Chapter 13
Being okay if it happens and okay if it doesn't, is a powerful place to be. - Kate Eckman
P lague
“Ow, shit,” Seth whimpers as we transfer him from the SUV to the clubhouse. We stopped before leaving the city and made Ammo and Mouse leave their bikes in Dallas so they could ride Prez and Angel’s bikes in their place from the hotel. Angel drove the entire way home in the SUV to stay with the woman he brought with him. Prez had to ride with him and with the kid still glued to him, hissing and biting at anyone who tried to take him away. Seth, the mysterious woman, and Lunatic were all in the back of the SUV for the ride home and I can only imagine it wasn’t a pleasant one.
Powerhouse, Wrench, and I led the way on our bikes and fuck, I’m glad. I needed the ride to help clear my mind so I wouldn’t be out of it when we finally arrived. I need my focus to help take care of Seth and also Lacey. If she’s still awake, it will be a mess, I already know it. Not that I can blame her for it, she loves her family and has every right to be worried. I know she will be once she gets one good look at Seth and sees how fucked up he is.
“We’ll get you inside, need to get you spread out to figure out what’s broken and can be reset.”
“No,” he argues and attempts to shake his head, but I can tell the move is painful.
“We need to get you fixed up. Lacey’s here and I don’t want her seeing you looking this bad. It’ll mess her up, she’s been worried sick looking for you.”
We’re lucky it’s still night, damn near dawn, after having to wait until nighttime to get into the club undetected and use the dark to our advantage. If it were any earlier, I have no doubt she’d be out here demanding answers that I’m not ready to give. She doesn’t need to see her brother looking all sorts of fucked up, he’ll be bad enough once we get him bandaged up. Then toss in several of us that have been sprayed down with blood, along with Angel practically swimming in it and she won’t be able to handle it.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think it’s a bad thing she can’t deal with the reality of what we’ve been through, in fact, it’s one thing I find attractive about her. She may have some fire inside giving her a bit of spice, but overall, she’s not a hard bitch, she’s soft. She wasn’t built for MC life, for the roughness that comes along with the patch and the bike, it’s something she’ll have to ease into being comfortable with over time.
“My sister ? Why is she here? She should be with our parents.”
I wish he’d stop talking and just rest. His voice is already hoarse, cracking around every other word. I’m guessing it’s the lingering effects from screaming, which only further infuriates me with the thought. I hope I see Carlos Montoya or any of those cartel fuckers, so I can pay them back tenfold for the hurt they’ve caused my friend and his family.
“She was beyond worried. Your family has been concerned over you disappearing and not coming back to work. Lacey was the only one with big enough balls to come find me, asking for help in locating you…or I never would’ve known you were missing in the first place.”
He winces with his one open eye. “T-they’ll hurt her,” he tears up again, the wetness falling to coat his cheek once more.
He’s broken.
Those assholes completely fucked up his inner spirit and it takes a lot for a broken man to become whole again. The club is exactly the place he needs to be. The men here will not be easy on him, but it’s what he’ll need to not be allowed to wither away into nothing and throw in the towel. It’s exactly what would happen if he’s given the chance to escape to his parents and hide under their care. He’ll never be the same, he’ll either grow harder from it and not let it define his future, or he’ll allow the pain and fear to crumble him.
“I won’t let them. It’s part of the reason I showed up earlier. I planned to kill the motherfucker who’s responsible for all of it so he can’t ever harm her.”
We get Seth moved and set up on one of the couches because the only empty room we have available right now will be given to the woman and the kid if they decide to take it. The female hasn’t said a word to anyone, and Angel just carries her around like if he sets her down, he’ll fucking die or something.
Whiskey hands me a bottled water and a tall Seven and Seven, then squats down on his haunches beside me. I sip the icy alcohol greedily, needing it more than I realized, then unscrew the cap and bring the water to my friend’s lips. He opens and I carefully pour in small amounts at a time. The missing teeth look disgusting, and I can only imagine the pain he felt with them being knocked out. Or hell, they could’ve been yanked out. Whatever happened had to fucking rock him, that’s for certain.
Whiskey peers closely at him, pressing his fingers against his tweaked wrist, his ribs, and everywhere else. Baker’s there next with a pair of scissors so Whiskey can cut Seth out of his clothes so we don’t hurt him anymore trying to get them off. They’re filthy anyway, filled with blood, sweat and tears.
