34. Mia
Being able to get out of the clubhouse, even with a brother following me for safety, was so much better for my mental health. I didn’t realize how miserable I’d become being cooped up inside for so long. I inhaled the fresh air through the cracked window of the cab, with Easton in the driver’s seat. The trip to the diner to meet Jenna was a welcome break, one I had been looking forward to all morning. Rex had prompted the little trip after my breakdown yesterday. He had comforted me in the only way he knew how, offering his shoulder and just holding me while I cried into his cut. The day’s heat warming my face already had me feeling much better about my current predicament. It was probably all the vitamin D I was getting—no pun intended.
The truck rumbled down the alley, before turning left to hit the main stretch of town. The sun shining through the windshield was blinding, and I reached into my bag to grab my sunglasses. “Oh fuck, I forgot my purse.”
“I’ll get what you need, princess,” Easton drawled beside me. “Rex will beat my ass if I let you go out and can’t pay for anything.”
I didn’t know much about East, he was a quiet man of a similar age to me, but he was unranked. His cut carried the patch of the Street Kings, but there were no other insignia across the black leather. He very rarely engaged with me or the other women, preferring his own company and never taking any of the club women back to his room and it wasn’t for their lack of trying.
“That’s sweet, but I want my own money, otherwise you may as well just turn around and go back.” I was living on the Kings’ dime since we moved in here and I wasn’t about to have Rex pay for every single thing. Besides, I couldn’t buy a pregnancy test with Easton watching, the first thing he would do was run and tell his brother. “I need to buy some feminine items…” I left the comment hanging, letting him get the gist of it, his cheeks flushed pink, keeping his eyes on the road in front of him and avoiding eye contact. Why did men get embarrassed at the mention of tampons? It was universal, and the men here were just like the men back home. Dad used to flinch at the mention of our periods and walk out of the room, preferring us to keep it ‘between women’.
Easton’s sigh of surrender filled the cab, and he threw the truck in reverse, heading back to the clubhouse.
“I’ll be two minutes.” I threw the door open, and ran inside. The guy was doing me a huge favor taking me, I didn’t want to make him wait any longer than he had to. Throwing the bedroom door open, it took me a minute for my brain to catch up with my eyes. The image of Rex sitting on the bed was burned into my retinas, my bag dropped to the floor, I didn’t even register the contents spilling out by my foot.
“You weren’t supposed to be back yet.” Rex threw the condom to the bed, the unused condom that he was just… just…
“I… did you….” Betrayal wormed its insidious way through my body. “Were you poking a hole in it?”
Rex rose to his feet, his hands outstretched before him. “Now listen, princess?—”
“WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?” My heart thudded in my chest as I screamed at the man who had torn my life apart. My screams had men pouring from their own rooms watching in fascination as Rex tried to calm me down.
“Hey, hey. Calm down, let me explain.”
“Explain? Explain how you were trying to baby trap me by poking holes in your condoms,” I screamed over the gasps behind me. “How long?” I seethed beside the door, stepping back from his outstretched hand, but I wouldn’t let him touch me again. He’d done enough. I guess I didn’t need to take that pregnancy test anymore.
“Fuck off outta here.” Rex stabbed his finger at the bystanders, who quickly left me to deal with Rex’s betrayal on my own. I guess all that talk about being one of them was just for show, because when I needed them to help me, to have my back, they close their doors in my face, leaving me to my fate. “Princess, stop…”
“Don’t fucking call me that, I’m not your fucking princess,” I spat as I walked backward, keeping Rex in my line of sight. I wouldn’t turn my back on him again. The treacherous snake had coiled his way around me, and kept me in his prison… and I’d let him. But he was shedding his skin, and I could see him for what he was underneath… the serpent who betrayed Eve had whispered his silver tongued promises in my ear—I’d stupidly listened. Now I was stuck in a new prison of my own making, one that would last 18 damned years before I could be free.
“What was your plan huh? Get me pregnant and I’d be forced to stay here?” I hissed, loathing—both for him and myself for trusting him with my body—spread through my entire being. I stared at the man in front of me, a man I had begun to fall for, to care about, and it was all a lie. “TELL ME!” He flinched as if I’d struck him, his fists white knuckled by his side.
