Bull (Reapers MC Book 7) Page 4
If that isn’t the worst part, I see my eye rolling on the floor in front of me.
7
Fear does not stop death. It stops life.
~unknown
Alexa/Lola
My head pounds as I wake, not even realizing I had fallen asleep. Did I fall asleep or did I pass out from the torment I just endured? Placing my arms under my body I push myself up, look around the room and see I’m alone.
Surprisingly the light was left on, however, I don’t see any light coming through the windows. This only means it’s either the middle of the night or early in the morning. I try to stand up and somehow do, but lightheadedness hits me like a slap in the face. Floaters appear in my eye while I feel insanely weak. I decide to go back to the ground and lay on my back. The concrete hurts but not nearly as bad as it typically does.
Heck, I think everything I experienced not long ago is a dream until I see blood covering my naked body. I glance over to the floor and see a puddle of blood, and a few feet away is . . . is my eye. I can’t hold my stomach contents down this time. The little I’ve eaten and drank comes pouring out of me bit by bit.
Since I’m alone with the light on I can take my time to glance around the room and become familiar with it. When I was in the shed I was restrained, unable to use anything to my advantage. Here I haven’t been tied up in the same way. I’m not sure why they haven’t limited me to any extent . . . but you won’t see me complaining either.
There are two electrical boxes in the back right hand corner of the basement with some sort of thick wrap around the tubing. I don’t want to call it a pipe because that would be inaccurate. There’s no hard surface to it from what I can see. It kind of looks like electrical tape wrapped around something numerous times.
Four large green columns go up through a concrete block in the floor and hold up parts of the basement, giving them structural support. I’ve run into one or two of them before but I’ve never seen them until now. The basement is some sort of older brick and I’m not talking nineteen-seventies. It looks like something you’d see in the eighteen-hundreds, old stacked stone on top of the other with concrete holding it together. The stone is partially painted over but it’s peeling in most places. This is when I see a pipe half-way hanging off the wall.
I refuse to be dumb and not use the tool I see right in front of my face. In all my time here I haven’t been given an opportunity like this. My entire body aches from top to bottom. I’m exhausted, extremely malnourished and to top it all off the left side of my face is stinging from the blade he cut me with earlier.
Putting one hand in front of the other and using my knees to the best of my ability I army crawl over to the other side of the basement where the hanging pipe is. If this thing is as old as I think it could be, it’ll be the perfect weapon to use. I sit on my ass as I reach the hanging pipe and place my hands around the edge, pulling with all my might. Surprisingly it gives way after a mere few seconds of me pulling. I make sure to hold on tightly so the metal doesn’t clink against the floor and notify my captors something is going on.
I can tell the boxes on the other wall are electrical ones, however I’m not sure why there are two boxes instead of one. I hold the pipe close to my chest as I slowly venture over to the wall where the boxes are and return to sitting on my butt. From glancing at the boxes there isn’t any sort of lock on them and I think this is too good to be true. Surely they would’ve protected their electricity in some way.
Now that I see how easy this should be, I muster up every ounce of strength I have, move up onto my knees and bring my body upward into a standing position. With my fingers I open both boxes, place the pipe between my legs and hold it as I flip off every switch I can. Within a matter of minutes, I hear cursing from upstairs and even the basement returns to its usual pitch-black darkness.
Grabbing the pipe from my legs, the harsh sounds of boots pounding against the wooden floor become closer and closer until I hear the awful creaking sound of the basement door come flying open.
“What in the hell is going on?” Grizzly hollers out, more agitated than I’ve ever heard him before.
“Looks like the power went out, Prez.” Rascal replies. No sooner as he finishes talking Grizzly chuckles in a way which makes me think he’s furious.
“I doubt the power just went out, Rascal. The bitch you’re into flipped the switches to the boxes. I thought I told you to shut the fucking light off. You didn’t do what I said, did you?!” At this point Grizzly is screaming and it’s incredibly easy to figure out where he is.
I make my way around the two of them and place my hand in front of me, feeling for the door. It takes a couple of minutes for me to find it, but I do. Meanwhile they’re both cursing as they fail to find me. I take a step up and bring the door shut, closing it and lock the handle like they always do.
Cursing greets me once again and I make my way up the stairs, dropping to my knees and crawling up them one by one. My head hurts more than it ever has before. You’d think someone is shoving an ice pick through my ear with how it radiates to the front and back. Add in the pain I’m trying to ignore from my eye being carved out and I’m in pure hell. Fuck, I know they did this for a reason. They purposefully have been feeding me the littlest they can which will still keep me alive. They didn’t want to give me any advantage if I somehow managed to escape.
I take it slow but am able to get to the first floor. It’s pitch-black like the rest of the house so I crawl around, trying to keep as quiet as I can. Who knows where the other three men are? If I’m lucky, they’re still in bed.
It takes me about ten minutes to find the front door, place my hand on the knob and open it. I don’t bother shutting it, but instead crawl onto the porch and down the few steps onto the snow-covered ground. Shit. I didn’t think about this. They’ll be able to follow me so easily once the sun rises.
