One Hundred & Thirty-Six Scars (The Devil's Own, #1) (5 page)

“Beast you can’t do this. Hella, tell him he can’t do this,” Jada demanded from her pace walking.

“He can,” Hella added. “And I’ll be going with him.”

Hella had been here for ten years and was recruited at age ten. He was a lost boy. Caught up in the foster care system. One night he was sleeping under one of the local bridges in NYC when he was found. I guess they took him because of his tender age and because he had no family, no-one who cared—a lost boy. He was utterly ruthless and shredded anybody with the snap of your fingers.

“What?” Jada gasped. “You can’t leave, Hella. I’ll have no-one with the both of you gone.”

“Then come, Jada. You don’t have to stay here.”

“I can’t. If they find me…” she trailed off.

“They won’t. We won’t let anything happen to you.”

“I can’t. I’m sorry,” she answered, tears streamed down her reddened cheeks. She swiped them away angrily, spinning around and walking out of our tent. The entire section of where we were was surrounded by white tents. When we were younger, we had to stay in the confinement building that sat right in the middle of the property. But once we hit eighteen—and stopped trying to fight the system—they put us out here with the rest of the soldiers. There were around thirty-eight, and we all kept to ourselves. Hella and I had been planning our escape since we decided to stop fighting against Kurr. We’d studied each detail with careful precision. We knew when the guards switched shifts or when they were at their busiest, therefore, giving us a ten-minute window of opportunity.

“We can’t leave her here,” I said to Hella while tying up my combat boots.

“We can’t do anything else about it. She doesn’t want to leave.”

“We’ll come back for her.” Throwing my black vest over the top of my hoodie.

“Yeah,” he swallowed. “We will come back.”

“Ready for this?” I asked with an arched brow.

“Born fucking ready,” he replied, eagerness and determination boring through his eyes.

Once the clock-tower that sat above the guard’s headquarters struck nine, we began our escape. Throwing my backpack over my shoulders, I pulled my hoodie over my head, shading my eyes.

“Let’s go,” I whispered to Hella, who was following closely behind in my footsteps. The dry leaves crunched under the heavy weight of my combat boots, and the darkness of the night leaving any visible vision impossible. Pulling out the night vision goggles I’d stolen a few weeks ago, I handed a set to Hella as we continued our trek. Dodging the bright spotlights that swung around the entire compound, we made it to the corner of the diamond metal fence. We’d both been working on it for a few weeks, with full knowledge that this part of the fence was weaker than the rest. We decided to cut all the metal and then re-bind it back together with our own wire, making it easier for us to remove it easily when the time was right.

Unhooking all of the hooks, I passed them to Hella, who then placed them in his pockets while still keeping watch, his head moved from side to side, his gun cocked with his finger on the trigger. Hella and I were around the same height and the same build. We could pass as brothers, only where my hair was dark, his was blond. We could both bench around the same. One of the only things that mattered in the compound when we weren’t training was how much you could bench. It was all about the size of the man on the outside
and
the size of the fight on the inside. Hella and I both had plenty kills on our hands, Kurr always made it clear just how successful we were and how much we contributed to the cause. The cause of what, I never fucking knew. Taking out people who they said or sending us into Iraq, it didn’t matter. We had to do it. But where I had patience with my kills, Hella would just tear you to shreds like a Pit Bull with a lockjaw and not bat an eye.

“Done,” I whispered, stretching out the wire and rolling it back to form a hole that was only just big enough to fit us both. Pushing my body through, we both made it to the other side of the fence and ran. Ran like we’d done many times before, but only this time—we didn’t get caught.

My feet were pounding the pavement in heavy strides, and the air was dead silent with nothing but our heavy breaths and the crunching of leaves under our boots breaking the silence. With my hoodie thrown over my eyes, my legs found their fifth wind and I boosted forward. The freedom surging through me was surreal. I’d wanted this for so long. All the failed attempted breakouts, all the punishments, the whips, the cuts, it wasn’t all for nothing.

“Have you heard from your contact?” I asked Hella as we found the first car that was parked under a single street light. The only beacon lighting up the darkness of the night. The fog was thick and the air ice cold. A cold sweat broke out all over me. I took out the screwdriver from my backpack, popped the lock quickly and slid into the driver’s seat.

Hella took a seat on the passenger side, throwing our bags to the back. “Yeah, we’re good. She’s a cop.”

That got my attention.
What the fuck was he thinking bringing a fucking cop into this. One thing I knew was to never trust anyone in the law. Pussy or no pussy.

