by Lee, Kimball
He held up a syringe and spoke slowly and calmly, his eyes still holding hers in the mirror. “I don’t know how this drug will affect your baby, so you can come with me willingly, or I can drug you. It’s your choice, do I have to use this or not?”
She shook her head and his eyes cleared and as they did her eyes widened. His eyes were as beautiful as his face, they were blue, a startling shade of sapphire-blue, the exact color as hers, but he didn’t seem to make the connection. Christopher! She wanted to scream, why hadn’t she screamed, dammit? Fuck it all, he was her brother, there was no question. The man who had gagged her and was now leading her out of the room and across the grass to a waiting van, was Christopher Tremont. He opened the cargo doors and pushed her roughly inside and taped her hands behind her securely. He slammed the doors, then climbed behind the wheel and drove away. Charlotte got to her knees and struggled to see out the back window, she saw Finn climbing the stairs to their room. He had taken off his t-shirt and his body glistened in the morning sun. She tried to call out, then she fell back as the van turned a sharp corner and she kicked against the doors.
“It’s no use, so save your strength, you can’t escape, and your husband can’t save you. You’re a very beautiful woman, now you’re all alone with a ghost. That’s what they call me, el phantasma; the ghost. I don’t exist and I don’t care if you live or die, you realize that, surely. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a woman who stirred something in me, a long, long time. So for your own safety, don’t provoke my anger,” he said, and turned to look at her. His voice was cold and hard without a hint of mercy, and no hint of their connection. She curled into ball and closed her eyes and wondered if Finn would get to her in time.
She didn’t have to wonder for long, soon the van stopped and she could hear the roar of engines outside. The doors flew open and he hauled her over his shoulder and walked toward a waiting twin-engine airplane. He dumped her in the rear seat and handed a wad of money to a boy who removed the blocks from the planes tires. Then he sat in the pilot’s seat, put on a headset and said something in Spanish. The plane taxied down the runway, picked up speed and she felt the wind lift and carry them. He turned to look at her only once, and she stared into his eyes, willing him to see her, but he turned away without a flicker of recognition. So she knew that life as she knew it was over, he was taking her far away, Christopher was an accomplished aviator, after all. He was also, ‘the ghost’, the deadliest killer in the world, and he had a score to settle with Finn. She closed her eyes and prayed a silent prayer, not for herself, but for her baby. She prayed that somehow Charlie would survive and that Finn would find him and take him home to grow up happily alongside his brother and sister.
Chapter Three
Present day…
“What a fuckin’ kick in the ass! Ya’ll are cruising all the way from DC to Mississippi on Harley’s and I have to put up with Matilda’s wedding bullshit and then fly to Paris. I’m tellin’ you, life is not fair, and I miss Hadley like a motherfucker.” Cuatro Rhodes said, and took a long drink of his beer, then threw back a shot of tequila, and Atticus and Holden did the same. They were still a year away from the legal drinking age but Cuatro had supplied them with convincing fake IDs.
“Agreed,” Atticus said, “I don’t know which is worse for you bro, missing our Sons of Anarchy road trip or having your sister drag you around while she tries on wedding dresses.”
Holden and Atticus laughed at that and Cuatro looked miserable and finished his beer. “You’ll keep an eye on Hadley for me, both of you, she’s handful in the first place, and now with all this Oscar buzz… Just keep the hard-dicks away from her, okay? I intend to marry your sister, Atticus, but she’s being a little bitch about it. Sorry man, inappropriate thing to say about the woman I love, you gotta know she’s messed with my brain,” Cuatro said.
Holden felt sorry for Cuatro, he really seemed to be in love with Hadley, and from what Atticus had told him, Hadley had zero interest in anything other than an acting career.
“It’s cool about your book deal, Cuatro, and the Paris Review is publishing your short story series, that’s major league,” Holden said. “What’s the book about?”
“Yeah, the book,” Cuatro was already drunk and beginning to slur, and Atticus gave Holden a look that said ‘what a cheap drunk, wasted after only a few beers and a couple of shots’. “Well, the book is just an idea at this point, but it’s gonna be about a fucking beautiful, complex girl and her obsession with stardom. She changes lives, she especially fucks up the man who loves her. Then she leaves a bloody trail of hearts that she chews up and spits out, but she does it so sweetly and with such skill, the poor bastards are happy to let her destroy them.”
