Stolen: Hell's Overlords MC (24 page)

Rose

It feels like my heart is trying to punch its way out of my chest. The men who attacked me have disappeared into the town, but there’s no calming down, not after what just happened to me.

They’d dragged me out of the car, with God only knows what intent in mind. I might’ve been raped, or killed, or any number of horrible outcomes. I brush off a dusty memory about girls who’d seen something they shouldn’t have and ended up dead in a ditch or in cuffs at a sex slave auction. Crazier things have happened. Eduardo warned me about these men, after all. There’s no telling what they’re capable of.

I think of Lucila, abused and crying in the backroom of the club. She’s probably still there. Sure, she’d walked into the situation willingly, or at least as willing as anyone in desperate need of cash could be. But no one deserved to suffer what I saw them doing to her. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget that image of Lucila on her hands and knees, moaning miserably as the men treated her like a dirty tissue.

I could’ve ended up like that. That might’ve been me if this man hadn’t shown up at the crucial moment.

I look him up and down. My first thought is a surprising one.
Oh my God, he’s gorgeous.
It’s true. He’s six and a half feet of pure chiseled muscle. The low slope of his shoulders gives way to biceps thicker than my waist. His chest is testing the limits of the thin white shirt he’s wearing. Staring out from below a tousled mop of dark hair is a pair of the greenest eyes I’ve ever seen. And they’re fixed on me.

“You sure you’re okay?” he asks. His voice is a low, sexy rumble.

I nod again. I feel the tension tightening throughout my body ease a notch. Something about his presence makes me feel safer. The fact that he just beat the hell out of the men trying to take me certainly doesn’t hurt.

“Nice pig sticker you’ve got there.”

I blink. What the hell is he talking about? He must see my confusion, because he points to my clenched fist. I look down and realize he meant the knife. “Oh,” I say, embarrassed. “Thanks.”

“You cut the one bastard pretty badly.”

I don’t know what to say. His scent fills my nostrils. It’s raw, masculine, heady. I feel a little dizzy just being near him.

“What’s your name?” he asks me.

I start to open my mouth before I come to my senses. What the hell am I doing? This is a town of murderers, rapists, drug traffickers, bad people with every vice under the sun. Cozying up to strangers in El Cruce is tantamount to a one-way ticket to a whole lot of trouble. People disappear from here, and when they do, they don’t ever come back.

“I need to go,” I say. I turn to my car and start to open the door before he can say anything. But I feel his grip on my upper arm and I freeze.

His hands are strong, but there’s a curious softness to them, too. More than anything, his touch is like electricity, drawing out the currents of attraction I can feel sparking to life beneath my skin. “Wait,” he says. I don’t move.

He reaches a fingertip to my chin and gently swings my face towards his. He extends a thumb, touches it to my bottom lip. I see him frowning as he does. Those green eyes are swimming with a mixture of intense focus and profound confusion. I don’t know what is so puzzling. I’m just a girl in a parking lot. He did me a favor. So why the mystery?

The pad of his thumb brushes against my bottom lip. I feel a throb of pain. He draws it away and examines it under the light. I see a smear of crimson on his skin. “You’re bleeding,” he says. He’s quiet. Hushed. “You’re shaking, too.”

I hadn’t noticed until now that I’m trembling like a leaf under his hand. My whole body is convulsing. Try as I might, I can’t make it stop. It’s not cold out, but the hairs on my arms are standing on end. My teeth chatter.

“Who are you?” he asks. His eyes are searching mine. I want to dive into them, do backstrokes in them, immerse myself in those green oceans and never leave. The concerned slant of his eyebrows frames them with the dark tan of his face, making the colors pop all the more vividly.

I can’t find my voice. It’s not just that he’s physically beautiful, although there’s no denying that. It’s something more, something deeper and less substantial. Power rolls off of him in carefree waves. He exudes strength. Sex. It’s a cousin to the laconic, shadowy energy that the men in black gave off when I confronted them in the club earlier. But this man has more of it, and it’s a clearer, broader variety. I feel consumed by him already.

The magnetism of it draws me closer. I don’t know what’s happening, but I shift my weight a tiny degree towards him. He responds instantly, pulling me into his embrace. His lips press down against mine, one hand resting against the back of my head while the other encircles my waist. I rest a palm on his chest and feel his pulse thud while I kiss him back. I open my mouth to slip my tongue past his parted lips. It finds his own, teases it, then retreats before flickering back out again, hungry for more. Our mouths mesh flawlessly. A tingle rushes down my spine. The rusty metal of my car door against my back is forgotten as I rise onto my toes to kiss him deeper. My mouth opens, urging him inward to explore more. The fire between my legs is heating up at an astonishing rate.

