Page 34 of Kick

“He was a cop,” I say, resolutely. “His weapons, the rigid posture. He had special patches sewn onto the sleeve of his uniform. And a duty belt.”

“You can buy that shit off eBay,” he says, leaning forward on his elbows again and piercing me with that narrowed gaze. “How do you know for certain that he was a cop? Do you know the weapons were standard police issue? Did he have a badge? What did the patches on his shirt say?”

“I’m sorry, I was a little distracted by the knife he held to my throat to pay too much attention to the fucking patches on his shirt,” I shout.

The biker sets his jaw. A muscle in his cheek ticks, and his eyes glaze over as he clenches his right hand into a fist. He doesn’t like it when I yell. He’s going to have to get used to it.

“I know this might make you a little uncomfortable, but I need to know this shit so I don’t wind up serving a sentence for killin’ a cop who had nothing to do with your abduction.”

“A little uncomfortable?” I spit. “You wanna know what’s uncomfortable? You wanna know exactly what they did to me? He fucked my arse, until I bled out all over the floor. Then he raped me with his baton while the fucking Priest egged him on. They tied me to a post and beat me senseless. The Priest liked to quote bible passages, and call me a whore as he raped me over and over until I begged for him to kill me. Until I promised to repent for sins I never fucking committed.

“The Dentist liked to knock me out and wake me up in the middle of an extraction. He liked to hold my mouth and nose closed until I was choking on my own blood, and passing out from oxygen deprivation. And that’s just the stuff my brain hasn’t repressed.

“You want me to give you information that tells you for certain that he was a cop? I can’t do that. I don’t know the difference between a real uniformed officer and a fake. But I know in my gut he was a cop. Just like I know that priest is out there somewhere, sitting in a confessional booth, hearing the sins of his congregation, and drizzling holy water over the top of babies’ heads for baptismal rites. I know I wasn’t the first girl they’ve done this to. And unless we find them, I sure as fuck won’t be the last.” My breath comes in short, hard gasps. My hands shake and tears sting my eyes. Frustrated, heartbroken, and so full of rage I can taste it in the back of my throat, I stand, and instantly regret it. I dash for the bathroom and manage to get the seat up before I spill the contents of my stomach into a porcelain bowl that looks as if it hasn’t been cleaned since it was installed.

The biker’s shadow looms over me. He stands in the middle of the tiny room, probably not knowing what the hell to do. I vomit again, and again, and then I pause, leaning over the bowl. Hot tears sting my face. My hair is yanked back. I cry out and skitter away from his touch, wedging myself as close to the wall as possible. “Don’t touch me. Don’t fucking touch me.”

He holds up his hands in a warding gesture and backs away. “Just tryin’ to help, Little Spitfire.”

I wipe the vomit from my chin with the hem of the T-shirt he’d given me. I cover my mouth with my hands. The levee, the wall I’ve been building to fortify my heart, my spirit, crumbles, and just like that I fall apart completely. I don’t know how to deal with any of this. I can’t reconcile where I am from with where I was a few days ago, and where I am now. I want to see my mum. I want to hug my dad, something I can’t remember doing for the longest time.

The biker moves from the doorway. Without a word he stalks from the bathroom, through the living area and out the door, slamming it behind him. I lay down on the floor, curling into a foetal position. I thought I could give them what they wanted, and in turn he’d help me to take the Priest out, but reliving that stuff? I don’t know if I can do it. I don’t know if I have it in me. I don’t know if I’m strong enough to face all the things I don’t remember from that warehouse of horrors.

Ihad to help. Hearing her cry like that, hearing her fall apart, and not being able to do … something. It was rippin’ me apart. Which is fuckin’ ridiculous. I don’t know this girl from any other bitch on the street. I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing. I glance up at the late-night chemist from the parking lot.

And I don’t know how the fuck I got here.

I flip the kickstand down and take off my helmet, sliding the fastened strap over the handle bars. And then I ease off the bike and head inside the chemist. It’s warm in here, chasing away the wind-chill from the cold July night. My presence is announced with an annoying fuckin’dingand I head straight for the aisle with all the shit to fix upset stomachs. I pick up some antacids, some Panadol and then hit the fridge for lemonade, snagging a bag of potato chips on the way to the register. I pay the bored-looking chick on the front counter and then head outside and hang the sack of goodies from the handlebars. I left not knowing where or why the fuck I was going, so my backpack is back at the clubhouse. It’s late, and I likely won’t come across any cops in the three blocks back to the compound anyway.

When I pull in, Tank is leaning up against the outside of the garage. I haven’t seen him since the incident with Ivy in the hall. Grim said he’d taken Ivy to his big fancy fuck-off house in the woods, which admittedly shocked the hell outta me. He’d be better off dropping her at the nearest rehab clinic and getting her into a fuckin’ methadone program, but what the fuck could I do about it? I’m the one that left her in that fuckin’ state in the first place, and everything I’ve done from the time I first got that bitch on her back up until the way I fucked with her in the hall has just encouraged her behaviour, given her hope for something more, when there just isn’t hope—not for me, not for her, not for us.

I take off my helmet, pull the bag from the handlebars and step out of the garage. I’m met with a flying fist, a slash of pain and a pulsing eye socket. “Ah fuck!” I stagger back, drop the bag, and hold my hand to my eye to stem the pain radiating around my whole fuckin’ skull. “What the fuck are you doin’, cunt fuck?”

“Been dealin’ with cleaning up your shit for the last two fuckin’ days. Bitch is a goddamn mess. Won’t eat, won’t sleep, won’t even let me touch her. You fuckin’ broke her, man, and who the hell do you think gets to be the one left holdin’ the fuckin’ pieces?”

“Ivy’s not your fuckin’ responsibility. It’s not your job to step in and take my place, brother.”

“No? Who the fuck else is gonna clean up your mess and make sure the bitch doesn’t OD?”

“I don’t know, her fuckin’ family?” I say, but I know as well as he does that Ivy has no family. Only a sick son of a bitch for a dad who fucked her up so royally in the first place. “Bitch has problems beyond what you and I can fix. She needs help, and she needs away from this clubhouse.”

He shakes out his fist and throws back his head with a roar of frustration. “I wanna beat your fuckin’ head in for this.”

“Yeah? Why the fuck stop at one punch?”

“Don’t fuckin’ test me,” he warns, and then scrubs a hand over his face. “I know why you did what you did. I don’t blame you for it. But I won’t lie, if you so much as talk to her in the future, if you build her up again and give her hope that something might one day happen between the two of you, I’ll put you to ground, brother.”

For a beat all I do is stare at him. Tank, who didn’t kill me when I told him I’d shot down our entire chapter, the dude who feels nothing, is all fuckin’ twisted up over a girl. “Fuck me, does she know your boner’s the size of fuckin’ Uluru for her? All that shit about kicking her out ’cause she’s crying all over the place? That was all you covering up some unrequited love bullshit.”

“Shut the fuck up.” He turns and stomps towards the clubhouse.

I pick up my bag of goodies and start after him. “How long you been pinin’ after that bitch, brother?”

“You breathe a word of this shit to anyone and I’ll fuckin’ gut you in your sleep. You got me? I will put you to ground so fuckin’ fast your—”

“Jesus Christ, don’t get your fucking panties all twisted up your arse.”

“She doesn’t see me that way.”

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