Defying Destiny (Forsaken Sinners MC Series Book 3) (18 page)

The sound of the wood hitting him hard in the head echoes in my ears. His head snaps to the side and blood starts to pour out of his nose, mouth, and a large gash where a sharp piece of the wood cut through his cheek.

“
Fuck
!” he roars, but it’s garbled from the blood in his mouth and the pain he must be feeling.

I’m able to get to my feet, but from hitting the table and grappling on the ground, my sense of direction got messed up, so instead of heading the other way toward what I hoped was a door, I’m now heading toward the other hallway.

Too scared to turn around for fear that he’ll catch me again, I continue making my way down the hall, looking for another weapon I can use against him or a side door.

I make it to the end of the hall and realize this was a dead end. The only thing back here is a bathroom. There are no other doors and nothing I can use against him. I’m trapped,
again
, in a bathroom.

Before I can turn around to see if Titus has recovered yet, he rams into my back. The momentum from the push causes me to fall into the bathroom, the sink catching my hip. “
Ah
!” I scream, the pain almost making me vomit.

My body is hunched over from the intensity of the pain. “You’re going to fucking pay for that, bitch!” Titus growls from behind me, then grabs a handful of my hair, forcing my head back at an unnatural angle.

I don’t have time to think or worry about what he’s going to do to me now that he has me in his grasp again. It happens too fast and the next thing I know my head is being slammed into the mirror.

Glass rips through my forehead and wet, sticky warmth gushes into my eyes. I cry out and feel myself getting lightheaded. It’s all become too much on my already broken and bruised body.

But he’s not done yet. Hand still in my hair, he pulls me back.

Trying one last time to get away, I force myself forward, not even caring if I tear all of my hair out in the process.

I don’t even loosen his hold a little, but he lets go on his own accord. I just wish it was because he was done with me. I’m not that lucky though. Grabbing me around my waist once more, he hurls me to the side, making me crash through the shower door.

Falling into a crumpled mess on the shower floor, shards of the tempered glass fall all around me. I feel cuts on my arms and side from when I went through the door, but as the bigger pieces fall down around me, one lodges itself into my leg, causing a bloodcurdling scream to rip out of my throat.

The last thing I hear is Titus laughing, then the smell of all my blood pooling around me fills my nose and the pain is too much to bear.

I send a silent prayer up to my brother to take the pain away. I pray that I’m dying so I don’t have to open my eyes again to see the monster that took me away from the only family I had left.

I pray for death.

Chapter 17

Louie

It’s been thirteen hours since Harlow was taken and they’ve been the longest hours of my life. It feels like an eternity since I last saw her and I hate that it wasn’t seeing her happy, smiling.

I was such a prick to her, thinking she was fucking someone else. I’ve had enough time to think about it and know I was wrong.
So wrong
. She’d never do that. It doesn’t matter if we are officially together or not, she wouldn’t do that to me; to anyone. Harlow is so innocent and good, down to her very core, that it would hurt her more than it would hurt someone else to betray them like that. No, she’s not like that. She wouldn’t hurt anyone.

Me, on the other hand. I’ve fallen so far from where I need to be. I’ve never really been nice, but I’d like to think that if my life had been different—if I didn’t grow up in a such a shitty town with shitty people—I would have been different. Or maybe that’s just wishful thinking in a time as horrific as this.

But then again, if my father hadn’t been murdered and we left like we were planning to, I
could have
been different. I could have been a good man, a man that deserves a woman like Harlow.

She’s been through so much. First, not having any time with her real parents before they were ripped away from her. Growing up in the foster system, never knowing if the next home would be better or worse, and always wondering if there was something better out there. And then her brother taking his own life and finding out
why
he did it; what he went through and what he sacrificed to protect her.

Harlow deserves to be happy and get everything she ever wants out of this life. Right here, right now, I vow to give her just that. If she wants the world, I’ll deliver it to her on a silver fucking platter. If she wants me gone and to never speak to her again, I’ll leave. It would gut me to leave not only her, but also Mack and the club, but I would do it for her. I’d pack everything up and never look back. I’d spend the rest of my life regretting everything I did to hurt her and pray that one day, she’d forgive me.

And if she wants me, I’ll make sure that I’m the best man I can be for her. I’ll never take anything for granted, especially my time with her. I’ll tell her how I feel about her, how much I love her and need her in my life, and that I want her to be my girl.
Officially.

Now that I realize what she means to me, I’ll do everything in my power to make sure she feels loved and protected.

