The fear that leapt into my eyes must have confirmed his suspicions.
“I think they’re planning to kill you whether you tell me or not,” he said urgently. “They’ve been hanging around your room all afternoon, waiting for me to leave.”
My entire aching body stiffened, and my heart started beating so fast, I thought it would explode out of my chest and drench the beige walls in a shower of red.
Elliot eyed the small cart in the corner of the room that was meant for washing. He lifted the lid and peered inside, pulling out a blood-stained set of green hospital scrubs with his fingertips. He quickly and efficiently stripped down to his boxers, which would have been completely traumatising for me had I not believed that he was trying to help. He dragged the green scrubs over his head and hopped around, trying to pull the pants on as quickly as possible.
He came back over to the bed and unhooked my IV from the stand. I had a bag of morphine attached to the main saline bag, and a little button I could press to deliver a new hit of pain relief every fifteen minutes.
Elliot pressed and held the button, delivering the maximum dose possible, and almost immediately I felt floaty and numbed.
“Scoot forward,” he said, looking around behind him. He lifted me as gently as possible, but I still screamed in pain from my broken bones being moved. “I’m sorry,” he said, covering my mouth so that no sound escaped.
He maneuvered me to the side of the bed so that my legs were hanging off, and eased me down into the laundry cart. I wriggled down, biting on my fist to stop from screaming, and arranged myself so that the lid would close on top of me.
“Here,” he said, handing me his gun, and that’s the moment when any suspicion I had about his intentions melted away.
“If this doesn’t work, and somebody else opens this lid … shoot and keep shooting, you hear?”
I nodded.
“You know how to use a gun?”
I nodded, tears streaming down my cheeks. My father, up until a few weeks ago, had been the president of the most renowned and feared biker club in the United States. Of course I knew how to use a gun.
“I’m gonna get you out of here, kid. I promise.”
And he did.
Six years later, Elliot isn’t a cop anymore. In fact, he resigned from the force almost immediately after moving me to a safe house in Nebraska with his grandmother. Juliette Portland was reported dead in the hospital from internal bleeding the night he smuggled me out, and while we think that Dornan bought the story, it’s always possible that he is still keeping watch for me.
I’m standing outside a building with LOST CITY TATTOOS emblazoned across the front, my dirty clothes switched for a spaghetti-strap white summer dress that skims my knees and shows off my enviable tan. I’ve just spent the last hour scrubbing every inch of myself in the shower of my hotel room. I wasn’t actually staying in a dingy hostel. I had a room at the Bel Air. I figured I may as well enjoy my last few hours of freedom before moving into the clubhouse tonight.
I push the door open and am immediately hit by a breeze of cold air. The air-conditioning is bliss against my reddened skin, which has started to prickle after only a few moments outside. It is so much cooler inside, I think I might never leave.
I am expecting the humming of tattoo guns, but everything is silent. I look around the room, seeing nobody.
“Hello?” I call, waiting for an answer.
“Hi,” a voice behind me says, startling me. I spin around to see Elliot, still looking as gorgeous as he did the last time I saw him, only now more grown-up, and with tattoos covering every visible inch of his skin. He wears a white t-shirt and dark grey dickie shorts, a pair of bright blue sneakers on his feet. His face is the only thing that assures me of who he is.
I study his face and wonder if he knows who I am, then decide he probably doesn’t. “You don’t know who I am, do you?”
He immediately looks suspicious. “No. Should I?”
I shake my head, my fake Southern drawl thick on my words. “It doesn’t matter. I came here because I need a tattoo. Everyone says you’re the best.”
He smiles, licking his lips, and I see a flash that I think is a tongue stud. “Come on through,” he says, leading me to one of the hard leather beds. “What kind of tattoo are you after?”
“One to cover a scar,” I say, biting my lip.
He nods, patting the bed. I hoist myself up, studying his face intently. He is the kindest person I have ever met, I think to myself. He truly did risk his life to save mine.
