by Zoey Parker
“I’d have to say this is a first for me.”
“You seem awfully casual about it.”
“It is what it is.”
I felt like tearing my hair out in frustration. Or maybe I’d tear his out instead. “‘It is what it is?’ You don’t really believe that, do you?”
“I do.”
I stammered wordlessly. There were no words for how angry he was making me. How could one man get under my skin with such little effort? My face felt hot again, but this time it was with a blank, fiery rage, directed at one man—Ben Killmore. “You…I…You have to…I mean…” I babbled. Finally, I managed to spit out, “You have to feel something.”
He cracked an eye open for the first time. “Nah.”
All I could was echo him. “Nah?” I screeched.
“Can you do anything besides repeat what I say?”
Before I could stop myself, I took one long stride and slapped him across the face. Served the bastard right. How dare he mock me. Didn’t he know that my life was crumbling around me? Didn’t he know he’d caused it?
His reaction was lightning quick. He rose, unfurling himself to his full height, which towered over me. Grabbing my wrists in each hand, he spun me around. At the same time, he hooked one foot around my ankles and swept my feet out from under me. I fell backwards onto the couch. He followed, pinning me down. I was surrounded by his bulk, his smell. His face flared with intensity. I shivered. My rage shriveled immediately. Something about the way he was looking at me screamed danger, heat, violence. It screamed, Listen.
“I didn’t want this any more than you did, princess. But like I said, I didn’t have a choice. I’m stuck in this hellhole of a situation just like you. We’re mired in the same shit, you and I. I’m gonna try to make the best of it, by which I mean stay as far out of your way as possible. You do the same, and we’ll be just fine.”
He let the last few words linger in the air. Then he slowly released my wrists and stood up. Without a backwards glance, he paced into the adjacent bedroom and shut the door.
I sat on the couch for a long time after he had gone. Silence settled back over the room, so deep and complete that I could hear my heart beating in my ears. I rubbed my wrists back to life where he had squeezed them. I knew I looked ridiculous. I was sitting on this squeaky new couch in this sparse new apartment, wearing a pristine white wedding dress and staring at the floor with the world’s blankest expression. I could think only one thought, and I thought it over and over again for the longest time.
I’m married to a madman. And I’m pregnant with his kid.
Chapter Sixteen
Ben
I was lying in bed for hours with my eyes wide open. I couldn’t have slept even if someone was paying me to do it. A weird brand of adrenaline was coursing through my system. I felt too tired to get up and too awake to drift off. I wasn’t even thinking. I was just staring dumbly at the ceiling.
“Aw, shit,” I grumbled to myself after a while. I forced myself to climb out of bed and stand up. The apartment was dead quiet. I glanced at the clock on the bedside table and saw it was close to midnight. I wondered where Carmen had gone. She wasn’t in here. She must have still been in the living room.
I padded quietly to the door and eased it open, wincing as the hinges squeaked. Slipping through the crack, I walked out and looked around. There she was—asleep on the couch. Her dress was splayed across the cushions and drooped to the floor. She was curled up, deep in the middle of a dream, judging by the way her face twitched and frowned.
I felt all the tension I’d been carrying melt as I looked at her. She seemed so troubled. Shadows flitted across her face as a low murmur escaped her lips. It didn’t look to be a happy dream. Hell, none of this was happy for her. She’d been yanked out of her life and dropped without warning into mine. I couldn’t even imagine the kind of shit that must be racing through her head. Dreams were the least of her worries. Real life was the actual nightmare.
I wondered if I’d scared her too badly with my deaf and dumb routine earlier. She’d seemed like she was about to explode, she’d been so hopping mad. It was like rubbing salt in a wound to be so cold towards her, but I didn’t feel like I had a choice. I’d made a promise to myself to keep this girl the way she was. I knew damn well this life was capable of breaking a person. If I had any decency at all, I was going to shield her from that. And that meant shielding her from me. If I had to be rude to accomplish that goal, so be it.
Carmen’s head was kinked at a weird angle where it rested on the arm of the couch. I frowned. Sighing, I walked over to her and scooped her up in my arms. She was even lighter than I remembered. She barely weighed a thing. Nestled against my chest, she felt every bit as fragile as she looked. I was careful not to wake her as I turned to bring her to the bedroom.
I kicked open the door to the bedroom and crossed the threshold. The hinges squeaked again and a deep growl of annoyance ripped through my chest. Carmen stirred and turned to look at me with bleary eyes. I saw she was still mostly asleep.
“S’happening?” she asked.
“Shh,” I replied. “It’s okay. Go to sleep.”
She nodded and curled up again, her head against my chest. I didn’t know what this emotion I was feeling was, but it wasn’t familiar and I hated that. My life was simple before this: bikes, broads, and booze. Now, there was all this intangible shit mucking everything up. Goddamn James.
I laid Carmen down gently in the bed, then tugged the blankets up around her. I thought about easing her out of the wedding dress, but I decided against it. Let her sleep. She’d had a hell of a day. We both had.
