Tracy

Fitzie had disappeared upstairs with his phone. I sat upright with some struggle. I needed to get these zip ties off me. I needed to do something to fight back. No one had seen Fitzie take me out of The Castle, I was certain of that.

And thanks to me not being fast enough, no one knew Fitzie was unbalanced.

No one knew that he’d been obsessed with Olivia.

Fitzie was back downstairs. He was focused and looked less crazy.

He had a knife. He came toward me with it. I was done.

Instead of stabbing me, he slit the zip tie that bound my feet.

“Stand up.”

I did what he said and tried to find my balance.

“Move it.”

He dragged me up the stairs. We were in some old bungalow. Fitzie’s house?

I didn’t know. But what I did know was that pictures of Olivia – Olivia smiling, Olivia walking, Olivia talking to Maddox in a restaurant – surrounded us.

Then I saw one of Olivia in her bed, after, now. The way she was today.

The photos papered the walls and it was horrifying. I couldn’t decipher everything that was happening, but it was clear that Olivia didn’t know she was being photographed.

They were all photos from far away. Fitzie had stalked her, for a long time.

“Come on.”

Fitzie dragged me out of the house, to his car, which was idling in front. We were in the middle of nowhere. There were no houses. It looked like a rundown place on an acre or two. My hopes that I could alert neighbors were dashed when I saw there were none.

Was there a way out for me? I didn’t see it.

“You’re going to get me out of here, see. Maddox won’t shoot me if you’re right here.”

Maddox, had he been the one who called?

I heard the roar of bikes. I could hear them before I could see them. And they were coming from two directions.

Fitzie heard them too and threw me in the backseat of his car.

“I need the pictures. I need them,” he said. He seemed to be conflicted between getting out of here fast and the things in that awful little house.

If I could impede his progress in some way, maybe I could buy time.

“Go on, get what you need, Maddox won’t let you keep those if he finds them.”

I was trying to be on his side. And I was trying to buy time.

“Right, right.”

Fitzie went inside and left me in the car. I looked for keys, but my hands were still bound. Maybe there was something in this car to get myself free of at least my hand bindings. I had no idea how long Fitzie would spend gathering his crazy collection of photos.

But it was too late. I could see bikes coming up the drive. Four of them. I hoped to God it was Maddox and The Saints.

I shimmied over the back seat into the front and managed to drag myself out of the car.

The headlights made it impossible to see who rode the bikes. Fitzie came out of the house. He was in the same predicament as me, blinded by the headlights.

“Okay, you fucking maggot! We’re here.”

I didn’t recognize the voice that came from the bikes. Then the sound of a second wave of engines came from the direction of the tree line. Vehicles were weaving through the woods that bordered the property. Four more bikes, I counted, were barreling toward the house but they were way further off. I had no idea which way to run, if I did run.

“Come on, we’re going for a ride.”

Fitzie dragged me toward the row of bikes that had reached the house first. We got closer and I realized they were Hawks. Fitzie was dragging me straight to The Hawks.

The Hawks were his escape plan and I was the insurance.

“No.”

I knew this was it. If The Hawks took me, I could forget about mercy, I could forget about safety. I wasn’t going to get on any of those bikes with Fitzie or The Hawks. So I used every bit of strength I had and tugged my arm free.

And then I ran. I ran harder than I’d ever run in my life. And I could run hard. I was betting on that second wave of bikers. I was hoping for a miracle from The Saints.

It was hard to get my top speed with my hands tied but I knew I was faster than Fitzie.

“Fuck!” he said.

The second set of bikes approached, and I was awash in their headlights. I stopped my sprint and turned to look back. Fitzie had stopped chasing me and was getting on a Hawk’s bike. At that same moment I felt myself whisked up in midair.

It wasn’t the first time.

Maddox had me again.

I was in that familiar spot, cradled in the front of him as Maddox and his crew bore down on The Hawks.

“You okay?” Maddox yelled over the roar of the engines. He brought his bike to a stop and his brothers did the same.

“Yes. He shot Olivia. He was the one,” I said, and Maddox nodded his head. I didn’t know if he’d already put that together or not. I also didn’t want to think about what that meant for what happened with Jonesy C.

The Hawks had turned around, with Fitzie on the back of one of their bikes, and were racing away.

“Do we go after them?” Kade asked.

“They’ve got Fitzie. We’re fucked,” another Saint with a patch that read ‘Benz’.

“No, we go after them now, we got no choice but fight, it’s open war,” Axle, another Saint chimed in.

Maddox looked off to the horizon as The Hawks got farther and farther away.

“Fitzie is going to have to pay,” Maddox said. “But I’ve got what I need.”

He squeezed me tight.

“Come on, let’s get to the club. Bear needs to know what went down and she needs Josie,” Kade said.

“I’m okay,” I said it but I knew I probably looked far from it, after the blow Fitzie had delivered to my face.

“Shit, you’re bleeding.”

The ties had sliced into the flesh of my wrists. Kade had come over with a pocketknife. I put out my hands and he slit the twist tie. The blood flowed faster.

Maddox held me closer.

“Hold on, I got you.”

The engines roared, and I buried my face in Maddox’s chest. It was warm, solid, and safe.

I quietly cried as we drove to The Dark Saints. I was alive. And I had Maddox.

I had thought I was dead. I had thought all was lost.

And Maddox was here.

I remembered Harlow’s words.

“Maddox would take a bullet for you.”

I knew it was true.