Sin & Suffer

by Pepper Winters

  I groaned under my breath as scenarios and horror-filled daydreams tormented me.

  Please, please, let her be okay!

  My eyes flickered to the door. All I wanted to do was leave. To chase after my rotten enemies and give them what they deserved.

  Suddenly, nausea raced up my gullet. I stumbled to the side. Crashing against the bed, I gritted my teeth against the swirling room.

  The doctor sidestepped, avoiding me as best he could. “If you could sit down, Mr. Killian.”

  “Do what he says, Kill. Just behave for once in your damn life,” Grasshopper growled. “Let us explain before you kill yourself, you bloody asshole!”

  A wave of brutal heat tackled me to the bed. The nausea turned to sickness. My teeth chattered as the agony in my blood came back full force. Having no choice but to lean against the bed like a fucking invalid, I muttered, “Why the hell aren’t you out there looking for her? She’s your responsibility, too!” The light stabbed my eyeballs as I stared at my trusted friend and vice president.

  Grasshopper’s black mohawk hung limp, floppy without gel. His blue eyes ringed with stress lines and bruises. He swallowed hard, refusing to answer my question.

  “Well?” I prompted, holding my pounding skull. “What the fuck have you been doing to get her back?”

  “Kill, back up.” Mo inched forward, wiping at the blood on his chin with the back of his hand.

  Hopper never took his eyes off me. “We had to make sure you would survive. Been for a ride in an ambulance, helped dress your naked ass into a hospital gown, and stood by you while you were given scans and all that other medical bullshit to make sure you didn’t croak.”

  Pointing at my bandaged head, he added, “You were out of it. Talking nonsense; wouldn’t wake up. The doctors thought the swelling might affect your speech. What were we supposed to do? Strap you to your bike and drag you with us to kill your own flesh and blood?”

  My fists clenched. Blood dripped from my torn vein, splashing faster to the floor.

  I couldn’t contemplate that the two brothers I trusted above anyone had let my woman get taken. And then not gone after her the second she was stolen.

  It’s not their fault.

  She’s yours and you failed her, asshole.

  This is all on you.

  “Fuck!” I groaned, tearing at the bandage around my head, trying to reach inside and turn off the incessant throbbing. Why was I so weak? I’d failed her again!

  The room swam; my eyes worked like a faulty camera lens unable to focus. “You know what she means to me. You know how damn important she is.” Glaring at Grasshopper, I couldn’t bring myself to be grateful for his loyalty or attempts at keeping me alive. I didn’t want to be alive if Cleo was hurt.

  I deserved to rot in hell for letting her be taken again.

  “We did what—”

  I slashed my hand, cutting off his sentence. “No, you did what you wanted to do. Not what I would’ve done. You know damn well I would’ve gone after your woman—regardless if you lived or fucking died.” Punching myself in the chest, I growled, “That’s what I wanted.”

  “Kill, what were we supposed to do?” Hopper snapped. “We’d go to war for a girl who would hate us if she knew we did nothing while you bled to death. No point in that fight. No one wins.”

  I couldn’t see his logic. It was flawed. Ridiculous. Cleo would understand if I died while my men rescued her. She would expect such a gallant act.

  At least she would be safe.

  I didn’t want to listen to fucking reason.

  I want blood!

  I didn’t care that my ass was hanging out the back of this paisley printed apron. I didn’t care that blood dripped from my hand, staining my bare feet and floor. And I definitely didn’t care about the viselike agony in my skull.

  All I cared about was Cleo.

  The nausea faded and I charged at Hopper. In a jumble of leather and hospital gown, I pinned him against the door, threading my fingers around his throat.

  “Mr. Killian, unhand him!” the doctor shouted, swatting the back of my shoulders with the clipboard.

  I ignored him like a lion would ignore a flea. He was nothing.

  However, the rush of energy, coupled with moving reluctant legs made me squeeze Hopper’s throat more out of support rather than rage. My vision blacked out. I blinked, trying to see. “How long? How long was I out?”

  Mo slapped a warning hand on my arm, tugging me away from Hopper. “Let him go, then we’ll tell you.”