Mack interrupts my thoughts by coming up to me at the bar. I’ve been sitting here for the past hour, just staring at the wall. I have a bottle of beer in front of me, but I haven’t taken one drink. I want so badly to drown out the pain with alcohol, but worry that if I do and we find her, I won’t be able to do what needs to be done.

“I think you should get some sleep. We still haven’t found anything, but when we do—and I promise you, we will—you’re going to need your strength,” he says with authority, but also compassion.

It saddens me to think back to all the years I’ve had with Mack and I never really appreciated any of them. He’s always been there for me and I took it for all for granted. That’s another thing I’m going to have to change when this is all said and done. I can only hope it’s not too late.

“I don’t think I could even if I wanted to,” I say. Every time I close my eyes, I picture Harlow somewhere scared and alone, crying out to me. But when I try to reach out to her, it’s like she’s always just out of reach.

Taking a seat beside me, he opens a beer I didn’t even see him grab and sets it in front of him. He doesn’t take a drink, just has it sitting there as if it comforts him somehow to know it’s there. Kind of like me, I guess.

“She’ll be all right, ya know. Whatever hell she’s going through, she’ll be okay.” He tries to reassure me, but it’s not doing any good. The situation feels hopeless.
I
feel hopeless.

“When my dad died, I was devastated and enraged. I thought the world wronged me by allowing him to be taken away from me. I wanted the man that killed him to pay, but I wanted the whole world to pay too. But this…what’s happening
right now
…it’s different,” I say, trying to explain to him what I’m feeling, hoping that he’ll know how to fix it. You know that feeling you get when you’re young and hurt, you tell your dad what’s going on and he somehow magically can make it better.
That’s
what I’m hoping for right now.

“Even before Harlow left two years ago, she meant the world to me. I just didn’t realize it then. I mean, I knew she was a good friend and I cared immensely about her. Then while she was gone, I felt the same way I did when my father died; like I had been wronged. I was angry at the world, at myself, and at her for leaving me willingly. I hated her in a way for the longest time. But then she came back. And yeah, she was different, but it was in a raw way that I could relate to. She’d lost the only person she could count on, and I wanted to be the one to help her through it.”

Finally turning to look at him, I finish. “And I think I did. I helped her through her anger and helped her heal. Like you did for me. She’ll never be the same, but that’s okay. I realized yesterday that I love her, Mack. I probably have from the very beginning, but it just hit me like a ton of bricks landed on my chest. And now she’s gone. I don’t even want to think about what she’s going through. If something happens to her and I lose her, I don’t think I’ll survive. I never thought I’d feel anything like I felt when my dad died, but I do, except it’s worse. I can’t lose her, Mack.”

We sit there in silence for a few moments, each digesting what I said. When he does finally speak, his voice is clogged with emotion. “I understand what you’re feeling, son. I may not love a woman the way you love Harlow, Toby loves Sara, or Blaze loves Dani, but I get it. I do. And I promise you that you will never have to find out if you could survive without her because you won’t have to. We
will
find her and we
will
get her back. And do you want to know how I know that?” he asks, though I’m not sure if he actually wants an answer, so I just shake my head. “I know that because after everything you both have been through, you both deserve to be happy. You both deserve a long life filled with love. So we will find her, Louie. She’ll be all right.”

Both of us stare at each other for a few seconds before turning back around to face the bar and our untouched beers, each in our own heads.

I love Mack for what he said, I just pray that he’s right.

“Now if you won’t sleep, what do ya say we head out to check in personally with Blaze and Toby? They’re watching the Kings and it’ll give us something to do while we wait on news about Harlow.”

Nodding, I get up and head outside. Straddling my bike, I wait for Mack to pull out first before following him.

I really hope Blaze and Toby have some news for us because I feel the monster gnawing at my insides, just begging to come out. But I don’t want to let him because Mack was right, I need to feel all these emotions to be any use to Harlow.

***

Twenty minutes later, Mack and I are pulling up next to Blaze and Toby’s bikes. They parked about three blocks away from where they are keeping watch so no one would know we are here.

Toby and Blaze are holed up in a house right across the street for the Kings’ compound. We actually paid for the owners to go on a much needed vacation, which they were all too happy to take. Turns out the Kings don’t make the best neighbors.
Go figure.

Opening the door, we make our way upstairs. Toby is sitting at a card table they must have brought in looking at something on a computer and Blaze is sitting at the window with binoculars. “Hey, brother. So what type of set-up we got going on here and do we have anything new?” I ask Blaze.

