by Ace Gray
“Cupcake,” Horse taunted and I finally shoved out of the passenger seat.
I jogged up the stairs the way I always had, my muscles accepting their fate far easier than my mind. When I went to knock, I couldn’t force myself.
“I’ve got your back. Always.” Horse had managed to creep up the stairs without making a sound before he said it low and earnest behind me.
His hand extended around me to knock on the door and I automatically blew out a deep breath. Both my mind and my body were on board with trusting Horse. I always could and certain things never changed.
Horse shuffled beside me and pushed on the door when the buzzer clicked. I glowered at the camera I knew was watching as I stepped into Satan’s lair.
Inside everything was different than the street outside. Everything was deep, dark wood, dark lighting and spots of candlelight. Both accentuated the black velvet furniture and twisted paintings. Downstairs was a traditional layout, used as more of a waiting room than anything else. The smattering of handguns, blades and brass knuckles on the coffee table were the only hints the decor didn’t mean different, it meant sinister.
My skin crawled all the same.
I’d sat on the couch in the living room gathering my nerves to follow through on Mickey’s orders. I’d sat on that couch, wishing I were in the shower, scrubbing off the filth I’d been a part of.
“Take a seat, Cole.” Horse interrupted my memories and gestured toward the seats.
The springs squeaked and bounced beneath me just as they always had and it was as close to homey as this walk down memory lane would get. I scanned the room as Horse started up the grand staircase, noticing more artwork than the last time I’d been here. Most of the walls were covered in framed canvases or photographs and a few morbid pieces leaned against the walls on the floor. They’d gotten progressively more haunting in recent years.
One seemed to be a river of dead bodies that I couldn’t pull my eyes from. The longer I looked, the more I convinced myself I recognized the faces. I stood before I thought too much about it, drawn to the picture like a moth to a very black flame.
Up close, I did recognize some of the faces. I remembered what they looked liked scared, bloody and knowing they were going to die. I’d always turned away after that. But here were the dead faces of men I’d killed, staring back at me with their death masks on. Before I knew it, I was choking back bile.
“You like Mick’s own personal River Styx?” Some new kid called from the bottom of the stairs.
If the bile hadn’t been choking me, I would have shot a snarl at him. Telling him just how many bodies I’d put in that river instead of Mick. But I couldn’t quite swallow what I was doing here, let alone the vomit it put in my throat.
“Leave your weapons.” He jerked his head toward the pile on the coffee table then toward the stairs. “Mickey will see you now.”
I walked toward him without hesitating at the table.
“I said leave your weapons.” He puffed up his chest and narrowed his gaze.
A dark laugh bubbled up in my throat. “Kid, I’ve been out for a while. I don’t carry.” I walked toward his perch on the staircase, toward Mick and my future. I paused to whisper in his ear, “But even now, I wouldn’t need them if I wanted to take you out.”
Without waiting for an answer, I climbed the rest of the stairs and pushed the massive single door open into the den of vice.
Spread legs and a quivering pussy greeted me. Mick sat behind the woman he had offered up on a tray in a king-like throne. The same dark lighting cast shadows across both her skin and his. Mickey’s eyes and the girl’s sex were accentuated in the little bit of brightness.
“The prodigal son returns.” Mick spoke with Siobhan to his right and Horse to his left. “I got you a present,” Mick added with a jerk of his chin towards the girl trembling on the table, tied down and spread for me.
“I’m good, thanks Mick. I’m here on business, not pleasure, remember?”
Horse cringed when I said it, Siobhan’s eyes glinted. I was undoubtedly playing with fire but I couldn’t bring myself to care.
“Fine. Business it is.” Mick’s voice was dark, darker than normal, as he rose from his chair and circled the girl. He dragged his hand across her skin as he walked toward me. She trembled, and it wasn’t at the tender touch of intimacy either, it was fear, plain and simple. Her whole body jumped when he smacked her hard on the hip just before stepping nose to nose with me.
“Just what business do you think we’re in, Cole?” He enunciated his every icy word.
“Murder, Mick.” I met his gaze unflinching. “Sometimes money laundering, grand theft auto, drug running, prostitution…”
“You’re in the business of shutting the hell up and following orders, Cole. My orders.” He cut me off, hissing in my face. “And I said take her.”
“No, Mick.” I softened but I didn't flinch. “Please.”
“Did you think you could take Elle’s place to simply placate me? That it wouldn’t mean anything? That just hearing the words would be enough?” His volume was rising.
“That’s not what I mean…”
“Because now I fucking own you, Cole!” He screamed in my face, his breath assaulted my skin. “And I want to see you lick this.” Mick shoved his finger toward the girl’s open legs.
“I have Elle.” It was the only defense I had.
“You don’t have her,” he sneered. “We’ve been watching her for a while and you’re just a dick she jumped on. She’s just a cunny you’re enjoying. So stop feeding me lines and prove your loyalty.”
My eyes fell from Mickey’s and he let out one breathy laugh. I looked over to Horse and tension wracked his body, his fingers were digging into the chair, white visible even from over here. His eyes were pleading with me. Siobhan was cackling across from him, pleased to see me bend.
