Satan's Revenge (19 page)

“Sit,” Ace says, as I turn to face him. I obey. He walks toward me, one hand slowly reaching into his jean pocket. He pulls out a pair of handcuffs and I stiffen in fear. He shakes them at me, delighted by my reaction. “Just like the ones you used on me. Except these are much stronger.”

He walks behind the chair and cuffs my hands together tightly. I can smell his B.O. as he leans close to me, his breath blowing across the back of my hair. He crosses back into my vision as I try to circle my hands. He’s locked them so tightly that I can hardly move at all.

Ace holds his hand out, palm up, to Marcus. “The gun.”

Marcus pauses, looking at me, then lowers his eyes and hands Ace the pistol. Ace checks the safety and tucks it into his pants at the small of his back.

“I don’t know about this new look, Ace,” I say, with more bravado than I really feel. Maybe I can buy some time before Ace does whatever he’s going to do to me. Time in which Drifter might be able to find me.

“No?” Ace says, running his hand across his shaved head.

“No, you always had such nice hair.”

“The skinheads really seem to like it.”

“You say that like you’re not one of them.”

“Truth is, I don’t give a fuck what they think about blacks or Jews as long as I get a cut of what they’re bringing in,” he admits, spreading his arms wide. “As Marcus here learned, eventually, everyone loses at cards. It’s funny watching them sit in here, the excitement on their faces. Each of them is convinced that they’re special, that somehow they’re going to beat the odds, and so they’re always so shocked when they lose. It’s like their God has abandoned them! As though He’d ever poke His head into a place like this.”

“Are you trying to tell me that you’re a non-racist skinhead?” I ask, cocking my head slightly.

“I’m telling you that when your fucking boyfriend killed my best friend and every one of my brothers, I was left with nothing.” He starts advancing on me. Oh, shit. “I’m telling you that I needed protection, a new brotherhood. And I that’s what I got.”

“I didn’t mean…”

“Do you have any idea what I’ve had to do to get in with these guys?” He suddenly whips around and pulls up the back of his t-shirt. Where his Devil’s Army tattoo once was, his back is now covered in thick scars. “That wasn’t even the initiation.” He begins to laugh, a sick, dry, chortle. “That was just so that I could be
considered
for initiation. And then to rise through the ranks as quickly as I did?
You have no fucking idea.
” He spins back around and spits out the last sentence at me, just inches from my face.

“Ace, I never meant…”

He pulls his face back and I see his hand coming toward me just a second before my head is snapped to the left from the force of the blow. I close my eyes as my vision blurs and a buzz begins behind my eyes. I’ve been hit before, by my ex-husband Rooster. I know it will go away in a minute, and I know Ace isn’t done yet.

As I pull my head back, his hand hits me from the other direction. I think the first blow was with an open hand, but this was definitely a fist. The chair teeters back and I feel Ace’s foot on my knee, pressing the front of the chair back to the floor.

“Ace…” I hear Marcus murmur from the door.

Ace hits me again. And then again.

“Ace!” Marcus yells. My head rolls forward, my chin dipping to my chest. I hear scuffling in front of me and open my eyes to see Marcus’s hands on Ace’s shoulders. Ace reacts quickly, spinning around and grabbing Marcus’s shirt.

“The fuck did you think would happen?” Ace yells at him, and throws him against the wall. Marcus yelps in pain as he slams into it. He struggles to get up but Ace is on top of him. He punches Marcus once and Marcus tries to cover his face defensively. He’s in no condition to fight. Ace grabs the back of his shirt and yanks the door open, half-throwing and half-pushing him back into the bar area.

I hear a yell and the sound of a glass breaking before I lose consciousness.

Chapter Twenty-One

When I wake up, Ace is sitting across from me, staring.

“Finally,” he mutters, leaning back in his chair.

My vision is a little blurry, and I blink my eyes rapidly to try to clear it. I wonder how long I was out for.

“Where’s Marcus?” I murmur, as my head begins to pound.

