Ashley

“Ashley, baby…” Harry breathed into my ear, a warm rinse of dread pooling down my consciousness.

I can’t recall when my heart sank that night. Was it the moment my husband’s f              ace changed for the worst when I told him I was pregnant with his child? Or was it the moment I started sinking into my thoughts after the only thing he could think to mutter out was “Are you fucking kidding me…”

I don’t know. I can’t remember because not even a second after that look did I end up pinned to our bedroom door with his hands around my neck.

“You stupid, stupid girl…” He spoke through clenched teeth, “Why do you have to make life so difficult!?”

When his thumbs pressed into the hollow of my throat, whatever was left of my breath ran up to my mouth in a choked protest. I tried to scream. Each time I tried, he squeezed harder. The grip he had on my throat was fixed and I could see my face turning white with fear in the reflection of his cold eyes. With my fingers scraping into his hand, he still refused to ease off in the slightest. It was when I slid my hands down to his wrists to dig my nails hard into his skin did he finally let out a frustrated growl. His arms pried me away from the door, pulling me forward by my throat only to bash my skull back into the wooden frame again, and again, and again. My eyes closed shut at the blunt pains building at every hit. The fire-like sensation was spreading across my skull in flares until it consumed every inch of my thoughts.

When he stopped, I opened my eyes and felt my wet tears break down in streams across my cheeks. I – Ashley Monroe was not a woman to be broken, and yet my husband did that. He broke me down into something I didn’t even recognize.

I didn’t even realize he had slid his hands away from my throat to keep me still by my shoulders. I didn’t even realize that I was holding onto my own throat, scared senseless that he’d take my neck again and snap it in half if he had the chance.

I jumped when his right hand left my shoulder.

"Harry—!"

The pounding in my head became stronger and stronger, at this point I thought he was going to hit me again. But he didn't. Instead, he took it upon himself to glide his fingers up to my cheek.

I restrained every inch of my body from flinching as he took the side of my face in his enormous hand, holding it gingerly.

“Oh baby…”  He whispers, the coarseness of his breath smelling wet with the Heineken on his tongue. "Why you' shaking so bad, baby? Can't you see?"

I blinked hard, trying to understand what he meant. The tears were swelling back down from my eyes, but his expression remained hard to read; I couldn't think for the life of me, no matter how much I tried.

"I thought..." I spoke softly but my own voice sounded strained under my bruised throat. "...I thought you'd be happy about this.”

With a stifled cough, I expressed myself again, "We haven't been ourselves lately, and I thought maybe this would help?"

"And what's this exactly?" He dropped his voice.

I swallowed down my fear.

"A family."

Just hearing me say it gave him something to think about as he stood hovering over me with his thumb forming hard circles onto my cheek. I closed my eyes again in the quiet of the moment, trying to breathe. Every inhale I took was slow, but the exhale that followed was practically a shudder tearing out of my body. I was shaking in front of him; a crying figure that couldn't explain herself. Just where did I go wrong? The only problem was, I didn’t. I didn’t go wrong at all.

"Of course, baby..." Harry breaks me from my thoughts, speaking aloud.  "You thought I'd be happy with one extra mouth to feed on top of taking care of your sorry ass."

"What?"

My eyes flashed open the moment his hand closed into a fist and swung down over my face. The sound cracked between the two of us as I hit the floor in defeat, legs unwilling to hold me up to my aggressor. Every nerve of pain that was screaming in the back of my head was traveling back to my face. As he stood there watching me, my arm slowly went up to hold my eye, but he left me no time to catch my breath. I didn't see his arm reach forward until his fingers clawed through my hair and yanked my head back from the floor. My voice escaped me as I yelped at the agony splitting from my scalp. When I reached up to his arms to stop him, he pulled harder and the sting made me grab his wrist in panic.

"Stop, Harry! Please!"

He chuckled at the sight of me and forced me back on my feet, "Baby, I'm only doing what's best for you..."

With his free hand, he opened the door and pulled me of the room with his legs moving fast. Every step was followed with a jerk to my hair and I could only follow him down the stairs with my knees threatening to quit on me. Everything felt dizzy at this rate. When we reached the kitchen, even the walls were spinning around me.

Harry pulled me close to his side and buries his mouth against my ear. "Bend over that table."

I didn't have a chance to blink before he pushed me into our dining room table with a thick grunt. My legs took a fumble, but my arms shot out to the edge and I caught myself in time. I steadied my body to stand and looked over my shoulder only to see that his back was facing me. He was making his way up to the garage with the drag of his feet, as if he was looking for something specific. I didn't question it, especially when I didn't have much time to begin with.