“Called in one of my lady friends, she’s on her way.” Whiskey quietly shares, casting a worried glance at Seth. My brothers know it without me having to say a word—he has a long recovery and there’s no telling if he’ll fight through it or give in.
“She a doctor?” I ask, and he nods.
“Sam will be here too,” Baker offers.
Sam’s his daughter, who is also a wickedly smart nurse practitioner, so between the two women, everyone will hopefully get the care they need. We’d be fucked tonight without them, as we don’t have any favors to call in with other charters. We used them up to help out Blow after his accident because the crazy fucker wouldn’t go back to the hospital. He has some massive scars from the gnarly road gashes he ripped open leaving the hospital to get to his ol’ lady. Our crazy VP is lucky he didn’t bleed out with all the stitches and shit he popped.
I meet Seth’s anxious stare. “They’ll be here to help, and I can give you some tequila or bourbon to help dull the pain and hopefully you can get some sleep.”
“I don’t want my bones r-re-set. I don’t want to be touched .”
Christ, witnessing him like this has me choking up and fighting back my own goddamn tears. We’ve gotten our asses kicked at practices, had various sports injuries and others from being dumbass teens, but he’s never experienced the ugly side of life before.
Not like this.
Not like I have, or any of these men around me have. Some have been through serious shit multiple times, but they’re still stubborn enough to keep fighting. We have to make Seth into a fighter somehow. I’m praying Lacey manages it with all her hope, love, and light shit, but we all know my prayers have never gotten me far when it comes to the people I care about.
“Baker, do we have anything in there soft that Seth can eat?”
His brow screws up, thinking a beat, then asks, “His jaw broken? Didn’t seem so to me.”
He’s not being a dick, just knows what a broken chop looks like from being around the club and spending time locked up. Shaking my head, I silently tap my front teeth when Seth has his eye closed.
Baker makes an ‘oh shit’ face and nods. “Got some cheesy, garlic potato soup left from last night’s dinner. Give me a sec and I’ll fix him up. Make sure it’s smooth for ‘em.”
“Appreciate it, brother.”
He nods and stops to ask Prez if he wants something for the kid. He’s still glued to Ripper like a spider monkey, holding on for dear life. He asks for a bowl of the Captain Puff cereal, since the little heathen won’t speak any words. Not that I can blame the brat, there’s no telling what the poor thing went through or witnessed. We still don’t have any idea who he belongs to, doubt it’s the woman though as she doesn’t seem to mind being away from him.
Baker stops by Angel next, smart enough to keep his eyes on Angel’s and not look at the chick our enforcer won’t let go of. Angel whispers in her ear, no doubt asking what she wants. She shakes her head, but my brother’s far too stubborn and doesn’t let it fly. He asks for a bowl of soup and some toast. Baker is all too eager to get into the kitchen to grab food, as it’s his domain around here.
One thing’s for certain, whatever happened to these people has them all types of fucked up, enough so they don’t want to talk or be touched. I can’t blame them; we’re used to a bit of carnage from time to time, but they obviously aren’t and at this point we have no idea how long any of them were kept. We have an educated guess of when Seth went to his meeting, but we don’t know if they took him right away or if he was able to leave before they got pissed and snatched him back up or how anything happened. I want to ask him but at the same time know he needs a chance to just breathe and exist before he gets peppered for more information.
I sit on the floor beside the couch, head in my hands, trying to work out what we know and what we don’t that may be of some help somewhere. “Brother,” I’m shaken out of my trance by Whiskey, and I can honestly say I have no idea how much time’s passed or if I was even awake. I thought I was but I’m going on fumes, my adrenaline all drained out of me, so I can’t tell up from down. “They’re here.”
“Huh?” I ask, glancing around, trying to get my bearings. The pill House gave me earlier must’ve worn off as well, and I’ve been coming down off it or something. I feel like I’ve been tuned completely out and have just woken back up. I feel almost fuzzy if that were a thing.
“The girls are here to help out your buddy, to patch him up however they can.”
“The food,” I begin, knowing Seth needs something in his stomach and help eating but Whiskey cuts me off.
“Club slut already helped him eat a bit. She was right beside you the entire time.” He cocks his head, carefully looking me over. It must click that I wasn’t all there and have been lost in my mind with everything as he holds out his hand. I take it and he helps pull me up. “You need to eat something too. Fill your stomach up. Burn your clothes. Take a hot shower, then fuck your girl. It’ll fix everything and you’ll be right as rain again tomorrow.”