Ace smirks at me. Even after what Marcus has done, I find myself hoping that he’s not dead.

I jerk my head up at the sound of a low rumble—maybe a motorcycle engine?  I see Ace pause for a moment, too. But the sound passes quickly. I’m not even sure it was a bike, anyway. Ace smiles.

“No one’s coming, sweetheart.”

“Why haven’t you killed me yet?” I reply.

“Because you haven’t suffered enough,” he answers with a sickening grin. “Seems to me you’ve had a pretty sweet fucking life for a whore. You went from Rooster to fucking one of the Sons like it was nothing. And what did you get for it? Nothing. Everyone else suffered but you. You always acted like you were some fucking MC princess. Well, you’re not untouchable.”

He takes a lighter from his pocket and starts flicking it on and off. The flame jumps to life and then dies, again and again.

Bile rises into my throat and I force myself to keep it down, to keep breathing.

Someone is coming for me. I have to believe that.

“Those scars on my back…you’re a nurse now, right? I bet you can guess how I got them. Soldering iron. Over and over again until my tat was gone. I passed out before it was over.”

He presses his hips forward and takes a pack of cigarettes out of his front pocket. A wave of dizziness unrelated to my head injuries passes over me as he places a cigarette between his lips and flicks the lighter back on, holding it to the end of the cigarette. He takes a pull and the tip burns orange. He puts the lighter and pack back in his pocket, holding the lit cigarette casually in the corner of his mouth.

He stands up and walks over to me, taking the cigarette in his long fingers and releasing a plume of smoke into the windowless room.

“Ace, this won’t help any…”

“Let’s see how long you last.”

He brings the cigarette down onto my shoulder as he finishes speaking. I scream as he holds the burning embers to my skin. A hiss and the smell of burning flesh fills the air. I reflexively try to stand, to do anything to get away from the pain, but he brings his booted foot down onto my thighs, pressing me hard onto the chair.

Finally he pulls the cigarette away. I whimper, tears pouring down my face. I’m shaking in pain and fear. I watch him reach into his pocket and bring his lighter back out. He puts the cigarette back in his mouth. The flame is out now, extinguished against my skin. I gasp for air as my throat closes up. I can’t look away from the orange glow of the end of the cigarette as he relights it.

He stares at my face for a moment, then swings one leg over and onto the other side of the chair, straddling me, and sits down. He’s heavy, and I quickly feel my legs go numb. I try to pull my face away from his, but there’s nowhere to go. He’s far taller than me, and his beard is right in front of my eyes. It smells stale and musty. The cigarette is just millimeters from the top of my head.

He leans back a little, and then cups my face with one hand. I flinch and look straight ahead at his chin. He reaches up with his other hand and takes the cigarette out of his mouth again. I brace myself for what I know is coming next. He brings the cigarette toward my cheek and I frantically press my head in the other direction, but his hand is there, stopping me.

“I wonder if it will go all the way through…” he muses, as though he’s conducting a scientific study.

The cigarette hits my cheek and my vision goes black with the pain. I can feel the heat burning through layers of skin as though it’s happening in slow motion.

Suddenly, the pain stops. I gasp for air, my breathing ragged. I realize Ace is frozen on top of me, head cocked toward the door, like a dog who’s just spotted a squirrel.

Through the haze of pain I’m in, I hear it, too. A faint crunch of broken glass.

Ace whips off the chair and stands behind me. At the same time, his arm snakes around my neck and pulls me to standing. A moment later, there’s a click, and I feel the metal of a gun barrel against the side of my head. He pulls me roughly to the right of the chair and then tightly up against him, so my body is covering as much of his as possible.

We stay frozen there. My eyes are trained on the handle of the door, and I’m sure his are, too. I’m unsteady on my feet, and even though his arm around my neck is constricting my breathing even more, I’m not sure I’d be able to stand without it. The sharp pain on my shoulder and face have spread to a general buzz of agony, a buzz that is almost deafeningly loud.

