Game Changer (Hell's Saints Motorcycle Club) (3 page)

It took me the better part of the night to get Claire settled into the hospital and to arrange for a subsequent bed in rehab. We had to file a (falsified) police report and I was exhausted from the fear, and the lies, and the worry.

To say I thought a lot about that night would be a lie. To say I thought of nothing else would be much closer to the truth. I jumped at every sound and locked every window despite the heat of the evenings. I jammed a chair against the bathroom door while I bathed and against the bedroom door when I slept. I fretted and worried constantly. I had a permanent headache and my eyes hurt. I wanted this to be over. I had no idea what had happened to Jamie and I didn’t want to know. If my head was clear, I might have worried about him coming after us. But my head was full of other really, really bad things.

About a year ago I had moved in with Gino Abbiati. He managed a club next to the hospital that served cheap drinks and pub food. Best of all, the staff never made you feel rushed or complained when a study group of ten took up a table for a few hours during the busy time. Appreciating this, we always ordered the cheapest thing on the menu to be able to tip big for the privilege of sitting there.

Gino was beautiful, charming and persuasive. He smiled, flirted and asked me out every single time I was in the place. He never charged me for my drinks and on the odd occasion I ordered a burger he would pick up the tab for that too. He was genuinely interested in everything I had to say and took every opportunity to converse with me. I held him off for a while but not long enough to really get to know him.

He showed up for our first date with the biggest bouquet of flowers I had ever seen. Since no one had ever given me flowers, it could have been one rose and it would have had the same effect. He showered me with just enough and just the right kind of attention. He took me out when he sensed I needed that release and when the class work became overwhelming, he sat up with me all night and tested me on my flashcards. One time when I complained that my hand was cramped from taking such copious notes, he showed up with a little handheld tape recorder so I could record my lessons. No one had ever done anything like that for me. No one had ever treated me that well. No one had ever paid enough attention to my life to know about the things that would make it easier. He not only paid attention, he made an effort towards the making it easier.

I fell hard and he wanted me to move in immediately. He hounded me about it day and night until finally six months into it I agreed. The agreement was that I would stay at his place but still keep gram’s house. He had wanted me to put the house on the market or rent it out but that was where I drew a hard line. He didn’t even attempt to cross it and we lived happily ever after for another six months. The sex was great and we actually had fun together when he wasn’t drinking. He had a nasty streak that came out when he drank, but he had never hit me. I had been dealing with drunks in one way or another most of my life, so while I wasn’t okay with the nasty drunk side of Gino, I could put up with it.

I put up with it right until I caught him in our bed with our sixteen year old neighbor. When she saw me, she ran out screaming and disgusted I turned to walk out the door. In my mind, it looked to me like she was happy to be escaping and not just from me. But Gino wasn’t happy, as a matter of fact, he was so enraged that he came charging at me. The first punch he landed broke my nose. Then he took payment from me for the sex I guess he thought he was missing.

I always knew I had to go back and get that money. I knew it would be safe there, Gino never went into the second bay of the two car garage. But the thought of what he did to me made me sick and honestly, I was afraid of him. Really, really afraid. He had raped me while I was barely conscious and my nose was gushing blood. That made him an animal in my mind, all the good forgotten.

I had made some mistakes in judgment in my life
but I wasn’t that girl.
And I was never ever going to be that girl. The one who forgot and forgave when a man beat her and raped her, that girl was not me. The only way I had escaped from him was because he was so strung out he passed out right after. I had no thoughts of giving him another chance at hurting me again. A drunk Gino was annoying, a jacked up Gino could be deadly. I wished with all my heart I didn’t have to go get that money, but I did and it loomed over me like a big black doomsday cloud.

Waiting around the house until the time rolled around was just too much. I jumped at every noise. I paced, and I couldn’t eat or sleep. I decided to see what I could do about getting to that money sooner. I sat outside his house in different spots at different times for the next two days. Finally, I saw Gino and his Lexus leave with a pretty flaxen haired blonde riding shotgun.

Now or never.

I slipped around to the back yard and carefully turned the door to the garage. It gave way immediately. I saw a newly installed alarm system to my right and figured it was to the main house. Who would alarm a garage? But I hurried any way.

The cardboard box I had hidden the money in was at the very top of the shelf and I grabbed a ladder to retrieve it. I had it!! I hurried down the ladder and was heading towards the out when the automatic garage door came flying open! Gino was standing in the driveway with the Lexus still running behind him. I looked quickly at the alarm and the sequencing of lights was going crazy. I must have set it off. I was shaking so hard at seeing him, I almost wet myself.

He was standing in front of me shouting. His fists were balled and the next thing I knew he was straddling me alternately choking and hitting me. I put up my hands to block my face right after I felt the left side of it split with the force of his fist. He had my head firmly in his hands and was getting ready to smash the back of my skull in. I fought and screamed like a wild cat, then I heard a gunshot and felt plaster raining on my face.

