Page 38 of Ryder

“I’m fine,” I repeated. “Really. Don’t worry about me.” I tried to see if Ryder was still in the room with us, but I couldn’t find him anywhere. “Where did they take him?”

“They dragged him to his room and cuffed him to the bed.”

“They can’t do that. Oh my God.” I tried to shove past Jagger, but he caught me midstride, pulling me back toward him. “Let go. Please. I need to see him.”

“Uh-uh. No way, Braylen. Not a chance in hell. I learned my lesson the first time. You’re not going near him until he sobers up. And even then. . . .”

My body tensed as I asked, “Even then what? Finish what you were gonna say.”

“When he sobers up, if he remembers you being here and that you hurt yourself because of him, he won’t forgive himself.”

“It’s only my wrist,” I said, gingerly holding my arm. “I’ll show him I’m okay. That he didn’t really hurt me.” I pleaded with him to release me so I could at least check on Ryder, but he held firm, ushering me toward the exit.

“Kena, I need you to take your sister home. Now.” Looking at me, he said, “For your own good . . . you’re not allowed back here to see him. Do you understand me?”

I remained silent because there were no words sufficient to convey my distress.

“Do you understand me?”

Finally I nodded, Kena helping to hold me upright while guiding me outside.

Ryder

The clink of steel rattled and drew me out of my haziness. I moved my limb and the noise sounded again, the soreness creeping down my extended arm causing me to flinch. In truth, I felt like I’d been run over by a goddamn Mack truck. Everything pained me, from my temple to my jaw, to my ribs and arms. Hell, even my tailbone hurt, although I couldn’t fathom why.

“Fuck,” I grunted, not quite sure what the hell was goin’ on. Only half opening my eyes, partly because I was beyond exhausted and partly because my head was gonna explode as soon as the light spearing in through the window hit my pupils, I glanced warily around the room. It was mine, at the clubhouse.

Why am I here?

Craning my neck, I looked toward the iron headboard and saw my left wrist cuffed to one of the rungs, my flesh reddened from the pressure of its grip.

“Hey!” I shouted as loud as my lungs would allow, which wasn’t much. The effort instantly made my head hurt, thumping so badly I could feel the bile rise in my throat. Still dressed from the night before, I scooted over toward the edge of the bed and placed my foot on the ground, and I stomped with my heavy boot. When minutes passed and still no one came, I searched my immediate area to see if there was something I could use instead. I couldn’t find anything, so I clumsily removed one of the boots I’d been wearing, and with as much strength as I could muster I flung it at the door. It thumped against the hollow wood, and within seconds I heard someone walking down the hallway.

“You better be back to normal,” a gruff voice said, the door slowly opening. Jagger’s face appeared, and when he gave me a quick once-over, deciding I wasn’t any kind of threat, he strolled forward. How much of a threat could I be restrained to a bed?

He looked tired, like he’d been through the ringer. When he pushed his hair away from his face, I saw a pretty nasty bruise near his eye. “Did you have a fight last night?”

“Yeah,” he scoffed. “With your ragin’ ass.”

At first I thought he was joking, but then I realized that he was tellin’ the truth. Otherwise, why would I have been handcuffed? I could only recall bits and pieces, not enough for me to fully understand what went down.

Shaking his head, and with a pained expression of disappointment, he removed a key from the front pocket of his jeans. “I can’t believe you did this again, man.” He leaned over me and unlocked the restraint, letting it dangle around the bottom of the bar once I’d freed myself. “You promised us all last time that it was, well, the last time.”

“Cut me some slack,” I argued, not entirely sure what made me break my promise to my brothers never to get as out of control as I had the last time. “I don’t even remember what happened.”

“You never do,” he retorted.

I’d been good for years, but obviously something had pushed me over the edge. Rubbing my temples, I asked, “What did I do? Where did I get the whiskey from?” I’d always given the guys slack for not allowing me to drink the hard shit when we were together, threatening to sneak some behind their backs. Hell, I could’ve stopped by the liquor store at any time and bought some, but I’d made a promise. To them and myself.

Whenever I had mentioned needing something stronger than beer, they’d shout for Trigger to keep an eye on me, or tell Carla to make sure to serve me only beer whenever we swung by Indulge to check things out. To be honest, I loved that they looked out for me, as I would for any one of them.

“You’re askin’ me?”

His humorless laugh irritated me, but not because I was pissed at him. I was upset with myself. Disappointed even, that I allowed something to affect me so greatly that I threw all caution to the wind and said goodbye to any restraint I’d been holding onto.

“How did I get here?”

“You just showed up, already annihilated as you stumbled through the door.”

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