Dangerously Damaged: A Contemporary Dark Bully Romance (The Shadowed Souls Series Book 3)

by Abigail Cole

  “Did you think you’d be able to escape me that easily?” Stalking towards me like a predator, I hold his gaze even when I have to tilt my head right up to do so.

  “Yeah, I did to be honest.” Slipping his hand around my neck and squeezing tightly, Wyatt pushes me back into the mattress and leans over my body. I could easily inflict some serious damage from this position, a few broken ribs, or a good old-fashioned punch to the balls but for some reason, I lie still. There’s a twisted light to his eyes that says he’s enjoying this, maybe even needs it. And stupidly, the thought that I could give him something he seems so sure he wants, doesn’t disgust me the way it should.

  His grip loosens, my lips parting as I watch the change of emotion in his face. His square jaw slackens, a confused furrow to his eyebrows as his hand trails south. Through the centre of my cleavage, over my toned abdomen. My pulse quickens, a strange fluttering taking root in my stomach. For one split second, nothing else exists, only me and him. The lingering scent of his cologne rolls through my senses, coiling with my rational thoughts until I can’t remember what they were. His fingers graze my waistband and travel across to my side where my hand is lying uselessly.

  A soft click sounds, my mind jarring back into action as the cool slice of metal at my wrist shifts. Looking down, I gasp seeing he has locked me to himself, a cruel smile twisting his lips.

  “Try and escape me now, Sweetness.”

  Garrett

  Pacing around the tiny waiting room I’ve been forced into while the doctor preforms his morning check-up, I can’t stop replaying the other night in my head. Like a scratched DVD that plays the same scene, glitches and jumps back over and over. His blood coating my hands, the warmth leaving his body, the words lodged in my throat I wish I’d said. His life was literally slipping away and no amount of praying or crying could bring him back to me. I can’t even consider if the air ambulance hadn’t shown up when it did, I refuse to travel down that path knowing a part of me won’t come back.

  My fingers clasp into fists, my body shaking with the need to be back at his bedside. It’s been two fucking days and not a single doctor can tell me why he’s not woken up yet. Dax, Huxley and Avery have been staying at a motel on the edge of the city, returning during visiting hours like one of the nurses suggested I also did. Like I told her, either I’m allowed stay with Axel at all times or she’d better get a second bed ready in his room, ‘cause I will jab a scalpel into my throat if that’s what it takes. Not only was I permitted to remain, we now have security standing guard by the door, and I got a free evaluation from a psychologist so I can’t complain. Nothing like a mental sweep of my childhood trauma to get the juices flowing and I know where to direct all of that unearthed murderous intentions. Wyatt fucking Hughes.

  The same nurse who called security on me walks past the glass door, rounding the safety of her desk before nodding for me to return. I fly into the hallway, making her jump as I jog back to Axel’s. A part of me thinks she’s kinda overreacting, although I had snatched a needle from her trolley and had it pointed at my jugular for extra effect. Nodding to today’s guard with a cocky smile, I slip into the room and my heart finally settles at his sleeping form.

  “Sorry that took so long,” I talk to Axel, as I have been since we arrived. Pretending he can hear me is all that’s keeping me calm, literally all I can do in this helpless situation. Reaching over to fluff his pillows, this private room and its small luxuries being the best thing I’ve ever spent my trust fund on, I kick off my shoes and jeans to slide beneath the cover beside him. Shuffling down, I rest my head on his shoulder and link my fingers in his.

  “I was thinking after you’re all healed, and I’ve painted my bedroom walls with Wyatt’s blood, we should go away somewhere. You know, like a trip away. I’ve always wanted to visit Italy. We could hit Florence first to see Michelangelo’s David, row on down the canals in Venice, rave it up in Vatican City with the Sistine Chapel, finish with the Pantheon and a villa in Rome. Just me, you and a never-ending supply of pizzas.”

  I’ve always had a secret passion for history and architecture, since I was a child who’s only friends lived within the pages of books from my father’s study. It never bothered me when my parents travelled the world, in fact I preferred it over lying in bed listening to their constant arguments. I’d learnt to look after myself from a young age, content in my own company and rarely scared of anything. Maybe it was because I only read non-fiction, no tales of monsters lurking under the bed or vampires in the closet filling my head.

