Stephanie Tyler - Vipers Run

I had to use the bathroom anyway, so I followed him in. He stopped to talk to Preacher for a second and I continued walking toward the bar area so I could go through to his room. My mind was swirling. I was thinking about Ned, wondering if I could have a normal life here. I couldn’t say yes completely, no matter how well the past week had gone. But I was trusting Cage more and more each day, so I’d been willing to make it work.

I was so focused on getting to Cage’s that I almost missed it. I’m not sure how, since there were wolf whistles and cheering, and when I stopped dead in my tracks, Cage nearly ran me over.

“Babe, what?” He put his hands on my shoulders but I was immovable, staring at the scene in front of me. I’d seen men and women looking like they were going at it in the bar, but this was different.

There was a woman—one of the young mamas that Amelia had warned me about—sitting on the pool table, her legs spread, and a man kneeling with his head between them. People watched and cheered as she cried out.

“S’all right, babe. Slim just got out of the Navy. Six months on a sub,” Cage explained. And that was fine—I could understand, even deal with it. But not the way the other men eyed her, men I’d sat and talked with. They were getting closer, a few with their hands on their crotches.

“What’s going to happen to her?” I asked.

“Whatever Slim wants,” he answered back.

“He’d share her?”

“She’s not his old lady. She knew what she was in for.”

“Jesus, Cage.” I turned and tried to push past him. His grip was like iron. I tried one of the moves on him that I’d learned living with Tenn, and he practically howled but wouldn’t let go of me. “Goddammit, he said that would work on anyone.”

“Anyone but me, Calla. Why don’t you believe me when I tell you I’m not letting you go?”

He didn’t seem to care that we were in public, and no one cared that I was actively fighting him. We were in the clubhouse and this was expected even and, for the most part, ignored by the other men unless there was a gang bang involved . . .

I stopped. Pulled away. Twisted in his arms and he was backing away, his hands out.

Trigger much, Calla?

“Please . . . I have to get out of here.” I heard the woman’s cries now—of pleasure, it seemed, but the crowd was chanting and I couldn’t watch, couldn’t be here.

“Calla—”

“What if that was me!” I yelled finally, and he froze against me. Then he picked me up and carried me out of there, out into the parking lot. He didn’t say a word, just strapped the helmet on me, climbed onto the bike and waited for me to do the same. And then he drove away from the madness happening inside Vipers and he took me to his apartment.

He carried me from the bike into the building. Wouldn’t let me go in the elevator. He talked to me like I was a wounded animal, telling me I was safe, and I let him, because I was still shaking from being in that crowd. I clung to him, feeling stupid. Vulnerable. There was no way I could survive in this world.

It wasn’t until we were upstairs and I was huddled on the couch, a blanket wrapped around me, that I focused on his worried green eyes.

“I didn’t realize, Calla.”

“How would you have?”

“You told me that a guy hurt you. I should’ve known . . .”

Honestly, I should’ve known too. But the way Cage treated me, the fact that he’d stripped down first and bared himself to me, had stopped all the familiar feelings of dread. Because he turned me on more than any man I’d ever met. The connection that solidified during our first phone call had never weakened.

But I’d avoided talking about this subject—and he hadn’t mentioned it except to tell me he hadn’t forgotten his promise.

But this morning, while I was answering Tenn’s e-mail, another, all too familiar one popped up. I didn’t want to open it, but I had to. I always had to, just to check. Somehow, I felt as if Jeffrey knew, that he was tracking whether or not I opened them, and if I didn’t, something worse would happen than just being sent a picture.

After I’d glanced through the pictures, I’d immediately gone into the bathroom and gotten sick. I’d shut the computer down and didn’t even think about it again. Until now. “I don’t know if I can do this.”

“You don’t have to go to the clubhouse anymore.”

“That’s not going to work. That’s your home, Cage.”

“You’re my home,” he said fiercely; then his tone quieted. “Babe, come on. Deep breaths, then talk to me.”

“I’m not strong enough.”

“Maybe not right now. But I’ll be strong enough for both of us.” God, that soothed me almost immediately. But I still remained on mute, and he continued trying. “Calla, come on, just talk to me. Lay it all out, because—fuck, I can’t help you with anything if you keep me in the dark.”