Mack takes a seat by Toby, leaning over to check out what he’s doing on the computer.

“Well, nothing has been going on here, that’s for sure. No one in or out in the past hour and a half. The place is dead. On the bright side to that though, I was able to sneak in the back and put a surveillance camera out there. If anything happens back there, we now have eyes on it.”

Nodding, I look over to Toby. “Jax is in the process of setting up the rest of the security cameras at the other locations were we have a blind spot. This way, nothing will get past us. The last one should be up soon.” Liking what they did and where their head is on this, I relax a little. They’ve got my back and in turn, they have my girls back.

I guess you could say I was a little worried how they’d react to this after what went down with Sara a few years ago and how it almost tore us all apart. And even though their women aren’t in danger this time, I worried how they’d feel about going no holds barred looking for Harlow. I mean, let’s face it, she’s probably not the most liked girl even though she has gotten better since she’s been back. But she was downright rude when she first got here and I know Toby and Blaze were both itching to give her a piece of their minds.

“Good. That’s good,” I say.

“Have you heard back from the other brothers? Any noise or movement on their ends?” Blaze asks without even looking at us. He’s still looking out the window, always watching. But he’s damn good at it.

“Only person who I’ve heard from is Slayer. He’s got his ears to the ground, but there’s been nothing. Louie, why don’t you make a call to Tom Tom, see if there’s anything he’s got for us,” Mack says, then turns back toward the computer.

Standing up, I dig my phone out of my pocket and hit speed dial for Tom Tom. “Hey, brother.” He answers on the second ring.

“Hey, man. We’re with Blaze and Toby. They’ve got a nice set-up here with security cameras, so anything happens behind their line of sight, we’ll still be able to see. Jax is finishing setting up the cameras at the rest of the locations.” I fill him in on the comings and goings on my end before asking him, “Anything new on your end?”

“Nah, man. It’s like these pieces of shit know we’re watching. There is zero movement and everything is radio silent. I was even able to get in touch with one of their suppliers who owed me a favor. He tried calling them in, was going to say there was a problem with one of their shipments, but they ain’t budging. Didn’t even answer, man. Something is definitely going down.”

I don’t like the sound of that. You don’t just
not
answer a call from your supplier, so what the fuck is going on? If it doesn’t have anything to do with Harlow, it has something to do with us, that I know for sure. We’re the only club within an hundred miles radius.

“All right, brother. Keep us posted,” I say before ending the call.

“Tom Tom has nothing. Said there’s no movement anywhere and they couldn’t even lure them out by using one of their suppliers.” I fill the guys in, maybe they’ll have some insight to what the fuck is going on.

Everyone is quiet for a moment, taking in the new information and trying to come up with a good reason the Kings have gone dark.

It doesn’t make sense, even if they did have Harlow. You’d think that they’d try to keep up some sort of ruse. They’d know we’d be looking and they know that we are aware of them. Sure, they don’t know how closely we’ve been keeping an eye out, but they’re the only MC close by. And they would have always been our first lead whether there was reason to suspect them or not. That’s mainly why we are here now. We don’t have a solid lead but they are technically a rival.

“I wish there was a way we could get a bug in inside. If we knew there was no one there, we could sneak in and plant it. Then we’d be able to have ears on the inside instead of just eyes on the outside.” Blaze is the first to speak up.

I look at Mack because even though I think it’s a great idea and would say we should risk it, anything to get more information on what they are up to, he’s the only one that can make that call.

“Do we know if there is anyone inside?” he asks.

“No. We can’t be one hundred percent sure, but by the looks of it and based on what I heard when I set up the security camera, I would bet they aren’t there.” Blaze answers.

Mack looks to Toby. “What do you think?” Even though Blaze is the one that has experience in surveillance, Toby would be the best person to send for the bug. He knows how to set them up because he’s trained with Blaze, but also because he’d be the best guy if a problem arose once he was inside or if we are wrong and there are members within those walls. Blaze was always behind the scenes with security while Toby was front line in the Marines
and
a fighter in the cage.

Looking to Blaze, he asks, “Do we have mics? That way we can communicate. I’ll be your eyes and ears on the inside and you’ll be my eyes out here.” See, they’d make a great team for this. I just wish there was something I could do to help with this, but it’s probably best for me to stay where I am.

“Yeah, man. I’ve got ’em. I can have you wired in two minutes, then we can get this done,” Blaze answers, then we all look to Mack for approval.