But then I remember. I’m a lone female, standing in a deserted parking lot with a man about whom I know nothing. I don’t know his name or where he’s from, what he wants or what he’s doing here. I have not a clue why he rescued me, although I owe him my life for it. Most of all, I don’t know why he’s staring at me like I’m a ghost and asking me questions that I don’t have good answers to. As scarily good as the kiss was, I can’t be here. I need to run away.

I drop to my heels, put two hands to his chest and shove him away as hard as I can. He barely budges. His eyes flash.

“I can’t be doing this,” I tell him. “I need to go right now.”

He catches me again by the crook of my elbow. “Stop,” he says. His voice drips with easy authority. “Just tell me who you are.”

“I’m nobody,” I say. Then I wriggle free of his grasp and slam the door shut before he can snag me a third time. The car sputters to life, miraculously. I try not to look at him as I peel out of the parking lot as fast as the piece of shit vehicle will let me, but I can’t avoid stealing one last glance in the rearview mirror. He hasn’t moved his feet. Only his head pivots to follow me as I race down the road and away from him.

I can still taste him on my lips. He doesn’t look away.

Then I round the corner, and he disappears from sight.

Vince

What the fuck was that?

So much just happened at once. She’s real; the girl from the dream is real. She’s here. I found her before I ever even began to look. In a strip club parking lot of all places, on the verge of becoming a plaything to people she likely did not want to meet.

But just like that, she’s gone again, literally slipping away between my fingers. It’s almost funny, in a dark kind of way. No girl ever runs away from me. The running only ever takes place in the opposite direction.

Something about this one, though, tells me she is different. For starters, El Cruce is light years away from Galveston. Young women here are targets for the cartels, the drug traffickers, and anyone else with a gun and an inflated sense of self-worth. It makes sense that she’s not particularly eager to be making out with strangers in the parking lot.

But she knew what I knew; she felt it, too. She knew there was something different here. Something special. Rare. I saw it in her eyes.

I don’t know how to explain it or what words to put to it but I’m determined not to let this be the last time I see this girl. No one runs away from me. I’m Vince Foster. When I want something, I take it, and “no” is not an option.

I’m going to find out who she is, and I’m going to make her mine.

The heat of the sun begins to bake the back of my neck. I can hear the sounds of the town stirring awake. Cars begin rumbling by. Storefronts are thrown open. The seedy drunks slink their way to the bars to resume murdering themselves one beer at a time. In short, life in El Cruce is proceeding as usual.

I pull my cell phone out of my pocket and check the time. “Shit,” I curse under my breath. I’m going to be late to meet Cesar. If that asshole no-shows me again, I’m going to burn the whole fucking town down until I find him. But for now, I need to haul ass to the diner and hope that he comes. He knows things that could be vital, not just for me, but for every Angel in Texas.

I turn and head back towards my bike, still standing where I leaped off it when I tore into the parking lot. I start to mount it, but something shiny on the ground catches my attention. I reach down and pick it up.

It’s a small, metal rectangle with a needle and eye on the back of it, the kind used to fasten the thing to clothing. I flip it over. The word “Rose” is etched into the steel. It’s a nametag. Her nametag.

“Rose,” I say to myself. I like the way her name sounds in my mouth. “Her name is Rose.”

Rose

I whip down the road to my apartment. The ancient car is squealing around me, threatening to break down or fall apart at any moment, but I’m too desperate to get home to care. All I can think about is getting inside and shutting the door.

I veer into the space in front of the apartment complex, snatch my purse from the passenger’s seat, and race inside. I sprint up the stairs. Keys in the lock, open it up, burst inside. The sound of the door slamming shut behind me is heavenly. The sound of the deadbolt driving home is even sweeter.

I slide to a seat on the floor with my back against the door. I feel a wrench in my chest. It builds up to what feels like an expanding bubble, then a wave, and before I can tell myself to stop being so silly, tears start pouring down my face. It’s a full-body cry, a pathetic one. I’m a blubbering mess. My tears soak the front of my shirt as I press my face into my crossed arms and let them flow.

Lucila, the men in black, the biker…it is too much for one person to process. That much should not be allowed to come all at once. I know life isn’t fair. I’ve known that for a long time. You can’t grow up in this town without facing the harsh truth like that.

But still, how much is enough? Where is my breaking point? I can’t imagine it’s far off. For all I know, the men are still after me. Maybe they were waiting around the corner for the biker to leave before they followed me home to finish what they started. If they come here, I’m worried that I’ll just give up on it all. Might as well just say, “Fuck it,” and let the world have its way with me.

