Fighting Destiny (Forsaken Sinners MC; Book 2) (Forsaken Sinners MC Series) (7 page)

From what Dani’s told me, he is the saving grace she needed to get her life back together when she left her hometown four years ago. He is most certainly a man I want to know and have on my side, but I have no idea how to go about making people like me the way they like Dani.

I see her nod her head, then look around the room until her eyes land on me. She smiles and leads him over to where Toby and I are sitting at the bar. When they stop in front of us, Dani introduces us.

“Sara, I’d like you to meet Mack, the President of the Forsaken Sinners. Mack, this is my friend, Sara. She’s helping out at the shop and staying in the upstairs apartment.” Mack looks to her for confirmation on something, then turns to me and smiles while he offers me his hand.

“It’s nice to meet you. Dani has told me a lot about you.” Not sure what she would have told him, I just smile and shake his hand.

“Hi,” I say in return, offering him a polite smile.

Mack turns his head and looks at Dani. They seem to be having a silent conversation between themselves. Just by looking at the two of them, I can tell this is something they have perfected and do a lot of.

When Dani looks back in our direction, she steps towards Toby. “I need to steal you for a couple of minutes. Mack, why don’t you take Sara into your office where it’s quieter?” Toby looks between Mack and Dani, then at me with a silent question in his eyes, asking if I’ll be all right. He seems torn and guilty about leaving me. Not wanting him to worry about me when Dani needs him, I smile, assuring him that I’ll be fine and turn to Mack.

He offers me his arm and once I take it, he leads me back the way he and Dani had just came from.

Once inside what looks like a small office, he leads me to a couch that’s set off to one side of the room before taking a seat next to me. “So, tell me about yourself, Sara. What brings you to our neck of the woods?” I give him a nervous chuckle. He would go right to the hardest question. I wring my hands in my lap and think about how much I should tell him.

Deciding to go with the truth, or most of the truth, I tell him the story that I wanted to leave home, so I left. I got in my car and just drove till I wound up here. I don’t want to go into the details with him, but I have a feeling he’s not going to be satisfied with my vague answer.

After I finish, he just sits there and stares at me, almost like he’s waiting for me to continue, but deep down, he knows that I won’t.

Standing up from the couch, he walks over to the desk and sits down behind it. He brings his right hand up and rubs his index finger along his lower lip while the other hand taps on the arm of his chair. He hasn’t stopped looking at me since he sat down and I start to feel uncomfortable. I know he won’t hurt me, but the way he’s looking at me, I can tell he’s trying to read me.

“Look. I understand that you don’t know me from Adam, and you certainly don’t trust me, but I just want you to know that I’m one of the good guys.” He stands up and begins pacing, “I’m not sure what Dani has told you about when she first came into town, but when she came into my shop, she was running away from her old life and looking to start over. I gave her a job, a place to call home, and offered protection if she needed it. Thankfully, the only thing she was running from was herself and not some lunatic, but that’s her story to tell, not mine. So, the bottom line is this. I offered her a safe haven and protection, and I’d like to do the same for you. Now you don’t need to tell me everything, but I need to know enough to be able to spot trouble if it comes knocking, because I have a strange feeling that it will.” He’s quiet for a moment, giving me time to let what he’s saying sink in.

I do know a little about what happened to Dani, but not the whole story. She only told me she was once in my shoes and Mack, along with this club, helped her when she didn’t have anyone. With what I know of Dani, I know that she’s someone who inspires me, someone that lets me know that people can overcome their pasts and make their lives better. I want what she has, and if it means laying all my dirty laundry out for Mack to see, then that’s what I’ll do. It would be nice having someone watching my back and be there for me. I don’t know Mack, but I can tell that he means what he says, and he’ll do anything he can to help me.

Taking a deep breath, I decide that in order for him to help me, or at least let him decide if he still
wants
to help me, I need to tell him everything.

I motion for him to take a seat and begin telling him what led to me to leave and end up here.

