Chapter 9
Dash
In that room, I had no concept of time, so once Harley was gone I had no clue how long she had been gone for. But I was thinking about her. Constantly. Her face and her low voice were the only things in my mind.
She had a sweet, delicate heart shaped face, and a petite and tender body. I’d noticed everything about her—her curves, her eyes, her pink mouth and how long and shapely her legs were.
I didn’t know what was happening to me. Why I was this attracted to her. What made her so different from every other woman I got to fuck? It was all about wanting her, wasn’t it? I was a man with needs and Harley was beautiful.
But there was more to it than that. It wasn’t just her body that I was thinking about.
I was thinking about the fear in her eyes, how she could barely look at me because she was so afraid. How the color drained from her cheeks when that guy opened the door. It reminded me of something…
I was six when I started noticing things around my house. I would hide under my bed while my father beat up my mother every night. I’d wake up and see her with bruises on her face and all over her body. I noticed the way she flinched every time he entered the room, and how she kept her voice down when she was spoken to. I loved her, but I could do nothing for her.
I grew up knowing that my mother was unhappy, that if she could, she would be anywhere else in the world but here, with us. With pop.
I couldn’t do anything for her, not until I was fifteen and I was big enough by then to finally stand up to him.
He didn’t see it coming when I sent him flying across the room one night when he raised a hand at her. He didn’t know what I was capable of, but I showed him. I kicked him out, made sure he understood that if he ever stepped foot in the house again; I would choke him to death the way he had tried to choke her so many times.
He was gone from our lives and I joined a street gang. I never saw my mother cry again. She even smiled and went out more often to meet her friends. Since I was born, I had never seen her that happy before.
So, I had witnessed abuse. I knew how to recognize it, and even though Harley had barely said a few words to me, I could sense she was being abused.
That was what I recognized in her and I’d be damned if I was going to let that keep happening to a beautiful woman like her.
To any woman. But least of all to Harley.
***
Other than her name, I knew nothing else about her. Was she one of their old ladies? Maybe Caesar’s? There was no way to know now, unless she told me or I saw her with someone. Would I even see her again?
It was possible that feeding me when she wasn’t supposed to, had gotten her into trouble and she might never come back to this room again.
Did they have something on her? What was making her stay here with them? What were they threatening her with?
It had to be something. That fear in her eyes was real. She wasn’t putting on a show for me. She was frightfully scared of them and the more I thought about it now, the more convinced I was that she needed to get out of here. But how?
I had been so close to giving up. I didn’t want the rest of my club to come and rescue me because I didn’t want them to put themselves in danger. I didn’t want them making any deal with the Hell’s Drifters or Dark Legion. Death would have been sweeter than that.
But now that I’d met Harley, things were beginning to change for me. I wanted to get out, if only to save her. She was trapped here with them and I wanted to protect her. The only way I could, would be by getting out of here and taking her with me.
I needed to get her to safety, even though she didn’t know yet that was what I wanted. I didn’t want anything in return from her. I just wanted to do what was right.
I growled and pulled at the handcuffs again. It barely made a difference. I slumped back down on the ground, feeling defeated. How long were they going to keep me here before it was time for them to eliminate the problem. By which it meant; they were going to kill me.
I knew they had no plans of returning me safely to the Marked Skulls.
But if they killed me, what would happen to Harley? She was going to be stuck here with them, leading a life of abuse. I didn’t know her but that was not the life I wanted for her.
I had decided already—I was getting out of here and I was taking her with me.
I pulled at the handcuffs again. Nothing.
A woman like her deserved to be worshipped. Deserved to be cherished and looked after.
I didn’t make the mistake of assuming I could do that for her. I didn’t deserve her either, but there was some man out there who did. And it was my duty to rescue her from this life and make it better.
I pulled at the cuffs again and this time, a bolt on the wall that was holding the pipe in place pulled out. I blinked, staring at it in disbelief. I wasn’t expecting that to happen.
But it did.
Saving Harley had given me the strength I needed to get out of this shithole.