  If there was food in the fridge, I was happy – until there wasn’t. My parents had decided to take a month-long cruise, leaving nine-year-old me with a wad of cash and a list of numbers for local takeaways, but I didn’t call for any. I guess I’d given up on caring for myself, wondering how long it would take before someone else noticed I wasn’t attending school, or I didn’t turn up for basketball practice. Eleven days. That’s how long. I barely remember being scraped off the floor by a police officer, the blue lights flashing beyond my eyelids, waking in a hospital bed with a tube through my nose leading to my stomach bringing me back from the brink. And that’s the last time I gave a shit about being loved, until now.

  I’ve decided to give Axel every part of me when he wakes up, including the monster hidden beneath my cocky façade. The one that’s extremely close to the surface right now, teeth bared and claws at the ready to rip chunks out of Wyatt and this Perelli asshole and anyone else who dares to get too close to my family again. Then we’ll see if Axel really wants me. Leaning upright, I pull across the TV suspended by a metal arm until its hovering over our knees. Unhooking the remote control from the side of the bed, I flick through channels until I find a Planet Earth documentary. When I run out of things to say, I read aloud the subtitles just so Axel can have the comfort of my voice should he need it. A bit of familiarity to latch onto and pull himself back to me.

  ∞∞∞

  “Hey, I’ve told you before – you can’t be in the bed with him,” a deep southern twang wakes me with a snort. A large woman with pale skin and a smirk on her lips jabs me in the side playfully, her blue and white dress straining to conceal her insanely huge breasts. Sitting upright, I stretch my arms high above my head and my back gives a satisfying crack before swinging my legs over the edge of the bed. The nurse, who attended to me when Axel was rushed into theatre insists I call her Mamma, scoops up my jeans and throws them at me. “Boy, you better put those chicken legs away before Dr Breeson comes back. One more strike and he’ll have you removed from this here ward.”

  “Firstly, I’m paying his annual salary for Axel to stay here and secondly, I don’t have chicken legs.” I frown at my thighs, realising they’ve lost some muscle definition lately as I hop down from the bed and pull up my pants. Mamma laughs loudly, fixing the sheets around Axel’s body to hide that I’d been in there. Rounding the other side of the bed, I take his palm in mine, careful not the touch the cannula strapped on the other side. My shirt is stuck to my torso, my body odour off the charts and my mouth feels like something curled up and died in there.

  “Mamma, would you mind staying with him for 5 minutes while I have a quick shower?” Her eyes crinkle as she smiles, and she inclines her head. Placing a kiss onto Axel’s forehead, I run my hand over the short brown hair that he’s going to freak out about when he wakes up.

  “He’s lucky to have you,” Mamma muses to herself, adjusting the IV drip. I step into the bathroom, glancing back at his peaceful expression as I slowly close the door.

  “No, he’s really not.” I quickly strip from my clothes, twisting the shower dial to scalding knowing from the past two showers, the water will barely reach above cool. Stepping into the spray, I smother myself in the shower gel attached to the tiled wall and work up a lather on my chest. Once the bubbles have expanded enough, I rush to spread them over my body, the fissure in my heart starting to open again from the distance between us. Forgetting about the swollen
bruises lining my ribs, I groan from with the contact of my own hand in my haste. Washing the suds away and flicking the shower off, I grab the world’s smallest hand towel to dry myself.

  A soft knock sounds at the door, my heart lurching that something’s happened to Axel or he’s woken with the instant need to take a leak. Although I’ve been begging him to open him eyes, the thought of him not being the first person he sees rattles me. “It’s me,” a soft feminine voice sounds, one I recognise as Avery’s. Holding the towel over my junk, not that she hasn’t see it before, I push the door open wide. Mamma is nowhere to be seen, Huxley is positioned in the corner like usual and Dax is in the armchair. Avery’s eyes widen, rolling across my exposed skin before visibly shaking herself.

  “We brought you some clean clothes and toiletries.” She hands her backpack to me over the threshold, careful not to come too close. I don’t know who’s benefit that is for, but it certainly isn’t mine. I won’t be making sexual advances on anyone anymore, especially not when Axel’s unconscious in the adjacent room. If he wants to invite someone to join us sometimes, that’s his call but there’ll be no more fucking around for me. My eyes are set solely on the man I nearly lost, the one I’ll never let come to harm ever again. I might not be much, but what I am he can have - wholly, completely, exclusively.

