Devil May Care: Boxed Set (99 page)

In his mind, the Reverend had done the most deplorable thing of the bunch. He’d failed his wife.

Jan had been put through hell and the Reverend had been unable to stop it. He’d tried to live with the consequences, but hadn’t been able to. It had destroyed him in the end.

But that had been part of the thing that made it such a coward’s choice. He could have found a way to live with it. Jan did. He could have done the right thing and figured out how to help his wife work through the demons that must have been feasting on her for years. He could have killed the son of a bitch that had done that to her in the first place.

Any and all of those choices would have been a justifiable course of action. I would have backed him up on any of them. But instead, he couldn’t see past his own grief, not even to help Jan deal with hers.

In the end, he let it devour him, even when Jan had been strong.

I thought of Charlotte. It would haunt us the rest of our days what had happened to her, but I would do everything that was within my power to help her work through it. We would be a team and we’d survive, because we had to. I wouldn’t take the coward’s way out, no matter what had happened to her today. I would be there for her.

I nodded my head once, finitely. “I only have one question left to ask you Stitches. Do you know what it is?”

Stitches stared at me, something lurking in his eyes. Maybe he didn’t know the exact words, but he knew what I was searching for. “Can’t say that I do.”

“I want to know who you’re working for.”

“
I
run the show!” he burst out suddenly, anger surging through him. “This is
my
club! The Berserkers belong to
me
!”

I didn’t bother to tell him that his precious Berserkers were either dead or long gone, scattered to the wind. He already knew it; I could see it in his wild eyes. “Who’s calling the shots, Stitches?”

He bared his teeth at me like an animal. “I ain’t telling you
shit
.”

I smiled at him coldly. “Yes, you will.”

In the end, the very end, all Stitches would give me was a name. Cassias Hoyt. Maybe it was all Stitches had, I didn’t know. But his time was up. I couldn’t let him breathe one more breath. So when I stood, he sensed his own end. He didn’t beg, but he sneered and threw as much maliciousness at me as he could as I reached for the gun I had tucked away in my jacket. It had a bullet with Stitches’ name on it and he knew it. When I pointed it at him, he just continued to yell and blather at me.

Then I pulled the trigger and there was finally silence.

My mother and I had eventually gone downstairs. Worm was bustling around the kitchen like a maid or a mother hen. It was actually kind of endearing and I cracked a smile. He’d made coffee—way too strong, even with milk and sugar—but that was okay. It was warm and soothed me more through the mug in my hand rather than for its contents.

We were seated at the table, my mother across from me. She hadn’t said anything for a long while, her eyes glazed over as she stared off into the distance. Her mug sat on the table, untouched, already getting cold. I was on my second cup and Worm’s was half drank sitting on the table corner off to the side.

I wondered why he stayed, though part of me already knew.

“How’s Emma?” I asked, because the silence was starting to get to me. I didn’t want to talk about serious things or dark things. We’d done too much of that already. But I needed something to cling to, preferably something normal. Emma was pretty damn normal.

Worm turned to me suddenly, his eyes wide. “Oh, um, yeah, she’s good. She’s great. Uh, haven’t seen her much today. There’s been a lot going on. But I texted her. She’s… she’s glad you’re okay.” He blushed a little at the admission, and looked away. I understood what he meant—though I thought “okay” was a bit of a strong word right now—and the implications of it. That text told me that Emma knew what had happened to me.

I gripped my mug tighter. “Oh. That’s… good. Thank you.”

He nodded, still not looking at me. Fluttering about like a giant ogre mixed with the tooth fairy, he seemed to be trying to find something to do with himself. I had a sneaking suspicion that Johnny had ordered him to stay and babysit me and my mother while he went and did some of those violent things that I had yet to get away from.

I pushed the thought aside, because I didn’t want to think about what was happening or who was being hurt as a result of what had happened to me. What I had done.

Worm finally decided what it was he wanted to do and reached for his half empty coffee mug still sitting on the corner of the table. Except that when he reached for it, his thick, clumsy fingers brushed along the side of it and caught the handle, turning it the wrong way. The mug slid off the table and crashed onto the floor with a shatter.

Both my mother and I jumped. Worm immediately cursed loudly.

