Purgatory

by Hayley Smyth

  “I'm sorry. Carter instigated it, I swear,” she cried.

  Vladimir grabbed one photo and shoved it into her face. “Is that the face of a woman not enjoying herself? You fucking slut.” Screwing the paper into a tight ball, I watched on in horror as Vlad then shoved it into Marnie's mouth, before throwing her to the floor.

  I was so fucking tempted to mention Amy. The fact that we had received photos showing just how much of a hypocrite Vladimir fucking Chrobak was.

  Jozef took one last aim at Marnie's stomach, and this time we all heard her ribs crack. She wheezed, face soaked with tears, mascara streaming like a morbid watercolor down her cheeks, and I looked at Benny sat at the far end of the table. He looked grim, his usual cheerful persona stripped from him after the last week.

  Vladimir clicked his fingers and the three men opposite me, or the triplets as they were also known as, stood in unison, grabbed Marnie from the floor and hauled her broken ass out a room at the far back of the library. A room I didn't know existed. I tried to spy on how they opened a door that had no damn handle, but Jozef stepped into my line of sight.

  “Jaxon, I assume you knew nothing of this?” He asked, sliding the other photograph across the table towards me.

  I picked it up and studied the image. From what I could see, it had been taken at The Warehouse, where drugs were first delivered to be weighed and cut. From there, the packs ready to be sent out were loaded on to our truck, guys from different towns would begin distributing.

  “No, sir. Not a damn fucking thing.” My mind whirled. Both Amy and Carter shitting on each other, it made no sense.

  “Well, what's done is done. But can I trust that everyone else left here today can keep their shit in their pants?” Vladimir eyed me as he asked this, but it'd take a hell of a lot more to spook me, especially knowing he was guilty of shit he was trying to stop. Practice what you preach, right?

  Heads nodded in agreement.

  “Good. Then, you're all free to go.”

  Thank fuck.

  Despite the bruises, I hurried my ass back to my room. Needing a quiet moment to take all this in, being out of work, I found myself with a lot of damn time on my hands.

  Closing the door, I hobbled over to the window, opened it at the top, and took a cigarette from my pocket. Vlad had ripped into me for smoking in my room, but I physically couldn't keep trekking across The Mansion when I needed a nicotine fix.

  The smoke filled the air, and I made a point of hanging my arm out the window and blowing the smoke away before it had a chance to come in. When I'd started to feel a little better, there was a knock at my door. The person didn't wait for a response, and when I turned to see who it was, I saw Edith's face, her hands clutching the necklace as she sped towards me.

  “Jax, oh, I've been looking for you.”

  “What's up?”

  “Look.” She thrust the necklace into my hand and pointed to the bottom of the heart. “You need to let the light hit it just so, but it's there.”

  I flicked my smoke out the window and done as instructed, following Edith's finger as a guide. But as sure as shit, I spotted the writing.

  Engraved into the silver were the words: To, my Angel, love always, Carter.

  “He fucking gave Marnie this?” I asked.

  Edith shrugged her slender shoulders and pulled out her phone, her fingers tapped the screen a few times and then she showed me a photo. “I looked it up online to see how much it cost and whether anything would help me figure out why this is so special.”

  “Well?”

  “The wings unclip. It's a locket.” She showed me the tiny clip that you wouldn't be able to see unless you knew it was there. “I haven't opened it yet - I came straight to you.”

  And like a gunshot, a firework exploding, a punch to the jaw it all clicked. It. This is what it was. The same fucking It Carter had lost. It wasn't Marnie's necklace; it was Amy's.

  “Where did Ella get this?” I asked Edith.

  “I have no idea, my dear. All I know is what I've told you.”

  We were quiet for a moment, sitting at the edge of the bed next to each other. A smile played on my lips as I thought about the old woman next to me, helping me. I'd come to grow quite fond of her over the week.

  “Right, well, let's do this then,” I said, and I flicked the clip. The wings opened up, creating four instead of two, and a tiny piece of paper fell into my lap. Placing the necklace down, I looked at Edith and unfolded the paper.

