Silence. Long enough that I'd peeked out of the closet, needing to see. My parents stood in the kitchen like boxers in separate corners. My mother in her Walmart cashier vest, still wearing her name tag. My father in full leather, patches gleaming under the harsh overhead light.

"You're dragging me down, Diane." His voice was cold as February rain. "Both of you. The medical bills, the special needs, the constant fucking need. I'm thirty-two years old. I've got a life to live."

Special needs. He meant my asthma, the inhaler I needed but we couldn't always afford. The emergency room visits when I couldn't breathe. The way my mother had to call out of work to take care of me, losing jobs, losing insurance, losing everything.

"She's your daughter." My mother's last attempt, already knowing it wouldn't work.

"She's your problem now."

I'd pressed Mr. Friendly harder against my face, his button eyes cutting into my cheek. Even at seven, I'd understood: I was the problem. The sick kid. The burden. The reason Daddy couldn't have nice things or freedom or whatever waited in Chicago with a fresh patch and no responsibilities.

Back in the present, thunder crashed hard enough to rattle the shelter windows. The pink dress hung limp in my hands, rhinestones catching the flickering light.

I thought about grabbing Mr. Friendly from my locker right now, but decided against it. I could give him a cuddle when I was back at my apartmetnt.

The next memory came whether I wanted it or not: standing at my bedroom window that night, nose fogging the glass. My mother behind me, trying to sound brave. "Just a business trip, baby. Daddy has to go help his friends with something important."

But I'd seen her eyes, red and swollen. Seen the way her hands shook as she tucked me in. Heard her crying in the bathroom after she thought I was asleep.

The motorcycle had started up at exactly 11:17 p.m. I knew because I'd been watching my alarm clock, the red numbers burning into my retinas.

The engine revved once, twice, like he was making sure the whole neighborhood knew he was leaving.

Then the sound had faded, carrying away my father and any chance we had at normal.

When Mom passed, the paramedics said it was diabetic ketoacidosis—when your body starts eating itself because it can't process sugar anymore. But I knew the truth. She'd died of being abandoned. Of being told she wasn't worth staying for.

Lightning flashed, illuminating the thrift store in stark white. The storm was almost here. I needed to finish up, grab my things from my locker, and get to my van before the rain started in earnest. The last thing I needed was to get stranded at the shelter overnight.

T he rain hit like a slap, zero to biblical in seconds.

I pressed myself against the shelter's brick wall, keys already in my fist like the world's most pathetic brass knuckles.

The overhang offered maybe three feet of protection from the downpour, just enough to let me pretend I was waiting for a break in the weather instead of working up the nerve to sprint for my van.

Twenty feet. That's all. Twenty feet through a monsoon to my rusty salvation. The van squatted in its usual spot, collecting water like a bathtub with wheels. I could see streams running off the roof, pooling around the bald tires. Just perfect.

"On three," I muttered, rain misting my face despite the overhang. "One . . . two . . ."

That's when I heard it—voices carrying over the storm. Male voices, laughing. The kind of laughter that had nothing to do with humor and everything to do with power. My keys bit into my palm as I tracked the sound to the dumpster alcove across the lot.

Three motorcycles. Even through the rain, I could see the patches on their jackets, and my blood turned to slush. The snake eating its tail. Iron Serpents.

The club had a grim reputation in the area. They weren’t really a club, more like a criminal gang. Extortion, gun running, drugs. You name it, they were involved with it.

They'd formed a loose semicircle around someone pressed against the brick wall.

The security light above the dumpsters flickered with each lightning strike, giving me snapshot glimpses: blonde hair plastered to a thin face.

Skinny arms wrapped around an even skinnier body.

A girl. Maybe fifteen, probably younger, definitely in the kind of trouble that ended badly.

"Come on, baby." The biggest biker's voice carried that false friendliness I remembered from my childhood. “Come for a little ride with us."

The girl—Jessie—shook her head hard enough to fling water from her stringy hair. She was wearing a tank top despite the cold, track marks visible on her arms even from here.

"I can't." Her voice was thin as paper, barely audible over the rain. "Please, I can't go back."

"Sure you can." Another Serpent, this one with a gray beard that made him look almost grandfatherly until you saw his eyes. "Buzz misses his favorite girl. Got your room all ready and everything."

Her room. Christ. I knew what that meant.

We all knew what that meant. The shelter saw girls like Jessie sometimes—when they managed to escape, when they lived long enough to try.

Elena kept a special locked cabinet with rape kits and emergency contraception and the kind of paperwork that broke your heart to fill out.

