Chapter 1
Bridger
Everything’s fucking wrong with her.
Kyle’s words are still buzzing in my head as I look down at the unconscious woman.
He’s only been gone a few minutes, but already I’m overwhelmed with the enormity of what he’s laid upon me.
My first reaction is that this doesn’t sound right. Kyle coming in here and dumping this on me, claiming he’s undercover ATF. I feel like I’m being set up for something, but maybe that’s just paranoia kicking in. Still, it’s just too goddamn hard for me to accept that Kyle Sommerville is anything but a thug who rides with Mayhem’s Mission.
Don’t get me wrong… his criminal proclivities never bothered me. I don’t judge, and I sure as shit don’t get messed up in it. Keep that shit away from me and as long as you can do that, I can hang and party with the best of them. And I’ve partied with Kyle on several occasions, no doubt, which is why it doesn’t make sense he’d come to me to conceal this woman. We don’t know each other all that great because sharing booze doesn’t necessarily lend itself to strong bonds of friendship. As such, he has no idea if I’ll keep this woman safe or turn her over to Zeke. Shit, I’ve spent more time with the club president, Zeke, and his old lady, Kayla, doing all kinds of nasties with them, than I have with Kyle. How in the fuck does he not think I wouldn’t have more loyalty to Zeke?
Not that I do.
I can’t stand that son of a bitch actually. He’s a thug times ten and rules that club with more than an iron fist. If the money he pays me weren’t so fucking awesome, I would never do the kink he hires me for. Sadly, though, selling my services for money is what I know best. It’s where my fundamental value as a human resides, so I’m not likely to turn my nose up at it.
The ironic thing is I don’t need the money. I make plenty just off The Wicked Horse and The Silo. But it’s not the same. A dollar earned for an orgasm I can dole out is far more valuable to my fucked-up sense of self than money earned otherwise. While I don’t allow my Fantasy Makers to earn money for sexual services, I don’t have the same qualms when it comes to me accepting it, and that’s because I don’t get off on what I do. It truly is just a job. There’s no real pleasure in it for me, but it is important to me on a level no one could ever understand. Being the one controlling the whip and doling out the pain, while being revered for doing so to such an extent that I’m given true value for my abilities…
It’s necessary for me to survive.
The woman on the couch hasn’t moved, but I can tell by the steady rise and fall of her chest that she’s still breathing. And it looks strong too, which means there’s no need for me to feel for a pulse. Still, the blood matted in her hair concerns me, and I’m afraid there may be other things wrong with her that I can’t see. Maybe wounds under her filthy clothes or inside her mind… which I’m kind of thinking might be the case.
Everything’s fucking wrong with her.
“Christ,” I mutter to no one, as she can’t hear me.
Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I flip through until I find Logan’s number and tap the screen.
He answers with a, “Yo, dude?”
My eyes cut down to the woman, and I mutter another almost silent curse before I say, “I need you to come to my house. I’ve got sort of an emergency I need help with.”
Logan doesn’t question me but simply says, “I’m on my way. Assume you want me alone?”
“Yeah,” I say, my eyes still pinned to the unwelcome visitor on my couch. Logan disconnects immediately without even a goodbye. It’s best Auralie stays out of this, although Logan will probably tell her about it anyway. Those two practically have one step on the altar even though it’s been a little less than a month since she’s come back to live here with Logan. But when Logan finally decided to live in the real world, he jumped into the deep end with both feet and gave himself fully to Auralie.
About two weeks ago, Logan stopped by my office at The Wicked Horse, almost timidly knocking on my door in the middle of the day. He came in when I called out the door was open, and by the look on his face, I knew immediately he wanted to unburden.
Turns out, the reason Logan was running from his demons was about as legitimate as I’d ever heard. Ranks right up there with my reasons, but Logan has more general fortitude than I do apparently because he decided to confront them rather than cherish them the way I do. He sat in my office for over an hour and told me all about his life in Chicago where he was a successful surgeon. My chest squeezed with pain for my friend when he told me his daughter died while under his care and the incredibly torturous guilt he’d been living under.
Why he told me these things, he never revealed, but I suspect it’s because I had made a casual reference to my own demons to him once. I’d given him sage advice and told him that you can’t outrun them because they’re inside of you. He turned it back on me and wanted to know if I’d gotten rid of my own, but nah… they’re still there, very much fluid and alive within me.
Like I told Logan… I’m keeping those fuckers around as a reminder to me of all the shit I’ve endured and what I’ll never go through again. What I didn’t specifically reveal to him was the importance of their reminder; it never lets me forget that love is for idiots and trust is for fools. Staying strong behind an iron wall of protection is far healthier to my sanity than opening up to the unknown. There isn’t much that frightens me in this world, but not knowing what’s around the corner causes me heart-pounding anxiety. It’s exactly why this mess of a woman on my couch is wigging me out a bit. It’s destroying my carefully ordered world.
While I wait for Logan to arrive, I walk back to my master bathroom, which is where I keep my first aid kit. It doesn’t have much other than antiseptic and bandaging supplies, but I’m guessing it’s going to be needed. I mull over what Kyle told me during his very brief visit, and it clearly wasn’t enough for me to be able to wrap my head around whether or not I can trust him.