  In a blood-red ink was a small paragraph.

  A small paragraph that destroyed the world beneath me and every single lie and truth came crashing together.

  “What? What does it say?” Edith breathed.

  I gave the note for Edith to read, and it seemed as though her world reacted precisely the way mine had.

  Fuck.

  This changed absolutely everything.

  Chapter Twenty Nine

  Then.

  It was the morning after the party, and I'd woken first. Carter and Amy were curled into each other's naked bodies, with me next to Amy, Mila lay peacefully on the edge of the bed. My head pounded, my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth, and my stomach churned.

  With as much care as I could muster, I crawled from the bed, sliding off the end, mindful not to wake anyone. My body craved coffee or something with sugar, and I couldn't face the three people in the bed.

  Stepping over clothes and underwear, I cringed, thinking of the night we'd spent together, of how fucking incredible Amy had been. I hated myself for thinking more of her more than my girlfriend, my girlfriend who'd trusted me enough to go through with last night. She'd let me pop her sweet cherry, and all I had wanted were Amy's plump little lips wrapped around my dick. I'd wanted that, and I'd gotten it. And now I felt like shit. I didn't deserve Mila and her sweetness, and as I grabbed myself a bottle of water from the mini-fridge, I felt resolved in making it up to her. In being the boyfriend she deserved.

  I stepped out on to the balcony after shoving my legs into a pair of jeans and pulling on a t-shirt.

  “Hey, you,” purred a voice from behind me.

  I rolled my eyes. “Can I not have ten minutes to myself?”

  “Jeez, someone's still pissy then?” Amy said, sliding up beside me, copying my pose against the balcony wall.

  I felt bare skin touching mine, and I sighed on seeing her still bare ass naked. “Can't you put some fucking clothes on? Game's over.”

  She stuck her tongue between her teeth and grinned at me. “I never pegged you as a prude, Jax, especially not after last night.”

  I gulped down some water. “Let's just not talk about last night, Carter likes you, that's the end of it.”

  She pouted. “But what if I like someone else? Someone more of a man,” her hand slipped between my crotch and the wall and she grabbed me.

  She wanted a reaction. I was beginning to learn something about this new girl: she wanted to be the center of attention at all times. Last night had been proof of that. Having Carter worship her body hadn't been enough, and even when Mila had, rather bashfully, taken a hard nipple into her mouth, she'd begged to me to fuck her, too. Anytime Carter kissed Mila, she'd sat back and watched, but when Mila captured my mouth with hers, Amy had wanted in.

  “I'm not playing your stupid games. I've got Mila, and I'm not about to fuck that up for you.” For a split second, I saw a look of defeat in her eyes, mixed with sadness, and I felt fucking bad. “Look, we can all be friends, despite the fact that you're a raving bitch, I think you'll fit in well with us.” I smiled, and so did she, releasing my overused dick.

  She moved away, tucking her long hair behind her ears, and sighed. “I guess I should apologize. I've never really had friends. My dad moved us around a lot, and I’ve never stayed in one place for too long.” She looked at me through thick lashes. “I try to overcompensate.” She shrugged.

  “There's no need to, not with us. Carter's fucking crazy for you already, Mila needs a girl l
ike you around, and as for us? Friends.” I held out my hand, and she shook it, trying not to laugh.

  For a moment we were silent, watching the view before us, the sun as it rose across the land and into the sky, the clouds disappearing to make way for bright blue.

  She wrapped her arms around her naked body and sighed again. “Can I tell you something? Something personal.”

  I nodded. “Of course.”

  I slipped off my T-shirt and handed it to Amy before we sat down at the small table on the balcony. I let her drink the last of my water and waited for her to carry on.

  The white material was far too big for her, and she tucked it snug around her thighs. “I'm not actually a bitch, you know?”

  I raised my eyebrow and grinned.

  She laughed, the first real laugh I'd heard since meeting her. “No, seriously. All bullshit aside right now. But I swear to God you tell anyone I said this, and I'll fucking cut you.” She made threatening snipping motion with her fingers.

  “Okay, fine. You have my word.” I said, hands up as a truce.

