Nyx grabbed one arm, Steel the other. Link and Rex dealt with my feet, and Maverick was the one who slipped his hands around my waist as, on the count of three, they all hauled me into the air.
A yelp escaped me as I wriggled out of their hold, but it was no good. They weren’t letting go. They were holding on tight.
A couple Sinners saw our antics, laughed and jeered as if it were a joke, not realizing that this was serious.
That my brothers were intending to dump me in the Fridge again.
That they were going to force me into withdrawals.
Panting and gasping for breath, they hauled me over to a waiting cage. I buckled one knee in an effort to kick my boot in Rex’s face—this was all his fucking idea, and seeing as it worked, they kept on goddamn doing it—but as I did, a soft gasp caught my attention.
A woman stood there. Young. Her eyes on us. Taking in the situation.
My mouth tightened as I ignored her, not giving much of a shit that she was hot, just needing to get free.
"Who are you, honey?"
Link.
Always the fucking flirt.
"I’m Kendra," the woman replied softly. "I-I just—"
"The party’s in the bar," Rex said, his tone flat, dismissing her without words while also containing Link from heading after her.
I took advantage of the distraction to pull my arm back, and when I managed to clock Nyx in the side of the head, he went down with a grunt, straight onto his knees which knocked out the stability of their hold on me.
With a yelp, I felt myself falling, but then Maverick was there, under my gut, holding me up while the others managed to swing me toward the cage.
As I was tossed in the back, my head collided with the metal framework, and groaning, I didn’t even notice when they clambered into the cage, some leaping into the trunk with me. The engine just rattled, and I felt the aches pounding through my system as we roared off the driveway, past the cemetery, and onto the land that separated the clubhouse from the Fridge.
The guys were talking, laughing, bitching.
This was a regular occurrence now. It wasn’t as traumatic. At least, not for them. For me?
It was hell.
I tried to get up, tried to roll onto my knees so I could clamber off the side of the truck, but my body wouldn’t let me.
Lying there, curled up in a ball, I groaned as we went over a nasty ridge that jerked the vehicle, and I puked, almost choking on it until Maverick hissed and grabbed me by the hair, then tugged me away from it and over onto my back.
The journey could have taken a decade and it wouldn’t have been long enough.
When we pulled up, I started crying, not giving a shit about looking like a pussy. I just sobbed as they dragged me out of the cage, then hauled me into the place where we tortured enemies, killed ‘em, and cut up their bodies to hide the evidence.
They threw me in there like I was trash, locking the door before I could scamper forward and escape.
The pitch black of the walls had me closing my eyes, and finally, I got enough strength to crawl over to the door, to lean against it, to bring my knees to my chest as I huddled in on myself. Then, I pressed my head to the door, listening. Always listening.
I heard them set up a fire, heard them laughing and joking, Link talking about Kendra and how hot she was and how, later, he was gonna tap that. I heard them opening cans of food and popping bottles of beer, sitting around like they were Boy Scouts at summer camp.
And even as the fear hit me for what was about to come; even though the pain was a specter just waiting to consume me whole; even though the withdrawals would tear my sanity to shreds, I was grateful for them.
Closing my eyes, aware that I’d never be left alone for one minute, that I’d be here for weeks, that they’d be the only people I spoke to for days, who’d give me food and drink, I accepted what I couldn’t change.
Cold turkey was about to make me its bitch.
Thirty-Nine
Storm
PRESENT
The sounds of that shotgun, of Kendra’s voice, of the implications of what was happening at my house, didn’t send me into a tailspin.
In fact, the rationale that settled over my brain was similar to when I took a hit of coke. The alertness, the hyper focus, it was beautiful. So fucking crystal clear that I recognized how hard life was without the ability to concentrate intensely.
But it made sense.
My woman was in danger.
My kid was in danger.
My fucking everything was in danger.
My hands curved about the edge of the desk as my brain clicked into gear.
Men—I needed men.
Guns—I needed guns.
Blood—I needed to shed it.
I slammed my fist into the table, not even feeling the pain as it soared through my knuckles. I needed my brothers. My fucking people. Rex, Nyx, Sin, Steel, Maverick, Link, Cruz.
As tunnel vision took over everything else, I ignored the flurry of notifications I’d received during my conversation with North, and sent out a chapter-wide text with two words in it:
Code Red
Following it up with my address, I shoved my phone into the back pocket of my jeans, then pivoted on my heel toward the cabinet where I housed our weapons.
Arming myself with as many guns as I could fucking carry, I headed to the door and out into the hallway, ready to direct the troops to the armory so they could arm themselves.
As I moved down the hallway, though, the silence within the clubhouse resonated hard.
It wasn’t possible that they’d reacted so swiftly to the Code Red, but when I reached the bar and found it empty, my jaw clenched, my eyes widened, and I took the hit as much as I would a bullet to the gut.
The fuckers had defected.
Jesus, you could have heard a pin drop in the silence of the room, a silence that seemed to buzz over the music that was playing on the speakers, music that—even at top volume—usually could barely be heard over dozens of brothers shooting the shit.
Hell, even the clubwhores had absconded.
I ran outside, found the gates wide open and North standing there, perplexed as he hovered by the gatehouse. He kept twitching, jerking from side to side like he wanted to do something but didn’t know what.
"Where is everyone?" I snapped, mind racing back to our meeting. Had I heard them ride off?
Bikes drifted in and out at all hours of the fucking day and night. Hearing the rumble of a dozen bikes wouldn’t have caught my attention because it was white noise by this point.
Christ, I was used to dozens of bikes coming and going at West Orange. They barely caught my attention now.
North sputtered, "I-I was gonna leave but with the gates wide open, I didn’t think I should—"
"You did good," I told him stonily. Because he had. The fucker hadn’t left, even though he knew something funky was going on. Bastard had just proven himself to be more loyal than the entire fucking chapter. "I need you with me."
"What’s going on?" he shouted as I ran over to my bike.
"Keira’s been…" I couldn’t get the words out, so instead I hollered, "My house has been hijacked."
His eyes flared wide in astonishment, but he earned himself another brownie point by running over to his hog and kicking it into gear without another word.