“They left me in a god damn ditch for two days. My voice is fucked from screaming. Do you know I didn’t even have it checked out, huh! Let’s not forget the week I walked around naked without clothes, begging with a cardboard box on. And the days I went without food, without water.” I laugh but it’s hollow just like my soul.
Shaking my head, I say, “You wouldn’t understand the idea of being hungry, or the reality of it if you’re pregnant, but I’ll explain it to you, our daughter didn’t stand a chance.”
He’s quiet, and for a second I swear I hear him breakdown but he clips the phone off, so I guess I’ll never know.
I look up at the men, there’s like twenty different men in the room and Venus looking at me with shocked expressions, except Zero because he already knows.
I didn’t tell him everything but I told him what was important.
He didn’t take it very well but he hid it well.
I hand Storm back his phone and regain my position.
“I need to make a phone call. He’ll be here soon.”
They all move aside as I climb off the bed. Everyone is silent.
These new people must think I’m crazy. They just walked in, and the first thing they saw was one of my episodes.
Maybe I am crazy.
But I’m the best and only hope they have of getting Jade and Falon back.
I walk out of the lounge and go to the front door, aware Zero is behind me. I dial up the only person I’ve never doubted.
The person I met when I was sixteen and pregnant, he was my last hope and he never failed.
The price I paid was worth it.
A life for a life. Una vita per una vita.
“Talk.” The bark of his voice makes me smile even in my darkest of moments.
“We spoke about that, it’s mean.”
He’s quiet for a long minute,
“Fuck you Riya, where the fuck are you? You just vanished overnight.”
“Nice to hear your voice too Boss man, but this isn’t social.”
“We’re Italian and family of course it’s social.”
My voice drops,
“Lucca called. He seems to think our daughter survived.”
“Fuck,” I hear him throw something.
He never could control his temper.
“I was thinking the same thing. He’s coming here, I know it, he won’t wait until Wednesday.”
He knows what I’m talking about, why I’m saying what I’m saying, but only him.
“I’ll bring your stuff.”
“That’s exactly what I wanted to hear.”
“But, I don’t fucking like it, this is the last time Riya, that Strunzo better be clipped by next week or I’m sending Vince with a Moe Green Special.”
I shake my head, “See you soon Boss man.”
I clip the phone off and face Zero’s tired gaze.
“Come on, you need to sleep. Falon will be fine.”
He pulls me in closer as his hands squeeze my ass.
“You damn well know it’s not Falon I’m worried about.”
I kiss his cheek, “And you damn well know I have to do this. I know Lucca, he doesn’t make empty threats and his men won’t stop at just killing your men. They’ll hunt your family down, rape your children and burn your houses, this isn’t a war ground with rules Zero, this is the outfit, there is no fucking rules.”
I push away from his warmth and walk past him, no doubt he’s following. He’s always following me.
“Beauty, whatever you thinking about doing don’t. We’ve hardly had anytime. We haven’t even really spoken.”
When I’m silent, he shakes his head.
“I planned to tell you this over dinner or a picnic or some romantic shit like that, not like this.”
I frown, “What are you talking about?”
His shoulders slump, “I’m being deployed.”
I stop dead in my tracks.
“It’s a covert operation, I got two weeks with you, don’t cut it short by going to that motherfucker, please stay, give us a chance.”
My stomach sinks and for the first time since I met Zero, I do the very thing that he warned me not to- I lie to his face.
“Ok, I won’t go until I really have to.”
The relief is evident as his shoulders drop. I smile at him, and it’s not a hard thing to do. He looks dangerous and sexy in his cut and chains hanging from his pants, a true badass biker.
Taking the few steps toward him I place a chaste kiss to his cheek. My back turns, missing the disappointment that marks his face.
I don’t bother with the new bikers that are lurking in the house with half naked girls hanging off their arms.