  My brain didn’t feel right. The sequences of numbers I relied on all my life, the ingrained knowledge and intelligence I’d taken for granted was muted … faded. Missing beneath a storm of pain and swelling. My temper was fucking insane.

  Grasshopper didn’t try to remove my hand. Instead, he stood taller, breathing shallow as I slowly suffocated him.

  “Two days.”

  My world fell away.

  I stood on the brink of suicidal mayhem.

  Don’t snap. Do. Not. Snap.

  My headache consumed me until I felt sure I would explode into bloody particles and devour the entire world with my fury.

  Letting him go, I staggered backward. “Two days?”

  Two fucking days where my father could’ve done anything to her.

  Hopper shrank before my eyes. “Rubix took her about fifty hours ago.”

  I shook. Fuck, I shook.

  “Fifty hours?” I couldn’t do anything but repeat him. It was all I could do to force English through my lips and not revert to primitive grunts and growls.

  I wasn’t human. I was an animal. An animal drooling at the thought of tearing my enemies limb from limb for what they’d done.

  “Why was I out for so long?”

  Mo answered, “They hit you a few times over the head with a baseball bat. The scans showed—”

  “The PET, MRI, and CT scans all came back conclusive,” the doctor jumped in.

  I’d completely forgotten he was still there.

  “You have a hairline fracture in your skull and heavy swelling on the prefrontal cortex.”

  I turned my attention to the man severely pissing me off. I didn’t want to hear what happened to me. Didn’t he get it? None of that fucking mattered!

  “We kept you in an induced coma for thirty-six hours, hoping the swelling would recede to acceptable levels.”

  “You. Did. What?” My heartbeat exploded. “You kept me fucking drugged when my woman is out there with men who won’t hesitate to rape and murder her?”

  I couldn’t fucking believe this shit.

  “You need to get back into bed, Mr. Killian. The swelling hasn’t decreased as much as I’d hoped. Your rage is a side effect of your injury. The prefrontal cortex is in charge of abstract thinking and thought analysis. It’s also responsible for regulating behavior. I don’t believe—”

  I laughed. “The bump on my fucking head isn’t the cause of my behavior; it’s because my woman is missing.”

  Mo placed himself in front of the doctor. “Kill, this is serious. If you don’t let yourself heal, you might suffer long-term effects.”

  “Yes, like … eh …” The doctor scrambled. “Your normal reactions and moral judgments might be impaired. Choices between right and wrong could be compromised. You won’t be as quick to predict probable outcomes. The prefrontal cortex governs social, emotional, and sexual urges.”

  “I don’t fucking care!” I roared. “All I care about is getting her safe. Healing can come later.”

  “But you might not heal correctly if you damage yourself further!” the doctor yelled, finally finding some balls. “I refuse to sign you out until you are well. You’re my patient. Your recovery is on my conscience!”

  Putting one bare foot in front of the other, I shoved aside Mo and towered over the doctor. “Listen to me, and listen good. I am no longer your patient. I can take care of my fucking self and if that means I damage myself in order to save her, then so be it
.” Bending so our eyes were level, I glowered into his mousy brown ones. “Get it?”

  He swallowed. “Fine. I’ll let you leave. But you’ll sign a waiver saying you refused treatment in case you become a damn vegetable.” In a flurry of blue scrubs, he dumped the clipboard on my abandoned bed and shot out of the room.

  “Kill, you really should stay. Everything depends on you and that genius brain of yours. How will you run the Club, the trades—shit the whole fucking operation if you can’ t—”

  I snarled, “Shut it, Hopper. This is the way it has to be. I won’t waste another moment arguing when Dagger Rose has my woman.”

  Mo sighed. “Despite what you think of us, we did send a couple of men to the compound to spy and report back. They say they’ve seen her. She’s alive and unharmed, Kill. You could afford to heal and let us take care of this.”

  That didn’t make me calm down. If anything, it made me worse.

  I couldn’t speak. I only glared. It was enough for Mo to shut his hole and nod.

  My father had Cleo.

