Holding On (23 page)

I point to the hanging
body of limbs in front of Hem for effect.  I’m ignoring Shame
because he still has yet to say anything regarding this monstrous
act at Hems hand.  I’m disappointed in him for not backing me,
he knows I’m on the right side of this.  Hem pauses and
finally breaks his stare at me and looks down.

“
Cut him fucking loose,
call Honor down here. He can call Doc Taylor and pay him from our
discretionary funds to keep this shit quiet.  He’s going to
need stitches, probably a few ribs taped up, and sure as fuck he
will need a dentist.  We may as well give the new boy a full
picture of what happens here when I’m crossed.  Mace is right,
no one hears of this.  Boys, get your asses up through the
garage and clean up before coming back down for the rest of the
party.”  

He walks over to Ace before the boys
finish setting him free, grabbing his shirt and steps on his cut
that has been left on the concrete floor.  “Do not ever think
I wouldn’t take another opportunity to whip your ass again if you
ever step out of line with me.  Nod your fucking toothless
pussy bald head so I know you understand me, son.”

Ace groans and Hem drops
him hard onto the concrete. In response to that sound, I’m suddenly
sick to my stomach.  I try to hold it back but when I look
down and see four broken teeth laying by Ace, everything comes back
up.  Quickly jumping to the side of the concrete and out of
the shining lights I lean over and let it go.

When I’m done I look back at Hem,
shake my head and disgust and see now that Shame won’t even look at
me but he does look a bit relieved.  Maybe he didn’t want to
be here, but that means fucking shit to me right now.  He had
the power to stop this and he chose not to.  I’m disappointed
in him.  That’s why he won’t look at me, he already knows I
see through him.

I leave Hem and Shame to gather their
composure and talk while they wait for Honor to show up and handle
Ace.  I want to stay with him, but I know this would spin up
Hem again so I go back to the house to check on Sadey, trusting no
more will happen to Ace in my absence.  

When I walk through the
doors, I look for Gunner at the bar.  I need to warn him about
what happened so he knows he’s in the clear, and no one suspects he
told me where to find my men.  He’s standing at the end of bar
with a beer in hand, looking unaffected but I know he’s not.
 He’s worried about Ace. They aren’t close but seeing a
brother being dragged away by Hem wouldn’t sit right with anyone.
 

“
Hey.”  All three men
standing in the huddle with Gunner look to me.  My eyes on
Gunner I lift my lips in half smile as a silent way to communicate
so he knows all is okay for now, well as okay as it can be pending
my late arrival to aid Ace.  The brothers continue their talk
and I’m starting to visibly shake as the adrenaline starts to fade.
 

Gunner motions the newest bar keep, a
prospect on duty.  “Get her some Jim Beam, brother.  Make
it a double and one for me as well.”  I’m thankful he’s taking
this over.

“
Alright?”

“
Good as can be.”  He
reaches over and grabs my hands that are twisting in front of me,
I’m barely holding on and with that touch from Gunner I’m about to
lose it.  I step towards him because I’m needing someone
familiar, someone I’m not so fucking pissed with to help calm my
nerves.  Gunner freezes at my advance so I start to step back.
 He’s been so nice to me, I don’t want this ruined by my ever
present insecurities.  When I back up, I land against another
body.  Turning around I see a very pissed off and disgusted
Shame.

“
What the fuck are you
doing, Princess?”  

Oh god.  He doesn’t use that word
with me unless he’s trying to hurt me and right now, that’s his
aim.  I don’t think I can do this right now.  I turn back
to Gunner quickly and start to tell him I’m going to make my exit
and then I hear Shame, and unfortunately I hear every damn word
loud and clear.  

“
Cherry and Kegs let’s
go.”

His tone is defiant and I’m
scared because I know what he’s about to do.  He’s about to
ruin us, right now in
this
moment.  If he does what he’s intending to do
then it is over, we are over.  I know myself, I could never
recover from his intentionally hurting me out of anger, hurt, or
otherwise.