“Shit, I’m sorry, you guys,” he told us apologetically. He turned towards the sink and grabbed a towel to mop up the mess first. He knelt down and picked up the broken pieces. “I’m real sorry,” he said again.

I shook my head as I pushed back from the table to stand. “It’s okay. Accidents happen.” I went to find the broom and dust pan, pulling them both out of the closet. When Worm had finished mopping up the spilled coffee, I cleared up the smaller pieces of the mug.

“Thanks, Charlotte,” Worm mumbled, looking embarrassed. “You feeling okay? Sorry, sorry, I know that’s a stupid question. Of course you’re not. That rat bastard Stitches—”

I shook my head, swallowing hard. “He… he is a bastard, but he wasn’t the one who…” I trailed off. I couldn’t say it, not out loud. I wasn’t ready for that.

Worm gave me a funny look, then glanced towards my mother before looking back at me. “Uh, what do you mean?”

I made an uncertain gesture with my hand, looking away. “You know. What
happened
. In the… in the video.”

Worm stared me straight in the eyes and told me something that I would spend the rest of my life being grateful for: “That man didn’t touch you. We got there in time.”

I froze. My world swam again, images flashing before my eyes, but there was hope mixed within them.
I wasn’t raped
. I’d been brutalized, drugged, stripped, humiliated, and taunted, but
I hadn’t been raped
. It was a small consolation, but it made a world of difference.

I opened my mouth to say something, but nothing came out, so Worm continued.

“I came down there with some of the other guys and we saw you on the bed,” Worm said, his face flushed with a mixture of sympathy for me and anger at those who did it to me. “You were all woozy and didn’t seem to know what was going on, but you were… you were crying. This huge guy was leaning over you. I cold clocked him and he went down, though.” Worm swelled up with pride and I smiled just a little bit. He was a good guy, no matter what he looked like or what club he’d decided he needed to be a part of. “Then we carried you out. Johnny said to get you the hell out of there, to keep you safe, so I took you home. I didn’t… I didn’t
dress
you, you know? That was Tayna, Robert’s old lady,” he explained quickly, making sure that I understood
he
hadn’t seen me naked. That no man had seen me naked.

It made me feel little better, too, but… Something bothered me still.

Why hadn’t
Johnny
taken me home?

Biting my lip, I asked Worm. “Where’s Johnny?”

Worm scratched at his balding head, his doughy face showing uncertainty. I wasn’t sure if Johnny had sworn him to secrecy or if he was just feeling like maybe it was a bad idea to tell me, but I could see the reluctance in his eyes.

“Please,” I asked, my voice pleading.

He let out a heavy sigh that made his whole body droop. “He’s taking care of what’s left of the Berserkers, you know, so they can’t do anything like this again.”

I smiled at him and said thank you, but my heart wasn’t in it. Not in any of it. He seemed relieved that I was taking it so well, but when I asked him to leave so that I could have some personal space, he blanched.

“I can’t do that!” he said vehemently. “Not until everything’s done and Johnny’s back. He said, ‘Don’t you let anything happen to her,’ that’s just what he said.”

Internally, I wanted to shake him and tell him to just fuck off, to leave me be, but that wouldn’t get me anywhere. If anything, it would just bring Johnny back to me—and part of me was desperate for that, needing his warm, comforting embrace—but I couldn’t have that. If I was going to do what I needed to do, everyone had to be gone. One look at the faces of those I loved, and I knew I’d lose my nerve once again.

Forcing a smile, I nodded. “Okay, but can you maybe… give me some space? Hang out downstairs? I just… I need to be alone.” I directed this at my mother, too, who was only half there anyway. She barely heard me, I thought, but she nodded just the same. She was the one who answered first.

“Of course. I need to do the laundry. And I left the coffee pot on at home. I shouldn’t have left that on.” She was muttering more to herself than anything else as she got up and walked over to the sink to dump out her coffee. “I need to go home.”

An idea sprung into my head then, and it was sort of terrible. I felt bad for even going there, but it was a good idea. It would fix a lot of things for me,
and
keep my mother together as she struggled to deal with her secret.

