Beyond Shame b-1

by Kit Rocha

  “This is useless,” Jasper muttered, more to himself than to Dallas. Martel was a dead man already, and only information could delay his execution. If he didn’t have that, he was out of time.

  Dallas watched their captive, icy rage gathering behind the blank expression he’d worn since he’d first seen Lex, unconscious and bleeding. “I agree,” he said. “Unless you want to take a couple swings for Noelle, why don’t you go see if Bren’s friend is any smarter than this sorry bastard?”

  Jasper shook his head and turned. Even if he had the stomach for it, it wasn’t his style. “Martel’s yours.” He tossed the words back over his shoulder.

  “Damn right he is,” came Dallas’s reply, a claim reinforced by the sound of a fist hitting flesh, along with Martel’s pained grunt.

  The cries rose into screams, and Jasper closed the door behind him to shut them out. Bren’s friend, Lorenzo Cruz, sat at the square table in the center of the room, his shirt stripped away. Rachel perched beside him, swabbing antiseptic on his shoulder.

  Jasper watched as she set the gauze aside and reached for a wickedly sharp scalpel instead. One cut, shallow and slow—and Cruz didn’t blink, showed no sign whatsoever that he felt the incision.

  Ace winced at another muffled scream from behind the door. “I don’t know what’s creepier. That guy’s screaming, or the fact that Rachel’s cutting a tracker out of this motherfucker’s flesh without drugs, and he’s not even twitching.”

  “I have a delicate touch,” she murmured, then flashed Cruz a reassuring look. “It’s okay, right?”

  “It’s fine.” Cruz shared a tight smile with Bren. “I’ve been through worse.”

  “He’s being modest.” Bren tapped the table. “We were running an undercover op once. Dipshit here got shot in the leg and still managed to con his way through a sector checkpoint without blowing it.”

  “You do what you gotta do to get the job done.” Cruz met Jasper’s gaze. “When it’s a job you can live with. Fewer and fewer of those coming down from on high these days.”

  “Or you’ve worked your way too far up the food chain to keep your conscience clean.” Jasper dragged out an empty chair and sat. “Can you connect this guy to Gareth Woods?”

  Cruz nodded. “No doubt. Martel’s been tasked to Woods’s security detail for the last six months.”

  “Why would Woods want Noelle dead? How did he even know where she was?”

  Both of Cruz’s eyebrows swept upwards. “You must not have access to the vid network out here.”

  Ace answered with a frown. “Not without patching in, which is usually more trouble than it’s worth. Why, has Noelle been in the vids?”

  “Nonstop for the last couple days,” Cruz replied. “Someone leaked a video of her serving drinks at that club of yours, and now everyone in Eden thinks her father’s doing dirty business with Dallas O’Kane.”

  It made killing her the perfect way to discredit Cunningham. Everyone in Eden would assume he’d done it to cover up his dealings with Dallas. “How many others would jump at this chance?” Jasper asked. “Even if we deal with Woods, is she still in danger?”

  Cruz blinked and glanced at Bren. “Is this guy for real? He’s just going to deal with a councilman?”

  “Him? No.” Bren inclined his head toward the door. “But Dallas? Yeah.”

  Jasper bit his tongue, but not even that could hold back his vicious curse. “Fuck that. I’m not passing everything off to Dallas, not this time.”

  “You can’t waltz into Eden and double tap the guy with a forty-five, either. Hitting Woods is going to take money, planning, and a hell of a lot of favors.” Bren lit a cigarette. “Dallas is the only one who can get it done, no matter how much you want to be the one protecting Noelle.”

  “Shit.” Cruz’s face shuttered. “As long as she’s in the sectors, she’s a liability for her father, which means she’s a target for any of his enemies. Cunningham knows that. This morning he put out a press release talking about how he was going to rescue her.”

  Jasper bit off a curse. “So the only way to stop the attempts is either to scare the shit out of anyone who even thinks about trying it…or to send her back to her family.”

  Ace interrupted for the first time. “She’s inked. Will they even take her back? How much juice does her pop have?”