“Why the fuck would you do that?”

“Calm down, not her,” he responded nonchalantly.

I placed the screwdriver down, ripping the hoodie off my head. “Don’t give me this
she’s different
fucking bullshit.”

“She fucking is Beast. Like I’d get us in the shit. You need to trust me.”

“What’s her name?”

“Abby,” he began, running his palm over his chin. “I knew her from Boston, one of the foster homes I was in. She was a rebel, wanting to get into trouble every single corner we turned. We made a pact that we would always find each other, and then she got taken to a family in Westbeach. I followed her move as much as I could. The night I was Blacklisted, I’d just seen her. She was happy, found a family within an MC club in Westbeach called the Sinful Souls. She was fucking happy. She wanted me to stay, said I could have a home there, but there was no way I could barge in on her life. I was just fucking happy that she was happy, you know?” He ran his hands through his short hair. We all had our hair in a buzz cut. We weren’t allowed to have it any longer. Blacklisted is what it’s called when they take you. Not sure why it was called listed, they chose people by random. The younger, the better and with no family—Hella was perfect and fit the mold.

I continued my job at getting this car started as he carried on, “Anyway, I’m hoping she’s still there.”

“If she’s not, at least we’re out,” I said, turning the screwdriver until the light roar of the engine and the exhaust smoked to life.

Shutting our doors, I pulled it into drive and got the hell out of there.

“To Westbeach?” I asked, glancing at him in the passenger side.

“Yeah. I’ll show you where to go.”

He better, because I haven’t driven anywhere outside of the compound before.

Two days later and one stop at a hotel, we were in Westbeach. Rubbing my eyes with the back of my hands, I shoved a sleeping Hella awake.

He stirred from his seat as the passing streetlights shone through into our car at each passing.

“We here?” he asked, sitting his seat up.

“Yep, where now? It’s three in the morning. We need to check in somewhere.”

“Fuck, I’m certain we’re almost out of cash,” Hella answered, running a hand over his stubble.

“We’ll worry about that later. I have some cash left in the backpack, take it out and count it.”

He leaned over the back, pulling the cash out of the front pocket of the backpack.

“Holy fuck, where the hell did you get this from?” he asked, skimming through the hundred dollar bills with his thumb.

“I’ve been saving since I was little. Every bit of dough I got my hands on, I took.”

Hella smirked. “This will do us a solid, bro. Nice.” He placed the money back into the bag, dropping it onto the floor at his feet. “Hook a left up here,” he pointed. “There’s a motel we can crash at.”

The next morning, we were driving toward the clubhouse still in the stolen car.

“We need to drop this car, and pick up another,” I said, scanning the surrounds for police officers.

“Yeah, we can’t take this back to the Sinful Souls. Can’t imagine them being happy about us arriving in a boosted car. Pull over up here, there’s a park, we can drop it and walk the rest of the way.”

I nodded my head, swerving into the parking lot that was covered under trees. I took out a microfiber cloth that I kept in my bag and began wiping down the areas that we’d touched. We both knew not to touch the surfaces, but shit happens.

“Are you sure about this?” I asked Hella as we were just about to reach the high wire gates. The front gate had a sign of a skull face wearing a cowboy hat and a cigar hanging out of its mouth, with the lettering
‘Sinful Souls MC’
reading in an arc rounding the top of the image and the wording
‘California’
in an arc under the image. I looked to Hella with a single shake of my head. “You better be fucking right about this.”

Not two minutes later, a young fella with spiky blond hair walked toward the gate, eying both Hella and I up and down. “Can I help you?”

He wore a patch that read
‘Prospect
.’ I almost laughed. This boy was the bum boy of their operation.

Hella answered, “Yeah, looking for Abby?”

“And you are?” the spiky pretty boy looking kid answered. His demeanor irked the shit out of me.

“Her fucking past. You gonna get her or what?” I growled from where I was standing. Pretty boy’s eyes drifted to mine before he slanted them. I laughed again. “What? That supposed to be intimidating?” I asked, attempting to chain my thoughts of wrapping this little fucker in saran wrap and ripping each of his eyelids out.

He smirked. “You come here…” he pointed to the ground, “…and try to step on me on my own turf?”

“Travis!” a low voice interrupted from the patio of what one could only assume was the actual clubhouse.

“Get the fuck over here.” The man began making his way to the gate and Hella mumbled next to me, “Just don’t lose your shit. Rein it in.” I looked to him, eye brows drawn. It was usually me telling him to hold off on his anger, not the other way around.