Page 4

Chapter Four

Summerville Dax

A nger flows so harshly through Dax it borders on hatred. Hatred of the Kingsmen. Hatred of the world. Hatred of Chance.

The woman in the picture is nothing short of dirty and sickly, but Dax knows it's Dani. He'd know her anywhere. And he hates that Lex was right. He never believed that bullshit story about Dani was true, but he was told repeatedly he had to get over it in order to move on. He needed to believe it, and one of the people who kept pushing it was Chance. And Dax wasn't the only one he pushed like that.

Dax barely knows how he got to his bike or the address he's already forgotten, but the universe seems to propel him to the right place. He hears the other motorcycles behind him, but he has no idea who followed. It doesn't sound like all of them, but he doesn't turn around to look. It feels like even the simplest deviation from what he's doing will take this small sliver of something he never thought he'd have away. That he'll lose Dani all over again.

Jumping off the bike, he barely gets the kickstand out, and he races up to the house. Heavy footsteps follow him, and there's no plan. There's no talk about what's to happen. He just has to get to Dani. Maybe he should have had a plan.

His shoulder rams into the shitty front door of the white house with the paint peeling, and he's greeted with ten men on the other side jumping up and rushing towards him. It occurs at this moment that there should have maybe been at least a couple minutes of discussion before rushing in, but it's too late now.

“Get the fuck back!” Undertaker's loud, booming voice shouts, and Dax sees a shadow over him. The man really is huge.

Swinging a fist, Dax knocks out the first Kingsmen that rushes towards him. After he's fallen to the ground, he stomps on his head until he knows he's dead. This motherfucker stands between him and Dani, and he will never walk out of here.

Venom whips by Dax in a flash with his relatively new platinum hair, and he lunges at a larger man, grabs his neck, and twists. The cracking as he breaks the man's neck hits Dax's ears, and he sees the Kingsmen fall to the ground, limp. Venom turns and begins a fist assault on another man who raised a gun towards Dax, and even though no one particularly seems to like the guy, Dax has never been happier to have him with them.

“Aim that gun at my Pres again, I fucking dare you!” Venom shouts, pushing the guy to the ground where the kitchen elevates with a step. His boot slams down on the man's neck, breaking it cleanly. “Oh, guess you won't get the chance, motherfucker.”

Colt's also beside Dax as fists fly, and it feels like a never-ending sea of men coming at them. A sea of men who separate him from his wife. The woman who has been alive for so many years, but he didn't know where she was. That she was still here.

A flash of black hair whips by Dax as Shep breaks the neck of a man aiming to shoot at Colt. Colt's opponent falls to the ground in a bloody and broken heap, and he turns to Shep. “Thanks, man.”

“It was more for your wife than for you,” he says with a smirk before hitting another opponent.

“I thought it was about ten men,” Finnegan says beside Dax as they both punch in unison to two more rushing towards them.

“This is fucking fun!” Venom shouts as he climbs onto a chair and dives onto the group of Kingsmen like he's crowd surfing in a mosh pit. “Blood and bones. It's like Halloween, Christmas, and the Fourth of July all in one pretty little present.”

Undertaker grabs men, lifts them, and bends them over his knee like he's breaking a branch. Everyone he does this to cries out in pain as they fall limp to the floor, and he pulls out a pistol to shoot them in the head. “The guy may be a little crazy, but I don't disagree.”

It feels like no time and all the time has passed before there are no more men rushing towards them, and Dax searches for a basement. A door. Something. “Where the fuck is it?”

Colt rushes outside to grab the bolt cutters from his bike, and he hurries back in as everyone scatters through the small house, opening every door.

Nothing. Dax can't find the way into the basement, and he shakes. “Do I go outside and break the fucking window to climb in?”

“You wouldn't fit,” Undertaker says. “I thought of that already.”

“This is probably it,” Colt says as they see what looks like a pantry door off of the kitchen with four padlocks keeping it secured.

Undertaker walks up, grabs the door handle, and yanks. “Allow me.”

“I fucking like you,” Venom says, and the two share a sadistic smile with the other.