  The same fucking father who’d orchestrated an entire murder, sent me to life imprisonment, and left my lover to burn.

  I’ll fucking kill him.

  Screw my plans. Screw my vengeance. I wanted his soul. And I wanted it now.

  The heart monitor squealed as my pulse skyrocketed with another dose of adrenaline. Reaching down the front of my hospital gown, I ripped off the sticky sensors and threw them on the floor. “Call reinforcements. The entire crew. We’re going after her.”

  Grasshopper grabbed my elbow as I swayed a little to the side. The room faded in and out, an irritating fog consuming my vision. As much as I hated to admit it, the doc was right. The ease and supercharged highway of my thoughts was blocked and faulty.

  I wasn’t myself.

  But it didn’t matter.

  “Kill, seriously, man, you’re not in a condition—”

  I shoved Grasshopper away. “He’s hurt me for the last time. This time there will be no elaborate schemes, no long-winded plans to destroy him piece by piece. This time … I want his head at my feet, his blood on my face, and his soul hurtling toward hell.” Pointing a finger at Hopper’s chest, I said coldly, “Don’t try to stop me. You’ll lose.”

  Hopper nodded. “What do you want to do?”

  I know exactly what to do.

  My lips stretched over my teeth. “We kill them, of course. Slowly, painfully. I want them to scream.”

  Chapter Three

  Cleo

  We climbed on the roof of the Clubhouse again tonight.

  We ignored our parents and stargazed until the bugs drove us inside. Lying beside him, discussing Orion’s Belt and the Milky Way, I’d never felt so close to him. When we’re up there, we aren’t boy and girl or neighbors or even friends. We’re infinite … just like the stars shining upon us. —Cleo, diary entry, age twelve

  More time passed.

  How much, I had no idea. There was no way to tell.

  Hunger twisted my stomach, my head ached from dehydration, and my bladder was uncomfortably full.

  I’d investigated until I’d memorized the pattern in the brown carpet and become best friends with every streak in the terribly painted walls. There wasn’t a rusty nail, paperclip, or even a pencil to turn into a weapon.

  Nothing.

  No tool to pick a lock or phone to call for help.

  But I had a more pressing problem: I couldn’t stand another moment without a bathroom.

  As much as I didn’t want to bring attention to myself, I had no choice.

  Swinging my legs from the bed, I stomped over to the door and banged on it. “Hey!”

  I paused, straining my ears for any movement outside.

  Only silence returned.

  I hammered again. “I need the bathroom!”

  My mind left the confines of the room and traveled through the house that I’d been in so many times as a child. Would it still look the same? The Killian household wasn’t big: three bedrooms all joined by a short narrow corridor with one bathroom in the middle. The lounge was open plan with a kitchen where Art and I would spend many hours watching his mom bake and complete our homework.

  My heart punctured with daggers.

  Please, let him be okay.

  He’s okay. He has to be.

  And if he was okay, I had no doubt he would come for me.

  He might already be on his way.

  I just had to stay hopeful and strong and bide my time until Kill, the president of Pure Corruption, cutthroat killer, and hardass protector, came for me.

  It would be a bloodbath.

  Pressing my forehead on the door, I knocked as loud as my knuckles would let me. “Someone let me out of here!”

  Silence.

  “Are you awake, Buttercup?”

  My eyes snapped open, staring directly into the soulless gaze of Rubix Killian. I winced at the pain in my bladder and the weakness of hunger.

  He smirked, leaning against the door frame. “Did you still need the toilet or did the past hour push you to the breaking point?”

  Sitting upright, I gritted my teeth. “If you’re asking if I disgraced myself, then you’ll be unhappy to know I haven’t.” Standing, I hissed, “Let me use the bathroom.”

  He chuckled. “Still so high and mighty. Always giving demands as if I have to obey.” Pushing off the door frame, he came forward in creaking leather and smoke. “You’re not the princess around here anymore, Cleo.”

  Cocking my chin, I didn’t back down. This was a man I’d been raised with as an uncle. The vice president of Dagger Rose and best friend to my father. My temper banded around me until I throbbed with the urge to make him pay. “We trusted you. I loved you. How could you be so cruel?”