“GET OFF HER NOW, YOU WOMAN BEATING SONOFABITCH”

Gino let go of my skull long enough to turn around and scream at the pissed off blonde.

“Shut up cunt, or you’ll be next!”

I felt Gino slump on me then. I pushed him off and looked up to see the blonde heaving with the exertion that came from clocking Gino with the butt of the gun. That coming after shooting the hell out of the ceiling.

She extended her hand, pulled me up and said, “Sugar, the guy’s a bastard. Now get your sweet ass out of here and never come back.

Gino started moaning. The blonde and I looked at each other and ran like hell.

I wasn’t sure I could make it home. My head was pounding and my cheek felt slick with blood. I wondered if I would need stitches on my face. I was sick with the knowledge that Gino would come after me now and vaguely wondered if I needed to worry about Jamie as well.

My hands were trembling so hard I could barely drive. I decided to pull into the back of my house and go through the cellar as a precaution. My eyes welled up with tears. I wasn’t a crier. Self-indulgent tears had been one of the luxuries I wouldn’t allow myself. I had learned to keep my feelings bottled up until the emotion passed. The few times I had allowed myself tears, I had cried for so long and hard that I couldn’t stop for hours. Opening those flood guides was a bad idea for me. But it had been a really, really shitty few days.

I fumbled with the keys as I felt huge drops of water begin to form in the corner of my eyes and run freely down my cheeks. I looked down as the tears began to drop on my white tank and wondered briefly why they were pink. How much was I bleeding? My mouth was starting to swell and I had been tasting blood all the way home. I took the edge of my shirt and spit blood into it on my way to the bathroom. This was not good.

I looked into the mirror. My blue eyes were so dark they looked purple. The side of my face was beginning to swell. Still sobbing, I washed my face carefully and threw the white tee shirt in the hamper along with my dirty blood stained jeans. Then I thought again and threw them out into the trash. I wanted no reminders of this night. I picked up the cardboard box that had nearly cost me my life and painfully made my way up the stairs.

It was a full moon and I jumped at every long shadow cast by my familiar worn out furniture. Still hesitant to turn on any lights, I made my way hiccupping with newly shed tears towards the back of the house and into the kitchen. I needed a shot of booze for my nerves and a bag of ice for my face. Mostly, I needed to get a damn hold of myself and stop crying. But I just couldn’t seem to manage it.

Carrying the box towards the table, I stopped when I saw him.

The stuff of nightmares.

There was someone very big and scary shadowed against the outline of my kitchen cabinet. He saw me at the same time I saw him. The badass biker who wanted my thirty grand or me dead and he was two days early. I let out a shriek! He moved fast but I was faster. I turned and ran down the hallway knocking down chairs in his path as I went. I heard him swear loudly right behind me as one came crashing down in front of him. I felt something swipe at me and miss and for a moment I was glad I didn’t haven’t much on. It meant that he couldn’t grab my shirt to pull me back. I was almost at the door when he got me.

With steel arms around me, he pulled me tight against him. I went crazy. I bucked and kicked and bit and scratched. He just held on tighter avoiding my kicks and blows. I knew I wasn’t doing much damage. I had managed, however, to push my bra up to around my neck with all that fighting and I felt his hands move to my breast squeezing.

This struck a terror of a different kind in me and I suddenly went still. My back against a solid wall of muscle and my breasts being firmly kneaded by a big warm hand. I moved my hands to cover his and attempted to pry them off. When I felt each one tweak a nipple, I felt a rush of wet go straight through to my panties and I was so ashamed I wanted to die.

“Please.” I whispered.

“Please what baby?” he whispered against my hair still holding on to me.

“Please let me go.”

“Please let me go,
Diego
.” He said against my hair.

“Diego?”

“Yeah, baby. Diego.”

“Please, Diego. Let me go.”

Suddenly I felt my lace bra fall back onto my bruised breasts and he turned me around to look at me. His face went from mild amusement to instant shock. He took in my whole face and put two big hands on the side of my head. He tilted my face to the light and I heard his sharp intake of breath.

“WHO?” He roared and it felt like an accusation.

I jerked my face out of his big hands and looked into his black eyes.

That was a good question, I thought to myself. Who really had done this to me?

The answer made me sad and I smiled slightly at the irony. I looked him straight in the eye and said,
“
I did this to myself.”

Then I walked straight past him to get the money.

I needed to get some clothes on, but I mostly just needed this day to be over. I decided to forgo the extra two seconds it might have taken me to go and throw on a pair of sweats. Plainly speaking, I just didn’t give a shit. Besides the bastard had already seen everything I was showing anyway. I stood with my back towards him as I unlocked the metal box containing the envelope that held the money. My outstretched arm was shaking so much that I thought the cash was going to jump right out of the envelope onto the floor. But it didn’t.

Diego was standing against the door jamb with his arms crossed against his massive chest staring at my face. He didn’t make a move towards the money so I jabbed at him again with the envelope. My head was throbbing, I was bone tired and on the verge of tears again. I wanted him to take the damn money and leave. I really didn’t want to vomit in front of this man but it was dangerously close to happening.

