Page 16 of Rider Daddies (Venom Vultures MC #6)

LUCIA

Manual and Tristan might not be the end of me, but this sickening mildew will be if I don’t get my ass into gear and escape this hellhole.

Except, I don’t have full control over my muscles. Not yet. I open my eyes and take a better look at my surroundings. Everything is black. The walls, the carpet…everything.

Or is that just because I can’t see?

It takes all of my strength just to raise my hand and rub my eyes so I can get them to focus. My head is dizzy, like the earth is spinning at a speed far too fast for me to keep up.

I tug on my eyes, forcing them to open. Everything feels hot. I feel sweat trickle down my forehead, landing on my lips. I taste the salt and realize just how fucking dehydrated I am.

The room slowly starts to come into view, one piece of furniture at a time. First, a mattress sitting on a metal bed frame. Next, a closet, both doors flung open to display its empty inside. I manage to move my head and see a desk and chair—empty again.

Where the fuck am I?

It’s night still, crickets chirping loud outside.

I force myself up. That’s when I remember I cut my elbow on glass. I grit my teeth, wincing as I turn it around to have a look. Somebody has removed the glass shard and wrapped the wound up in layers of bandage.

How caring of them.

I use the wall to help myself up and lean against it to take in more of my surroundings. A pain starts to break out on my forehead. Putting my hand over it, I feel a bump.

Maybe I was annoying Manual too much and he decided to knock me out.

A cool breeze blows against my skin, ruffling my skirts. It takes me a minute to realize that a sliding balcony door has been left open.

I rush out of it as fast as my aching body lets me—anything to escape the intoxicating smell of mildew. Stars shine bright in the sky, thousands of them. That must mean I’m still relatively far away from the city.

It’s not long before I’m hitting the walkway edge that connects all second-floor rooms.

A motel.

An abandoned one by the looks of it.

I lean back over the balcony and check out the rusted “Motel Sunshine” sign that looks like it once used to be lit-up neon.

The name definitely sums up the vibe. The gray walls and forgotten parking lot definitely give the place a cheery appeal.

There are all but two cars parked here—I wouldn’t count the third since it’s missing two wheels.

Wind blows in through the desert, sending my hair into the air. Goose bumps spike up on my arms. It’s a pity Manual didn’t let me take one of the boys’ leather jackets before kidnapping me. I feel colder than a fucking freezer.

Or is that just because reality is starting to set in?

Let’s be honest—I was dumped at my own wedding. Tristan might’ve attempted to take me back, but it was all bullshit. He’s made his bed and now he has to lie in it.

Except, things aren’t so simple anymore.

Tristan was fooling me this entire time.

He didn’t love me. He wanted to own me.

It all makes sense now. Things moved fast between us. Ridiculously fast. I went from girlfriend to fiancée in the space of seconds, it felt like. He told me everything I wanted to hear.

On our first date, he asked me what my biggest physical insecurity was. I said my nose because I had the same one as my father, so from that day forward, he’d say how well my nose fit the rest of my face. How I didn’t need to be insecure.

He was fucking manipulating me this whole time.

I clench my hands into fists over the railings, feeling my knuckles crack. For his sake, I hope Tristan’s not loitering around here. Not if he wants his face to resemble a smashed cherry pie.

That’s why he was forcing that wedding ring onto my finger at the clubhouse.

He wanted to have authority over me. Own me so his perverted ass could do whatever he liked. Sell me. Rape me.

Willow and I will never be on good terms again, but she fucking saved my life.

I shake my head, laughing. If anybody is watching me right now, I bet they think I’m crazy. My outfit is giving medieval wench who just got off her shift. My hair has seen better days. I have a lump on my forehead and a bandaged-up elbow.

You could say that Tristan tried to claim me. This is exactly what I’m talking about. Men are all the same, just in slightly different fonts. They all want to control. To take ownership of things, whether it’s a bike or a woman.

I must say, the biker brothers’ means of claiming ownership was much more alluring. They almost had me.

But not quite.

I assess how far away the ground is beneath me. I could make the jump and still have all bones and ligaments intact, no problem. What concerns me are the two men doing laps around the perimeter of the parking lot. They must be security guards hired by Manual to prevent victims from escaping.