My hand automatically went down to my back pocket to check for my phone only to find it missing. Did I have it on me in the bedroom? What if I dropped it when I fell... God, help me. Was there enough time to find out? No, I can't take the risk without the time. Thoughts ravaged my mind over and over. I couldn’t just stay here and think, I needed to act.

Instead, I ripped myself away from the table and started into the living room. We have a house phone perched on one of our end tables by the ottoman. My hand grabbed for the receiver and pulled it up to my ear only to wince when my bruised face touched the cold surface. With a shallow breath, I stared hard at the panel of numbers before me.

I honestly didn't know who to call. Who to reach out to. Did I want the police involved? Certainly not. That wasn't an option for me to get involved with police that were probably best buddies with Harry at the old bar up the road. I went over and over who I could call in my mind. The truth was, I didn’t have hardly anyone and the only person I did have, well, I walked away from him years ago. My father.

Would my father pick up in time? There was only one way to find out. I looked over my shoulder to check the kitchen if Harry was back from his search only to see that he was still gone. With a shaken breath, I started my fingers on the first set of digits that came to mind. So far, so good–––only... I couldn't remember the last four.

"Shit.. Shit.." I whisper in complete panic.

Ashley, come on. Now wasn't the time to forget. I was trying to tap out the remaining two when suddenly a hand shot down at my wrist.

"Agh!" I cried out as he bent my arm up til’ my hand reached my shoulder blades.

"Just what do you think you're doing?" He growled into the back of my neck.

"I didn't–!"

"Who the fuck did you call?!" The level of his voice escalated with his demand.  

When I tried moving to the opposite direction, he squeezed the mobility out of my wrist and I hissed.

"No one, Harry! Jesus Christ, let me go!"

From there, he didn't waste time with making me comply. Harry dragged me back to the kitchen with a steel-firm grip on my arm and hip. As soon as we reached the dining room table, I felt the ominous dread filling my head as to what he intended for me to do next. He looked to me, then the table, and when he looked back to match eyes with me––his eyes were almost as mad as the words that came out of his mouth.

"We're going to fix this, baby." He nods and strokes the width of my wrist slowly, "You're going to bend over, right now, and we're going to fix this."

I couldn't believe what I just heard.

"Harry...no..."

The hand that was on my hip grabbed my shoulder and dug its fingers into my bones. I cringed the second he touched that sensitive aching nerve only to find myself leaning forward into the table. His hand proceeded from my shoulder to the back of my head and he forced my face down to the tabletop, my aching cheek pressed into the surface. The table held my body up from the chest and up but my stomach was the only thing that wasn't parallel to the surface top.

A thick sob escaped my lungs and I could hear him drag something behind my head––something metal. His hand was still on my arm at the base of my back and had I tried, I didn't even think I would shake him loose. My shoulder felt numb, my arm was strained to the point that I couldn't move my hand, and I didn't know what to do. I could only wait as the metal left the table with a thickening skid that made my stomach sick. I was breathing so hard in a room that felt so small. The oxygen was leaving at the rate my fear was settling in.

I closed my eyes expecting the first hit, but it wasn't until I started to breathe again did I feel the pipe smash into my abdomen. My body doubled over at once and I gave out a wrenching groan. Harry kept me up against the table, forcing me to keep standing even if my body was weak from the blow. He swung again, and the hit took the air out of my lungs. What was left of me was spilling out in cruel whimpers against the wood and felt my body twisting against his arm. The pain was caving into my abdomen and I could feel it's weight telling me not to run, but to curl into the nearest corner until he stops. I choked on my cough, sputtering with my fingers digging into the wood. My broken voice filled the room but the only thing my ears could pick up was the way the metal whistled at each swing.

And then the doorbell rang.  

The beating stopped and his hand pushed off my back. I fell back to the floor and my good arm followed me down to cradle the pit of my stomach. As soon as I hit the linoleum, the pain was too much. My opposing arm couldn't catch me in time and I groaned hard at the overwhelming nausea filling my body.

"Quiet, you bitch!" He hissed.

When I lifted my head, I realized he was already at the front window to check who was at our door. The thing he used to beat me was a metal pipe that he was propping up to the wall beside him. I tucked my legs below me and came up to my knees, my eyes going back to the phone. When I looked back to Harry, he had just opened the door with a suburban smile spreading across his red face.

"Jack Jones!" He laughs and my heart clenches as I see the man’s face from my position.

Jack "Grizzly" Jones. He was the Prez of the Bears MC. A man I hadn’t seen in years – a man I shouldn’t be seeing here in Tennessee. Tennessee is a long way home from Montana. Some of the men called him Grizzly because he had enough hair on his body to make eleven bald men happy. Others say it was because he was a ruthless fighter in his youth. I didn't know what to think of him personally. What I did know was that it didn't matter if he a WW-fucking-E champion or whatever; my daddy would rip him to shreds and use his body as a bearskin rug if he hurt me.