“Right, I think it’s time to send you back to your sister’s house so she can put you to bed. Man, don’t you have a body guard? Holden here has a body guard, I thought all tycoons needed someone to watch over them,” Atticus said, and Holden motioned for his body guard, Cruz De Leon, to see that Cuatro was deposited safely at his sister’s town house on DuPont Circle so she could deal with him.
“You don’t have a body guard, Atticus, why is that? Cuz only the inner circle knows you’re a Bly, maybe the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree after all. I’ll be as bad off as Alex Bly when Hadley’s done with me, Holden’s daddy will never be normal since sweet-ass Charlotte stole his heart and his baby and left him…” Cuatro barely got the words out of his mouth when Atticus hit him. He landed on the floor and lay there moaning until Atticus reached down and helped him to his feet.
“Sorry about that buddy, but you’re drunk as shit and you crossed a delicate line,” Atticus said, he handed Cuatro a napkin from the bar to stop the blood flow from a cut under his eye. He dusted Cuatro off and smiled at him, but it wasn’t a real smile, it was barely contained fury. “I like you Cuatro, and I’m going to try and forget what you said about my mother, but you’ll need to stay away from my sister from now on. Come near her again, unless she actually wants you to, and you’ll deal with me. You see, the women in my family know what they want, and my mom and dad have been very happily married for a long time. Yes, I was a happy little accident, Alex Bly is my father, and my mother obviously wasn’t in love with him. Is that what you want, any meager crumb Hadley throws at you until she does find true love? Move on, brother, and don’t piss me off again or I will seriously fuck you up, you can count on that.”
“Hey, Atticus, I’m drunk, man. I shouldn’t have…”
“Don’t worry about it, just go sleep it off,” Atticus said and nodded to Cruz, who hauled Cuatro out of the bar.
“Whoa, bad ass Texan can’t hold his liquor for shit,” Holden said. “You know his big sister will come looking for you now, you and Matilda, fucking and fighting, is all that going to stop when she’s married?”
Atticus shrugged his shoulders and ordered another beer, “Matilda’s bat-shit crazy, and she’s one conniving little bitch, but she’s addictive as hell. I don’t know, it is what it is. She’s got some kinky idea about us fucking in every room in the White House when she’s first lady. Knowing her, it’ll probably happen.”
“Well, be sure to steal an ashtray from the Lincoln Bedroom while you’re there. What do want to do tonight, or should I say who do you want to do? Have you noticed that group in the corner? The one wearing the ‘I’m the bride’ banner is looking pretty hot and bothered since you knocked Cuatro on his ass, maybe she likes it rough.”
“Yeah, well, I can handle a little friendly pain with pleasure, but I steer clear of the nut jobs who want be slapped around. That’s fucked up, if a man uses a woman for a punching bag, his ass belongs in prison not in the bedroom. Okay, little brother, I think a couple bridesmaids are calling your name. And remember, your penis is a weapon, keep it covered,” Atticus tossed him a couple of condoms and headed toward the group of girls.
“I always do, a weapon, huh? I’ll try not to kill anyone with it,” Holden said, and they both
laughed as Atticus led the way and Holden followed.
Holden idolized Atticus, much to everyone’s surprise. Mia was an entirely different matter, but the two brothers had become friends as soon as Atticus began to spend time with Alexander Bly. That was thirteen years before, when Atticus was seven, and Holden was six, and the bond of brotherhood was strong between them. From the moment Alexander Bly had introduced Atticus to Holden and Mia as their older brother, he had instilled in them the importance of the blood they shared. Mia fought against it, rejecting Atticus and treating him with disdain, but Holden loved his brother without question or reservation.
