Ember

by K. T Fisher

  The police officer looks between us all and then quickly nods his head. We all run past him, only stopping when we find the girls in the living room. They’re all in a circle, tied up back-to-back with gags covering their mouths. The police shout to the men dressed in black who are in there, guarding the girls.

  “Freeze!” The police shout. “Get on the floor!”

  I search the room for Roxie. I see Lacey being freed by Cole, Ria and Paige being assisted by Tate and Booker ripping free Crystal, but no Roxie. Where’s my woman and our baby?

  I hear Lacey crying. “He took her!” Cole is trying to calm her but he’s making no progress. “He took Roxie.”

  I quickly make my way over to her. “Who took her, Lace?”

  She looks to me with big, wet eyes. “Joe.”

  I fall to my knees in shock hearing his name. If Joe has Roxie, god only knows what’s happened to her. I grab at my hair and pull, screaming in frustration. Roxie and my baby need me. I need to get them away from that psycho bastard.

  Tate rips down Ria’s gag. “He took her upstairs.” She spits out.

  “Are you sure?” Cole asks her, and when Ria nods, I get up and run out the room and head upstairs. I hear footsteps behind me, but I don’t know if it’s the police or the guys. I turn and see three police officers following me and they don’t look happy that I am running in front. Too bad fuckers because I need to help Roxie.

  I search every room I pass, trying to find her, and I become restless as more rooms don’t reveal her. As I carry on running, a man much dressed like the ones on their knees downstairs runs at me with his gun held high. I dodge out of the way just in time as he shoots to my left and manage to land a punch to his temple. When he stumbles, I push him to the floor and kick him hard in the face, making him scream like a bitch. He drops his gun, and I quickly grab it. I slam down hard on his temple with the handle again. When he doesn’t fall the first time, I hit him harder, and relax when he falls to the floor, knocked out for the count. I look to the police behind me.

  “I’ve got this.” One of them says and bends down next to the guy I knocked out. He handcuffs him and as other come to help him another starts to walk past me.

  I quickly match his steps and he looks at me from the corner of his eye. “You need to stay back.” He whispers his order.

  “No offence but this is my woman and my baby. I’m helping.” With the gun I took from the thug in my hand, I carry on my search. I must be close if one of his men has already tried it with me.

  “You did well there, son,” one of the other policemen whispers as we quietly walk.

  I don’t answer. I just want to catch Joe. However, he probably heard me and his guard fighting nearby. I just pray for his own good that he hasn’t hurt Roxie.

  I find Roxie two rooms across from where I ran into one of Joe’s men. She’s tied up much like the girls downstairs were, only she’s sitting on the bed. I stare at her, trying to see if she’s in any sort of pain. If it wasn’t for the policeman standing beside me shouting towards the shadows, I wouldn’t have seen Joe.

  He comes forward, grimace in place as he holds a gun to Roxie’s head. My body starts to panic. I don’t like seeing that lethal weapon so close to the woman I love. I need to get him away from her and fast. I take a step closer but the policeman beside me orders me to stop.

  “Listen to him, Mason,” Joe mocks me. “You don’t want to do anything that will hurt poor Roxie here.”

  “Get the fuck away from her!” I shout.

  Joe laughs. “She’s my woman now.”

  I step forward again. “Like fuck she is!”

  “Stop right there, or I will blow her brains out!” Joe screams.

  “You aren’t going to do shit!” I shout back. “You say she’s your woman, and so you threaten to shoot her? You’re bullshitting.”

  From the corner of my eye, I see movement through the side door that leads to the bathroom connecting to the bedroom next door.

  “It’s better than seeing her and my baby with you.” He presses the gun harder into Roxie’s head.

  “This is your last warning,” I tell him, but Joe just laughs.

  “I’m really scared.”

  As soon as he speaks, Booker runs from the joint bathroom and charges straight into Joe. As Booker wrestles him to the floor, I take advantage and run for Roxie, trying to get her out of here as quick as possible.

