Hostile Saint (Steel Stallions MC Book 1) Read online

  Table of Contents

  TITLE PAGE

  AUTHOR NOTE

  DEDICATION

  AUTHOR WARNING

  Making Vows

  Finding Signs

  Taking Steps

  Hearing Cries

  Giving Knowledge

  Watching Tate

  Needing Sugar

  Facing Paths

  Learning Truths

  Seeing Fates

  Sharing Memories

  Climbing Walls

  Helping Hearts

  Telling Lies

  Creating Gains

  Making Footprints

  Surrendering Hearts

  Perceiving Goals

  Being Understood

  Evading Poison

  Offering Dreams

  Howling Pain

  Demanding Faith

  Weaving Full Circles

  Building Alliances

  Burning Deaths

  Wanting Retribution

  Balancing Vengeance

  Brewing Storms

  Demanding Peace

  Walking Blind

  Saving Loves

  Contemplating Outcomes

  AUTHOR NOTE

  FREE BOOK!

  INDIA’S THANK YOUS

  CONTACT AUTHOR

  BOOKS BY INDIA R. ADAMS

  HOSTILE SAINT, Book 1 in the Steel Stallions MC Series

  Copyright © 2021 by India R. Adams

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, stored in or introduced into retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the author; except in the case of a brief quotation embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Lead Editor: Kendra Gaither @ Kendra’s Editing and Book Services

  Second Editor: Michelle Myers

  Cover Design and Formatting by Cat at TRC DESIGNS

  AUTHOR NOTE

  (This novel is a standalone, but to read the prequel, Hostile Illusions, for FREE, click HERE)

  I’m the kind of author who always has hidden meanings in my words. Hence a motto of mine: Let the journey begin. I love reading reviews and seeing who catches on. The reader may not give anything away, but I smile when knowing they got the bigger picture.

  So, in this novel, I’ve decided to give you a clue. If you like to ponder (a favorite pastime for me), know that my chapter titles will always have more than one meaning. One may be obvious, but there will also be at least one more hidden meaning.

  Enjoy the journey!

  DEDICATION

  This dark novel is dedicated to those with the patience of a saint.

  Every day, I yearn to be more like you.

  Create light, and there will be no darkness…

  ~India

  AUTHOR WARNING

  The very first chapter of Hostile Saint may bring you to your knees.

  The rest of the book may help you rise…

  Later in this novel, there will be some gruesome revelations. Please know that some of the details in this story are included to bring awareness to my readers. In certain states, there are laws that have yet to be implemented, therefore leaving children exposed and unprotected.

  Other horrific details that you will read later in this novel may not have as much proof, but are claims by some who say they fell victim to and were lucky to survive and live to tell.

  Whether or not to believe these people is, of course, your choice.

  As I have said before, this world is a beautiful wonder… but there is also some darkness that, with awareness, we can snuff out.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Making Vows

  In fear is how I had lived every single day of my life, yet I had never been as afraid as I was the night I knew I was going to die. And, it wasn’t even my death that was terrifying me. It was hers.

  Staring into hazel eyes that usually held angelic kindness, I was heartbroken to now see them so empty, the same as they had been most of the long day.

  Was it the pain she had endured that caused her mind to drift away? No. We were both very accustomed to agony of all sorts. It was something else. It was something she saw.

  In the dark trunk of a car, I gently ran fingers through blond hair that had been savagely cut short…

  On our sides, although we faced each other, only one of us was present. Void eyes stared.

  Due to who was driving the car, my voice shook as rapidly as did my scared heart. “Lacey, my Pretty Girl, find me.” Her unstable mental wellbeing was causing me just as much fear.

  The car’s taillight glowed inside the trunk, just enough to force me to keep witnessing her blank expression of shock. I swallowed down unbelievable guilt for failing her and letting them find us. “See me. Find me.” I whispered the inevitable, “I need to hear you one last time, baby.”

  Wheels of fate were turning, but so were the wheels underneath us, driving us to a location where it was all to unmercifully—and mercifully because it would all finally be over— end. Lacey and I were so close to finishing high school but would never get the chance. That’s why I needed to feel her love one more time while on this earth. After that, all I could do was hope there truly was a God and that He would let me and my Pretty Girl find each other again, someday.

  We deserved it. We deserved to have our evermore.

  Quietly, to not be overheard by them, I pleaded, “Lace. Talk to me, baby.”

  When she didn’t respond, I begged the angels I was hoping were with us, Please. One ounce of kindness through all this terror. Let me hear that soft voice, one last time.

  Surrender? Peace? Belief? Faith? I’m not sure which one caused the calm to come over me when Lacey’s eyes finally blinked, but it was like a wave of contentment blew through me as she began to focus and actually see me. Even though she was viewing my swollen face and recalling what happened before ending up in this deadly predicament, I was still grateful my last moments would be spent with her.