I stop for a moment, seeing the sky starting to turn orange. I need to get a move on before I get caught. I continue crawling through the pain and I maybe make it fifteen feet before I hear a whistle come up from behind me. “Well, my, my. How’d you manage to get out?”
8
“You win some, you lose some. Except for me. I always win.”
~unknown
Bull
I didn’t get an ounce of sleep last night. Instead, I drank plenty of water and filled my stomach. The last thing I wanted was to drive out here with a hangover, or even still drunk. The drive out to Big Horn was a little over two hours away from us. Instead of getting on our bikes, we hopped in a couple of trucks. Fist and I took one truck, whereas Zane and Blackjack hopped in the other. We didn’t want everyone to come along with us since this is such an important mission. Hell, even if we got all of them to bed and forced them to drink a gallon of water I can bet they’d still have cinnamon rum flowing through their veins.
From what Roxy said she didn’t have the exact location of where the Bears now are, but she did say they’re on the edge of the National Forest. There aren’t too many who live out this way, so I’m positive we’ll be able to locate where they’ve been hiding out.
I have my hands on the wheel when Fist speaks up, “I called Boomer. He told me they saw someone moved into an old abandoned cabin a few weeks back. I’m pretty sure this would be them.”
Shit. I didn’t think Fist would ever call Boomer unless he was desperate. Those two have a shit ton of drama between their two families. Unlike the Bears, Fist and Boomer’s dad were able to have a successful truce. Boomer’s dad retired a few years back and his son was voted to be the new Prez of the Corrupt Kings MC.
“They giving us backup?”
Fist grumbles back his response, “Mhm. Apparently Grizzly has been making shit difficult for them too.”
Honestly, I’m still a bit surprised Fist even wanted to come along. He’s been sticking to himself so much none of us really know what he’ll do. I’d call this a good surprise, though. “Have you thought about how you’re going to do this yet?” I ask Fist, knowing the old man has probably dreamed about this day for weeks. Hell, spending that much time alone should give you the mentality to plan how to axe someone who’s harmed the people you love numerous times.
“Of course I have, but nothing will be enough. No matter what I do, it won’t make up for the great losses we’ve all had.”
I nod, understanding what he means. There’s no amount of revenge that ever makes losing a loved one feel better. Fuck, I’d know. When I was in MARSOC one of my sisters was killed by a target. I made it my own personal mission to hunt the bastard down and make him suffer. I think that was the moment I knew staying in MARSOC wasn’t the right choice for me. Instead of following a direct order I went on my own time and took care of the bastard. It didn’t matter if I was caught on surveillance doing what needed to be done. I just knew how I needed to avenge my fallen sister. What no one knew is Arizona was more than another member in uniform. The woman made every sacrifice she could for her country, but more than that, she had my damn heart. The moment she died in my arms was the one time I felt completely helpless. That day I started to hate the chain of command, the order that wasn’t given which ended up resulting in me losing the first woman I ever loved. Two days later the accident happened and I lost not only my legs after being too close to a bomb, but everyone else in my squadron. I didn’t know if I was lucky or being eternally damned to hell.
I was discharged from MARSOC after losing my legs and went through hell trying to recover. I found the MC afterward and found a new squadron so to speak, one who didn’t need to follow a chain of command and would do what needed to be done versus twiddling their fucking thumbs and waiting.
“The next road we come up to you wanna take a left,” Fist says and I follow his
direction, turning down the road. Zane and Blackjack are in their truck behind us twenty feet or so. “Cut the lights. Boomer said the cabin is all the way down this road. I don’t want these fuckers to see us coming.” The sun is starting to rise a good bit at this point, meaning our cover is going to be blown one way or another.
The air thickens as we venture closer, knowing all this shit with the Bears will soon come to a close. This has been years in the making. Fist and I both take notice that all the lights are on inside the house. I pull the truck over to the side behind some thick pine trees and we both get out slowly, parked maybe a couple hundred feet away. Zane does the same thing and both he and Blackjack walk up to us. “What’s the game plan here?” Blackjack asks Fist, who chuckles lowly.
“You shouldn’t be askin’ me that, son. Ask your Prez.”
“We’ll go in through the front with guns drawn, mags loaded. We’re not fucking around here. I don’t know about y’all but I’m pretty sick of the Bears givin’ us trouble.”
“Damn straight,” Fist hisses out while Blackjack and I grumble in agreement.
“Follow me,” Zane orders out. I slip my gun from my holster, raise it and follow him. Blackjack is behind me and Fist is behind him. My MARSOC training comes in handy here acting as a unit. Zane places his hand on the front door and walks inside, firing off a shot before I’m even in the door. I turn, covering Zane’s back and spot Rascal, Grizzly’s second in command and pull my trigger. Like a movie playing in slow motion I watch the bullet enter his chest, knock his shoulder back and visibly see the blood coating his white shirt. Within a moment, he’s fallen to the floor and is no longer an issue. Two down. I really fucking wish we knew how many people were in this fucking place.
“Boomer tell you how many were here?” I call back to Fist.
“He said four.” Fist replies.
A deep gut feeling hits me. There’s something wrong here. I don’t know what the fuck it is, but I sense it. “Keep your eyes open,” I state, scanning over the area.