  He grinned. “Who’s to say I’m cruel? Your father didn’t see the potential of what our brotherhood could be. He was weak … and there ain’t no room for weakness in our Club.”

  “There’s no room for liars or murderers, either.”

  Rubix lost the gloating glint in his eye, replacing it with rage. “Tell that to my fucking son.”

  I shot forward and slapped him.

  We both gasped at the same time.

  My brain transmitted the message to cause bodily harm without being filtered by rationality. My palm stung from connecting with his scruffy five-o’clock shadow.

  His green eyes narrowed as he grabbed my wrist, jerking me painfully close. “You shouldn’t have done that, Buttercup.”

  My stomach turned inside out with revulsion.

  My nickname. It was blasphemy on his tongue.

  My hands curled. “Don’t ever call me Buttercup. You lost that right years ago.”

  “I can call you whatever the fuck I like.”

  Asshole.

  “Why did you frame your son? What did he possibly do to deserve his own father betraying him?”

  Rubix turned from rage to savagery. “Don’t talk about that motherfucker in my presence.” Dragging me forward, he carted me from my prison and threw me into the bathroom two doors down—exactly as I remembered it.

  “You have three minutes.”

  He slammed the door.

  I had no doubt he meant I had precisely three minutes. He’d always been a Nazi when it came to time. Tardiness was as much an affront to him as disobeying a command or spilling brotherhood secrets.

  Turning to stare at the bathroom, I pursed my lips. The grout between the tiles was blackened, the shower curtain covered in grime, and the toilet filthy. The air was rank with mildew and smelly drains.

  Who lived here? Was it just Rubix and his second son, or had he patched in more members and shared his home? I remembered the layout of the compound from when Arthur and I would explore from fence to fence. The piece of land had approximately twenty homes all dotted in an ever-widening circle. But the Clubhouse and my parents’ home had been the crown right in the center.

  Quickly relieving my bladder, I splashed
my face with cold water and drank as fast as possible straight from the tap.

  The door wrenched open before I had time to dry my face. Not that I’d touch his towels—probably covered in E. coli.

  Rubix narrowed his eyes, his gaze trailing down my nightshirt-encased body. He smirked as he took in my scars—the scars he put there. “Pity the burns make you ugly, isn’t it?” He licked his lips, looking at my left side. The ink that ran from my collarbone to my little toe was an intricate mural of blues, reds, and greens. “If it were me, I would’ve covered up the scars with the tattoo. Hide your awful disfigurement.” His forehead furrowed. “Why didn’t you?”

  Because I’m not ashamed of wearing my scars or from finding strength in them.

  Yanking a few squares of toilet paper free from the holder, I dried my face and threw the wadded tissue in his direction. “Curious or just trying to figure out how I survived you?”

  He ducked my missile, green eyes darkening. “Neither. Just making conversation.”

  I snorted. “Everything you say is loaded with ulterior motives, never just conversation. Always has been.” My mind skipped back to snide comments over the years as I grew up in his shadow.

  “You really shouldn’t draw that way. It’s not very good.”

  “Your father sure doesn’t care about your welfare if he lets you walk around wearing that.”

  “Jesus, Cleo, could your voice be any higher and annoying?”

  Most of them had been said in jest, with a cheek-pinch or a licorice allsorts being given, but the desired effect never failed.

  His words were the only way he could hurt me back then.

  Now he could hurt me any damn way he wanted.

  My father was dead. The men loyal to him most likely dead, too, or joined with Rubix under fear of torture.

  I was alone.

  My heart panged for Arthur. I didn’t care that I had no one to rely on—I’d spent most of my life that way—but now that I’d found Arthur again, those feelings of togetherness only amplified the echoing emptiness of loneliness.

  “You’re right. I never quite grasped the art of straight shooting.” Rubix grinned. “Always preferred to deal my true thoughts in thinly veiled bullshit.” His nostrils flared, his eyes taking yet more liberties of my scantily dressed figure. “How about I forgo the veils and just tell you point-blank, hey?”