Claimed By The Iron Reaper’s Son

Chapter Three

Chapter Three

The ride to the Iron Reapers compound was a complete blur of dark roads, black trees, and passing streetlights. Everything outside the window looked like a gray smear because the car was moving so fast. Surrounding our vehicle was a fleet of loud motorcycles. They rode closely on both sides of the big black SUV, flanking us like a heavily armed military escort. The deep, heavy rumble of their powerful engines shook the very air inside the car. It was a constant, angry noise that vibrated through my bones and made my teeth chatter.

I sat completely rigid in the middle of the back seat. My body was as stiff as a wooden board. My wrists were no longer free; they were now tied tightly in front of my body with the same kind of thick, white plastic zip-ties that had cut into my father’s skin back at the dirty warehouse. Every single time I tried to open my mouth to speak, or to beg for them to let me go, the giant enforcer sitting right next to me would turn his head. He shot me a sharp, cold warning glare that instantly shut me up fast. His eyes told me that if I made even one sound, he would make me regret it. By the time the vehicle finally began to slow down, my throat felt completely raw and burning from all the loud screams I had desperately swallowed down.

The SUV turned off the main road and approached two massive iron gates. They were towering and painted black, with the scary club logo painted right in the middle. The gates rolled open slowly, moving on heavy metal tracks. As they slid apart, they made a loud, heavy, metallic groan that echoed loudly in the quiet night air. The moment our car drove through that opening, my stomach dropped completely down. It felt like all of my insides were falling out from under me, leaving me empty and hollow.

Bright, harsh white floodlights lit up the entire area inside the walls. The massive parking lot looked almost like a secure prison yard instead of a regular driveway. There were long, neat rows of shiny chrome motorcycles parked in perfect lines. Their metal bodies gleamed perfectly under the bright, artificial lights. I could see a few smaller wooden buildings scattered around the edge of the property, perhaps tool sheds or storage units. But right in the middle of everything stood one huge, two-story house. It was the main clubhouse of the Iron Reapers. It looked incredibly strong and heavy, built out of thick dark wood and reinforced metal plates. It looked like a military fort that could easily survive a violent, bloody war.

My heart hammered wildly against my ribs as the SUV rolled to a final stop near the wide front steps of the house. This place was not just a simple hangout spot for friends—it was a true fortress designed to keep enemies out and keep secrets in. High chain-link fences topped with loops of sharp razor wire surrounded the entire property. Small security cameras with blinking red lights turned from every single corner of the roof, watching everything. Men wearing heavy leather vests with the club's patches—known as cuts—lounged around on the wide wooden porch. They had cold beers in their large hands, and they watched our arrival with open curiosity and dark smiles. Some of them let out low, sharp whistles when they spotted me being pulled out from the back of the vehicle.

“Welcome home, princess,” the big enforcer grunted next to me. He reached over, grabbed me roughly by the upper arm, and yanked me out of the car.

My feet hit the hard, loose gravel of the driveway with a loud crunch. I stumbled immediately, my legs feeling weak like water from the pure fear and the long, stressful ride.

I forced myself to stand up straight and stared up at the massive clubhouse. I took in all the small details that made my skin crawl with discomfort. Heavy black wooden shutters covered most of the windows, blocking anyone from seeing inside. The front door was made of thick, reinforced steel, and it had the club’s large skull-and-reaper logo burned deeply into the metal face. Loud music thumped faintly from inside the house—a bass-heavy rock song that made the very ground beneath my feet vibrate. The air out here smelled terrible. It was a thick mix of motorcycle exhaust, bitter cigarette smoke, and the greasy scent of something frying in the kitchen.

A few parking spots away, Jake Callahan climbed off his large black motorcycle. His movements were incredibly fluid, smooth, and powerful, even after riding for such a long time in the cold night air. He did not look at me right away. Instead, he turned his back to me, but I could still feel his powerful presence like a dark storm rolling into a valley. He stood on the gravel and exchanged a few quiet, serious words with one of the older guys standing on the porch. After a minute, he finally turned around and fixed those flat, stormy gray eyes right on me.

“Inside,” he ordered. His voice was rough, deep, and left no room for any argument. “The bar is straight through the main room. You will start working tonight.”

I dug the heels of my shoes into the gravel again, trying to hold my ground even though I knew deep inside that it was completely pointless. I could not fight these men. “This is crazy!” I shouted, my voice trembling. “Two hundred thousand dollars? Why did the number change? My dad said fifty thousand! Either way, it will take me years and years of hard work to pay that off. You cannot just keep me here like some slave or a prisoner!”