“
What?”  Kegs stands
from the table she was sitting at before being summoned to Shame.
 She looks from me to Shame, and she’s way confused.
 Welcome to the party sister, shit is about to get
interesting.  Cherry is standing behind her now because she
too knows about Shame and I, but she’s not about to jump in here at
Kegs defense.

“
I said let’s fucking go!
Up to my room, out of here, I don’t care where we go as long as I’m
not having to look at anyone’s trash.”  He never breaks eye
contact with me as he roars those words.  

My heart has stopped.
 He is
really
doing this.  This is Shames ways of saying goodbye.
 He knows I won’t share him.  Mentally I just
can’t, I’m not that girl.  He wants to hurt me in such a
way that I can’t recover and would refuse to take him back.
 This will do it, and he knows it.

Kegs speaks for both her
and Cherry now.  “Fuck that Shame.  I may be a Club
whore, and you may not think enough about me to assume I would go
with you, but fuck no.  You’re doing this only because you’re
hating something or someone, you’re not lusting for sex. I’m not
even sorry for saying this but Cherry and I have been watching you
and Hem all night, you’re an asshole Shame.  That woman there
is way too fucking good for you.”

With that she and Cherry both look to
me, each giving me an apologetic look as tears that are about the
shed, remain in my eyes and then they walk away.  Wondering
what happens next I look to Shame silently begging him not to do
this.  He looks at me, then behind me to Gunner, then back to
me.

“
WINNIE and BLOOM, follow
me.”  Shame bellows now gaining us even more an audience of
pity. He walks out of the compound as those skanks follow him,
leaving the boys they were just with to dangle, unsatisfied.
 

I turn to Gunner.  I can tell he
wants to reach out to me, but I won’t let him.  I’ve caused
enough trouble for this club in my mission to help Ace.

I’m marching up the stairs before I
know it, leaving all this chaos behind me.  I need to go grab
Sadey and get the hell back home before I completely fucking fall
apart.  Christ, once I realize what just happened here I don’t
think anyone or anything will be able to pull me out of the
blackness.

Chapter
Eleven
:

“
I know the night is not the same
as the day: that all things are different, that the things of the
night cannot be explained in the day, because they do not then
exist, and the night can be a dreadful time for lonely people once
their loneliness has started.”

--Ernest Hemingway

Last night, after getting Sadey and
her bags from upstairs, we came back down to find a fuming Hem
sitting at the bar.  From the looks of the surrounding members
within his distance, it went unspoken that he was to be left the
fuck alone.  He had glanced at Sadey and me as we had walked
by but said nothing to either one of us.  I hadn’t anticipated
him to say anything though.

Even in his fury, he was
starting to feel the self-hate set in.  Hem deals with
self-hate through alcohol, his way of self-destructing.
 Always has been his choice of self-infliction and his way of
keeping himself numb while he works through his own
shit.

Luckily enough though, we
did not see Shame on the way out.  Safe to assume he was
already readying himself to be balls deep into Winnie and/or Bloom.
 Shame deals with his self-hate by fucking his way through as
much pussy as he can get, in as short amount of time as he can get
at it.  This has always been Shames way of dealing with his
self-hatred, women versus alcohol. Same way of copying through an
addiction, different drug.  Whatever Shame went through as a
child kept him close to the edge of his fuckedupness.  I just
had the audacity to believe I was enough to navigate him from this
for the rest of our lives together.  

Sadey and I finally made
it to the car without incident and we drove home in complete
silence. Nothing needed to be said between us because we both knew
how the other was feeling.  We were both silently praying to
keep be able our shit together long enough to just make it inside
the walls of our own home and then allow ourselves to grieve out
loud in the privacy of our bedrooms, without witness.

Right now, I’m lying in my
bed, and in the contrast of the morning sun flitting through my
windows bright, I’m feeling so alone and broken.  Through the
night my sleep was interrupted by the roars of tears and anguish I
would hear coming from inside me, waking me then reminding me that
what I thought was a nightmare wasn’t and that Shame was no longer
with me.  Sadey never came to me in the night as I had
expected she would. What she and I were going through was not the
exact same, but it was hurting in the same place.  I can
honestly say that my heart isn’t just broken from this, it feels so
much more than that.  My heart is literally shattered,
unrecognizable, and it is unrepairable.

