The Scars That Define Us Read online

  THE SCARS THAT DEFINE US

  Copyright © 2014 M. N. Forgy

  Edited by Hot Tree Editing

  Cover design by Arijana Karčić, Cover It! Designs

  Formatted by Max Effect

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fictions. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite eBook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the work of this author.

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  Eleven

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  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Epilogue

  Preview

  About the Author

  Acknowledgements

  I dedicate this book to those who were dragged through life’s unforgiving hurdles, and came out on top.

  Wear your scars with pride.

  Live with no regrets.

  THUNDER ERUPTS FROM ABOVE as the dark, ominous, sky opens up, allowing sprinkles to cascade down. I blink, the rain clinging to my eyelashes as I stare at the club from afar. The smell of wet pavement is heavy in the air as the rain pounds against the asphalt. I’ve been considering my options, my fate. I’ve been standing here for an hour, knowing that walking into the clubhouse could seal my future with a bullet to the head, possibly by the one I love most, Shadow, but going back to the life I had before would grant me a destiny of only surviving; I wouldn’t be living.

  I was just as shocked as the club was when my mother and her boyfriend Stevin showed up at the bike show with a team of Federal Agents. Not only did I feel betrayed, I felt hurt. How did I not know my mother was a part of the FBI? That bitch kept me for two and a half days trying to pry information from me as a witness. After they got nowhere, they tried to keep me as a possible suspect. Stevin and my mother were the laughing stock of their work force.

  “Look, we have wasted a lot of our resources on this club. When the informant was shot, we had to go in, breaking our six-month cover in the El Locos. Only one of the Devil’s members had a gun, and he tested negative for gunshot residue. We don’t have any evidence, and we won’t get any; they cover their asses too well to get caught. I’m calling it quits.” The conversation carried from behind the door, which led to my interrogation room. The detective speaking sounded agitated, like the one who had been questioning me all day.

  “I know I can get her to talk. Just give me some more time,” my mother pleaded. Her consistency at making me her rat angered me. It also showed me just how much my mother hated me; she only kept me around in her life for this exact purpose; bringing down my father and his club and making his daughter, me, the one to do it. It’s not going to happen, though; I’ll die in the hands of my father’s motorcycle club being honest rather than live and being a rat.

  “She is your daughter, Sadie,” the agent said in distaste.

  “Blood doesn’t make her my daughter,” my mother spoke harshly. That should hurt but it didn’t.

  “No judge is going to sign off on detaining her any longer,” the FBI agent replied sternly.

  “It’s over, Sadie; it’s time to let go. We gave it our all. I gave it my all, for you,” Stevin said softly.

  Three hours later, here I am.

  The rain starts pounding on my shoulders as the wind picks up, its velocity so hostile, I have to firmly plant my feet to the ground to keep from blowing away. That wouldn’t be a bad thing right now. Away sounds better than here, but I have nowhere else to go.

  “You!”

  I look up and see my father Bull, Locks, and Bobby all standing outside the clubhouse. Shit, how long have they been standing there? Bull stands in front of the others with his hands on his hips, the rain slamming down on his leather cut; his cut claiming him as a Devil’s Dust member. My father is the president of the club. I should be fine, but with the look he has on his face; I’m not so sure my safety is on the top of his priorities. I take a deep breath, possibly my last, and move forward hesitantly.

  “That’s far enough,” Bull says, his voice cold and threatening.

  I stop a few feet in front of them, my body trembling with fear. I straighten my back to appear unaffected, but it’s no use. I’m scared to death.

  “What the fuck are you doing here? You got a death wish?” Locks barks, his hand planted firmly inside his cut, no doubt on a gun. Locks, being the Vice President, could shoot me right here in the courtyard and get away with it.

  “I -” I choke, “I’m not one of them,” I say timidly. The wind’s so loud it’s hard to speak above it.

  I look in Bobby’s direction, curious as to where Shadow is. He should be here protecting me. I want to believe Shadow will keep me safe, that he will shield me from the throes of violence from the club. However, if I close my eyes, I can still see his face when the look of distrust slithered across it.

  Bull looks me in the eye from a distance, his eyes darting up and down trying to read my body language. We stand silently. The wind howls and thunder claps from above. My eyes plead for him to believe me, believe that I had nothing to do with my mother and her plans to take down the club. My worst fear of all surfaces he won’t kill me; instead, he will send me away and I’ll have to go back to my mother or live on the streets.

  “I have nowhere else to go,” I cry above the thunder.

  “Bobby, check her.”

  “Check me?”

  Without warning, Bobby stomps forward, grabs the hem of my shirt, and lifts it up, exposing my bra. The cold rain blasts against my flesh like razor blades as he pats my back, legs, head, and every other inch of my body.

  “Clean, no wire,” Bobby informs.

  Wire?

  “I’m not one of them!” I yell in frustration.

  The wind gusts, and lightning cracks loudly from above as my heart bleeds for them to believe me.

  “Let’s take this inside.” Bull nods toward the club.