They look like giants, the pair of them. Every time one of them comes into the light, I examine their faces. Dealing with clients at the law firm makes you a pro at reading facial expressions. Right now, all I’m getting is pissed off and bored.

I bet they’re mad that Manual threw them on the night shift.

One of them catches my eye, which stops him in his tracks for a second. I stare down at him, waiting for him to strike up a conversation, but he simply looks back down and continues to walk.

“Ouch, it looks like they knocked you out real bad.”

I turn and see a girl emerge from the motel room next to mine, a painful look on her face as she surveys me.

“Part of it was my own fault.” I raise my elbow. “Thought it would be a good idea to smash car window glass with this thing. Adrenaline is a crazy bitch.”

“At least you tried to fight them.” The girl tightens a silk robe around her slender body and stands beside me. “I just seized up and let them take me. Probably didn’t help that I was stoned out of my ass.”

I laugh, but the smile quickly fades when I see how innocent the girl looks. “How old are you?”

“Seventeen.”

Fucking sickos.

“What’s going on here?” I ask her.

“What do you think?”

“So, what’s Manual’s deal? He steals girls away from their homes and puts them up here in this crappy motel as storage until somebody decides to buy us?”

“Pretty much.” The girl looks out at the motel with a vacant look in her eye.

“How long have you been here?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. There’s no clocks. The only way to work out the time is by looking at the sun.”

I chew on my lip, looking out at the motel with her.

Home sweet home.

“We’ll find a way to get out of here,” I try to assure her.

“I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard that line,” she says, eyes still staring straight out ahead of her.

“I’m serious. If I say I’m going to do something, I do it.”

“I don’t doubt that,” the girl says. “But you don’t understand. It’s impossible. Girls have tried to escape in the dead of night, but these two are always on the prowl…and they don’t miss nothin’.” She turns to me. “You wanna know what happens when they catch you?”

I stare at her, preparing for the worst.

“Something worse than death.”

A shiver runs through me. This time, it’s not from the cold wind.

“How are these cunts getting away with all of this?” I ask.

The girl widens her blue eyes, fright taking over her face.

“Shush. You wanna watch what you say around here. Manual’s men must have hidden microphones in all the rooms. A girl was relocated because she was talking shit about one of her handlers.

Calling him a rhinoceros-looking gimp with a nose that looked more like a horn. ”

I burst into laughter.

The girl elbows me in the side, giving me another cautionary look.

My laughter fades. “How many men are working here?”

“Too many,” she says. “I was taken by five. They offered me free weed at a club in Vegas because I apparently looked like I “needed mellowing out.” Do you know what’s even crazier?

I could’ve sworn that I was being followed by someone for weeks.

I brought it up to my daddy but he said I was just being paranoid, watching too much true crime.

” She shrugs. “He wasn’t lying about that, but I had a weird feeling in my gut.

It was like it was trying to tell me something. ”

I stare at the ground as the security guards begin a new lap around the parking lot.

Should I be scared that I never once got a gut feeling that something was wrong about Tristan? That fucker really knew what he was doing.

“I was about to marry my stalker.”

The girl frowns. “What?”

“We met at a law firm. I was a new recruit and he was my senior. We dated for a year. Tristan Hampton—do you know him?”

“Tristan?” The girl’s eyes widen for a moment, but it’s not long before she’s shaking her head and rolling her eyes. “I shouldn’t be surprised. He’s an odd one.”

“You know him?”

“Not well. I heard on the grapevine that he’s been working with Manual for about a year now.”

I frown. “That’s about the length of time I’ve known him.”

“Weird,” she says, staring into empty space again. “Tristan is a strange one. He works closely with Manual as one of his most trusted employees. You never saw the signs when you were together that he might’ve been involved in a ring?”

Like I said, master manipulator.

“Nothing. He would sometimes stay at work until late. I guess that’s when he was pursuing certain…underground ventures. But I trusted Tristan. Well. I confided in him until I saw him getting with my best friend on our wedding day. I left the state after that and broke it off.”

“So, how come you’re here now?”

God, the last few days have been such a whirlwind that I don’t even know myself. Between being fingered in public by three brothers, to being taken away by a sex trafficking kingpin, I really don’t know how I’m supposed to process all of this.