“What I told you was the truth, but not everything. I did live in New York, but with my ex-boyfriend. I’d tell you the short version, but I suppose you need to know it all?” He gives me a small smile, then nods for me to continue. “We’d been together for about five years, but during the last year and a half, things went downhill. Actually, now that I think about it, I can’t say that we ever really had a “good” relationship, but the last year or so, it was bad―the worst. He was always kind of a jerk and possessive, but I just thought he was your typical alpha-male type of guy, and to be honest, I liked it in the beginning, especially because we'd been together so long, it made me feel important. As time passed, he became obsessed with being in control and was jealous over the littlest things. He would always make rude comments about me, the things I did, or what I wore. After three and a half years of going through the motions of what people call a “relationship,” things with him began to escalate, turning into harsher words, only to turn into harsher actions. His control over me became suffocating. He told me I was starting to look fat and that I dressed like a slut, so he went through all my clothes and threw half of them away before taking me shopping to buy only things he approved of. Then he demanded that I stop hanging out with my friends. He would tell me what time I needed to be home, and when I didn’t always make it on time, he hid my keys, telling me that I must have lost them. He was supposed to take me to get another set from the dealership, but that never happened, so I was stuck with only him for transportation. He made me dependent on him for everything.” I stand up and start to pace in the same spot Mack was pacing moments before, needing to be doing something besides sitting there and reliving everything that Rick did to me.

“Before I knew it, he was the only one I had in my life. He had officially made sure that the friends I had were no longer there for me and even my co-workers stopped talking to me. He wanted me to quit so I couldn’t leave the house at all, but since he liked having extra money to spend on gambling, he let me continue to work. The only reason I still had my own apartment was because I’d have to pay more money than he was willing to give up just to get out of my lease. He never let me stay there unless he was with me, but I was thrilled that I still had it because it was the only thing that was truly mine anymore.

His jealous rants turned physical. He started with slapping, then went to punching and beating me anywhere that could be hidden with clothes. I knew I needed to get out of there, but every time I tried to leave, he would catch me and beat me to the point that I was too scared to leave anymore. I’d given up on the idea of ever getting away, so there I stayed.” Taking a deep breath, I try to compose myself as much as possible, knowing that the worst part is coming next.

“One night, he came home late from work and was mad that I went to bed without him. I guess he thought I shouldn’t be able to sleep unless he gave me permission to. I woke up to him grabbing my ankles and pulling me out of bed. He was yelling at me but I couldn’t understand anything he was saying, he was slurring so bad. He started dragging me into the hallway and towards the bathroom, and I instinctively started kicking out, hoping I could distract or hurt him long enough for him to release me so I could get away. I was able to catch him in the crotch, but it wasn’t anywhere near hard enough. It only caused him to drop my feet and start punching me in the stomach, and a few times in my face. It hurt me enough that I stopped struggling, which allowed him to rip off my pajama pants and panties. He was going to rape me. In all the years we had been together, even when he was abusing me, he had never forced himself on me. We barely even had sex by that point, but that was because he was out screwing other women because I disgusted him. He said that I needed to lose weight before he would touch me again. I knew I wasn’t overweight, but if that’s how he felt, then I was good with it. It kept him from touching me.”

I look Mack in the eyes, “I knew if he succeeded, I wouldn’t be able to come back from that. It was one thing to deal with the hits and verbal abuse, but I knew I wasn’t strong enough to get over being raped.” I know it makes me look weak in his eyes that I stayed and let it go on for as long as it did, but I just need him to understand.

“My eyes landed on a small statue that must have fallen to the ground in the struggle, or maybe on his way to the bedroom, who knows, but I saw it and wiggled just enough to reach it. Rick was too busy trying to spread my legs and keep me from kneeing him in the balls to notice that I now had a weapon. Without even thinking, I hit him over the head as hard as I could, repeatedly, until he fell to the side of me, dazed from the blows until he went completely limp. I didn’t know if he was dead or alive and at that moment, I didn’t give a shit. I got up, pulled on my pants, and ran out the door.”

