Reckoning (Sacrifical Duet Book 1)

by Riley Ashby

  I walked to the desk and pressed the button on the intercom on the phone, hoping someone was on the other end to hear me.

  “Get us ice,” I barked, hoping my voice sounded deep enough that they would believe it was him speaking, not me. Walking back to Meyer, I reached down and touched his face.

  He jerked back at first, then leaned into me. My fingers slipped across his wet skin. “Stand up,” I said, trying to sound like I had authority over his actions. When he did get to his feet without protest, the face that looked down at me was completely broken. Every rational thought fled my mind. I would have done anything to put him back together, even if it meant killing Conrad myself.

  But murdering his father wouldn’t fix his hand right now. He needed a doctor, and he wasn’t going to get to one without my help.

  “Get the door,” I said. My throat was scratchy from screaming, and I swallowed. It didn’t help; my mouth was bone-dry. “Don’t let them see you like this.”

  Some part of us that was still removed from this situation realized the dynamic that had to be maintained. There had to be no doubt that Meyer was holding me in fear. He had to win this battle because there was no option for me to succeed. It would mean death.

  Meyer took the ice from the stranger at the door, hiding his bleeding hand behind him and opening the door as little as possible. When he got back to me, he just handed me the ice and fell back to the floor. I sank to my knees beside him and took his hand.

  “Don’t,” he hissed, jerking it back, but I held firm.

  “Let me help you.” I bit the words out through my teeth. I didn’t owe him this. He had hurt me so deeply, so many times, beyond the point where I should ever forgive him.

  But his words shed new meaning on his anger. Conrad’s twisted worldview hadn’t corrupted him. He didn’t hate my mother because she left Conrad. He hated her because she left him behind when she escaped. Left him to take the brunt of his father’s anger.

  I saw every scar in a new light. The hematoma in his ear not from school wrestling but from having his face ground into the carpet for every infraction. I suddenly recalled Anita’s comment about his arm from the night she tried to kill me—Conrad broke it, then toyed with it for her amusement. His aversion to being touched by his father, even seemingly affectionate gestures.

  I was still angry, but there was another emotion there now too.

  Shame.

  Shame that I had been unable to see the true source of his pain and fear. I always considered myself so empathetic, focused on identifying those in need of help and then bringing it to them. This man had suffered in front of me for weeks, and I didn’t see it. I didn’t notice how he always put himself between me and his father and then ducked his head if Conrad raised his hand even a fraction. He had shown me more mercy in those moments than I had shown him in the entire time I had been here.

  We were quiet for several minutes while I iced his hand, ignoring the burning cold in my palm. It was a paltry penance for my refusal to see past the lies that had been fed to me by a man who I should have known I couldn’t trust to ever give me an ounce of truth. When I couldn’t stand it anymore, I set it aside and instructed him to make a fist. He did, but his little finger still stuck out with unnatural stiffness.

  “You should get an X-ray.”

  He didn’t seem to hear me. His eyes focused behind me, wading through memories he’d long since locked away. “She left me behind.” His voice was quiet. This wasn’t business mogul Meyer I was talking to. This was the broken young man fresh off a suicide attempt who had been dragged into my birthday party by the collar, looking confused and embarrassed. The one who mouthed an apology to me as his father threatened my mother and then pulled him away when my own father put himself between them.

  “She took care of me,” he moaned. “She got between us when he came down on me. Then she disappeared, and she left me with him.”

  If I thought he was broken before, the Meyer I saw now was completely shattered, his hand in pieces and tears in a free-fall on his cheeks.

  Moving around him, I sat so that our knees were touching and took his unharmed hand in mine. He withdrew it almost immediately, and I felt an unexpected pang of rejection. But he just moved his hand to my neck, drawing me to him and putting his forehead against mine.

  “It’s okay that you’re mad,” I said, barely aware of the words as they came out of my mouth. “You didn’t deserve to be abandoned.”

