Rising tide broken chain.., p.1
Rising Tide (Broken Chains MC Book 5), page 1
RISING TIDE
Broken Chains MC
Book 5
E.M. LINDSEY
Rising Tide
E.M. Lindsey
Copyright © 2021
All rights reserved.
This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This book is a work of fiction. Any events, places, or people portrayed in the book have been used in a manner of fiction and are not intended to represent reality. Any resemblance is purely coincidental.
Cover by Amai Designs
Editing: Susie Selva
Content Warning: this book contains characters and situations with grey morality. This book also contains gunshot wounds, as well as mentions of past torture, violence, blood, and references to past sexual assault. Please take caution with any triggers you might have.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Epilogue
Also by E.M. Lindsey
About the Author
Chapter One
If Rory wasn’t so goddamn tired, he might think this whole thing was hilarious. After all, being stalked and kidnapped was starting to get a little old. That shit had been going on since he was a kid, and he found it almost ironic that these assholes still expected him to be surprised by it.
Rory knew pain better than anyone—both internal and external. He’d been raised by an abusive piece of shit who saw him as a burden. He’d been abandoned by his mother, raised by his brother, and assaulted by one of the men his father trusted.
And you’d think he’d have been ready to run when his brother had decided enough was enough, but he’d been pissed about it.
When Aaron had announced they were leaving the Reapers to start their own life away from the club, Rory was furious. After all, his brother had ripped him from the only world he’d ever known. But Aaron had expected him to be relieved, so Rory had played the part because his brother had suffered enough on his behalf.
Rory had learned to live as normally as possible, but he knew better than to believe Aaron would accept civilian life forever. And a few years later, when Rory heard Aaron slip on his cut bearing the name Broken Chains for the first time, he knew it had all come full circle.
Just like he knew they wouldn’t be able to escape their past.
His old man might have died, but there were still monsters lurking in the shadows, waiting to claw open their bellies and play with their insides. The only time Rory had ever felt fear was when he’d heard Hydra’s name on their lips again, but it was coupled with determination to get this over with—once and for all.
Which was why he wasn’t running. He was walking at a leisurely pace back to his little rental, pretending he couldn’t hear the assholes behind him. Even after this many years, people still underestimated him.
They figured if he wasn’t fuckin’ Daredevil, then he was some weak, helpless, disabled little boy who couldn’t take care of himself. Like if they got the jump on him—which they would—he wouldn’t be expecting it.
Of course, there wasn’t a second that went by where Rory didn’t understand his limitations. He wasn’t a superhero, so he wouldn’t be able to outrun two sighted men on a street where he only knew one path. His cane wasn’t magical, and his echolocation skills were subpar. Like, if he banged his cane on the ground, he could tell where cars and walls were, but he couldn’t lose them if he took off at a sprint.
His best bet was to let them take him.
That would put a target on their backs and a price on their heads.
Rory should probably feel bad about letting the men condemn themselves to death, but it was hard to feel pity for people who’d kill him if the price was right. When they took him, they wouldn’t be kind about it. They’d hurt him and take pleasure in it. So why should he allow any mercy?
He was about five minutes from his front door when he finally got tired of the little cat-and-mouse game. He came to an abrupt halt, almost laughing when he heard their footsteps skid to a stop. He carefully folded his cane, slipped it into his back pocket, then turned.
Rory could see some—though he hated calling it that because sighted people always misunderstood the word. Yeah, he could make out shapes and shadows—and if the conditions were right, he could even see a bit of color. But that was it, and the most he could do was track the movement of the three men in front of him.
They were dark and blurry, and trying to keep his eyes from moving was giving him a headache, so he didn’t bother.
“So do you want me to, like, fight back? Or…”
“Shut the fuck up,” one of them spat. He didn’t recognize the voice, not that he expected to. He knew Hydra was after him as a way to get to Aaron, but he didn’t think the man would be out doing his own dirty work. That’s what these little grunts were for. Prospect bitches getting their hands dirty in hopes of getting on Hydra’s good side.
Pathetic.
Rory closed his eyes and bowed his head. “Could you please hurry up? You do know my brother has eyes on me all the time. You keep this up, and—”
He didn’t get to finish the rest of his sentence. Something sharp and cold knocked him against the back of the head once—then twice—and he was out before he hit the ground.
Rory woke up tied to a chair. It was a position he’d been in more than once, and after wriggling his wrists, he could tell he was bound with rope. Fuckin’ amateurs, he thought with a grin. Duct tape was the worst to break out of, followed by metal cuffs. Sliding his hands out of rope would give him wicked burns, but those would heal, and it would take far less time.