I headed towards him, all bloody and bruised. I was wearing nothing but blood stained pink lace and my hair was partly matted with blood and draped around me like a weird cape. My headache was making me woozy, which made it impossible to walk a straight line. Waves of nausea kept swirling around me and I fought with everything I had to maintain some sort of dignity.

I was the undead.

He watched me carefully as I approached him. As he unfolded his arms, he let them rest casually on his hips, his eyes never leaving my face. Avoiding his gaze, I reached down and grabbed his hand. He gave it up willingly. I pressed the envelope deep within his big paw, looked right into his eyes and said,

“This is finished.”

With as much dignity as I could muster I wobbled past him, down the hallway and into my bedroom. I twisted the knob till I heard the cheap lock give a satisfied “click” and sat down on the edge of my bed to take stock. I trusted that having gotten what he came for, and two fucking days early to boot, Diego could find his own way out. I forced myself to relax, summoned what was left of my courage and gently began to examine my face. With infinite gentleness, I pushed determinedly past the tenderness searching for fractures on my cheeks, jaw and nose. Thankfully, I found none. Thank goodness for one mean ass, quick thinking sistah, I wasn’t sporting a split skull.

Because of the extreme nausea, I went through a quick check list in my mind. I wasn’t disoriented, definitely had no memory loss, hadn’t lost consciousness and my speech was fine. I hadn’t eaten since supper last night and supposed that was where the nausea was coming from. I tore off my underwear, pulled on a pair pajama shorts and a tank top. Then I started to crawl into bed. That’s when the first wave of nausea hit me fill force and I ran to the bathroom and proceeded to dry heave my way into what I hoped would be oblivion.

Diego pulled himself away from the wall and watched Raine make her way to the bedroom. The envelope of cash still in his hand.
Friday,
he thought,
she was supposed to go get this on Friday. What the fuck had happened?
He had worked this to keep her safe and it fucking all blows up.

Twenty minutes after the cops left in disgust with Jamie refusing to go to the hospital or file any charges, Gunner was back and he had brought a few brothers with him. All it took was seeing them to make Jamie give it all up. And the “all” was the mother lode.

There had been about five hundred grand in cash, four nines, a good amount of uncut coke and a shit load of H hidden in that shit hole. As to who he fucked over to acquire that tit stock, Jamie sang that tune like a sweet canary. That took about fifteen minutes to put together. The rest of the hour was spent teaching Jamie exactly what it meant to hold out and then spit in the face of the Hell’s Saints. No one bothered to check if he was still breathing when they left. But it was doubtful.

Given the amount of cash, guns and drugs, it took a couple of days to sort out shit and find out exactly who else Jamie was dealing with. Diego had come up from another charter to see what the hell was going on. A lot of it came from their territory. Not the drugs, that was the Los Rojos smack, but the money the Saints definitely had a part in.

Today at church they had discussed Raine and Claire. Not sure how deeply they were involved in this whole shit storm, Diego had Gunner put out some feelers. When he reported out, the general consensus was that Claire wasn’t a bag bitch, but just another stupid little piece that got caught up with the wrong guy.

They knew from their people that Raine had driven Claire to the hospital right after she had taken her from the junkie’s shit hole. They knew about the bogus police report and that Claire was in rehab. They knew that Raine lived in a shitty little shanty on the outside of town that had belonged to her grandmother and that there was no extra floating around. They knew where she shopped for groceries and that her car was 13 years old. They knew she was a pediatric nursing student who had just finished up with honors. They knew she didn’t fuck with the drugs she had legal access to. They knew she was clean.

The vote was taken and the shit with Claire and her junkie boyfriend was considered a settled issue. The only thing that remained was to let Raine know and when Diego said he would “take care of that” the members of the Hell’s Saints smirked thinking they knew exactly what that meant.

On his part, Diego couldn’t get Raine out of his mind. He got hard every time he thought of her. Really unbelievably gorgeous, she was that. Every guy in that fucking kitchen held his breath when they saw her. Brave too. Christ, just walking into that room took some guts. Then as cool as anything, she had put herself between her sister and a loaded gun. Tight little body, when he held her against him. Plenty of long dark hair, smooth tanned skin, and deep blue eyes. Her little sister not bad either, as Gunner pointed out several times. He had called them exotic little pieces and Diego had to agree.

There was some other information that Diego had gone after but that was personal. He had paid a lot for the file and it had Gino Abiatti’s name on it. As soon as Jamie let it out that the piece of shit holding Raine’s money had beaten and raped her, Abiatti was a dead man. Knowing that Friday night, Raine was going to be putting herself in the path of this psycho, Diego had put a plan in place to have him taken care of him before that could happen. But Raine going there early, for whatever reason, had fucked up his plan. And Gino had hurt her again. Abiatti had a lot to look forward to, because Diego was gonna make sure he spent a whole lot of fucking time dying.

He picked up his cell thinking, better late than never.