Worm was getting ready to argue, probably to tell me that I should be with people right now, maybe even offer to call Emma, his girlfriend, over to hang out. But I wasn’t letting him get that out. I stood quickly and went over to him, dropping my voice to a whisper as I pointed towards my mother. “We can’t let her go home alone,” I told him with raised eyebrows. “She’s a total mess.” My phone buzzed. It was sitting on the table, recovered from the cabin where I’d dropped it last. I hadn’t even checked it, though I knew any missed calls or texts would have been from days ago, not today. It seemed tainted to me, just like everything else. I barely even glanced at it before returning my focus to Worm. “Please, my mother is
important
. She’s already been through so much…”

Worm looked over to where my mother stood at the sink. She’d already dumped out her mug of coffee and now she was just standing there with her hands gripping the sink, staring out the window at nothing at all.

He crumbled as soon as he saw her, just like I knew he would.

“Are you gonna be okay, though? I mean, Johnny said to make sure—”

I waved off his concern, though it was probably more valid than he knew, albeit for very different reasons. “I’ll be fine. You’ll only be gone for a little while, right? Just going to look out for my mom, make sure she gets in all right. Tuck her in, maybe?”

I made my eyes wider, pulling my eyebrows together, my best pleading expression. The last time I’d used it was on my father, begging him to give Johnny a chance, because that was a look he couldn’t resist.

And it seemed like neither could Worm.

“Okay,” he said nodding his head, along with some plan working through his mind. “Okay, yeah. I won’t be gone for long. You’re okay. And… and I’ll call Emma. She’ll come over and by the time I get back, you’ll both be fine. And she’s a woman, so it’ll be better.”

I was about to tell him that it wasn’t necessary, that Emma didn’t have to come over, but he’d already pulled out his phone and had dialed her number before I could even get my mouth open.

“Hey, honey? How are you? Yeah, listen, I need a favor…” He trailed off as he walked out of the room to finish the conversation.

I turned to my mother, feeling guilt spread through me as I realized just how badly this would affect her. Everyone else would survive. Johnny would miss me, but he’d move on. Everything would be okay. But mom? She’d already lost so much and, for a second, I wasn’t sure if I could do it. Could she survive losing yet another member of her family?

I didn’t know. What I did know was that I was running out of time and options. There would always be another fight. Another danger. There would always be another Stitches. That was part of this life. That was the real territory that motorcycle clubs—
gangs
, I thought,
call them what they are
—claimed as their own. If I ever truly wanted to get away, then I was going to have to do it by leaving all of this behind.

Maybe, if the circumstances had been different, I would try to convince her to leave with me, but I knew better. Mom had been a part of this life for longer than I could even understand. She’d loved my father, but she’d stayed also because this life was ingrained in her system now. His death was evidence enough of that.

There was no point in asking her; she wouldn’t say yes.

Biting my lip, I walked over to her. I put my arm across her shoulders and squeezed. “I love you, Mom,” I told her in a quiet voice. “I always have and I always will. No matter what, please, don’t forget that.”

She looked over to me, bleary eyed and managed to crack a smile at me. “I love you, too, baby. My beautiful girl.”

I opened my mouth to say more, but nothing else came out. She smiled at me sweetly, clarity finally shining again in her eyes, right alongside the tears.

“I know, baby. You’ve got to go,” she said quietly so that Worm wouldn’t hear us in the next room. “It’s okay. I want you to be happy and you were never the kind of girl that was going to be happy here. I’m sorry I didn’t get you out.”

Biting my lip, I shook my head, “No, Mom, it’s okay. It’s not your fault. I… Come with me?”

She laughed a little then, sort of how I expected, and shook her head. “No. I was made for this place and I need to be close to your father. Don’t you worry, baby. No one’s going to go after your momma anymore. Johnny’ll make sure of that.”

I nodded once. There was nothing else to say. I’d been prepared to leave her, because I had to, but hearing her choose to stay ate me up in unexpected ways. I nodded once more. Then Worm came back into the room and announced that Emma was on her way. She’d be there in maybe ten or fifteen minutes. Then he escorted my mom out, promising to get her home safely and come back as soon as he could. He told me that if anything happened, if I ran into trouble, to call him right away.

I promised I would.

I made sure they were gone before I grabbed my phone and headed upstairs. Glancing at the screen as I did, I saw that I’d received a new message from today. It was from Johnny.