“Okay,” he says, smiling. “Where’s your scar?”
I swallow thickly, gather my dress in my fist, and raise it so that he can see.
His face contorts into something tortured. He looks at me, then the scars, then back at me.
“Julz?” he whispers. He takes in my hair, my skin, my blue eyes, my new nose. He steps back as if horrified.
“It’s Samantha, now,” I say, the accent gone, my breath hitching in my throat. “And I need your help.”
Six
He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t move. I suddenly feel ill, as though I have done the wrong thing by seeking him out.
“I’m sorry,” I say, pulling my dress back down and sliding off the bed. “I shouldn’t have come here.”
I try to leave but he catches my elbow, turning me to face him. “Wait,” he says. “Please. I don’t want you to go. I’m just a little … shocked. I haven’t seen you in three years.”
I just stand there, feeling pathetic.
“Juliette,” he says darkly. “What are you doing here?”
“Sightseeing,” I reply with a deadpan face.
He lets go of my elbow and walks to the front of the store. He flips the sign hanging in the door to closed and locks the door, pulling the shade down so nobody can see in.
“My apartment is upstairs,” he says, looking at me like my appearance is causing him physical pain. “I think we need to talk.”
“And then you’ll tattoo me?” I ask hopefully.
He appears to be fighting an inner battle. “If you tell me why you need those scars covered up, then sure, I’ll make you the best fucking tattoo you’ve ever seen.”
“I’ll tell you why if you promise you won’t try and talk me out of it.”
He suddenly looks weary. “Let’s just go upstairs,” he says, “before anyone else finds you here.”
I look around the deserted shop, confused as to who exactly is going to find me in a store that is now locked, but I follow him upstairs anyway.
I am pleasantly surprised when I enter the apartment. It is a far cry from the stark white of the store, and feels surprisingly spacious. It has been decorated in a retro style, all black and reds, with hits of canary yellow here and there. There are band posters covering the walls – from a cursory glance, I can see bills for The Ramones, The Rolling Stones and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Knotted beams of polished oak run beneath my feet. There are two low-back, black leather sofas facing each other with a glass coffee table between them and a gloss-black kitchen tucked off to the side.
Elliot walks behind the bench and reappears several moments later with two open bottles of Budweiser.
“Good idea,” I say, accepting the one he offers me.
He sits across from me, and I can’t help but remember the very first time I saw him after my father died, when he came back to Nebraska.
I’d been puking. At first, Grandma wrote it off as a stomach virus and kept me in bed for the week. But one week slowly crept into two, then three, and I was still sick, still lying in bed all day, and the doctor eventually confirmed what she had secretly feared and what I had never considered.
I heard her on the phone to her grandson, late one night when I couldn’t sleep.
“You have to come back here,” she pleaded. “It’s bad, honey. It’s real bad.”
She knew everything. She knew what they had done to me. And now, she knew that I carried a lasting reminder of their t
reachery.
Elliot was there the next day, sitting beside me as I puked into an old tin bowl. He held my blonde hair back as I vomited, pressed a cold flannel to my neck. He cared for me the way I desperately needed someone to care for me.
“What do you want to do?” he asked me. Even then, when I was only fifteen and he was just shy of twenty-three, he treated me like I was the most important person in the world.
“I just want it to go away,” I said. “Can you make it go away?”
He clutched my hand, both of us trapped in a nightmare that never seemed to end.
“Yeah,” he said, the rage in his clenched jaw meant for them, not me. “I can make it go away.”
We drove to the clinic in silence. He filled out the paperwork for me, used a fake ID so nobody would know my real name.
He held my hand the whole time, as I was counselled, as I was prepped for theater, as the remnants of Dornan’s duplicity were painfully sucked from my cramping womb.
He crouched at the foot of my bed as I bled and cried. He stroked my hair and promised me he would kill Dornan Ross and his sons for what they had done to me. That he would make them pay.
