CHAPTER FOUR
Before the Rescue
Jess
Something was going down.
The activity around the clubhouse had changed, and I wasn’t sure what was happening.
There are usually drug and alcohol fueled parties going on into the wee hours of the morning at the MC clubhouse.
I didn’t want to attend, but I couldn’t even if I wanted to.
I worked every night in the strip club on the compound.
Skeeter often came towards the end of the night to watch me for a while and then walk me directly to his room.
If he didn’t come, then he sent someone to do it for him. Someone he trusted not to try anything with me. That’s when I knew he was either on a ride doing some sort of club business, or he’d chosen to attend the party and fuck some sweetbutts. He didn’t care if I saw, either.
It was such a weird dynamic. I didn’t love, or even like, Skeeter.
But I still didn’t like watching him fuck other women and then come to the bed I shared with him.
It was gross. And he always tried to lock eyes with me when I walked through the door, and he was partying with a couple of women. I hated it.
Sometimes he’d still expect sex, and I’d make him take a shower.
Other times it was a night off for me. At least a night off from Skeeter.
I had to suck off guys each night. It was part of my job.
As I did it, I just kept thinking that Mom was being taken care of.
That’s what kept me sane. At least I didn’t have to fuck anyone.
Most of the girls who worked the VIP room with me did.
A couple of the MC guys who ran the strip club would make sure they’d taken some shots and some meth at the start of the night, so they’d get really horny and be into it.
They got to keep some of the money, though. I didn’t. Skeeter wanted me dependent on him.
Still, the night before had been different at the clubhouse.
Skeeter sent someone else to walk me back, some prospect who didn’t even tell me his name.
When we got inside, the guys were in the middle of an intense conversation.
There were no sweetbutts around, no partying, no drugs, no music—nothing.
Some guys had beer or whiskey in their hands, but that was it.
I took my shower and made sure I stayed awake for when Skeeter came in.
“So, what’s going on?” I asked him.
Those blue eyes of his that most women thought were gorgeous, but I just saw insanity in, were on me instantly. “Don’t worry about it.”
“That makes me worry more. Is there something bad going down?”
“I said, don’t fucking worry about it,” he said, his voice low. I could tell he was barely holding it together, so I backed off.
I finished getting ready for bed and was pulling off my robe and getting ready to ride him like every night, when he stopped me.
“Not tonight,” he said and rolled over in bed, his back to me.
Okay. That was the most worrisome thing I’d ever seen. I started to get a T-shirt to wear to bed, but he stopped me.
“Sleep naked like usual. I might fuck you in the night. Just… not now.”
I nodded and got in bed. I couldn’t sleep because I was so worried about what was happening.
Was he tired of me? It had been five years.
I was twenty-three, so I wasn’t old or anything.
But I’d seen him with lots of eighteen- and nineteen-year-olds.
Maybe that was more his thing. After five years I still knew very little about him.
I didn’t know how old he was or his birthday. I didn’t even know his real name.
He’d shared very little with me.
Jesus. Was I about to be trafficked?
***
I woke up to an empty bed.
I usually slept until twelve or one, since I got in so late at night. Today I’d set an alarm. I’d asked earlier in the week if we could see my mom today, and he’d agreed. I had no clue if he even remembered that.
Though Skeeter tended to remember everything.
I went ahead and got ready. I’d begged Skeeter for some normal clothes over the years so my mom wouldn’t be upset when she saw me. He liked me to look a certain way, though, when I was seen with him. And that way was like a total skank.
We’d reached a compromise over the years. I’d wear a decent dress that covered more of my body than what he wanted, but he wouldn’t let me wear a bra. And I still had to wear stripper heels and a lot of makeup.
I’d agreed. It wasn’t like I really had a choice, anyway.
I stared in the mirror, thinking. In the five years I’d lived here, everything had followed a pattern.
It had been the same thing, within reason, day after day, week after week, month after month.
For there to be a difference in the pattern was giving me a very uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach.
Mom had always taught me to listen to my instincts.
I’d taken both psychology and sociology in high school.
I knew that humans were highly evolved animals.
All animals have instincts. Animals in the wild know to trust their instincts or they will likely get hurt or die.
For instance, if a deer is eating grass near a swamp and suddenly feels as if a predator is nearby, it’s going to run.
It doesn’t wait to see if it was right or worry about looking stupid in front of other deer.
It just gets out of there before the alligator, human, whatever apex predator is nearby, attacks it.
Humans, on the other hand, have been taught to ignore our instincts.
Let’s say you get a strange feeling about a person, but everyone around you insists he or she is a wonderful human being.
You might ignore your own instincts for fear of looking foolish in front of others.
So, when the person who causes little alarm bells to ring comes to your door to borrow a cup of sugar, you let them in.
And that could be how you end up the victim of a serial killer—because you trusted others instead of yourself.
No other animal on Earth is taught to ignore their instincts.
I bit my lip and looked around for a piece of paper and pen.
It was time to ask my mom for help. With shaking hands, I wrote a quick note telling her I was worried something bad was going to happen to me.
