The North Star | COMPLETED ✔️

Chapter 2 ~ Tomorrow

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Chapter 2

One-thousand, four-hundred and sixty days.

Two-hundred and nine weeks.

Forty-eight months.

Four years.

A lot of time to think. About my life, where I'd been and what I'd become. The more time I spent behind bars, the more I realized what a fucking statistic I was. Drake, the club, the family that had once been my lifeline had had me backed into a corner for years. And I'd just been standing there, hands up in surrender, tiptoeing around in an attempt to make each day as good as it could be.

Prison was no different than home. Women had been waiting just like I'd known they would be. No sooner did the guards show me my cell, a group appeared to give a taste of what was to come upon my release.

Three cracked ribs, two black eyes, one blessed day in the infirmary, and me. Hands up. Balled into a U-shape. No fight. Just a statistic. An abused animal too trained to bite the ones who beat her.

Drake visited every month. Each time to fuck with my head. To remind me. The lust in his eyes had nothing to do with sex. He'd do worse than the women had.

He couldn't wait to do worse.

Nowhere was safe, and I was tired. So unbelievably tired. Karma owed me something. She owed me at least some semblance of a life before I inevitably rotted in the ground.

But she wouldn't hand it to me.

It wouldn't fall into my lap.

I'd have to pry it from her cold, bitchy fingers.

I made a decision. A huge decision that would most likely end in my death, but I didn't care. It didn't matter. I'd rather die fighting my way out of the corner than spend my days cowering inside it, bowing my head. I was stronger than that, and Drake could fuck off.

I lied about my release date, dyed my hair black, and added a new tat to my temple. It was as good a disguise as I could manage, but the end result wouldn't help with my goals to have a normal life. It took away my only tool. My harmless college girl persona flew out the window to be replaced by someone worth a wallet check.

Still, I ran.

As far as the terms of my probation would allow, which wasn't very fucking far at all. Colorado was a deadly mistress in the winter, and as I trudged along the wet road, legs aching after ten hours of job search, head down and hair a curtain around my features, the October chill crept through my hoodie like an omen.

The law wasn't helping, not without a testimony. The shelters weren't an option. I had no family. I couldn't hightail it down to Florida without risking being locked back up, and I was one person hiding from a club with thousands of members.

Any one of them would snatch me up and hand me over to Drake in a second. For what? A pat on the back? A little golden star?

I didn't have a chance.

I had a fucking bridge. A bridge, a hoodie, and ten dollars of panhandled change.

I pushed forward as the familiar lights entered my distant peripheral. Bars lit the path down Main Street, heated, open and ready to service anyone with a buck to spend. They called to me like long lost friends, and the meager amount of money sat heavier inside my jean pocket. But walking into a bar would be like a mouse going for the trap. A death wish, and while the cheese had never been more tempting, the threat was far too great.