Two years before, Atticus had been accepted at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, just outside of Washington, DC, and Holden had joined him there a year later. Holden had survived the previous grueling summer as a ‘plebe’, and he’d just finished his first full academic year. Now the two of them were marking one off on their bucket lists and taking a motorcycle road trip to the Gulf Coast. Bly knew they were making the thousand mile trip on Harley’s, in fact, he’d paid for them. His sons had picked them up at the dealership that afternoon and would head south first thing in the morning. Charlotte and Finn didn’t know, and Atticus had to wonder if Alex had gone along with the idea simply to piss his parents off. Especially his mother, he imagined Alex would relish a confrontation with Charlotte. Alex Bly was a brilliant and powerful man, and Atticus loved his father completely, but he didn’t understand Bly’s fucked up love for another man’s wife.
Matilda did show up that night, she didn’t even knock on the hotel room door, just used the key-card she’d bullied the desk clerk into giving her, and walked right in.
“Asshole!” she said, standing next to the bed where Atticus lay with the bride-to-be from the bar. “You, out of here! Grab your polyester dress and fuck-me-heels and move your little ass before I call the manager and report you for prostitution.”
“Really Matilda?” Atticus laughed and told the girl to calm down and ignore the drama queen. “Give me the key to my room and go back to your fiancé, better yet, go take care of your foolish brother.”
“I said out!” she said to the girl who was hurriedly sliding into her dress and shoes as Matilda held the door open for her.
“Call me!” the girl said over her shoulder, smiling at Atticus as she scurried out the door before Matilda slammed it behind her.
“What is your obsession with common trash, Atticus? Ugh, you just love the lowlife, don’t you?”
“Do you ever think before you speak, Matilda? That young woman is Director of Communications for Senator Bradley’s office, I’d hardly call her trash. In fact that’s a despicable word, you should erase it from your vocabulary before your fiancé runs for president.”
“Let’s take a shower and wash her cheap perfume off of you,” Matilda cooed, she’d already begun to undress as he stood peering down at her. “Come on lover, hate me all you want, but some things you can’t hide,” she wrapped one small hand around his hugely engorged cock and stood on tiptoe to press her lips to his. “This is the only thing that will ever come between us, Atti, your amazing cock. I love it, and you love that it’s too damned big, and that the only way you can hurt me is by fucking me with it.”
He lifted her with one swift movement of his powerful arm so that her legs circled his narrow waist, her hands clutching his broad shoulders. They kissed deeply and savagely, and the heat between them had nothing to do with love, only physical chemistry, with a side of the forbidden, and an abundance of carnal desire.
“Yeah, you’re right, I do like to punish you, and God knows you deserve it. Although it takes a bit of the thrill away knowing that you love it so much. You love my cock, and I love the way it brings to your beautiful, arrogant knees and reduces you to a primitive, whimpering animal like the rest of us,” he said, and he carried her into the shower, and she stayed with him, and he didn’t get any sleep at all that night.
Fatigue and sleepless nights didn’t bother him, he had gotten through two years at the Naval Academy, and replacing pain and discomfort with endurance had become second nature. He and Holden rode south the next day, cruising along on the powerful Electra Glides. His body was weary but that didn’t matter to him at all, he was young and alive, and he was keenly aware that his was a charmed life. He turned and nodded to Holden as they rode side by side, the sun on their faces, and the warm wind rushing past them, enveloping them in that place in time. Holden nodded and smiled at his brother, he looked just as tired and just as content. The classic rock Charlotte had subtly taught Atticus to love when he was a kid played on the sound system. He’d disliked the music at first, but it had grown on him, now it was part of his history, part of who he was. He sang along in his head, loving it as he loved life. He controlled the music with a flick of his thumb on the hand grip, and The Allman Brothers Band sang a mellow song for a young man traveling light and free.
“Well, I gotta run to keep from hidin’, and I’m bound to keep on ridin’. And I’ve got one more silver dollar, but I’m not gonna let ‘em catch me, no, not gonna let ‘em catch the Midnight Rider.”
“Let’s crash here and order a pizza, what do you think?” Atticus asked as he and Holden parked the bikes and walked toward a motel in the middle of nowhere that had seen better days. “It won’t hurt you to slum it for the night, you’re a spoiled rich kid; you need see how the other half lives.”
