Brutally Beautiful

by Christine Zolendz

  The drive back was silent; my thoughts though, were anything but. Nothing made sense to me. Why hadn’t she freaked out? How was she so calm? And how did she spread that calmness to me? How did she do everything she did? Why did she have those bandages? Did she have to take a CPR class because she was a waitress? Shit, I wasn’t stupid, I knew there was seriously more to it, I just wasn’t ready to admit anything yet, but a waitress she was not. And whose Porsche was this?

  I woke her softly as soon as I pulled into her driveway, but when she opened her eyes and looked past me, I knew something was wrong. Her eyes were full of tears and I snapped my head in the direction she’d been staring.

  The door to her trailer was torn off the hinges, broken in two and thrown against the stairs, like a child’s toy that had been long forgotten. Vile, demoralizing words had been painted in neon spray paint across the front of the tiny white trailer. Bitch. Cunt. You’re going to die.

  With no regard for her safety, Lainey was out of the car and rushed through the ransacked trailer. “Lainey, stop, it’s too fucking dangerous!” I called after her.

  She ran in anyway and I fumbled like a madman out of the car after her. Instantly, she had my brother’s gun in her hands, and stepped through the open doorway, surveying the room, as you’d see a police officer do on a crime show.

  Windows were shattered, broken in, as if someone had taken a baseball bat to them, and glistening shards of glass littered the rocky ground. Running up the wooden steps, I stopped just inside the threshold of the doorway and watched Lainey sink to her knees, surrounded by the mess of debris that used to be her cozy little home. “Clear,” she yelled out loud in a haunted voice, but I had a strange feeling she wasn’t really talking to me.

  Dirt and mud caked the furniture that was all bashed and battered across the floor. Piles of what smelled like fucking shit towered over her tabletop and across her walls written in thick red ketchup, or some sort of morbid looking sauce, were the words: Peek-A-Boo-Samantha-I see you. Deep beneath all of it was some rancid smell of decay. I gathered my arms around her kneeling form, as if in prayer, and lifted her off the repulsive floor. Cradling her in my arms, I carried her to the bedroom and sat her on the bed. “Pack a bag for yourself and Bree. Take anything that’s important, I’m calling the police.”

  “NO!”

  “Are you fucking serious right now? Look at your trailer!”

  “I can’t…get the police involved.”

  Sitting on her bed, I pulled her into my arms and held her, let the world fix its-fucking-self, my brain shut to autopilot and I brought her closer, nestling her against my chest. I’ll just take her home with me, protect her.

  After a few moments, she untangled herself from my arms and began rummaging through drawers, shoving clothes into a large duffel bag. “What hotels are near that hospital?”

  “Come home with me,” I whispered.

  “Shut up, Kade.”

  “Fuck you, Lainey, or whoever the fuck you are. You think after all this shit that I’ll let you out of my sight? Fuck you.”

  “This isn’t a game! Just shut up. Just shut the fuck up!” She slung the duffel bag over her shoulder, grabbed what looked like a computer bag from under her bed, and rushed for the door.

  Before she could get past me, I kicked the door closed, and backed her up against a wall filled with craters of broken plaster. Slamming my hands on the walls on both sides of her head, I wedged her against the wall and my body, ensuring the fact that she wasn’t getting away. She could fucking shoot me for all I cared.

  Grabbing hold of her face with a tight grip, I tried to make myself perfectly clear. “You are coming home with me.”

  Without warning, a slap hit my face that stung like a bitch, “Don’t put me in a corner, Grayson, my fucking claws will come out.”

  My fingers tightened around her chin, making her eyes narrow in challenge.

  Her hand shot out for another slap, but I caught it in my fist, tangled her fingers with mine and pressed my forehead to hers. I felt her rage, it rolled off her in strong waves, and I took it, crushing my body against her and covering her mouth with mine. What traitorous vessels our bodies are to fold into each other with violence, melt into each other in danger and anger. Her lips opened to mine and I slipped in, never wanting to leave the heat of her breath, but I had to, I did, just long enough to say, “You. Are. Staying. With. Me.”

