“We both love to read anything we can get our hands on. The dictionary and thesaurus are our favorites because we can look up words and their meanings,” One blurts out.
“That’s good to know,” Nova says. “Let me give you a tour and then we’ll grab your things out of the bed of my truck so you can unpack and start settling in.”
CHAPTER
THIRTEEN
NOVA
We spend copious amounts of time in each room as they take things in and absorb them. The wonder in their eyes as they take in the furniture and pictures on my walls have me tightening my fists into balls. This shouldn’t be a whimsical experience for them. I didn’t take stock of the walls surrounding them at that piece of shit’s house long enough to notice they didn’t have a single thing hanging on them. There were no proud fatherly moments plastered for visitors to reminisce on. There were no photographs of the girls as they aged, no paintings or growth chart marks on the paneling. If I hadn’t found them in their prison, nobody would’ve ever known they existed. That thought makes me sick to my stomach, knowing that he left them there while he went to dispose his latest victim, not knowing if he’d ever make it back to them or not.
Once we make it to the room I had in mind for them, I step out and let them roam so I can make a call to my president, Riptide. Christmas is around the corner and I want to give them a good one because I doubt they’ve ever seen a real tree or had a present underneath it that’s been gift wrapped with their name on the tag.
It only rings four times before he answers. “Nova. How’d it go?”
“It was an unexpected experience,” I state before going into further details, letting my frustrations out. When I finish telling him about my discoveries, I get into the facts surrounding the ladies. “Rip, these girls don’t have names and there are no birth records of their existence. They were living in squalor. They pissed and shit in a bucket and the motherfucker had jail bars put in the basement where he kept them for their entire damn lives.”
“And they’re staying with you?” he asks, surprise laced in his voice.
“Marsten asked for me to watch over them. My place is their safe house,” I inform him.
“Interesting,” he murmurs. “Did he not have someplace he trusts for them to go, or did you volunteer to take them in?”
“It was his idea,” I admit. “But that’s because he’s starting to have doubts about his team and the ones assigned to him.” Then I go into telling him how Marlon fucking Jennings got away when he should’ve been easily captured.
“That’s fishy,” he sighs before offering, “I’ll get with Booker and see if he can catch anything amiss on that computer of his. If anyone can follow his trail and see how he managed to get away, it’d be him.”
“Booker was my next call, but if you can take care of that for me, I’d appreciate it, pres. There’s something else I wanted to talk to you about, though.”
“What’s that, Nova?” he inquires.
“How do you think the club would feel about adopting the girls for Christmas, Rip? They’ve never had one before and everything they have is tattered and torn. They need everything from clothes, to personal hygiene products, to books and electronics.”
“Books? Are you telling me that even with them living a life of poverty and enslavement, they know how to read? That’s admirable, Nova.”
“They taught themselves to read and write by watching television and devouring the encyclopedia, dictionary, and thesaurus as well as any educational books their father brought them from the consignment shop. They’re smart but naive at the same time.”
“Send me a list of their sizes, requirements, and wants,” Rip orders.
“It’d be a shorter list if I sent you what they have,” I harrumph. “I’m going to order a tree from the farm, put my name on the lists for Ma Grady’s Christmas dinner, and cheer up my house for the holidays.”
“You sound enthusiastic about that,” Rip chuckles.
“It’s not my thing, Rip, but I’m damn determined to give them a great first Christmas.”
“We’ll help. I’ll enlist some men to come and put strings of lights on the outside of your house. We’ll light that shit up like it’s the fourth of July.”
“You’re enjoying my misery a little too much, Rip,” I grumble.
“Stop pouting, Nova. Badass bikers don’t do that shit,” he chuckles.
“What the fuck ever,” I gnarl. “I don’t pout, I ruminate and I don’t always like what I see in my head. Sue me.”
“Now who’s full of shit?” he counters. “And there’s not enough money in your account to pay me my penance owed for dealing with your grouchy ass. Send me that list, Nova, and stop your whining. Come up with names for the girls so we can get Booker to create an identity for them. Do we even know their birthdays or how old they are?”
“Not a clue, and from what I’ve gathered, they don’t either,” I convey.
“That’s goddamn sad,” Rip mumbles. “I can’t even imagine how they’re feeling after discovering the things they have in regard to their father and themselves.”
