Savage: Iron Dragons MC (48 page)

“Time’s up, lovers!” Abe screams over the sounds of Sierra shouting and then gagging. “But that was really, truly precious. I never knew you were such a softie, Tank. This whole thing is going to be so much easier than I even thought. Nothing like a little sap in love to make revenge so much sweeter.”

“I swear to God that if you touch her, you will pay.” My words are harsh, cold, stinging. I was back to old Tank, but Tank with a purpose. Abe had no idea what he had just unleashed in me.

“Two in the morning, Tank. I’ll see you then at the Faben’s Rest Stop. I’ll be waiting for you. So will she.” He laughs once more as it fades in the distance. Then, there’s a click and the phone goes blank. I throw the phone across the room, listening to it slide across the wooden plank floors with a loud clamor.

Outside, Guzman’s men and Rafael wait around their bikes, checking their watches and phones, while inside, I slump to the floor of the bathroom, unable to make a plan. The only sound in my mind was that of Sierra’s screams and sobs as Abe and his goons beat her.

Chapter 24: Caught

During the first hour, I screamed. I screamed so loud and so long that I thought my lungs would burst or my head would explode. I screamed so much that the person next to me yanked down my hood for just a second—enough time to stick a dirty black sock into my mouth. And even with me choking back the smell, the sweat, the cloth pressing up against the roof of my mouth, I still managed to scream.

But I got what I wanted. In that second, I got a glimpse of what was happening around me. It wasn’t much information, really. However, just knowing a few simple things gave me hope. I was sitting in a van, a gunner van—the vehicle that stashed all the guns and armory for a motorcycle gang. And in my brief bit of visual freedom, I spotted at least four, long, black and brown, cut off shotguns near the left side of my head. On the right were knives and machetes, enough to make any man shake.

The man who pulled my hood down was unfamiliar to me. He was bald with a long gray beard that touched his bare chest. He wore only a leather vest with the Aztec seal on it. This man was just about as old as my father, and I couldn’t help but wonder if he knew him when he was an Aztec, or if he had joined under Abe’s regime.

Abe sat in front of us in the front passenger seat, and I listened to him yell shortly at the man next to me to shut me up. He seemed more agitated than ever. The Abe I knew was cool, calm, and collected. He was never fazed when I rejected him over and over again. And he didn’t bat an eyelash when I brought other boys I was interested in to the neighborhood to meet my family. He would just brush them off as if they didn’t matter in the long run.

I had a sinking suspicion that this was how he had planned on it going down all along. My stomach ached, and my head felt like a balloon as every bit of me longed to escape the shell of a body being transported towards Abe’s future plans. I screamed even louder in hopes he’d just drop me off at the side of the road.  

A rusty, brown-gray cage separated Abe and the driver from me. The rest of the van ride, I would listen to it rattle as the road became hillier and uneven. We were off the highway, that was for sure. And based on the minutes I counted in my head and the turns I tried to map out like a human GPS, I guessed we were somewhere near the border on the east side—close enough for Abe to run to safety but far enough to be away from Tank’s territory.

After about an hour, I felt myself nodding off. The adrenaline that had kept me kicking and screaming had worn off, and the weight of the predicament that I was in settled in heavy on my shoulders and eyes. Another part of me thought that if I just let my eyes fade for one second, I would wake up back in bed with a crick in my neck from sleeping on Tank’s wide and muscular shoulders.

My head grew heavy, as I found myself drifting. Each time, I would force myself alert, begging myself to pay attention for just a few seconds longer to the changes in the road, the men’s voices, the lights that occasionally filtered their way through the sack over my eyes. If I could use the hands tied up with wire, I would have slapped myself, but all I could do was pinch the skin of the other palm in the hope that it would do the trick.

Another twenty minutes or so passed before the car fully stopped. Abe or the driver turned off the music, and the car went dark. I tried to scream again, hoping that we were making a run somewhere where a person outside the Aztecs could hear me. But my hope dropped when I felt two different hands lift me up from under my arms and carry me out into the cold, dark night. One of the men knocked my hood back, enough for me to catch the red gravel dragging along by my heels, the little leaf ash brush that stuck to the hem of my short black dress, and the hands of a man with a tattoo unlike any I had seen before.

A door opened, and I was carried into a room with cherry wood floors and a bright yellow welcome mat. We passed a room, probably a bedroom, with pale gray carpeting and what I thought was a baby toy lying discarded near an entryway. The men around my arms followed a man’s voice giving orders to them on which way to the main bedroom. This wasn’t their usual digs, apparently.

We passed through a double door and into another carpeted room. It smelled vaguely like flowers and cleaning supplies—a woman’s touch. The men placed me upright on the high bed, and someone appeared behind me and used a knife or a pair of scissors to cut the wire holding my hands together.  As soon as they were free, I fell backwards into a heap on the soft white linens of the bed. The man who cut my ties pulled the hood off of my head and yanked the sock stuck in my mouth.

“Abe wants ya to stay here, lady. Don’t make a sound or this goes back in.” The man’s thick, Spanish accent threw me. Most of the guys in this area speak Spanish or are from Mexico, but his accent sounded like he’s just arrived in the States. The hair on my arms stood in alert, as he stared at me, waiting for my answer. I managed to nod and gulp before sitting myself up again.

He slipped out the door moments later, a finger to his mouth warning me not to make a noise. The door locks quickly, and I’m left alone in a lavish bedroom to wait for my fate.

Two hours or so pass, and the room is completely dark outside of a small crack of light that peeked in through the closed, velvety red curtains. It feels so much later than it actually is. It’s as if time has completely stood still for me, and I’m meant to live each and every moment with the hands of the clock.  To make matters worse, I can’t make myself move from my place in the bed in case I’m heard or it trips some alarm system. While Abe has been a relative gentleman to me, I’m not going to push my luck.

