Forcing a smile, I said, “Sure. That will be fine. As long as we’re not out too late. I have an eight o’clock class in the morning.” I held my tongue on the fact that I hated football with a fiery passion.
“Of course,” Preston replied.
“Okay. Sounds good.” As I rose from the booth, I once again caught the stranger’s gaze. Cocking his brow at me, he seemed to be issuing some sort of challenge. I cut my eyes away from his and looked at Preston. “Give me a few minutes. I’m going to run to the bathroom.”
“No problem.” He leaned in and bestowed a chaste kiss on my cheek before turning to follow the guys to the game room. With a sigh, I picked up my purse and started for the bathroom.
Just as I was passing the sexy stranger at the bar, his arm reached out and grabbed mine. “Excuse me?” I demanded as I slung his arm away.
“Don’t let that uptight prick ruin your evening. Sit down—have a beer with me. You deserve a night with a real man.”
The tug-of-war between politeness and temptation raged in my mind. “Thank you for the offer, but I don’t think so.”
“You know, I haven’t been able to take my eyes off you all night.”
My brows shot up, and with a teasing smile, I said, “You should work on your pick-up lines because that one is kinda creepy.”
He threw his head back and laughed. “Yeah, I guess it is.” His dark eyes twinkled. “You’re a ballbuster, aren’t you?”
I shrugged. “Maybe.”
“You know what, ballbuster?”
“What?”
“You’ve been checking me out just as much.” A wicked gleam burned in his dark eyes. “Since I’m not a gentleman, I would say you’ve been eye-fucking me all night.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “Oh, is that right?”
When he leaned in closer to me, his breath scorched my cheek. Almost involuntarily, my eyes closed at his proximity. I hated the feelings he was eliciting in me, but at the same time I wanted to savor them and explore them. “You want to know what it’s like to be with someone like me—a biker. A good girl like you wants to know if all the rumors are true.”
“You’re pretty sure of yourself.”
He grinned. “As sure as the wet panties you’re sporting right now.”
My eyes widened, and I stared at him. “No one has ever talked to me that way before.” Secretly, I loved the boldness of his filthy talk. It made me wonder what would come out of his mouth next.
“And you love it.” When I started to protest, he shook his head. “Come on and let me buy you a drink, ballbuster.”
Nibbling my lip, I stared at the entrance to the game room. Everything in me said this was a bad idea. That I should make my way back to Preston as soon as possible. But I had always taken the safe route, and I was sick of it.
“Don’t worry about him. He’s already so into the game he’s forgotten he had the finest piece of ass he’ll ever have sitting across from him.”
“Do you have a bike?”
His brows rose in surprise. “Hell yeah, I have a bike. A fucking Harley-Davidson Dyna Super Glide Sport.”
This was it. Now-or-never time. “Then take me for a ride.”
“You’re serious?”
I nodded. “I’ve never been on a motorcycle before.”
He laughed. “That doesn’t surprise me at all, babe.”
Thinking about Preston’s disregard for my feelings gave me fuel to keep going. “So will you take me home?”
“You’re not waiting on your boyfriend?”
“He isn’t my boyfriend. And no, I’m not.”
The guy rose from the barstool. “Then let’s get the hell out of here.”
“Wait—I don’t even know your name.”
“It’s Johnny.”
“And I’m Annabel.” As I fell in step behind him, I couldn’t help wondering whether this decision was a good one.
THREE
ANNABEL
My anxious feelings quickly disappeared. I’m not sure I had ever felt anything so freeing as being on the back of Johnny’s motorcycle. Any fear I’d had about riding on a bike faded. With the wind rippling through my hair and clothing, I closed my eyes and snuggled closer to Johnny.
In that moment, I enjoyed the freedom of the open road. I didn’t allow myself to worry what my parents would think about me being with some blue-collar stranger or how appalled they would be by my reckless behavior. Inwardly, I chuckled at what Preston’s face would look like when he realized I had ditched him. Would he even acknowledge he had been thoughtless? I wondered if he would buy some lame excuse that I’d had a friend take me home.
