by Naomi West
“All right.” I walk through the hospital to the observation room, kneeling near the glass and keeping my eyes on him. Then I reach into my handbag and take out the pepper spray. “Hurry up, please.”
“I will,” he promises. He hangs up.
I’ve been kneeling here for about an hour, body aching, when somebody kneels down next to me. I turn, meeting eyes with the tallest, widest man I have ever seen. Tattoos cover his face, making it difficult for me to read his expression. When he smiles, that problem goes away. He flashes canine teeth and his eyes twinkle. “Hello,” he says. “How are you this evening, Kayla?”
“Get away from me!” I hiss, jumping to my feet and taking a step back.
He spreads his hands and shrugs. “I’m not going to hurt you here. That’d be a big mistake. And if you want the truth of it, I don’t want to hurt you at all.” He winces slightly as he moves. He’s wearing a black shirt and black pants, but here and there the black turns to a shade of dark red, blood-red. Is he injured? “I want to offer you a deal. Connor wants to offer you a deal, I should say. If you and the little fella come with me back to Denver, he’ll put you up in a nice apartment and only visit you once every couple of months. He’ll never force himself on you, he’ll never ask anything of you, and at any point you can end the arrangement.”
“A prisoner,” I mutter. “A toy to be picked up and used whenever he feels like it.”
“No.” He shakes his head seriously. “This is the real deal. I know the boss and he don’t make deals for the sake of it. He means this. You’ll never have to fuck him or anything like that. A free apartment, a life for your kid. How can you turn that down and call yourself a good mother?” He scratches his chin. There’s something deadly in that movement, the shifting of his giant’s muscles. “If it was me I’d marry you and be done with it. I don’t get all this romancing shit. But the boss is a sweet guy. Everybody says that.”
“Then nobody really knows him,” I say, stroking my pepper spray. “Because the last thing Connor is, is a sweet guy.”
“Well.” The man shrugs. “I’m leaving now. I’ll see you soon. If you’re not out by morning or if I spot any police, I’ll be forced to come in here and kill you. I really don’t want to do that. I don’t like killing women, or children, actually.”
He stuffs his hands in his pockets and walks to the end of the hallway, and then turns around and smiles at me. “Remember,” he says. “Be outside come sunrise.”
He whistles as he rounds the corner, his whistling getting quieter and quieter until it’s replaced by the sound of my breathing. I turn back to the glass, pressing my nose against it, staring at Cormac as his chest rises and falls softly. He’ll be better soon, the doctor promised, but that still doesn’t stop my mind from overflowing with harrowing images.
I have to stay strong. Soon, Xander will be here. Soon, we’ll both be safe.
I hope.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Xander
I ride like the devil. I ride like there are flames at my heels, licking at me all the way, and I have to ride just that little be faster to keep them at bay. I weave between cars and race forward, take quick turns, bringing my knee to the ground almost every time. I ride like a man who realized too late that he needs to protect his woman. Every so often Arsen bursts into my head, staring at me with his too-knowing eyes. “First Marie Keller, now this—”
I block him out, even if it’s painful to do. I can’t let him rule me, not tonight anyway. It’s true. He might be angry if he learned what Kayla and I have done, but Kayla and her kid could die if I don’t get to her. Kayla and Cormac could be kidnapped; Connor would rape her, raise the kid as his own. These are realities I have to deal with, solid here-and-now things. I can’t lose myself in the mists of the past.
I ride under starlight, under moonlight, crossing the state line and riding all the faster. My body aches but I ignore it. This isn’t the time for aching bodies, for pain. This is the time every outlaw both dreads and looks forward to: the time when he doesn’t matter, only the job matters, and he has to put all his bullshit aside to get it done. I feel sharper than I have in months, my wits honed, my reflexes honed.
After around five hours of riding, I reach the hospital where Kayla is. I bring the bike to a slow and coast along into the parking lot, stopping at the very edge and then climbing off, checking my knuckle-duster and my pistols, and then skirting the edge of the parking lot until I’m in line with the entrance. Looking at the entrance it’s pretty easy for me to envision where I’d be waiting if I wanted to grab somebody as soon as they got out, but I’d also want to make sure they couldn’t sneak out the back without me knowing. I’d want a view of as much of the place as possible. I look around. Just behind the hospital there’s an incline which leads to a road, a small hill which would give a good vantage point. I scan it and, sure enough, a car just sits at the edge of the road, a shadowed figure looking down on the hospital.
I take a wide route around the hospital, going all the way to the road and walking around, losing sight of the hospital and the car for a few minutes. He can’t know that I’m coming. He’s probably still angry about the business with the gunshot-torture—there’s no mistaking who that seven-foot shadow is—but that’s fine. Let him be angry. It’ll make him easier to take down.
I sneak up on the car, pistol in one hand and the other gripping my knuckle-duster. The feel of the metal is cool and reassuring, the type of feeling every outlaw looks forward to, the feeling that everything is okay now, ’cause it’s time for blood, and when it’s time for blood we don’t need to worry about anything else. Only the seven-foot giant has fucked me. It ain’t a seven-foot giant at all; it’s a few duffle bags skillfully piled atop each other. And then, in the reflection of the glass, a real seven-foot giant steps up behind me, pushing the barrel of a gun against the back of my head.
