3, An angel

Bane walked with determined steps through the nightclub. He had been in his office on the third floor when Jax had called him and asked him to come down to the counting room. Bane knew that Jax wouldn’t have asked if it wasn’t something that Bane needed to deal with.

He was still irritated to be interrupted and whoever had caused it would face the consequences of it. 

Bane smiled as two women called for him to join them. He didn’t have time to stop and talk, but he let his eyes move over both of their bodies. He made a mental note that he should go back after he had handled the situation. 

He came to the door that led to the back area of the nightclub. Bane held his card up to the scanner and entered his code. He sighed as he stepped into the white corridor and relaxed as the sound of the music and the people were muffled as the door closed behind him. 

The nightclub was a good investment and a good base of operations. But the noise of it could drive the sanest man mad. He walked along the corridor, spotting Jax just ahead. He was just about to ask his right-hand man why he had called him down when a loud crash echoed through the corridor. 

Both men’s hands reached for their guns out of habit, but neither of them drew their weapons. A woman’s loud voice screamed. Bane couldn’t make the words out, but she sounded pissed.

“Bane, we have a situation,” Jax told him.

“No shit man, what’s going on?” Bane asked. 

He briefly considered that one of his ex-lovers or ex-girlfriends had thrown a hissy fit. It wouldn’t be the first time. But he couldn’t remember pissing off any women lately. 

“Dave and Tobias came back from their run,” Jax told him. 

“Did they collect?” Bane asked, irritated to have been called down for a simple debt collection.

“You can say that,” Jax said. He looked serious.

Another shriek sounded from within the counting room and Bane had had enough. He walked over, unlocked the door, and pushed it open. By nothing but luck, the stapler that came flying missed his head and hit the door frame. 

Bane’s eyes followed it as it fell to the floor with a second crash. He then looked up and saw an angel. It took him a moment to realise that it wasn’t an angel, but a scared and crying woman. 

Even with the bruised cheek and split lip with tears running down her face, she was beautiful. Her light blond hair had at one point been in a ponytail, but now had pieces falling down her shoulders. 

Her pale blue eyes were swollen from crying, but that didn’t take away their beauty. The bulky sweater and mom jeans couldn’t hide the curves of her body that made Bane grow hard. 

He reluctantly looked away from the woman as she hurled a pen at his men. Both his men were looking at him, and the pen hit Tobias in the chest with a light thump before falling to the floor. 

Bane noted that Dave seemed to pale somewhat as he looked back at Bane. Interesting, Bane thought. Jax stood behind Bane’s right shoulder and watched the scene. 

The woman had another pen in her hand and threw it at Dave and Tobias. It sailed in the air between them. Bane could hear the words she was shouting now.

“Stay away, stay away from me, stay away,” she shouted, over and over. 

She kept shouting even though she had run out of things to throw. Bane was more than a little interested in knowing exactly what was going on. But he couldn’t focus when the woman was making a ruckus.

He walked around the table towards her. She backed herself into a corner, holding her hands out in front of her, shouting the same sentences repeatedly. Bane grabbed both her hands with one of his and stood right in front of her, looking into those brilliant eyes.

“Will you shut the fuck up!” he roared at her. 

She fell silent, and he saw tears fill her eyes. Her lips trembled. Oh fuck, he thought. Like most men, a crying woman scared him shitless. He would rather have a gunfight with a hundred of his worst enemies than have to deal with one crying woman. 

His solution to the issue was to release her hands, noting the bright red marks around her wrists, and turn his back to her. Out of sight, out of mind. He wasn’t as effective in blocking out the quiet sobs that came from behind him, but he ignored them.

“Can someone tell me why the fuck my bill counter is smashed on the floor and why I was nearly decapitated by a fucking flying stapler?” he growled to the three other men in the room. 

The room was quiet except for the soft sobs that were still coming from the woman. Bane stared at Dave and Tobias. 

“Since that is obviously too hard for you to answer, let’s start with the fucking basics. Did you go to the collection?” Bane asked, feeling his blood rising. 

If he wasn’t given some answers soon, he would not be responsible for his actions. Heads would fly. There was a fifty - fifty chance they would literally be separated from someone’s body. 

“Yeah, boss, we did,” Dave said. 

“Did you collect?” Bane sighed.

“We did. Cobler didn’t have the money. But he offered his niece’s services to pay off his debt,” Tobias grinned.

Bane felt a primal urge to punch the man in the face. He took a deep breath and reminded himself that the man was new to the family. He was allowed a mistake. One. Dave, on the other hand, should have known better. 

“Explain,” Bane demanded from the man.

“It just sounded like a better deal than to come back empty-handed,” Dave shrugged. 

Bane shot Jax a look and his right-hand man nodded. He knew what Bane wanted. 

“Go with Jax. I’ll clean up your fucking mess,” Bane growled.

“Yes, boss,” Dave said. Tobias gave Bane a look that spoke of defiance and of a want to take back what he felt was rightfully his. The woman, Bane thought. 

He waited until the three other men had left before he turned around. Even in her dishevelled state, the young woman shone with innocence and pureness. Bane felt a need to corrupt her, to show her the dark side of life and bind her down here with him. A wicked smile spread across his lips.

Emma stood petrified, locked in the room's corner with the giant man in front of her. If the blond man had been good looking, this man was like something created from a wet dream, made come to life wearing a burgundy three-piece suit that showed off his toned body. If she wasn’t so petrified, Emma would be drooling.

As soon as he entered the room, her brain had noticed him with his dark hair styled back, his pale grey eyes and a five o’clock shadow. At first, she had hoped he would be her saviour, but then he had trapped her in the corner and shouted at her. 

It seemed he was the boss of the other three men. Emma had a stray thought, she wondered if this place was filled with hot men in suits. She immediately put it away as a highly inappropriate thought in the situation. 

Mr Tiny had said something about her uncle owing them money and not being able to pay, that he had sold her body to pay off his debt. But that couldn’t be true. 

It was true that her uncle used to have a gambling problem, and it was true that he didn’t love her the way she would have hoped he would. But to sell her to those men? No, she couldn’t believe that.

And now she was trapped behind this giant, hot man. As the door closed, leaving the two of them alone, he turned around and an ice-cold smile spread across the man’s face as he looked down at Emma. 

“Jonas Cobler is your uncle?” he asked. 

Emma’s body trembled out of fear and she tried to stop her lower lip from trembling. The look in his eyes is something that forever will be in my nightmares if I survived this, she thought.