“Lick it, Cole,” Mickey snarled in my ear, pressing his barreled chest against mine.
I had to beg for Elle, I’d go home to her and she deserved that much in our last few hours. I couldn’t live with myself if I caved, despite the face I’d save.
“Please, Mick.”
His arm swung up and around my neck and wrestled me to his hip. I automatically tensed but forced myself not to fight him. His knee snapped up hard and fast to my gut and I groaned. His grip tightened on my neck, making it hard to breathe. I still didn’t fight him but I felt the fury throbbing in my face.
“You’ll lick that cunny if I say. You’ll fuck it if I say. You’ll kill her with one word, you understand me, laddy?” He kneed me harder this time and I made a downright pathetic sound, barely able to breathe.
Mick squeezed tighter with the arm around my neck and my hands finally reacted on instinct to pull him away. As soon as I started to struggle, he slapped me full across my face. I fought harder against him only getting myself two more hard knees into my stomach and a punch to my kidneys that brought me to my knees.
The second I hit the hardwood floor, Mick let go and I slumped down, gasping. I was completely defenseless sitting like that, and anywhere else I would have let the monster I tried to keep at bay run free, but with Mick, I knew to stay submissive if I was going to get a favor.
A small telltale click made me wish I’d fought back. The cock of a gun preceded the press of cold metal against my temple by a single heartbeat. Mick pushed hard against me, grinding the barrel left to right. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, wanting to see Elle, smell her, remember her taste if I was really lucky.
I did catch the scent of a turned-on woman but it wasn’t Elle. It made me heave but I couldn’t stop sucking in deep, haggard breaths. When he didn’t pull the trigger, I opened my eyes to find myself staring between the legs of Mick’s waiting woman.
Once more, he pressed hard against my head, jostling me enough to press my cheek against the girl’s trembling thigh.
“Lick it,” he commanded, and this time, with my life on the line, I did.
>
9.
Elle
It was the deep pounding that woke me rather than the cascade of the shower, or even the vacancy Cole left beside me. I squinted a few times, barely able to believe the night was just starting to fade from black then rubbed my eyes and stretched.
Each of my bones creaked but it was the ache of my throat when my muscles tensed that stood out, but I didn’t mind. All I had to do was imagine Cole’s intensely burning eyes when he yanked on the belt to turn myself on all over again. I pushed out of bed without giving it a second thought, magnetically attracted to Cole more than anything.
I pushed open the bathroom door and was enveloped in steam. My blurry eyes took a minute to adjust to the skewed brightness but when I did, Cole was hunched behind the glass door of the shower. He had one forearm resting on the tile supporting the graceful curve of his perfectly muscled and inked body. Only after watching for a little while did I realize he was brushing his teeth almost violently. His body shook under the ferocity of it. Each time he spit, he pounded his fist against the wall where it rested.
“Fuck,” he swore then tilted his head up for a mouthful of shower water and spat it out. He banged his hand a few times in quick succession and swore even louder.
“Cole?”
He turned at my voice and the steam he’d created in the bathroom swirled around his god-like body.
“Ladyface? Did I wake you?” It took a minute for him to find his voice and even then it was shaky.
“Yeah, but that’s okay.” I walked over and pushed the clear glass aside. I stepped in only to screech when the water scalded my shin.
“Shit, sorry.” He scrambled for the dial and turned the water down. His hand reached for me the next moment and pulled me into the waterfall.
I wrapped myself around him only to discover angry welts from the heat he’d been showering in.
“Good Christ, Cole.” My fingers traced up his arms, across his shoulders then up his neck. Beneath my fingers, the muscles twitched as Cole jerked away from me. “Are you okay?”
Green eyes zigzagged up and down my body as his mouth opened once or twice to say something. When he didn’t manage anything, I let my fingertips trace the side of his panther, relishing the dips and grooves of his abs. When I got lower on his body, he cried out.
My eyes bugged. I couldn’t help it.
“What did I do?”
“Oh, Ladyface.” His whole face contorted, every bit as pained as when I touched the sensitive spot on his abs. “You didn’t do anything.”
“I can do something to cheer you up.” I reached for his cock and went to stroke but he grabbed my wrist mid-pump.
“Can I hold you?” His voice still wasn’t his. In some ways, it was darker but in others, it was broken.
“Yeah, of course.” I wove myself into him without hesitating and let my fingers brush across his back.
Cole twisted himself around me like roots desperate to hold a massive tree steady. I pulled his face down to me and gently kissed each of his eyelids then leaned my forehead against his. He breathed in deeply as I played with the edges of his hair.
The man that cuddled into me like a kitten in a warm blanket was such a sharp contrast to the one that had needed control earlier. Only one explanation made sense, and whether it pulled him from me or not, I needed to ask.
“Did you leave me tonight, Cole?”
“When’s your flight, Elle?”
“So that’s a yes.” I arched my eyebrow at him even though he pulled me tighter so he had no way of knowing. “Was it because of Mr. Maloney?”
His whole body convulsed underneath me at the mention.
“Cole, you have to fill me in. Please,” I begged still holding tight to him.
“There’s nothing to fill in, okay?” He nuzzled his nose into the wet strands of my hair.