  He dragged in a ragged breath but didn’t speak. His eyes were all over the place, never settling on one spot for more than a second. But there wasn’t much he could see with our heads pointed down, and eventually, they fell on my hands and stayed there. He placed his injured hand in my palm, fingers twitching slightly as he fought to hold it still.

  “Meyer,” I whispered. I beckoned with one finger, still holding him, willing him to look at me.

  “No, no, I can’t.” Fresh tears fell on our joined hands.

  For the next several moments, the only sound I was aware of was our breath. I felt every centimeter that separated us, a pulsating space that I was suddenly desperate to cross. This confession, the truth, was a victory. It said that Meyer was not bound to his father’s way of life. He had shown me kindness when everyone else around me had sought to destroy me. He had taken physical abuse meant for me even though he desperately wanted to pay back my mother for leaving him to that mistreatment so many years ago. He was still the son of the man who had wrecked my mother, stolen her childhood, and now sought to destroy me too; but he was also a broken little boy who had made my mother his enemy only because there was no escaping his true attacker. He had coped in the only way he knew how.

  I suddenly knew the truth of why he had kept his hands off me after his first attempt to take me. Why he had shied away from touching me unless it served a purpose. He had seen himself becoming his father at that moment, and the thought had repulsed him. I wanted to show him, so desperately, that he wasn’t anything like that evil man.

  Just like the day in the barn, before my vow to destroy him and everything he held dear, I took the first step. I tugged him toward me and captured him in my arms.

  The kiss wasn’t what I expected. His lips pressed easily against mine, not seeking anything except to let him stay there. On the first night he tried to take me, everything had been about power. He had held me like a thing, not a person. Right now, he clung to me like a life raft. He was drowning, and I was the air.

  My head spun with the ecstasy of finally feeling him like this, finally breaking down the tension that I had tried to keep buried beneath my overwhelming rage. But mixed with the ecstasy was the immense grief for all he had suffered; thirty years of mental and physical abuse that had made him believe not only that he was undeserving of love but also that he didn’t even know what it was. I didn’t realize I was shaking until he pulled away.

  “I’m sorry,” he muttered, somehow even more defeated than he had sounded a minute ago.

  “Don’t,” I choked out and kissed him again. I opened my mouth, and he broke. The hand on the nape of my neck tightened, pulling me closer as our tongues finally met in the culmination of all the mind games and thinly veiled threats over the past weeks. What had happened before wasn’t a fluke or a one-time mistake. This thing that existed between us was real, but if we didn’t protect it, we would lose so much more than each other. He groaned low in his chest as my hand stole to his chest, pushing against the heartbeat that reminded me he was a human being with free will and the ability to change the future instead of being shackled to the past. The ability to change my future. For the first time, I thought that perhaps he wouldn’t lead me to my death after all.

  He tried to grab my wrist with his injured hand but broke away with a sharp gasp of pain. Tears sprang anew on his face as he clutched it to himself, but he never took his eyes off me. I reached out to thumb away his tears, still trying to catch my breath.

  “We have to get out of here. You need a d
octor.”

  He nodded mutely, relenting to me as the leader of our actions for a short time. He had poured every bit of himself into the wall, and then my lips, and now nothing was left.

  “Find something with pockets,” I said, pulling both of us to our feet. “And tell Shawn we need his car. I don’t want Joshua with us.”

  I turned to prepare myself, but he caught my arm and pulled me against his chest. He winced as I jostled his injured arm but didn’t let go.

  “Madeline … Maddie.” He put his forehead against mine again. He closed his eyes as though he couldn’t bear to look at me.

  I kissed him. I couldn’t stop myself. Something had broken in me, and the only fix was his touch. We both had the truth—the full truth—and every pretense between us was stripped away. I needed him close. Against me. Inside me. I needed him to show me that no one is doomed to make the same mistakes as their parents, no matter how deep the cancer has grown.

  But first, I needed him healthy.

