Gabriel - Jessie Cooke Page 0,23

together for church. The mood was somber as soon as they all heard what condition their brothers had been found in, but it was even worse as Sharon, Chance’s girlfriend and the woman violated by this other club, took center stage. She’d been the first one to alert Le Singe that Chance was missing, and Blackheart had spoken to her alone before he convinced her to tell her story to the guys. He knew they’d be hesitant, getting in on the fight they believed was Chance’s...but not after they heard what Sharon had to say.

The 5'2" 110 lb. strawberry blonde stood up in front of the roomful of men. Even before she opened her mouth, anyone present could see how nervous she was. She was twisting her hands together in front of her and the tremor that came out when she opened her mouth was heart-wrenching to listen to. “I found out yesterday that I’m pregnant.” There were a few whispers, but one glance from Blackheart shut them down and she went on. “The baby is not Chance’s baby. We always use protection. The only person I’ve...” Her eyes swelled with tears, but she pushed on, “The only person who has been inside of me without a condom was Gregor, one of the Mad Men. The night they assaulted me they did all kinds of horrible things.” The tears began to spill and most of the muscles in the men in the room tightened. The Jokers could be assholes, and they were wild, but Blackheart had strict rules against abusing women, and most of the men he let into his club agreed with those rules even before they patched in. “But the only one who...” It was almost painful to watch her stumble over her words. “The only one who left his seed inside of me was the one they call Gregor.” She broke down then and sat down in the chair behind her, putting her hands over her face and sobbing. The whispers began to turn into growls and Blackheart could tell that the men were growing restless, already imagining getting their hands on the pig who had done this to this pretty young woman.

Sharon pulled her head back up, and tears dripped off her pretty face and down into her hands as she went on, “This is my fault. I told Chance, and he found out where Gregor was...” she said, almost in a whisper, before collapsing again in a torrent of tears. Blackheart knew there wasn’t a man in the room that would blame her; any one of them would have gone after that motherfucker. He just wished Chance had called him first. He wished he could get the young ones to understand that part of being in a club like theirs was safety in numbers. Now he had two of his best men down, and no choice but to go after the man responsible. Blackheart picked up the phone and called out to the front:

“Villa, sweetheart, come and help Sharon out.” Villa was one of the older club “girls.” She’d been with the club since right after Blackheart started it. He used to hook up with her on occasion, but these days she was more about taking care of the younger girls, and less about being an easy lay for the guys. Besides, he’d recently made a promise to Sally that they’d be exclusive and he was sticking to it. The forty-something big-breasted woman was in the room in seconds. She put her arm around Sharon but before Sharon could be led out of the room she looked back at the men and said:

“I’m sorry, about all of this.”

Villa frowned but before she could say whatever was obviously on her mind Blackheart said, “You’ve got nothing to be sorry about. We’re going to take care of this, and you, young lady...okay? You take care of you and them babies of yours, everything’s going to be okay.” She nodded at him, gave him a little smile, and wiped at her tears before letting Villa lead her out of the room. Blackheart waited until she was gone before focusing his blue eyes back on his men. He was so angry that he wasn’t sure his own voice wasn’t shaking as he said:

“I blame myself for how much of this has played out. Back when this all happened, I was distracted by the man who was trying to take down this club and hurt Sally. I was willing to