Rebel Revenge (Saint View Rebels Book 1)
Rebel Revenge: Chapter 6

I wouldn’t let her go.

I knelt at her side, begging and crying for her to come back until my knees went numb and my throat ached. From outside somewhere came shouting, and sirens, but my whole world had shrunk down to me and the only person in my life who’d ever loved me.

She couldn’t be gone.

“Rebel,” Vaughn said in a voice as hoarse as mine would have been, had I been able to get out words.

I didn’t answer him. I couldn’t.

“Rebel, stop. Come on. The police are going to forcibly remove you if you don’t come with me.”

I didn’t care. Let them. I wasn’t leaving her.

“Goddammit, Roach. I’m not letting them do that to you.” His hands came around my middle, and he hoisted me up off the floor.

“No!” The scream ripped from somewhere deep inside me, some place where the pain was so acute I was sure I was bleeding. I thrashed out, kicking and screaming, elbows flying, fighting him with everything I had.

His grip only tightened when he hauled me backward down the aisle, ignoring the way I scratched and kicked at him. “Let me go! Let me go!”

People lined the hallway, all of them staring at Vaughn dragging me out. “Help me!” I screamed desperately at them, but none of them moved. Not one person stepped in to stop him.

Someone held the doors open, and we burst out onto the street, sunlight momentarily blinding my eyes but doing nothing to stop the agony coursing through my body. “Stop, please!”

My cries for help triggered the memories of my attack. The darkness rushed in, taking out my vision again, stiffening my muscles until they ached. “I can’t breathe,” I whispered. “I can’t breathe!”

I was right back there. Trapped by men intent on hurting me. No escape. Their weight pinning me down.

“What the fuck are you doing? Let her go!”

I knew that voice. It broke through the darkness. He hadn’t been there for me last time, but when I opened my eyes, he was all I could see. Tall. Strong. His gaze a mixture of fury and need. All of it directed at me and the man holding me captive.

“Fang,” I gasped out. “Help. Please.”

“Who the hell are you?”

The binds around me loosened, the man standing me up on two feet.

I stumbled at having to hold my own weight on legs that tingled with lack of circulation.

Fang didn’t answer. He caught me with one arm, pulling me tight to his side, while the other arm swung back and connected with Vaughn’s face.

I blinked.

Vaughn.

Not Caleb. Not Caleb’s friends.

I shook my head, trying to clear my foggy brain and decipher what was real and what was in my head.

“Jesus, fuck, man!” Vaughn howled. “What was that for? The cops were going to sedate her if I didn’t get her out.”

“Don’t fucking care,” Fang growled. “You put your hands on her when she told you not to.”

“I was helping her!”

“Not anymore. I’ve got her.”

Vaughn looked at me. “You know this asshole?”

His lip was already swelling. Guilt rushed in that I’d been the cause of that, when all he’d been trying to do was help me. “I’m sorry.”

He shook his head and spit out a mouthful of blood. “Tell your guard dog to take a Valium next time. I’m her brother, asshole. I wasn’t going to fucking hurt her.”

Fang glanced down at me, but I had no idea why Vaughn would have said that. Our parents hadn’t even gotten a chance to sign their wedding certificate before they’d collapsed. He was not my brother.

But it stopped Fang from following up his first punch with a second.

Something flashed in Vaughn’s eyes, and it startled me to realize Vaughn had just lost his father too. I reached a hand out but stopped short of actually touching him. “Vaughn…”

He shook his head. “Don’t ask me if I’m okay. I’m as okay as you are, with the addition of a busted lip.”

I cringed. “I didn’t mean for that to happen.”

He wiped blood from his chin and stared down at it smeared across the back of his hand. “Yeah, well, it did. See you around, Sis.”

He walked away, back toward the cops who were barely paying attention to the scuffle, clearly bigger things to deal with when there were two dead bodies inside.

Fang gazed down at me. “What the hell happened in there, Pix?”

