“Good. Now, there’s someone I’d like you to meet.”
I stay planted where I am, right in the foyer. I don’t ask who, because I’m struck numb with fear at the current of wicked delight in his voice.
“I’m really tired…” I try to tell him.
I figure that if I can make it to my room, I can lock myself in there, and he’ll leave me alone.
He surprises me, though, as a smile curls over his lips. “You’ll come with me. It’s not negotiable.”
I sink my top teeth into my bottom lip. Hard.
I remember the way his fingers pressed into my arms, bruising me the last time.
I don’t actually have any idea what he’s capable of.
I just have to hold on until tomorrow night.
Somehow, I’m going to get my mother out of the house, maybe under the pretense of a doctor’s appointment, late in the afternoon.
Steel’s going to arrange a safe house for us in Miami.
I just have to get there. I’m hiring a car, something that terrifies me as I’ve not driven since the accident. But I have to get us away.
My father turns, and all I can do is follow him.
I trail down the halls of a house that has always felt like a prison, but never more so than at the moment.
I wish I could leave in the morning, but Steel needed the extra day to arrange a safe place for Mom and me to go.
I knew that even in her apathetic state, she’d fight me every step of the way, so Steel’s plan made sense.
I had to get us out of town and holing up at the clubhouse wasn’t an option.
He stops in front of his office and opens the door, gesturing for me to enter. My eyes widen when I step inside and he shuts the door behind us. A huge, black-clad figure steps out from the darkened corner of the opposite end of the sprawling office, and my breath catches in my throat.
My father takes a seat behind his desk, presiding over the two of us like he owns us both.
I blink hard at the man who approaches slowly.
He moves like he is one with the shadows.
Tall. Over six feet, but slim. His long, dark hair hangs down to his shoulders.
His facial features are hollowed out to the point of gaunt.
His eyes are dark, but in the dim lighting, they gleam like black pits in his face.
His nose has been broken a few too many times, and his lips are thinned out.
A grimy looking black leather jacket hangs off broad shoulders.
Long legs are clad in jeans with dark stains mottling most of the surface.
His feet end in black boots, and if the rest of his attire and the black hatred in his eyes didn’t give him away, those boots would have.
“Coulson Hughes. President of the Black County Sinners MC. You can call me Wraith.” Surprisingly, he has a pleasant voice. It’s wasted on him, though, a man knee-deep in blood. He extends a tattooed hand glinting with silver rings.
I gawk at that hand, my mouth hanging open.
“Don’t be rude, sweetheart. Shake the man’s hand,” my father commands.
I see the sick pleasure my father is deriving from this, and I want to turn to the biker and tell him that he is making a deal with the Devil. I want to warn him that whatever he promised him, it’s not what it seems. Nothing ever is with people like my father.
“I said, shake his hand,” my father repeats, standing slowly. He smiles, though, a second later, and my pulse quickens. “If you won’t shake his hand, then go upstairs and pack a bag.”
“A-a bag?” I stammer stupidly.
“That’s right. A bag. I wouldn’t worry about a handshake if I was you, Leah. You see, part of the deal, part of the payment I promised, was you.”
“What?” I take a step back, then another, until my back is against the office wall. The door is so close. Just a few feet to my left. Maybe if I can reach it, I can get it open and run—
“Don’t even consider it.” My father shakes his head, amused.
“Mr. Hughes’ men are outside the house. You try and run, they’ll be on you in a second.
I’ve heard that this gentleman doesn’t like to share what’s his, but then maybe, in this case, he’ll make an exception. Let his men break you in for him.”
Wraith lets out a low rumble. “You promised me she was a virgin.”
“And virgin she is. Just thought you’d like her a little more… experienced. Willing and eager.”
“She’ll be willing and eager enough,” Wraith responds, with a growl, and when his eyes sweep back to me, there is a strangely protective gleam there. “But she’s mine now. No one touches her. She can run, but she won’t get far.”
My father holds up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “Right. Now that it’s settled, she’ll go prepare a bag, and we’ll finish up with our business talk.”
“I’m not preparing anything,” I protest weakly. “I’m not going with him! You can’t just… sell me like I’m something.”
He blinks at me, once, twice. I have obviously served whatever usefulness I might have had, and he is done with me.
“What did you think was going to happen? That you’d just continue to walk free?
That I’d keep providing for you to stay alive?
You killed my son. I never wanted you anyway, you were a mistake.
You should be thankful that I’ve provided for you as long as I have.
You’ll make Mr. Hughes a fine woman, I have no doubt.
Unfortunately, you have a knack for surviving. ”
His cruel words are like a sucker punch to the gut.
“Don’t you leave this room.” Wraith glowers at me.
“You don’t need no fucking bag. Anything you need will be provided.
You stay right there where I can see you.
You’ll come with me willingly, or I’ll fucking tie you up and gag you.
” His mouth twists in a sadistic snarl. “Or maybe I’ll just tie you up.
That way, you can scream. I like it when women beg. ”
“I’m not a virgin!” I cry out. Desperate to save myself from the fate my father has planned for me.
Wraith looks at my father.
My father shrugs. “I didn’t realize she was still fucking that dirty biker. Still… you’d be taking what he wants, even if she’s damaged goods?”
Wraith nods.
I can’t just stand here and let this happen.
Have them talk about me as if I’m an object to be traded or sold to the highest bidder.
Panic chokes me, and my feet move before my mind catches up.
I edge closer to the door and then it is there, at my back.
I twist the handle frantically, nearly falling on my face when it springs open.
I run, run like my life depends on it because it does.
I burst through the front door, and I make it about twenty feet, before, like Wraith promised, I’m tackled to the ground from behind.
The beast on top of me smells like stale sweat. I fight back, kicking and clawing at him, even though the breath has been knocked right out of my lungs. I don’t need to breathe to fight.
I manage to claw at the asshole’s face, drawing a few stripes of bright red blood before his hands lock around my throat. He squeezes me unmercifully, crushing my throat, almost collapsing my windpipe. Is he going to kill me?
I fight until the first black dots dance on the edge of my vision. I fight for my life, for my future, for my love. I fight for the only thing that has been good in my life, for the man I might never see again.
Steel.
His face is the last image that swims through my mind before everything fades to black.