  From one of her pockets the shrill electronic beeps of a cell phone screamed out. I pulled away from her, allowing her to take the call.

  “Hey, Bree. Everything okay? Yeah, you were both sleeping and Kade drove me home.”

  She listened to the reply, eyes fixed on mine. I took the bags and started walking to the door to put them in the car.

  “That’s great. Yes. Yes. Okay.” She gave a small sigh. “Listen, we can’t stay at the trailer, someone broke into it…Yeah, it’s bad, looks like something out of Scarface…” She started to explain, and then closed herself in the small bathroom to finish the rest of the conversation without me hearing, but I was out of the trailer anyway, getting ready to take her out of there.

  The drive to my house was silent. She spent the ride worrying her lip and twisting her fingers around the hem of her coat. We spoke no words to each other until she was standing in my living room, eyes wide, looking about ready to puke.

  “May I sit?” she asked in a small voice. “My legs are trembling.”

  “Yeah,” I croaked, barely able to get the word out.

  Lainey sank to the floor in one fluid movement, like a cascading waterfall. Running to her, I pulled her up, and tugged her over for a better place to sit. I stared at her as she sat, eyes closed on the couch, hands trembling. My brother’s blood, caked all over her was revolting and contradictory to her smooth ivory skin. I traced a trail of crimson with my thumb, rubbing the smear from her cheek. Her eyes opened wide, taking in my closeness and my deeds. My fingers couldn’t help but linger against her face.

  Lifting her in my arms, I carried her into my master bathroom and placed her on the chaise lounge chair. I ran the bath and dumped a shitload of bubbly soap inside. I distinctly noticed a sheen of sweat covering her forehead and I swallowed hard. “I have to get that blood off you. I can’t…I can’t look at you covered in blood.”

  “I know,” she whispered.

  “I want you to stay here with me. You’re not leaving my sight,” I snapped.

  “I can’t get you involved in this, Kade. It’s not your fight.”

  “You just can’t leave what’s happened here. My brother is in the fucking hospital so you can’t leave him, and you can’t take Bree away from him.”

  “Bree has nothing to do with any of this, Kade. She could stay here with him. Hell, I want her too.”

  “You can’t leave me.”

  “Kade, please.”

  “I’m not letting you leave me. You don’t want to either.”

  “Can you stop doing that crap? Just get out of my head and stay out. There’s so much chaos in there, you might get hurt.”

  I swept the hair away from her neck, tucking it behind her ear and the pulse in her throat came into view, pounding fast under her skin. “It’s because you’re screaming your thoughts at me. And just so you fucking know, you WILL tell me who Samantha Matthews is and why my brother almost lost his life for her,” I exploded.

  That shut her up. Backing up, I walked out of the bathroom.

  I shut the door quietly behind me, giving her the privacy that she deserved, even though all I wanted was to sink inside of her and forget about what happened in the last twenty-four hours. I left her there for my bitter curiosity too, I won’t lie, because now I had a name to search, Samantha Matthews from New York City.

  I sat at my desk and powered up my laptop, just as small pellets of icy rain began their assault at my window.

  Chapter 11

  Kade Grayson was the most unbearable, arrogant and demanding man, I’d ever met. What was wor
se is that he was the only man ever to be able to get me really worked up, and I was like a damn piece of putty in his hands.

  From right outside the bathroom windows, a loud roar of rain began crashing against the glass. Within seconds, the even louder roar of my own blood rushing through my ears drowned it out, as I thought about my options. I needed to get away from here. I needed to keep them safe. I had clamped my mouth shut when he told me I couldn’t leave his sight, and tried my best to throw him a hard glare, but I was absolutely positive with the state of my bloody attire and my matted hair, I didn’t look too fierce.

  As the tub filled with steamy water and bubbles, the faint smell of cinnamon and apples drifted through the room.

  That man bought the soap I used? Opening the large linen closet, I found a bottle of the body spray too. If it weren’t the most heartwarming thing I’d ever felt, I’d think it was a little creepy. But, no I didn’t find it creepy at all. Nope. I found it gave me a warm tingling feeling all over my body. I. Needed. An. Intervention.