I shook my head, letting the familiar nickname wash over me. It was one he normally only used in private, but clearly, he was rattled, too. “I don’t even know. My mom…I think she overdosed. She’s dead.”

Fang swore softly. “I’m taking you home.”

“The cops…”

“Fuck the cops. They want to talk to you; they can do it on your time.”

I nodded, clutching his T-shirt. He wrapped his arm around me, and I inhaled the familiar scent of him. It was the same cologne Vaughn wore, the one I’d fallen in love with because it reminded me of Fang.

He guided me toward his bike, and it was only then I noticed the other guys from the club. They sat on their Harleys in the parking lot, watching the commotion with interest.

War, the club prez and my bestie’s man, had a phone pressed to his ear, but when he spotted me, he moved it slightly away from his mouth, his gaze sharp with concern. “What the fuck happened in there? They wouldn’t let any of us in; we’ve been going crazy out here. They said people were dead. You’re okay?”

I wasn’t, but I wasn’t physically hurt either, which was what he meant, so I nodded.

“Bliss is on the phone. Do you want to talk to her?”

I shook my head. “Not now. I’m tired.”

I only realized how true that was after I’d said it. Exhaustion swamped me, even though the sun was still high so it couldn’t have been any later than early afternoon.

All I wanted to do was close my eyes and sleep until none of this was true.

“I’m taking her home, Prez.”

War ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah, do that. I’ll hang around here for a bit longer. Try to replace out what the hell happened.”

I didn’t have it in me to argue. I stood numbly, letting the two men talk over the top of my head, a ringing in my ears starting up that didn’t quit until Fang swung his long leg over the seat of his bike and settled with his hands on the handlebars.

“Get on, Pix.”

“I’m wearing a dress.”

“Like I care.” His fingers circled around my wrist and dragged me in. With one yank of my skirt, he lifted it high enough for me to climb on behind him.

I probably flashed more of my panties than I wanted to in the moment, but I doubted anyone was watching me when there were far more interesting things going on.

I gripped the bar behind me, and Fang let out a grumble that resembled a pissed-off bear. He reached behind, hand sliding up my leg in the space left by the split in my dress. He kept his touch to the outside of my thigh, then up to my hip, fingertips pressing in, anchoring me in place.

“I’m riding like this with one arm unless I can feel your arms around me, Pix. I need to know you’re okay back there. Can’t know that if I can’t feel you. Put your arms around me.”

If it had been anyone else, I wouldn’t have been able to do it. But I knew this man. He would sooner die than hurt me.

So I sank down against him, pressed the side of my face into the back of his jacket, and wrapped my arms around his solid waist.

I inhaled the combined scent of leather, cologne, and gasoline, all of it swirling me in comforting waves. Then I closed my eyes and let the man drive me home.

Fang slowed the bike on a gravel road, and I finally opened my eyes. I’d kept myself awake long enough to lean into corners with him, but barely. I blinked at my surroundings. We were most definitely not outside my shitty apartment complex in the middle of Saint View.

Woods surrounded us, thick on all sides and easy to get lost in if you were stupid enough to go wandering. Every tree looked the same as the ones before, and there was only one clear road through them, the gravel drive we’d taken.

The big rectangular building we’d parked in front of was familiar though. I’d been to more than a couple of parties here. We’d played pool in the back room, done shots at the bar. Had my ass spanked by Fang in the middle of a common area while the entire club watched after I’d broken one of their rules. That had been fun.

We’d had mind-blowing sex afterward, with me tied to Fang’s bed in the clubhouse while he licked every inch of my body.

Good times.

Ones that seemed like a lifetime ago, before Caleb and his friends. Before my mom…

A hiccuping sob rose in my chest, and I put my hands to my face, pressing my fingertips tight against closed eyes, trying to stem the flow of tears.

“Hey, don’t do that.” His voice was soft as he pulled my hands away. He brought one to his lips and kissed my fingertips.