For everything.
I shake that horrid memory from my mind and focus on the here and now.
“Are you going to stare at me all day?” I ask him gently, attempting to get a smile.
He slams his beer down on the glass coffee table and froth sloshes onto the wooden floor.
“A goddamned ghost just walked into my shop asking for a tattoo,” he says gravely. “Excuse me for needing a minute to deal.”
I look at the floor. “A ghost is someone who died. I didn’t die.”
“No,” he says, shaking his head. “But everyone in this city thinks you did.”
I sip on my beer as I study the intricate network of Elliot’s tattoos that reach from each wrist to shoulder before disappearing under his shirt.
“Why are you back, Julz?” he asks, studying me intently. My heart drops when I realize his hands are shaking.
“Hey,” I say, setting my beer down and putting my hands over his so we are both cupping his beer. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“Fuck,” he says bitterly. “The last time I saw you …”
“Calm down,” I interrupt him. “Nobody knows I’m here, I swear.”
I take the bottle from his hands and set it down next to mine, and shift seats so that I am sitting next to him.
“Remember the last thing we spoke about?” I whisper, taking his hands in mine. It’s been so many years, but it feels like it was five minutes ago that he was holding my hands like this and promising me vengeance.
He shakes his head. “No.”
“Yes, you do,” I prod firmly. “You promised me you would make them pay.”
His eyes go wide as he finally understands what I’m here for. “Julz, no …”
“Elliot, yes,” I murmur. “It’s time. It’s time to make them pay for their sins.”
He pulls away from me and stands, walking over to the window. It is blessedly cool and dim in the apartment compared to the scorching heat outside. I look at my iPhone, aware that I am supposed to be at the clubhouse in four hours and require a tattoo that will take at least five. Still, I bear the moments as patiently as I can, worried that to push Elliot will make him refuse to help altogether. And, really, I can go to any tattoo artist and request a coverup for my scars.
But in a town run by Dornan Ross, I can’t risk showing his macabre handiwork to a single soul. Because if someone finds me out, I’m as good as dead.
And I still have so many things left to do.
“It should have been me taking them down, Julz, not you.”
I speak gently. “Grandma told me about your daughter.”
He seems startled, fear registering in his eyes.
“What I mean,” I say quickly, “is that I understand why you haven’t been able to do anything about…” I’m suddenly at a loss for words. “Well, you know.”
Elliott rubs his eyes, and I wonder how many sleepless nights he has had since we met in an Emergency Room decorated in beige and bathed in my blood six years ago. Or how many sleepless nights since he drove away and left me all alone, three years ago?
Elliot keeps shaking his head. “You shouldn’t have come back,” he says. “You should have stayed away.”
I rise from the couch. “I have four hours to get a tattoo that covers these scars. I am doing this with or without you. Are you going to help me, or am I going to leave and find another tattoo artist to cover this shit up?”
He turns, seemingly shocked by my determination. “Dornan knows artists all over this city. You can’t show your,” his voice cracks, “scars around.”
“Elliot,” I say firmly. “I’ve dreamed about this for years. I’ve danced in the dark after the lights were switched off, teaching myself the things I needed to know. I’ve memorized every single thing about Dornan Ross and committed it to memory. I am doing this with or without your help.”
With my final outburst, I turn to leave. I am bluffing, but he doesn’t know that. I think of the last time we were together, three aching years ago, and I can’t bear to think about how he walked away from me.
It was hot and dusty. It was always fucking hot and dusty. It had been a year since I had “died”, since I had been smuggled out of a hospital room circled by men who wanted to kill me, and delivered to a safe house thousands of miles away from everything I had ever known.
Elliot was my one constant. He was gentle and kind. He listened to all of the demons inside me that were clamoring to smother me, to kill me. He held me while I cried. He wiped away my tears.
And then, inexplicably, he fell in love with me.