  Bobby pushes me in the small of my back toward the clubhouse, making me stumble. Everyone treating me like a rat has me second-guessing going inside, but with the grip Bobby has on my arm, I don’t think I have much of a choice anymore.

  ***

  I’m sitting in the spot at the wooden table where I always sit. It seems I’m always in trouble when I’m sitting at this table.

  “What did you fucking tell them?” my dad questions. “And, Dani,” he pauses, “I want everything.” His voice is demanding, and his menacing eyes penetrate my soul. Gone with the loving, caring father he was before, before my mother tried to bring the club down. I can’t believe she had the nerve to make it look like I was part of it.

  His voice is cold and laced with warning, making me think hard before answering.

  “They asked if I knew Ricky, the boyfriend of Shadow’s mother, Cassie. I said no. The agent showed a picture
of Shadow carrying me out of Ricky and Cassie’s house, when you guys rescued me from being kidnapped, making me out to be a liar. So I said I woke up to Shadow carrying me and I don’t know or remember anything else.” I stop to look around the table at Locks and Bobby, their faces not giving any indication they believe me or not. “I didn’t tell them anything. I swear.”

  “She’s a liar, Prez,” Locks says as if I’m not even in the room. My hands begin to tremble with fear; if my dad listens to him, I won’t be alive much longer.

  “She’s my blood.” My father speaks with emotion. It takes me back. Maybe I have hope on my side after all.

  “I think she’s telling the truth,” Bobby says, looking right at me, his words making me smile slightly.

  “What the fuck would you know?” Locks snaps.

  “I got to know Firefly a little bit, and I think I would have seen something along that time to indicate she had something to do with it, and I didn’t,” Bobby insists. The name Firefly catches me off-guard. I remember when he gave it to me how ridiculous it sounded. Yet, I fell in love with it after Shadow said it was perfect for me; that I was his light in his cruel, dark world. Shadow. Where is he?

  “Vote,” Locks demands.

  Vote? What the hell does that mean?

  Bobby and my dad both look in his direction, Bobby’s face unreadable and my dad’s angry.

  “Fine, but until then take her to your room, Bobby. Get all the guys rounded up. I want this shit aired out now.” Bull moves his hand toward the door, indicating Bobby to take me away.

  I stand up, the chair scraping the hardwood floor with a screech. I make my way out of the doors, not looking back at the table, which will hold my fate.

  “I don’t need to stay in your room, Bobby. I can stay with Shadow in my old room,” I declare, shaking his grip off my shoulder as we head toward the hall.

  “No, you need to stay with me, Firefly. It’s for the best,” Bobby whispers softly as he tries to grab hold of my arm again.

  “You can shove that thought up your ass, Bobby. I’m not staying with you. Shadow wouldn’t allow it.” I look at him over my shoulder with raised eyebrows. He looks shocked at my crude tone, but if I’ve learned anything by all this, it’s that you can’t be soft. Soft means you’re weak, and weak can break you.

  I open the bedroom door to mine and Shadow’s room and see Shadow lying on the bed naked, a sheet wadded around his crotch. There are empty beer bottles on the floor, and the nightstand has drugs laid out across it.

  “Shad-“

  “Who the fuck are you?” a female voice interrupts from the en-suite bathroom the bedroom holds. Snapping my gaze from Shadow to her, I notice a tall, skinny woman. She has dark-brown hair which is long and tangled; overall, it’s just disgusting. She is tying up her slutty dress around her neck like she had been naked just moments before. My gaze slides back to Shadow, who looks like he’s seen a ghost. I suddenly feel sick to my stomach, and I want to claw my heart from my chest from the unbearable ache spreading from it.

  “What the fuck is she doin’ here?” Shadow asks Bobby as if I’m the stray dog who came in from the rain.

  That is the first thing that comes out of his mouth? No “I’m sorry, baby; it’s not what it looks like”? No, he doesn’t even try to hide that he just messed around on me.

  “Meeting now,” Bobby says, pulling me from the doorway. “Come on, Firefly.” I pull my arm from him and stare at Shadow, my eyes beginning to glaze over with tears. How could he? I want to jump on the bed and beat him in the head with the alarm clock sitting on the nightstand, but I can’t even move from the hurt radiating through my veins.

  “It’s all right, Firefly. I got you. Come on.” Bobby pulls me with a little more force to get my feet moving before he closes the door and opens the one directly across the hall.

  ***

  “You were gone for a few days. Everybody thought you were in on it, including Shadow,” Bobby explains, as I sit on the bed dumbfounded. His blue jeans hang low on his hips, and his white shirt is bunched upward on his hard stomach. I avert my eyes to the trashy floor.

  “My mother kept me, trying to use me as a witness,” I say flatly. Suddenly cold, I pull my leather jacket tightly around my body. Bobby nods in understanding as he hooks his fingers into his belt loops.

