Page 20 of Battling Aries

“Yeah, I know,” I grind out, not wanting to talk about it.

Fox narrows his gaze, shifts in his seat, sits forward, and braces his elbows on his knees. “Did you know she signed a contract indenturing herself to Roger because he was going to have you killed while at basic training?”

This I didn’t know. “No.”

“I bet you didn’t even know once a year, he straps her to a Saint Andrew’s cross and not only beats her but forces her to take whatever he wants to do to her body. Usually, this is around the time of year when she’d force herself to have a miscarriage to keep from having to have his child. I also bet you didn’t know that she sings in his clubs, not because she wants to but because he makes her. She’s not allowed to go anywhere without him or a guard with her. If she disobeys, she pays the price. Which pretty much means that she takes what Roger decides to do to herbehind closed doors. Which you might not want to hear means, she has to take his dick.”

Fuck me, I don’t want to hear this shit.

“Do you have anything else for me that doesn’t involve Roger putting his dick in Rory?” If I have to hear any more of this, I’m gonna lose it.

“Oh, I’ve got plenty. Like the fact he dosed her a handful of times with a drug called Heavenly Rose.”

“Fuck.”I know what the drug is. I know what it does to a person. Before we all decided to come to Mississippi, my brothers, the club, we saw what the drug can do to someone firsthand.“How about you tell me something else?”

“Roger is using the different clubs to launder money for several different groups, including one that just so happens to be in your very backyard.”

“You’re shittin’ me. The fight club group we went up against?”

“The one and the same,” Fox confirms. “Granted, Roger had a bit of a roadblock come into play here lately since the organization took on a new set of head honchos. They’re not really wanting to do business with him as such.”

“What else do you know? What about the bounty?”

I need to know what I’m dealing with completely.

“Bounty is out to find and bring her back in one piece. Doesn’t matter if she’s beaten beforehand. She’s to be brought back. Roger’s pissed because he’s losing money without her on stage. You might remember how good she was at singing. She’s also a damn good dancer and puts on a good show at his clubs.”

“And how do you know this?”

“I’ve seen a show once or twice when going to one of his places for work.” He shrugs like it’s not a big deal.

“You’ve seen her and didn’t do anything to help her?”

“I didn’t know everything I know now in the times I’d seen her. And besides, it wasn’t my place.”

“Since when do you care if it’s your place or not?” I’ve never known my brother to sit by and watch.

Fox gets to his feet and sneers. “The line of work I’m in, Aries, I turn my head to a lot of things I might not agree with. Besides the contract, I’d seen only for the first five years. That times up, she just doesn’t know it. And he’s not going to give her up without a fight. The son of a bitch has been all up in her shit since we were all kids. He didn’t like you with her and wanted you out of the way. The bastard was willing to kill you. Think of that when you get your head straight where she’s concerned. She gave you up to save you. Her life for yours.”

“This isn’t the first time I’ve heard that. What I want to know is how he thought he could pull it off?” It’s one of the questions that’s been eating at me.

“Because your Staff Sergeant was going to put a bullet in your head as a payoff from Roger. There was proof of it. Roger had pictures to show Rory he wasn’t playing around.”

Nodding, I don’t say anything. I just let Fox’s words sink in—all of them.

However, Fox wasn’t done. He keeps talking, filling me in on everything he knows. All of it churning my stomach. Moving across the room, I look out the window and watch the cars go past the hotel. But I wasn’t focused on the cars. My mind was picturing the woman I’d left back at the clubhouse. The broken look in her eyes. The pain I’d heard in her voice. The defiance I’d seen in the way she acted.

All these years, she’s been nothing but a prisoner to a man who trapped her and took from her what should have always been.

I’m going to have still to hear it from her, but at least when I do, I won’t run off again. I’ll have myself in check and will beable to hear her out with a clear head because there’s one thing I know for certain, and it’s that Rory has always been mine.

I’m claiming what I should have all those years ago rather than walk away because of what she’d written in some letter.

CHAPTER 13

RORY

“Your bruises are looking better by the day,” Mace’s mother, Kendra, says while pulling my shirt back in place. “And you said your ribs aren’t hurting as much?”

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