Page 80 of Foxx
Mia
“You tired, honey?” Roz asks me sometime around one a.m. Aiden has been in meetings with someone named Sam—while I’ve been sipping on my drink—for the last hour. These bikers know how to party, and the later it gets, the rowdier they become. I don’t get the impression the music will stop anytime soon.
I answer Roz’s question with a nod. I am tired. It’s late, and I’m still recovering from hardly any sleep last night. Roz gives me a warm smile; she’s the only sober one here, and once again, I marvel at her strength to keep up her sobriety in this place.
“I’ll find Dicky to walk you back.” She pats my arm as she stands. I know enough to understand what happens at parties like this. Fights could break out at any moment, or a member of another club could try to put his hands on me, all of which would mean I’d spend my night waiting for Aiden to exact revenge, instead of in his arms. Which, lately, is the only place I make sense.
I stand when Roz heads off, needing to stretch my legs,before meandering through the crowd. I eye up a picnic table near the edge of the forest, deciding some peace and quiet isn’t a bad idea. It’s on the way back to the cabin, and Dicky will see me here.
I walk over to the bench but freeze when I hear a woman’s moan from beyond the trees.
I move closer on impulse, unsure at first of where the sounds are coming from as I duck behind a large poplar and see a woman’s high heels in the dirt. Peeking around the thick trunk, my eyes widen, and my knees almost buckle as I take in the scene before me.
The pretty brunette I saw with Dagger earlier is on all fours, her dress covered in dirt and torn as a young blond woman stands behind her, whipping her with a filthy stick. I watch, horrified, as Dagger forces his dick down her throat.
“I said don’t stop sucking, bitch.” He pulls his cock from her mouth and smacks her cheek roughly—she falls over onto her side and passes out. Either she’s really drunk or really stoned, I can’t tell which from this distance, but I’m hoping she’s still breathing.
“Worthless whore,” he says in a disgusted tone and grabs the blond, forcing her to her knees in front of him. He doesn’t even flinch as he shoves his cock down her throat next, yanking her hair so hard she cries out. I watch in horror as he spits in her face, and rage fills me from my head to my toes. All I can think about is killing Dagger as I pick up a heavy rock in one hand. If I could get over there before he sees me, I could hit him, hard enough to stun him or maybe even knock him out for long enough to save these girls.
I shift, and the sound of sticks crunching underfoot causes his head to turn toward me. I move back behind the tree. Hecan’t see me, but he knows someone is here, and he’s staring right in my direction.
A smile creeps across his face, and I’m frozen in terror; it’s as if he’s looking right at me, chin tipped down and an ear-to-ear grin like something out of a fucking horror movie.
I feel a heavy hand on my arm, and I flinch at the contact. Spinning around, I realize it’s Roz, with Dicky following close behind her. She holds a finger to her lips and shakes her head no when she sees the rock I’m holding. I’m quaking as I look back to Dagger, but before I can see anything else, I’m pulled from the trees, almost hyperventilating when our feet hit the path back to the cabin.
“What the fuck did I just witness?” I ask Roz. “Someone needs to fucking kill him.”
“I warned you,” she says as we walk. “Those women went willingly. Dagger gives them free drugs. You can’t save them when they don’t want to save themselves.”
My stomach drops. I’m so fucking sad and so fucking disgusted.
I look back over my shoulder as we walk, a little more grateful Aiden stepped in when he did. There’s another dimension out there somewhere where I never go home, I never go back to school, because if it weren’t for Aiden, that woman in the dirt could’ve been me.
* * *
“How are you feeling?” I ask, holding Nic’s hand. The steady, methodic beep of hospital machines is the only sound in the room.
“Like I want to die.” Nic starts to cry, and I can’t do anythingexcept lean down and wrap my arms around her. There are no words for what she just went through. No fixing it with gifts or hugs or smiles. This will be a long road to recovery for her, and my mother isn’t even here yet. Last I talked to her, she was in Connecticut and en route, so Mason and I set up camp here in the hospital while the police came in to take their reports. Doctors have come and gone throughout the day. They want to keep Nic overnight for observation, which means I’ll be staying here too.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” she whispers against me as tears well up in my eyes. I should never have left her. I should have stayed with her. I’m her big sister. I was supposed to protect her, but I didn’t.
Instead, I jumped the moment Connor asked me to come to his frat’s party. I was making out with a guy while she was being raped. For as long as I live, I’ll never forgive myself.
I look up when the door to Nic’s room opens, expecting to see Mason or the doctor, but instead it’s a man with gray hair and beady eyes I’ve never seen before.
“How are my girls?” he asks in a raspy voice as I climb up onto the bed, pulling Nic into my arms to protect her.
“No!” Nic cries as I kick at him from the bed, but I miss and knock the tray off her bedside table. I jump up and run to push him out the door and quickly lock it, but as I stand there staring at the handle, heart racing, I hear it unlock from the other side.
He has a key.
I bolt upright in bed, drenched in a cold sweat, at the sound of a man’s voice. A dark shadow moves past the window of our cabin to my left, and I suck in a breath, blinking my eyes, trying to focus. I can hear Aiden’s voice outside talking to Dicky on the porch. Rubbing my eyes with the heels of my palms, I look at the clock.
I’ve only been asleep for an hour, so I relax and lie back down to analyze the dream. The man was Dagger.
The moment Aiden comes through the creaky front door to the cabin, he toes his boots off and removes his cut, laying it over a chair. The cabin is warm, rustic, and simple, has a view of the river through a large bay window in the living room, and is far enough away that I can barely hear the party.
“Tired after your chase?” he asks me from the edge of the bed, and I instantly feel at ease.
