Chapter Ten

BISHOP

"The hell were you thinking?" I loudly questioned as I stormed through the emergency room's double doors. Hawk was right on my heels, barely squeezing through behind me before they swung closed again.

The U-shaped room was lined with small, curtained cubicles, and a large doctors' and nurses' station stood proudly in the center. Shay sat behind it, her auburn hair like a beacon, pulling me toward her as she slowly spun her chair to face me, folding her arms across her chest.

The man in the white coat beside her went straight into panic mode as Hawk and I approached, his eyes frantically searching the room until they fell on a couple of guys wearing white button-ups. "Securit—"

"It's okay!" Shay interrupted, rolling her eyes. "They're with me." The two security guards barely shuffled a few feet in our direction before turning away again, honestly looking relieved as it was obvious one of them had already gone a few rounds and lost.

The doctor standing with Shay didn't look much better, with his eye swollen and a wide split in his lip. "Sorry," he said, clearing his throat. "This morning has already been far too exciting for me. I'm a little on edge."

Ignoring his complaints, I scanned my eyes over Shay, quickly noting the ice pack she had pressed to her ribs. She'd gotten hurt, and it boiled my fucking blood. I pressed my hands against the desk between us, leaning in and lowering my voice. "If I'd known you were going to lose your fucking mind and try to take down a street pimp, I would have never shared those photos with you."

She leaned in as much as she could on her little roller chair, meeting my dark stare with one of her own. "If you'd never shared those photos with me, that street pimp probably would have gotten away with dragging Alice out of here."

I slammed my palm down, the loud bang shocking the entire room into silence. "He could have killed you."

Shay swallowed hard, her eyes beginning to glisten, though she refused to back down or look away. "He wouldn't be the first person to try."

It wasn't often I was left without words, but all I could do was hold her gaze.

There was no joke.

No just kidding!

She wasn't being dramatic to get a response out of me, but I guess she'd gotten one anyway. This was fucking it. Shay never spoke a lot about her past. The handful of things I knew about her were from what Calli had told me—she'd lost her mom, spent a few years in the foster system, and hated the dark.

Together, none of that information had told me much. But as I collected more pieces, things began to fall into place and create a bigger picture. Shay had all the signs of a survivor.

Someone who had been through some shit and barely lived to tell the tale.

Which was why, on the ride over, I'd been almost out of my fucking mind wondering what the hell I was going to walk into because I knew she was never going to sit her ass down and wait for us. No. She would throw herself into the line of danger because her knee-jerk reaction was to fight.

To come out swinging and hope for the fucking best.

And not just for herself.

For anyone else she thought might be in trouble, anyone who looked like they couldn't fight for themselves—friends, family, people sitting in a damn hospital waiting room, or some girl she saw in a photo I'd shown her a week ago.

"They catch the guy at least?" Hawk questioned, interrupting our tense standoff.

"Yeah," the doc confirmed, eyeing the destruction still being attended to—crimson-colored smears of blood looking like some kid had fingerpainted across the crisp white walls and floors. "The cops were here pretty quick. Hauled him away in a cruiser about fifteen minutes ago, and he did not go quietly."

Not surprising.

I'd seen the lengths some of these bastards would go to keep their girls, and this asshole had already lost her once, then managed to get his hands on her again.

She was important to him. More than just another bitch to earn him money on a street corner.

"She'd taken a whole lot of pills. Any guesses as to the result she was trying to achieve?" Shay asked dryly as she pointed across the room to one of the cubicles, its curtain pulled open.

Alice.

I'd been carrying her photo in my pocket for nearly two weeks.

There was no mistaking her thick dark hair, though it was messy and matted. The thin hospital blanket covering her did not hide that she was clearly undernourished as her bony limbs protruded unnaturally.

"I just don't understand. Why would that guy even bother to bring her in? He had to know someone would take one look at her and know something wasn't right." Shay exhaled slowly, shaking her head as she stared across the room at Alice. There was sadness in her eyes that piqued my curiosity. It was something more than just sympathy for a young girl who lost her way.

