Chapter Six
Kyllian
“I appreciate this so much, Keely,” I said as she stepped back and yawned, exhaustion clinging to her like a shroud. “No problem. Sleep’s overrated anyway.”
Shutting the door, she trudged past me, and I followed, a knot of unease tightening in my gut.
The second the biker left, I ran upstairs, my heart a frantic drum against my ribs.
I packed a small bag, my hands shaking as I shoved clothes in, the unspoken threat of his presence a tangible weight.
Run, girl. Run. The thought screamed in my head, an overwhelming urge to escape.
I had no fucking clue what Jessup was mixed up in, but the thought of being anyone’s collateral, of being used, of having my life dictated by some stranger’s dangerous dealings, didn’t sit well with me.
It went against everything I believed—the independence I’d fought so hard to carve out for myself.
But even as I fled, a colder, more insidious fear gnawed at me: what if I was already too involved?
What if the biker’s attention, now fixed on me, couldn’t be so easily shrugged off?
“Power out again?” Keely asked, her voice thick with sleep as she flipped the lights on in her small kitchen.
A weak yellow glow sputtered to life, doing little to dispel the gloom.
I groaned internally and nodded. The mundane reality of my power being out felt like a cruel joke, an afterthought, considering the night’s events.
“I only need to stay the night,” I rasped, my throat dry. “I’m leaving on the first bus out of here.” My words felt like a betrayal, a white flag of surrender to the very life I’d tried to outrun.
Pulling out a chair, Keely sat, her expression etched with concern. “And go where?”
“Home.”
“Back to Alabama?” Keely’s eyes widened in shock, her disbelief evident. “We promised we would never go back there.”
Her words hung in the air, heavy with unspoken history. It was the thing we had in common... Alabama.
The word itself tasted like retreat. It represented everything I’d fled—a suffocating small town, a family that had fractured and broken, a past I’d desperately tried to bury.
Going back felt like a concession, an acceptance of failure.
But as the reality of my situation slammed into me, the desperate need for sanctuary, for a place where I wasn’t constantly looking over my shoulder, began to override my fierce independence.
Could I really afford to hold on to my pride when my safety was at stake? Was it stronger to face the ghosts of my past than to remain a target in this present danger?
My choice felt impossible, a cruel bind where neither option offered solace.
Going back home meant confronting the pain I’d escaped, the people who had hurt me.
Staying here, however, meant potentially drawing Jessup deeper into my life, and the very thought of that made my stomach churn with the terrifying realization that I was already making a bad choice, no matter what I did.
“I don’t have a choice, Keely. After what happened with Jessup, and then that biker showing up... this place isn’t safe anymore. I need to get away from all of it.” My voice cracked on the last word, exhaustion and fear finally catching up to me.
Alabama, the place I’d spent years trying to escape, suddenly felt like the only sanctuary left.
It was a bitter pill to swallow, admitting defeat and returning to a life I’d fought so hard to leave behind, but the threat of being used as collateral by a man like the biker, a man who exuded danger like a second skin, was far too real.
Keely’s expression softened, the usual playful sarcasm replaced by a genuine concern.
“Kyllian, you don’t have to do that. We’ll figure something out.
You can stay here for as long as you need.
And I’m sure I can find you a job somewhere that doesn’t involve kitten ears and lecherous old men.
” She reached across the table, her hand covering mine.
That small gesture of solidarity meant more than words could say.
“I don’t want to be a burden, Keely,” I whispered, my eyes stinging. “Besides, what if that biker comes back? What if he thinks I’m still there? I can’t risk you getting caught up in my mess.”
The image of his hard, unreadable face, his predatory smile, flashed in my mind. He was a wolf in leather, and I was a lamb who had somehow wandered into his den. And now, he’d declared me his collateral. The thought was terrifying, but also... strangely compelling.
Getting up from the table, Keely yawned. “Come on. Let’s get you to bed. It’s too damn early to decide anything.”
I nodded, too numb to argue, and followed Keely to her guest room.
It was small and sparsely furnished, but clean and quiet, a stark contrast to the chaos that had become my life.
As I lay down on the narrow bed, the unfamiliar softness of the mattress a luxury I hadn’t experienced in what felt like a lifetime, my mind raced.
The biker’s words echoed in my head. “You owe me, Kitten. And right now, you’re all I’ve got. ”
Collateral.
I knew what the word meant.
It meant I wasn’t free.
