Ridge Creek Read online

  This picture is on the roof above me.

  I can hear voices yelling.

  “I told you to help her off the fuckin’ bike Pops. Not drop her on her ass on the concrete.”

  I recognize Hulk’s rumble coming from my left somewhere.

  Turning my head, I see him standing just inside an open doorway. Catching my first real sight of him I let out a silent gasp. Now only wearing a tight, black short sleeved t-shirt, I can confirm that his broad is indeed all muscle. With arms like tree trunks, each muscle appears to be more clearly defined by the many tattoos spiraling up them towards his neck. He has a tribal tattoo starting behind his ear that runs down the left side of neck. He also has an eyebrow piercing above his left eye.

  He has shiny, raven black hair that hangs in loose waves down to his shoulders. He is tanned like he spends all day in the sun and my guess he is aged in his thirties somewhere. In profile, I can see he has a strong square chin and heavy brow.

  Not usually one to take notice of biker men, I find myself instantaneously converted. I should have been paying more attention all these years. If these are the sorts of guys hiding under biker outfits, I’ve been missing out.

  This is one hawt biker.

  Dragging my eyes from the visual pleasure that is ‘Hulk’, I see Pops is standing in the doorway looking forlorn.

  “I didn’t expect her to just drop like that. Fuck. It was when I saw her arm. That on top of her ass and back and I was afraid to fucking touch her in case she screamed or something.”

  “You’re fucking useless,” Hulk growls as he swings back to look at me. I blink slowly at him and watch as he registers that I am awake. I register that his eyes are a bright iridescent green.

  Holy shit.

  “Why the fuck did you bring her here anyway?” I hear yet another voice coming from my right and I swing my head slowly to see where it is coming from.

  My eyes catch sight of another huge hulk looking guy. This one has short cropped dark hair and vivid blue eyes. He is only wearing a pair of jeans that have not yet had their top button done up and I gasp again as I stare at the best set of washboard abs I have ever seen.

  Fuck, I died and went to heaven.

  “Are you my angels?” I whisper softly as I drag my eyes from hulk number two’s chest to look longingly in his eyes.

  “Huh?” He grunts as he knits his brows in confusion and steps closer. Stooping towards me, I watch as he roams his eyes over my face. He winces and then looks over towards Hulk number one near the door. “I think her head’s as fucked up as the rest of her.”

  “Fuck,” I hear Hulk number one say. Turning my head towards him I watch as he moves closer. He too now leans closer and I watch as his green eyes scrunch with concern. “Arianna, you okay?”

  Trying to put a smile on a face that feels like it might be swollen twice its size, I announce, “I’m having a bad day.”

  “I’m getting that,” he says as he swings to look at Hulk number two. “She’s fine.”

  “How the fuck you get the words ‘she’s fine’ from what I can see lying there, I don’t know brother. She doesn’t look fine to me. Why the fuck did you bring her here anyway? She needs to be in intensive care or something.”

  “She begged me not to take her to a hospital, a doctor, a police station or any place public. What the fuck was I supposed to do?”

  “Fuckin’ ignore her stupid ass request and take her anyway.”

  “No!” I yell as I struggle unsuccessfully to lift myself off the bed. “No hospitals…”

  My words are cut off by Hulk number one instantly planting his hand in my chest as he pushes me back down onto the bed. “I told you. I’ve got this Arianna.”

  Staring up helplessly I fall quiet and stay put.

  “Call in a marker. We need a doctor. Here. Under radar, no questions asked.”

  With a huge sigh of relief I stare thankfully up at my new savior.

  “Thank you… um…”

  “Jake.” Tipping his head towards hulk number two he says, “Zane.”

  Straightening his huge body back to its full height he lifts his chin to Zane and they both stride towards the door. Passing through, I watch as Pops leans back in, grabs the door handle and pulls the door shut behind him.