For now, I’m safe. I’m alive, if rattled. The door is locked, and all the evil of the world is stuck on the other side, where it belongs. I can only hope it stays there.

Eventually, the tears slow down to a trickle, then stop altogether. My breath swoops smoothly in through my nostrils, filling up my chest with sweet air. The sound of it whooshing back out into the too-warm room is the only thing I can hear. Blessed, blessed silence.

Until the knock at the door.

I hurl myself away at the fist pounding on the other side of the rickety wood. The voice coming through is too muffled to identify. My skin is crawling with anxiety. There’s nothing as horrifying as being unpleasantly surprised right when you thought you were beginning to calm down.

“Who is it?” I yelp through a throat choked and dry. “Leave me alone!” I can feel my hands trembling.

More indistinct mumbling.

“Go away!” I repeat. “I don’t want to talk to anyone!”

My heart is pummeling my sternum.
Boom, boom
, pumping fight or flight chemicals through my bloodstream like flocks of frightened birds. Every muscle in me wants to spring away, to jump through the window or bust clean through the far wall and run until I can’t run anymore. But my brain knows full well that I’m trapped in here. Whoever it is, they aren’t leaving.

I force myself to take a deep inhale and let the oxygen rush through my body. The tremors ease slightly. I steel myself, stand up, and walk over to the door. Pressing my eye against the peephole, I look out into the distorted world beyond. When I see who it is, the tension seeps out of my body. I quickly wipe the stained tears from my face and try to rub the red out of my eyes.

I slide the deadbolt free, unhook the chain, and open the door. A hunched, frail old man is standing on the doorstep with a friendly smile beaming from his face. “Come in, Señor Ramon,” I say. My voice is crackling with exhaustion. He shuffles in. When he’s all the way inside, I shut the door and lock it again.

Ramon cups my hand between his. “Rose, how are you,
cariño
?” he asks in a soft, lisped tone. His hands on mine are warm and wrinkled.

I lean down and kiss him on the cheek. “I’m okay, Ramon. Can I get you anything?”

“No, no,
por favor
, no,” he says, wriggling his jowls adorably. He’s a cute old man if I’ve ever seen one.

“You look thirsty,” I insist. “Let me grab you a glass of water.” Ignoring his protests, I pace to the cramped kitchenette and fill a cup with water from the sink. I press it into his hands as I pull out a chair from the desk and indicate for him to sit. He sighs, groaning as he eases into the seat.

“This body does not work as well as it once did,” he says with a laugh. His eyes are rich with a jovial twinkle. In all the years he has been my landlord, I’ve never seen him without a smile.

“You don’t look a day over twenty,” I tell him, trying my best to joke and be normal, despite the quaking fear that even now is curdling in my stomach. I can’t seem to shake it.

Ramon clutches his belly as he chuckles. “Too sweet, dear,” he says. “Sit, won’t you?” He pats the bed next to him.

I look around the apartment. It’s tiny, hardly enough for one person to move around in comfortably. Meager kitchenette in one corner, shower in the other, a rickety desk shoved against the wall, with barely enough room between it and the bed to wedge a salvaged chair. The few things I own are scattered around the floor or draped over the furniture. I flush slightly, embarrassed for someone else to see how little I have, even if it is only Ramon.

I focus my eyes on him and try to smile, but I can’t quite get it right. The smile feels clumsy, like it’s a motion I’ve never tried before. I can see in the worried flash of his eyes that he knows something is wrong.

“Let me get you the rent,” I tell him. I should have known he would come here today. He’s never late. I turn around and pick up my purse from the floor where I had dropped it. Plucking my wallet from inside, I count out the cash I owe for the apartment. There’s not much left when I’m finished.

I spin back towards Ramon. I don’t want to look at him, don’t want him to see the unhappiness brewing in my eyes. My eyes stay fixed on the floor at his feet as I offer him the cash in my hand.

The sound of the bills crinkling lightly against each other seems so loud and obvious. My hands are shaking wildly, uncontrollably.

Ramon reaches for the bills, but instead of taking them, he takes hold of my hand again. “Rose,” he says in his velvet voice. “Is everything okay?” His brows are knitted together in concern.

I pause just a moment too long while I try to come up with an excuse. I open my mouth, but no words come out. The wrinkles on Ramon’s forehead deepen.

“Rose,
amor
, please sit.” He takes my hand into his lap as I collapse on the bed next to him.

I can’t help it—the tears come back, as thick and relentless as they were before. Ramon says nothing, just holds my hand between his own and waits patiently for the storm to subside. I hiccup and sob, my whole body racking with the remnant fear forcing its way out of my nostrils. It takes a long time, but this second panic attack passes, leaving me just as whimpering and wrecked as the first.