  She tightened and loosened the cap of the bottle methodically as she weighed up her words. “My daddy...he's not a nice guy. He used to be; he used to be my whole wide world. Until I turned nine."

  I could sense where this was going, and my stomach churned. “Amy, you don't have to tell me this to prove you're not a bitch.”

  She smiled, yet her eyes were sad. “I'm not, I just feel...drawn to you, like I can tell you shit without judged.” A pause. “I know what people see when they look at me. A confident, bright, take-no-prisoners bitch who could have any boy she wanted. And they're right for the most part. What they don't know is: why. Why I'm like this. Why I have this incessant need to go for what I want regardless of the consequences.” She scratched at her arms. “Fuck, you don't have a cigarette, do you?”

  I nodded and pulled a carton from my pocket, taking two out and handing her one. I sparked up her smoke and then mine, quiet and waiting to hear this mysterious girls' story.

  She blew smoke into the air as she spoke. “The first time it happened that I can remember, I was nine. A touch under the quilt here, a lingering kiss on the lips there. My mom was busy trying to take over the world one business at a time, putting money she didn't have into companies that had no potential, so my dad and I were often by ourselves.” More smoke swirled into the sky. “I was so fucking confused, you know? I'd seen television couples and the way they kissed, and I'd seen the way kids and their parents showed affection. That first time? I just assumed it was because I was getting older. Which is ridiculous, I know.” She rolled her eyes and took several long drags off her cigarette, the ember glowing bright orange.

  “From then, it just got worse. I was powerless to stop it, my daddy's hands down my pajama pants, his...” she looked at me, scared fucking shitless, “thing in my hand.”

  “Amy...”

  “No, let me finish.” She flicked ash on to the floor and stowed herself. “And then when I turned eleven, on the night of my birthday, that's when he went the whole way.”

  “Jesus, Amy, I'm so sorry.” What else could I say?

  “It happened every single fucking night,” she said through choked sobs, “until the night I left. I went and lived with my grandmother, no one asked any questions, and once I'd gone through several months of wanting to die, I promised myself that no man would ever make me feel like that again. That helpless, that weak and disposable. That...fucking disgusting.” She flicked the cigarette end to the ground and swiped the tears from her cheeks.

  I got up and wrapped my arms around her. To this day, I don't remember deciding to hug her, but I had no clue what else to do.

  She lay her chest on my head and laughed. “It's fine, I'm fine,” she said, pulling away from me with a wave of her hands.

  I crouched down in front of her and took her hands. We looked at one another, a weird sort of pact, an unspoken promise, that I'd forever protect her. She would be a Murdoch in no time. “Want me to kill him?” I asked.

  She didn't even flinch. “Can you do that?”

  I nodded. “Carter wasn't kidding when he said my old man is a name in this town.”

  She thought about my offer for a moment, stroking the back of my hand with a red nail. “No,” she shook her head. “No. As long as he's alive, he suffers. That's all the punishment I could ever hope for.”

  “Understood.”

  She cupped my face and the look she gave me? I'll never fucking forget it. “You're something else, Jaxon Murdoch, you know that?” She kissed my cheek. “Mila is one lucky girl.”

  Standing, I held out my hand for her to take, which she did. “Come on. Let's have a shower - separately...” I smiled. “Then we'll get some food for the other two, and the four of us can go out and do something. How does that sound?”

  She stood, smoothing down my shirt. “That sounds like a mighty fine plan, Jax.”

  And that was it.

  One fucked up night. One fucked up father, and one fucked up conversation, and the four of us were inseparable. We never spent the night together again, Mila wanted us to become more serious. Plus, the more time Amy spent with Carter, the more I could see her falling for him. She lost her resting bitch face and the attitude, and before long, she was one of us. We spent four amazing summers together, partying, spending weekends at my pops' lodge, drinking, and then eventually working.

