Avenging Devil Part 1: Satan’s Devils MC - San Diego Chapter #3 Read online

  He’s going to treat me like a whore.

  In the scheme of things, it could be worse, and it’s not like it hasn’t happened before. Hell, he’s even fucked me over the pool table in view of everybody to make a point. For a serious infraction, he’s even let the other members fuck me.

  I hate this. It isn’t who I am, or rather, who I was. While knowing it’s fruitless, I try to appeal to a better nature he doesn’t possess. “Duke,” I begin, anxiously looking around. Keeping my voice low, I stress, “I’m your wife.”

  In the brief space that follows, I pray I’ve gotten through to him, but no. His face darkens. “You really want to play that card? When you’ve been fuckin’ around behind my back?”

  “I didn’t!” As soon as my involuntary rebuttal escapes my mouth, I know it’s a mistake. I could plead that with two broken legs there was nothing I could do, but Duke will believe whatever he wants to rationalise the violence he’s about to dole out. His appetite for causing pain hasn’t been satisfied by Jude’s death. He wants more, and I’m the only one here who can assuage his dark hunger.

  I brace but can’t do anything more. Recently, his attacks have become more violent and more regular. While I may wish for death, I don’t relish the pain that will accompany it. This time I fear that tonight I’ll be following Jude into his grave. All the signs are there that he won’t stop. I want to wail at the unfairness of it. Neither of us did anything wrong or even thought about it. Not Jude, twelve years my junior who just had his life so cruelly curtailed, and certainly not me. After Duke’s less than tender administrations, I never wanted sex with a man ever again.

  But hurting me isn’t his immediate priority. I’m part relieved, part disgusted when he states, “Spilling blood gets me hard. Now suck me like the fuckin’ pro you are.” His dick now out, he steps closer, grabbing hold of my hair and wrenching my head back. “Open your fuckin’ mouth.”

  I’m worth more, my internal voice screams. I’m no whore.

  A violent jerk on my hair which will leave me missing a few strands has my mouth opening automatically. His cock enters, not gently, not slowly. He rams it into my mouth and down my throat. I retch, he laughs, holding himself there until I start to choke, then he draws back, letting me grab a breath then starts fucking my mouth in earnest.

  He’s wound up tight, heated by the death of the man he murdered in cold blood. On edge already, it’s not long before he’s swelling and flooding my mouth. When he pulls out, he slams his palm over my mouth, forcing me to swallow. I gag and almost choke on my own vomit in an attempt to keep it down. Tears stream from my eyes, my nose is blocked, and I gasp, desperate for air when he at last removes his hand.

  Is my penance done?

  It seems not. Now with the hand still twisted in my hair, he pulls my face up and lets his other fist fly, hitting my nose, the crunch and blinding pain telling me he’s broken it. He throws me on the floor and kicks me in the ribs, in the stomach, my legs, and my head.

  I curl up, trying to protect myself, even now conscious that out of all the men standing around, not one of them makes a move to stop him or to save me. Punch after punch, kick after kick, the pain assures me this time he’ll go too far, and I’ll be buried alongside the prospect.

  Pain, agonising in its intensity is my whole universe. Blows follow one after the other until they seem to merge. My hope for a quick death is denied to me, and my punishment seems to go on for hours, until a welcome darkness descends.

  * * *

  I’m alive.

  When I come to, I’m uncertain whether that is good news or bad. My body is a ball of pain. It’s hard to breathe, and there’s no part of me not screaming in agony. I’m vaguely conscious that the bed, more like a cot, feels familiar. The blankets I’m lying on are scratchy and smell unwashed. My senses tell me I’m in the clubhouse, in the room they put me in when my legs were broken.

  But where I am is of no matter now. I might have survived the beating, but my instincts tell me Duke’s gone too far. It’s not just painful to take air into my lungs, it’s fast becoming impossible.

  I’m dying.

  Self-preservation makes me gasp, trying to suck in air and failing. Panicking, my lungs burn as if I’m drowning. There are people around me, and I try to cry out for help, but my voice doesn’t work.

