Scorned (A Ruthless Rebels MC #2) Read online

  Scorned

  The Ruthless Rebels MC Novella Series Book 2

  Chelsea Cameron

  Ryan Michele

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peak at Scarred releasing May 5th, 2017

  Excerpt of One Ride (Hellions Ride Book 1) by Chelsea Camaron

  Excerpt Ravage Me (Ravage MC#1) by Ryan Michele

  About Chelsea Camaron

  Other books by Chelsea Camaron

  About Ryan Michele

  Other Books by Ryan Michele

  Don’t Miss a Release!

  Scorned (A Ruthless Rebels MC Novella Book 2) Copyright © Chelsea Camaron and Ryan Michele 2016

  All Rights Reserved. This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction in whole or in part, without express written permission from Chelsea Camaron and Ryan Michele.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  1st edition published: December 2016

  Cover Design by: M.L. Pahl of IndieVention Designs

  Editing by: Asli Fratarcangeli

  Proofreading: Silla Webb

  This work of fiction is intended for mature audiences only. All sexually active characters portrayed in this book are eighteen years of age or older. Please do not buy if strong sexual situations, violence, domestic abuse, and explicit language offends you.

  This is not meant to be an exact depiction of life in a motorcycle club, but rather a work of fiction meant to entertain.

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  Chelsea Camaron

  Ryan Michele

  To gum lovers, the words: that, had, and.

  To life on the road less traveled. And to everyone who still wishes for a second chance at love

  Scorned (A Ruthless Rebels MC Novella Book Two)

  Austin Shamus Fletcher – the untamable beast.

  Heartbreak with a capital H.

  The toned cut of his every muscle to his larger than life attitude, Shamus is the one person I should stay away from.

  Why can I not let go even when everything in front of me says run like a bat out of hell?

  Chapter 1

  When your dream becomes your living nightmare, what’s a girl to do?

  The constant booming is slowly driving me crazy. I thought I was prepared. I thought I had a handle on this. I thought I could fight back the fear. Investigative reporting, this is what you wanted, Andrea Lynn Davies! I keep reminding myself over and over that this is what I chased. That this is what I thought I wanted, yet every day here is proving me wrong.

  Granville, Alabama in the rearview mirror and wide open spaces in front of me going from one story to another was the plan. College took me to Florida State University, and I never looked back. Making my way through the ropes in a busy and competitive network, I landed myself this single opportunity to get in the big leagues of my career.

  The task was simple, follow David Holloway on his journey. He’s bringing his two very young children home, to the United States, after their mother took them to her home country without his permission during the couple’s separation. This landed me in Eastern Ukraine. Our research into her family has brought Mr. Holloway, myself, and my cameraman, Luke, to this shanty home that has been shelled harshly leaving only the base floor as livable space. The walls are barely stable, and I can see the sun through parts of the roof. This is our only safety.

  Three days we’ve been here, and the sounds never end. The continual pops of gunshots, the vibrations of the ground at our feet, the wails of hungry children, and the desperate looks of these broken people stuck in their war-torn country never stop, not even for a second. It all slowly kills, piece after piece of me on the inside. What hurts more is there’s nothing I can do about their situations. I’ve practically emptied my bank account in this short time to help those I come into contact with, but I can’t stop the bombs, the shootings, and the overall chaos these people are forced to live in.

  Living like this breaks my heart with every passing moment. Mr. Holloway’s mission is to simply bring his children out of this danger zone and to the safety of his own home in Florida. Yet, his soon to be ex-wife and the mother of the two boys swear he’s the one they’re in danger from, and she’d rather raise her boys living in the streets of slaughter than in the home of hell. We met with her yesterday. She refused to allow Mr. Holloway to accompany us but did wish to tell her side of the story.

  This entire situation is turning into more of a soap opera, in some ways, than a damn documentary. Really, the more Luke and I talk to either of the Holloway’s the more nothing makes sense. It’s like there is a piece to this puzzle they are both leaving out.

  I don’t know what’s right or wrong anymore. Nothing we found on Mr. Holloway gave my superiors any reason to question why the courts gave his wife temporary primary physical custody until they could get through a final mediation and settlement, even though it was well known she was a flight risk. After all, she came to the United States after meeting Mr. Holloway online, and without their marriage holding her to his home, she had nowhere else to go. As a woman who packed up and got out of town my first opportunity after a bad break up, I can sympathize with her.

  After my humiliation from a man, I got out of Granville and never looked back. Well, physically that is. I haven’t been home since I packed up after high school graduation. My mind, my heart, well, they aren’t always on board with leaving Granville in the rearview. It gets lonely sometimes but after what he said, what he did, and how it made me fall apart, I have no business going back to that town and seeing him again.

