Halley 5 Years Later
Lying in my bed, listening to the clock tick, I let my mind lock on a picture. Sometimes I can picture him in my mind. He’s far away, calling to me. I can hear him, but I can’t see his face that I imagine looks a lot like mine.
It’s no secret here, I’m the spoils of war.
Well, it isn’t anymore. When I was young, I didn’t even know my real name.
Growing up as simply Star—Fuck, things were good back then.
But Serpentine’s a cruel man. The cruelest thing you can tell a young girl, her life is a lie, you killed her parents and she has a brother who’s fighting to get her back—that you’ll never let it happen.
You’ll never let her go. You’d kill her first. Yes, Serpentine really was the devil he proclaimed to be.
The first time the Asphalt Gods’ MC got too close to rescuing me, I was thrown in this basement and locked away. It’s where I’ve been for five long years. My life stopped when I was fifteen, but I guess, things could be worse.
“Did you want to die? What would you have me do?”
Putting my head under my pillow, I blocked the ticking, the sound of the clock, a cruel reminder my time was almost up.
When Serpentine’s old lady LuAnn died in a gun fight last summer, he made a deal with me.
I don’t know if her death softened him or it was just another cruel game.
He said if my brother paid him what the Coyote Ghosts’ MC owed the club plus interest, he’d let me go.
Poof.
I’d be pardoned. If not, I’d get out of the hole anyway and become his old lady without a fight.
Hell yes, there’d be a fight, but I agreed to Serpentine’s deal anyhow.
Trying not to think about that, I remembered my brother’s voice. Serpentine let me listen to my brother, Edmond’s voice as he made the deal over the phone. Then I’d spoke to him this very week.
At least, I think it was this week.
Needless to say, the days and nights, the weeks and months run together down here in the rabbit hole.
In the last five years, not many people had cared about me enough to go up against Serpentine.
I could tell how much Edmond, better known as Scar cared from the desperation in his tone.
He’d come through for me or die trying. Sometimes I imagine I was a princess locked away in a tower but instead of my prince charming, it was my brother who’d come and rescue me.
But, fairy tales weren’t going to save me.
I’d already waited for Edmond for five years. I had no illusions that Serpentine would keep his word. He was the devil. A trickster. My brother was being called to slaughter. I had a backup plan. I planned to save myself.
The door opened, letting a block of sunshine in. Snakebite came down the stairs with my dinner. I tried to get up but remembered, I’d been handcuffed to the bed.
“How long… who did this to you?”
“Since last night… when I tried to escape… I don’t even remember…”
Snakebite had taken a liking to me. Can’t remember exactly when.
He liked me more than his brothers who came down to humiliate me, rape me, run a train on me.
Though, they weren’t allowed to do that anymore since Serpentine decided he wanted me for his own.
I tried to block a memory of last night out of my mind.
The old man had visited me, drunk. The sixty-some-year-old man wasn’t waiting until we were married to violate me. I fought him, but it didn’t matter. A struggle was just what he liked. I’d even made it to the door, and that’s when he cuffed me to the bed.
“Let me out of these cuffs, and I’ll play nice.”
“I’m not going to make the same mistake old Rusty made.”
Snakebite would let me out of the cuffs. He’d take care of me—I unexpectedly remembered that, too. After he let me go, I went and cleaned up. At least I had a bathroom with a sink and a toilet.
“Do you need any help?”
“No.” I practically took a bath in the sink, wanting all of that old man off me.
“Star, what happened last night?”
Instantly, I felt shame. I wouldn’t dare tell Snakebite about what happened when he wasn’t around. “That’s not my name, and it’s none of your beeswax.”
I wasn’t hungry, but I ate. If I ever were freed, I’d need all my strength. Plus, I needed my strength for what I was about to do.
When I finished eating, Snakebite kissed me softly on the forehead, like he always did before he’d leave.
Only a few years older than me, he’d grown up with me.
I remembered when he was young. The spiky haired boy always cared for me, but it was hard for me to think of him as anything more than a friend these days.
In the last five years, it seemed he grew up hard, becoming a big tough man. If I didn’t know him, I’d be scared shitless. His wild long hair, swelling muscles and devilish tattoos were intimidating enough, but it was his split snakelike tongue that frightened most people. Scared me, too.
Besides a few of the women, now that LuAnn had passed away, he was the only one to think to feed me, to check on me.
Too bad he hadn’t cared enough to stand up to his brothers and Serpentine when they wanted their nasty way though.
Nevertheless, I knew he still cared because unlike the others, he’d never taken me against my will.
“I love you,” I told him, clutching his hand.
It was a lie.
He was my way out, if he weren’t such a chicken shit.
My eyes pleaded with his. Then I closed them and went in for a kiss, finding the bulge in his pants with my other hand.
He responded, hardening as I unzipped his pants and pulled his warm erection out.
I laid back, tugging him forward. “I want you to love me.” I felt tears sting my eyes.
Part of it was true. I longed for some tenderness, but more than that, I wanted Snakebite to finally care about me enough to get me out of here.
He took his time and kissed me all over, my face, neck, shoulders and chest. This I could take, but still, I found silence.
I set my thoughts out to far off destinations as he made love to me.
He’d said he loved me, after all. I imagined his arms were the sun, warming me.
Jumping into a lake, I swam in cool water when he entered me for the first time.
His breath on my shoulder, his hands clutching tenderly, I started to come back to reality.
Snakebite’s face hung above mine as he stared into my eyes. “I want to take you away from all of this.”
“Please. Take me away, tonight?” I begged, clinging to him as he pumped.
He shook his head. “Star, there are men guarding this door. You don’t know what I had to do to see you.
It’s not like before. Now that Serpentine has staked a claim on you…
but don’t worry. I’ll get you out before your birthday, I promise you.
” His lips crashed onto mine, and I let myself be in the moment.
I let myself feel, something I haven’t done in so long.
It felt like love as I had the first orgasm of my life.
We laid with our arms and legs jumbled together.
He was sweating. I wiped his brow, thinking if I could love anyone it’d be him.
Snakebite kissed my forehead again, but this time he cupped my face. Again, he confessed he loved me, his whisper giving so much meaning to the words.
“Halley, are you in there? I never wanted it to be like this. I swear I didn’t know anyone else dared to touch you. Why didn’t you let me know sooner?”
“If you ever loved me, you’d never let me rot for so long.”
He turned his back to me. “I knew you were in there somewhere. You know I promised him anything for your life to be spared. You know he sent me away. I should’ve had the sense to negotiate better.
Don’t you realize as soon as I cross dad the other men think they can come down here and off you at any time?
And I can’t make any claims to a prisoner. ”
His mouth moved, but there was only one thing on my mind. “Please, take me away, tonight.”
“By the end of the week, I’ll get you out of here. I promise,” he stressed before he left.
“It’s either that or I’ll be your step mama,” I muttered under my breath.
Serpentine’s son, Snakebite going against his devil of a daddy, even for the love of a woman was a long shot, but tonight I was almost convinced.