  Mila had always been ambitious. She had the smarts, the brains that most of us in that town lacked, and, just after we'd all turned twenty, she broke my damn heart and left, leaving for a job she couldn't have refused. We tried to keep in contact, but she was never going to accept my lifestyle, especially as I'd gotten older, and I didn't blame her. More often than not, Carter and I were on runs across the country, coming home bloodied and bruised, particularly in the beginning, and while it had taken me a lot to get over her, I managed. I fucked and drank my sorrows away until she was nothing but a distant memory.

  If I thought the secrets before finding the damn necklace had been twisted, I'd been mistaken.

  The storm was brewing.

  The army were sharpening their weapons, and I was crazy fucking in love with Ella goddamn Chrobak.

  Chapter Thirty

  Ella.

  There was a constant, steady drip coming from somewhere when I awoke once more, a torturous noise that teased my full bladder. My eyes were crusty, with what I don't know, and I couldn't move my arms or my legs. Locating a tiny amount of strength, I moved one extremity, which caused a loud clanking noise. I moved another, the same thing happened, and when I shook all four in unison, that's when I realized: I was chained to some huge contraption, upright, legs apart, arms high above my head.

  I whimpered, that one simple action had my throat screaming in pain. I was naked, cold, and desperate to use the bathroom, but I couldn't panic. I couldn't risk using any energy I had left.

  The room was pitch black, echoes as I moved, each bone in my body cried out for some relief, I could feel the tension in my joints and almost sobbed in frustration at not being able to crack them. My lungs wheezed, and my hips groaned. What on earth was happening to me? Where was I?

  In my delirious state, memories of Jax and I at the motel flooded my brain, images of us naked, kissing, touching, his beautiful mouth telling me he loved me had my heart aching and yearning for him. What was worst of all - I had no idea if he was even still alive.

  The tears came now, thinking of this man. This beautiful, talented, kind man in the world of such evil and darkness, and I welcomed the salty wetness on my cheeks, trickling past my swollen lips. My arms burned and tingled because of being unable to move them, but they ached to hold Jax more. It was a new kind of grief, one completely different from losing baby girl, yet it was still as potent. Still as cruel.

  Maybe Vladimir would kill me this time.

  For a while, I slipped in and out of consciousness, and the darkness ensued a permanent state of confusion, u
nable to tell whether it was night time or day time. Each bone and nerve in my body was on fire, screaming for some kind of relief, and I almost ignored the voice speaking to me, convinced I must have been dreaming it. But the nudge in my ribs woke me up, and I was suddenly alert.

  “Oh, good. You're awake.” Came the distorted voice. A hand wrapped around my arm, and then I felt a strap being fastened, the leather bit into my skin, and I couldn't fight. Not even my eyes were able to open thanks to the crust locking them shut.

  “W-What are you doing?” I asked the voice.

  It sighed.

  “Who are you?” I tried.

  The voice didn't answer me as there was a sharp pinch in my flesh, the strap was removed from my arm, and I felt a gush of wind against me as the voice moved. My head felt as though someone had stuffed it with cotton wool, sickness bubbled in the pit of my stomach, and I flopped against the chains, the metal digging into my skin.

  And then there were two voices I couldn't recognize through my foggy brain.

  “How much longer? I've waited long enough.” The first voice said.

  “Vladimir is planning a nice meal to welcome him back; be patient. You'll have your say.”

  Voice one groaned, I could hear the stamp of its feet. “About time.”

  They spoke quietly then, just a monotone mumble of noises as my mind swam, the drugs they'd injected taking effect.

  “Who's moving her?”

  “She'll be there for the show, too, stop panicking.”

  “I'm not panicking. I've sat waiting in the dark like a dog for fucking weeks now; I'm angry. I want this to run just as I imagined it; anything less will not do.”

  “He's got his work cut out with you,” voice two chuckled.

  Who were these people and what the hell was happening? I wanted to yell and scream and rattle my shackles, but I couldn't, I felt numb. Paralyzed. Heavy yet weightless. Alive and dead.

  There was a loud screech, metal being dragged across the concrete, though my eyelids I saw the light from outside come flooding in. The voices grew louder, as though there were more people arriving, but the drugs kept me quiet, unable to ask any more questions. I couldn't even feel scared.