When the bike started to slow down, I raised my head from Johnny’s back. My brows furrowed in confusion as we pulled into the parking lot of a run-down motel. I had given him directions to my house, so I wasn’t sure what we were doing in this part of town. After Johnny eased up to the curb, he killed the engine and put the kickstand down.
I slipped off my helmet. “What are we doing here?”
Johnny glanced at me over his shoulder. “Thought we’d go inside and get to know each other a little better.”
Instantly, my stomach twisted into apprehensive knots. The reality of the repercussions of my decision crashed down on me. While I might have been extremely attracted to Johnny, I certainly wasn’t ready to sleep with him. Deep down, I should have known he would have expected more for taking me for a ride. “I really don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why not?” Johnny asked, his brows shooting up in surprise.
“Because I barely know you.”
“Then give me a chance to get to know you.”
I shook my head. “No, you don’t understand. You see, I don’t have sex with a guy I just met.”
Giving me his most seductive smile, Johnny countered, “Maybe I can change your mind.”
I swallowed the rising fear in my throat and willed myself not to panic. “Look, I’m sorry if I led you on, but you were just supposed to take me for a motorcycle ride and then take me home.” My eyes scanned the desolate parking lot, and more than anything, I wished that there were people around. “So I would really appreciate it if you would take me home now.”
Johnny’s dark eyes narrowed at me. “I’m afraid I can’t do that, darlin’.”
“W-Why not?” I asked as a chill ran down my spine.
At that moment, the door to the room in front of us swung open. Three hulking men loomed in the doorway. They all wore motorcycle cuts like Johnny’s. “Whatcha score tonight?” one guy with waist-length dark hair called.
I glanced from them back to Johnny. “What’s going on?” I questioned lamely. In the back of my mind, I had already come up with the frightening answer. More than anything, I knew I needed to get away from Johnny. I needed to get my phone and call 911.
“Sorry, darlin’. But you’re going to make me an awful lot of money.”
Without further thought, I scrambled off the motorcycle and started sprinting away from Johnny and his friends as fast as I could. Although I could barely run in my heels, my fear pushed me harder and harder. I’d almost reached the motel office when strong arms grabbed my waist. As I was jerked back against Johnny’s body, his breath burned in my ear. “Don’t you even think about running again, bitch!”
I opened my mouth to scream, but the bite of a needle pierced the skin on my neck, silencing me. The raging fight I’d had within me succumbed to the drugs pumping through my system. As my eyelids drooped, I felt my feet leave the pavement, and I began to float.
My body felt like a buoy bobbing along the ocean waves. One minute I was outside gazing up at the darkened sky and the next I was in a hotel room. As I was lowered down onto something hard, my eyelids fluttered, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t wake myself up.
Conversation floated above me. I began to feel like I was in a coma—that level of consciousness where you are aware of your surroundings, but you can do nothing about it.<
br />
“I did good tonight, right, boys?” Johnny asked. Just the sound of his voice now caused my skin to crawl. Gone was any attraction I had once felt for him. Instead, I loathed him for the monster he was—a true wolf in sheep’s clothing.
A hand gripped my jaw and roughly turned my head from side to side. “She’s a little older than the usual pick,” a different man said.
Johnny grunted. “Yeah, well, she was at Pacey’s like all the other girls. I don’t take the fucking time to ask if they’re eighteen. I go on looks and personality, and she’s the best looker I’ve picked in months.”
A cruel laugh came from my left side. “I’ll agree with you on that one. Mendoza’s gonna cream his pants when he sees her. Just his type. Probably keep her all for himself.”
“Then I suggest we take some now while we still have the chance,” I heard Johnny say.
In that moment, I floated outside of myself. Self-preservation? It felt as if I were standing on train tracks, staring down a charging locomotive. With one foot stuck in the tracks and the other scrambling to find freedom, I could do nothing but watch my impending demise.