  *****

  Jake…

  “What the fuck were you thinking brother?” Zane asks me as we walk together through the maze of rooms attached to the back of our Harley store. Arriving at the main communal area, I walk across the room to stand behind the timber bar. Stooping down to look along the shelves lined with liquor bottles, I spot a bottle of Jamieson. Latching onto the neck of a bottle, I tag three shot glasses from the end of the bar and line them up.

  Quickly pouring three shots, I watch as Pops and Zane settle into stools opposite me.

  Each picking up a shot glass, we tip them back, swallow and then drop the glasses to the bench again. I refill them as I feel the burn of the whiskey sliding down the back of my throat.

  “I was thinking that tiny little strip of a woman lying in there had just told me she’d been bashed, raped and had to throw herself out the back of a moving truck to avoid execution. Not only had she told me that, but she also told me she’d rather die on the side of the road than go anywhere public. It didn’t take a Rhodes Scholar to work out someone wants her dead.”

  Zane slams his second drink and pushes his shot glass towards me for another.

  “My point exactly brother. Someone wants her fuckin’ dead. Fuck, take a look at her. She should be dead. Didn’t you stop to think that someone might come lookin’ for her?”

  Nodding my agreement, I drink my own drink and wait for Pops to catch up. Pouring us all another round I reply, “Yeah I considered it. But fuck me boys, look at her would ya? She’s about five foot nothing, wouldn’t weigh more than fifty fuckin’ kilo’s and someone has opened a serious can of whoop ass on her. I’m pretty sure a fair few of those injuries were already there when she threw herself out of that truck. Most men wouldn’t have survived what she’s been through. Getting raped on top of all that, the woman’s got some fuckin’ grit.”

  Pops nods slowly, “Now there’s a fact.”

  “How far away is the Doc?” I direct my question to Zane who has just spent the last five minutes making calls and pulling markers to get us a doctor willing to work ‘private’ at five in the morning, no questions asked.

  “He said he’d be at least thirty minutes. He was about to go running but hadn’t left yet so was heading straight to his car. He warned me he couldn’t get anesthetic…”

  “Fuck,” I curse as I realize what he’s saying. Arianna thinks she’s having a bad day. It’s about to get worse.

  “Pops, I’m gunna need you to ring Ma. Don’t take any shit from her. Tell her what’s going on. We need a woman in there. Zane, you might want to roll us a couple of strong ones.” Holding up the Jamieson bottle I add, “I’ll take this in there and see if I can get a couple down her before the Doc gets here.”

  Nodding in solemn agreement I am about to leave the bar and head back to Arianna when Zane asks, “How’d the other business go?”

  Of course, the reason I was out there in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night in the first place. To set up a new hydroponics system in an old farmhouse that we’ve kitted out with both solar and wind power. One of our new ‘green’ houses as we call them. Green covering both the energy we generate and the pot we grow as a sideline. This particular sideline uses the Harley shop as a business front. This was now the third farmhouse we had set up as ‘green’. So far, without massive energy bills being detected by the power companies, our hydroponics setups were flying safely under police radar.

  “Sorted. No one saw us coming or going. The batteries were all charged up and everything was running as expected. We got all the shit set up and were out of there by one-thirty.” Pausing, my mind jolts as a piece of Arianna’s puzzle falls into place. “That’s why she threw herself
off the side of the road. I was following the truck back. She thought it was the truck she’d just leaped from. Fuck. I still can’t believe I caught her out of the corner of my eye. At the time I almost convinced myself I was seeing things and I nearly didn’t stop.”

  Shaking my head in amazement, I head back through the maze of rooms to my bedroom where I hope Arianna is sleeping. She’s gunna need all the sleep she can get.

  Chapter Two

  Hell On Earth

  Arianna…

  Listening to the quiet murmurs of men talking somewhere else in the house, I nod off. Startling suddenly out of sleep, I sense movement to my left. Gasping in fright, I swing my head to the left but am relieved to find it is just Jake dragging a chair closer over to the bed.

  Watching him as he moves about, I find myself in awe of the sheer power that is Jake. Moving with ease, he looks like a man who knows every bulging muscle in his body and how to use them.

