Page 4 of Jett

The streets around the clubhouse are quiet at this time of night and it isn’t long before I’m opening up my baby on the highway. Cold wind rushes over my face, creeping into the pockets of exposed flesh created by my hoodie.

I slow as I take the exit and a few minutes later, I turn the corner onto her street. This part of Redfern sucks. It’s mostly all mum and pop shops, and green grocers who’ve long since closed, and abandoned buildings. But it’s not safe for any woman, let alone someone as fucking beautiful as Raine.

I pull into the shadows created by an abandoned building. The alley is dark—it’s always dark—and I can’t see the front doors of her apartment block from here, so I park my bike, remove my helmet, and walk up the deserted street.Why she lives in this shithole is beyond me. I wait in the dismal laneway, staring at the piece-of-shit cars parked under one gloomy streetlight.

“Get off me! Please. Get off!”

What the fuck? That’s Raine, alright, but I can’t see her. She screams, and my blood curdles.

I pull the gun from my cut and cock it. Then I crouch and hurry across the road as quietly as I can, using the cars to hide me from view. I peek around the butt-end of the vehicle. Some arsehole has her pinned to the ground as she sobs. His dick is out, and her jeans are down around her knees. Her perfect, lily-white arse is exposed to the street, and she’s bucking to unseat the dead man on top of her. And he is a dead man. Whether he actually got his cock wet or not, I’ve never seen a deader fucker.

I step around the car and come up behind them. This arsehole’s too busy getting his rape on to notice me. I lean down and shove the pistol into the base of his skull.

“Get the fuck off her,” I say quietly. He stills. I grab the back of his hoodie with one hand and yank him upright. “Drop the fucking gun.”

“Okay, okay,” he says in a thick Russian accent. He drops the pistol and holds his hands up in the air, as if I could be placated with a simple gesture after he just tried to rape the woman I love. “We were just fooling around, man.”

I kick the gun away from us and glance at Raine. She’s trembling so bad she may as well have Parkinson’s. There are grazes on her face and hands, her knees too, but I don’t see any blood between her legs.

“Raine, babe, you okay?”

Okay?O-fucking-kay? What kind of stupid-arse motherfucker asks a question like that?

Her baby blues meet mine, and her face crumples as a timid cry escapes her throat. She scrambles to pull up her jeans, but her body tremors and sobs wrack her frame as tears and snot run down her face.

That’s all the confirmation I need. I slam the arsehole up against the fence, shoot him once in the dick and then again in the head. Blood mists my face, and I wipe it off with the hem of my shirt as his body slumps to the ground.

Raine staggers to her feet. She screams, but covers her mouth as her wide eyes spill more tears. I glance around to make sure we haven’t been seen, then I grab her bag from the ground and take hold of her elbow, tugging her down the street. No way has no one heard that commotion.

I move us into the shadows beside my bike. She’s shaking so hard she has to lean against the dilapidated brick building to stay upright.

“What the fuck are you doin’ walking home after midnight? Where the fuck’s your car?”

“It’s in the shop. Damn it, Grim. I just had a gun put to my head and a man trying to rape me, and you’re yelling at me?”

I scrub a hand over my stubble. “You’re right but, babe, what the fuck is your car doing in the shop? Didn’t you just have it fixed a month ago?”

“It was more than I thought it was going to be. The guy’s an arsehole and wants an extra grand for it.”

“Why didn’t you tell anyone—Jett? Kick? Fuck, why didn’t you tell me, Raine?”

“Because it’s no one else’s business.”

“Oh, it’s our fucking business. You’re club property.”

She stiffens. “I am not one of your whores.”

“No, but you work for us. You clean up our shit and pour our drinks, and listen to those other whiney fuckers go on about their pathetic sex lives. You’re family—that makes you club property.”

“Stop yelling at me!”

I hold up my hands in surrender. “Get on. We gotta go.”

“But my apartment—”

“Have you got any idea how close you just came to having your pretty head splattered all over the footpath? You’re not going home until I say you’re going home. You’re coming with me. Get on the bike.”

I grab the helmet from the handlebars and step closer. After placing it on her head, I fasten it under her chin. She stares blankly up at me, her whole body trembling.

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