The house has two stories and I hear stomping coming from above us. Instead of moving, I’ll wait for the idiot to come barreling down the stairs and cap him. Much to my surprise, there are two men who I don’t recognize coming straight toward us. Blackjack and I fire our guns and watch as their struggling bodies hit the ground. They’re Bears, which means they deserve no mercy. Instead we’ll let them bleed out onto the filthy floor.
“Where is Grizzly?” Fist roars, looking to the group of us.
“Boomer told you there were four men here?” I question. Grizzly may be a sick fuck but he’d never leave his men behind.
“It’s what Boomer said.” He hisses back.
“He can’t be far,” Blackjack interjects, walking up the stairs. Zane follows him.
I call up to them as they’re on the landing with the two men, “We’ll clear this level.”
“Alright. You two check out the basement as well. I saw a light on down there. After we’re done clearing the upstairs we’ll go around the property and look for tracks.”
Nodding, we go our separate ways.
9
May God have mercy on my enemies, ‘cause I won’t
~unknown
Bull
The cabin is nothing fancy. Cheap linoleum floor is spanned across the space, with the type of walls you’d see in a trailer. It’s no wonder this place has been abandoned. I contemplate how the Bears had even been living here because there’s hardly one piece of furniture in the entire first floor. A tiny wooden table sits off the kitchen, shoved against the wall with three rickety chairs.
The doors to the cabinets in the kitchen are hanging off the hinges and I swear I saw some mouse crap sitting on the counter. I don’t know how people live in conditions such as this. Disgusting comes nowhere near to accurately describing it.
“This door leads downstairs,” Fist says from behind me, so I turn and walk over to him. He pulls a cord which turns on a single light bulb in the middle of the stairwell and it reveals another door to us.
“Why would they need two doors?” I ask, looking to him.
“Usually people only need two doors if they’re hidin’ somethin’.”
With that Fist goes down and I follow him with my gun drawn, ready to fire at anything coming our way. He puts a hand on the door and turns the knob, revealing another single light on in the basement. I can’t see past the old man, but his words cause a chill to run over my entire body.
“Holy hell. What have they done?” He steps to the side and a woman is hanging mid-air with chains wrapped around her wrists. She seems to have red hair, but blood is coating her body so it makes me wonder if she’s actually a redhead or if it’s just her blood. Her skin is coated with dirt, making me think about how long she’s been here. Even under the grime I can see her skin puffing out like she’s swollen. Not only that, but there are hints of purple and blue across her entire body from her neck down to her ankles.
“Is that her eye?” Fist’s question pulls me out of my daze so I look in the direction he’s pointing. Yep, there is something round over there. Not like I want to go up and look at it. Twisted as it may be, that’s crossing the line.
I approach her, unable to tell if she’s still breathing. “Jesus Christ. What did they do to you?” I whisper it out, scanning over her body. Anyone who laid their eyes on her could see she’s malnourished, but the swollen parts on her confuse me. Based on the pigmentation of her skin I’d say they beat her with something.
“Found some chain cutters,” Fist states, positioning them above her hands he puts them around one chain and pushes the tool together. Her right-hand drops and her body slumps along with it. I wrap my arms around her body, holding her tightly against my own to make sure she doesn’t fall and further injure herself. Fist goes to the other chain and cuts it, causing her small weight to rely fully on me.
I kneel and put this woman against the concrete. Now I’m in a sweatshirt, full winter coat and my cut. She’s been exposed to every element possible, freezing and withering away down here. “This is the girl, isn’t it?”
Fist looks at her, “I’d assume so.”
“God dammit. I wish we would’ve gotten here earlier.” I confess, somehow knowing she couldn’t have been this far off too long ago. I slip my cut off with my winter coat and pull her body to me. Placing her left arm through the sleeve of my cut, Fist whistles.
Glancing back to him, I cock a brow. “Got somethin’ to say, old man?”
“You’ve been in this lifestyle long enough to know what you’re doin’ right now.” Fist replies.
Taking in a breath, I nod. “Yes, I do.” I don’t care about what it means. I care about doing what is right and that just happens to be covering this woman up with as much warmth as possible. I slide her arms into my cut and take off my sweatshirt, leaving me in a t-shirt. Continuing to dress her I slide her arms into the sleeves of my sweatshirt and zip it up, then go for my winter coat and do the same thing.
There’s no way I’d let her be exposed to the elements any more than she has been already. She takes in a deep, gurgled breath and it evokes a type of anger I’ve never felt before. I’m not angry at the girl, but at the Bears for putting her through this, for endlessly torturing her for no god damned reason. For some reason all I want to do is guard her, tuck her under my shoulder and protect her with everything I have.
“What’s her name again?” I ask Fist while I rake my eyes over her soft features.
“Alexa. That’s what Agent Williams told us.”
“Did she say why they had her?” I don’t need to know this information, but a primal part of me is demanding answers.
“All she said was that this girl is a key witness in a series of murders.”
“She saw something she shouldn’t have.” I’m guessing. I don’t really know. The Bears have never needed a reason to harm a woman from what we all know. Hell, look at what they did to Ivy. Fuckin’ bastards.