“You weren’t supposed to find out.” My laugh was hollow at his muttered excuse, the joy of finding out I was expecting a child completely absent, because it was forced on me, and he couldn’t even say sorry. “Mia, I did it for us?—”
“Don’t you fucking dare!” My teeth clenched around the hatred that I felt right then. “You did it for you, this was always about you. All of the excuses about having to stay here because it was too dangerous outside was just a bunch of lies to keep me here.”
He inched forward one step at a time. “It’s all true, prin… Mia. I kept you here to keep you safe, because I wanted—needed to protect you. And now we have someone else to protect.” He gestured to my stomach. “Please just come in and sit down, you need to calm down or you’ll hurt yourself.”
“Huh.” Cold seeped in, my grief washing away like the tide. I called on that persona, the one that I used on the wards when I had to deliver bad news, or deal with arsehole patients. Rex frowned, registering the change in my demeanor. “Joke’s on you, Gavin.” Rex winced hearing his given name, he hated it. He’d told me one night when I lay in his arms while we whispered our secrets to each other. I guess he left one really big fucking secret out. Storming past him, I dragged open the drawer, digging behind clothes for my passport. “Where is it?” I threw everything over my shoulder, underwear and pajamas that he had bought for me hitting the walls.
“You won’t find it.”
“Where is my passport, Rex?” My whole body froze in fear, I was trapped. “You can’t do this.”
“I can do this, princess, and I have.” He towered over me, his hard eyes were like granite and stared straight into my soul. “Did you think I’d let you take my kid?” His whispered words were filled with venom and spite, and through sheer will I stayed uncowed, meeting his cold gaze with my own.
“You can’t keep us here, this is kidnapping.” I shoved him, his large body stood firm before me.
Rex lowered his head to mine, his hot breath burning my skin. “Not in the state of Ohio, that child is mine and I have equal rights. When the baby is born, I’ll give you your damned passport back, and then you can do whatever you want, but my baby stays here.”
He stepped back at my gasp of outrage. “You’d keep me from my child?” My eyes widened, fear slithering inside me. “You… you can’t—” I looked around for something, anything that would show me this was all a dream, that the nightmare of the last hour would disappear, a figment of my overactive imagination. But Rex glowered down at me. I felt his anger… at me. As if he had a reason to be angry when I was the one who had her life completely turned upside down by a decision not my own.
I walked back toward the door, keeping him in my line of sight, until my back hit the wall. “I’ll never forgive you for this.” For a second, a flash of regret sparked in his eyes, and he stepped forward, but before he could reach me, I bolted. My feet pounding the floor until the sunshine hit, almost blinding me.
“Uh, Mia?” Easton walked toward me, I’d taken so long he had got out the vehicle to look for me, his face a mask of confusion at my sudden change of heart. “I kept the truck running.”
I darted past him, hearing Rex’s boots thud behind me, getting closer and closer. But I wouldn’t stop for him, I wouldn’t stop for him ever again.
The cab door was left open, the key dangling in the ignition as I jumped in, shutting the door firmly before locking myself in and reaching for the gear…
“Fucking automatic,” I screeched, slamming my hands on the steering wheel, as I looked at where the gear stick was supposed to be.
“Mia, baby. I need you to get out of the truck.” Rex spoke softly as if I was a wild animal he was trying to calm down. My mind was a raging mess of chaos. An ache deep in my chest was trying to consume me, my breaths coming fast as I tamped it down, along with the tears that threatened to escape. Rex knocked on the driver’s window, the handle outside jarring as he tried to open the door. His pulling rocked the vehicle. “Just come inside and we can talk some more, I’ll explain everything. I know you don’t want to go driving in this condition.” His bright blue eyes pleaded with me, his knocks getting faster and harder. “You can’t go out there, you don’t even know where you’re going.”
Slamming my foot on the gas, the truck shunted forward. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Rex jump back, avoiding being run over. In the rear-view mirror, I saw him dart into the clubhouse.
As soon as I reached the main road, I put my foot down, speeding toward an unknown destination. I couldn”t go back to the motel, it would be the first place he looked for me. Not to mention I’d dropped my bag inside, so I had no money and no phone. I was literally on my own.