  I watch as he swipes his hand across the bedside table next to me. With a single swipe, he sends empty bourbon cans, cigarette packets and pieces of paper flying to the floor. Setting two shot glasses and a bottle of Jamieson down in the clearing he has made, I watch as he lowers himself into the seat.

  Settling his exotic green eyes on my face, he announces, “I’ve got good and bad news.” Pausing to cast his eyes along my body I watch his eyes linger on my right arm before he continues.

  “The good news is that we’ve organized a doctor. Confidential. No questions asked.” Pausing again, his eyes wander slowly back up my body to my face. “The bad is that he doesn’t have any anesthetic.”

  Realizing what he is saying, I sigh heavily. Looking direct into his eyes with my only good eye I try to grin. Again, I feel like my face isn’t doing what I’m asking it to do and I wonder how bad it looks. “Oh well. I think my arm is only dislocated anyway so I hope that with one quick yank it will all be over.”

  “Arianna.” I watch as his face contorts a little and a fleeting look of concern shoots across his eyes before vanishing quickly.

  “What?” I ask quietly.

  I watch as he seems to war with something behind his eyes before he softly sighs and asks, “Do you drink?”

  “Wine,” I murmur my response.

  “Today’s a top-shelf day sweetheart. You’re gunna need to drink a whiskey or two with me.”

  “Okay,” I breathe the word out slowly.

  Watching as he pours a couple of shots of Jamieson, he moves his chair even closer and gently places a hand behind my head. Tilting it slightly forward, he holds one of the shots to my lips and says, “One big swallow. It's gunna burn but just go with it.”

  Keeping my eyes on his, I nod slightly and he tips. Pouring the entire shot into my mouth, I swallow and choke hard as the fire of the whiskey burns through my nose and throat.

  “Good girl,” he says as he leans back, takes his own shot and throws it back.

  Pouring another two drinks we repeat.

  I find myself starting to feel warm. It’s sort of nice as I realize that some of my pains are starting to feel like dull thuds instead of stabbing fire.

  Pouring a third round, he helps me drink my shot, throws back his own and then starts talking.

  “I’m not sure what you can feel right now but most of the skin on your back and one whole ass cheek has torn off. There’s chunks of rock, sticks, cloth and fuck knows what else hanging out of most of it. There’s also a lot of blood between your legs honey. You’re gunna need more than whiskey. You ever smoked pot?”

  Shocked at what he’s just told me I find myself blinking rapidly as I stare into his eyes.

  “My skin is gone?” I ask in horror.

  “Pretty much sweetheart. I’m guessing you landed on your back when you flew out that truck yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Pot?” He asks again.

  “No…” I whisper softly.

  “Today’s a smoking pot day too sweetheart. You hearin’ me?”

  “Okay,” I murmur as we both hear the sound of the door quietly opening and shutting.

  “Doc’s five minutes out. Ma just got here.” Zane’s voice rolls heavily through the room. Moving closer to the bed, I watch as he hands Jake a couple of home rolled cigarettes.

  “Pops donated some of his good shit,” I hear him rumble as Jake reaches into his back pocket and produces a lighter. “I rolled us all one each.”

  “You ever smoked sweetheart?” Jake asks softly.

  “Yeah. Gave up two years ago.”

  “Good,” he replies softly and I wonder whether he means it’s good that I smoked or it’s good that I gave up. Not a point worth worrying about right now I guess.

  Lighting the first joint, he sucks on it a few times to make sure it is burning strongly before reaching across and holding it to my lips. Unsure what I’m in for, I take a small drag to find I’m pleasantly surprised by a smooth herby flavor that is not unpleasant.

  Encouraging me to have at it, he flicks the ash carelessly to the floor between each drag, always returning the joint to my mouth quickly.

  The cigarette is soon gone and I watch as he picks one of the discarded cans up from the floor and drops the butt into it. It hisses against some leftover bourbon.

  “How you feeling?” He asks softly.

  “Heavy,” I murmur back. And I do. My body feels like lead and I’m slightly dizzy. Most of the pain is gone from my arm and I feel like I could happily snooze.

