Chapter Nine #2
No. No, no, no. This couldn’t be happening.
Every fiber of my being screamed denial.
My breath hitched, a ragged sound in the suddenly still air.
This was a nightmare, a cruel twist of fate designed to dismantle everything I stood for.
My instinct, honed by years of self-preservation, was to flee.
I took a step back, my hand tightening on the pepper spray in my bag, a pathetic defense against the storm I suddenly felt bearing down on me.
I had to protect myself. But how? How could I protect myself from a truth so devastating?
“I didn’t know,” I blurted, the words tumbling out in a desperate bid for leniency, for a way out of this impossible situation.
My moral compass, not that I really had one, felt like it was spinning wildly.
I was well versed in facing consequences, but this.
.. this was a consequence I never could have imagined, a consequence that would stain me irrevocably. “I have the money.”
“You better have the fucking money,” he threatened, taking a step forward, his gaze pinning me in place. His sheer presence was an oppressive force, crushing any lingering hope of reason. “All seventy-five million dollars that wasn’t yours to take.”
The ground seemed to tilt beneath me.
Seventy-five million dollars. The number was an abstract concept before, a phantom sum I gambled with in a moment of desperate recklessness. Now, it was a concrete weight, a crushing indictment.
The Brotherhood.
The money belonged to the Brotherhood.
I stole seventy-five-million dollars from the Brotherhood of Bastards.
The name itself was a sneering insult, a promise of retribution.
I had known Michael dealt with some unsavory people, that he was well connected.
Knew he had ties to dangerous people. I rationalized it, told myself it was a necessary evil, a way to achieve a greater good, a way to finally escape the suffocating mediocrity of my life.
But I thought, I hoped, it was just local crime.
Drug dealers. Maybe some organized crime outfit in Rapid City.
Something I could, perhaps, even justify to myself.
Something that wouldn’t require me to confront the darker aspects of my own character.
Not just any MC.
The Brotherhood of fucking Bastards.
The irony was a bitter pill, a poison I was forced to swallow.
My desire for freedom had led me to this precipice.
I had traded what miniscule integrity I had for a fleeting sense of control, and now the bill had come due.
My carefully constructed facade of righteousness was crumbling, revealing a core of something I was terrified to acknowledge: a capacity for deception, for theft, for aligning myself with the very darkness I always vowed to oppose.
The choice I had made, to take the money, was no longer a single act but a defining moment that had branded me.
And now, I had to choose again, a choice that would shatter what little remained of my self-respect, or face a fate far worse.
“I didn’t know,” I whispered, my voice catching, a pathetic squeak that I instantly regretted. “I swear, I didn’t.”
“Doesn’t matter.” He grinned as he moved toward me with a slow, predatory grace. “You took what wasn’t yours. And now you owe us.”
I turned to run, and that was when I saw them.
All of them. Men. Stepping out of the darkness. From behind the building. From the tree line. From places I hadn’t seen in the shadows.
All of them were wearing cuts.
All of them watched me.
I was surrounded, trapped, and the worst part wasn’t just my fear. It was my shame. The knowledge that I put myself in this position. That my own choices had led me to this terrifying precipice.
I spun back to face the man, whoever the hell he was.
He was closer now, his presence an oppressive weight.
Close enough that I could see the intricate, brutal tattoos on his forearms, each line seeming to whisper of violence.
Close enough that I could smell leather and engine oil and something darker underneath, something that hinted at a hunger I couldn’t even begin to comprehend.
Do I beg? Do I fight? Fighting was suicide.
Begging would make me look even weaker. What kind of person am I that I ended up here?
What choice did I have left that didn’t feel like a betrayal of myself, of everything I thought I stood for?
I couldn’t just give them what they wanted.
But I had to do something. And I had a sickening feeling that whatever I did, it would be the wrong thing.
“You set me up,” I said, my voice shaking. “You knew who I was the whole time.”
“Of course I did.” He tilted his head, studying me like I was a puzzle he was solving. “You reached out to me, sweetheart. You made it too easy.”
Sweetheart. The word was a slap. Condescending. Possessive.
“What do you want?” I demanded, trying to sound braver than I felt.
His smile turned sharp. “I already told you. I’m here to collect a debt.” He stepped closer. Close enough that I had to tilt my head back to look at him. Close enough that I could see the flecks of gold in his dark eyes. “I’m here to collect you.”
His words hung in the air, heavy and final.
You.
“What?” I whispered.
His smile didn’t waver as I looked around again.
At the men surrounding me. At the darkness pressing in from all sides.
At the complete and utter lack of escape routes.
I walked into this trap willingly. Driven here myself.
Handed myself over to the very people I had been running from.
And the worst part? I thought I was smart.
Thought I was one step ahead. But I never was.
I had been the prey from the moment I clicked on that dark web post.
And now the hunter had me.
He leaned in, his breath warm against my ear. “Alexandra Jones, you just became the Brotherhood’s property.”
The words sent ice through my veins.
Property.
Not a prisoner. Not a hostage.
Property.
I looked up at him, at those cold, beautiful eyes, and saw my future reflected back at me.
I stole from the Brotherhood of Bastards.
And now he was going to make me pay.