  As I rip away her gag, a loud gunshot makes us both jump and I look over to see Joe and Booker in a crumpled mess, the police surrounding them.

  “Oh god, no!” Roxie cries.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Roxie

  “Is he hurt?” I ask Mason. I really hope Booker is ok.

  “Are you ok?” Mason asks me, and I nod. I’m as good as I can be.

  The rest of our friends appear in the room, all concerned about Booker. They rush by my side to check me over and then look down to Joe and Booker, waiting.

  The paramedics run in and gently pull Joe’s body away from Booker’s, and that’s when we see all the blood. So much blood.

  “He’s dead,” I hear the paramedic declare.

  “Both of them?” asks another.

  “No, this one is alive,” he replies.

  This room is silent, the only sounds are the paramedics working hard on their patients, and Crystal’s crying. Finally, she can’t take anymore, and she runs to him, kneeling by his side and crying even harder than before.

  I’ve never seen a dead body before, and I’ve never put much thought to it. I guess I thought that when I did, I would be freaked out or upset, but one emotion I thought I never would experience was happiness. When the paramedics carry Joe onto a stretcher and Booker onto another, I am so relieved that Booker has survived and even more so that Joe is dead. Call me a heartless bitch, but after what he has put me through, I am so fucking happy!

  The policeman who shot Joe dead explains that he had his gun aimed at Joe because he was a threat, not just to me, but everyone in the house seeing as he was carrying a gun of his own. When he watched Booker and Joe fight on the floor, he saw Joe aim the gun at Booker’s chest so he shot at him to stun him, hoping to distract him from hurting Booker. Joe moved right at the last minute, though, and caused the officer’s gunshot to hit him in the neck. I just hope he experienced some pain before he left this world.

  “Looks like a shoulder injury,” the paramedic reports, trying to stop the bleeding pouring from Booker’s wound. Crystal looks at him, panic and dread written all over her face.

  We all follow them downstairs, and I scowl at Joe’s lifeless body the whole time. When we get to the ambulances, Crystal follows Booker in without a word to anyone. If you didn’t suspect anything between them already, you would now. Even Tate, who frowns as he watches her, doesn’t say a word. This is just one of those times that you leave the lesser things go in order to get through the more important.

  Just as Booker and Crystal drive away in the ambulance, and Joe’s dead body leaves me for good, I feel a warm feeling between my legs. I look down and gasp as I see the redness between my thighs.

  “Roxie!” I hear Lacey shout from beside me and she runs towards me, ignoring her own safety.

  “Oh no!” I cry. “No! No! No!”

  Mason turns and his eyes widen when he sees the blood leaking down my thighs. “What’s happening?”

  “I don’t know,” I cry. “Oh god, Mase, I don’t want to lose our baby.”

  Mason looks me dead set in the eye. “We are not losing this baby, Rox.”

  With determination he picks me up and carries me to Cole’s car. Cole is quickly by our side with his keys and gets in the driver’s seat.

  “What are you doing?” Mason demands.

  “Driving so you can ride in the back and look after Rox.” Mason nods and helps me in, before climbing in himself. Lacey gets in the front with Cole, and we rush off to the hospital with the luxury of a police escort. When they found out what was
happening, they demanded we let them so we could get there faster. Nobody argued because we were all wishing the same thing.

  As I silently cry in the back with Mason, blood spoiling Cole’s car, I pray that my baby is ok. Please let my baby be ok.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Roxie

  After getting rushed into the hospital, we’re taken to a private room, and Mason gently lays me down on the bed. I can’t stop crying and even Mason’s soft and loving touches won’t help. I just want my baby to be safe.

  I think I zone out a little bit, because I see Lacey and Mason talking, but I don’t hear anything.

  I’ve already spoken to the nurse, and she knows everything. From the risk of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome due to my early drinking and what happened today, there’s a few reasons as to why this has happened.