The door handle begins to move ever so slightly downward. It’s almost imperceptible.

“Not a fucking word,” Ace murmurs in my ear, tightening his hold on my neck.

The handle is pressed all the way down now, and the door begins to slowly open. I feel the gun barrel being removed from my head and can see Ace straightening his arm out toward the door. The door opens another inch. I don’t know if it’s Drifter behind it or not, but no Son is getting shot on my account.

“Don’t!” I scream.

The movement of the door stops abruptly and Ace immediately moves the gun back to my head. His elbow snaps in on my neck. I can no longer breathe enough to speak.

“Ace!”

I recognize Drifter’s voice immediately.

“This building is surrounded. You’re all alone here. There’s no way out of this for you,” he continues from behind the door.

“Oh yeah?” Ace yells back, his putrid breath blowing down on me. “I can think of one! And I’m slowly choking the life out of her!”

There is silence behind the door.

“What do you want?” Drifter yells back. “Just tell me what you want.”

Ace pauses. This definitely isn’t going according to his plan.

“You and your brothers back the fuck out of here! I take her with me. I’ve got a car on the street. We drive out of here together; I ditch her when we’re fifty miles down the road. You follow us, I kill her.”

“You’ll just kill her once you’ve gotten safely out of here anyway,” Drifter replies. “You need a hostage to get rid of? Take me instead.”

I see a pair of empty hands reach through the six-inch crack in the door. Ace stiffens, pulling me up so that I’m on the balls of my feet.

The door is pushed slowly open and Drifter’s body comes into view. He’s holding his hands up, showing Ace he’s unarmed. His eyes flick to mine momentarily, and then they’re back on Ace.

“I don’t want you,” Ace spits out.

“Take me and I won’t cause you any trouble. I know what I’m getting into. In fifty miles, you’ll shoot me. I know that. A man like me wouldn’t expect to die from anything else.”

I feel my heartbeat sputter unevenly in my chest. The idea of being without Drifter causes me more fear than anything I’ve felt so far tonight. 

Ace loosens his grip on my neck slightly. I can tell he’s wavering. So can Drifter.

“You think Violet’s the one who pursued me? I went after her. She told me she was married, wouldn’t be unfaithful to Rooster, and I wouldn’t take no for an answer. We put an ankle monitor on her, she stole one of our bikes anyway to try to escape, to get back to him.”

That liar. He’s pulling elements of the truth out of what happened and twisting it to lay the blame on himself, to focus Ace’s anger on him.

“Take me,” Drifter repeats, and I can hear he’s trying to put all of his willpower into it, staring Ace down. “I know I’ll die. I deserve it. I won’t fight you.”

I hear his voice crack slightly on the last word. My Drifter.

Ace’s arm relaxes from my throat.

“No, no, no, no,” I beg as I gasp for air. “Take me.”

Drifter ignores me, keeping his eyes trained on Ace’s, but he turns his face toward the open door.

“Back up to the sidewalk across the street!” he shouts. “We’re coming out!”

I hear movement within the bar as the rest of the Sons clear out, and then silence. Drifter looks back to me, a well of sadness in his eyes. I feel my heart beating so loudly it’s like my entire body is one giant pulse. Even though Ace’s arm is now around my shoulders, I feel like I’m choking more than ever.

The thought of being without Drifter is too much for me to bear. I feel like I’ve found myself with him; how could I keep going if he isn’t there?

Memories of the last year with him flood over me. Making love with him, quiet mornings eating our cereal on the couch, taking walks with Scout and Kalb, his smile when he opens the front door and sees me in our house, him teaching me to fight.

Him teaching me to fight.

My body is shaking, I can barely stand, and my hands are still cuffed, but I have to do something. If I fail, the worst thing that will happen is that Drifter or I dies, and that’s going to happen anyway. I try to breathe a little deeper but my throat feels like it is closing up on me, even as Ace drops his arm and begins to move his gun to focus it on Drifter, his new hostage.