“Let me have a look, you stubborn fucking bastard,” Skins laughed, earning him a glare that could have melted the face off aBarbiedoll.
He hobbled over to the bed, his muscles clenching and his eyes locked on me as he did.
I just wanted to touch him, to feel him.
I was fucking done hurting.
I needed to feel something. I needed to know things could be okay between us, and we would be stronger now. If I was some kind of religious person, I’d probably ask for some kind of sign from the big man up above, something to remind me of why Ham was always the one.
“Fuck,” Ham hissed as Skin’s peeled back the bandage with a sadistic grin on his face as if he enjoyed causing his friend pain. “Aren’t you meant to rip it off fast? Isn’t that meant to hurt less?”
“That’s the theory,” Skins agreed as he continued to pull at the medical tape torturously slow. He took a quick peek underneath the bandage and examined the area. It only took a moment before he nodded and began to replace the medical tape. “It looks okay. But you need to fucking slow down. Give the stitches time to do their job.”
Once everything was back in place, he took a step back and grabbed his medical backpack.
Ham groaned and threw himself back on the bed, his jeans riding deliciously low on his hips and exposing something I’d never noticed before.
A tattoo.
“What is that?” I asked, climbing off the chair and taking a couple steps toward the bed.
They both looked up at me, but I could tell by the way Ham’s pursed lips turned into a delighted smirk, he knew exactly what I was talking about.
“It’s a tattoo. If you hadn’t realized, I have quite a few.”
I didn’t appreciate the sarcastic tone, folding my arms across my chest and popping my hip. “When did you get it? And what is it?”
Skins moved to the side as Ham unbuttoned his jeans and shucked them onto the floor, giving me a perfect look at the intricately drawn dove which was situated on his hip bone. The strokes, the patterns, the shading and line work I all recognized.
It was all mine.
“Meyah,” Hadley said quietly. “Run.”
I didn’t waste a second, digging my feet into the gravel and turning on my toes back toward the clubhouse. I made it through the space in the fence that led out back before the gunshots started.
The first one made me jump, and I tripped, falling onto the patio and skinning my knee.
Then came the rest.
One after another after another.
I forced my shaking body to its feet, diving for the patio door handle and yanking it open. I tried to stem the tears that were streaming down my face, tried to keep the sobs from leaving my mouth as I ran up the stairs, my feet catching on every other step, in my mind searching the clubhouse for a place to hide.
There were a million places, different rooms, different closets and cupboards, all places I could easily slip inside and hopefully be concealed until someone else got here.
But I didn’t actually need to think.
My feet carried me, my mind forgotten.
There was one place I just felt like I needed to go, where I felt like nothing would hurt me.
I turned the handle to Ham’s room and pushed the door open, quickly closing it behind me and throwing myself back against the door. I’d never been in there before or even seen inside since the door was always closed, but I didn’t have time to look around.
My heart thumped hard in my chest, and I searched the room, licking the salty tears from my lips as I tried to take in deep breaths and keep somewhat calm. I was scared. That man, Jayla’s granddad, he wanted to take me away from the club and use me to hurt them.
I needed to hide.
I needed to stay away from him, so he couldn’t do that.