  Emerging with a fresh set of clothes and sparkling white teeth, I feel marginally better. Placing Avery’s bag down by Dax’s feet, I pull out the ladies’ razor I found in a hidden pocket. “Will you help me?” I ask of her, gesturing between the razor and Axel’s head. “He’ll hate waking up to that.” Her eyes flick across the room and back to me, her eyes full of understanding. Grabbing a plastic cup from beside a water jug, Avery fills it while Dax and Huxley move to either side of the bed to help. As carefully as possible, they lift his head so I can slip the hand towel beneath and hold him there. Dipping the razor into the cup, I slowly shave from his nape to forehead in a reverse mohawk style.

  Section by section, the four of us take turns to remove all traces of hair growth from our different angles. It’s going to be a bit patchy at the back, but once he’s awake and sitting upright, I’ll take a strange sense of pleasure in fixing it for him. Avery carefully does around his ears and passes the razor to me to finish his hairline across the front. Removing the towel with our help, Dax takes it and the hair-filled cup into the bathroom while we assess our work. Axel looks good as new, now I just need for his incredible amber eyes to open and I’ll take the rest from there.

  Huxley is the first to walk away, taking the armchair for himself for a change. His blonde hair shines in the sunlight gleaming through the window, his cheeks not as drawn and eyes not as bloodshot as before. Avery strolls over and settles herself into his lap, curling her legs into his chest and his arms circling her automatically. I raise my eyebrow as Dax returns, stopping in his tracks at the sight and turning back to join me.

  “That looks cosy,” I whisper. Dax is close enough for his Afro to tickle my shoulder through the basketball jersey they provided me with to match the shorts. I’d smiled upon seeing our black and yellow team name scrawled across the back, actually missing our 5am drills before a big game.

  “Mmm,” Dax growls in his chest. “They’ve been sharing a room again.” There’s a note of jealously in his tone, his posture rigid as he glances over to see Avery combing Huxley’s hair through her fingers. “She blames me for Meg being taken.”

  “There’s nothing any of us could have done. We had a spy in our midst, Meg would have been taken sooner or later – with or without Avery.” I’ve put a lot of thought into this, since I’ve barely been able to sleep. I needed to understand what drove Wyatt to do what he did, why he’d put Axel’s life in danger like that. The only conclusion I could come to was his loyalties now lie elsewhere.

  The clicking of high heels echoes around the hallway beyond the door, loud enough to hear the steady approach. Glancing towards the door frame, my heckles rise and I grip onto Axel’s hand protectively, instinctually knowing a threat is advancing on us. Dr Breeson steps into the room, followed by a woman dressed for a business meeting rather than a hospital visit. A navy jumpsuit clings to her curves, pink detailing around the bust to a matching sash tied tightly to cinch her waist. Her neck and ears are dripping with expensive jewellery, her dark hair pulled back into a chignon bun.

  “Who are you?” Avery stands and confronts her, despite the foot in height distance even without the added six-inch heels. Ignoring the question, the woman’s pale brown eyes drag over Axel lazily and come to rest on our joined hands. Her perfectly painted red lips lift in a sneer, the true reflection of her ugly personality coming to the surface. Lifting my shoulders and puffing my chest, refusing to be intimidated by this waste of oxygen, I answer Avery’s question in a clear voice.

  “Even though she doesn’t deserve the title, this is Axel’s mom.”

  Wyatt

  Leaning back in the driver’s seat, I settle in for another long haul. I’m not risking another overnight stop to give Houdini in the passenger seat a chance to get away again. I’m still baffled and slightly impressed she managed to slip out of the bathroom without waking me, but I had been trapped in the throes of a nightmare, so she got lucky. This once. I have one hand resting on the wheel with the one she’s chained to propped on the arm rest between us. Every time her skin grazes mine, a bolt of pure energy zips all the way to my dick so I’ve learnt to be extra careful of my arm placement. Our morning toilet break and shower was great fun though, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone turn a brighter shade of beetroot before.