It was stronger. More intense. Less like an acknowledgment of how Alice must feel and more of an understanding.

Another puzzle piece.

"There are many reasons why he might have brought her in," Hawk answered when I remained silent, my nephew watching me curiously out of the corner of his eye. "Maybe because she makes him money, and he doesn't want to lose that income. Or maybe because of what she did. Taking the pills. If he had other girls, and they knew doing that had gotten her free from him, they'd probably all start trying it too."

"Or because she's his favorite toy," I added, clenching my fists at my sides. "And he wasn't done playing yet."

A shudder rippled up Shay's spine. "He kept calling her his girlfriend."

"That's how it starts." I'd seen it so many fucking times and once, even within my own fucking club. "They date for a while, and everything is good. Then he starts asking her to do things with other guys. Tells her he'll use the money to buy her nice things or maybe drugs. Saying shit like, ‘if you loved me.'"

The look on Shay's face was pure hatred and disgust, her nose scrunched and head shaking as she removed the ice pack from her ribs. "Wish I'd cut his dick off while I had the chance," she muttered under her breath, tossing the ice pack onto the desk with a hard thump before lifting her baby blue scrubs to show her stomach. The area was red—maybe just from the cold—but a hint of light purple began to show through.

She was lucky that was it.

Thankfully, she looked okay.

But despite repeating that mantra in my head a couple of times, I still clenched my jaw and barely resisted the urge to leap across the desk to help her as she took a little longer to get up from her chair, moving cautiously so as not to irritate her injury.

When she finally stood steadily, I released the breath I'd been holding in a hard huff, and she rolled her eyes. "It's nothing, I'm fine."

"Is that your opinion or a doctor's opinion?" I countered, and the doc standing awkwardly at her side quickly cleared his throat.

"Our definitions of fine may vary just a little. There's very minor bruising, she's breathing okay, and there's no signs of internal damage or bleeding." Jesus Christ. Internal bleeding? "I'll probably get her to come back in tomorrow and get X-rays and things, but I think she'll recover pretty qui—"

"Why not do those things now?"

"Because I want to go home," Shay cut in, an almost manic laugh falling from her mouth. "I've just finished a twelve-hour shift and had my ass beat. I think I deserve a sleep now."

The doc scoffed loudly. "Given you managed to get him on the floor by yourself and pin him there by threatening to inject shit into his spine… I'd say that fight was more like a tie."

Her face morphed into this beautiful fucking smile. For the first time since I'd stormed in there, I witnessed her realize the kind of power and courage she'd displayed.

How she'd saved a life.

And while I wanted to continue to remind her that she'd risked her own in the process, there was no fucking way I was about to dampen that light in her eyes. It was so mesmerizing that I couldn't look away.

Fuck. I didn't know how to deal with this shit. I didn't take orders. I did whatever the hell I wanted.

I'd never felt this way before like I was fighting my own feelings.

What I'd felt for Calli's mom hadn't exactly been instant, but it had slowly climbed, built, and developed into something.

This attraction with Shay had been like a rollercoaster—off like a rocket from the moment we met. The ups and downs were constantly doing my fucking head in, and yet, every time I saw an opportunity to get the hell off, I just held on instead.

"I'm gonna head home." Shay grabbed a small backpack from the desk and delicately slipped it over her shoulder.

"Hawk will give you a ride."

"While I appreciate that," she countered, smiling politely at my VP and strategically shuffling around us, moving toward the exit, "… I'll probably call Calli on the way home and have a complete breakdown, which I'd rather no one witness. Then when I walk through the door at home, I can just fall into my bed and sleep this bullshit off."

Everything in my bones told me not to let her leave, but as she backed away, I was distracted by the frantic father I'd called on our way here, bursting through the double doors behind her and rushing toward me. "Alice? Where is she?"

I glanced past him just as a blur of blue scrubs slipped out the emergency room doors, my hands curling into tight fists as I battled the need to run after her.