“I can’t leave him. I don’t want Lace seeing him like that.”
“Brother. You’re surrounded by perfectly capable adults.” He gestures to the females going through various supplies they’ve spread out across a few tables. One’s in scrubs while the other is in a long white coat like she just left the hospital or something. They unpack stuff, set it in certain spots, and then discuss what they’re still missing. It’s like watching them talk in code, so I turn back to Whiskey instead.
He continues, “These two beautiful women are going to doctor him up. We’ll make sure Seth has everything he needs. You’ve done your part while a few of us had to stay back. Let us do ours now. Everyone on that ride needs food, a shower, and rest.”
He's gonna dad us all, and with how much we all respect his ass, we’ll probably all listen to what he tells us to do. With an exhale, I give in and nod. “’Kay. If you’ve got him, I can do the rest.”
“Go on, Plague. Take care of yourself, your woman will need to lean on you. She can’t do that if you’re not at your best, she’ll need you strong for her.”
Without a fight, I do as he says and head for the kitchen. I warm up a bowl of Baker’s famous golden potato soup, topping it with some freshly crumbled bacon, and realize I haven’t eaten shit since yesterday or the day before. No wonder the pill and alcohol hit me more than it typically would. I don’t remember eating or drinking anything. I was too busy trying to put the cartel into the ground so they could never hurt or take Lacey from me that I didn’t consider anything else in my life. Fuck. I hope she was smart enough to eat while I was gone. Knowing Baker, he’d have badgered Lacey until she tried half the shit in the kitchen, thankfully.
The soup goes down quickly, and it helps. I start to feel a little more like my usual black-hearted old self. I head outside through the back door and toss all of my bloody clothes aside from my boxers and boots into one of our grills. We have a few and this one in particular is for getting rid of evidence. I dump a little bit of gas and toss in a match. With an exhale of relief, I watch as the clothes burn down to ash before shutting the lid and heading back inside the clubhouse.
I have to shower before I touch Lacey. Bad enough she’ll have the hands of a killer on her, but I’m damn sure not letting any blood touch her silky smooth skin. I won’t dirty her up any more than I already have. She deserves better from me, and I’m determined to give it to her. Hell, better may be more than I can ever offer her, but it won’t stop me from trying. I’ve attempted to put up a wall between us, but I think it’s safe to say that’s not happening any longer. After tonight, my will towards having her is broken. I refuse to snuff out the strongest feeling for someone I’ve ever had before.
I’m extra quiet as I make my way into my room, silently cursing the bathroom door when it squeaks as I close it. I don’t want to wake her until I’m ready and all I need to do right now is wash and then look at her. Once I’ve looked my fill, then we’ll get to the touching part. God knows I want to hold her something fierce.
Ever since she showed up, it’s been one stressful day after the next, and for once, I feel like I’m able to climb into that bed and breathe a sigh of relief. The fact she’ll be beside me to hold is one hell of a bonus I’m not about to take for granted. I hated leaving her last night once she was asleep, but I had no choice. I knew if she discovered my plan, she’d never have let me leave without her and there was no way in hell she was going with us. My job is to keep her safe, not put her in the path of more danger and it’s one promise I’m taking seriously whether she likes it or not.
I can handle her anger, so long as she’s alive and breathing. I want her unharmed and giving me a piece of her mind. That I can deal with any day, over having to possibly bury her.
Tossing my boxers in my cheap, white, plastic clothes hamper, I hop in the shower and do a thorough job scrubbing down my skin. I even include using the small nail brush thingy to make sure every speck of blood has been cleansed and sanitized off my body. There’s no way I’m touching her sweetness with any of the cartel’s toxins, so I do another pass with my soap, cranking the water to the point it makes my body lock up from the scorching burn.
Once I’m tingly and nearly breaking a sweat from the steam, I hop out and towel myself off. I’ve waited too long, what feels like nearly my entire fucking life to have this woman beneath me, taking my cock and telling me how good I make her feel. It’s almost too much, to finally have the chance to feel her warmness around me, to take in her smell, her touch, and her taste at once. I hope she’s ready for me, because I’m pretty sure I’m going to die if I don’t finally have her tonight.