After he revealed he was undercover and then went all cryptic on me by telling me this woman had one foot in the grave, I pressed him for details because fuck if I was going to keep a half dead person in my house without a little bit more from him.
“Dude,” I’d said in frustration. “You’ve got to give me more of an explanation. I do not want to get tangled up in something illegal with Mayhem’s Mission.”
Kyle shook his head. “I wouldn’t ask that of you. She’s got nothing to do with any of the illegal stuff.”
I took that as solid verification she wasn’t part of the sex-slave ring he’d mentioned. My fate was sealed when Kyle added on, “She’s an innocent in all of this. Got caught up in that shitty world. It was going to cost her life if I didn’t get her out.”
“How would it cost her life?” I pressed, because I needed more still.
Kyle started walking toward my front door, apparently assuming I was on board with this woman staying with me. I was not, and I wouldn’t hesitate to dump her at the police station door if he didn’t satisfy my curiosity.
“Kyle,” I barked as he grabbed for the door. “I need to know the trouble she’s in before I agree to this.”
His shoulders slumped. When he turned to me, it looked like he’d aged twenty years. “She’s Zeke’s property, and Kayla isn’t quite on board with that. Zeke’s on a run and for the past four days, Kayla’s been torturing her. She wouldn’t last another day.”
“Torturing her?” I grit out in stunned disbelief. Not disbelief that Kayla could torture someone because that chick is seriously twisted, but that she’d bring it to the point of murder.
Kyle’s eyes slide to the woman on my couch, and then back to me before whispering with such pain that it makes my ears feel like they’re bleeding. “I’ve watched some sick shit happen over the three years I’ve been deep. I’ve watched people die. I’ve let people die while I watched. Just couldn’t do it again. I had to get her out. I’m begging you to just keep her safe for a bit until I can get things finalized for the ATF to take this club down.”
Jesus Christ.
I know all about being unprotected and alone, completely at someone’s mercy. I know all about helplessness, sadistically delivered pain, and the hopelessness that comes with forced isolation and antipathy. Fuck me good and hard, that touched me deeply, although Kyle would never understand the power her plight had over me.
“Fine,” I said as I exhaled a long breath. “Just… fine. I’ll keep her.”
Kyle merely nodded, then he was gone, and it appeared I was on my own with trying to figure out what the fuck to do next.
I carry the first aid kit back into the living room, seeing the woman is still laying in the same position, but I pause a moment to watch to make sure she’s breathing. I don’t get any closer to her, and I’m not sure why other than the possibility that she might stop breathing scares the fuck out of me.
Placing the kit on the coffee table, I sit back down in my recliner, but I don’t lounge. Rather, I sit on the edge, feet planted solidly on the floor, and I sip at my beer as I watch the woman slumber in her unconsciousness. I wait for Logan to arrive, which he does not fifteen minutes after I hung up the phone with him.
His knock on the door is soft, as if he knows this whole encounter is covert. My socked feet padding across the floor are equally furtive, which is ridiculous really. I swing the door open and step to the side, my head nodding toward the couch.
Logan walks in, but then immediately halts when he sees the woman lying there.
“Who’s that?” he mutters.
“No clue,” I tell him honestly as I shut the door. “And I can’t tell you the details of how she came to be here, but she’s in danger and has been roughed up.”
I purposely don’t use the word torture, because I don’t want to freak Logan out any more than necessary.
Logan veers off into my kitchen. While he told me the day he stopped by my office that he was never practicing medicine again, I can tell it’s not going to stop him from helping me. “Let me wash my hands first,” he says by way of explanation.
I wait in the living room for him, pacing back and forth nervously, my eyes cutting from the woman to my feet as they traverse the hardwood flooring made of reclaimed lumber.
When Logan returns, he rolls up his shirtsleeves before taking a seat on the coffee table by the couch so he can get a good look at her. “How long has she been unconscious?”
“Not sure. She was like that when he brought her here.”
“Which was when?” he asks as he leans forward and takes a closer look at the dried blood on her head.
“About two minutes before I called you,” I verify.
Logan nods and says, “I need a flashlight.”
Turning from him, I walk over to the large entertainment unit against the wall and pull a flashlight from the drawer. I have them all over the house in case the power goes out. After giving it to Logan, I watch as he uses his thumb and forefinger to open one of the woman’s eyes and shines the flashlight in it briefly, then does it to the other eye. She doesn’t move a muscle or react in any way, which doesn’t surprise me. I’d been observing her carefully since Kyle walked in my door with her, and she was truly unconscious.
After handing the flashlight back to me, Logan carefully prods at the bloody and matted hair on her head. He takes her pulse and seems satisfied. “I don’t think this head wound is serious. Her pupils are reacting fine.”
“So what’s wrong with her?” I ask.
He turns to me and shrugs. “I’m going to have to give her a thorough examination, but Bridger… there’s only so much I can do. I have no equipment. Hell, I can’t even listen to her heart or lungs without a stethoscope. No clue what her blood pressure is. I’m sort of hamstrung here.”
“I understand,” I say gratefully. “Let’s figure out what’s wrong with her if you can, and then I can decide what to do.”
Logan nods and turns back to the woman. I hover beside him, ready to help if he needs it, but otherwise not having a fucking clue as to how badly my life just got turned upside down.