The exhaustion hit me like a brick. Suddenly, I could barely keep my own eyes open. I slipped off my boots, wriggled out of the silly shirt I’d had on since the ceremony, and walked around to the other side of the bed. I crawled in beside her.
The heat of another person next to me was strange. I could count on one hand the number of times I’d let a woman spend the night, but suddenly this girl was two for two. Two nights together, two nights spent with skin against skin. I felt her hand brush mine and wrap softly around one of my fingers. I paused for a moment, but I didn’t move away.
For some reason, it felt right. Either way, it only took a moment before I was asleep, too.
# # #
When I woke up, the sun was piercing through the curtains and hitting me square in the face. I covered my eyes with one hand and groaned as I sat up straight in bed. It was already mid-morning. I couldn’t believe I’d slept so late. I didn’t even remember the last time I’d slept for this long straight through. Normally, I was lucky just to string a few hours together without the assistance of copious amounts of alcohol.
I felt movement next to me and looked over. I almost jumped out of bed. I’d completely forgotten about everything that had happened yesterday. Carmen was fast asleep next to me, still wearing her wedding dress. She looked less troubled than the night before, though. Her forehead had smoothed out and her mouth had relaxed.
I figured I’d let her sleep as much as she wanted. But I had to go to the clubhouse. There was work to be done. Finding a pen and scrap of an old receipt in the drawer of the bedside table, I scribbled a quick note and left it next to the alarm clock. Then I swapped out the suit pants for my black jeans and pulled a t-shirt over my head. I grabbed my leather jacket and my keys and swept out the door.
The ride to the clubhouse was quick. I’d picked an apartment just a few blocks away since I knew I’d be shuttling back and forth a lot. I hadn’t wanted to give up my room at the Dark Knights’ headquarters, but it wasn’t a good idea to have an old lady hanging around while I was trying to conduct business. Better to have her stashed away nearby. Close enough to keep an eye on but far enough away to keep her removed from some of the nastier things that on occasion happened under this roof.
Jay was smoking out front as I approached. I parked my bike just inside the gate and walked up to him.
&n
bsp; “Morning, Jay. How’s it hangin’?”
“Low and to the left,” he replied without smiling.
“You should take that comedy act of yours on the road. People pay big money to see a light-hearted guy like you.”
“That’s what they tell me, boss.” He took a drag and hooked a thumb behind him. “Someone’s waiting for you inside,” he said.
I raised an eyebrow. “Who?”
“Wouldn’t say. He’s Russian, though.”
“Hmm. Guess I’d better go see what the commie bastard wants.”
“Vodka and a rifle, just like the rest of ’em.”
“Politically correct as always, Jay,” I said. He grunted in response as I walked inside.
The transition from the bright outdoors to the dark interior of the clubhouse took me a second to adjust to. When my eyes refocused, I saw the broad back and bald head of the man Jay had mentioned. It was only ten in the morning, and yet he had a murderer’s row of drained shot glasses in front of him. I saw Slick behind the bar give me a shoulder shrug as I took the seat next to the man.
“I’m Ben,” I said as I settled down in the stool.
“I know who you are,” the man replied in a light Eastern European accent.
“My men said you were looking for me.”
“Yes.”
“Well?”
“Ivan sent me.”
“What for?”
“He tells me to say to you that he was very sorry that he could not help you with your problems. Truly. He considers you a friend and ally.”
“Nice to know.”
“Ivan has many friends.”
“He’s a real social butterfly, that one, ain’t he?”
The man did not laugh. “Many friends,” he repeated. “He likes to help his friends.”
“Get to the point, buddy.”
He ignored me. “Ivan especially liked your man Olaf. He did not like to hear about what happened to him.”
“None of us liked what happened to him.”
“It is the kind of thing for which there should be revenge, no?”
My fists tightened on the bar top. “There would be. But we don’t know a damn thing about who did it or why. Don’t you think I’d like to get back at the bastard who killed one of my men?”
He nodded soberly, then continued, “That is the right thing, yes. And that is why I am here.”
“You know something? Tell me,” I demanded. “Tell me what you know.”
As I glowered at him, he reached into his jacket and pulled out a slip of paper. “Here,” he said. “Go find this man. He knows something about Olaf.”
I took the paper from him and looked at it. It was a photograph of a thin white man, balding, with a wispy mustache. He had on a checkered, open-necked shirt and khakis. The photo looked like it had been taken without the man’s knowledge. Scrawled in messy handwriting across the bottom was a name: John Robinson.
“Who is this?”
“We do not know. But Ivan’s friends say that he knows something that will be of interest to you. I suggest you find him and ask him what it is he has seen or heard.” The man stood up from the stool and shrugged his jacket into place on his shoulders. “Ivan would like very much for you to mourn Olaf properly. As I said, he was very fond of him.”