  “He has plenty,” Rachel answered. “At least, he did when I lived there. I’m sure he’ll spin it like she’s gone nuts, but he couldn’t leave her out here, so he brought her home to recover.”

  “The trauma of the sectors,” Cruz drawled. “She could strip naked and walk down the streets of Eden, and people would eat up the scandal. If her father managed to bury the original charges, he could play the martyr. The loving father struggling to save his daughter’s eternal soul. Of course, he’d have to ruin the men who originally arrested her…” He glanced at Bren. “But most of the councilmen aren’t above framing good men for their own gain.”

  “It’s been known to happen,” Bren agreed mildly.

  “There.” Rachel dropped something tiny into a metal bowl with a clink, then smoothed down the edges of a small, square bandage on Cruz’s arm. “No more tracker.”

  “Thanks.” Cruz flexed slightly, testing his shoulder. “I guess there’s no going back for me. The Cunningham girl is lucky the rules don’t apply to her.”

  “Yeah.” But something told Jasper that Noelle wouldn’t agree.

  The door to the back room crashed open, and Dallas stepped through, wiping his bloody hands on a rag. Through the doorway, Jasper could just make out the still, unmoving form of Alistair Martel.

  Bren rose. “It’s done?”

  Dallas nodded shortly and met Cruz’s eyes. “I know what you gave up to bring us Martel. I’ll make sure we’re square.” Dallas shifted his attention to Rachel. “You and Ace take our new friend out front. Get him something to eat, and anything else he needs.”

  They hustled the man out of the room, leaving Jasper staring at Dallas and Bren. “Tell me this isn’t as fucked up as it seems.”

  Dallas listened in silence as Bren relayed everything Cruz had told them, and shook his head when the man finished. “This is what I’ve been trying to tell you all along, Jas. Politics in Eden are like a vicious, bloody game of chess.” He sighed. “I’d bet my boots a story about the attempt on her life is about to hit the vid network, if it hasn’t already. Noelle’s on the board now, and the game doesn’t end until she’s either back in Eden or dead.”

  All that mattered to Jasper was her safety. “I’m going to see what Mad can set up. We need to monitor the situation in Eden.”

  “Bren can do that.” Dallas gestured. “Go now. I need to talk to Jasper.”

  Jasper wasn’t remotely in the mood, and he told Dallas so before the door even snapped shut. “The pep talk’s gonna have to wait, coach.”

  “This isn’t a pep talk.” Dallas braced both hands on the table. “What are you going to do if her father shows up to rescue her? If he offers her a free pass, all sins forgiven, right back to her cushy, safe little life? What are you going to do when she looks to you to help her decide?”

  He’d tell her that it wasn’t his decision, that she was the only one who truly knew what to do—except he knew it was a lie. He’d do everything he had to do to keep her out of danger. “I’ll tell her she needs to go,” he snarled.

  Dallas didn’t look surprised. He didn’t look happy, either. “Can you live with that?”

  “I don’t exactly have a choice.”

  “You have two choices, and they’re both shit.”

  Let her go, or keep her and maybe get her killed. “They’re both shit,” Jasper echoed. “But they’re all I’ve got, unless you’re cooking something up in that head of yours.”

  “I have a few ideas,” Dallas said, but held up his hand before Jasper could say anything. “But nothing that’ll make her any safer than she is now. Hell, for all I know, we’re headed into a territory war. I’ll pro
tect Noelle like she’s one of us—but you know what war means.”

  First Trent’s bomb, and now a sniper from Eden. Things were going to shit all over the place, just like the days when they’d had to scrounge and fight like hell for every scrap of peace that came their way. If they were smart, they’d take precautions.

  Some of the men hadn’t hesitated to take women then, even knowing they might not come home to them at the end of the night, but Jasper had never been one of them. “I won’t keep a woman I can’t protect. That hasn’t changed.”

  Dallas sighed. “Can’t say I fault your logic, Jas…but maybe that means we’re both looking at cold, lonely lives.”

  “There are worse things.” Like more gunshots, and Noelle’s eyes blank and unseeing instead of snapping with life.