  “Good,” he says as his hand lifts to my face and gently slides some hair behind my ear.

  Looking solemnly at Zane he nods, “Send them in as soon as the Doc gets here.”

  *****

  What I experience over the next two hours can only be described as Hell on Earth. Thinking back to the moment when I was lying next to my roadside log and asking Jake to leave me to die, I now really wish that he had.

  At first I thought it wasn’t going to be too bad. This was because the agonizing sharp pain that jolted through my body as Jake and Zane held me down while the doctor reset my dislocated shoulder made me pass out.

  Being sent to oblivion was good, but short-lived.

  Coming out of my pain induced slumber, I open my eyes to see a pair of bright green eyes staring closing at me. But they aren’t Jake’s.

  They are on the face of a gorgeous middle-aged woman with sleek black hair tied neatly in a ponytail behind her head. She is holding my hand and crooning something to me softly.

  Seeing that my eyes are open, she stops her crooning and speaks softly to me. “My name is Ellen. I’m Jake and Zane’s mother.”

  Smiling back at her as best I can, I process this new piece of information and decide it makes sense that the two hulks are related and they have a beautiful mother.

  I soon become aware that I am no longer lying on my back and twist my head to look down my body. I have been turned over, and to my horror, stripped naked.

  The Doctor who introduced himself earlier as Simon, looks grimly up at me. He explains that while I was out like a light, he managed to make some minor adjustments to my shoulder. It is now in pretty good shape. There is however lots of soft tissue damage that will take some weeks to repair.

  Suggesting I look away, I watch as he leans in closely to inspect my back.

  That’s when I feel the first agonizing tug at my back.

  And I scream.

  How I survived the next ninety minutes I don’t know. Jake would appear periodically with a freshly rolled cigarette and sit with me while I smoked it. During these times, his mother would leave the room.

  I sensed that pot wasn’t her thing.

  These pot breaks would be a short reprieve between sessions of pure agony where the Doctor would continue his plucking and sometimes stitching, along my back and rump. I screamed a lot. Now and then during my screaming I would hear loud thuds coming from another room far away. I even thought at one stage I heard glass smashing.

  Nearly two long hours after
he arrived, the Doctor finally arranged for the boys to turn me back over onto my front again. By that stage I didn’t care that I was naked anymore.

  I didn’t care that two hot guys were seeing me at my worst.

  I just wished I was dead.

  I think I could see this reflected in the Doctor’s eyes as he performed his last task of care. He examined between my legs. Making short work of my internal examination, he shakes his head slowly as heads back to his bag. A few more agonizing stitches later, he is finally done.

  “With clever cushioning, you may prefer to lay on your front or your side Miss…” His voice floats off as he questions my surname.

  “Arianna,” I mumble.

  “Arianna,” he finishes. “I will leave plenty of wound dressings, pain killers and ointments with Ellen. You can wrap your ribs, three of them are broken. You will also need to take some strong antibiotics for a couple of weeks to suppress any follow up infections. I will give you an injectable antibiotic for now and write a script for you to fill as well. I will need your name for the script.”

  I shake my head. “No names. No scripts.”

  “Miss Arianna, I cannot write a script without your name.”

  “Write it in mine,” I hear Jake’s voice rumble from near the door. “I’ll fill it later this morning.”

  Nodding his ascent, the Doctor writes the script and gives me a couple of shots in the arm. “One is a tetanus, the other the antibiotic,” he advises.

  “Thank you,” I murmur softly to him.

  “Don’t thank me yet Miss Arianna. You have a long road ahead of you and I’m no plastic surgeon. I’ve put you back together as best I could but as to the extent of the scarring, I cannot advise.”

  Nodding my understanding I watch as he packs his bag up and leaves the room.

  Jake wanders slowly over as his mother starts settling blankets gently over my body.

  “One more smoke?”

  “One more smoke.” I agree with a slight nod.

  Please God let this be the one that sends me to sleep.