Python: Soldiers Of Hades MC, #2

Python laid her onto his bed. He was about to send for Doc but Cobra had gone to get him already.

Doc went to the bed and began examining Peggy. He ran his fingers over the back of her head and frowned. Then he grabbed a small light and lifting one eyelid, he shined the light to check her pupils. First one, then the other. Then he checked her heart rate. Then he examined her arms but didn’t say why.

He gently turned her over and lifted the back of her blouse. He visibly winced when he saw her back and lifted the material higher, so they could see it all. Her skin was knotted, twisted, and scarred as if in the past, she had been whipped savagely. Then he noted that he could see her ribs she was so thin.

He looked up at Python as he turned her on her back. “This woman has been used and abused almost to the point of death. These scars are old but it was probably only her will to live to attest to the fact that she’s alive today. There’s also a spot on her skull that tells me she was hit pretty hard a long time ago and it was never allowed to heal correctly.”

He turned his head to look down at her again, and noticed she was still in a state of unconsciousness. Her skin looked sunburnt and dry. He tisked under his breath in disgust at the shape she was in. “Do you know who she is?”

Python nodded. “Her name is Peggy Sue O’Donald. She was my woman a long time ago, and the mother to three of my kids.”

Cobra snarled at his father’s announcement. “And she walked out of all of us didn’t she? She left us behind without even a word.”

“Son, I get your anger I really do.” Python hung his head. “I hated her for the longest time myself after she left us. But I had three young sons to care for and life goes on.” He turned back to study her and then said, “She has a lot to answer for, so I think we should find out where she’s been all these years before we toss her out.”

“You can listen to her lies but to me, she died, years ago.” Cobra snarled then he turned and walked out, slamming the door as he went.

After a moment, Doc asked, “Did she say anything at all before she passed out?”

Python nodded. “She seemed to know me and asked if she was finally home. Then she looked at Cobra.” He shook his head. “And said something about him still being alive or something like that.” He shrugged. “She said someone told her he was dead. That he killed him in revenge or something. Then she collapsed.”

“Curious isn’t it?” Doc asked.

Python turned his head to glare at him. “What’s so curious?”

Before he could answer, Peggy Sue groaned and began opening her eyes. She first saw Doc as he was sitting close to her. She cried and shied away from him and in her panic, she called out, “Stay away from me! Please don’t hurt me.”

Python frowned and growled, “Peg, that’s enough. He isn’t going to hurt you.”

Peggy raised her fear filled gaze up and stared at him for a moment then burst into tears. “Python… it really is you?” Peggy sobbed. “I finally found you. I can’t believe I found you again.”

“What do you mean you finally found me?” He growled. “I’ve been here all along. I didn’t go anywhere. You’re the one who left. You left me and the boys behind a very long time ago.”

She shook her head as tears ran down her face. “I didn’t leave willingly. You were my life. You and our boys were my whole world.”

“Then where the fuck have you been?” Python’s growl grew deeper.

“I’ve been in the depths of…hell,” Peggy whispered brokenly. “W-waiting and praying for death to finally take me but he never would. That devil would watch me from a distance but never come close enough to claim my soul. He would tell me in my dreams that death was too good for me.” Turning her head away, she grabbed the pillow and sobbed into it.

Python took a step back and frowned at her response. Her words didn’t make any sense to him. She spoke as if the devil were a real person. “What’s this devil’s name?”

“Luis Brago,” she whispered in such a weak voice that it was hard to hear her.

Python lunged for her and grabbing her shoulders, he lifted right off the bed, shaking her hard. Snarling, staring right into her terrified face, he asked her again, “What did you just say?”

“L-Luis B-Brago,” she stammered. Her eyes were wild and she was shaking.

Python threw her back down on the bed. “Brago. Luis Brago is your devil?”

Peggy curled into a ball at the sound of his name. She shivered and didn’t speak again.

“Boss, I think she’s fading again,” Doc told him as he grabbed his stethoscope and listened to her chest. Her heart was pounding so hard he feared the stress might be too much for her. “We need to get her to the Infirmary now.” He stood to gather her into his arms to carry her down the hall.

Python growled and pushed him away. “Don’t touch her. I’ll carry her.”

Peggy began to fight him.

Python gripped her tighter. “Be still woman.”

Her eyes began rolling into the back of her head and Python felt her faint take hold. “Fuckin’ hell, she’s out again.”

“Hurry, she could be in bad trouble,” Doc urged. Doc had been with the club for years, but he didn’t know what went on before he got there. But he had heard of Peggy Sue. He’d been a medic in the Army before he joined the MC and he’d been doctoring this group for a long time. The one thing he knew was these men were decent men. If they weren’t good men, he would have been left a long time ago.

As soon as they reached, the Infirmary, Python laid her out on one of the beds.

Doc moved in and listened to her heart again. It wasn’t pounding anymore but he could barely hear the echo in her chest. He checked her eyes and shook his head. “She’s badly dehydrated. I need to get liquids into her first.” He looked over at Python. “Maybe you shouldn’t be here right now. She doesn’t really need any more stress.”

Python turned his head and glared at the other man. “Doc, I ain’t fuckin leaving her until I have some answers. One day, this woman went to town to pick up some fucking milk for the kids and she never came back. We looked high and low for her for weeks and never found anything. And since then, not a damned word from her. Then out of the fucking blue, she shows up this morning like nothing happened. I need to know where she’s been all this time.”

Doc looked up at the man and nodded. “I hear ya boss, I really do. But whatever this woman has been through can wait. Unless you want to lose her without getting your answers. Take a look at the bottom of her feet.”

Python frowned. “And why the hell should I do that?”

“Just look,” Doc commanded. “This woman has been tortured for a long time. Long enough for her to pray for death to take her.” He nodded. “I’ve seen this type of torture before in the military and it’s never a good thing.”

Python lifted one of her legs and slipped one shoe off. Then he caught his breath as he surveyed the bottom of Peggy’s foot. The skin was no longer smooth, indeed, she had scars where someone had busted open the bottom of her foot several times, and the wounds hadn’t been allowed to heal before they beat her again and again.

He could see holes on her heels and on the pads of her feet. He gently put her foot down and curled his fingers into fists. “What kind of animal does this?”

“A true sadist that’s for sure,” Doc told him in a hard voice as he inserted an IV into her hand. She didn’t even wince when the needle pierced her skin. “Do you know this bastard Luis Brago she spoke of?”

“Yeah, I know that motherfucker,” Python admitted. “Around the time she disappeared, we were in a battle for the territory and we won. We killed a lot of men in the months leading up to that time and just before she disappeared, we had the final showdown. One of Luis’s sons was killed and several of his upper men died in a massive fire we started.”

Doc snorted. “That explains it then, doesn’t it?” He grumbled. “He took her to get back at you.”

“But he kept her alive for all those years. Why would he do that?” Python looked lost.

Doc shrugged and checked her vitals again. They were about the same, not any better but not any worse either. She might just survive this. “Maybe he wanted her to use against you if you ever came after him again.”

Python frowned as he thought about Doc’s statements. Was Luis really that much of a bastard? Python already knew the answer before he asked himself the question. Yeah, Luis Brago was really that big of an evil bastard.

“Then he really fucked up when he let her go, didn’t he?”

Doc snorted. “Maybe he didn’t let her go, maybe she escaped. He could be after her even as we speak.”

Python growled. He turned to leave the room but before he left the room, he ordered the other man, “Don’t you fucking leave her alone until I get back.”

Doc looked up at him and nodded, “I ain’t going nowhere, boss.”