It only made it harder to fight back the tears. “Please don’t,” I whispered. “I can’t handle you being nice to me right now.”

He pulled my arm and helped me from the bike. “Too bad. I’m taking care of you. Can you walk?”

My legs wobbled, but I fiercely nodded that I could.

His disapproval was written all over his scowl. “No, you fucking can’t. Come ’ere.”

Even if I’d wanted to protest, I couldn’t. He had me up in his strong arms before I could get a word out. On instinct, I wrapped my arms around his neck and buried my face there, breathing in his familiar scent because it was the only thing that made sense right now.

“What on earth you got there, Fang?” Queenie’s thick Southern accent rang through the clubhouse.

She was the wife of one of the other guys and a good friend of mine, even though she had ten years on me. She was always sweet, but right now, I couldn’t even look at her.

“Rebel. Taking her to my room. Tell the others I’m not available until tomorrow.”

Queenie laughed. “Off for some more wild monkey sex, huh? Get it, girl.”

That was my reputation. The good-time girl. Lover of men and sex. Life of the party. Confident in my skin.

“It ain’t like that, Queenie. Not today.” Fang’s voice was deep and gruff, even more clipped than normal.

I lifted my head, my watery eyes meeting Queenie’s deep-brown ones, and the smile fell straight off her brown face. “Oh, honey. What happened?”

A lump rose in my throat, and I shook my head. I couldn’t do this with her right now. It was too much. It was bad enough Fang was here to watch me fall apart. This wasn’t who I was. Some weak girl who needed people to look after her. I’d always had my own back. I’d prided myself on how strong and independent I was.

Yet when it came to the crunch, I’d been pathetic. Too weak to fight Caleb and his friends off. Too small to protect myself. He’d broken something inside me, and now I couldn’t even get it together emotionally, let alone physically.

I couldn’t even save my mom when she was right there in front of me.

I hated the woman I was right now. Hated her with every ounce of my being, and yet I couldn’t stop.

Despite Queenie trotting after us, peppering us with questions all the way down the hall, Fang just kept going, straight into his room, kicking the door shut behind us.

There was a pause, then Queenie’s worried voice called through. “I’ll hang around. If there’s anything you need…food, drinks… I’ll be here.”

“Thank you,” I mumbled, but I wasn’t sure it was loud enough for her to hear.

Fang sat on the bed, the springs squeaking beneath his heavy weight.

I struggled to get out of his arms, but they tightened around me, keeping me on his lap.

Panic roared in. “Let me go, Fang!”

He did instantly, his grip loosening, and I shot across the room, back to the wall, chest heaving with panicked breaths.

Confusion flickered in his blue eyes. “What’s going on?”

I shook my head, trying to get myself under control. “Nothing. I just…I can’t do affection right now.”

“Okay. What do you need?”

My mom. I needed my mom to not be lying on the floor of a courthouse, while police officers and paramedics and the press swarmed around her limp body. I needed her to be at her wedding reception, eating cake with a man who saw past her flaws and loved her the way I did. I needed her to be pulling me up from my seat while I complained that I couldn’t dance, and for her to say, “Who cares, do it anyway!” the way she always had when it was just me and her, dancing around the kitchen in shitty Saint View low-income housing.

I was never going to have that again.

“I need to be sick.” I ran for the little bathroom off to the side of his room, crashing through the doorway and dropping to the floor in front of the toilet.

But there was nothing in my stomach. I dry heaved, stomach cramping painfully in on itself every time I thought about my mom, the red-tinged bubbles around her mouth, her staring, unseeing eyes.

Fang knelt on the tiled floor beside me and rubbed a hand down my back. “You’re okay, Pix. I got you.”

I shook my head. “Just leave me.”

“No.”

I turned to glare at him. “Why? Why did you bring me soup and chocolate? Why did you even say yes to driving us to the reception? Why did you bring me here? This isn’t what we do.”

