Clutch: Satan's Fury MC (2 page)

My folks loved us, but they worked hard and expected me and my sister to do the same. They had high expectations and accepted nothing less than our best. They wanted us to be happy and have a good life, and believed that good grades and college were the best ways to make that happen for both of us. I did what I could to make them proud, but whenever things got to be hard, I found myself at the foot of my Grandma Pip bitching about my problem of the day. She’d sit there in that old blue rocking chair listening to me gripe as she peered at me over the rims of her bifocals. When I was done complaining, she’d offer me her advice on whatever was bugging me, but she’d sum it up by saying the same thing every single time: “Life ain’t always peaches and cream, hon. You’re just gonna have to toughen up and make things happen.” She’d then tell me to ignore the pain, forget all the obstacles that stood in my way, and fight for what was important to me. I’d try to explain to her that it wasn’t that easy, but she never listened, never wanted to hear my excuses. She agreed with my folks that there was only one path that led to a good life, and if you were strong enough to follow it, you’d find happiness.

I’d like to say that following in my parents’ footsteps came naturally to me, but it didn’t. I was driven and determined, just like them—even more so in some ways. I wanted a good job, a big house, and a fancy car, and I wasn’t afraid to work for it. I did what was expected. I started my first job as soon as I turned fifteen, graduated high school with honors, and got a full ride to college with a football scholarship. Everything I thought I wanted was within my reach, but it just didn’t feel right. I tried ignoring that gnawing feeling that I was on a path that I really didn’t want, but it was no use. I was fighting for something that wasn’t meant to be mine. The closer I got to my parents’ dreams, I knew in my core it was just that:
their
dreams. I didn’t want the highfalutin job or the big fancy house. It all seemed so mundane. I wanted something different, something
more
.

I left college and the good graces of my parents to find my “something more”. When I met Cotton and the other brothers of Satan’s Fury, I knew I’d found just what I was looking for. Being with them made me feel alive … really alive for the first time in my life. With them, I found a brotherhood that offered a life that fulfilled my need for adventure, and a sense of belonging that I’d never really known.

It wasn’t the life that my parents had expected for me. Hell, it wasn’t even the life I’d expected, but I couldn’t imagine wanting anything more. That’s when I decided that walking away didn’t mean I was giving up; to get what I really wanted, I had to be strong enough to know when to let go.

My life was rocking along great. I’d graduated college and had gotten a great job in pharmaceutical sales. I’d moved into an amazing apartment overlooking the city and felt like everything was going my way. I couldn’t have been happier, but it didn’t last. All it took was one phone call, one traumatic moment, and my world as I knew it shattered down around me.

Three months earlier…

“Hello?” I answered as I rubbed the sleep from my eyes. I sat up in the bed and quickly glanced over to the clock sitting on my bedside table, noticing that it was three o’clock in the morning.

“Olivia? This is Linda Moore.” Her breath caught, signaling me that she was trying to keep herself from crying. Linda lived next door to my parents. She and my mother were best friends, and I knew she wouldn’t be calling me at this time of night unless something was wrong. The minute she breathed her name, panic washed over me.

I stood up with my heart racing as I asked, “Linda? What’s wrong?”

“Oh, sweet girl…” she cried. “I think you need to come over to your parents’ house.”

“Why? What’s going on?” I pushed.

“It’s your parents… someone broke in.” She hesitated. “Bless their hearts. Someone shot them both, Olivia. Oh, darlin’… your parents were murdered,” she sobbed.

After that, all I could hear was static. My heart pounded against my chest as horrifying thoughts took over my mind. My momma… my sweet, precious momma. My dad, my invincible dad, gone. No! No! No! My body turned ice-cold. I couldn’t breathe. My skin hurt, my knees buckled, and I fell to the floor. I gripped the phone in my hand, held it to my ear, but I couldn’t speak. Thoughts of our house flashed through my mind—the large two-story brick home that I’d grown up in, the very one in which I felt so loved, so safe. When I closed my eyes, I could see my mother standing at the stove talking incessantly about her day while my father sat back in his recliner and pretended to listen to every word. I could even see her big white Boxer peering in through the front door window, pleading for someone to let her in. I could smell the flowers she’d have sitting on the kitchen table, and I just couldn’t fathom anything bad ever happening to her. Then the next instant, unwanted images bombarded my thoughts … the sounds of gunshots exploding through the house, small clouds of smoke drifting down the long hallway to my parents’ bedroom, my mother and father lying in their beds in blood-soaked pajamas. Endless horrific visions kept pounding through my mind. Eventually, my thoughts drifted back to that long hallway, and my breath caught when I remembered my brother and sister’s rooms were just a few feet away from my parents’ room.

I raised myself off the floor and asked, “Linda! What about Charlie and Hadley? Are they okay?”

“I don’t know, dear. The police have been looking for them for over an hour, but there’s no sign of them.”

“Oh my god. I’m coming. I’ll be there as soon as I can,” I told her as I tried to fight the overwhelming, strangling fear that filled my soul. All I knew or instinctively felt was that I had to find my brother and sister—and I had to find them now. My head was pounding. I couldn’t think clearly as my mind raced with so many unimaginable thoughts, but somehow I knew I had to get my clothes on and go.

In a matter of minutes, I was in a pair of sweats and a t-shirt racing my car towards my parent’s house. I could barely see through my tears as I drove, but I didn’t slow down. I had to get to Hadley and Charlie. They were all I had left. Mom had me when she was still very young. She’d barely finished high school when I came along, and after realizing how difficult it would be to start a family so young, she decided that they should wait before they had any other children. It was almost eleven years later before she got pregnant with Charlie, and Hadley came along two years after him. Even though there was a vast difference in our ages, we were still extremely close. I was thrilled when they were born, and I couldn’t imagine my life without them in it.