  Meg’s chest rises on a loud sigh, my t-shirt swamping her frame and pooling over her crossed legs. She’s drawing the figure of eight on her sun-kissed thigh over and over, my eyes unable to stop flicking across to watch the movement. I forced her to change with the excuse of ensuring she didn’t have any more tricks hidden in her clothing, but even I’m not going to let someone spend their last few days living in their own grime and two-day-old clothing. I’d also made sure to take my vitamins before heading out this morning, needing a clear mind to stay alert. Shadowed figures creeping around on the edge of my vision won’t help to soothe me whilst I’m on kidnapper duty, especially when my captive is as slippery as this one.

  Raindrops patter across the windscreen, the overhead clouds mimicking the heavy atmosphere within the car. If I keep my eyes fixed on the road, I can pretend I’m an average guy taking a girl home to meet his parents for the first time. Although in this scenario, the dad will be putting his carving skills to good use and the girl won’t be walking back out again. Such is life when you’re a pawn in a powerful man’s game. Directly ahead, the sky is filled with streaks of rainfall which has the overly cautious drivers in the other lanes slowing already. Pussy shits.

  “Answer me one question,” Meg fills the silence as I refuse to let her have the radio today, despite dying of boredom myself. Disobedient prisoners don’t get rewards. I grunt when she doesn’t continue, her chestnut hair tickles my arm as she sets her baby blues on me.

  “Just, why? Why are you a part of all this and why do you think I deserve the fate you’re delivering me to?” I’m forced to slow behind a BMW’s brake lights as the driver spots the torrential rain nearing up ahead, words fail me briefly so I grit my teeth instead. I can sense her watching me, waiting for an explanation to help her understand. But not everything can be summed up into a neat little box, not everything makes sense. I was floundering until Ray gave me a light, a purpose. That’s all I have to hold onto.

  “Because my whole life is a sham. I’ve been lied to since the day I was born. At least Ray treats me with enough respect to have given me the truth at last. For that, I’m in his debt.” I indicate to undertake the BMW, a wide-eyed woman quivering behind the wheel at the sight of a bit of rain. Resuming the middle lane in front of her, I speed straight into the downpour. Rain ricochets off the car, the thundering around us finally giving me a reprieve fr
om Meg’s silent observant stare.

  “Meh,” she shrugs and shifts back to face forward.

  “Did you seriously just say ‘meh’? You asked for an answer and I gave it to you, which is more than anyone else has managed to get from my lips and you fucking ‘meh’ me?!” I want to be furious but I can’t say I expected anything else from her. It must have been so easy to live a simple life, never having to deal with detrimental issues of the soul.

  “Well, I mean…. Does it really matter?” I nearly swerve the car, my fingers gripping tightly around the wheel. The rapid flailing of wipers across the windscreen has my stress levels rising, unable to shift the onslaught of rain like my heart is unable to rid the darkness that begins churning again for the first time in the past two days. I hadn’t even realised it had dwelled until this moment as she continues on, unaware of the storm raging inside of me.

  “Because in theory, you took the life I was owed. Biologically Nixon and Cathy are my parents and the lavish lifestyle you’ve led was mine, but do you see me being a mop about it? You should be thankful and move on.” I snort loudly, refusing to buy into her words. All the money in the world couldn’t give me what I wanted, what she still managed to receive despite all the odds being against her. A loving childhood and the sole attention of a supportive mom.

  Realising I’m only punishing myself; I reach over to turn on the radio which causes her cuffed hand to graze my knee. This is going to be the longest drive of my life. The chorus of a new pop song begins to play but Meg immediately turns it back off, reaching over to rest her hand on my thigh. Throwing her a side glance, I force myself to focus on not crashing the car rather than the heat building along my leg as if her palm were on fire.

  “I saw you in the streets a few times growing up. I used to hang over our balcony every time I heard the chaos from below, desperate to see what new gadget or designer outfit you had. I remember complaining to my mom how unfair it was that some people get everything they want when I had to save my allowance and wait for sales. Do you want to know what she said?” I don’t react, pretending I haven’t heard when I’m actually hanging on her every word. “She said, ‘You’re only rich once you have all the valuable things money can’t buy.’