This metal is cool, too, but not reassuring in the slightest. “I wouldn’t move if I were you,” he says. “I might slip. I can get pretty clumsy when I’ve got four fucking gunshot wounds.”
“Sorry about that.” I’ve had guns pointed at my head plenty of times. When it first happened I was terrified, but after a while you get used to it. At least, I thought I had. But now I’m terrified. Not for myself, but for Kayla and Cormac. If I’m not here to protect them, nobody is. I lift my hands up slowly. “I’m gonna turn around, ’cause my daddy taught me to always look a man in the eye when you’re speaking to him.” This is a test, a dangerous test, because if Connor has given him the leeway to put me down, he’ll kill me right now. He has no reason not to. But if Connor has given him the more difficult order of bringing me in alive, then he won’t fire.
“You better stop,” he says, when I’m about halfway turned. “I’m warning you.”
“I don’t wanna be rude,” I say, turning all the way and staring into his tattooed face. I smile. “Looks like your boss wants to keep me as a prize.”
He shifts from foot to foot. “That’s just wishful thinking on your part, fella. My boss don’t give a damn about you. All he cares about is the lady and the little shit.”
I glance over his shoulder. “Kayla! Get back!”
What a fucking idiot … He turns his head, not a lot, but enough to give me a window.
My body moves quicker than my mind, batting the gun away and closing his throat with my fist, biting down on his wrist so hard I taste blood—he drops the gun—and then bringing my knee to his groin over and over, winding the bastard. I take out his legs with a sweep and close his throat a second time with the heel of my boot, crush his nose, break a couple of his ribs if the cracking sound is anything to go by.
I take his gun and press it against his head. “That was some kindergarten shit you fell for there, tough guy. Now, what’re we gonna do about this situation? ’Cause the way I see it, I don’t want to deal with an out-of-town murder, but at the same time, I don’t wanna deal with you bothering my lady neither.”
&nbs
p; “Just let me go,” he says, laughing grimly. “I won’t bother her. You think I give that much of a shit? I won’t go back to Denver, fuck it. I’ll go west. I got some friends in Vegas. Let me go, man, and we’re done. I’m already shot up enough as it is.”
“I wish I could believe you,” I say. “Let me ask you something, Tattoo-Face. You got any handcuffs in that there car? A man comes to take a prisoner, he’s usually got handcuffs.”
“I’ve got cuffs, yeah.”
“Are they police-standard cuffs or those shitty things low-rent gangsters sometimes use?”
“No, they’re the real deal.”
“All right, how many pairs you got?”
“Two.”
“Two?” I think for a moment, and then grin down at him. “I get it. You thought I might come, that you might need to cuff me as well. Sorry to disappoint you. Where are the cuffs?”
“In the glove box.”
“All right. Stay down.” I walk backwards to the car, gun trained on him the entire time, open the door and reach past the duffle-bag-man to the glove compartment. I open it and take out the cuffs, and then return to him, kneeling down with the gun pressed right against his temple. “This is gonna hurt, all right, but it’s gonna hurt a hell of a lot less than a bullet to the skull.” I take his hand and bend it to his ankle so that he’s doing the splits. He bites down as his body stretches at the unnatural angle. I cuff his wrist to his ankle, awkward using one hand, and then use both hands to do his other wrist and ankle. I leave him there like that.
“Come sunrise, someone’ll see you. You’ll have to deal with the local cops asking you questions. I’m sure you won’t give me away, ’cause that’d mean giving yourself away.”
“Fuck you.” He lets out a shaky breath. “Fucking asshole.”
“Yeah.” I shrug. “I guess so. See you around, Tattoo-Face.”
I leave him there and go into the hospital, searching the hallways for Kayla. I find her in the baby section, kneeling against the glass, a small canister in her hand I can only guess is her famed pepper spray.
She turns at the sound of my footsteps. She lets out a whimper. And then we’re running at each other. Her hair is even more tangled and her eyes are wide with stress and sleeplessness, but I’ve never seen a more beautiful lady. She throws herself into my arms. I catch her, holding her close, smelling her and trying to convince myself that she is here, this is real, I found her; my whisky-drinking didn’t end this forever. I stroke her hair, knotting it further, and then both of us lean back and look at the other, drinking each other in. Her lips are curved slightly, cynical and happy at the same time, as though with that one gesture of her lips she is critiquing the absurdity of this situation. Then I grab her by the back of the head and bring her lips together. We kiss for a long time. It’s the best goddamn kiss I’ve ever had. I feel like we sink into each other.
Then she breaks it off, stepping back. “The doctor came by a few minutes ago,” she says. “Cormac should be ready to go in around twenty minutes.”
“Did they sort out the problem?” I take her hand. It’s cold and damp, the hand of a woman who’s had to handle too much shit alone.