Just thinking about what he'd do to Harry made me feel a little better.

"Harry, don't wake the neighbors now, heh." Jones chuckled lowly, "Where's the missus'?"

I watched Harry take a thick gulp.

Ah, well we're going through a spat. She's upstairs sleeping it off right now."

Jack laughed at that, "That kind of spat, eh? That's a shame. I was hoping to talk to her personally."

"Yeah?" Harry nodded, "What do you want with Ashley?"

What did Jack Jones want with me?

We'd only been introduced on my wedding day and even then, he seemed greasier than a grizzly. Knew how to talk to women and tell them what they wanted to hear. I could still remember him telling me that Harry would "take care" of me as the "man of the family". God, help me. With Harry showing his true colors, I didn't even want to think what this man was capable of. Were they working together?

"Just a talk. It involves you too so why don't you just let us in and we'll have a beer or two over it." Jack started in, but Harry stopped him there.

"Gimme a moment, Prez." Harry coughed, "Ashley just washed the hardwood. Why don't you guys take off your shoes out there while I get some of those beers?"

I wanted to fucking scream my head off. See what'd happen if Harry fucking Vale got caught on a lie. Wouldn't that just upset the big bear himself. But no, that wouldn't do a bit. I wanted to know what Grizzly had in store for me. If he was willing to talk to Harry off to the side from me then obviously they were in on something that I wasn't supposed to know.

"Sure, Harry. Your house, your rules." Grizzly chuckled languidly.

"Thank you, Sir'." Harry put on his best hunky-dory smile and closed the door.

The room went quiet for only a moment.

Finally, Harry reared his head back at me with an expression that made my stomach tighten.

"Can you walk."

I bit my bottom lip and nodded slowly.

"Good." He gestured his head up to the stairs, "Get yourself in bed and keep that mouth shut."

From there, I was left to pick myself up with the help of the table. The screaming pain roaring against my stomach was telling me to stop but Harry's threatening stare kept me moving. Once I was on my two feet, I held onto the limp form of my arm and started my way up to the stairs, climbing my way with Harry's stare uninterrupted. I dragged myself up to the bedroom door, took the door handle, and stood there opening the room before closing it behind me. With my back up against the wood, I found myself in the reflection of our dresser mirror and gasped.

My face was almost unrecognizable with my skin already turning purple and my left eye swelling shut from where he hit me. I collected my face in horror and felt the tears stinging against my raw skin. He did this to me––drunk and angry––and now, he could carry on a friendly conversation with his friend’s downstairs? Just who the hell did I marry...?

I stifled my soft cries when I heard their voices below me, laughing like drunk hyenas. My hand came up to my mouth to calm my body down and eventually, I could feel my breathing grow slower.

"You sly dog..." I could recognize Grizzly’s voice. "How you ended up with the daughter of our rival MC is beyond me, honestly."

"Last I saw, she had a good set of legs." Someone else's voice chided with the men and they laughed all over again. If my stomach wasn't already upset, I'd be repulsed to no end.

Harry's voice finally spoke up, "Well, let's just say she was in my cards."

"Oh, we know about those cards of yours, boy." Grizzly hummed. "Which is why we wanna borrow her as our ace."

"Ace?" Harry inquires.

"Leverage, Harry." Grizzly chuckled.

"We want to use her to get to the Reaper sons of bitches." The other man responded.

At that point, my eyes widened in shock. I spun my body to face the door, hand already at the knob but my head told me not to leave the room. Not yet. Still, I was gritting my teeth just at the nerve of them. Did they honestly think it was going to be that easy to get to my father? The Prez of the Reapers MC? They had another thing coming, my daddy wasn’t the type of man you could push around.

The man that carved his life work and family line into this foundation of notorious bikers? Hell, they didn't know what they were getting into... If they honestly thought I'd sit around and let that happen, they could break every bone in my body trying to stop me from getting back home. That’s the one place I needed to be right now. Like primal instinct I knew I needed to leave this shithole and get back home to Montana as soon as I possibly could.

"You honestly think it could work?" Harry sounded unsure.

"What' you talking about, boy?" Grizzly was firm.

"These people are loyal to Fist and all. I've seen them myself."

"Doesn't mean shit." The other man spat.

Grizzly added to that, "Fist is a father who would do anything to get his daughter back. We'll threaten him to step down if he ever wants to see sweet Ashley back in one piece––pictures, videos, maybe even send the old man some of her lush blonde hair in a box. Hell, maybe we’ll spice the pot a little bit and send him one of her fingers. We’ll arrange for a meet to offer little Ashley back over to Fist and that’s when we’ll strike. We’ll take him out right then and there."

