“Don’t screw up!” Trinity calls over her shoulder.
Coco gives my chain another choking yank and moves to the other end of the bar. I glare at her as she gives orders to another girl before peeking her head through a little curtain in the wall to shout at the kitchen. Great. I guess she’s my new manager.
And I thought George was bad.
The other girl behind the bar stares at me for a second with wide blue eyes. They didn’t let her keep her bra, and I see that both her nipples are pierced and a chain dangles between. Her ankle is cuffed to the pole on the ground, too. She gives me a curt nod and returns to her work, her expression carefully blank.
Unsteady, I look around to get my bearings. I know we’re three floors below the sleeping quarters. I can see that the bikers come and go through a door that attaches to the same stairwell we entered from. No light filters through the tiny barred windows on the far wall, so I have no idea what time it is or what the view is like.
The bar can’t possibly be at street level, but the sight of windows—the first I’ve seen since coming to Death Layer—is driving me insane. The outside world is tantalizing close and yet impossible to reach. I stare at the glass panes longingly before remembering my chains.
There’s a giant black flag behind the bar with the Death Layer MC colors and rockers, just like Bane’s massive back tattoo. The flaming devil’s head grins luridly down at me between the crossed barrels of a pair of guns. On the sidewall, there is a fleet of framed portraits—all men, all menacing.
With uncanny speed, my eyes lock on to a familiar portrait: Bane himself. It’s under a plaque that reads: “Road Captain.” A few rows above him I see Jack’s picture under the words: “President.” I recognize one of the big bouncer guys as the Vice President.
“Yo Jessica Rabbit,” someone shouts at me. “Dewar’s, neat.”
The irony of my situation does not escape me. Being fired from a service job was, ultimately, the beginning of this mess, and here I am right back to pouring drinks. The thought almost makes me laugh.
Yeah. Pouring drinks in hell. For Satan and company.
My head snaps up and I study the jerk that has decided to crack a redhead joke along with my last nerve. He’s got a springy mess of jet-black hair and a ruthless face. Muscles bulge large under his MC jacket and enormous rings sparkle on most of his knuckles.
When I don’t move, his attention settles on me. “Dewar’s, neat.” He repeats. “You deaf?”
I cross my arms under my breasts and glare, clearly acknowledging and refusing him.
He laughs, his eyes sweeping over me and resting on my matching black eyes. “Really?” He says. The laugh dies with a playful bite of his lip. “Whoever gave you those shiners not enough for you? You wanna play with me, too, bunnyrabbit? Huh? Ok.”
Startlingly fast, his hands snatch my spiky collar and jerk my body forward over the bar until my face is close to his. He leers at me and I can smell his surprisingly fresh breath, minty Listerine. Those hands of his are way too big for me to pull away, and my stupid ankle cuff and collar are digging painfully into my skin.
This is what’s called being stuck between a rock and a hard place.
His voice is rough. “I’m happy to play with you and your little attitude problem. Teach you a lesson or two. It’ll be good for you.”
I stare right back at him with open loathing but say nothing. That was usually my strategy with bullies: don’t give them the reaction they want. He chuckles, seeming to get a kick out of my lack of physical resistance. To punctuate his threat, his free hand reaches over the bar to squeeze one of my breasts.
The assault startles me out of my deadweight and in spite of my restraints I lurch to get away, but the metal cuts into my ankle and neck and a whimper of pain escapes my throat.
“Oh yeah, you like that? I’ll play with you anytime, bunny. Don’t worry; I’m playing. I’m playing right now.”
His groping hand moves south over my bare navel and towards my underwear. A wave of nausea washes over me. My hands scramble to push his away but he’s way too strong for me, even if I wasn’t caught up in chains.
“Hey!” Coco is suddenly at my side, surprising the hell out of me by trying to insert herself between us. Her arm wraps around my waist, tugging. “There a problem I can straighten out for you here, Smokey?”
I feel like the rope in tug-of-war, both the biker and the sweetbutt treating my body like their disputed territory. A frustrated growl emanates from my throat.
“Butt out Coco,” the guy named Smokey warns.
“Can’t,” she insists, “Sorry Smoke, this bitch is Bane’s and he says hands-off.”
“I don’t take orders from Bane, or you.” Smokey’s hand lashes out to the side, cracking on Coco’s jaw and sending her sideways with a startled cry. She lands on the floor behind the bar, her head hitting the corner of the sink. I wince at the sound of the impact. “My hands go where they want,” Smokey shouts over Coco’s moan. He grips me between my legs where I’m tender from Coco’s earlier punch and lifts my body high, the painful pressure distracting me from the cuffs cutting my ankle. I gasp in agony. “Right now my hands are gonna fix your attitude problem for you, bunny. What you need is a good finger fuck, yeah?”
“Let go!” I gasp, terrified. “Stop!”
Opening my mouth to speak was a mistake. He frees up a hand and shoves his fingers under my tongue, moving them slowly, gagging me. “Get them nice and wet for me,” he whispers. “For lube. You’ll like it. That’s a good girl.”
Something moves in my periphery but before I can identify it, I see a wall of black slam into Smokey. His grip loosens on my neck and his fingers fall out of my mouth. Stumbling back, I cough and swallow air like a beached fish. The room is spinning.
The wall of black is a man, moving fast. His fists hammer into Smokey’s chest and yank him off of the barstool, then slam Smokey down on the bar. An iron fist shoots out, grabs a beer bottle, and breaks it on the bar. Green glass splinters in tiny fragments in all directions and I’m showered with beer droplets, shivering as I see that the now-jagged bottle end is poised over Smokey’s throat. An edge pricks Smokey’s skin and there’s a slow drop of blood dripping from the point.
Gasping, I glance up at the newcomer’s face. Though it’s twisted in a violent mask, I can still recognize the incongruously clean and rugged good looks: Bane. He leans over Smokey, and I can feel the heat radiating off his tensed body. My legs are trembling as I watch on.