  Familiar voices reach my ears. “Nah, can’t do that. Prez would fuckin’ kill me. That’s if Duke doesn’t get to me first.”

  “Croak, she’s got a fuckin’ collapsed lung.”

  “Treat her, doc. You fixed her last time.”

  “Last time he didn’t do as much damage as this. Does Duke want her to die? ‘Cause that’s where she’s heading.”

  “You fixed her lung, what more do you want?”

  “She’s got half my fuckin’ pen in her chest. It’s a temporary solution. I can’t leave her like that, Croak.”

  Oh God, I’m dying. Won’t anyone help? In my dreams, my death was always peaceful, perhaps a blow or a bullet to the head, not lying helpless and conscious, feeling my life leeching out of me, slowly dying a painful death inch by inch. I try to open my eyes, but they feel glued shut. My ears are in full working order as I hear a thumping when heavy boots approach.

  “Prez.” Croak sounds relieved. “Duke want her finished? If not, Doc says she needs to go to the hospital.”

  Knife sighs heavily and there’s a pause before he responds. “Fuck. No, she can’t die. You know how Duke gets. She’s his fuckin’ property. He patched her for life.”

  Yeah. So why the fuck did he just half kill me?

  “Never saw her fuckin’ around with the prospect,” Croak speaks again. He sounds confused.

  Now a laugh comes from the prez. “Of course she fuckin’ didn’t, but that’s the VP for you. When he has a hankering for bloodlust, he’ll use any excuse. Easier to just let him get it out of his system. Doc, you sure she needs to go in?”

  “Can’t treat her here, Knife. Just look at this fuckin’ place. My fix won’t work for long. She’ll drown in her own blood if she doesn’t get professional help. Then there’s a risk of sepsis.”

  Take me to the hospital. Please, let me go.

  Even if it’s just for a day or so. To get off the compound would be enough medication in itself. To be with normal people, people who wouldn’t hurt, degrade or humiliate me. That’s all the medicine that I want.

  Do I pass out, or does Knife just take a long time deciding?

  Whatever, it seems forever before I hear those glorious words. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, get her out of here. Tell the hospital it was a mugging, or someone out to get the club. I’ll clear it with Duke. One fuckin’ body already today was enough.”

  Decision made, they don’t waste time springing into action. It’s Croak who says, “I’ll get her. You bring your car around, Doc.”

  “Be care—”

  Though I doubted I could do it, a piercing scream leaves my mouth when Croak picks me up. Once again, mercifully, I pass out.

  The next couple of days I don’t care where the hell I am, as time passes in a blur of machines beeping and pain, then wooziness as the pain meds kick in. Unaware of the passage of the hours, I only find out how long I’ve been here when I finally struggle up to full consciousness, seeing the relieved looking nurse, and, for the first time, am able to understand what she’s saying.

  While she catalogues my injuries, I tune out, not relishing hearing the damage he’s inflicted on me. From what I do let sink in, it sounds bad. I don’t even feel lucky he hadn’t caused mortal injury. If he’d finished the job this time, it would have prevented me going through this again. There can be no doubt, once I’m healed, it will only be to go through more abuse.

  I lie still, lost in my abject misery, wishing I were dead. Or I do until some more words spoken by the nurse register.

  I try to speak, but my throat is dry. After sipping at some ice she holds to my lips, I manage to get some words out. “You’re kidding me.” She
has to be.

  Trying to focus on her face, through eyes I can only just open, I see her smiling. “No, I’m not. Though how the baby survived is a miracle. It’s early days, you’re about six weeks.”

  A miracle. Mine. Only mine. She starts to busy herself as if to leave me.

  “My h-h-husband,” I stammer out. “Does he know?”

  Her eyes sharpen. “I don’t think so. Honey, you were so badly hurt, I’ll be honest, it’s been touch and go. We’ve given him reports on how you’re doing. We honestly thought even if you’d make it, you’d lose the baby.”

  “Is… is there still a chance I could miscarry?”

  Compassion floods her features. “I can’t lie to you, but the baby’s made it so far. He must be one determined little soul to keep hanging on in there.”