Jake walked over to me, his long strides closing the distance quickly until he was towering right over my smaller body. Up close under the bright white floodlights, the dark black ink of the tattoos on his neck and arms looked even more menacing and scary.

“Your father made his choice tonight, Ava,” Jake said, his gravelly voice dropping low so only I could hear. “Now you have to pay the price for his mistakes. Keep your head down, do your job without complaining, and maybe you will walk out of here alive one day.”

Before I could say another word, his large, warm hand landed flat against the small of my back. It was a firm, possessive touch that guided me forward up the wooden steps, whether I wanted to move my feet or not. The sudden contact sent an unwanted jolt of electricity straight through my body. It was a strange feeling—pure fear mixing with something much sharper and warmer that I completely refused to name or acknowledge.

The heavy steel front door swung open with a creak, and the full force of the Iron Reapers clubhouse hit me right in the face. The inside was dimly lit by red and yellow lights. There were worn, comfortable-looking brown leather couches scattered around a massive fireplace. Along the far wall was a huge wooden bar lined with hundreds of glass bottles of alcohol. There were way too many dangerous-looking men inside, and every single one of them stopped talking and turned their heads to stare at me. The loud laughter and crude, dirty jokes died down instantly as dozens of cold eyes raked over my body from head to toe.

I swallowed hard, my pulse racing like a runaway train.

This was my new reality. I was completely trapped behind enemy lines, surrounded by lawless outlaws, with Jake Callahan watching my every single move.

And as I looked around the room at all the scary faces, I had absolutely no idea how I was going to survive this nightmare.

The large enforcer pushed me forward, forcing me to walk past the rows of leather couches. Every man I passed looked at me like I was a strange animal that had just been brought into their cage. I kept my chin up as much as I could, but inside, I was shaking so hard I thought my bones might snap. My hands were still tied together in front of me, making me feel completely helpless.

"Sit her down over there," Jake called out from behind me. His voice cut through the low murmurs of the room easily.

The guard steered me toward a small wooden table near the corner of the massive bar. He pushed my shoulder down, and I dropped into a hard wooden chair. The wood felt cold against my legs. I pressed my back against the wall, wanting to put as much distance between myself and these bikers as possible.

The main room of the clubhouse was much bigger than it looked from the outside. The ceiling was high, with thick wooden beams running across it. The walls were covered in old photos of men on motorcycles, club flags with skulls on them, and various metal signs. In the center of the room, a large pool table sat under a low-hanging green lamp. Two men were holding pool cues, but they weren't playing anymore. They were just staring at me.

"She looks a bit small to be working the bar, Jake," one of the men by the pool table shouted out, letting out a rough laugh. He was a heavy man with a long, gray beard that reached his chest. "Are you sure she can handle the heavy kegs?"

Jake did not laugh. He walked past the pool table, his heavy boots making a slow, steady thud on the floor. He stopped right next to my table and looked down at me. "She will do what she is told," he said shortly. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a small pocket knife, and clicked the blade open.

I flinched back, pressing myself hard against the wall. I thought he was going to hurt me. But he just reached down, grabbed the plastic zip-ties on my wrists, and slid the sharp blade through the plastic.

Snip.

The thick white band broke apart and fell to the floor. I instantly pulled my hands back against my chest, rubbing my sore wrists. The skin was red and indented from the tight plastic, burning with a dull ache.

"Thank you," I whispered automatically, though I hated myself for thanking him. He was one of the men keeping me here.

Jake did not acknowledge my words. He folded the knife closed and put it back in his leather vest. "Don't make me regret taking those off," he warned, his gray eyes narrowing slightly. "If you try to run out the front door, the guys outside will catch you before you hit the gravel. And they won't be as nice as I am."

"I am not stupid," I said, my voice shaking but holding a tiny bit of anger. "I know I can't outrun a motorcycle. But you still haven't told me why the debt doubled. My dad told you he owed fifty thousand dollars. Why did you tell me it was two hundred thousand?"

Jake leaned down slightly, resting one hand on the back of my chair. He was so close I could feel the heat radiating from his large body. The scent of leather and tobacco hit my nose again. "Fifty thousand was what he borrowed from us for his little games," Jake explained in a low, quiet growl. "But your father has been running his mouth all over the city, Ava. He used our club name to get loans from other dangerous people. He told them the Iron Reapers would back him up if he couldn't pay. He brought trouble to our doorstep. That extra hundred and fifty thousand is the tax for using our name and bringing his mess to our club."

My jaw dropped open slightly. A fresh wave of anger and despair washed over me. My father hadn't just lost money; he had lied and used these dangerous criminals as a shield. He had practically signed my life away months ago without me ever knowing.

"He is a monster," I breathed out, the tears threating to return. "He lied to me about everything."