“Yes,” she said. “The other doctor prescribed the wrong medication. This one has fixed it. I have to pay the bill, though, Xander.”
I don’t even think. I reach into my pocket and take out the envelope I stuffed with cash before I left. “That should cover it.”
“If you wait in the waiting room, I shouldn’t be long.”
I kiss her on the forehead. “All right.”
I sit in the waiting room drinking black coffee, staring at the entrance, waiting for police or Tattoo-Face to come in, but it seems that life finally wants to give us a break. Nobody bothers us. The outside world, for now at least, is done with us. There’s something peaceful about sitting here waiting for my lady and the kid, something separate from the similar feeling of sitting in the clubhouse after a job. I’m not waiting on some club girl with her giggling looks and her wandering hands. I’m waiting for something honest, something real.
Then we’re sitting in my car, driving back toward Denver, my bike left behind for some scavenger to claim.
“I’ll marry you,” I tell her. “Connor let it slip about your grandmother, and if it’ll make life easier for you I’ll marry you in a damn heartbeat. I wouldn’t want any of the cash and you don’t even have to be with me if you don’t want, but there’s no sense you livin’ your life on the edge when you’ve got all that cash just waiting for you.”
“You’d do that?” She touches my hand, stroking my knuckle. The sun slowly rises; we drive into it, the car filled with its startling light. “Really?”
“Really,” I say. “I don’t want you two to suffer. I can’t believe all this shit went down ’cause I couldn’t control my goddamn drinking.”
“Hush.” She leans across and kisses me on the cheek, the sweetest feeling there is. “You don’t have to worry about that now. Let me think about the offer. It’s really nice. Thank you.”
“You hungry?” I ask, as we approach a diner.
Kayla shivers. “Yes, I am. But can we stop at the next one?”
“Sure.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Kayla
I wake at around four in the afternoon to sunlight shining on my face, and for a moment it’s like the past few days were all a dream. The window is slightly open and a bird sings, a sweet song I wish I could capture, bottle up, but then it moves on and the song goes with it. I close my eyes and stare at the red imprint on my eyelids, trying to convince myself that the madness was just a dream, that I never left Xander’s apartment. But in the end, it doesn’t matter. In the end I am here and that is the most important thing; I already feel safer than I have in days.
I lean up in bed and listen to the next room. It sounds like a man talking to a baby, the baby laughing. It sounds almost like a father and his child. Arsen, I reflect, with a twisting of my belly; how would Arsen feel about this? But the cruel part is that I can’t dampen the happiness of this moment with Arsen’s memory. Or maybe that isn’t cruel. Maybe that’s just what happens when you meet a man you really care about; the previous men cease to seem so important.
“What do you think?” Xander says, and then he laughs. “You don’t think I’m very funny, do you, kid? Well, I get it. I don’t think I’m very funny, either. Hey! You’ve gotta be careful where you’re throwing those fists. Maybe I’ll take it personally.”
I stand up and creep across the room, kneeling down near the door and pressing my ear against it.
“Let me tell you somethin’, kid. Your old man was a really good guy, a much better guy that I ever was. He always did the right thing. He was always nice to folks. He never liked to make people upset. I remember one time when we were at a club Arsen saw this lady crying and he went over there and went home with her, and the next day all the fellas were giving him props about it, you know—well, you’ll learn how men get about that sort of stuff. He just smiled and didn’t say anything, only later he told me that he didn’t touch that woman once. He just sat there and listened as she went on about her boyfriend and her dead dad. He bought her some takeout. That was it. That’s what I mean, kid, when I say he was a better man than me.”
“Why?” I ask, walking into the living room, heart melting at the sight of Xander sitting with Cormac on his knee. And Cormac’s cough seems to have stopped, too. “Would you have taken her, you dirty dog?”
“Taken her.” He grins. “Dirty dog. These are some pretty retro insults, Kayla.”
I sit on the edge of the ruined armchair. Xander makes to give me Cormac but I wave my hand. “Hold him for a while longer,” I say. “I like to watch it.”
“You trust me with him?” he asks, voice low. I can tell that the withdrawal is hurting him, even if he is putting on a brave face. Sweat drips almost continuously down his forehead and he grits his teeth as he speaks. “You know, after …”
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br /> “I think you’ve learned your lesson,” I tell him.
“I hope so.” He tickles Cormac under the chin. Cormac laughs, waving his arms. “I think this little guy likes me.”
“I think he does, too.”
“You can go take a shower if you want, or a bath. I haven’t used the tub in—I don’t think I’ve ever used it, actually. Maybe you can christen it. I’ve already fed and washed Cormac.”
“You’re amazing.” I move to the couch, place my hand on his leg, rest my head against his shoulder. “Seriously, I’m sorry I left.”
“Sorry you left?” He shakes his head. “You didn’t leave. I pushed you away. But that doesn’t matter now. We’re together. We’re safe.”
“I want to tell you something …” I lower my voice instinctively, since I’m voicing matters left silent for years. “Maybe it makes sense for you not to go to the police about Connor, since, you know, you’re an outlaw and everything. But did you ever stop to think about why I didn’t?”