  How, I don’t know, but I’ll do everything to keep it that way. “Please.” Injecting as much pleading as I can into my voice, I beg her, “Don’t tell my husband.”

  Duke’s been ambivalent about wanting a child, sometimes ruminating about an heir, a son he could mould to be a reflection of himself. But when that became a reality a year after our marriage, after his first moment of elation, he’d kicked the baby out of me. Then, of course, he blamed me for infuriating him so. It was my fault I lost his baby, not his violent and uncontrollable urges.

  After the loss of that baby, it seemed all Duke had wanted was me pregnant again. He couldn’t fuck me enough and kept me full of his semen. I couldn’t risk it, unable to bear the thought of losing another to this irrational man, already knowing carrying his child was no protection.

  So, I’d taken precautions. Duke would kill me if he knew, but on the pretext of needing women’s necessities that members didn’t want to purchase for me and women’s problems about which they didn’t want to know, I’d managed to secretly go on the pill. The pill I’d not had access to during the weeks of captivity while my legs had healed.

  The nurse looks at me, her brow furrowed. “I won’t tell him if you don’t want me to. He’s here, though. It’s up to you if you want to share the news yourself.”

  He’s here. Of course he is, playing the concerned husband role. He can do that very convincingly. Using his charm was what had originally allowed him to reel me in and foolishly accept his proposal. At that time, I’d felt the luckiest and most treasured woman in the world.

  My face must betray how I feel about my husband being close by and probably a whole lot more as her face fills with commiseration. She tilts her head to one side, considers me for a moment, then asks, “Do you want me to tell him you’re not up to seeing him?”

  I’d love that, but no. He’d only break down the door if he thought he was being kept away from his property. Analysing it fast, I realise I’m safe right now, hooked up to monitors that will alert someone if he so much as raises my blood pressure. “I’ll see him.”

  She gives me another assessing gaze, then nods, albeit with a trace of reluctance. “I’ll send him in.”

  When she goes out, I gather what strength I have, and focus my mind on how to get out of here. I’m determined not to lose this baby. It might be Duke’s seed, but it’s my womb it’s growing in. This baby belongs to me, and it’s up to me to protect it. Which means, whatever the odds against me, this time I have to escape.

  With the Crazy Wolves controlling most of the surrounding area, how can I get away? I run through my problems in my head. I’ve no money. He controls all my documents. The only clothes I have here are the ones I was brought in wearing, and they’ll be bloodied and soiled and that’s if they hadn’t been cut off and destroyed.

  But whether I have to run in a hospital gown and beg strangers to help me, I have to not only try but succeed. It’s not just me. It’s my baby. A new life inside me. As the realisation sinks in, so does my determination to get out of his clutches.

  When the door opens again, the air grows heavy around me, and I don’t need to open my eyes to see who’s there.

  “Fuckin’ cunt,” he hisses. “Have you any fuckin’ idea how much trouble you caused me? Jeez, why you insisted on coming here, I don’t know.” As he kicks a chair, I don’t explain I had no choice in the matter. He’ll blame me in any event. “Cops want to talk to you. I told them you were attacked by a person unknown. That’s all you fuckin’ tell them, you got me?”

  “I got you, Duke.” I know how this goes.

  “Hmm. Well, once you’ve seen them, I’ll break you out of here and take you home.”

  “I might need to stay in. I’m… I’m hurt pretty badly.”

  “I don’t fuckin’ care how bad you’re hurt. Your place is with me.” He moves forward and leans over the bed, letting me feel his warm whisky-tinged breath on my cheeks. “You do whatever you have to do, Sapphire. Tell them you want to discharge yourself. Hell, refuse treatment. I don’t care how you do it, but you’re coming home. I want you back tomorrow, you feel me? You can lie around in this bed feeling sorry for yourself for twenty-four hours. Then I’m bringing you home.”

  Chapter Three

  Niran

  Present day

  Arriving back at the clubhouse just in time to catch the end of Grumbler’s band’s set, I stand a few steps inside the doorway and grin. As they finish on a crescendo that has hands clapping and boots stomping, I shake my head. Who would have known the old man would have it in him? But hell, his vocals are good, and as for the way he plays that guitar? He’s as good as any rock star I’ve seen. The whole band is excellent. If they went professional, they could probably make a killing.