Tilting his head to the side, he did a quick assessment of the room. He couldn’t hear anything besides the groan of an AC somewhere to his left, but it wasn’t enough to give him the scope of the room. Everything sounded a little muffled, but that could easily be the head injury.
It was too dark for him to make out anything at all, so he was leaning toward being thrown into someone’s closet.
He debated about tapping his foot on the ground to give him some idea of the room’s size, but he didn’t want to draw attention to himself just yet. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been out, but the pain in his temple told him he’d been hit hard enough to cause a concussion, which meant trying to escape on his own was out of the question.
Lifting his right leg, he brushed the top of his foot against the cuff of his jeans and almost laughed because they hadn’t even bothered to search him. His emergency burner was still strapped to his calf, which meant his brother had access to the tracker.
There was no chance that whoever Smokey had sent to watch his apartment wouldn’t have alerted him when Rory never got home. Rory couldn’t feel his phone in his pocket, which meant those fuckers had taken it. So when he didn’t answer, Smokey would have gathered the troops, ready to rain hellfire down on them.
He debated about breaking out of the ropes at all, but he’d rather be of use to his rescuers instead of waiting on his ass like some fuckin’ damsel in distress.
He started twisting his arms and felt pain shoot through his temples again. He hoped that whatever happened, these guys suffered when the Chains were done with them. He wriggled a little harder, then paused, but he didn’t hear anyone coming, which meant he wasn’t being watched.
Yeah, he was in a fuckin’ closet.
Assholes.
He began to move with a little more purpose now that he was sure he was locked behind a closed door, and it only took him a few seconds and a couple of nasty scrapes along the outside of his thumb before his hand was free. He immediately lifted his wrist and used his teeth to dislodge the little woven bracelet, and he dropped it into his hand. Instead of a latch, it had a sharp, one inch knife, and he used that to saw through the second rope, freeing his left hand.
Snapping the little knife back into place, Rory stood and twisted back and forth to free some of the kinks from his arms, then waited another second to see if anyone was coming. The room was still silent, so he stretched out his hands and felt nothing until his fingertips brushed a wall. The floor was bare, and when he felt for it, there was an empty hanger bar stretching across the space. The size of the room told him it was probably some sort of coat closet.
That meant he was in someone’s house.
Finding the door, he put his back to the wall, then crouched down and pulled the burner from his ankle. If he was kidnapped, the guys knew better than to call him, but the moment he pushed the speed dial button, Forge answered.
“We got someone on the way.”
“Aaron?” he asked.
“He’s caught up in something else,” Forge said, and Rory almost laughed. That meant he was either under fire or also tied up because there was no way in hell Aaron wouldn’t have immediately hit the road.
“He gonna survive it?”
Forge laughed. “You know he is. Where you at right now?”
“House somewhere,” Rory said, keeping his voice
“Nate’s got a lock on you,” Forge told him. “He’s about two minutes away.”
Nate. Fuck.
Rory was just starting to forgive him for abandoning him all those years ago, and he was taking a sort of perverse pleasure in watching Nate and Aaron posture at each other instead of working through their issues. He’d started talking to Nate again mostly to piss Aaron off, but somewhere along the way, Rory had started to like him again.
Only…it was different this time.
This time, he was seeing Nate and understanding the man he was with an adult’s perspective. He wanted to hate him for leaving the way he did, but Rory also understood why he had to go.
And Nate was still very much the man Rory had crushed on with his tiny little preteen heart. Only better, and braver, and stronger than he had been as Ghost.
Not that Rory thought he had a chance with Nate, but Rory was also the sort of person who went after the things he wanted, zero fucks given to what other people thought about it. If things hadn’t been so chaotic with him trying to finish grad school amid a fuckin’ club war between his brother and Hydra, he might have made a move.
“Still there?” Forge asked.
Rory rubbed at his eye, an old habit from childhood, and ignored the pain in his head. “Yeah. Debating whether or not I should break out of here and distract these guys before Nate gets here.”
“Just lie low. Nate’s on his own, but we were able to get surveillance, and there’s only a couple of them.”
“There were three who picked me up. I’m not sure if I should feel flattered they sent so many guys after me,” Rory said, hunkering down against the wall. The concussion was starting to make him tired, and he wanted to crawl into his bed and sleep for a few days.
“I’d say it’s appropriate.” There was a buzzing sound on Forge’s end, then he sighed. “Nate’s there, and Smokey’s got his shit handled. He said to tell you he’ll be in touch.”
“Sounds good,” Rory said. His sentence was punctuated by gunshots, then the sounds of shouting. He really hated sitting on his ass and letting Nate fight his battle for him, but he was also hurt and—if he was being honest with himself—a little annoyed.