  “Coat,” I said breathlessly as I tore myself away. “Five minutes. We’re going.”

  Meyer

  Fifteen minutes later, we were far enough away from the building that Madeline took off the sunglasses and hat she had worn to hide her face. We’d left Joshua behind, agreeing we couldn’t trust him enough to string him along for this. My eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror, trying to see if we were being followed. So far, we were alone.

  Shawn stopped us in the garage where he was waiting for us. “Where do you think you’re going?” He stepped toward Maddie, but I shifted in front of her. He scowled. “You’re insane if you think I’m letting you take her out of here.”

  “Get out of our way, Shawn.” I hoped my voice sounded menacing. In reality, I felt powerless. Madeline had destroyed me, first with the truth and then with … with herself. The person she’d always been that I had tried to keep at arm’s length, thinking that I could have her soul without giving her mine as well. The woman who looked into me and saw someone who could be better, even as I hurt her again and again.

  What I was feeling toward her wasn’t possible. I had wanted her to be a thing, a doll I could put on a shelf and wind up with orders and demands and favors. I couldn’t pay back Eva for leaving me to Conrad’s violence so many years ago, so I thought Madeline would have to do. But she’d managed to break me down instead.

  Shawn reached for Maddie’s arm again, trying to pull her away. I felt a snarl of possession, the caveman part of me rearing up in defense at this competitor trying to steal my woman away. Not now, not when we were finally bare in front of each other.

  Maddie put her hand on his wrist, stilling him.

  “You need to let us go, Shawn. I have to get him out of here.”

  And just like that, the dynamic shifted. I wasn’t secreting her away; she was the one stealing me. I sighed as my shoulders fell, letting down my guard. It didn’t matter around him. She could take care of it. Shawn was as surprised as I was at the change in the air, stepping back and letting his hand fall. Maddie stepped forward beside me.

  “He needs a doctor. Can you help us?”

  Shawn pursed his lips, then stepped back. With his hands off Madeline, I pulled her back tighter to my side. “My private doctor. I’ll text Meyer his address.”

  “Tell it to me. We left his phone upstairs.” She fished in her bag for a receipt and a pen, writing down the address as he rattled it off. “I don’t want Conrad tracking us.”

  Shawn’s eyes widened. “You think he monitors Meyer’s phone?”

  “I know he does.” Her eyes narrowed. “It’s chapter three of the abuser’s handbook.”

  I huffed, running my uninjured hand through my hair. I didn’t want to be talked about as though I wasn’t even present.

  They both noticed, shifting uncomfortably.

  “Is there somewhere we can go, Shawn?” Madeline stepped closer and wrapped her hand gently around my arm. I looked down at her, my heart suddenly swelling. She gazed up at me with such concern, but it didn’t make me feel vulnerable. It made me feel whole. I couldn’t stop myself from leaning down to kiss her.

  Shawn handed us the key to his downtown apartment, and a minute later, we were pulling out of the underground garage.

  “Pull over,” Madeline said now, unbuckling her seat belt.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m driving. You can’t shift this stupid car with that hand.”

  When we crossed in front of the car, I caught her briefly to kiss her again. I couldn’t stop. I felt raw, flayed open. I thought that this moment was going to pass, and I’d never get the chance to touch her again or be brave enough to love her. She looked at me as we kissed.

  “We’ll make it through this together.”

  I could only nod.

  We drove across town to a lavish townhouse where Shawn’s doctor lived. We paid with cash for an X-ray housed in his basement that showed a fracture to my fifth metatarsal. The doctor wrapped my wrist and two of my fingers with a splint to help it heal. While I was signing the final paperwork, the doctor pulled Madeline out of my sight. I felt myself panic, not wanting her to disappear, but she reappeared a moment later.

  “Are you okay?” I asked, suddenly worried she had sustained some invisible injury.

  “It’s all right.” She stroked my hair and kissed the bandaged fingers softly. “Let’s go.”