Then rough hands were all over me—stripping me of my clothes, touching me in intimate places that brought stinging tears of humiliation to my eyes. Excruciating pain soon replaced the humiliation as I was physically torn and battered. There seemed to be no end—I was trapped in a strange alternate universe of degradation and assault.
And there, in a seedy hotel room while I was gang-raped repeatedly by four strange men, the old Annabel died in a nightmare she never could have fathomed. Her broken spirit slipped away while her ravaged body was forced to go on in a horrific world, alone and hopeless.
FOUR
REV
The van jolted and jostled us over the uneven terrain as we drove farther and farther into no-man’s-land. Glancing out the window, I took in the moonless night and our dark isolation from civilization.
It seemed unbelievable that less than forty-eight hours ago I had sat at a table in the Rising Phoenix and listened to the El Paso Raiders’ attack plan. While I had first been skeptical that they had the resources to take on a cartel lieutenant, they had quickly made me a believer. I had felt more than confident in tonight’s mission and was sure that soon Breakneck would be reunited with his daughter.
Now I threw a glance over my shoulder into the third row, where Breakneck sat next to Bishop. He had flown in yesterday to be a part of the rescue mission. At first, Ghost hadn’t wanted him to come along. “He’s too emotionally invested—it’ll fuck things up.” But Breakneck had gone toe-to-toe with him to veto any ideas about him staying back at the Raiders’ compound. In the end, I didn’t know what physical condition we were going to find Sarah in, so it made sense to have someone with medical training along.
Because we couldn’t just go storming into a cartel compound half-cocked, it had taken a full day of further research and planning before we felt ready to move. Thankfully, the El Paso Raiders had set the wheels in motion while Bishop and I were on the road. They also had a lot of allies who were willing to get us intel. The room in their roadhouse where they held church looked more like something out of a Pentagon war strategy session as we spent hours poring over maps, aerial images, and printouts from Google Earth.
What we had learned from the Raiders’ sources was that Mendoza ran a relatively small-time trafficking operation. He never housed more than five or six girls at a time before “unloading” them, as it was known. Because of the low numbers, he had fewer than ten men working for him at the compound. With our group of nine in the mission, we were pretty evenly matched.
The location of Mendoza’s slave camp was about fifty miles from any semblance of civilization. The gravel road we now found ourselves on seemed to stretch into a desert oblivion. Close on our tail were two other identical, black-paneled vans. One carried the remaining members of our mission, and the other was loaded down with enough explosives to take out the wired, steel-enforced gate at the front of Mendoza’s compound.
“Fuck, I wanna claw my skin off. I think I’m allergic to this fucking war paint!” Bishop exclaimed, breaking the tense silence. As a form of camouflage, each of us had slathered black shoe polish onto his face, neck, and arms.
Despite the tense mood, I chuckled. “Jesus, you’re as bad as when you had the chicken pox. Mama and Pop didn’t sleep for three days trying to make sure you didn’t scratch yourself to death.”
“Whatever,” Bishop grumbled.
When the van began slowing down, I sat up a little straighter. Chulo turned around in the passenger seat to face us. “Okay, guys, here is where we leave the vans for safekeeping. We’ll do the last half mile on foot. Then once the front gate is blown, the reserve vans will pull up to wait for us.”
With a nod of my head, I reached for the handle of the door. Once I slid it open, I dropped out onto the soft desert floor. Breakneck came next, with Bishop behind him. They were followed by Ranger and Nero, two of the El Paso Raiders who had been appointed to come with us based on their skills.
At six foot five and three hundred pounds, Ranger got his road name from his time with the Army Rangers. After two tours in Afghanistan, he came home to his MC brothers and worked out his extreme PTSD by beating the hell out of anyone who crossed the Raiders’ path. Like a true Army Ranger, he was our lead man into the compound.
Nero, a scrappy Italian originally from Jersey, had stepped forward to be our explosives expert. With his bottlecap-thick glasses, he looked more like a tech nerd than a tough biker. But any doubt I had in his abilities faded the first time he showed us a test run of one of his homemade bombs. I knew then he was truly an asset to have along.