We waited for a long time to do anything more than fool around, but once we took that final step, I was his, body and soul. I loved him. He was my world.
Only, he wasn’t enough to chase away the demons. Nothing was.
For the first three years after I escaped, I was a broken shell, trying to survive, trying to forget. The scars, my constant reminder. The sound of a motorcycle. The touch of leather under my fingertips. Being in confined spaces.
I was broken, destroyed, and although he tried, Elliot couldn’t put me back together again.
The first time I tried to kill myself, I swallowed a bottle of pain pills from his grandmother’s bathroom cupboard. It didn’t work. I woke up and I was still alive.
Elliot begged me to promise I’d never do it again. I did, and then the next day, I hooked up a hose to the exhaust of his car, locked the garage, and waited for sweet release.
Of course, he found me. Cut through the garage door with an ax and saved my sorry ass.
The third time, I was so pathetically obvious that he found me in the bath before I’d even had a chance to drag the razor blade down my wrists.
After the third time, he left. Because I was darkness, and he was sinking inside that darkness, and every time he tried to pull me out, I’d hold him under with me.
I understood. His life had revolved around saving my life for three whole years, and he couldn’t save me anymore.
“I have nothing left to give you,” is what he said, before he climbed into his car and drove away.
It was only after he’d left me that I realized I had been going about things all wrong.
That it wasn’t forgiveness and forgetting that my soul truly craved.
Once I set my sights on vengeance, life made perfect sense.
But by then, it was too late for Elliot and me. Our time was up. He was already with another girl, his baby in her belly.
So I stayed in Nebraska and learned to dance, and dreamed of my revenge.
“Wait,” he says.
I stop, still staring at the door that will take me downstairs.
He sighs audibly. “I’ll do it. If you promise to tell me what you’re up to.”
I spin around, the smile on my face impossible to
fight. “I told you,” I say, grinning like an idiot. “I’m going to take them out. Dornan Ross will rot in jail for life, and his sons will suffer, too.”
Eliot looks at me quizzically. “The cops have never been able to get anything to stick on Ross OR his sons. What makes you think you’re different?’
I laugh. “Well, I’m the dead girl, aren’t I? I’m going to find that tape he made of me, and send it to every single TV station in the country. They’ll have no choice but to charge him with my murder.”
Elliot nods, and a slow, sweet smile spreads across his face. He takes the three steps across his apartment to reach me and pulls me into a bear hug so tight, I can barely breathe.
“I missed you,” he says, his arms pressed tight around me.
I think of how we were strangers once, pulled together by circumstance and a burning will to survive. How, even though we haven’t laid eyes on each other in so long, Elliot is the one person on this planet who truly understands me and my past.
“Missed you too,” I murmur sadly, wishing it didn’t have to be like this, but knowing without a shadow of a doubt that it does.
Seven
Four and a half hours later, I’m running to the address Dornan gave me. Of course, I don’t need to look at the card – I know exactly where the clubhouse is. I’m almost there when it occurs to me that the address looked a little off, and I stop to fish the card out of my bag.
Sure enough, the address on the card is not for the clubhouse at all. I stand under the yellow glow of a street lamp, trying to massage the stitch out of my abdomen without touching the fresh tattoo gouged into my side.
I unlock my iPhone screen and navigate to the maps section. I plug-in the address that Dornan has written down for me, and wait impatiently as it loads. The little red dot is telling me to go in the opposite direction – 200 yards to what appears to be an abandoned warehouse. I jog the 200 yards and come to a stop in front of the warehouse, my fear a living thing inside me. My heart sinks as I wonder why Dornan wants me here instead of down the road at the clubhouse.
I jump suddenly as a dark figure materializes out of the shadows. I immediately recognize him as Jazz, Dornan’s fifth son. He is painfully thin, and it doesn’t take a genius to realize he has some kind of drug problem.
Seven Sons Page 3