That is, until I hear his voice just on the other side of my door. It booms unselfconsciously, “Did you call up Guz? What did he say?”

“Yeah man. We called. The game’s on. Everything’s set. We just need to get Tank to the rest stop at two and he’ll be waiting for us.”

As soon as I hear Tank’s name, I jump off the bed without a second thought and race towards the door. My ear and head press up against the ornate double doors for a better listen.

“He’s not going to come easily, boss. You’re gonna have to use that girl.”

My heart sinks. I’m “that girl.” I’m
that
girl! What is he going to use me for? A million unanswered questions go through my head. But Abe seems to be on top of it. “Don’t worry about her. I’ve got plans. In fact, I think it’s about time…”

There was a click by my hand, as I felt the door slightly vibrate under me. I attempted to run back towards the bed, but I only got three steps in before the door swung open and Abe’s arms found their way around me. His hand clasped around my mouth while the other pulled me into his chest and hips. The hand lingered by my waist, as he pushed me into him.

His hot, sticky breath lingered on the side of my neck, as he gently stroked around my chin and jaw. “Oh Sierra. What have you gotten yourself into?” With one push, I’m on the ground in a heap. My arms just barely catch myself from hitting my head against the table. But I’m not that lucky. As I turned to face Abe, his boot comes crashing into my chest, and I tumbled down onto the ground.

“You got messed up with the wrong person, girl. I gave you a chance and you run to him? Am I not good enough?”

I curled myself into an even thicker ball with my back pointed towards him, but that didn’t stop him. He reached down and pulled me up by my hair. The tug caused my neck to snap backwards and my hands to shoot upward. He threw me into the wall, my head hitting it first, as I felt a small drip of blood run down my forehead and past my nose.

Two men walked into the room to see the source of the noise. They sneered at me, but with lecherous stares that make me think they want to either beat me or fuck me -- maybe both -- and maybe at the same time. Whatever their deal, Abe didn’t seem to pay them much heed. He sauntered over towards me, as I backed further against the wall. He grabbed my arms—dangling at my side—and lifted them up above my head, pinning me in place. His other hand lingered at my chest, tracing lines side to side over my cleavage. Then he pulled my dress lower and lower, practically stripping it off me, leaving me with zero opportunity for modesty—and leaving nothing to his own imagination.

“Y’know,” he says wryly, almost apologetically. “This could have gone differently, Sierra. I wanted it to be nicer. Now I’m going to have to do bad things to you.”

My mouth went dry, as I tried to conjure up a response. But my mind drew a blank, and my voice wasn’t working anyway. All I could do was stay speechless, unmoving, in the hope that I could make it through. He reached his hands down to his pants, and my head went completely blank. I tried to think of everything else but this moment—Carmen in the hospital bed wondering where I am, the cops on the hunt, my mother back at home waiting for a phone call, my professors happy that I’m not there to be argumentative.

Everything went still until I watched Abe bring his hand back to his face and push himself away from me. And then I heard
him
—Tank—calling my name over my phone clutched in Abe’s hand. The men around him laughed on cue, as if this was all planned—until they thrust the phone my way. And I knew exactly what I need to do. I needed to tell him that Abe’s plan was a trap, that whatever he was saying or doing was a lie, that trying to save me would only lead to his death.

That’s how I ended up on the floor of this bedroom, blood caked on my face, rug burn on my thighs, and a swollen eye keeping me from seeing. As soon as the phone is hung up, Abe attacks me, laying in another barrage of fists and kicks. I manage to get him to back off his hands that travel under the skirt and up my bare thighs by fighting back and screaming even louder till his men have to come and drag me away for another beating.

“You think you’re in love with that fool? You’re a dumb bitch, Sierra! He doesn’t care about you. All he wants is to take over the Aztecs for himself, and you’re just a pawn—a stupid, pathetic pawn like your roommate.” He removes his shirt slowly and tosses it on the bed before leaning down to my face. He spits his words directly into my eyes. “You know, beating her was actually pretty hard. I hate hurting someone like her who has nothing to do with this shit. But beating you has actually been fun. You deserve each and every last bit of this.”

Another kick, and I roll away. My body is merely a conduit, just reacting to whatever he throws at me. But my heart swells with something more furious—hope. I had said the words that have been on my lips since earlier today. I love Tank. I love him. And now he knows. And I can take all the beatings in the world if it means that Tank understands that what I am doing for him is from my heart.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” Abe continues, clearly turned on by all the power I’m giving him. “I’m not going to punish you too much—just enough to make you learn your lesson. After all, I need you to look good when I sell you off to our friends in the cartels. They’re always looking for fine pieces of ass like you.”

I turn slightly, just enough to see him lick his lips. Fingers gently lift at my tight skirt until his hands are pressed against the folds of my sex. He pets at me softly, as if this is part of the plan. “Then again, Sierra, I may just have to keep you for my own personal sex toy. You in this dress, down on your hands and knees, has me changing my mind on your price.”

Without hesitation, I grunt and bring up the lump in my throat. My spit launches in his face, hitting him right on the nose and mouth. He shudders and spins away before standing and walking off. His men, who have lingered in the background, follow him and slam the door shut tightly behind them.

Silence sets in again as I try to count the seconds once more. Only a few hours ago. While Tank had told me not to get hurt, to not put myself in danger, I was not going to let him die for me. As I try to remain still so that my bones may magically put themselves together, I promise myself that I will not die here or in Abe’s cartels. And more importantly, I wasn’t going to let Tank die out there without me.

I had a plan, and it was going to work.