“Is it Carlos?” Ramon asks quietly.

Carlos.
It’s funny how, for someone I haven’t heard from nor seen in over two years, he comes up so often. Everyone in El Cruce reminds me of him. They all have the same dark shadow flitting across their face if you sneak a peek at them when their guard is down. Like looking inside a haunted house when the wind blows the curtain open, only to see scary, broken things. The only difference between Carlos and the run-of-the-mill gangsters in El Cruce is that his shadow was magnitudes darker.

I think about the last time I saw him. There was not a single remarkable thing about that day. He had dropped me off at work, too distracted to even say goodbye. I’d climbed out of the car, he’d peeled off. And that was that. Neither hide nor hair of him since. Such an inscrutable end to an inscrutable marriage. He was not a good husband, to say the least.

“No. I haven’t seen Carlos in more than twelve months,” I tell Ramon.

“He was hanging with men he should not have been around,” Ramon says. For such a kind man, his voice is stern. He’s right, of course. Carlos was a bartender, nothing more. He told me he came from a small town to the west and that his parents were dead. He didn’t like to talk about them very much. He didn’t like to talk about anything from the past, really. Carlos preferred to do simple things, like watch soccer on TV or borrow a bike from the neighbor and take a long ride on the outskirts of town when his shifts at the bar had been long and hard on him.

But he’d had his weird habits, too, things that didn’t click with the mundanity of his day-to-day existence, with the normal, simple man that he was. He disappeared once, about six months after we’d been married. He was supposed to pick me up from work but never showed. It wasn’t like him to simply not come. He was as dependable as clockwork. Until he wasn’t.

Two days went by without a peep from him. No one knew where he’d gone, not his boss at the bar nor Ramon. He’d quietly traded away his shifts to a fellow bartender and vanished into thin air. I was dumbfounded at the time. It was hard to even be upset, because it was just so unlike him. It didn’t fit with what I knew about Carlos.

So, when he’d returned just as suddenly as he disappeared two days earlier and refused to talk about it, the only logical thing to do had been to forget the whole thing. I did exactly that. Just let it go. We never discussed it again.

That came easier for me than it would for people who didn’t understand my hometown. In El Cruce, girls like me don’t ask questions. It never leads to anything good. We keep our heads down, smile, and try to stay away from the men who wield the guns. That is best for everyone. It minimizes the bloodshed.

Forgetting where Carlos had gone was natural. I didn’t ask, he didn’t tell, and that was the end of it.

But I couldn’t help noticing that something about him had changed. He had always been a guarded man, ever since the day he had first wandered into the bar I used to work at and asked about getting a job. He kept his emotions to himself, offering little and demurring when asked. “I’m here now,” he would say. “What does the past matter?” As if it didn’t make a difference what happened to a person to bring them to a place like this.

When he returned, though, I saw it: that shadow passing across his face. It only came when he thought I wasn’t looking, when he thought he was alone. I took to peeking into rooms before I entered them in the hopes of catching that look and trying to figure it out. It wasn’t a look of anger or of fear, though there was some of each in it. It wasn’t the vacancy that accompanies a daydream, either. It had all of those elements on its surface but only in the way that part of an iceberg is above the surface. The rest of it—the heart of it—was something deeper and darker than I had ever seen. It was more than I could understand, too. I did with that look the same thing that I did with everything else I had ever seen in El Cruce that puzzled me: I buried it.

“You’re probably right.” I sigh. “I don’t know how or why he got involved with those guys. I never asked. Maybe I should have.”

“No, no,” he tuts. “It is not your fault, Rose. He was a man who did what he wanted.”

I wonder how true of a statement that was. To be sure, Carlos never asked me what I thought about his life or his choices. In his defense, though, there was never much to ask. His life was as unadorned and uncomplicated as his pale skin. Work, television, those long bike rides. We were just two people huddling together and trying to drag ourselves through the muck of survival. We didn’t have pretensions, goals, or ambitions. We had each other. That was about it.

At least, that’s what I used to think. But when he returned from his vanishing act, everything was different. Carlos started working less and less. Instead of coming home, he began going to a bar on the bad side of town. There were worse, more violent bars, but the one he chose was known for being a meeting point for all kinds of people with business that didn’t exactly conform to the letter of the law.

From what I heard, he hadn’t taken up with any of the more notorious cartel members who frequented the place. It was crawling with
sicarios
,
halcones
, and
capos
, not to mention the regular thieves and enforcers—all the various species of predators that populate the Mexican underworld. But everyone I talked to said Carlos merely sat in a dimly lit corner booth, smoking a cigarette and keeping to himself. Strange.