Dax sees the staircase and damn near rolls down it as he skips as many steps as he can to get to the bottom. When he finally reaches the dingy, dirt floor of the basement, he finds Dani cowering in the corner, her hands covering her head with large chains connected to the wall and the shackles on her wrists.

The sight takes his breath away, and he only hears a couple sets of footsteps behind him. “Dani?” he whispers.

She's dirty, skin and bones, and she looks so sick. The skin around the shackles is red and raw, and she looks like a scared, abused animal. Her eyes peek up over her hands at him, and she shakes her head.

“Are you here to kill me?”

“What? No!” he gasps. “Dani, it's me.”

“Please, just kill me,” she begs. “Please. Please!”

Colt's eyes widen as Dax looks at him in frozen fear. His wife just begged to die. He has no idea what to say or do, and Colt nods as Venom hangs back, looking around the room for anyone who may jump out and attack.

“Dani, can you look at me?” Colt asks, his voice gentle as though approaching a child.

Her eyes look at him. “Are you going to kill me?”

“No, I'm not. I'm here to get you out of those shackles and take you away from this place.”

Shaking her head, she presses her back against the cement wall. “I don't want to go to another basement. I'll stay here. Please, don't put me in another basement.”

“Dani, we're not here to hurt you, and we’re not here to lock you up again. We're going to take you out of here, and you'll never have to have chains or shackles. You'll be free.”

She stares at him, her eyes blinking with no emotion on her face. “Free?”

“You looked out the window today, right? Do you remember the girl with the curly blonde hair and the stroller? She may have had a crazy little boy running around like a maniac with her?”

Blinking, she tilts her head. “I saw Sutton and Hannah,” she says. “They were with the blonde woman who walked up to the house. She took my picture, I think. I know her. I knew her.”

“Lex.”

“Lex. Lex Dalton?”

Colt smiles, and Dax just stares in amazement. How does he know what to do here?

“Lex Nichols now. That's my wife. She's a daughter of the Deranged Drifters Motorcycle Club. She remembers meeting you a few times, and she recognized you when she saw you. That's how we knew where you were.”

Her eyes look back and forth into his, and she slowly nods. “I like Lex. She has attitude. I heard Thumper saying he wanted to hurt her before he went outside, but he didn't. She's good with words. He came back saying all the things he wanted to do to her if he ever saw her again. When she left, she looked into my eyes. Like she was going to get help. You're the help?”

Venom's neck cracks behind them, and Colt's back tenses as Dani talks about Thumper and Lex. Dax continues to stare in awe as Colt gets Dani to feel more at ease.

Nodding, Colt smiles and crouches down in front of her. “I am. I'm Colt Nichols. I need to cut these locks to get you out of those terrible metal bracelets. Can I do that?”

“Okay,” she says, and her eyes lock on Dax. “I know you.”

“That's Dax,” Colt says, saving him from trying to figure out how to introduce himself to his own damn wife as he inches closer to cut the first padlock. “Do you remember who he is to you?”

Her hand falls free from the shackle, and she twists it, an unnatural cracking sound coming from her wrist as she does. “I think he's my husband.”

The scars on her wrist and arm look like she tried to commit suicide, and Dax has to hold back the vomit. “I am, baby,” he says, his voice thick with emotion. “I thought you were dead; otherwise, I would've come looking for you sooner. So much sooner.”

“They wouldn't kill me,” she says as Colt frees her other hand, and Dax sees another set of scars. “I tried, but they stopped me. Said I couldn't go yet. They weren't done.”

Tears fill his eyes. “We're going to take you home.”

Her eyes land on his leather, and she backs away, pressing herself tightly against the wall. Shaking her head, she looks ready to have a panic attack. “You're not my husband.”

The words feel like knives. “What?”

“Dani, calm down. No one's going to hurt you or take you to another bad place, okay? Are you saying this isn't Dax because of his leather? That's not showing the Hellraisers on it?” Colt says, his hands in front of her as he drops the bolt cutters to the ground.

“My husband was the President of the Satan's Hellraisers.”

“And now he's the President of the Summerville Deranged Drifters charter. We patched them over.”

Dani continues to shake her head. “I can't go with you. I can't go with either of you.” Her body slides down the wall and curls into a ball, rocking back and forth.