“I don’t want you to know things. I don’t like what you know already.”

His voice lowered to a dangerous octave. “What the fuck happened to you, Calla?”

“It doesn’t matter. I’m fine.”

“You’re lying. And I’m the guy. I’m supposed to say everything’s fine. You’re not.”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “I’m not like other women.”

“No, you’re not. And that’s why I’m here with you. You’re not getting rid of me, so it’s either tell me now or I’ll start digging.”

“Don’t you dare. You bastard . . . you wouldn’t.”

“Yeah, I would, if it meant getting to the bottom of all this shit.”

The glint in his eye meant business. I knew he had the will and the means to try, but what was buried by Jameson Bradley was intended to stay that way. I couldn’t let Cage dig. Which meant . . . I’d have to tell him the truth.

I curled up into myself—I didn’t want him touching me when I told him what happened, and even though he didn’t look happy about it, he seemed to instinctively understand. He sat next to me, giving me plenty of space.

I took a breath and looked at him, saying, “I was fifteen and he was seventeen. He’d been my boyfriend for a couple of months. And it started out consensual.”

“Didn’t stay that way.”

“No. I mean, we had sex. I was drunk but I didn’t say no. I thought . . . I thought he loved me. Fifteen and stupid, but I wouldn’t have been the first girl to sleep with the wrong guy. But while I was passed out . . . I don’t remember what happened but when I woke up, I was in his dorm suite. They’d drawn on me,” I said, my voice hollow, my body numb. “I woke up covered in black and green permanent Magic Marker, on my body and my face. I was naked. I was bleeding between my legs. And I was all alone in his room.”

I didn’t want to go on, not after seeing the anger in Cage’s eyes. But he put a hand over mine and didn’t say a word.

I took a deep breath. “My phone rang. I picked it up and it was Jeffrey. He told me to check my pictures and I did. Me, naked, with guys’ naked bodies around me. No faces, though. It didn’t make sense until I realized that he’d let the guys watch us having sex, and then he’d let them jerk off on me, draw on me and take pictures of it for keepsakes. And he told me, ‘Last night was great, honey. Anytime you want to do it again . . .’”

Cage let go of my hand and I didn’t look at him. Not until I heard something smash and I turned to see he’d thrown the coffee table against the wall, letting it shatter into a thousand pieces. There was a dent in the wall.

He was taking all the anger for me so I could remain calm.

I don’t know if I was the first—or the only—girl he’d done that to. I suspected not. I could still see the goddamned pictures when I closed my eyes, so right then I kept my eyes wide open. “I want to get over it. I need to. But I haven’t found the right guy to make me forget. I hadn’t . . . until you.”

Cage reached his hand out and waited for me to grab it. I did. “I don’t remember much after that. I got sick in the garbage can before making it to the bathroom. I just wanted to get clean—I couldn’t leave his room like that, so I showered. Scrubbed myself raw trying to get the marker off me.”

It would take weeks before my skin was unblemished again.

“I didn’t think about the police. I was sick and confused, and obviously Jeffrey had counted on that. I was goddamned fifteen and had had sex with the guy I’d thought loved and protected me. At first, I didn’t even understand his part in the betrayal. Not until I saw the pictures. My father contacted his friends in the police department. They went after Jeffrey hard. Jeffrey’s family had a lot of money too, and my mother didn’t want any of this public. I don’t blame her—I didn’t want it getting out either. So there was a settlement and everything was buried.”

I took a deep breath and then said, “There’s more.”

“Okay,” he ground out.

“Remember . . . I told you my father was working with Bernie? Because my brother stole money from me?” I didn’t wait for him to respond. “That was true, but it was only partially why my father got in touch with me. Ned has the pictures and he was blackmailing my father—if he got money, he wouldn’t publish the pictures online.”

Cage’s eyes were stormy when he asked, “How did Ned get them?”

“I don’t know. He knew about them when it happened.” I swallowed past the lump in my throat and ripped the Band-Aid off. “But Jeffrey has sent them to me at least once a year since it happened. He’s not supposed to have any contact, but he sends them and I don’t say anything to anyone, and the rest of the time it’s fine.”

“When was the last time he sent you those pictures?”

“This morning,” I whispered.