  “All right.” Dallas straightened and rubbed a hand over his hair. “I’ll reach out to Cunningham and let him know I’m open to talking. Maybe you won’t have to make the choice at all.”

  “He’ll want her back.” Jasper took a deep breath. “What do we do with Martel’s body? Make it disappear, or make sure they find it?”

  Dallas stared at the wall and flexed his hands thoughtfully. “Put him on ice,” he said finally. “Let me hear what Cunningham has to say, and then we’ll decide.”

  “Speaking of ice, get some on your hands,” Jasper advised.

  “Yeah.” Dallas stared down at his bruised knuckles. “I need to go tell Lex it’s over before she crawls out of bed and hurts herself again.”

  It was his job to check on Lex, to make sure she was recovering and safe. It was Jasper’s equal responsibility to do the same for Noelle, but he needed distance. He needed to let go. “Will you…?”

  “I’ll take care of her,” Dallas replied quietly. “You go find Bren and Mad. It’s going to be a long night.”

  That it was.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Jasper was avoiding her.

  At first, she thought it was her imagination. Dallas had returned late and grumpy, and Noelle had been too wrung out to traverse the warren of hallways back to Lex’s empty bed. But sleep had been fleeting and restless, interrupted whenever she slipped her hand into the vacant space to her left. Every time she woke, she forced her eyes shut again by promising herself that the next time she flung her arm wide it would slam into the unforgiving wall of Jasper’s chest.

  It never did.

  She’d edged out of the huge bed at dawn, fleeing a loneliness that was more cutting in Dallas and Lex’s presence than it could have possibly been alone. Dallas had cracked open one eye to squint at her as she pulled on her clothing, but after admonishing her not to leave the compound, he tucked Lex’s sleeping form more firmly against his side and closed his eyes again.

  He’d probably assumed she was going to find Jasper, but she hadn’t. She’d already felt it then—something beyond sneaking suspicion. The certainty that Jasper wasn’t simply not present, but absent. Deliberately not there.

  It wasn’t until she was huddled in a cooling bath in Lex’s quarters that she understood the conviction. Her hands trembled as she scrubbed a washcloth over her newly healed skin, and she needed him. She needed to see him, touch him, know he was safe. She needed to curl up in his arms and know she was safe.

  She needed him, and he was supposed to know that. He had to know that. If he didn’t, how could she trust him to know everything else she needed? And if he did know but was ignoring her…

  No. It was too soon for such thoughts, especially with all the danger. Dallas had admitted to sending Jasper out on some unspecified errand. Maybe it had taken most of the night. Maybe he’d fallen into his bed not long before she’d crawled out of Dallas’s, and if she went to him now he’d open his arms and fold them around her—

  She didn’t. She told herself it was because he needed rest, and because it didn’t matter anyway. She drained the tub and dressed for the day, braided her hair in a crown around her head and picked out a short-sleeved T-shirt that left her arms—and her tattoos—bare. Paired with heeled boots and jeans and one of Lex’s studded leather belts, it felt like armor.

  She was an O’Kane. One night of uncertainty wouldn’t change that. Nothing could change that. That was the promise tattooed into her skin—her loyalty in exchange for their protection. Forever.

  Besides, she wasn’t entirely helpless anymore. She didn’t need Jasper or Lex to hold her hand and give her something to do. The stage had been cleaned of Lex’s blood, but the club still needed tending. Trix would be there to open the doors by noon, ready to serve the truly dedicated drinkers and sell individual bottles of liquor to anyone unable to strike a special deal with Dallas.

  Life had to go on.

  Noelle had swept the floor and taken down the chairs by the time Trix arrived, trailing a quiet bouncer named Zan. Zan nodded to her and positioned himself just outside the door, a solid wall of muscle that could—and would—turn deadly at the slightest hint of danger.

  Noelle had traded her broom for a cloth to wipe down the scarred wooden tables when the door swung open again, admitting two men almost as large as Zan—and tragically familiar.

  Her father’s bodyguards.

  She barely had time to wrap her brain around that—her father’s bodyguards—before he followed them inside, blinking against the darkness and skirting tables with a wide berth, as if merely touching them would contaminate him.

