My fists clench. No way would Sarah have let this happen if she were in my shoes. She’d have grabbed that gun. She’d have threatened him into getting her out of here. Maybe she wouldn’t have shot him, but she’d have done something.
Lord, she wouldn’t have let him get her on that bike at all.
I need to find her. I need to know that she’s okay.
If the Colony has her again…
I shiver. They can’t have found her.
Letting the need to locate Sarah fuel my resolve to escape, I push my hand through my curls, thinking hard for a plan. A plan that doesn’t involve Spider catching me and then doing something a lot worse than what he’s already done.
Guilt crawls its way slowly beneath my skin at the memory of what just happened between us. Oh, but how much easier would it be if I only felt guilty because I didn’t stop him?
That same need I’d felt while he was stroking my sex with his fingers is still there. It’s a lot less intense, but it’s strong enough that I squeeze my thighs together in an effort to relieve it.
It doesn’t work.
I growl under my breath and force myself to shake off the last few moments. It happened. It can’t be undone. I’ll book the one-way ticket to hellfire and damnation later. For now, I need to focus on the present. On getting out of here before he comes back and does who knows what to me.
Throat dry, I swallow. The taste of him still coats my tongue, masculine and rich and as toxic as poison.
I make my way to his bathroom and flick on the light to wash out my mouth. In the doorway, I freeze, staring at the back wall of his bathtub.
The shower curtain is pulled aside, leaving a window clearly visible.
A window that’s large enough for me to squeeze through. It would be a tight fit, but I could do it.
My pulse speeds up. The window is probably locked; he wouldn’t make things that easy for me, but if I could get it open…
I race to the bath and climb in. The window is one of those frosted panes of glass that makes it difficult to see through, so with bated breath, I push the pane sideways. It’s heavy and slides slowly aside. I peer through the window into the moonlit night.
Light from the back of the tavern makes it easy to see across the rear property. Sand baked hard by the sun stretches up to a hill a few hundred feet away. Fifty feet from the back wall, men and a handful of women are gathered around two of the bikers who look like they’re in the middle of a fight.
The fight looks like one of those boxing matches I saw on television at the job I’d worked before I started at The Devil’s Den, only without the ring and gloves. The crowd chants and cheers the two men on while they take swings at each other.
My heart plummets.
If I climbed out the window, the ground is less than five feet down, but I wouldn’t get more than a few feet across the sand before someone saw me. And if they did, they’d probably drag me right back to Spider, wherever he is.
Worse, even if I did escape without being caught, how far would I get on my own? I have no idea what’s beyond that hill. A short distance from the fighters, there’s only a tall, bare tree with a few branches reaching out into the night like the fingers of a giant, gnarled hand. There’s nowhere to hide, only more sand, and that hill.
It could be miles before I reached a house or a store. Miles, out there in the heat with no water or food.
People have died going out into the desert without taking the proper precautions. And when daylight comes and the sun is up, it’ll be even more dangerous.
Shoving the window shut, I turn and lean against it, letting my head drop against the glass. No escaping that way, either, at least not now.
Like it or not, I’m not getting out of here tonight. Until I find a better way, I’m stuck here.
Despair settles over me, heavy and crushing.
Anger with Spider rises up, and I let it burn away the demoralized feeling that tries to drag me under.
I can’t believe I worked so hard to get out of the Colony only to end up here. And all because of one stupid decision.
My fists clench. I won’t let Spider destroy my life. I won’t let him ruin everything I’ve worked so hard for.
There has to be a way out. The opportunity will come.
And when it does, I’ll be ready for it.
6
A Bad Day
As soon as the door to my room clicks shut, I pause, listening.
There’s no sound from inside.
No footsteps. No muttering under her breath like she always does when she’s pissed.
Has she even moved?
A twisted hope that her stillness is because of me burns in the back of my throat. I picture her in there on her knees, holding her breath while she waits until I’m gone.
No. She’s too strong for that.
I bring my fingers to my nose and inhale the musky scent of her pussy that still lingers there. My dick goes as solid as a steel spike.
Patting my cut where her panties bulge from the inside pocket, I smile, cocking my head toward the door until I hear her move across the room to the bathroom.
Good girl. If she broke that easily, if she fell apart from my skull fucking her, I’d be disappointed. I want the challenge of wearing her down, truly making her mine on every level. I need it.
Still, I’d give anything to be a damned fly on the wall and see what she’s doing in there. Would she shower? Would she try to wash off the stain I’ve left on her soul?
I hear water running in the sink. She’s probably washing my come out of that little mouth. Damn. I should have sent her to bed without letting her do that.
I should get Rat to put a camera in my room. No, two of them. One above my bed, so I can watch what I do to her there whenever I want, and another in the bathroom. Right in the shower. Rat would know how to set it up so I can watch the feed on my phone.
A smile spreads over my face.
When did I become such a sick fuck?
My phone buzzes and I pull it out, looking at the screen.
It’s the same guy who messaged me before I left her, the Sergeant At Arms for the Satan’s Bastards MC.
Gunner: Got what you’re looking for. Ricky’s. 2 hrs.
While it pisses me off that he thinks he can change things on me and expect me to obey him like a lapdog, there’s a larger concern.
Ricky’s isn’t our usual meeting place. I don’t know it as well as I know The Red Crow, which puts me at a disadvantage. Reading the text again, suspicion makes my skin prickle. Considering the history between our clubs, I wouldn’t put it past anyone with a Satan’s Bastards patch to use this exchange as a trap.
I shove the phone into my cut pocket and head for the prez’s office. Whether or not something is off, a meeting with Gunner means a talk with my commander in chief.
Dragon’s office is at the end of the hall, away from the rest of the clubhouse. Everyone knows not to come down here unless it’s for a meeting with him.
At the office, I rap my knuckles on the closed door. “Prez? You in there?”
“Nope.” Dragon’s voice drifts out.
Smartass.
“Need to talk,” I tell him. He knows I wouldn’t press him unless it was important, but no one walks in on him uninvited. Not even his officers.
“Come in.”
I push open the door.