  She left pretty quickly when she saw the bleeding, claiming that they needed to do a scan. I should be excited that I’m having the chance to see my baby again, but I’m not. What if I look at the screen and my baby isn’t alive anymore?

  This is all Joe’s fucking fault!

  Mason strokes my hair and whispers sweet nothings in my ear. I feel guilty that I’m not talking to him, but I need to focus on the baby.

  There’s a slight knock on the door, and the nurse returns, popping her head around the door. “You ready?” she asks.

  “For what?” Mason asks.

  The nurse walks in with a little machine behind her and another nurse follows closely behind her. “We’re going to give Roxie a scan and check on the baby.”

  Mason nods and stays quiet as both nurses go about their business. Once the machine is ready, they pour gel onto my stomach and then I pray. I don’t look at the screen because I can’t. I just look at the end of the room, hoping that my tiny baby is safe and sound.

  About five minutes passes and everything remains quiet. The nurses whisper to each other, checking everything over, until they both turn to me.

  “Ok Roxie.” The first nurse smiles. “Firstly, the baby is fine.”

  I breathe a sigh of relief. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Your baby is healthy and safe. Your bleeding looks like it’s caused by stress. So I suggest getting plenty of bed rest.” She places her hand on mine and smiles.

  I can’t stop crying. I am so happy, and after all my fears I am so relieved. After all the shit Joe has put me through, he cannot and has not taken my baby.

  “For how long?” Lacey asks.

  “To be on the safe side, I would say for about a month. Take it really easy. If you don’t have to walk, don’t. Only when you really need to. Try your best to relax and be calm. Seeing the amount of stress you have been through, I can understand why this has happened, so to be safe, try and do this for as long as possible. The longer you rest, the better the pregnancy.”

  “I’ll make sure she gets as much rest as possible,” Mason tells her, and she gives him a wide grin.

  “I have no doubt you will.” She packs away the machine and then pauses. “Oh, by the way: I can tell you the sex of your baby if you would like to hear it?”

  I look to Mason and his huge smile tells me his answer. With tears still running down my cheeks I nod and say, “Yes.”

  Mason gently sits next to me on the bed and squeezes my hand as we wait for the excited news.

  “You’re going to have a son,” the nurse beams brightly at us.

  Mason jumps up and shouts his praises, and I cry even more. A son! I’m having a little boy.

  My happiness is short lived when the nurse proceeds to tell me that I have to stay in the hospital for a couple of nights for my own health, just in case the bleeding returns.

  A couple of hours after I find out that not only is my baby safe, but that we’re having a boy, Crystal walks in and immediately hugs me.

  “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know what had happened until Paige told me. I’ve been waiting to hear about Booker, and I guess nobody wanted to tell me about you until he was out of surgery.” I can see she’s been crying and not to be horrible, but she looks a mess. I’m not surprised.

  “Crys, don’t worry about it,” I assure her. She softly nods and wipes at her eyes. “How is he?” I ask her, because much like everyone did to her, I haven’t heard about Booker due to Mason worrying about stressing me out.

  Finally, I see a smile on her face. “He’s doing great. Well, considering.” She giggles. “They said that the surgery was pretty much straightforward and he will have a speedy recovery.”

  “Thank god.” I lean back and look up at the ceiling. “I’m looking forward to all this shit ending.”

  “Me too, honey.” She cuddles me again. “And I hear you’re having a little boy!”

  “Yes.” I smile widely. “I’m having a boy!”

  If I could, I would be up and bouncing around with happiness. Even if I was allowed to do that, I have Mason watching me to make sure I get all the rest I need.

  Mason manages to persuade the hospital staff to allow him to stay with me in my room and I couldn’t be happier. Finally alone, we snuggle close in my hard hospital bed, but in this moment I am feeling so high. Nothing can bring me down.

  I have come out of rehab successfully and managed to fight my cravings. I have Mason back in my life, and I’m pregnant with our little son who I cannot wait to meet.

  From here, everything that happened before is put behind me, and I look forward to whatever the future holds.