  “Hell, they let the brothers go pretty quickly when they couldn’t prove they had anything to do with Cassie’s death. They didn’t have shit on ‘em,” Bobby says, crossing his arms and widening his stance. I forgot I saw him running with a gun after Shadow’s mom, Cassie, had been shot. I guess he got away. I am still in shock my mother used Cassie as a criminal informant. My mother is like a venomous snake, slithering her way in any way she sees fit. Cassie almost killed me, pissed that Shadow had killed her boyfriend Ricky. She wanted to take Shadow’s only love, me. She got her wish, only it was my own flesh and blood who did the taking.

  “You killed Cassie,” I state. Bobby shrugs and looks the other direction. “You saved my life, thank you,” I add quietly.

  “I did what had to be done.” He looks right at me, his stare letting me know it was for the club, not me. We sit here silently, the air filled with so many questions but silence filling the unknown instead.

  “I just need to tell Shadow I didn’t have anything to do with my mom’s cancerous plans. Everything will go right back the way it was,” I say to myself more than to him. I’m delirious with hope, not seeing the betrayal of Shadows actions clearly.

  “You don’t actually believe that, do you?” Bobby looks at me like I’m an idiot. I shrug, knowing this is not going to be a simple process of forgive and forget with Shadow. His mom ruined him of trusting and loving easily, neglecting him and making him fend for himself at such a young age; makes him question who he can trust in this world if he can’t even depend on his own mother.

  “No,” I respond, throwing my head in my hands.

  “Look, stay in here, get a shower and I’ll come back and fill you in later,” Bobby explains, grabbing the door handle to the old, wooden door.

  I look around the room. It’s a mess. I’m sure the bathroom isn’t any better.

  Before I say another word, Bobby leaves and shuts the door behind him.

  Looking at the dirty room around me, my heart suddenly ceases beating. A sob escapes my mouth as I realize the extent of the hell my mother has left for me to endure. If I ever see her again, I might kill her, make her bleed as my heart is bleeding right now and Shadow, he just messed around on me without a hint of shame. I look down at my arms and see the leather jacket claiming them, my jacket claiming me as Shadow’s property, telling the world I’m his ol’ lady. My chest feels heavy and begins to sweat. I’m suffocating. I pull on the leather jacket, scratching and screaming to get the damn thing off. I’m not anything of Shadow’s anymore. I get it off and throw it across the room as if it’s a plague. A violent scream erupts from my throat in despair.

  Fuck Shadow!

  SHADOW

  My lungs take a second to regain airflow as Bobby slams the door shut. The last fucking person I thought I would ever see just walked into my room, Dani.

  I think she was in on the bust with her mom, using me to get information on the club and using me to get back at her mother in the process. Even with all that, I can’t get her out of my head. I still love the woman who used me and betrayed my club. How am I supposed to deal with that feeling of treachery? The only way I know how is drugs and women. It’s not working, though. It used to work before I knew Dani, before she became my Firefly, lighting up the dark torment, which was guiding my self-loathing. She was my drug rather than the drug of killing. Killing gave me control, made me feel like I had a handle of myself, of my life. Now nothing helps, no matter how many drugs I take or the amount. I snorted so much cocaine yesterday my nose bled, and the sight of women just makes me angry. Nothing can make me feel like Dani did, and nothing can numb the pain she caused.

  “That your gi
rl?” Mandy, or was it Sandy, asks me.

  “Get your shit and get out,” I say, sitting up on the bed. Just seeing her makes my jaw clench.

  “She the reason you can’t get it up?” she asks, her hands on her hips.

  Like I said, even the sight of other women angers me. I still try to entertain the idea I want pussy but once I get them naked, I can’t stand to look at them. Knowing it’s not Dani and the fact that the only woman I want is a fucking traitor makes my stomach turn. Once I got this slut in here, I couldn’t even touch her, making me angry at myself. Dani did this to me. She broke me beyond repair. My fucking Firefly threw me into a darkness I can’t escape.

  “Bitch, if you know what’s good for you, you’ll get the hell out, now.” I point at the door. “Just your presence makes me want to kill you, let alone the idea of fucking you,” I say coldly. Her mouth forms a gaping ‘O’ perfectly; I’m sure she would give amazing head. I watch her turn in anger as she slams the door behind her.

  I get up, get dressed, put on yesterday’s clothes and throw on my cut. Running my hands through my hair, which is in desperate need of a trim and wash, I walk out the bedroom door. I stop and stare at the door across from me, knowing it holds Dani the remedy to my pain, but a toxin to my mind. How could she play me so well? I’ll never forget the feeling I got when her mother picked her up off the ground yelling about how she was a witness. I was told Dani was telling them everything, but I hoped it was a lie and they were just trying to get me to rat myself out. There are no words to describe it, but what boggles my mind more than anything is why did Dani come back?

  ***

  I sit in my spot at the table and instantly smell Dani’s perfume. Her smell of peaches fills the air, making the hair on my neck stand on end. I look across the table and see Bobby staring back at me, his face in a scowl. I’m sure he’s not happy that he and Dani just walked in on what looked like me fucking around. Fuck him.

  “Dani’s here,” Bull says, cutting to the chase as he lights a cigarette

  “What?” Hawk’s scratchy voice asks, along with everyone else who is just as surprised.