His thick eyebrows furrowed in. “What do you mean?”

“We fuck, Fang. That’s it.”

“It doesn’t have to be it. You know I want more than that.”

But it did. Because he was too much. Of everything. And he was all mixed up in that night, and I didn’t quite know how to fully separate him. “You aren’t my boyfriend.”

His mouth pressed into a line. “I’m well aware. But what did you want me to do? Leave you standing on the side of the road while the police brought your mother’s body out in a body bag?”

The tiny ounce of backbone I’d found crumbled into a heap. A sob shook my entire body.

“Ah, fuck. I’m sorry, Pix. I shouldn’t have said that. Come ’ere.”

I couldn’t let him touch me again. I’d disintegrate into dust.

When I didn’t move, he got the hint. Instead, he reached over and turned on the shower, slowly adjusting the temperature until steam billowed around the room. He stuck his hand beneath it then quickly withdrew it, swearing below his breath. “It’s scalding. Just the way you like it.”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. I knew I was hurting him, but I had nothing else to give.

He stepped in, and when I didn’t flinch away, he put his fingers beneath my chin and tilted my head up. “You don’t need to be. I’ll be whatever you need me to be.”

And this was exactly why I’d never let myself get too close. Because I’d burn the man. On the outside, he was formidable. Six foot five, thick as a tree, scarred and tatted up so bad that small children ran from him.

But on the inside, he was soft. Gentle. A man who’d give a woman he loved anything she desired.

That woman couldn’t be me.

I was selfish with him. Used him. Took what I needed with no thought to how it affected him.

And yet I couldn’t stop. Especially not now.

His fingers found the zipper on the back of my dress and pulled it down. He pushed the spaghetti straps down my arms, and the rest of the dress fell away easily, leaving me in just my panties. He knelt at my feet and lowered my underwear as well, his gaze on mine the entire time.

There was nothing sexual about it. As soon as my panties were off, he stood and stepped toward the door. “Get in. I’ll get you a towel and something clean to wear.”

He closed the door quietly behind him, and I stared at it for the longest time. We’d been naked together probably a dozen times, and it had never been like that. Normally it was all tongues, and hands, and lips. We were throw you up against a wall and slam home hard and fast. We were moans, orgasms, and dirty words.

We weren’t whatever we were doing right now.

My head pounded, pain piercing sharply behind my eyes. I got in the shower, because doing as I was told was easier than thinking for myself.

The hot water poured over my head, drowning the lengths of my short hair instantly. It was the perfect temperature, hot enough to turn my skin pink, and soothed over tense, aching muscles. I dropped my head forward, letting the spray pound on the back of my neck and rivulets run over my body.

With water running in my eyes, I blindly groped at the shower caddy on the wall, grabbing a bottle of what I hoped was bodywash, but shampoo would do the same thing. I squirted a dollop of it onto my palm, the scent rising with the steam of the water.

I opened my eyes in surprise and took in the label on the bottle.

It was my favorite. The same one I used at home, because it smelled like peaches and vanilla.

He’d bought it for me. I was sure of it. His bodywash sat in a black bottle next to it, the scent deeply masculine and at complete odds with the one I used.

I could have tried to convince myself that it was a coincidence. Or that he wanted a bottle of something feminine for when he had other women here.

But I knew neither of those were true.

I stood in that shower until the water ran cold, and then I stood there some more, deserving the punishment for the way I treated him.

Fang was not the sort of man you used for a good time. And yet I hadn’t ever been able to stop.

I turned the water off and pulled aside the shower curtain.

A neatly folded gray towel sat on the closed toilet lid, along with a faded T-shirt I’d seen him wear. I wrapped the towel around myself and then picked up the T-shirt, holding it to my face and inhaling the scent. It smelled clean but still faintly of him.

I was sure nothing had ever smelled so good or so comforting. Knowing I was playing with fire, I dried myself off and slipped into his clothes.

