Satin and Steel (2 page)

“Let’s dose this little wildcat. I’m gonna tear her apart,” a voice growled.

Terrified, Rhee screamed herself hoarse as the needle broke her skin.
They’re going to rape me!
She tried to struggle, but to her horror, her body stopped responding. After a few moments, she dangled limply in the first man’s grasp, suddenly fascinated by the raised scar on his left cheek. An evil chuckle wafted to her ears as she tried to process what was happened in a detached kind of euphoria.

Then, Rhee was swimming in a sea of languid confusion. Voices drifted slowly around the room but they didn’t make any sense. There was a slow, deliberate explosion of activity as a series of loud cracks pierced the night. In slow motion, her tormentors wafted out of the room, leaving her crumpled on the floor. Slowly, she managed to pull herself up, her blurry eyes on the dark rectangle that the men had disappeared into. Rhee floated out the door and into the darkness that lay on the other side.

I want to go home.

She pushed her arms in front of her as though she were doing the breaststroke. Her father’s soft bedtime voice resonated in her ear as a soft, familiar melody played in her mind. A commotion down the corridor sent Rhee in the other direction.

Fly away, little butterfly…

A cocoon! There was a sleek black cocoon in the parking lot. Rhiannon the butterfly floated towards the cocoon and fell inside. She collapsed into the warm, cozy safeness of the haven. Then, she knew no more.

*

It had been a hard sell, but Dax and the crew had convinced
The
Chicos
to hand over the guns. Well, perhaps “convincing” wasn’t the best choice of words. Sonny had Miguel’s pants down, and was threatening to surgically remove his testicles before
The
Chicos
V.P. had acquiesced. Dax didn’t feel bad about the violence. It had, after all, been the
The Phantoms’
deal. He was just sick of the constant stress gunrunning produced. They loaded up quickly, filling the Suburban with the A-Ks. Dax leapt into the driver’s seat and gunned the engine. He tore out of the parking lot, his mind on a nice, cold beer, when Wince spoke up.

“Uh-Dax?”

“Keep it ‘til we get back to the clubhouse, man.”

“Dax…”

“What the fuck, Wince? Seriously?!”

“I think we picked up a stowaway…”

Chapter Two

Dax pulled over when they reached the clubhouse and yanked the sliding door of the van open. Wince said their surprise passenger was female, and she was in bad shape. Peering inside, he could make out a small form, lying prone against the back bay of seats. From the size of her, she was hardly more than a teenager.
Probably one of Juan’s hookers
, Dax thought to himself.
Great.
Hope she hasn’t overdosed and puked in the car!

He reached in and grabbed the girl by her slender ankle. He pulled sharply, eliciting a soft groan. Dax turned the girl onto her back to get a closer look at her. A shock of long auburn hair obscured her face. He brushed it back impatiently, and his mouth fell open in surprise.

It’s her!

It had been strange how he couldn’t get that girl out of his head since she nearly bowled him over running out of
Lenny’s
a few weeks back. Maybe it was her eyes that got to him, although he couldn’t see them right now. He recalled how those emerald green orbs had practically flashed fire at him, as though she couldn’t believe he dared to speak to her. Looking for her kid sister, Lenny had said. Dax smiled at the memory and then frowned as his gaze wandered over the darkening bruise on the girl’s cheek. Her shirt was slashed down the front, and he could see marks on her neck and chest.

What the fuck happened to her?!

Before he had a chance to process what he was doing, Dax slid his hands under her and lifted the unconscious girl into his arms.
She can’t weigh more than a 100 pounds, soaking wet
, he thought, cradling her head against his chest. He barked a few orders at Wince and Rollie and they began unloading the weapons as Dax settled the girl in the front seat. He fastened her seatbelt and reclined the seat so her head wouldn’t flop onto her chest. He dialed Trish and she was in the car with her doctor kit before he reached his street.

What am I doing?

Dax had no business taking the girl into his own home, but he didn’t know where else to take her. She obviously wasn’t part of a crew. She had no identification, and upon closer inspection he could see a needle mark in her arm, but he was pretty sure she wasn’t a druggie.
They must have dosed her to make her more compliant.
He grimaced at the thought of what else they might have forced the girl to do. She looked young, and there was an air of innocence about her.