I scoffed under my breath.

"Once he's down, we'll storm the place using Ashley as a shield. Or better yet, kill every single fucker one by one." A dirty cackle suggested.

"Death to the Reapers." Grizzly added.

"Could work then." Harry muttered to the men, "Let's do it."

"There we go!" Grizzly’s voice booms in the living room followed with a hard laugh, "We’ll plan another night boys, let’s celebrate the soon to be demise of the Reapers”

And drink they did. Glass clanked hard between the men as they spent themselves with bottles in hand. I heard their dirty laughs rolling underneath the floorboards. I was left to sit there for what felt like hours, but I listened. Boy, did I listen...

The things they'd share between the three of them. Harry was working for Grizzly this entire time. Probably before we even got married. That wasn't the only thing that put my mind to unrest. The drugs Harry had been moving left and right within the Bear's MC. All those strip joints he visited to sell at while I was at home, waiting for him to join me for dinner during those lonely nights. God knows what he was doing during his "break" time. Certainly not texting me back while I was waiting on him.

It took me a trip around the bedroom to look for my phone just so I could push my thoughts aside. Still, I couldn't find my cellphone, but I did find Harry's car keys to pocket. I couldn't find anything or anywhere to put my thoughts, so I returned to my spot on the floor with my back to the door and an arm up to my stomach. When my anger subsided, I was left to stroke my stomach with swelling fear. I didn't know if the baby… Were we going to be okay? I couldn't...I couldn't sit here any longer. I needed to get up on my feet and move.

I took the door knob and steadied my back to the wooden frame, pulling myself up. With a deep inhale, I stopped myself from breathing whilst turning the knob slowly––centimeter by centimeter. The door was loose and barely made a sound as I pulled the door to me with my eyes reaching to the edge of the stairs.

The house was quiet... Or at least quiet enough for me to make my next move. My legs started their trek to the stairs and once I was there, it took every grain of effort in my body not to make a peep from the old steps. Halfway down and the living room was already in view. Harry had passed out on the couch, one leg sprawled off the edge while his arm took the board. The color of his face was flushed from the alcohol which meant I was practically in the clear. Exactly where was Grizzly and the other guy though?

My eyes went from the kitchen bar to the front door where the welcome mat lay. The only shoes I could recognize was Harry's brown cluttered boots. Had they gone?

I didn't have much time to find out. I continued down the remaining steps and peered out the window to see if there were any cars in our driveway. None. Relief was splashed into my heart and I could breathe. I darted my way past to the living room that lead to the kitchen until I noticed the phone sitting at the end table by Harry's feet.

Those numbers were staring back at me with the green monitor.

Should I call my father?

No. I learned my lesson. Get out while he's down and don't look back. I pulled my body away from the door and stepped into the open kitchen just in time to spot something familiar. Harry's phone was sitting at the counter top by the stove!

I didn't know if it had been sitting there this entire time, but I cursed at not noticing it until now. Sure, I couldn't finish the dial of numbers for my father's cell––but I knew Harry's passcode and using his data would help me find my way back home.

My hand snatched the phone and I was already on my way to the garage with a swelling confidence building in my chest. So close, I had to be careful. The garage was closed and if I opened it with the remote, there's that risk of waking him up... I'd have to pull the door up myself.

With a close of the kitchen door behind me, I continued to the wide door with the freedom to move quickly. I dropped to my knees before the latch and inched my fingers underneath the handle. My endurance strained itself trying to slide the weight of the door up with one hand, but I held my breath, trying not to make another sound while I was so close to freedom! It took some time trying to slide the damn thing up to the halfway point but once I was there, the rest seemed to lift on its own like a feather.

I rolled it quietly on up to the garage ceiling and saw the dark night clearing of my neighborhood before my eyes. The cool air rolled up to my heated face and distressed my mind all at once. At that moment, I could've cried to have made it this far. After everything, never did I think I’d walk out on my husband. Until now, our spats had been purely emotional. He’d never laid a hand on me until tonight – and tonight was the last fucking time he’d lay a hand on me

Harry wasn’t a model husband by any means. He knew exactly the right things to say that would break me down. He would apologize from the bottom of his heart and I could only sit there and believe him. Not anymore. This was the last damn time he'd ever do anything to hurt me.

I picked my head up and walked away from the entrance to get into the car. When I slid that key in the ignition and turned it, I didn't care if Harry woke up from his drunken slumber. I didn't give a shit if he freezes to death in his sleep when the cold escaped the garage and filled up the rest of our house.

My foot lifted off the brake and as the car followed on forward, I didn't stop. As soon as I was up to the lip of my driveway, I hit the gas and turned the wheel with the arm he didn't fuck up.