The hem hung around my knees, and the sleeves halfway down my arms. But it was as soft as I’d thought, and there was no way I was putting on that dress again. I picked it up off the floor and shoved it into the bin by the sink.

“Rebel. Are you okay?”

I wasn’t, but I opened the door and stepped out.

He was sitting on the edge of the bed again, with his elbows resting on his knees. He looked up when I entered, his long blond hair falling in his eyes.

In an instant, his expression changed from neutral, to something cold and dark. He pushed to his feet violently fast, and startled, I skittered back into the bathroom until my ass hit the sink. But he didn’t stop. He strode right after me, caging me in with his big body, his fingers gripping my chin again so he could see my face.

“What. The. Fuck?”

“What?” I yelped.

“Your face. It’s covered in bruises.”

Oh shit. I hadn’t even thought of that when I’d been in the shower. I’d so painstakingly covered each and every one of them with heavy foundation that morning, but the shower must have washed it off. I turned away, hoping I could still hide the damage. “They aren’t bruises. It’s just my mascara running.”

“Bullshit. Who did this to you?”

I shook my head. “I’m fine.”

“Say you’re fine again, Rebel, and I swear, my head will implode. I’m trying real hard not to walk out this door and kill every man who has ever looked at you. So please. Do me a favor, and tell me which one it was, so innocent people don’t have to die today.”

I twisted out of his grasp and stared at myself in the mirror.

It was like punching myself in the gut.

My face was a mess, even after a week. If anything, it seemed worse with the bruises in various states of healing and all sorts of different colors. I sighed. “No.”

Confusion flickered on his face. “No? What the hell does that mean?”

“It means I’m not telling you who did it, because I have it handled.”

“Do you see the way my brain is leaking out my ears right now?” His voice was barely above a growl. “A name.”

“Why? So you can go over there and kick his ass?”

“Exactly!”

“What do I get out of that?”

He paused. “The satisfaction of seeing him dead?”

“The only satisfaction I want is the one that will come when I kill them myself.”

“Them?” The word was a feral snarl on his lips.

Ah, fuck. His fingers clenched into fists, and he paced the length of the small room like a caged animal. One with big teeth and claws and the capability of busting out at any minute and going on a death rampage.

I couldn’t let him do that.

I needed to be the one who did it. I would never sleep well until I proved to myself once more that I was the woman I thought I was. That I could protect myself.

If Fang knew, he wouldn’t be able to stop himself. So I had to defuse the situation, because when a man like him said he would kill every man who’d ever spoken to you, he meant it. He’d been a member of this MC the entire time I’d known him. I knew they did things that weren’t always on the right side of the law. He had the means and motive to rip Caleb and his friends apart.

I lifted the covers on his neatly made bed and got beneath them. His sheets were soft, his mattress the perfect firmness. I tugged the quilt up to my chin and then silently raised the corner, offering him a space beside me.

He stopped pacing to stare at me. “That won’t work.”

I said nothing.

He sighed. Then he put his hand to the back of his shirt and pulled it over his head.

I counted the ridges on his abs while he undid his fly and took off his jeans, leaving him only in black boxer briefs.

Like I knew he would, he got beneath the blankets with me.

I flipped over, giving him my back and wriggling onto the other side of the bed. His thick arm banded around my middle, dragging me to him again, his chest against my spine.

“You played me,” he murmured into the back of my head.

I’d given him a thing I never had before. Normally after we had sex, I was straight out of bed and blowing him a kiss as I walked out the door.

I never snuggled with him.

I couldn’t, because I knew how much he liked it. Every time I got out of his bed, his face would fall, and I’d pretend not to notice.

“I know,” I whispered back, letting him hold me in a way he never had before.

In a way I’d never wanted, because being this close to another person was terrifying and stifling.

Except his warmth felt nice. His arms around me made me feel small and protected. I fell asleep, knowing while I was in Fang’s bed, nothing bad was going to happen.