"He is a gambler," Jake corrected flatly, straightening back up to his full height. "And gamblers always run out of luck eventually. Yours just ran out tonight."

Before I could respond, a woman walked out from a door behind the bar. She looked to be in her late thirties, with long blonde hair tied back in a messy ponytail and dark tattoos covering both of her arms. She was wearing a simple black t-shirt and jeans, and she held a clean white apron in her hands. She looked at me with a mixture of pity and curiosity.

"Is this the new girl, Jake?" she asked, her voice sounding tired but not mean.

"Yeah," Jake replied, nodding his head toward me. "This is Ava. Ava, this is Sarah. She runs the kitchen and manages the bar during the day. She will show you what to do. Make sure she works hard, Sarah. No slacking."

Sarah walked over to my table, her boots clicking softly. She handed me the white apron. "Get up, kiddo," she said gently. "The sooner you start learning, the easier it will be. We have a busy night ahead of us, and the boys are thirsty."

I looked from the apron up to Sarah’s face. She didn't look like the scary bikers in the room. She looked like a regular person who just happened to work here. It gave me a tiny sliver of hope that maybe I wouldn't be treated like a animal the entire time. I slowly stood up from the chair, my legs still a bit shaky, and took the apron from her hands.

"I don't know how to mix drinks," I confessed in a quiet voice, tying the apron strings around my waist. "I've never worked in a bar before. I've only worked retail at a clothing store near my school."

Sarah gave a short, small laugh. "Don't worry about fancy drinks, Ava. These guys don't drink anything complex. They drink cheap beer from the bottle and straight whiskey from the glass. If you can open a cap and pour liquid into a cup without spilling it, you can work this bar."

She guided me around the side of the long wooden counter, leading me into the space behind the bar. It felt a bit safer being behind the thick wood, like it was a small barrier between me and the room full of outlaws. The shelves behind the bar were packed with hundreds of bottles of different liquors, and large refrigerators underneath the counter were filled to the brim with ice-cold bottles of beer.

"First rule of the clubhouse," Sarah said, leaning close to me so the men at the tables couldn't hear her over the music. "Never argue with a patched member. If they ask for a drink, you pour it. If they try to touch you or make you uncomfortable, you tell Jake or Stone immediately. The club has strict rules about how the bar girls are treated. You are here to work off a debt, not to be anyone's toy. Remember that."

I nodded quickly, absorbing her words like a sponge. Knowing that there were some rules to protect me made the tight knot in my stomach loosen just a tiny fraction. "What about Jake?" I asked, my eyes darting across the room to where Jake was now sitting on a couch, talking to three other large men. "Is he... is he dangerous?"

Sarah looked over at Jake for a long moment before looking back at me. "Jake Callahan is the Vice President of this club, and he is the President’s son. He is the most lethal man in this room, Ava. If someone breaks the club rules, Jake is the one who handles it. But he is also fair. He doesn't hurt people for no reason. Keep on his good side, do your work, and he will protect you from the wilder members."

"He doesn't seem very fair," I muttered under my breath, remembering how he had coldly told me I belonged to the club now.

"He did not kill your father tonight," Sarah pointed out quietly, checking the ice bucket under the counter. "In this world, that is considered being very fair. Now, grab that bottle opener over there. Big Tom at the end of the bar needs another beer."

I took a deep breath, trying to calm my racing heart. I reached down and picked up the heavy metal bottle opener from the counter. My hand was still shaking slightly, but I forced myself to move forward. I walked down the length of the bar to where a massive man with a long beard and a scarred face was banging his empty bottle against the wood.

"What can I get for you?" I asked, my voice sounding much braver than I actually felt.

The man, Big Tom, looked up at me with a wild grin, his dark eyes crinkling at the corners. "Well look at that, the princess can speak," he boomed out, causing a few men nearby to laugh. "Give me a cold blue label beer, girl. And make it quick. I'm parched."

I reached into the refrigerator underneath the counter, my fingers brushing against the ice-cold glass of a beer bottle. I pulled it out, placed the metal cap into the opener, and popped it off with a sharp clink. I set the foaming bottle down on the wooden counter right in front of him.

"Here you go," I said simply.

Big Tom grabbed the bottle, took a long, deep gulp of the beer, and wiped his mouth with the back of his massive hand. He looked at me for a second, then slid a crumbled five-dollar bill across the wood toward me. "Keep the change, kid. Welcome to the Reapers."

I looked at the five-dollar bill sitting on the dark wood. It was the first piece of money I had earned here, but I knew it wouldn't go toward my father's massive debt. It was just a tiny tip. Still, I picked it up and slid it into the front pocket of my white apron.