He was willing to fight because club business was his business, but this wasn’t his war. Hydra didn’t want him because he thought Rory was a threat. Hydra wanted him because he wanted to hurt Aaron.
And Rory fuckin’ hated being anyone’s pawn.
Before he could really make a decision, he heard the sound of a boot meeting wood, then the door swung open. The light was so bright it was painful, and he threw his hand over his face as he was grabbed and tugged from the closet.
It took him a second to realize it wasn’t Nate. The fucker who grabbed him had a gun pressed to his back. Rory had been in this position before, and while he had never been mortally wounded, he wasn’t afraid of being hurt. He wasn’t afraid of death.
He heard Nate swear, then Rory threw an elbow up into the guy’s ribs with enough force to knock him back. He hit the ground, then covered his ears as a series of pops eclipsed every sound in the room. All he heard after that was a high-pitched whine and somewhere beyond that, Nate’s voice.
“…okay? Can you walk?”
Rory’s vertigo was making him feel like he was trying to walk on a moving carnival ride, and he finally relented and shook his head. “Don’t think so.”
Nate’s hands were all over him, checking him for injuries, and he stopped when he hit the head wound and Rory hissed in pain. “Fucker.”
“Well, I think you made him pay for it,” Rory said wryly. He gripped Nate’s arms hard as he stood up, and the world spun again, so he didn’t let go. “Any chance you took something other than your bike?”
He was met with silence, which meant either a nonverbal answer or guilt. Rory guessed the latter.
“Whatever. It’s fine. Just get me the fuck out of here.”
Nate sighed and slung an arm around Rory’s waist, leading him out of the house. Rory wanted to ask about his cane, which was definitely missing from his pocket, and his phone, which had basically the rest of his life on the little device, but he didn’t think Nate would appreciate it—or go back inside to hunt for either.
Rory managed to keep himself upright as Nate got onto his bike, then he situated himself behind the other man and held his waist as tightly as he could. The roar of the engine was fresh hell on his tender temples, but he knew he could bear it.
And it wasn’t like he had a choice.
Nate wasted no time spitting gravel behind them as he hit the road. Rory felt a punch of relief to finally be away from that house, even if he’d only been there a short while. The sun hadn’t even fully set, which meant they couldn’t have kept him for more than an hour.
But Rory hated feeling vulnerable.
He hated getting knocked out and having no idea where he was when he finally came to.
It had happened years back—the only time Rory had been really afraid Aaron wouldn’t reach him in time. He’d been snatched after his last class of the day, knocked out, and tied up. The fuckers were trying to pressure Aaron about something, and Rory was just the collateral for his cooperation. Rory had wanted to laugh at the time because he knew Aaron was going to rain down fresh hell on them.
But they were sadistic little fucks. They kept Rory turned around and unsteady and in pain until the Chains finally showed up to get him. The way that made him feel—weak and unable to protect himself—was something he never said aloud. He had a feeling the rest of the guys knew, but he appreciated that they never asked him about it.
This time would be no different, but this time he was also not a trembling mess. He was just in pain, and he wanted his bed, and…
His fantasy about what he’d do when he got home fizzled out when he realized they’d been driving for half an hour. Which meant they weren’t going to his house. He was fairly good with directions, and he could tell immediately that they weren’t heading for River Crest either.
That motherfucker. He knew immediately why Nate hadn’t mentioned it. Rory would have kneed him in the balls, then called Forge to come pick him up because he wasn’t about to play any more of these goddamn games between his brother and Hydra. He was done.
His rage was enough to eclipse his pain, so when they finally rolled to a halt at whatever fucking middle-of-nowhere safe house Nate had dragged him to, Rory hopped off the bike and took a swing at him. His fist connected with soft leather, and he heard Nate stumble just before the bike’s engine cut off.
“What the hell is your problem?” Nate demanded.
“Where are we?” When Nate said nothing, Rory took a step forward and swung at him again. Nate had the advantage of seeing it coming, and he caught Rory’s fist with ease.
“Stop fuckin’ punching me.”
“Where are we?” Rory demanded again.
Nate gripped him by the wrist and tugged him away from the bike and toward what Rory assumed was some house. They were in the middle of the woods if the swamp smell and the boxed-in humidity was anything to go by, and the ground beneath his feet was definitely sand and grass.
“Five steps,” Nate grunted.
Rory wrenched his hand away and groped until he felt a railing, then got himself up onto the porch. “Answer me, or I’m gonna run.”
“Go for it. I’d be happy to let you fight a couple gators.” Rory heard Nate unlock the door with a series of soft beeps from an electronic keypad, then came the click of a deadbolt.