  Being here, living in this place, wondering from one moment to the next if I’m going to make it out of here alive, I no longer care why Yelena Holloway felt she had to go so far. I just want to go home. Home? Home to Florida, not Granville. I damn sure won’t find any comfort in Granville, other than my mother. Living there would be living on eggshells, thinking at any moment I could see him again. In such a small town it’s bound to happen, and my heart still isn’t healed enough to take it.

  They say there are some things you never can get over, he’s mine. It hasn’t all been bad, leaving home. The opportunities have been amazing, until now. Seeing all this destruction and the way innocent civilians are being forced to live is too much for my heart to take. I want to help them all, and I can’t even manage to help myself over here.

  Mr. Holloway made it very clear that we are to keep our documentary going at all costs until his children are back on United States soil with him. In fact, the man is so desperate he offered to pay the network all of our production fees and employment fees to do this. Maybe he has more money than brains. Then again,
I don’t have children of my own so maybe this is a parent willing to go to any lengths to secure a place in his children’s lives.

  Yet, she won’t see reason. In the times we’ve made contact with her, we can’t even secure a single visitation for the boys with their father. I’m becoming desperate to escape this place while she’s unwavering in her stance to stay.

  More than anything, I want to go home. A feeling I’ve not had since I left my mom and headed to Florida. Early on, I missed Granville and the familiarity. Letting my mind revisit his words, I easily pushed it away. This, this place, only makes me want to get back to Florida, and there’s nothing there to shy me away from returning. The feeling in the pit of my stomach that’s missing my apartment, the sunshine, the security of a normal life only grows more with every passing day.

  This life isn’t for me. I thought it was. In my mind, investigative reporting was an adventure. I would be researching and getting to the bottom of mysteries and unsolved situations. Only it hasn’t been at all what I thought.

  A high pitched whistling sound assaults my ears. Before I can react, Luke is tackling me to the dirt-covered floor. His large body covers mine. The weight is suffocating as I feel the ground beneath us shake. Everything is a blur before it all goes black.

  “Momma, I’m fine!” I screech for what feels like the thousandth time. I’ve been back home for four months. Four agonizingly long months. One hundred twenty-three days in Granville, Alabama staying cocooned in my childhood home.

  Six months ago, I came to in a hospital that was severely overcrowded. Before I could gather my thoughts and stop the rushing in my head to even try to translate what the people around me were saying, I found myself transferred to a hospital in Germany. Since I was an American, the embassy felt this was the best care for me to receive for my particular injuries. It’s all a blur. I remember the doctors rambling on not seeming to really know what to do with me. Heck, I didn’t know enough about what was going on to know what to do with myself.

  When I close my eyes, I can still feel Luke’s weight laying over me. I can still smell the scorching building around me. If I let myself go there, I can remember Luke’s lifeless body being dragged off mine before I’m scooped up and rushed out of the building by some good Samaritans who, apparently, know to rush in after explosions to look for signs of life. All of our equipment was destroyed. Story gone. David Holloway is presumed dead even though his body was never recovered in the rubble. Everything was a pile of ash and dust.

  I survived because of my cameraman, my friend, and my comfort in the Ukraine, covered my body with his own, shielding me. I spent two months in a hospital in Germany before my company brought me back to a traumatic brain injury center in Atlanta, Georgia. Since David Holloway was funding all of the costs, it took them some time to get me stateside. After learning that the marbles rolling around in my head will be there forever, I was discharged. The Shepard Center did as much as they could for me and still consult on my care. Unfortunately, there will be life-long effects from my injury.

  With my job lost, I had to return to Alabama with no way to support myself in Florida anymore. Disability is what the doctors say I need to apply for, but it’s a long process and I need a place to stay right away. The traumatic brain injury I suffer from is a closed head injury resulting in Diffuse Axonal Injury, which literally means pieces of my brain tore off and are bouncing around like marbles in my skull. I have partial hearing loss, continual vision problems to where I can’t even drive a car.

  With nowhere else to go, needing more care than I could ask a friend to take on, I came to the place I tried so hard to leave. A place I never thought I’d be again.

  Home.

  “Andrea, you have a job interview today.” My mother stands in my bedroom doorway.

  “What?!” Panic hits and the thump of my heart is so powerful I hear it in my ears.

  She crosses her arms over her chest tightly. “The doctor said at your last check-up, you can try to work if we find a job that understands your disability. It’s time, Andrea, to get out there.”

  I feel the tears hit the back of my eyelids as I squeeze them tight fighting my fears. “Mom,” I can only say in a whisper.

  “Honey, I know it’s not easy, but I can’t afford to keep everything up much longer.” The sadness in her face shows while she’s trying to simply be honest with me.