  As her fingertips soothingly touched my bloodied and cracked lips, raw emotion filled my heart. Shakily, I whispered, “There she is.” Her undeniable love was replacing all the darkness in the confining trunk. Her essence was touching me again. Lacey, I love you so much. “You’ve been…” There was no need to waste time explaining she’d been in shock, nor about fatal facts that couldn’t be changed, so I continued with, “out all day.”

  When she tried to talk but couldn’t, due to the washcloth I had placed in her mouth, I gently removed it. Her bleeding had stopped. Now there was only a hole in her mouth where there once was a molar.

  Soon, the memory of her pain and screams will be gone for good.

  Trying to talk again, she winced and held the side of her face where the violent injury laid beneath her cheek. “Where are we?”

  Did it really matter? Not to me. All I wanted was Lace. My eyes did their best to soak in every ounce of her natural beauty. Her delicate nose. “I don’t know.” Her blond eyebrows. “They have been driving us for hours.”

  That precious little bottom lip, that I had sucked on so many times, now began to tremble. “They’re going to kill us, aren’t they?”

  You are so beautiful. I’m so thankful to have had you in my life. “Yeah. They are.”

  Pain pierced my heart when her tears began to fall. “I should’ve stayed in the closet.”

>   Lacey didn’t just love me with the limited capacity a high school girl could have for a boy. She loved me with her whole soul and spirit. That’s why, when she heard my screams from my bedroom’s bathroom, she charged out of the hiding spot I had placed her in, came to rescue me, even though it was fruitless.

  Now in the trunk, I told her, “No. You were so brave it made me love you even more.”

  After a slight pause, she burst into a sob. “I will miss you so much, Tate.”

  It pained me that she was realizing this was it. This was our goodbye, but there was no denying it.

  Wanting her as close as physically and emotionally possible, I leaned my forehead to hers. “No. We will be together.” I grabbed her hand that had my blood on it and pulled it to my chest. “Lacey, say it. No matter what, we will find each other again.”

  She had just been lost in her traumatized shock but managed to come back to me. Now I was begging her to do it again, in our afterlife.

  With so much affection, her hand wiped away tears I was clueless I’d been crying. “No matter what.” She cried, too. “E-Evermore.”

  Between our crumpled forms, she held up her right hand.

  I knew what she wanted, so I pressed my left palm to that hand so our scars could touch.

  Then, our fingers intertwined and folded so we could hold on tight.

  To help us through the years of abuse, that one word, evermore, and that hand-hold, had become our promise to each other. That one word and simple touch gave us a rock to hold on to when it came to our deep connection. Not that it was truly needed because her innocent love for me was boundless.

  “Evermore.” My lips pressed to hers. “You made every hour of their hatred worth it.” Hungrily, I kissed her, again.

  Ravenous lips welcomed me as Lace cried and held me tight. “Every second of it all, worth it, because of you.”

  Every moment we had spent together, the serene and the horrific ones, were now all blending together and fading away. That is what it felt like to be so close to the end. It was eerie to comprehend all the normal dreams two in-love teenagers could create, would never be for us. Not that we ever dared to dream such things, but now there would never even be a chance to. No home to share. No children to adore. My Pretty Girl would never be my wife.

  “Lace…” The car turned onto another street. “Marry me.”

  After a gasp and magical stare, she kissed me with lips that were drenched in blood and tears. “I would’ve. I swear it.”

  It was during the very last seconds of our lives when I realized that no preacher or priest need be present when making promises of the heart. So, in that grungy trunk, I took matters into my own incapable hands and spoke the truth. “I, Tate, the young man who loves Lacey, will always treasure and adore her.” My eyes met hers. “Even after death.”

  Her swollen mouth fell open in surprise, making her look more beautiful than any bride ever could.

  Then, with admirable determination, she attempted to smile before saying, “I, Lacey, the young woman who loves Tate, will always treasure,” she choked on a sob that was mixed with joy and terror, “and adore him. Evermore.”

  With that pledge, my soul could now rest in peace. Lacey was mine. Spirit and heart. “Evermore.”

  We lay there, staring at each other as our bodies began to bounce. The road turning into bumpy terrain told us we had taken our vows… just in time.

  The car skidded to a stop.

  Car doors creaked open.

  Even with serenity in my heart due to our marriage, my body began to tremble. This death was going to be our brothers’ most violent act.

  Yes, it was our own brothers—hers and mine—that were going to kill Lacey and me.

  Jarod and Jake, Lacey’s twin older brothers, were who I saw first when the trunk opened. From under their short dark hair, their brown eyes gleamed with promises of horror. Behind them and above, I saw trees and the glowing night sky. Nothing else. We were in some woods I didn’t recognize.

  Behind Jake and Jarod appeared my own two brothers, Damien and Crow. Their blue eyes radiated the demented excitement I had witnessed so many times before, and their smiles beamed the malice I was grateful to soon never see again.

  My throat was so restricted from worry. “Please don’t hurt Mom after I’m gone.”

  So many sacrifices had been made to keep two girls safe. My mom and Lace.

  All four brothers smirked.