“You’re a liar.” I would have shoved away from him but I didn’t want to hurt him. Cole was fragile to the point of breaking, to the point of recklessness, something I recognized intimately. It was something my mom and Jimmy had shoved on my shoulders so many times. It was part of my ugly that Cole had wordlessly accepted yesterday whether he knew it or not. Perhaps today he didn’t want it, perhaps he’d learned…
The water ran cool and Cole reached around me to crank it. His hands came back to me and skated along my curves.
“You gonna answer me about that flight?” he purred.
“If you answer me one thing.”
“I’ll sure try.”
“You really want me gone, don’t you?” I buried my head in the crook of his shoulder, unable to meet his eyes when he answered.
He didn’t speak. Instead he pulled my chin so his lips could find mine in the cascade of the dying water. He kissed me with everything he had, pulling, pushing, caressing. His hands found their way into my hair and yanked, tilting my chin up to the ceiling. He nipped and licked along my jaw then started down my neck.
He kissed the sensitive spot where the belt had been then his lips hesitated against my skin.
“Yes,” he finally breathed the word. “I’m a monster.” His finger traced along the mark I wore from last night. “And you need to be as far away from my marked soul as possible.”
Our last moments haunted me as I sat in the terminal of O’Hare.
“You’re everything, Elle. Absolutely everything.”
“You don’t have to placate me, Cole. I don’t think I mean much to you.”
“Ladyface, I pray to God you never know how much you mean to me.”
As soon as he’d finished speaking, he kissed me. Hard. His hand shoved up my skirt and clutched my ass to yank me onto his lap in the driver’s seat. He wrapped around me so every inch of my chest pressed against his. His hand came to the back of my neck and squeezed; his thumb and forefinger dug into the faint bruise I wore hard enough to bring back the feeling of ownership.
I kissed him all the harder.
When cars started honking behind us in the drop off lane, Cole’s tongue wormed its way into my mouth and danced its intimate dance against mine. He explored leisurely as if we were still in his bed and I was more than happy to match him move for move. It wasn’t until TSA knocked on the passenger window that he stopped and slid me back to my seat. Security banged again and I started collecting my things.
Cole didn’t say a word. Hell, I don’t think he breathed as I climbed out of the rumbling car. But at the last minute, right before I was going to shut the door, he lunged across the seat and grabbed my hand. He yanked roughly on me, toppling me back to the seat.
“Everything.”
His whisper barely preceded the sweetest kiss to the tip of my nose.
The whole thing had left me thoroughly upset. Not because there was anything wrong with it—the goodbye was actually painfully perfect— but because there was so much left unsaid. He’d stayed hidden and I’d swallowed three very important words.
I grabbed my bag and darted to a quiet corner of a different gate area that was bathed in sunlight. I dug for my phone as I went, almost colliding into a few different people as I all but shoved my head in the bag. Phone in hand, I barreled toward the windows and flipped the video on. I hit the icon to turn the screen then held the phone at full length and hit play.
Without saying a word I waved at the camera then smiled as wide as I could. I kept the goofy grin on my face while I pointed at my eye, then right to my heart and last but not least at the screen where Cole would be. The moment I stopped recording, I sent my eye heart you message and turned off my phone to board.
The plane ride was torture. Every single thing reminded me of Cole and I half expected him to file in and sit next to me. When I went to the bathroom mid-flight, I let my fingers wander over the dingy plastic casing and took note of how much larger it seemed without Cole in it.
I sighed. Over and over and over again. Throughout the entire flight back to Seattle. I missed him and in a far deeper way than I should. I knew it didn’t make
sense, I met him Friday morning, and here I was flying home on Sunday, but my mind wandered through the steps it would take to move to Chicago all the same.
It was still meandering down that path as I walked through the Seattle airport. Cole’s manly scent and piercing eyes filled any part of my brain that wasn’t required for walking.
“Elle Belle, earth to Elle Belle.”
I snapped toward my nickname, so dazed that I didn’t recognize Conrad. My perfectly coiffed best friend looked like a golden god of a Southern California surfer even though he refused to touch the ocean. Fish were “gross.” And now he sat with his head cocked, arms crossed, and his usual glowing halo as he watched me walk through the airport like a zombie.
“Hey. Sorry.” I tried to shake the image of tattoos flexing over top of me as I turned to walk toward him.
“Did it go that bad in Chicago?” He threw his arm around my shoulder.
“It went…different.” I scrunched up my nose.
“So Jimmy was decent? Your skin didn’t crawl? You cried?” he asked with sass thick in his voice. “Give me details, girl.” He used his grip to start us walking toward short-term parking.
“Jimmy was Jimmy and he was definitely responsible for Mom.” I sighed loudly.
“Good. Tears dry out your skin.”
“I may have cried a little. She was my mom after all. But come on, the shit that they did, that they got mixed up in?” I couldn’t soften the little bit of disgust in my voice.
Conrad curled me into his chest and I wove my hands around his waist. For the first time in ages, his toned chest and narrow hips didn't feel like home. I readjusted.
“Elle Belle?” He stopped walking and I looked up to find his eyebrow quirked up.
“What?”