I stared at the photo as he turned to leave. The man had ratty eyes, but he seemed normal enough. He certainly didn’t have that squinty gaze that most of the Bratva had, the kind of shifty, looking-over-my-shoulder-to-see-who’s-trying-to-kill-me expression that they all picked up sooner or later. They were a bloodthirsty crew, those Russians. But they had honor. I liked that about them. Ivan had done me a solid by finding this tip. He was a man worthy of respect, in spite of his proclivities for drugs and whores.
“Oh, and one more thing,” the man said, pivoting back around for a moment. “Ivan also says congratulations on your new wife. He is happy you have found a woman, although he would have suggested that you stay far away from the married life.”
I laughed and thought of Ivan berating his poor son. “Tell him I said thanks,” I replied. “And that I appreciate his friendship.”
The man nodded. “I will tell him.” Then he walked out the door, whistling.
I looked back at the photograph after he had gone. “I’m gonna find you, John Robinson,” I whispered. “And you’re going to tell me what happened to my friend.”
Chapter Seventeen
Carmen
I was alone when I woke up. It took me a minute to realize where the heck I was. I thought I’d fallen asleep on the couch last night, but now I was in a bed. I racked my brain trying to figure out how I’d managed to get up and walk without realizing it, when I remembered a blurry scene I’d thought at the time was a dream of Ben picking me up and tucking me gently into bed. I guessed it must have been real. Weird. The way I remembered it, he was so soft and careful, almost tender with his touch. I shook my head to clear the cobwebs. That was not Ben’s way at all. More likely, he’d slung me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and dropped me off here.
Speaking of Ben, I wondered where he was. The other half of the bed looked like it had been slept in, but now it was cold. Either I was wrong and he hadn’t slept here at all, or he’d been gone for a long time, a few hours at least.
I sat up and swung my legs over the side. My feet came to rest on the cold floorboards, sending shivers up my spine. This place needed a rug. As a matter of fact, this place needed a lot of things. The way it was set up now, it felt more like a morgue than a home. If I were going to be living here, I would want to get some decorations, put things on the walls—anything I could do to keep it from resembling an abnormally roomy jail cell.
That would have to wait until Ben got back from wherever he was, though. For now, all I wanted was a shower. I felt crusty with sleep and yesterday’s makeup. I’d fallen asleep without washing my face, and now I could feel the raccoon eyes from my mascara smudging against the pillows. Some hot water would do me justice. Getting out of this wedding dress wouldn’t be so bad either.
I stood up but immediately collapsed back down. My legs felt weak and shaky for some reason, and the sudden motion had brought a sickening wave of nausea crashing over me. I put a hand on my stomach and felt it gurgling. It had been almost a week since I’d last noticed any kicking or had morning sickness. I’d almost forgotten all about the baby.
I closed my eyes and breathed carefully until the nausea passed and I felt my pulse settle down to normal again. When it had, I took to my feet slowly, keeping a palm flat on the bedside table for support. This time, I didn’t feel sick, thankfully.
Reaching behind my back as far as I could manage, I unhooked the top of the dress and found the zipper. I dragged it down and breathed a sigh of relief as the tight upper portion peeled off of me. I wriggled it down my hips and stepped out in my bra and panties, leaving the dress pooled behind me.
I found the bathroom jutting off of the bedroom and stepped inside, shutting the door behind me. It felt good to be in a small space, like there was nothing that could happen in here that was out of my control or that I wouldn’t see coming. I started the shower and the room began to fill with steam.
Looking in the mirror, I saw a nightmarish reflection staring back. Makeup was streaked across my cheekbones and my hair had begun to work itself loose from the tight coils I’d worn during the wedding ceremony. I raised my fingers to my scalp and began finding all of the pins keeping the hair locked in place. As I pried them off one by one, my hair fell around me in a blonde tumble.
I stripped off my underwear and bra and stepped into the shower. The water was blazing hot, and at first I could barely stand to stick a toe under the scalding stream. But gradually, I worked my way underneath until it was pouring over my head and cascading down my skin. I closed my eyes and stood there for a long time. The shower beat down blissfully on my neck and back, trickling between my breasts and the welts that the dress had left on my spin
e and hips.
I found some soap and scrubbed at my skin. I couldn’t explain why, but it was as if I was peeling free of something, like a snakeskin, and the me that stepped out of this shower was going to be a completely different person than the one who had first stepped in. Like I was embracing my new life in yet another way, after Ben and I had had our first bike ride and first night under the same roof as Mr. and Mrs. Killmore. It wasn’t the worst name in the world, I supposed.
Then I shuddered. I was not about to let myself get used to this. One way or another, I’d find a means of escape.
Finally, after I’d soaped every inch of my skin and rinsed the suds away, I cut the faucet off. The silence of the room was perfect. I stood there for a moment longer, soaking it in, breathing in the warm air and letting it fill my lungs before it whooshed out in a long, tension-melting sigh. Then I climbed out of the shower and used the lone towel in the room to dry off my hair and body.