“Fine with me, and you’re one to talk, your blood is as rich as mine,” Holden shot back and both of them laughed. “Just do me a favor and don’t have them send any girls to the room, I’m whipped and I’m out of rubbers.”
“Hey, this motel has our names all over it, look at the sign,” Atticus said and he Holden laughed until their stomachs ached. The sign said ‘Big Dick’s Halfway Inn’.
They settled into the scantily furnished room and ordered pizza after they figured out how to use a rotary dial phone, then they sat on the lumpy mattresses eating and talking.
“Are you happy with your life so far?” Atticus asked as he searched for something to watch on the ancient TV. “This place is fancy, remote control and three channels to choose from.”
“Sure, I guess, what’s not to like? I got to ditch my body guard for a few days, and hit the road on a Harley, I don’t suppose money will ever be an issue, and Dad’s pretty cool. My mother leaves a lot to be desired, it would have been nice if you and I had the same mom… your mom, to be specific. Charlotte, the kind of woman men go to war over, Dad and Finn, at least,” Holden said, and watched his brother’s face to see how those words would affect him.
“Right, my mother, the infamous Charlotte. Helen of Troy’s face may have launched a thousand ships, but Charlotte’s face launched a world of hurt for my two fathers. I can’t imagine falling in love like that, you know, where it colors your entire life. I’ve seen both the good and the bad of what love can do to a man. My dad, Finn, is the happiest man I’ve ever known, and Alex is happy until he thinks about my mom, which is most of the time. Do you hate her, Holden? For what she’s meant to him, for having me?”
“No, I don’t hate her at all. I don’t really know her except for what I’ve heard from you and of course, from Dad. I think she must be an exceptional woman to have two great men love her so much and for so long,” Holden said. “Dad said he never thought he could or would fall in love, he was deep into conquests and one night stands. Then he met your mom and the world began to spin in the opposite direction and he was the only one who ever noticed, obviously. Anyway, yeah, absolutely, I want to fall in love. It has to feel great for a while at least, if a man is willing to suffer the rest of his life. But, we’re not like him, he’s Alexander Bly, the great and powerful. You and I are just knock-off versions of him, right?”
Atticus thought about it, lying on the sagging bed with his hands laced behind his head. He was watching the only clear station on the TV, a man was rolling around in the mud wrestling an alligator. “Sometimes I don’t know who
I am, I have two fathers and a mother who have had these huge, extraordinary, lives. All three of my parents have had bizarre brushes death, how am I supposed to live a normal life? But, I want to love a woman, really… really love a woman, and be loved in return, and someday down the road, have kids. First I want to fly, fly fast and change the world, make it better. It’s what my dad… what Finn wanted, what he did in his own way. I’ll graduate from the Academy but I’m doing my time in the Air Force instead of the Navy. Floating around on a ship is not for me, I want to fly all the time, so I’ll graduate, and do my flight training, then who knows. I’m sure they’ll send me to some country with a lot a sand and deserts and I’ll do my thing for the good ol’ U.S. of A. After that I’ll figure it out while I wait for the weight of the world to fall in my lap.”
“Bly Inc. you mean, sorry about that, I hate to say it, but I’m glad it’s you and not me.”
“Guess what little brother? You’re going to be right there by my side, no way I’m doing it by myself. I can count on you, can’t I?” Atticus asked.
“Fuck, are you really going put that on me? Let’s talk about something else, all that responsibility is too depressing to think about. What about Cuatro and Hadley? And how do you feel about her being a celebrity, she will be, you know. She’s Charlotte’s daughter, it must be her destiny.”
“Cuatro’s in love and now he’s going to immortalize her in a book, I’m not wild about that idea. She’s great, Holden, my little sister. You haven’t had the chance to really know her, but she has something special, a spark of the divine, maybe. She’s gorgeous and talented and… she’s sweet and a little clueless about the way people really are. That worries me, my family has sheltered her too much, probably. Now she’s about to go off to New York and who knows where else with this celebrity shit. Listen, do me a favor, help me watch over her this summer, I want her to have this last bit of teenaged innocence before she goes out into the big bad world. I can count on you, I know. I’m going to sleep now, brother, you should too; we’ve got a long road ahead of us.”