  In the car, she told me what the doctor said. “They thought the attack on the wall had been meant for me. I told her the only person you were trying to hurt was yourself.”

  I found myself angry at the pity I saw so clearly on her face. “Don’t look at me like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like I’m a victim.”

  She didn’t say anything else for a long time.

  I directed her along winding side roads, hoping to stay away from traffic cameras or any major intersections where people could be looking for us. Shawn’s car should be free from bugs or trackers, though I didn’t put it past Conrad to follow him as well. But I didn’t have time to check.

  It was dark when we pulled into the garage of Shawn’s building. The place was private and locked down. We kept our faces turned away from the security cameras, but I didn’t keep my hands off her in the elevator. In the corner of the small metal box, I held her as tight as I could manage.

  *

  I was at a loss once we stepped inside, but Madeline took the reins as though it was natural for her. I supposed it was; she was just always suppressed by me.

  “You need to shower. Relax.”

  I protested, but she insisted. My clumsy fingers, hampered by pain and the brace, couldn’t manage the buttons of my shirt. She brushed my hand aside gently, then helped pull it off me.

  She gasped, seeing for the first time the bruise on my bicep where Conrad had hit me. I turned away from her, hiding it, but she followed me. She put her hand over the mark, covering my pale skin with hers. The other arm wrapped around to my back as she looked up at me.

  “You’re so brave, Meyer.”

  Water fell onto her face, and I realized I was crying again. She pushed up on her toes so that I could bury my face in her dark hair. I wrapped my arms around her, not caring about the twinge in my side, holding her like a life vest while I let myself be swept away.

  No one had ever seen it happen before. Shady doctors came to tend severe injuries and gave detached, clinical diagnoses followed by pain relievers and the occasional splint or butterfly bandage to suture together the split skin. But no one had ever touched my injuries and seen the more hysterical damage. The daily fear that plagued me ever since I became aware of what was happening to me, wondering why my sister didn’t receive the same treatment. The desperate desire to be perfect, to avoid another blow, and being surprised every time it wasn’t enough.

  The only person who had successfully staved off an attack had been Eva. And then she had left me alone.

  “I’m sorry,” I muttered when I fi
nally pulled away, rubbing my face with my good hand.

  “Don’t you dare apologize.” She sounded angry, but she wasn’t looking at me. She focused on my belt, pulling down my pants and boxers with professional disinterest. Her mouth was twisted into a grimace.

  “Go get clean.” She pushed me toward the open bathroom door, but I halted. I would either need a plastic bag for my hand or have to hold it out of the water. She saw my predicament. Then, without looking away, she started to undress.

  “No, Maddie, I don’t need—”

  “Don’t fight me, Meyer. I don’t have the energy for it.”

  Despite my grief and shame, I had to fight myself not to respond to her body. I wanted her so much—I always wanted her—and I felt so vulnerable.

  “You helped me before, so let me help you now.” She started the water, holding a hand under the stream until it warmed.

  She looked nervous. We had been naked together so many times before—when I helped her that first week, when we warmed her back to life, and when we slept together—so why was she hesitating now?

  I knew the answer when I thought about it. We were finally actually bare in front of each other. The curtain had been pulled aside, and she saw me fully, the whole story. I wouldn’t be able to hide from her after this. She was inside me deeper than she ever could be.

  It was a struggle to hold still while she washed my hair, her fingers gently massaging my scalp. I jerked as she pressed on a lingering bruise from when my head had struck a rock the day her parents had shown up, and she stood on tiptoes again to kiss it gently. When she grabbed the sponge to wash my body, I took it from her with my good hand.

  “I can’t stand it if you touch me anymore,” I confessed.

  She just nodded and washed her own hair, facing away from me while I scrubbed as well as I could with one hand above my head. When we were washed clean of suds, she handed me a towel while wrapping herself with another. We dried and dressed, her helping me again with my shirt.