Page 34 of Talon (Road Rebels MC 2)
I was following the same path now, which we had walked that night. I couldn’t help but wonder if it would be wise to ask my mom a little about him. What was he up to? Had he managed to get patched into the Bad Disciples MC like he always wanted to? I guess with the new nickname of Glock he had.
I gulped as I thought about Glock, with his green eyes, his hair falling over them and how warm and large his hands were. I never liked anyone touching me, in fact, I used to flinch when my mom hugged me. With Glock however, it had always felt so natural. It had always felt safe.
I was thinking about Glock too often since I came home. It had been two days, and everywhere I turned, I was reminded of him. This neighborhood was the culprit, my mom was the culprit. I shook my head to drive those thoughts out of my head. I needed to stay focused and out of Glock’s way. With any luck, I would be able to leave again in two weeks’ time and maybe find a way to get mom to sell the house and move in with me in San Francisco.
I heard the shrill cry at the same time as I checked my wristwatch. It was five minutes past eight. I looked up and down the street, and there wasn’t another human being in sight. I kept walking, thinking it was nothing.
I heard the woman’s voice again, a high-pitched cry like her life was in danger. This time I started running, it wasn’t just in my head; it was an actual person.
The faster I ran, the more incessant the crying became. It amazed me that nobody from the adjoining houses or other stores that were still open had come out to see what the cries were about.
It was coming from an alleyway, and I approached it with the grocery bags still in my hands. At the mouth of the dark, narrow alley, I saw the woman in the corner against a brick wall. A large man, whose back was turned to me, had her pinned against the wall with his hand around her throat.
She caught sight of me and screeched again, and the bags dropped from my hands. The man was turning to me now, his grip on her throat had weakened. I didn’t recognize him.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” I hissed as I stepped towards them.
“Mind your own business bitch!” he growled and let the woman go, but shielded her with his massive hulking body. Tattoos were crawling up his neck and a big scar across his left eyebrow. It was difficult to see him clearly in the dark, but I knew he was glaring threateningly at me.
“I can’t mind my own business. You’re assaulting a woman!” I barked at him as I stepped even closer.
The woman could have been a prostitute. She was wearing a tight pink corset and a short skirt underneath. Her pale breasts were spilling out from the top of her corset, and her hair was heavily hair-sprayed.
“Stay the fuck away from us bitch, or you’re going to be sorry!” he growled. I stopped in my tracks, aware that I was all alone here. Even if I threw myself at this monster and tried to scratch his eyes out, he was much stronger than me, and the woman didn’t seem to be in a state to lend me a helping hand.
“You need to let her go, or I’m calling the cops,” I said, and the man threw back his head and laughed like I had told him a terrible joke. Who was I kidding? I wouldn’t have thought of calling the cops back when I lived here. All the cops turned a blind eye to everything that went on in this neighborhood. I’d forgotten.
“Yeah, call the cops,” he growled, and he took one step towards me and grabbed my wrist. I screeched and struggled against his grasp, but he had yanked me to himself. I could smell the whiskey on his breath, and it made me sick.
“Let me go!” I screeched, worried that he was going to do to me now what he was doing to the poor woman. My best guess was that she was a prostitute and he was her pimp, trying to school her for something she had done to anger him.
“Yeah, I’ll let you go, after you’ve sucked on my balls,” he said with a laughing sizzle in his voice, and he kept me tightly in his grasp, close to himself. The woman was sobbing behind him, crouched and cowering into the corner.
“Let her go…please,” she sobbed, but the guy wasn’t paying her any attention.
I screeched again when he caught a fistful of my hair and yanked my face up so he could look into my eyes.
“Perfect, flawless skin, how much money are you going to make me?” he growled and his other hand traveled down my neck, my cleavage, till he had grabbed me between my legs.
“I know Jackson! Glock! He’s going to fucking kill you if anything happens to me!” I screeched. I knew I was taking a chance. There was a probability that this guy had no idea who Glock was.