There was bruising around her delicate wrists, and he knew she had struggled hard. Dax gently extricated his unconscious charge from the seatbelt and picked her up carefully. Holding the girl over his shoulder, he managed to get his front door open. He kicked the guest room door open with his booted foot and settled her into the bed. Dax sank down into the armchair and watched her for a while. Her breathing was slight but steady, and he could see her chest rise and fall. From time to time she groaned softly, as though she was in pain.

As an afterthought, Dax removed the girl’s jeans and boots, averting his eyes as her plain white bikini panties came into view. He gently drew the ruined shirt off of her. He sucked in his breath at the sight of her pert breasts, encased in a lacy white number.
Nice.
Dax winced at the sight of the bruising at the girl’s collarbone and the marks that littered her neck and chest. He wondered briefly if she had been raped, but figured that more than her shirt would be destroyed if her attackers had gotten any further. He could see defensive marks on her hands and wrists.
I hope you gave ‘em hell, little girl.
Finally, Dax pulled the covers up to the girl’s chin and slumped in an armchair to wait.

When the doorbell rang an hour later, he snapped out of a light doze and let Trish and her medical supplies in. She dropped her duffle bag and Dax swept his girlfriend of three years into a bear hug. Trish grabbed his chin and hauled him in for a passionate kiss. She moaned softly as her nipples brushed against his hard chest.

“First things first,” he told her, setting her on her feet reluctantly and grinning at her sigh of disappointment.

“Jesus, Dax! Where the hell did she come from?” Trish wanted to know after observing the half-naked, unconscious girl.

“Long story. Can you examine her and fix her up? I think she was dosed.”

“How do you know her?” she looked at him sharply.

“Just some girl that was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Dax explained.

Trish raised an eyebrow at that. She knew Dax had a soft spot, but unlike most of his crew he didn’t cheat. He didn’t have to. If her man said this kid was worth patching up, then she would do it, no questions asked.

Thirty minutes later, Trish had cleaned the girl up and had taken a blood sample. No evidence of rape or sexual trauma, other than the bite mark on her left breast.

Dax was surprised to find that he had been holding his breath until he let it out.

“Make sure she drinks water, otherwise I’ll have to come back and start a drip,” she said, holding out a small packet of pills. Dax stuffed them in his pocket, his eyebrows raised.

“Painkillers. She’s going to need them when she comes down. There’s significant swelling at her collarbone and her left rotator cuff might be damaged.”

“I love it when you get all technical,” Dax said huskily, pulling her close.

“Dax, treating your new patient ate up all of my time. I have to get to work,” Trish said, evading his embrace.

Dax sighed. He wanted to feel her under him, where she belonged. But Trish was his best ticket out of here. Her medical training could get her a job anywhere. The last thing he wanted to do was stand in her way. He patted her affectionately on the ass before she walked out the door. Dax took a long swallow of beer and then hit the shower. It had been a long, nasty kind of day. The water ran down his body, over his black tattoos. Sometimes, he wished he could wash them away, just as he washed away the remains of the day. Finally, he settled into bed, wondering when his unexpected houseguest would awaken.

*

Rhee woke up into a world of hurt. Her head pounded painfully and her shoulder throbbed. At first, she thought she must have been in an accident, but that didn’t seem right. Struggling to sit up, she found that she could hardly move. Her body felt like one giant bruise, and her eyes were swollen and bleary. Rhee groaned audibly as dim light hit her dilated pupils and she squinted at her surroundings, expecting to find herself in a hospital room. When instead, she found herself in an unfamiliar bed, staring at decidedly unfamiliar furnishings, she sat straight up, letting out a small shriek as pain lanced through her left side.

Where the hell am I?!
Rhee swallowed nervously as she looked around the room, her throat parched and achy. She spied a glass with what looked like water in it on the bedside table. Her fingers shook as she reached for it, and she had to concentrate hard to bring the glass to her lips. The cool, clear fluid was like liquid silk as it flowed down her throat. Rhee sighed. The minimal effort had exhausted her. She was dreaming, she told herself. She would doze, and then she would wake up in her apartment, in her bed, no doubt regretting the bottle of wine she must have guzzled the night before.

