Rage (23 page)

Layla

Thrash had me out of the binds in a matter of moments, but Cullen was fading fast.  Barely conscious and I knew I had to do something, or he would lose too much blood.  I checked him over for a pulse and then looked down his body, assessing the damage.  The knife had gone directly through his leather and his shirt into the left side of his abdomen.  Fuck.

“Gotta get that knife out,” Thrash said as he got out his phone. 

“No.  Leave it in.  It might be slowing the loss of blood.  Give me your shirt.” I scanned his body looking for any more wounds.  Bones only stabbed him once.

“What?”

“Now!” I shouted, practically ripping it off his body before he started helping.  Thrash shucked off his cut and pulled off his shirt, giving me the soft cotton.  I used it as a dressing, wrapping it around the knife and pressing down as hard as I could without disturbing the blade.

He dialed the chief first, and after a quick conversation he hung up, dialing one more number.  The club.  It was a short conversation.

“George is bringing an ambulance.  Robbery gone wrong.  We were at the property looking around when some thugs jumped us.  That’s what we say.”

I was too busy trying to figure out what to do.

“Pl-“ Cullen was still conscious, but just barely.  The words tumbled out of his mouth, but they were garbled and made only half sense. 

I shook my head and put a finger to his lips.  “Stay with us, but try not to talk.” I told him.

Cullen let out a moan of pain, his eyes looking toward me, but I wondered if he even knew where he was.

“Fuck.” It came out of him.  He must’ve been pretty conscious.

“You got everything under control?”

“Yeah, gotta deal with the two assholes up there, and get shit in order.”

I waved him away.  DeMarcus did just that, but I held on to Cullen, determined to stay with him.

I hadn’t had a chance to cry this whole time, and I wasn’t about to start now.  He needed me.  Needed me to hold it in for him.

“You’ll be fine, baby.  I know what I’m doing.  Took a first aid class in Chicago.  Gotta be prepared.” I babbled as I looked down at him, too afraid to let there be silence between us.  I must’ve talked about my entire time in Chicago, but I don’t remember, I was too busy trying to memorize what he looked like.  What he smelled like.  Just in case…

It didn’t take long, just a few minutes before I heard sirens coming our way.  He was still there, looking up at me, but just barely.  If he passed out it would be really dangerous.  He would have lost too much blood.

I was keeping him as stable as I could.

“Ma’am? Ma’am, I need you to let go.” The voices around me brought me back, my mind wandering to all the what-ifs that could happen.  I nodded and then let the man put his hands over the wound before stepping away.

“You did a good job.  Probably saved his life.  Kept the knife in.  Good.  Sir, are you awake?”

Cullen made a moaning noise and nodded.

“Can you tell me your name?”

“Ra-Cullen.”

“Cullen.  Very good, sir.  We are going to move fast, get you to the hospital, okay, Cullen?”

Cullen nodded.

It wasn’t until they got him on the gurney and carted him upstairs that I let the first tears fall.  Collapsing onto my knees they poured out of me, first a light cry and then eventually racking sobs as I sat in his blood.

I couldn’t lose him too.  I’d already lost too much.

Lost everything.

“Hey, baby girl.  You gotta come with me now, gotta drive to the hospital.” Aunt Donna put her arms around me and pulled me up, my body shaking.

“Wh-what happened?” I asked, the shock overwhelming me.

“They are taking Cullen into the hospital.  DeMarcus called Mick and we flew up here in the car.  Mick’s with him, honey.  I’ll drive you up.” She put her hand around my waist and pushed me forward.  “Got the MC here just before the cops showed, those boys are all at the clubhouse, Bones’ guys.  Saw ‘em myself.  Never thought he’d-.”

She looked at my face as we got out into the light, noticing the wounds for the first time.

“Oh hun, you okay?”

“Yeah, just a busted lip and brow.”

Couldn’t even see it in that dirty old basement.  Come on, let’s get you to the hospital to get cleaned up.”

“But, but they’ll know.” I was a little confused, but I knew the stakes.  If the police found out about all of this, it could be bad for us.  Mob, kidnapping, Bones.  We needed to keep this as quiet as possible.

“George is taking care of all that.  Don’t worry, he’ll make it go away.” Aunt Donna hushed me as she held me close.

“Ain’t nothin’ like bein’ turned on by one of your own, baby girl.” She shook her head as she loaded me into the car.  “Ain’t nothin’ like it.”

Chapter 17

Cullen

It was all a quick moving blur before me, nothing I could really understand.  Nothing that made any sense.  Just a bunch of sights, sounds, nothing I could make out.

All I remembered was the look in Layla’s eyes.

She was scared as hell.

So when I woke up in a soft bed with a halo of lights over me I thought I was dead.

But those eyes, her eyes, were looking at me, the same intense blue shining through into mine.

“You’re awake.” She said it like it was the one thing she wanted in the world.  Like what she’d been waiting for.

“How long?” I asked.  How long had I been out?

“Two days.  Doctors said you were pretty damn lucky.  Been any longer and you might’ve bled out.  He got an artery, but leaving that knife in your gut saved your life.” She looked me over, like she was checking me for any spot they might’ve missed.

“You knew to do that?” I was surprised, but then I remembered something about first aid.  Something about her voice comforting me as I laid there in pain.

“I know a lot of things you don’t realize.” I had no doubt about that, baby girl.

It might take years to know her, really know her, but that was okay.  She was mine and I would take it.

I tried to sit up, but white light flooded my eyes as a stab of pain took over my side.  Fuck.  It hurt like hell.

“Slow down there, Rage,” she said, looking me over.  “You need to just lay down and take it slow.”

“Damn, sonofabitch really got me, didn’t he?”