As I turned back around to walk toward Sarah, my eyes accidentally met Jake’s across the crowded, smoky room. He was still sitting on the leather couch, a glass of dark amber whiskey held loosely in his large hand. He wasn't talking to the other men anymore. He was just watching me. His gray eyes were flat and unreadable, tracking my movements behind the bar with a strange, intense focus.

I looked away quickly, my face feeling suddenly hot. I gripped the edge of the wooden counter, trying to ground myself. The night was still very young, the music was still thumping loudly through the floor, and I had hours of work left ahead of me. I didn't know how I was going to survive weeks, months, or years in this place. But as I opened another bottle of beer for a waiting biker, I knew one thing for certain: I had to stay strong. I had to survive, if only to prove to my father that he hadn't broken me when he threw me away.

The hours crawled by like snails. The smoke in the main room grew thicker and more suffocating as the night went on, making my eyes burn and my throat feel dry. More and more members of the Iron Reapers arrived at the clubhouse, turning the space into a loud, chaotic party. I spent the entire time running back and forth behind the long counter, opening countless bottles of beer, pouring heavy shots of dark whiskey, and wiping down the sticky wooden surface with a damp cloth.

My feet were throbbing with a dull, constant pain from standing for so long on the hard floor behind the bar. My arms felt heavy and tired from lifting crates of glass bottles from the storage room in the back. Sarah stayed with me for the first few hours, showing me where the extra alcohol was kept and how to use the old mechanical cash register, but eventually, she had to leave to go check on the food preparation in the kitchen. I was left completely alone to handle the thirsty outlaws.

"Hey, new girl! Over here!" a voice shouted from the middle of the bar.

I wiped my sweaty brow with the back of my hand and walked over to where three younger bikers were sitting. They didn't have as many patches on their leather vests as Stone or Jake did. Sarah had told me earlier that these younger guys were called "prospects"—men who wanted to join the club but hadn't earned their full patches yet. Because they were at the bottom of the club hierarchy, they often tried to act tougher and meaner than they actually were to impress the older members.

"What do you need?" I asked, setting my damp cloth down on the wood.

The prospect in the middle had short, shaved hair and a mean sneer on his face. His arms were covered in fresh, red tattoos that looked like they had been done just a few days ago. "Give us three shots of tequila, Ava," he said, using my name with a mocking tone. "And don't be stingy with the pour. We want the good stuff from the top shelf."

I turned around to reach for the tall clear bottle of tequila sitting on the high shelf behind me. I had to stand up on my tippy-toes to reach it, stretching my arms up as high as they could go. As I did, I felt the eyes of the three prospects burning into my back.

"Not bad," one of them whispered loudly to his friends, causing them all to let out low, dirty chuckles. "Frank Wang might be a useless degenerate gambler, but he sure knows how to make a pretty daughter. Maybe we should thank him for losing that money."

A sharp wave of heat and anger rushed straight to my face. My hands gripped the neck of the glass tequila bottle so tightly that my knuckles turned completely white. I wanted to turn around and throw the heavy bottle right at his smug face. I wanted to scream at them to keep my name and my family out of their dirty mouths. But I remembered Sarah’s strict warning from earlier: Never argue with a member. Even though these guys were just prospects, they were still part of the club, and I was just a prisoner working off a debt.

I forced myself to take a deep, calming breath, lowering the bottle down to the counter. I grabbed three clean shot glasses, lined them up in a neat row, and poured the clear liquid into them with a steady hand. I did not spill a single drop.

"Here are your shots," I said, my voice completely cold and flat, totally devoid of any emotion.

The shaved-headed prospect reached out and grabbed his shot glass, but instead of drinking it right away, he wrapped his greasy fingers around my wrist before I could pull my hand away. His grip wasn't as strong as the giant enforcer's grip from earlier, but it was still tight enough to keep me pinned to the spot.

"Why so cold, sweetheart?" he sneered, leaning his body closer across the wooden counter. His breath smelled heavily of stale beer and onions. "You're going to be living here for a very long time. You might as well learn to be nice to the guys who run this place. Who knows? If you play your cards right, maybe some of us will help pay down that big debt of yours."

"Let go of me," I said, my voice dropping into a low, sharp whisper. I tried to yank my wrist back, but he held on tighter, a cruel smile spreading across his lips as he enjoyed my struggle.

"Come on, just a little smile for the boys," he teased, his friends laughing along behind him. "We don't bite unless you ask us to."

"I said, let her go, Cole."

The deep, gravelly voice cut through the loud music and the noise of the room like a sharp knife through paper. The three prospects froze instantly, the laughter dying out from their throats in a split second.

I looked up and saw Jake standing right at the end of the bar