“What do we do?” Dax asks, pain and fear washing over him as he stares at the woman who looks like his wife but doesn't feel like her.

“I'm not going to carry her out of here kicking and screaming,” Colt says.

“Call Lex,” Venom says.

Jennings walks down to the middle of the stairs. “What's wrong?”

“She's a little... lost,” Colt says delicately. “Have Shep call Lex and ask her to come here right away. We need her help getting through to Dani.”

“Lex will know what to say,” Venom says, and Jennings calls up to Shep to get Lex here right away.

Dax turns and looks at him. “You know Lex?”

“They're friends,” Colt says with a chuckle as Dani continues to rock back and forth.

“Not something I would have guessed,” Dax says, his eyes never leaving Dani. How can this be his wife?

“Really not that surprising if you know Lex,” Jennings says with a chuckle. “Plus, he's kind of badass. Flew over and on top of those guys like he was at a metal concert or something.”

Venom just beams, and Dax wonders what else he's overlooked while he's been in his crazed mindset. “Lex is good shit.”

“That’s how I view her, personally,” Colt says with a smirk. “But, I might be biased.”

Chuckling, Jennings says, “You seem like an almost crazier Psycho. Which definitely makes sense that you and she would be friends.”

“Who would be friends?” Lex asks, appearing at the top of the stairs. No doubt expecting to be called and was already in her car.

“Us,” Venom says.

“Oh, that? Makes perfect sense.”

“Baby, we need you down here,” Colt says. “Dani doesn't trust us.”

She hurries down the stairs and looks at them before seeing Dani. Cautiously approaching, Lex crouches down in front of her. “Hey, Dani.”

Dani looks up at her, and her rocking stops. “Lex?”

“You remember me?”

“I do. They're telling me lies.”

“I don't know about that. Things have changed since you've been gone, but they're the good guys. They just hurt all those bad men upstairs to get to you. Dax would kill anyone who hurts you or tries to hurt you, Dani. So would Colt, and so would Venom.”

Her eyes flash behind Lex. “The crazy guy with the white hair?”

Lex giggles. “Yeah, he's cool. He's my friend. He's also your friend, and trust me, you want friends like him. No one messes with you when he's around.”

“I'm scared,” she whispers.

“I know. How about this? If you don't want to leave with them, you can leave with me.”

Lip quivering, she blinks back tears. “Can you bring me home?”

“I'll bring you wherever you want to go. I have a pretty bitchin' Mustang, and we can go get something to eat. Are you hungry?”

Dani rubs her eyes. “I don't remember the last time I ate.”

“She likes burgers and fries with a chocolate milkshake. From that place over on Broadway,” Dax says, hoping she'll realize he is who he says he is.

“How do you know that?” Dani asks.

Lex turns and looks back at him, and he can't find the words to explain. She just looks back at Dani. “That's your husband, babe. He looks different because my club patched his over a little while ago. Colt and I moved to Summerville because of it.”

“You live here?”

“Yes, ma'am. Come on, can you stand?” she asks, shifting up and out of her crouching stance to hold a hand out to Dani, who follows suit. “How about you ride with me, and we'll go get that burger, fries, and shake? Colt and Dax can meet us there, because they're obviously going to pay for it, and we'll have a good, greasy meal. How does that sound?”

“Extra pickles?”

Colt snorts. “There's no other way Lex eats a burger.”

Dani squeezes Lex's arm and holds onto her tightly as they move towards the stairs. “That might be okay.”

“Make a hole,” Lex calls up the stairs to make sure no one crowds as they walk through. “I got you, Dani. No one's going to hurt you.”

“What the fuck just happened?” Dax asks, looking at Colt.

Venom waits until the women are out of the basement before walking over and ripping one of the chains from the wall. “Motherfuckers!”

“Almost three years with those bastards is going to have a resounding effect on her,” Colt says.

Fear takes over again, threatening to strangle him. “Will I get her back?”

Both Colt and Venom exchange a look before Colt shrugs. “I sure hope so. But at least we've got a starting point, right?”

Starting point. Whenever Dax imagined getting Dani back, it was a joyous reunion, filled with kisses and embraces that quickly turned into lovemaking. Instead, she looks like a scared animal, and it makes him want to murder every damned Kingsmen he can find.