Page 8 of Sac-rifice (RBMC: Cleveland, Ohio Chapter #7)

I wasn’t too far from them, but, somehow, I had gone unnoticed, so I was safe to judge them from a distance for now.

I considered my options. I could either stay true to myself by continuing to hate bikers and ignore the job offer, or I had to swallow my pride, pretending I could tolerate leather cults.

They both wore leather vests with the same logo stretched across the biggest part of their backs.

A skeleton face with a beard was positioned in the center, and a crown rested slightly crooked on the skull.

The name above the logo was “Royal Bastards Motorcycle Club”.

Below the logo the words “Cleveland, Ohio” were stitched onto a worn almost U-shaped patch.

Even though I’d spent the better part of my childhood here, I didn’t remember ever being in direct contact with any of the members.

Of course, I knew of them. Everyone in the area did.

They were notorious. There was one common fact of knowledge anyone in Cleveland knew about those guys—no one fucked with them without suffering the consequences.

They weren’t known for kissing babies while holding local charity events and weren’t the people you wanted to take part as a welcoming committee.

They were dangerous outlaws and menaces to the area.

At least, that was more or less how Mom had put it when we were kids after she scolded the boys for talking to a guy with a spider tattoo on his hand while we were at the gas station.

I shuddered thinking about Tate getting mixed up with all of them, but he was in Boise.

Maybe things were different in Idaho. I doubted it, though.

The man on the bike to the left glanced back at me, and then his chin dipped down as his hand flattened just above his eyes, shielding them from the sun. Every muscle in my body froze in place. Surely he wasn’t looking at me like that, was he?

He cussed. “Fuck. I’ll be sleeping on the couch again tonight over that stupid fucking typo. One letter. A fucking D,” he complained to his buddy.

“D is pretty important if you ask me,” the other prick retorted, laughing when the first guy flipped him off.

There was something oddly familiar about him, something that hit too close to home.

Beads of sweat dripped down my temples, and the heat had nothing to do with it.

My heart pounded against my chest, and I had the sudden urge to vomit.

“For everything in this world, please don’t let him notice me,” I nervously whispered to myself, praying for once in my life things would go my way.

I needed to run, but neither of my feet bothered budging.

I had to know if it was him. Working at the pet shop wasn’t going to be a possibility if this was somewhere he hung out.

I wasn’t strong enough to see him every day—not after what happened.

There was a time in my life where seeing him was the highlight of my day.

He was my safe place. But this wasn’t our past, and I wasn’t safe if it was him.

This was the present, and if that man was who I thought, I had to get out of here.

And fast. He ruined my life back then, and I refused to let it happen again.

I wasn’t able to protect myself when we were younger, but I sure as heck would now.

His head turned in the opposite direction from where I was, and I blew out a ragged breath.

“That’s right. Do what you do best. Leave,” I softly coaxed him, fully aware I was the only one who heard my words.

A sudden lump caught in the middle of my throat, and my heartbeat was so incredibly strong behind my ribs that I had to grit my teeth from the pain.

I needed to calm down before my heart exploded and burst completely out of my chest. On its own accord, my palm flattened against my chest, and my body edged forward.

My feet tripped over each other, and I grabbed the wall to balance myself.

I was lightheaded. No. No. No! I refused to have a panic attack, especially here.

This wasn’t fight or flight. What was happening was one of the other less talked about trauma responses. This was freeze.

“Miss, are you okay?” Prick number one asked, tilting his head to the side, and pushed the kickstand to the ground with his boot.

I had to get a hold of myself. This wasn’t happening. Not now. It’d been years since I had a panic attack, and I had been in way worse situations than this. Hell, the guy trying his best to wear my crotch as an oven mitt barely phased me, so why did my body react to this any differently?

He got off his motorcycle and stood there silently, watching me, waiting for me to answer.

Maybe if I did, they’d leave. “Yep. Perfectly fine. I don’t need any help.

Just enjoying the fresh Cleveland air on a nice day.

” My words came out in a jumbled mess, but I somehow managed to force them out.

Honestly, I could have been mooing and wouldn’t have cared.

Talking meant moving lips, and hopefully, that also meant the rest of my body would get its act together.

I blinked quickly, testing out my theory and balled my fingers into fists before stretching them back out.

YES! I could move! Crisis averted…kind of.

I was still here and, judging by the way the man was blankly staring at me, making a scene all by myself.

There was no telling if he understood me or not, but I hoped he made out enough to be convinced I didn’t need help.

What I needed was for him to get back on his bike and drive in the direction of wherever he was going before he saw me.

He also needed to take his friend, who I refused to look in the face, with him.

“You must not be from around here or you’re a damned liar.

It smells like a swamp, and that’s on a good da…

” the other man started to correct me as the green eyes I never wished to see again found me.

I thought he had moved on, or at least had hoped that was the case when I had nowhere else to go.

Breaking up with my cheating boyfriend left me homeless, so moving back here was really the only option I had.

Isaac had agreed to help me out, but the one stipulation he had was me moving in with him.

I didn’t want that any more than he did, so we compromised, both settling for Cleveland—a place we both knew.

“Little Dove?” Shane asked in an uneven voice, and the amount of pain packed into those two words was enough to knock the air completely out of my body.

My teeth sank into my bottom lip, and I slowly shook my head.

I wasn’t doing this. Not now. Not ever. He didn’t save me like he’d promised.

I’d saved myself and had done a shitty job of it.

Honestly, I was still doing a shitty job.

“I can’t.” The words left my lips, and I bolted down the street.

“Wait!” Shane called after me. Everything within me begged me to turn back and look at him, but I refused. Seeing him again ripped a wound open that had never fully healed in the first place. There was no telling what actually talking to him would do to me, but I was certain I wouldn’t survive it.

“No! I won’t let you break me again,” I sobbed with tears flowing down my face, knowing it wasn’t loud enough for him to hear.

“I won’t survive you this time.” My speed slowed as I spotted a large bush just across the road.

It was the perfect size for me to hide behind until it was safe for me to head to my car… after Shane left.

I didn’t know the man he was today, but the boy I knew years ago always found me. Back then, I wanted him to find me. Today was profoundly different. We didn’t share a deep bond like friendship anymore. The only thing tying us together was heartache and tragedy.