  Stepping back from the closet, I looked around the bathroom and found myself wondering if anybody ever actually used it. It was too clean, immaculate, and sterile; I loved it. Everything in the closet was in a perfect little neat row, labels facing forward, each item in size order and even the towels were all folded to the same thickness. A perfect textbook example of compulsive behaviors of a control freak who was trying to create order in their chaotic life. It was as if I’d found my OCD-soul mate.

  Stripping off my bloodied clothes and stepping into the warm water, I scrubbed my skin of blood, then immediately emptied the tub, refilled it with clean water and laid back into its warmth. Groaning out loud, I covered my face with my hands. I couldn’t think straight. I couldn’t think past the fact that Dylan got shot because of me and that everyone saw me save him. Kade knows I’m not a waitress now and as soon as I step foot out of this bathroom, the questions are going to come flying at me like mortar fire.

  The door suddenly swung open, making me gasp, and Kade’s menacing presence filled up the doorway, half freaking naked. Oh, it gets better. Wait for it.

  Wait for it…

  Then he dove right into the tub.

  He splashed through the bubbles and water in nothing but a pair of black slacks. My stomach fluttered, and my hands curled into tight fists as the splashes of the water hit me. Water and suds spilled over the lip of the tub, splatting and sloshing all over the tiles in loud wet thwacks. “Grayson, you are seriously crossing the line of my bathroom boundaries here. I’m…I’m not dressed!”

  Grey eyes registering my state, scanned across the bubbles that I was trying desperately to hide under. But with the savage way he dove in, there wasn’t much left to conceal myself with, and I saw his eyes widen and hunger took over reason. Slowly, a flush of heat crept across my naked chest, up my bare throat and onto my cheeks. My God, if I could bottle the way that man looked at me, I’d never feel unattractive again. It was an indulgent feeling, one I wanted to keep, sip at it, swirl it around my tongue for a while, and then swallow. Any sense of guilt or shame, fear or insecurity was absent, and all I felt was beautiful, as if I could stand up before him and be viewed as a priceless, one of a kind sculpture, perfect and unbreakable.

  The way he looked at me made me forget the things I was upset over. Whatever they were that I was just thinking about.

  The sight of him was gloriously perfect, how…how to describe what this man looked like? The muscles of his entire torso were clearly defined and they rippled as he moved towards me. His shoulders, thick and solid, his arms tight and sinewy, he was the perfect specimen of a male and I simply couldn’t take my eyes from him.

  “It was my turn to use Google,” he whispered hoarsely, his wet hands reached my chin, lifting it to him.

  “Did you know that there’s a missing person’s report on two women from New York City? One’s name is Jennifer Coswell, and the other is Samantha Matthews. Jennifer is a nurse at New York-Presbyterian University Hospital and Samantha, well Samantha Matthews is the fucking head trauma surgeon there,” his nostrils flared. “And they’re both wanted for questioning in some sort of suspicious circumstances.”

  I tried to pull away, but he savagely grabbed the back of my neck and held me there; his cold grey eyes frozen, waiting for answers. I couldn’t find the right ones. I couldn’t find the words that would tell him…anything. I just wanted to run, run so he wouldn’t know me, the real me. “Well, I hope those two woman are okay. Because, sometimes I hear stories like that and wonder, maybe, if certain women are better off missing than being found. But I wouldn’t know anything about them, because I’m Lainey Nevaeh, and I’ve never been anything but a waitress.”

  “If you keep piling more bullshit on your story, you’re going to get buried in it. You have some sort of dark fucking secret that you think you can’t tell me, and I want to know. I want to know you.” Leaning in, his rough, unshaven chin scraped harshly against mine, “I want to know you.” Wet lips slid over mine, and the hands that held me down tangled themselves tightly through the wet strands of my hair, tugging my face closer to his.

  My eyes fluttered closed with the pull, and there was nothing in the room, nothing in the world, but his mouth on mine, and the sounds of the lapping water against the porcelain tub. Pressing the warm tip of his tongue across my lips, he parted them, dipping in, persuading me to give in, to lay me bare, know my secrets. “Let me in, Lainey.”

