Page 23 of Protected by the Biker (Grim Reaper MC)
Thorn had sat like that in front of me too when he'd reached for my hand and comforted me. With Ryan, I didn't feel an ounce of that same comfort. I hated him with fury. I wanted to hurt him the way he had hurt me!
"I want you to let me go," I said, my voice was in a hiss, and he reached for my knee. Slowly, he started stroking my legs, and I could feel chills running up and down my spine. If my hands were free, I would have used them to slap him, but now instead, I started pulling against the chords.
"There's no use struggling, Ensley. You know you're going to stay here with me, for as long as I want you to," he said, and a smile started spreading on his face.
"How did you find me? How did you know where I was?" the words burst out of me and he shook his head again like I had said something stupid.
"I saw you on TV, babe. It was simple. You couldn't keep your whore face away from the limelight, and I couldn't stay away from you," he said and started straightening himself up over me.
"If you'd just listened to me in the first place, and stayed away from that precious little career of yours; none of this would have happened. See? I told you I know best," he said.
I spat at him and then screamed. I couldn't just keep sitting there and taking his abuse anymore. I screamed until my lungs hurt, and until I felt his hand lash against my cheek.
He had knocked the breath out of me, and my face was jerked to the side. I could feel the sting of his hand on my cheek, and I felt like I couldn't breathe anymore.
"You just need to relax, Ensley. We're going to be here for a while. Settle down, sweetness," he said and then, he tugged my face back towards him. He was smiling again, even though there were tears pouring down my cheeks. My lips were quivering, my nostrils were flared, and I wanted to find the words I could fling at him that would really hurt him.
Ryan reached his hand out and started stroking my hair, in the same motion that Thorn had done, but this time, I wasn't comforted. Neither did I feel safe. I wanted to get away from him. I wanted him to stop touching me.
I looked up at him, with tears in my eyes and another scream rising up in my chest. I couldn't scream again though because I knew the next time, it would be more than just a slap. The next time, he would bring his knife out and make me bleed.
I cowered from him, as he kept stroking my hair.
"Beautiful, sweet Ensley. Doesn't know what she's gotten herself into, does she?" he murmured to himself, and now I was sure that he had lost his mind. This was not the same man I thought I was in love with five years ago.
Chapter 25
Thorn
The guys were all standing around me. I hadn't asked them to, but they had followed me to the hotel room near Ensley's apartment. Brooks was missing, but I didn't have the headspace to think about where he might have been.
Topher, Jamison, and Beckett were standing over me, watching me as I fumed. I kept cracking my knuckles and muttering to myself. For the first time in my life, I was feeling helpless, and I didn't know what to do with myself in that situation.
That asshole had her. That cowardly psychopath had kidnapped the only woman who had made me feel alive, and I couldn't do anything about it.
"I'll kill him myself," I growled after there had been silence in the room for several minutes.
"We have to find him first," Beckett stated, and I glared at him, throwing daggers at him with my eyes.
I cracked my knuckles again and watched Jamison as he ran his hand through his hair. I could sense that he hadn't stopped feeling guilty about everything that had happened and I wasn't sure if I had forgiven him fully yet either.
"If he fucking touches her, I'll kill him," I growled again, and I caught the guys exchanging looks.
"So, what do we do now, boss?" Topher asked, and I shook my head.
"Call Church," I commanded, and they exchanged looks again.
"This is Church. I called it because you told me to, remember?" he replied, and I stared at him blankly. I realized that I was feeling more lost now than I had felt before.
"Where the fuck is Brooks?" I growled, and he shrugged his shoulders.
I jumped up from the chair and walked to the wall and punched it. I needed to feel the pain shoot up my arm. I was trying to knock some sense into myself.
"Okay, Thorn, Boss, you need to calm down and tell us what to do. We want to get the guy just as much as you do," Topher said, and I whipped around to him, charging at him in full force. Topher took a step back from me, suddenly surprised by my behavior.
"No, you fucking don't!" I barked at him, and he looked back at me with a question in his eyes. I knew what he wanted to ask me. Why I cared so fucking much about a client, but he didn't dare ask me that.
"Fuck, Jamison, why did you leave the door?" it was Beckett who asked that, and we all turned to look at Jamison who ran his hand through his hair again.
"I don't know. I was an idiot. It's all my fucking fault," he said, and I clenched my jaws.
"No, it's not. It's all our faults. We should have been prepared. We should have anticipated that fucker's next move. We took him for granted. We thought he was just a deranged loony," I growled, and Jamison was looking at me gratefully.
I knew what the consequences were when your brothers start blaming you for something gone wrong. I knew Jamison had slipped up, but I didn't want him to face the consequences for that for a lifetime. I was going to forgive him this time and hope that he didn't fuck up like this again.
"Did she give you anything? Any clues about where he might have taken her?" Beckett asked me, and I shook my head.
"She had no idea where he was or what he had been up to in the past five years since she left New York. We didn't even know for sure if he was in LA," I said and clenched the fist that I had punched into the wall. I could still feel the sting of the force, and it made me feel good. I wanted that fist to break Ryan's jaw. He had taken Ensley out of her bedroom, out of her home and now he was going to have to pay for it.
I was going to find him and make sure he never touched a hair on her body again.
"So how are we going to find this fucker?" Topher asked, just as there was a rap on the hotel door. We exchanged looks, and Beckett pulled out the gun he had stuffed in his belt. Jamison approached the door and looked through the peephole.
"It's Brooks," he said, rolling his eyes and opened the door to our brother.
Brooks walked into the hotel room, and I immediately charged at him.
"Where the fuck have you been? We were all supposed to be on duty, watching Ensley's apartment. Do you even know that he's taken her?" I was barking at Brooks who was watching me intently, listening to every word that was spitting out of my mouth.
When I was finished, he took in a deep breath and stuck his hands into the pockets of his jeans.
"Yeah, I heard. Topher told me. I wasn't here because you ordered me to do some digging and my shift didn't start till five in the morning. Remember?" he hissed at me. We were both glaring at each other.
"And if you have to bark at someone, do it at Jamison. From what I hear, he's the one who couldn't control his nicotine cravings when he needed to. If he hadn't disappeared for so long, that bastard wouldn't have been able to walk into her apartment," Brooks continued through gritted teeth, and I stepped angrily towards him.
I didn't know who or what I was angry at anymore. All I knew was that I needed to hit someone, punch something again, so I could get the rage out of my body.
"Okay, we need to take a step back. Thorn, Brooks, let it go. We're all here now, and we need to work as a team!" Beckett had stepped in between us, and he was trying to catch both our gazes so he could talk some sense into us.
I stepped away from them, clenching my jaw in the hopes that I'd be able to calm myself. I didn't need to pick a fight with one of my brothers. We were all on the same side. We had slipped up, but I needed all their help to get Ensley back.
Brooks nodded his head slowly, with his eyes still on me, and pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket. He held it up, and I could see that there was an address scribbled on it.
"I got into his bank account," he said, and I narrowed my eyes at him. What did an address have to do with his bank account?
"And anything there we can use?" Jamison stepped up to us now, and Brooks turned to look at him.