Dax had always been a light sleeper, and his decision to sleep on the couch so he could be closer to the guest room made his rest even more fitful. His eyes flew open when he heard the thin cry. Silently, he padded into the guest room and found that his charge had moved. A thin sheen of sweat had popped out on her forehead but her eyes were closed. His trained eyes noticed the empty glass and he smiled as he refilled it in the kitchen
.
Little girl has a survival instinct
, he thought to himself. He dropped back onto the couch and this time, he slept hard.

God, I’ve been poisoned
. Rhee groaned inwardly. She woke up feeling confused and agitated at her physical state and at her surroundings. She truly had no idea where she was and her first notion was to flee. Well, actually, her first notion was to pee. Her bladder burned with urgency, but she was so weak she was afraid she wouldn’t make it to the adjacent door that stood slightly ajar to reveal a bathroom. Too, she worried that whoever had brought her here would come back if she made any noise. Rhee fidgeted a few moments but her current pressing need won out.

Standing for a few seconds made her head swim so she sank to the floor and managed to crawl to the bathroom. The cool porcelain felt so good against her burning cheek as she leaned against the toilet, heaving. Finally, she pulled herself onto the toilet and let go, a long sigh of relief escaping her dry lips. Exhausted, Rhee flushed and hung onto the counter for a few seconds. Her eyes came up and when she saw her battered reflection in the mirror, she couldn’t stop the loud gasp that erupted from her throat.

What the hell?!
A sick sense of dread permeated her brain as Rhee stared at herself. She was wearing her bra and underpants, but other than that, she recognized almost nothing about the girl in the mirror. Her left shoulder, the one throbbed every time she took a breath, was black and blue. Her face was swollen, and her eye had been blackened. There were marks and scratches littering her arms, neck, and chest. Rhee took a slow, painful breath as a tear squeezed out of her swollen eye and trailed a line through the dirt on her cheek.

She struggled to remember what had happened, but at first there was just a blank.
Ok, focus, Rhee.
What’s the last thing you remember?
Oh God….

The last thing she remembered was walking into that Mexican dive bar, and that-that man grabbing her. Fighting them. Pain…

A red haze filled her vision and Rhee crumpled to the floor, sobbing.
God, was I raped?
Breathing heavily, she drew her panties down again and felt herself. Nothing felt sore or swollen and when she peered groggily into her underpants, there was no trace of blood. Rhee wracked her brain for some kind of memory but she could not fathom how she left the bar, or how she came to be here, in this room. She managed to drag her panties back up and then reached for a towel that hung just above her head. She crumpled to the floor, welcoming the cool feel of the tile against her throbbing cheek. Pulling the towel over her legs, Rhee succumbed once more to oblivion.

Dax woke up slowly, momentarily forgetting about his patient. He yawned and stretched once before the events of the previous night came rushing back to him. He poked his head into the guest room and was briefly panicked when he didn’t see the girl. He scanned the room, and made out a pair of thin, but shapely legs sticking out next to the bathroom door.
Shit.

Cursing himself for falling asleep, Dax knelt beside the girl, hoping she hadn’t drowned in her own vomit. She was pale and cold. He could see the gooseflesh on her legs and arms. Her nipples were hardened from the chill, and he cursed himself again at his body’s involuntary reaction to the sight of the pointed nubs pressing into her bra.
Sick, man,
he told himself,
the girl has one foot in the grave and you’re trying to gauge the size of her nips?

Dax pushed the inappropriate thoughts from his head. He lifted the girl carefully and deposited her back into the bed. He pulled the down comforter over her, and threw another blanket over it. She moaned and he could see the sheen of sweat on her skin. She was detoxing now, he knew. It would be painful and she would be sick, but he had seen worse. Dax grabbed an empty trashcan from the office and stuck it next to her bedside. He’d be surprised if she didn’t puke at least once.