“Did you miss the part where I told you you’d been out for two days, had major surgery and almost died?”

“Come here.” I patted the side of the bed away from my wound and she walked over, laying down next to me, cuddling into me.

“I thought I was going to lose you,” Layla whispered, her eyes full of tears.

So close to her face, I realized she had a set of stitches on her eyebrow and a big bruise over her lip.

I raised my fingers up and traced over that lip.

“Motherfucker.  I’ll kill him.” She wasn’t the only one afraid of losing someone.

“Cullen, I-I love you.” She let out a big breath.  “I almost didn’t have the chance to say it before, but I need you to know that.”

“Baby girl, I never stopped loving you.  Not really.  I was a fucking idiot, but not no more.” I kissed her softly, her swollen lip trembling as I let the moment overwhelm the both of us.

She was mine. 

“Ahem,” some fancy asshole in a white coat came into the room and looked the two of us over.

“I see you are awake, Mr.  McFadden.” He looked at the machines beeping and giving off numbers.  “Vitals are good.  I have to say, the first night was touch and go, but it looks like you are going to be just fine.”

Layla tried to slide off the bed, but I held her close to me.

“How long you think before I have to get out of this hellhole?” I asked, grinning as I said it.

“Maybe a week, maybe two.  Depends on if it heals clean.”

“Thanks, doc.  I appreciate it.”

“Next time you go into an abandoned building, even if you own it, make sure to have the cops sweep it, huh?”

“Right.” I wasn’t quite sure what he meant, but I nodded and watched him walk out of the room.

“Bones?”

“Gone.  Police are going to want a statement from you.  We were checking out the factory to turn into a set of apartments, you know, looking to go into real estate.  And we were ambushed by a couple of guys.  Didn’t get a good look at them.  It was too fast.  Me, you, DeMarcus.  You got it bad, and they got scared, and took off.  Kids.” She said this to me like it was what really happened.  But I knew better.

“You come up with this?”

“Aunt Donna’s cousin, George.”

“Chief of police cleans it all up.  Makes sense.  I got it.”

“Boys questioned those two assholes, but they didn’t know nothin’.  Told them he was having them audition to be taken on as prospects.”

“Thought as much.  Boys let ‘em go?”

“Yeah, beat the hell out of the younger one, but the older one, Mick and DeMarcus like him.  He seemed genuinely pissed that Bones was full of shit.  Wants to let him hang around.”

“Makes sense.  How you know all this?”

“What, you think I’m going to let them keep anything from me? Look what happened last time.  No.  You want me in this club, you want me with you, you tell me everything or I walk.  Got a permanent offer with Strike.  Promised me I could take it any time.”

She pulled away from me, but I held her tight.

“Oh no you don’t.  You’re mine, baby girl.  You ain’t leavin’ me for the fucking mob.”

“Then you tell me everything.”

“Sure.  Right now, I got something that’s a pressing need.  More than anything else.”

“What’s that?”

I grabbed her hand and pressed it against my hard as fuck cock.  She was so hot, and so tight up against my body, wound or not, I needed her.

I’d always need her.

Epilogue

Layla

I surveyed the empty motorcycle club bar, Cullen behind the counter, wiping down the newly-waxed bar.  I saw him wince and lightly clutch his side before looking around to see if anyone else noticed.

It’d been two weeks since he came home from the hospital and he was still healing, but the road was long.

“Fuck, this is bullshit, man.” DeMarcus slammed the door as he came in, Tommy right behind him.  “That’ fucking asshole kills two of our members, and those motherfuckers leave our club?”

Steel and Fire lost almost half its membership as soon as the whole thing went down, most of them walking out the day Cullen went into the hospital.

“Dude, let them go.  They weren’t people we trusted anyway, so it saves us from having to worry about kicking them the fuck out.” Cullen leaned against the bar.

Seven members.  That was all that was left of the already tiny club.

“We got a long way to go to get healthy, but at least we don’t have to worry about the club or the garage.”

Both had been transferred into my name after my brother’s death, and I owned it along with Mick.

That was Bones’ goal: take us out one at a time until he controlled everything.

If he couldn’t have me, he was going to kill me.

Now he was on the run, and he knew if he showed his face anywhere in all of Pittsburgh, he’d be a dead man.

The mob, Snake’s MC, they all wanted a piece of him for being a punk-ass pussy.  At least that was what Strike called it.

I looked around at who was left.  This, I could work with.  This was my family.  It might be the MC, the one place I didn’t want to belong, but we could build on this.  It didn’t have to be the same place I grew up.  It could be something even better.

“What you thinking about, Lala?” Cullen asked pouring himself a glass of bourbon.

“Just about how this shit hole needs a good scrubbing before you start bringing in recruits.”

He smirked.

“Don’t you fucking look at me like that, I don’t do floors and I don’t do windows.  My job’s to do the numbers and that’s all.”

I swear to God, he jumped out from behind that bar so fast I forgot about his wound as he scooped me up.

“Anything else you don’t do, baby girl?”

“If there is, I’ll let you know.”

He bent down and kissed me taking my breath and all my sanity along with it.

“It’s a rough ride we got ahead of us.  You sure you’re going to be down for that?”

“Now
that
I can do.”

Acknowledgements

James Song- You are there with me through it all, and you listen to me. Even when I say, “Bring home pizza or die.” I love you. Thank you for bringing home pizza.

Mom- For listening to me talk about my work and my “dirty” books.

Lana Grayson- Writing Buddies stick together!

Lara Bryde – You seriously are my bestie. I am so glad to have you in my life. Thank you for working with me in the final hour.

To all the blogs, and fans who agreed to read Rage through before it was even fully edited. Thank you so much for your help.

And for readers who are willing to get me a try!!