The girl pressed harder against the wall, and I saw her looking for exits that didn't exist. The Serpents had cut off the parking lot route. The only other way was past the dumpsters, into traffic. In this storm, with this visibility, that was suicide.

Unless someone gave her another option.

My feet moved before my brain caught up. Stupid, stupid, stupid. But I couldn't watch this happen. Couldn't stand under my safe little overhang while they dragged her back to hell. My mother would have helped. Even sick, even dying, she'd have tried.

"Hey!" The word ripped out of me before I could swallow it back. "Leave her alone!"

Three heads turned in perfect synchronization. Predators recognizing prey. The biggest one grinned, and lightning illuminated gold teeth that probably cost more than my van.

"Well, well, well." He took a step toward me, and I recognized the rolling gait of a man who'd spent more time on a bike than on foot. "Boys, you see what I see?"

"A tasty little treat." Gray-beard's eyes went wide.

"I’m no one’s treat."

"Sure you are." Gray-beard had moved to flank me, cutting off my retreat to the shelter door. "You know, you remind me of someone. Can’t put my finger on—"

Movement caught my eye. Jessie, using the distraction to edge toward the street. Smart girl. Survivor's instincts.

"There she goes!" The third Serpent, silent until now, pointed at Jessie's retreating form.

"Let her run," Gold-teeth commanded, never taking his eyes off me. "There’s something about this one I like."

But I wasn’t going to let them have me.

I ran like my seven-year-old self always wished she could—feet pounding through puddles that soaked me to the knees, lungs burning with each desperate breath.

Behind me, motorcycle engines roared to life, the sound cutting through rain and thunder like it was nothing.

Three engines. Three predators. One prey.

My sneakers skidded on wet pavement as I careened around the corner onto Fifth Street.

The flooded gutters had turned the road into a river, and I splashed through ankle-deep water that dragged at every step.

Lightning strobed overhead, turning the world into a horror movie—flash of empty street, flash of rain-slicked walls, flash of nowhere left to run.

The engines grew louder. Closer. They were taking their time, knowing I couldn't outrun a Harley any more than a rabbit could outrun a wolf. This was sport for them. Entertainment. Let the little princess run herself ragged before they collected their prize.

Miller's Hardware loomed on my left, and I cut hard into the alley beside it. Narrow space, barely wide enough for their bikes. Maybe it would slow them—

The lead engine roared past the alley mouth, overshooting. Brakes squealed. I gained maybe ten seconds, maybe less. My legs shook with exhaustion and adrenaline. Every breath tasted like copper and rain.

I burst out onto Main Street, feet hydroplaning on the slick asphalt. My van was back at the shelter, might as well have been on the moon. No sanctuary, no safety, no—

A massive shadow blocked my path. Another motorcycle, engine growling like something prehistoric. I slammed to a stop so hard my knees buckled, certain I'd run straight into their trap. This was how they'd done it—herded me like cattle straight to the slaughter.

But the rider wasn't wearing Serpent colors.

"Get on!" The biker from the shelter, his voice cutting through the storm like a blade. Those careful eyes weren't careful now—they were fierce, urgent, protective in a way that made no sense. "Now!"

Every instinct screamed no. Every lesson my father had taught me in his absence said this was trading one predator for another. Bikers were all the same. They took what they wanted. They left when they were done. They—

The Serpents' engines roared closer, maybe a block away. Maybe less.

I vaulted onto the bike.

My body knew what to do even if my mind rebelled—legs gripping the seat, arms wrapping around his waist like I'd done this a thousand times instead of never. His leather jacket was warm despite the rain, solid in a way that made my chest tight with something that wasn't quite fear.

"Hold on." He didn't wait for a response, just gunned it.

The bike leaped forward like a living thing, and I pressed my face against his back, eyes squeezed shut.

We shot through the storm like a bullet, tires finding grip where there shouldn't have been any.

He leaned into turns that should have sent us sliding, navigated flooded intersections like he could see through the rain.

I could hear the Serpents behind us, their engines angry now.

No more playing with their food. But the biker beneath me clearly knew these streets, knew every alley and shortcut.

We cut through the old industrial district, between abandoned warehouses that echoed our engine song back at us.

Under the railroad bridge where homeless camps huddled out of the rain.

Past the elementary school where I'd hidden in the library during recess, reading books about girls whose fathers came home.

The Serpents' engines faded. One block's distance became two, became three. They were losing us in the maze of Ironridge's rain-drowned streets, and I felt something unknot in my chest. We were going to make it. Somehow, impossibly, we were going to make it.

I just didn’t know how far he was going to take me, or how different life was about to become.