  Her father. Here.

  Noelle clenched her fingers around the cloth until the nubby fabric dug painfully into her skin. Her father looked impossibly older, as if months or even years had passed instead of weeks and days. The grooves carved around his steely eyes were deeper, the furrows that formed when his brows drew together more intense. He seemed tired, stressed, and she knew with a certainty borne of painful experience that her absence couldn’t possibly account for either state. Not on its own, anyway.

  He looked at her—no, past her, his gaze gliding by without a glimmer of recognition before snapping back to her face. His brow crinkled, and he straightened the hem of his jacket. “Noelle. I didn’t recognize you.”

  She didn’t know what to call him. Sir was an honor she wouldn’t give him, not anymore, but she’d never called him anything more familiar. She’d never been permitted to.

  No greeting, then. Squaring her shoulders, she faced him with only her deathly grip on the dishtowel to betray her fear. “I wouldn’t have expected to see you here.”

  “I’ve been looking for you.”

  Not very hard, obviously. “I’ve been here since the day I was banished.”

  His jaw tightened. “I didn’t know where here was.”

  “Fine.” It wasn’t worth arguing about, so she changed the subject. “Why do you care?”

  The question seemed to take him aback. “Because I’m here to take you home. Your mother and I—we want you to come home.”

  It was so unexpected, so impossible, that for a moment Noelle could do nothing but stare at him. He stared back, the perfect picture of polite surprise—and even here, in the sector slums, he might as well have been playing for the vids.

  Anger took root, and she gave it voice for the first time in her life. “Why? I’m ruined. Damaged beyond repair. You’ll never find a man in Eden who would agree to marry me.”

  He looked away. “Your citizenship will be reinstated, and you’ll be free to live in Eden again. Isn’t that enough?”

  An answer that wasn’t an answer at all. “Why?”

  Edwin—she could barely think of him as her father anymore—huffed out a disgusted noise. “Why is why a question, Noelle? What’s the alternative? You can’t stay here.”

  She wanted more than anything to throw the word at him again, to taunt and prod at him, but that was the impulse of a child, not a woman. “I can stay right where I am,” she said instead, keeping her voice as even as possible. “And I intend to.”

  He held out his hand, and one of the guards pressed a tablet into it. “Even if Mr.
O’Kane contacted me about your presence here?”

  “He wouldn’t,” she said without thinking, but the words were ash on her tongue before the sound died. Last night’s guilt roared back to life, and she knew she’d been right. The bullets had been meant for her. Her father knew it, Dallas knew it…

  Jasper probably knew it.

  He’d never come to find her. Maybe he hadn’t wanted to say goodbye.

  “It would serve everyone’s purposes.” Edwin’s voice gentled. “Come home, Noelle. Your mother misses you.”

  Home. Her empty room with its endless trinkets, physical luxury and unending leisure. Hot showers and baths that never cooled, no matter how long you lingered. Soft lighting from every surface. Sheets changed every morning by silent servants.

  Never being touched. Never feeling. No pain, no pleasure, just the anesthesia of safety.

  Her lips were numb already. “Let me see,” she whispered. “Let me see what he said.”

  Edwin passed her the tablet, and she looked down at the white screen with its sparse black type. I’m willing to discuss arrangements.

  The words could mean anything. That Dallas wanted her gone, that he was willing to barter her for Lex’s safety. And he would, if it came down to it—Noelle didn’t question that for a moment—but Lex would never forgive him. She wouldn’t have agreed to pack Noelle off to the city.

  Of course, the words really could mean anything. Maybe she wasn’t giving Dallas enough credit. She wore his ink now, and loyalty went both ways.

  And Edwin had always told lies with the truth.

  Fixing her expression, she handed the tablet back to him. “Doesn’t say anything about me.”

  Instead of arguing, he nodded. “I thought you might take some convincing. Will you at least think about it?”

  “About coming back?” She tossed the towel on the nearest table and spread her arms wide, showing off the black tattoos circling each wrist and forearm. “I’m an O’Kane, ink and all, and I like it here. What can you offer me?”