“He stays with the vans,” Chulo said, pointing to Breakneck.
Even in the darkness, I could see Breakneck’s fists clenching at his sides. “I’m going to find my daughter.”
“You won’t be any help to her if you get your ass shot,” Chulo challenged.
I placed my hand on Breakneck’s shoulder. “It’s for the best if you stay here. If this goes bad, we’re all going to need you in one piece, not just Sarah.”
“Fuck,” Breakneck muttered under his breath. After a few tense seconds, he nodded and then slipped back into the van.
Once we checked our weapons and were ready, Chulo ordered, “All right. Let’s go.”
As I ran across the rugged desert terrain, it brought back memories of my one tour in Afghanistan. Just out of high school, I had signed on for a two-year term in the army. It was the shortest one I could do where I actually got out of town, but I would still not be gone long from the Raiders. It wasn’t so much a great sense of patriotism or that I felt I needed molding into a man as it was about getting money for school. Of course, in the end, I got only a two-year degree at the local technical college before Preacher Man was on me to step up and take more responsibility in the club.
As far as suffering from PTSD, the lifestyle I had known before I went into service had prepared me to deal with the horrors of war. That said, it didn’t mean I didn’t occasionally have a nightmare that brought me shouting up off the bed in a sweaty mess. In the end, the nightmares were just a few more to add to an ever-increasing pile. I was pretty sure any shrink who ever got a look inside my fucked-up head would make a run for it.
Just ahead of us was the row of tightly woven shrubbery that sat about twenty feet from the front gate. After seeing it on a map, Chulo had decided it would be our rendezvous point. Once we were all accounted for, Chulo radioed the weapons van. As I gripped my assault rifle tighter, I tried to still the erratic beating of my heart. Adrenaline had it pumping overtime. There was nothing left to do now but wait for the van to arrive and for the explosives to truly set our plan in motion.
When the van came into view, I drew in a sharp breath. Just as it got to the line of shrubbery, the driver’s side door was thrown open and one of the El Paso Raiders jumped out. The van’s gas pedal was rigged to keep acc
elerating. Just as it was about to hit the gate, gunfire broke out, riddling the hood with bullet holes. But it was all in vain. The moment it smashed into the steel, the van exploded in an orange ball of fire, taking out a section of the gate.
“Now!” Chulo shouted.
I sprang out from behind the shrubbery to get behind Ranger. With his gun cocked, he kicked down another part of the gate that was hanging precariously by one hinge. As it collapsed, he motioned us to follow him. The moment I entered Mendoza’s courtyard, I felt like I had been transported back into the service. Everything seemed executed with military precision.
Immediately gunfire rained down on us. Crouching, we returned fire until we took out the two targets and the only sound in the compound was the bellowing alarm.
“Go on. I’ll cover you guys,” Ranger said.
“Rev, you, Nero, and Snake take the house,” Chulo ordered.
“Okay.”
“We’ll take the back bunker,” Chulo said, nodding at Bishop and two others.
With Nero and Snake at my side, we hurried across the courtyard. When we got to the veranda, gunshots went off behind us. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw Ranger taking out three men who were rushing toward him. I had no idea how, with those odds, the fucker managed not to get hit.
Using brute force, Snake kicked in the front door while Nero and I covered him. When we met no opposition, we headed into the foyer. With its marble floors, crystal chandeliers, and expensive art, it was evident what drug money could buy, and Mendoza certainly enjoyed the finer things in life. Nero cleared his throat, then said, “Okay, how about I make a sweep of the front. Rev, you take the hallway and bedrooms, and Snake, you take the middle.”
“Sounds good,” I replied.
I advanced out of the foyer and past the living room. When I started down the hallway and came around the corner, a hail of gunfire met me. I ducked into an open bedroom. In the darkness, I took a knife out of my belt. Pressing myself against the wall, I listened to the sound of boots clomping down the hallway. As the gunman entered the doorway, I plunged the knife into his chest. The hit momentarily disabled him. Grabbing him by the shoulders, I shoved him against the wall and wrestled away control of his weapon.