Hem had been wanting to
give Sadey a taste of the club so she could view it as it should
be, a cage of darkness that he can never leave.  He had always
protected us both from the violence that surrounded his life.
 Dirty never touched either one of us because he would never
allow it. He kept both of us under his protective shield, always
ensuring we stayed innocent and clean from his dangerous and
dirty.

Hem also had spent years denying his
love for Sadey because he didn’t want this life for her.  He
kept me at arms distance in his own way as well, but since I was
his sister and in order to spend more time with him I was to view
at least shadows into his life.  Last night wasn’t a glimpse,
shadow, or a taste though.  That was a full on, all consuming,
act of hate that played out like a movie again and again for both
Sadey and I. We will have no choice but to replay in our heads for
days to come.

I wonder now how Ace is
this morning and where he’s at.  I hope he’s being taken care
of and that no more harm comes to him. Although I’m no doctor, I
could see that he would be better off to stay in a hospital for
care, but how the injuries occurred and to avoid police involvement
I know this won’t be the case.

Ace has a good heart. When
that man loves, that man loves hard.  He wasn’t afraid of
telling Hem that Sadey didn’t belong in this life.  He loves
Sadey enough to stand up and take the worst beating anyone could
ever expect and it came at the hands of his own Club brother.
 I can’t say I know Ace well enough to determine if he will
stay away from her now though. I do know the Club is his life, he
told me this the same night he professed his love for her to me.
Seems so long ago he and I shared how he had felt, had it really
only been just a week? Unsure where Ace comes from, if it would be
a place worth leaving her for and going back to start
over.

Knowing I need to get up and check on
Sadey I mentally prepare my checklist for today.  I am going
to talk to Hem first.  As of yesterday he was still planning
to take Shame and some of the members to Texas in search of Switch,
finally putting his plan of revenge into place for taking Doc’s
life in cold blood.  Wonder if Hem will ever get enough
revenge, I’m trying not to think about Hem spending the rest of his
life searching for ‘enough’.

I’m going to the Club
today for another reason, not just Hem.  I need get my things
from Shame’s room.  I have no intentions of going back there
for any other reason than to visit Hem, but even that won’t be for
a long time from now.  

Shame broke us,
completely.  I cannot forgive his actions with Winnie and
Bloom.  He meant for me to hurt, it was direct and
intentional.  This is something I won’t forgive.  If I
were a weaker person I would wait with bated breath for Shame to
return to me, begging forgiveness.  I’m not so weak though, I
know this lifestyle and have had a front row seat to see how it can
affect the behaviors of even taken men, men with wives and
families.  I knew walking into Shame’s life and sharing him
with that family that there was a chance for heartache, but still
believed that once we were really together that we didn’t need
anyone outside of us.  So wrong, he will always need them and
I could never have been enough.

Sadey needs to get over
this with Hem and fast, even if by distraction.  She’s most
likely hurting more than I am, I can admit that.  Out of the
two of us, I am cognizant that she fell harder.  She’s a lover
at heart and she has loved that stupid man all her life.  She
didn’t have any experience of love, sex, or relationships before
Hem took her there just a couple months ago.   He has
been the only love she has ever known, she doesn’t have memories
like I have of Greyson to give her hope of the future with someone
else.  Not as though either of us will be leaning on hope
anytime soon, but it’s something for me to encourage her to look
forward to.

I’m showered and I’ve
tried to wash all the ugliness from last night off and even made a
feeble attempt to act as though the longer I washed my skin it
would also help wash my memories of what happened down the drain as
well, but that won’t happen.  I’ve thrown away my dress,
garters, and heels I wore last night because I don’t want to be
reminded about how I had been so excited for Shame to see them. He
didn’t even get a chance to really see me last night before
everything fell apart.