I don’t look up when a cloud of smoke blows in my face. I keep my gaze to the floor, inhaling the thick smell of beer and stale smoke now masking the strong disinfectant that normally fills the air in this area.
Zero’s voice rings from me behind me as he stops to greet his brothers. I’m glad he has them here with him. He’ll need them soon.
If there is one thing about Lucca I know is, he will never let me go.
I’m not the least bit surprised when my phone chimes as I enter my room. I don’t have to question how he got the number. Someone is working for him.
The Satan Snipers have a rat, and I know the Enforcer will hunt them down.
“Amariya, Il mio mendicante.”
“Not anymore, give them back their women Lucca.” I sigh, but inside I’m dying a thousand deaths. Hearing his voice, seeing him is the one thing I never want to do ever again.
But since my conversation with him earlier I feel so much stronger. I have to be if I’m going to kill him.
He ignores me, “Do you remember that job you did for your dear old cousin.” I stiffen mid-way to the bed mindful of the door opening behind me.
I know it’s Zero when his hands wrap around my waist.
“I’m not sure what you talking about Lucca,” I say his name out loud for Zero’s benefit.
“Oh, let me refresh your memory, two in the head, one in the back, you filthy, dirty, beggar. Remember that?” He chuckles but it’s different from before, like it’s almost forced.
“You mean your goons that tried to steal me for you.” I’m not going to like what he has to say, I know it. I never had.
He laughs, “They were hardly goons, one was a P. I remember him, ring any bells, the white Texas man.” It’s the face I had trouble remembering.
I step out of Zero’s arms putting distance between us.
“You lying, no it can’t be.” Even my voice sounds doubtful.
“Oh yes yes yes yes yes yes, say hello to your boyfriend for me will you.” He laughs as the call goes dead.
I’m still frowning when I face Zero, who’s slipping his cut off his shoulders and placing it like a priceless gem on the chair that Texas left in front of the bed.
“Can you tell me about your family, do you have brothers or sisters?”
If he is shocked by my sudden question, he doesn’t show it.
He proceeds to the bed, sitting down to untie his boots.
“My dad is on his way from Seattle, had some club stuff to sort out, but we can see him tomorrow. My brother is in a rehab facility, got stabbed in the back, doctors said he’ll never walk again but the man is persistent. He’ll be home in a month. My mother is dead to me, haven’t seen her since I was a kid, the rest we can talk ’bout another time, maybe tomorrow.”
He stands up sliding out of his pants and turns to face me.
“Gotta head out in the morning. Tonight, I just need to hold you, please. I know you don’t like to be touched and shit when you sleep, please Beauty, just tonight.”
His voice breaks and I run into his arms.
“You can hold me every night.”
He lifts me up, my legs wrap around his waist.
“Every night ha?” His voice drops into a sexy growl causing my sensitive pussy to clench. His eyes take on that bedroom look he does sometimes where the one gets smaller. The scar under the eye is something I wanna know about him. But I don’t ask, as he said we will have other nights.
Even as the thought leaves me, a sense of foreboding settles within me.
“Kiss me.” I tell him, desperation stark in my voice as need to feel this man in me, claiming me over and over again becomes a suffocating fuse burning to be set free, screaming to be fulfilled.
He groans, as he licks his lips and does just that.
He consumes me with a kiss of contentment, a kiss of hunger, a kiss of pain.
He strips my clothes the same way he strips my soul with each touch of his hands, each dig of his fingers as he claims my flesh, unravelling me until all I can do is feel.
And I feel everything, the glide of his lips as he paints my body with the heat of his breath, awakening my senses, pulling me in until I’m arching up, as the chains of another draw me back.
I writhe and twist under his exploring lips and caging hands.
I cry out as he fills me with all that is him, chest to chest, heart to heart, we collide as one.
Thrust after thrust Zero takes me, claims me, owns me until I have no choice but to pull at the chains that hold me.
I have no choice but to give him the last shred of my humanity, the final piece of me.