"Bishop? Bishop, what's going on? Is Alice okay? Is she here?"

Sucking in a deep breath, the tension in my shoulders fell away, and I finally allowed my attention to turn to Alice's dad, Evan Hersh. "She's over here," I said, nodding toward the cubical across the room.

The second his eyes fell on her, his knees weakened, and he grabbed hold of the nursing station desk to steady himself. "She okay?"

The doc cleared his throat. "She's alive, but she's going to need a lot of help and support to get through the trauma she's experienced. Not just her body but also her mind. I need to check on a few patients, but I'll be around soon to discuss with you the next steps toward her recovery."

Evan patted him on the back. "Thanks, doc."

Shay's friend nodded and gathered some files off the desk before disappearing down the hall.

"I'll come by and pay you guys once I get Alice out of here. I don't have it on me, but I'm good for it, I swear."

He was good for it. I'd done my research.

Evan Hersh was an investor and one of the lucky people who'd put money into Bitcoin when it was new and upcoming. He owned property, companies, and had shares in fucking everything.

He was good for the fifty thousand, and I didn't feel bad fucking taking it from him, except the club hadn't been the one to find Alice.

"You should really be paying Shay. I showed her a photo of Alice last week, and she was the one who recognized her and stopped him from leaving with her."

Evan shook his head. "I understand that, but if I hadn't come to the club and given you those photos, this would have never happened," he argued, his eyes continuously flicking back to where his daughter lay as if he was scared she would vanish again. "I promised to pay for your help, and I'm a man of my word."

I shrugged. As I said, the man wasn't hurting for cash, and if he wanted to give it to the club, I'd happily fucking take it. "A deal's a deal."

Though, when he delivered that money, I'd be calling a very serious point of order in church to decide exactly what to do with it.

Shay deserved it.

And while it would benefit the club, we also weren't exactly hurting for cash. Both points that I'd be making very clear to my brothers.

"The cops in the lobby taking statements said the guy they arrested was absolutely feral," Evan said, lowering his voice. "They said maybe I should leave the state with Alice for a little while and hope he loses interest."

"They give you a name?" Hawk enquired, his eyes shifting to meet mine.

There weren't many bastards in Detroit we didn't know in one way or another, the club having spilled blood more times than I could count—ours and theirs—in order to come to what we called understandings about our city.

The only reason I took on this little side project in the first place was because, as far as I knew, none of those people we had deals with ran girls, at least not ones they just pimped out on the streets or that they had to drug to keep in line.

"Vince… Vince something…" The businessman's brow pinched tight between his eyes as he searched deep within the chaos of his mind. "Martelli!"

I swear to God, I felt the room's temperature go cold.

Icy fucking cold.

"Vince Martelli," Hawk repeated, pinching at the bridge of his nose. "You're sure that's what they said?"

"Yeah. Martelli." Evan's enthusiastic head bob gradually began to slow as his eyes moved between us, taking in our reactions. "It's bad, isn't it?"

Hawk coughed out a laugh and slammed his palm against the man's back. "You're talking about moving states to get away from him? I'd try moving countries. Get as far away as possible, as soon as fucking possible. My suggestion would be tonight."

It might have sounded dramatic, but thankfully the man saw past Hawk's playful tone and was instantly running after the doctor, demanding his daughter's release.

Hawk fell into step beside me as I turned on my heel and made a beeline for the exit. "This is not fucking good," he hissed out the side of his mouth as we all but ran through the waiting room. "Shay said Vince threatened to kill her."

We both knew what that meant, and I was already kicking myself for letting her walk out of those damn doors when my gut was screaming at me to stop her.

Shay had played off the threat like it was nothing, and honestly, in her line of work within the emergency department, I'm sure she'd had her fair share of drunks and addicts throwing around threats of violence.

The difference was who it came from.

Because Vince Martelli was the son of Detroit's most notorious crime family.

And the Martelli's didn't make threats they didn't intend on following through with.

"We need to get to Shay, and we need to get there quickly."