  But they won’t. Content to say their time has passed, they’re happy just playing a couple of times a month at the clubhouse, belting out favourites we all enjoy.

  As usual, Grumbler jumps off the makeshift stage and stops first to kiss the fuck out of his old lady, Mary, who grins and returns his affection wholeheartedly. When he finishes, the PDA that has had Alicia, his adopted daughter pretending to wretch, he pauses only to run his hand over Mary’s extended belly, the one carrying their surprise child, before heading my way. I grin at him, musing, Grumbler’s the epitome of the old saying, there’s life in the old dog yet.

  Stepping forward with a hand extended, I meet him halfway. “Sounded good tonight, Brother.”

  His thumb locks with mine. Pulling me in, he slaps my back, and a little hoarsely, turns to the bar and demands a beer from Connor. Then glancing at me again, he asks, “Were you in time to catch much?”

  Grimacing in regret, again I shake my head. “Just the end. That job was a fuckin’ bitch.” I’d stayed late at the auto-shop to ensure a rush job was completed for the customer to pick up in the morning.

  He grins. “Guess you didn’t notice our fuckup, then.”

  I suppress the desire to roll my eyes. I doubt any fuckup was worthy of note, and probably only noticeable to the musicians themselves.

  A movement to the side catches my eye. “Fagan, my man.” Stretching my hand out to the drummer, he takes it in his. “On form as always.”

  At Grumbler’s beckoning, the other two members of the band wander up, as anxious as he to wet their throats. It’s no hardship for me to greet Jon Boy and Kurt as well. The three are only too welcome at the club, where no one actually cares if they fuck up anything. Their music enlivens the clubhouse, and the only payment they’ll take is beer and snacks.

  I wait on the sidelines while Grumbler dissects the set with his bandmates, tuning out completely when they start to discuss C minor sevenths and shit like that. I might appreciate music but haven’t the first clue how to play it. As for singing? Let’s just say, people would pay not to hear my voice.

  Instead of listening to the conversation that’s going way over my head, I examine the changes in Grumbler. Less than a year back, he was staring sixty in the face, his only companion and interest his motorcycle. Now, while he’s added a year to his age, you’d easily take him for someone years younger. He’s been given a whole a new lease on life and looks the
better for it. It seems like in a flash, he’d resurrected his music hobby he thought abandoned, gained a wife, a stepdaughter, and currently has a kid on the way. Shows even old farts like him shouldn’t give up on life.

  I’ve got him beat in years, of course. I’m thirty-seven to his fifty-eight, but otherwise there are many similarities between us. A few years back, I thought I was made for life, a solid Marine rising through the ranks until a stateside accident took my leg. Lost, feeling washed up and abandoned, with no future to look forward to, I was adrift until I’d stumbled on the club’s beach ride out. Finding the Satan’s Devils had saved my life. Where would I be without them? I can’t even imagine. I wasn’t cut out for civilian life.

  Not that joining the Devils was easy. Prospecting was hard, but my background as a Marine meant I could take all of their shit. It hadn’t been the first time I’d gone through hazing. It had been worth every moment and I’d never looked back. Now I’ve been a patched member for getting on two years, and I fucking love it. Society might have turned its back on a vet having no further use for him, but the Devils made up for all that.

  “See you in the week, bros.” Grumbler’s finishing up with the band. “Practice on Wednesday? Yeah, hell. I’m up for that.”

  “See you, Niran.” Fagan mock-salutes as he walks past.

  “Bye, man.” I exchange a chin lift with Jon Boy, a man totally misnamed as he’s in the same age bracket as Grumbler.

  “Keep it shiny side up.” Kurt gives a sharp nod as he follows the others.

  Outside, their van will be waiting, already packed with all their shit. Well, what are prospects for if not to do the grunt work? I think having resident roadies is one of the reasons they enjoy playing here.

  “So, Grumbler,” I begin once I have his undivided attention. “How’s it all hanging? How’s Mary doing?”