  Epilogue

  Roxie

  Eight Months Later…

  So what has happened in these last eight months?

  To be honest, not a lot, really, and that might sound boring, but to me, it’s heaven. After all the stress Joe and the secrets caused me, I was glad to have a simple life! As straight forward a life being the girlfriend of a huge rock star can be, that is.

  Weirdly, the disaster we have gone through has created a major press hype surrounding the band and has boosted nearly every freaking single and album they have released. At least some good has come out of all this crap in my life. I’ve had to deal with the aftermath of Joe even though he’s not here. While I was recovering in the hospital, the police were digging though Joe’s craziness, and it turns out his head was even more twisted than I thought. Through people who work for Black Inferno, which are probably the same contacts that Natasha went through, they found out where Joe had been hiding and what they found freaked out everyone.

  The building was long abandoned, dirty, and filled with enough evidence to lock him up for a really long time if he wasn’t dead. Not only was there blood in every single room and disgusting bodily fluids, but there was a sick tick list of women he had used and abused that looked scarily like me. According to the police, the women and girls he had taken had been missing for a number of months, but sadly, only two have been found. From the statements by the victims, Joe would use them and call them their little Roxie girls which made me shiver when I heard about it. When he was finished with them, he would pass them along to his men who would beat, abuse and torture them until a new girl came along and they got bored with her. They would sell her to the highest bidder to their sick and twisted contacts, and then the whole cycle would start all over again with another girl. Knowing this makes me fear for Natasha. We have to find her, and not a day goes by where I don’t think about her and hope for her safety.

  On the plus side, we have had some special moments. After Mason and I found out that we were having a son, I was forced to bed rest for the remainder of my pregnancy. I knew it was for the good of my baby boy, but it almost killed me. I was so bored of sitting on my ass, and I swear to god my butt started to get flat and I was not having that!

  Obviously, my little boy was on the same wave length as me, because the next morning I woke to a wet bed. My water broke! Yes, it was all a little scary because he was coming five weeks early, but after the scare we had months earlier, it was a much better outcome, and little Quinton Rocco Masse was born at a heat
hy weight of 8lbs 3oz despite him being early. He is my absolute world, and I can’t ever think of my life without him or even my life before he was here. It feels like he’s always been here with me, even though he’s only five months old. He’s so chubby and chunky that everyone just wants to squeeze him when they see him, but the best thing that warms my heart is the fact that little Quinn is looks exactly like his daddy. Even though I knew by the dates that Quinton is not by any means Joe’s child, we had a DNA test when he was born, just to be on the safe side, and it confirmed that Mason was the father. So now when I look into my son’s eyes and see Mason’s hazel ones shining back at me, I couldn’t be happier.

  “Rox!?” I hear Mason shout at me.

  “Up here,” I reply, but I don’t move at all.

  I hear Mason’s feet as he finds me and enters the room I’m in. Mason laughs when he sees me. “Babe, are you going to stare at Rocco all night?”

  Quinton has a few nicknames already, and I ‘m sure when he’s older he will let us know what he prefers, but right now we all have a mixture from Quinn, Rocco, Rocky and Baby Mase.

  I nod in answer to Mason, because I just want to watch my baby boy sleeping. He looks so peaceful and beautiful. I am so relieved all our stress has gone now that Quinton is here.

  “You need a new hobby, babe,” Mason jokes.

  “Shut up,” I whisper. “Quinn is my hobby now.”

  Truthfully, he is. Since I went to rehab, my job fired my ass, so all I do is look after my son. I don’t even mind at all. It’s not like I have to work, because Mason has money coming out of his ass, but, eventually, I do want to get back into some line of work. Until then I’m going to enjoy my little boy as much as I possibly can.

  Mason steps closer, and my body immediately becomes aware of him, but I continue to look down into Quinton’s crib to make it appear as if I’m not paying my boyfriend any attention. Mason wraps his arms around me and I melt, I always do where Mason is concerned. He nibbles on the bottom of my neck, and my body shivers.