I told her I was living at the Gray Bones’ clubhouse and needed help if she could figure out some way to get it to me. And I told her I’d always love her.
Just as I finished and slipped the paper into the waistband of my thong, Skeeter walked in.
He stared at me. “Why are you dressed like that?”
Shit. “You had said it was okay for us to go see Mom today.”
He grunted and looked distracted. “Yeah. Okay.” He ran a hand over his mouth. He looked nervous. Skeeter never looked nervous. His eyes met mine. “You ready now?”
I nodded. “Can we take her some groceries?”
He shook his head. “Nah. I don’t have time for all of that. I’ll send someone on the regular day.”
“Okay.”
He grabbed my arm, squeezing tightly, and pulled me close. “There are some things that might go down over the next couple of weeks. If we get separated, I will find you. Do you understand? I won’t let you go, Jess. Not ever.”
What the hell was he talking about? “You’re scaring me,” I whispered.
He dropped my arm. “Sorry. Just… be normal, but be on the lookout for anything unusual. I might have to be gone off and on for the next few weeks.”
I wanted to know what he was talking about, but I knew better than to ask for details. He wouldn’t tell me.
We were quiet on the way to Mom’s. Skeeter took me in his tricked-out F-150 truck because he knew I hated riding on the back of his motorcycle. When he pulled into her driveway, he sat there for a minute.
“Your mom lives in a shithole.”
I frowned. That wasn’t what I thought he was going to say. I looked at the house I’d grown up in. It was nothing special, but it was nice enough. It was just a one-story ranch in a quiet neighborhood full of other one-story ranch homes. “You think so?”
He gave a quick nod. “One day, I’ll put her up somewhere real nice.”
I glanced at him. Why was he being nice? I swallowed hard. For some reason, that made me more nervous than anything else he’d done lately.
“That would be great. I know she’d love it.” That was a lie. Unless Mom got some serious therapy, I was afraid she’d never come out of that house. It wouldn’t matter if he bought her a mansion.
He nodded again. “Well, why are you just sitting there? Get out.”
I got out.
Mom gave me a huge hug when she opened the door. “Oh, Jessica Fletcher! It’s so good to see you.” She stepped back and held my face in her hands. Her eyes were worried as she studied the thick makeup on my face.
Skeeter cleared his throat.
“Well, let’s have a seat,” Mom took the hint.
Skeeter looked so strange in her house. He was sitting on her favorite floral sofa, and I had to bite back a laugh at the sight. There he was, this six-seven biker dude with tattoos all over his scalp and hulked out arms, sitting on a delicate, feminine old lady couch.
It had been my grandma’s
His leather cut, ripped jeans and clunky black motorcycle boots didn’t fit in, either. Of course, neither did my skanky dress and rhinestone stripper shoes.
Mom was wearing a soft-looking lavender cardigan. “What have you been up to, Jessica Fletcher?”
I sighed on the inside. It kind of drove me crazy that Mom insisted on calling me that. She treated Jessica Fletcher like it was a normal two-name name, like Emma Grace or Sara Beth or Mary Ellen.
Skeeter hated it. “Tell me who the fuck Jessica Fletcher is again? Her grandma or some shit?”
Mom winced at the language, but she didn’t say anything. “No, she’s named after my favorite TV character. Jessica Fletcher solved mysteries on Murder, She Wrote. You’ve watched it with me before. Remember, Skeeter?”
“Yeah. That’s right. I forgot.”
Skeeter sat there bored while Mom and I talked about what little we could in front of him. I knew she longed for a chance to get me alone. I wanted that, too, but I could only dream of it at the moment.
Mom talked for a while about the cozy mystery series she’d been writing for years and years. She’d never tried to have it published despite me begging her to do it.
“How many manuscripts do you have now?”
“Thirty,” she said in an off-hand way, like it was no big deal.
“Mom, that’s amazing! I really want you to try…”
“Time to go,” Skeeter said abruptly, clapping his hands loudly and getting up.
I blinked at him for a second.
“I said get up!” he practically shouted at me. Mom flinched and then gasped as he took my arm and jerked me off the couch.
I stumbled a little but caught myself on Skeeter’s rock-hard chest. He grabbed me again and started pushing me towards the door. “Come on, Jess!”
“Can I hug my mom?” I asked, making my eyes big and sticking my lower lip out. I’d never been a good actress at all, but I’d known these things to work before. I had to try. It was clear something was going on with him.
I’d managed to pull the note from under my dress while I was talking to Mom and he was looking around, bored. She’d seen me, and her eyes widened. I just gave her a tiny shake of my head.
“Hurry,” he said and practically pushed me towards her.
“Love you, Mom,” I said and grabbed her in a tight hug. I surreptitiously slipped the note in the deep pocket of her cardigan and then tugged lightly on it to let her know to check it. Hopefully she understood what I was doing.
She’d read and written murder mysteries her entire life, so I wasn’t too worried the clue would go over her head.
“Come on.” Skeeter grabbed my arm, gave my mom a head nod, and pulled me out of her house.
I turned and gave her a quick wink, and she waved. She looked more worried than ever.
I was afraid she had a reason to be.