Now that the hard part was over, I felt a calmness take over my body. It actually felt pretty good telling someone the whole story. “I had found my keys that he’d hidden and I knew I had a getaway bag still hidden in my trunk from the last time I tried to run, so I didn’t grab anything from the house. I didn’t go to my apartment. I just got in my car and drove until I wound up here.” Wrapping my arms around myself, I look up at the ceiling and wait for him to speak.

It felt like hours, years even, before he finally spoke. “Do you think he’ll come after you?” I almost smile because knowing Rick and how he operates, I feel pretty confident with my answer.

“No. Even if he had looked for me, he would’ve given up by now.”

Mack looks at me with doubt. “What if he
has
found you, but he’s waiting to make a move?” He makes a solid argument, but he doesn’t know Rick like I do.

“He would have approached me already. He isn’t a patient man, so if he knew where I was, he would’ve made a move already.”

After thinking about that for a moment, he nods his head. “Okay.” He stands up and walks over to me. Placing his hands on my shoulders, he gives me a reassuring squeeze. “You did good, Sara. You got yourself out of a bad situation. You did whatever it took to make sure you were safe. And I know it wasn’t easy telling me that, but I needed to know. I’ll keep my eyes open for any trouble, but you come to me if anything feels off or you see him around. Do you have a picture of him so I know who I’m looking for?” I nod my head and open my wallet. I only have one picture of him and it’s from when we first got together, but he hasn’t changed much.

Pulling it out, I hand it to him. “It’s an older photo, but he looks the same, just older.” Mack studies the picture, then puts it in his pocket before slowly walking us out of the office and back towards the bar.

“I won’t tell anyone what you told me, but I am going to pass this picture around for the guys to keep an eye out for him. They won’t know it’s related to you, though. I promise you that.” I feel so much gratitude toward this man that I can’t help but stop in my tracks and hug him tightly.

“Thank you,” I whisper in his ear.

“Anytime, sweetheart. Whatever you need, you just let me know, all right?” He says, but this time I just nod my head, afraid if I say anything more, I’ll start to cry again and I don’t want to do that in front of a crowded bar.

I start walking towards the bar, but stop short when I see Toby sitting there, but he’s not alone. My sudden stop has Mack looking at me with concern, then he follows my eyes across the room.

“Is there anything going on with you and him that I need to know about?”

I should be embarrassed that he’s asking about my relationship with Toby, but knowing more about Mack and the way he works, it doesn’t really surprise me that he’s already caught on, even if I’m only now just starting to realize my feelings. “Well, it’s kind of complicated. We met at the gym, then again when he found me working at the strip club. All I know is that when I’m with him, I feel safe and wanted, but that scares me after everything I went through with Rick. I mean, I have no idea who Toby is or what he wants with me. The way he is sometimes reminds me of the way Rick would act, but I don’t want to believe Toby is anything like him in any way. What I do know for sure is that I like the way he makes me feel most of the time, and I can’t stay away from him.”

Mack puts his arm around me and squeezes. “Sweetheart, Toby is an intense man, but I know for a fact that he would never hurt you or try to control you. Hell, he’d go to the ends of the earth to make sure you’re safe. That’s just the type of person he is; he’s a fierce protector.” He releases a long sigh and stands in front of me so I have no choice but to look at him. “Take a chance. Sit down and tell him about your worries. You need to be open and honest, and see where the road takes you. Who knows, maybe he’s exactly what you need.” With that, he leads me toward the man in question.

“Word of advice; be confident and go after what you want. Don’t let anyone stand in your way. If Toby is what you want, then stand up for him―claim him. I know you don’t know a lot about our way of life, but you’re no club whore. Make them give you the respect you deserve, because in our life, they’re nothing. Make sure she knows it.” He gives me an encouraging smile, then puts his hand on my back to urge me forward. “Go get him.”