When I parked the car, I was immediately overwhelmed by all the flashing lights and the people … so many people. It was chaos. The neighbors were all standing in their front yards talking and watching as the police rushed around asking questions and writing their reports. I just stood there astonished, frozen with shock. I couldn’t believe that this was all really happening, that it was happening to me, to
my family
.

Everything was a complete blur, until I spotted the paramedics pushing the two long stretchers down the front walkway. Everything fell silent as I watched them open the doors to the ambulance. The breath rushed from my lungs as I watched them carefully load my parents into the back. My feet wouldn’t move. I felt frozen, terrified. I wanted to call out to my mom. I needed her to tell me that this was all some terrible mistake. I needed her to tell me that they were okay, that this was just a bad dream, but when the doors of the ambulance slammed shut, I knew that was never going to happen. My mom and dad were gone, and no amount of screaming was going to change that.

I had to find Hadley and Charlie. I had to know if they were okay. The hope that they were still alive was the only thing that was keeping me from falling apart. I headed for the house, carefully slipping past the yellow tape that crisscrossed the front door and stepping inside. I was just about to start up the stairs when I felt someone’s hand wrap around my elbow, pulling me back away from the steps as he asked, “Where do you think you are going?”

I looked over my shoulder and immediately caught sight of a large, older man in a policeman’s uniform. I took a step back and said, “I’m Olivia Turner. This is my parents’ house. I need to find my brother and sister…”

“This is a crime scene, Ms. Turner. You can’t just go traipsing through the house interfering with the evidence,” he scolded. “You need to wait out front with Officer Stenson. He’ll have some questions for you.”

I jerked my arm free from his grasp and shouted, “No. I’m not going anywhere. I need to know what the hell is going on. Where are my brother and sister?”

“Ma’am, I know you are upset, but you’ve got to settle down,” he reprimanded.

“And how am I supposed to do that? My parents have been murdered, and I don’t know where my brother and sister are. I’m going crazy here. Can’t you tell me something? Anything?” I pleaded.

“I wish there was more to tell. From what we can gather, someone broke in around one-thirty this morning. There’s no sign of forced entry, so either the door was left unlocked or someone had a key. There are no signs of theft, so it looks like they were here for one reason and one reason only,” he clarified.

“To kill my parents?”

“Yes,” he answered.

“And Charlie and Hadley? What about them?”

“We haven’t been able to locate them. Their beds have been slept in and their clothes are still in the closet, but there’s no sign of them anywhere. From the looks of their rooms, whoever killed your parents tried to find them. Their rooms have been turned upside-down.” He paused for a minute, then leaned in closer to me as he confessed, “My gut tells me they were able to get away, but there’s no real proof of that. You got any idea where they might have gone?”

Hope instantly washed over me. If they were okay, I knew where they were. My mother had a dumbwaiter installed when Hadley was born. She had it placed in the bathroom that was located between their bedrooms, thinking it would help her out with the laundry. Unfortunately, it quickly became a nuisance. My brother and sister loved taking turns hiding inside that creepy thing and inching their way down to the basement. As they got older, they realized that they could take the next step and use the basement window to sneak outside. They’d slip out at all times of the day and night, and it drove my parents crazy. Thankfully, Charlie was only fourteen, so sneaking out usually meant going to the local park around the corner. Hadley would follow him whenever he’d let her, and they’d spend a few hours in their own little imaginary world, playing games and telling stories. I just prayed that they’d managed to get away without getting hurt.

Without checking to see if he was going to follow, I turned from the police officer and rushed out of the front door, running as fast as I could towards the park. It was still dark and the morning fog had started to creep in, making it almost impossible to see. I started calling out their names over and over, praying that one of them might answer. Just before I made it over to the monkey bars, I spotted Charlie sitting on a bench with Hadley resting her head in his lap. Even with his shaggy brown hair covering his eyes, I could still tell that he’d been crying. My heart ached as I watched his hand run up and down Hadley’s arm. He was a good big brother, and tonight, he’d gotten her out of that house and kept her out of harm’s way all on his own.

I rushed over to him and wrapped my arms around his neck, hugging him tightly as I cried, “Thank god you’re both okay. I was worried out of my mind!”

“We’re okay … but Mom and Dad …” he started, then stopped when he started to sob.

Still holding him close, I whispered, “I know, sweetie. I’m so sorry you were there when it happened.”

“I couldn’t save them, Livie. Those men … they were so much bigger than me. I couldn’t …”

“Oh no, honey. Don’t do that.” I leaned back and looked at him as I said, “Charlie, Mom and Dad would’ve been so proud of you tonight. Don’t you know that? You got Hadley out of that house all by yourself. You saved your sister’s life and yours. You were so very brave.”

He glanced over to me with tears streaming down his handsome face as he sobbed, “I wish I could have done something more. I wanted to … really, I did. Now they’re gone. What are we supposed to do without them?”

“I don’t know, Charlie, but we’ll figure it out,” I assured him.

Reality was starting to set in. We were all alone, and I had no idea who I could turn to. Our grandparents had died years ago and the rest of our family lived hundreds of miles away.

“Livie?” said Hadley with tears filling her eyes.

Her dark hair framed her face, making her porcelain-smooth skin seem to glow against the darkness of the night. She stared at me with those beautiful blue eyes, silently pleading with me to tell her that everything that had happened was just a bad dream. Since I couldn’t tell her what she needed to hear, I reached for her, wrapping my arms around her as I held her close to me. I gently ran my hand over the back of her head and said, “It’s okay, sweetheart. Everything’s going to be okay.”