It meant I was property, a bargaining chip in some dangerous game I didn’t understand.
I was well-versed in the knowledge of what property meant.
My whole life I’d heard that word. Property.
Like my mother and sister, we were never given a chance to be our own.
Born into a world where hard, cruel men ruled, I learned quickly that just because I was the daughter of someone important, didn’t mean I was safe.
The word property had always been a ghost in my life.
That specter of the past, whispering of obligations and chains I thought I’d broken free from, now felt like a brand, seared into my soul by a lifetime of men who saw women not as people, but as possessions.
The biker, that hulking embodiment of danger, had dragged it back into the light, branding me with it.
He claimed I was his collateral, a pawn in his game, and the thought sent a fresh wave of ice through my veins.
It was a grim echo of my childhood, of being passed around like chattel, of never truly belonging to myself.
My mother, a woman who had known her own share of being owned, had always warned me about men like him, men who saw women not as people, but as possessions.
My mother’s story was a constant, painful reminder.
She’d been sold, essentially, into a marriage that was as gilded as it was suffocating.
Her father, a desperate man drowning in debt, had traded his only daughter for a lifeline.
I’d watched her wither, her spirit slowly chipped away by a man who viewed her as nothing more than an extension of his own power, a trophy to be displayed and then discarded when he had no more use for her.
Her hushed tears, her phantom pains—they were etched into my memory, a stark warning against ever allowing myself to be claimed, to be owned.
My mother, once beautiful and gentle, had been my father’s prize for a short time, paraded and controlled, her spirit slowly eroded until nothing but a hollow echo remained.
When my father realized that he would never get what he desperately wanted, he threw my mother away, selling her to a vile man in Birmingham, Alabama, where he made her his whore until she died shortly before my sixteenth birthday.
My sister, bolder and more rebellious, had fought her gilded cage, only to be crushed by it, her dreams of freedom extinguished before they could truly take flight. She also died young. Barely twenty-one.
And now me. I was no different. Here I was, facing the same fate, a different man, a different kind of debt, but the same suffocating promise of being someone else’s property.
Destined to be someone’s collateral, a bargaining chip in a world where my own desires and safety were deemed secondary.
The biker’s declaration, though chilling, was merely an echo of a truth I’d known since birth: I was never truly my own.
I closed my eyes as the weight of my history pressed down on me.
Keely’s offer of sanctuary felt like a temporary reprieve, a fragile barrier against the storm I was caught in.
But the biker’s gaze, that unnerving, calculating stare, had seen something in me, something he intended to exploit.
Was it my defiance? My brokenness? Or was it the fire he’d spoken of, a fire that, like his own, promised destruction?
I knew I couldn’t stay here, especially knowing that I was now entangled in whatever dark dealings Jessup had with this man.
It was a terrifying prospect, being pawned off by one abuser only to be claimed by another, but the thought of facing my past in Alabama, of admitting defeat to the ghosts I’d tried so hard to escape, felt almost as bad.
Sleep offered no escape. The biker’s voice, that low, resonant rumble, played on repeat in my head.
“You owe me, Kitten. And right now, you’re all I’ve got.
” His words had found their way under my skin, searing themselves onto my very soul.
My fear was a cold, hard knot in my stomach, a stark contrast to the fiery defiance that had burned within me earlier.
I was trapped, a bird with clipped wings in a cage I couldn’t even see, and the shadow of this mysterious, dangerous man loomed large, threatening to consume what little freedom I had left.
The next morning, the sun was already high in the sky when I woke.
Keely was already up, making coffee. I sat at her small kitchen table, the events of the previous night replaying in my mind, a twisted montage of violation and unexpected danger.
Jessup’s brutality, the biker’s unnerving intensity, Cade’s betrayal—it was a relentless onslaught.
The bruises on my ribs throbbed, a constant ache that was a physical manifestation of the emotional toll.
I couldn’t stay here.
I couldn’t risk Keely getting caught in the crossfire. Alabama, a place of painful memories, was beginning to feel like the only safe harbor.
As Keely handed me a mug of steaming coffee, her brow furrowed with concern, I knew I had to make a decision. A bus ticket out of town, but to where? The image of the biker’s predatory smile, the weight of his unspoken threat, was a far more immediate reality.
I wasn’t free.
I was tied to him, to whatever twisted game he was playing, and the thought of being owned, of being collateral, sent a shiver of unease down my spine. I took a deep breath, the warmth of the coffee a small comfort, and decided.
It was time to run.