The town gradually gave way to country roads, trees and open highway. The blurred lines had me gripping the steering wheel with all of my strength, trying to remind myself to drive on the opposite side of the road to what I normally did kept my tears from falling.
My heart burned, the searing need to get away from everyone and everything kept my foot on the pedal. I felt violated, my trust destroyed by one decision that Rex made without my permission. He had taken my choice away from me, snatched it out of my grip and made me into this… this shell of a person who spent half her time anxiously considering a future with a man who could treat me like I was nothing. As if I was incapable of deciding these things for myself. He didn’t even speak to me about what happened next, whether we had a future together or if our relationship would work based on mere weeks of knowing each other. Instead he ripped my future out of my hands and molded it into what he wanted… what suited him.
I needed to pull over somewhere and find a phone, if I could get through to Millie, she could meet me with my things. She could get Kannon to try and find my passport and I could be on the next flight out of here. A tiny spark of hope lit in my chest as I revved the engine and put some speed between me and the Street Kings.
The road was lonely, not a car in sight, and if I’d been in any other kind of mood, I could have appreciated the sheer beauty of the view before me. But beside that spark of hope was a swirl of anxiety that swelled more and more the further I got from the clubhouse. Rex wouldn’t let me go that easily. He had been determined in keeping me with him, stealing my passport was a low blow, but I was pretty much neutralized until I got it back.
A dark spot on the horizon appeared in the rear-view mirror, and I passed it off as some stranger traveling in the same direction as me, begging to some unknown entity that it wasn’t Rex catching up. The car sped toward me, a trail of dust in its wake.
Apprehension reared its ugly head as the blacked out car raced up the highway and a breath of relief expelled in a long sigh as it overtook me, its taillights a welcome sight.
Before I could count my lucky stars that I’d gotten this far without a biker catching up with me, the car swerved into the middle of the road, parking across both lanes and blocking my exit. “No fucking way.” I slammed my hand on the horn, the sound ripping into my quiet solitude. “Get out of the fucking road, you prick,” I screamed to myself, hating Rex even more for his blatant disregard for my safety with this bullshit stunt.
Smashing my foot on the brake, I shoved the car into reverse, remembering a small lay-by about a mile back I could pull a U-turn and get the hell away in another direction. Anger had me fisting the steering wheel with all of my strength, and wanting to ram the truck in the car at the same time. The dodge was big enough to do some damage, but I didn’t want to run the risk of also doing damage to myself.
The engine picked up speed, and I threw my arm over the passenger seat to get a better look behind me. A dark flash of metal glinted through the rear window, and before I could slam on the brakes, the truck collided with the car behind me. The crunch of metal on metal rang in my ears, and my body jolted forward, the seat belt digging into my chest, pinching my skin. I groaned as we came to a halt, the smaller vehicle shunted back but ultimately stopping my escape.
Releasing my seatbelt with a ‘snick’, I shoved the door open and tumbled to the ground, my shaky legs barely holding me up. I hunched forward, my hands on my knees and sucked in great lungfuls of air, trying to calm my racing heart. “Holy shit.” My words rushed out in a wheeze as I looked up to take in the scene. The bonnet of the smashed car was crumpled, charcoal smoke filled the sky hindering my view of the driver.
I wobbled over, my nursing experience kicking in, and tugged the driver’s door open. The man inside was slumped forward, a crimson trickle working its way down his face from a gash on his forehead. “Sir, can you hear me?” I didn’t recognize him, his clothing spoke more of a cowboy than a biker.
I looked to the car that had blocked my way, waving at the occupant, I could just make out the shape of a man behind the wheel, his features hidden by the dark tinted windows. “Come on, come on,” I muttered. “Hey, I need your phone.” My shout and frantic wave got his attention, and his door was thrown open.
The man that exited wasn’t Rex. In fact, he wasn”t even a Street King, there was no leather in sight on his lean body. Each door opened to reveal another stranger, their icy gazes fixed on me. I suddenly knew that Rex had been right about the danger outside of the clubhouse.
And didn’t that just annoy the hell out of me even more.