However, he let me go. His grip weakened on my hair, and I stumbled back from him, panting, trying to catch my breath. I could feel my whole body shaking as I stood and stared at him.
He growled, like a wild animal and then turned around and caught the other woman by her hair.
“Let her go! Let her go!” I screeched, and I could feel hot tears pricking the back of my eyelids. I couldn’t bare to see him hurting her again. What had she done to deserve it? She had a big blue bruise on her jaw, and I stared at it as he dragged her over the cobbled street towards the mouth of the alleyway.
He was letting me free because I claimed I knew Glock, but this girl didn’t have the same fate as me.
“Let her go!” I screeched again, and this time, the hot tears streaked down my cheeks.
“Just go, just get out of here!” the girl screamed back at me. She was crying while she got dragged out of the alleyway.
The guy kicked my bags of groceries, spilling them all over the street on his way out. He didn’t stop or turn to look at me, and I cried, feeling helpless. I had saved myself by using Glock’s name, but I hadn’t been able to save that girl. What was he going to do to her?
After they had disappeared, I ran up to my groceries and started picking them up and bagging them again. The tears didn’t stop flowing down my cheeks. Why had I come back here to this place? The violence had gotten worse. When we were kids, the women and children were safe no matter how much gang violence occurred in the neighborhood. Now it seemed like nobody was safe anymore.
I straightened up with most of the stuff back in my bags, and I hurried back towards the house. I would have to tell my mom, she needed to know how unsafe it was for her in this place. Maybe then she would agree to move with me to San Francisco.
Chapter 5
Glock
“What did you say?” I barked at Mickey, who had stopped me in the middle of the road, while I was on my way to the Rusty Pelican.
“Her mom told Mrs. Jenkins and she told Crazy P’s mother, and he told me,” Mickey continued, and I shook my head in disbelief.
“You’re sure of this?” I asked, and he nodded his head.
“That’s what Crazy P told me,” he insisted, and I ran a hand through my hair.
“And you’re sure it was one of the Dragon Knights?” I clarified, and Mickey shrugged his shoulders before he nodded his head again.
“That’s what Crazy P figures. He was beating up one of the women and Sage tried to stop it,” Mickey said.
“Shit!”
“Yeah, man, it’s really fucked up. Apparently, he groped her, and he would have done much worse if she didn’t scream your name,” Mickey continued.
“Shit! Shit!” Something happening to Sage was the last thing I wanted.
“Well, knowing you probably saved her. The asshole didn’t want to piss you off,” Mickey said, and I shook my head in rage.
“When has that ever stopped them? I’m glad it worked for her though,” I said, and I was already walking away from Mickey.
“Go, man, talk to her. Mrs. Jenkins said that she's really shaken up. She wants to take her mom away from here and back to San Francisco, or wherever she lives,” Mickey called after me, as I jumped on my bike.
“Thanks, Mickey! I owe you one,” I said to him as I rode off.
I didn’t exactly plan on going to see her. I figured that she didn’t want to see me. Sage had been back home for at least four days, as far as I knew, and
she hadn’t looked me up or called. She had made it pretty apparent that she didn’t want me coming and looking for her either. But if she was assaulted by a Dragon Knights, and she’d said my name—I had no other choice but to find out if she was doing okay. Besides, now I had someone to give me details about what went on with the woman he was beating up.
I rode hard to the Campbell home. I knew it well. Even after Sage was gone, I visited Tracy sometimes. I did her shopping some weekends and went over just for a chat and a cup of coffee from time to time. I knew she was lonely, and I knew she was getting sicker by the day. We spoke very little about Sage during those meetings though. I didn’t want to know, and Tracy didn’t want to tell. It was an unspoken understanding between us.
When I knocked on the door of the Campbell house, it was Tracy who opened. She looked paler and thinner than when I last saw her.