  A chill ran through me.

  With no regard for how much his words would cut me, Damien informed, “You are an idiot. I want you to know that before you die. We would never, ever hurt our mom.”

  Terrified for my mom’s safety, I had suffered, unimaginably.

  As my mind raced, tried to comprehend the inconceivable, Crow gestured to Lace and me, and sneered, “You two, on the other hand… Well, you already know that answer.”

  The two sets of brothers laughed so callously, anyone watching would never have believed their siblings were bleeding in the trunk of the car.

  Crow leaned in, sneering, “Mom won’t even bother to search for you.”

  “She will!” I snapped, tired of their cruel words that were touching an exposed nerve.

  Damien, amused, spoke as if a crying child. “Ah, just wike she wrapped your boo-boos?”

  I winced because she had never done such a thing as tend to an injury the brothers caused. “She’ll look for me.” I suddenly wanted it all over with. “Please, just make it quick.”

  Jake reached into the trunk and started pulling Lace from my grasp. “Was it ‘quick’ when you fucked her?”

  Pulling on Lace’s hands, I ignored his taunt but yelled, “It was me who tricked you! Be mad at me!”

  Not only had Lacey and I found each other again while our brothers were off to college, but we had fallen madly in love. Neither were permitted.

  Damien, the ringleader of this sadistic quartet, hung a rope over his shoulder before reaching in to help separate us. “Oh, it is you who will pay, alright.”

  Four older sets of hands overpowered mine and stole Lace from me.

  As she was dragged from the trunk and pulled backward, I screamed, “Run! Run, Lace!” but it was no use. Lacey was already being restrained by my brothers.

  No one had to yank me from the trunk. I willingly, and rapidly, crawled free to follow Lace. The brothers were quick to learn how to use me as their puppet. If they had control over Lace, they had control over me.

  As Jake tied her wrists together, I stood there, obediently, panting, wanting to hold her. “Please, give her to me.”

  He just kept smiling, relishing in my inner torture. “Don’t worry. You can have her again.” With her bound, his hand slipped along the rope until it found the opposite end. He carried it as he walked away from us. I didn’t even hear the trunk slam shut before he said, “As soon as you catch her.”

  I just wanted Lacey.

  As the brothers laughed while heading back to the car, I rushed to Lace and wrapped her up in my arms. “Are you okay?”

  “W-What’s happening?”

  “I don’t know.” Car doors shut, mercifully muffling the laughter that was grating my insides. “Maybe—” The engine starting had me finally understanding what was about to happen. My eyes raced to Lacey’s wrists, then along the thick rope, then to the trunk. My heart pounded. “Oh, Jesus, no.”

  “Tate?” was all she had time to ask as my arms tightened around her.

  I’m not sure what I thought I could do to compete with the power of a car, but I swear I tried. With every bit of strength I could muster, I groaned and held on, but as soon as the car went into Drive, Jarod hit the gas.

  In slow motion, due to my mind unraveling, I watched the rope begin to move…

  There were no seconds left now. The end was here, and my brother was correct.

  I was going to suffer as I had never before.

  In slow motion, the rope went taut. My arms strained, then bent and gave…
forcefully.

  Lace’s eyes, they stared at me… as she was ripped away.

  I roared, “Nooooooooo…” but no one in the car cared about my agony. In fact, they desired it.

  The car kept driving.

  I chased.

  Her little defenseless body bounced and scraped over the ground as she was ruthlessly dragged behind the racing car. Running, rocks stabbed into the flesh of my bare feet, but I didn’t slow down. The brothers had said I could have her… if I caught her.

  All the years of abuse should have taught me the truth—that they would never let me catch her—but my mind was splintering. The horror of watching her being dragged was simply too much. Most of her past torture by the brothers, like my own, had been with us separated. Lace and I always had to witness the aftermath each other suffered, but not the act.

  Not until tonight.

  That is why she had rushed from the closet when hearing my screams…

  Snot and tears dripped from my face as I screamed and ran as fast as I could. “Laceeeeeey!” It sounded like my vocal cords were being shredded, just like my heart.

  Finally, there was an inhumane grunt when her head slammed against a larger rock in the road. Lacey’s body going limp told me she had been knocked unconscious. It was the only solace the angels could offer, I suppose. I took it as just that. A blessing. At least Lace was now free of pain.

  I screamed and pled to the brothers, “She’s out! She’s out! Stop!” hoping only my torture was what they craved.

  The answer to how long she had been dragged is one I don’t have. I can say it felt like an eternity before red brake lights finally glowed down the road ahead of me. Adrenaline and love had me still on my feet, charging toward her limp body. Her arms, above her head, were still attached to the rope and closed trunk.

  Brothers unloaded from the car, their eyes happily locked onto my panicked running. They cackled, enjoying how hard I was racing to Lace.

  Damien howled pleasure, “I do believe he loves her, boys!”

  Before I could get there, Jake’s boot nudged Lacey’s side. “She’s out to the world.”