  Wet fingers slid down my neck as I leaned back to look at him. “Something dark haunts us all. What darkness haunts you at night, Kade? What do you squeeze your eyes closed to when the darkness bites against your back when you’re alone at night? Because I was married to mine. I was daughter to mine, and I refused to look into the mirror and see it make me as dark as them, so I walked away from it all.”

  Reaching my hands up, I pulled a white towel that hung from a small brushed-nickel hook on the wall. As Kade thudded his head back against the corner of the tub, his eyes fluttered closed and I stood, wrapping the towel tightly around me.

  “Please don’t push me away. Let me know you,” he whispered when I reached the door.

  “How very fucking hypocritical of you, Kade. Weren’t you just the one in your truck screaming for me to get out when I tried to get you to talk to me? Why did you push me away? Why do you push everyone away? Maybe you have things you don’t know how to talk about, maybe you’ve seen things that you don’t want to see again, maybe you can’t even get the words to fumble out of your mouth. Whatever reason it is, Kade, you should understand that it’s probably the same reason as mine.”

  “I can’t trust anyone,” he whispered, clipped.

  “Me neither,” I replied.

  “I’m not comfortable around people,” he snapped.

  “Join the fucking club. We meet in the bar every Wednesday night at ten,” I said, stomping out of the room and grabbing my bag of clothes. I tore it open and shoved a shirt over my head and a pair of yoga pants on without wasting my time searching for any under garments. I growled out loud when I looked down and realized my shirt was on backwards. Screw it. I left it on anyway.

  Kade was storming out of the bathroom, soaking wet pants, slicked against his skin and dripping all over his rug. “Don’t fucking walk away from me. I’m doing what you wanted. I’ve been fucking telling you everything!”

  “BULLSHIT!” I screamed. “The lack of exposition from a fucking award winning writer astounds me,” I yelled, barking out a hideous laugh at his expense. “You haven’t told me anything. I found out everything by reading about you online, and you know what? It still doesn’t scratch the surface, does it? Because an entire town of people hate you and fear you. That’s not what would normally happen when someone goes through a tragedy like that. You did something that scares the hell out of everybody so much that even your own brother is afraid to push you to live!” His expression looked ashen, repulsed by the words I was saying, “What, Kade? Just say it
! Scream at me to get the fuck out again! But don’t expect me to tell all of my secrets to a total stranger, no matter how good he is at making me come with his mouth.” I shot him a tight smile, and shoving my feet into my sneakers, I strode past him and out his bedroom door. I couldn’t believe I had just said that, but I needed him to let it go. I needed to keep him away from all my problems, because it was safer.

  There was a small staircase at the end of the corridor that I didn’t remember Kade carrying me up when we first arrived, and I barreled down each step as the wood tapped and echoed my footfalls.

  Kade caught me halfway down, grabbing my waist, “Samantha, stop. Please.”

  My knees weakened hearing the name I loved, the name I missed so much, fall from his lips. It brought me right to the edge though, right to the edge of losing it, not certain if I’d scream more or lash out in tears, so I bit down on my tongue to stop myself.

  He stepped ahead of me, pulling me down against the hard surface of the stairs causing me to slam down on the side of my cheek. It wasn’t painless, but it also didn’t warrant a cry, but I knew I’d be bruised in the morning. He fiercely cupped my face to make me focus on him. I closed my eyes.

  “Don’t block me out.” He pressed my body against the wall of the stairs, my head lightly thudding against the handrail. His wet pants seeped a cold dampness into my skin. “I want to saw off my own hand, just so that I could let you go, let you go to keep you safe from my mind, from my issues. But you, you’re just like me, right? Something’s wrong inside you too.”

  “Fuck you,” I spat, pushing him off me. “You’re still not saying anything to me, Kade. You are still regurgitating the same fucking bullshit, just a little more poetically.”

  Without effort, he lifted my body off the stairs, carrying me down the rest of the way into a darkened living area and tossed me on a large couch, pinning me down with his weight. The feel of him on top of me made me breathless and needy. Burying his face into the side of my neck, hot breath fanned against my skin, and open lips across my flesh.