  The damn breaks and my tears stream wildly down my face. I know she can’t afford to carry my bills, too. Out of state tuition meant I had to use student loans to pay for my education. I was able to cover it before. The workman’s comp doesn’t do shit when you sign a waiver of liability for your job because investigative reporting comes with a known risk.

  The disability paperwork isn’t coming through, and my contact there said it could be another six months or so because I moved states. Collecting disability, though, when I can work isn’t right either. It’s not who I am or who my mom raised me to be.

  My mom has raised me on her own for as far back as I can remember. My father died when I was a toddler in a car accident. Things have always been paycheck to paycheck for Mom, ever since I understood what bills were. When I went off to college, she got a reprieve with one less mouth to feed.

  What loans didn’t cover, I got a job at a wing joint because Mom couldn’t help me. It was my decision to leave home, go to a big university. It wasn’t easy, but riding a bicycle to class and work saved bucket loads. Once I got my internship at the paper, I made sure to bust my ass to secure a full-time paying position upon graduation. From there, I had to make every deadline, do every assignment until the network picked me up. It wasn’t long until a bigger station brought me on for investigative documentaries like the one I was on with David Holloway.

  If I let my mind go back, I can remember meeting with his wife. She wouldn’t talk if he attended so Luke and I met her in secret. Just one day before the explosion, I remember asking Luke if trying to take these kids from her was really in their best interest. Those are the only pieces of the puzzle I can really remember. Everything else is like watching a black and white television show with a broken sound that comes in and out.

  A static blur.

  I can’t remember the details. So much is a fog in my mind. I shake my head trying to stop the rushing noises I hear as I think too hard. I only know what I’ve been told about the story, at this point. Another side effect of my injury. Memory loss, lack of focus, and the list goes on and on.

  The bed dips beside me while I still don’t open my eyes. My mother’s arms wrap around me tightly. “I’m sorry, Andrea. I wish I could keep us up, but with the medications for you to sleep and the therapies to help you recover, I’m already delivering pizza at night on top of teaching. With the issues delaying the disability money, I just don’t make enough, honey.”

  I choke back a sob.

  “Mr. Collins assured me you would have your own cubicle tucked away to the side. It’s the local paper, writing up easy articles. Something is better than nothing. You don’t have to go into the field. He knows all of your limitations with your vision, hearing, and your head. He said he’d make adjustments where needed.”

  I nod my head, not speaking. What is there to say? I need a job, and she found me one that will keep me doing what I love in writing but sheltered from the ugly.

  I can do this.

  I hope.

  The offices of Granville Journal Star are far different from Ellis News in Florida. It’s pretty much the exact opposite. Where Ellis was glitz and glamor, this is not. The building is small with a red brick exterior and a few windows. A large flag on a pole waves happily in the air above. This is it, Andrea. Buck up. This is much better than a war zone.

  The fear is palpable as it thumps through my veins. The doctor said it’s post-traumatic stress about what happened to me. Me, I think it’s I don’t want to get blown up again. I don’t want to have my friend cover me with his body, taking him away from his family while I live. Al
l of that is wrapped tight inside of my gut, and it happens to be debilitating at times.

  Entering, the inside is similar to the outside. The white tiled floors look as if they haven’t been replaced since the building was built, however many years ago, yet clean. The walls are a tanned color, and the room is wide open with small cubicles with half walls around them. The chatter is rhythmic and something I missed from my first internship. It was quaint like this one, but I wanted the big leagues. Now that I’ve experienced it, they can keep it.

  “Hi, can I help you?” A young woman, about my age, with honey blonde hair in a braid to the side greets from the desk off to the right. It’s well organized, as is she. Her smile is genuine and comforting.

  “I’m here to see Mr. Collins.” I pray the panic doesn’t come out in my words. The thought of going back in the field again makes me want to break out in hives. I hope my mother’s right about this because, if she’s not, I don’t know what I’ll do. I can’t go back out and cover stories. Not now, maybe not ever.

  “Sure thing. What’s your name, hun?”

  “Andrea Davies?”

  Her brow goes up. “Andrea Davies.” She says my name like a memory and taps her finger on her chin. “I went to school with you, but I’m a year younger. Oh! And you were an editor of the school yearbook.”

  The memories of my time at Granville High come back. The passion I felt when in the newsroom. The love for the written word. Funny how one incident can change your whole perspective of things.

  Thinking back, the woman before me doesn’t ring any bells. I keep at it wanting my memory to work. I’m only twenty-eight-years-old. I should not have problems remembering things as simple as people in this small town. I will remember.

  It takes me a while and the vision of Dixon, a boy from Granville High hits my head and then it clicks, just like a magical puzzle finding its way. Oh crap, this is Kenderly Hanson. “You’re Kenderly Hanson.”