No thought of consequence.
No thought of remorse.
The only thing I saw was red when I jumped on him and started pounding on his fuck-ugly face.
Nothing but delirium invoked in the first punch.
Memories assaulted me as I assaulted the prick.
Image after image.
Horror and hate and hunger.
Hits. Blows. Kicks. Scrapes. Screams.
And I couldn’t stop.
Couldn’t stop beating him bloody.
Knew he deserved every blow.
“You piece of shit . . . you think you own her? Is that what you think? Did you force her into this? Is that what this is?”
Motherfucking pimp prick.
Pain splintered across the side of my head and spread across my face.
Out of nowhere.
Knocking me back an inch.
I blinked in shock, trying to process what was happening around me. To see through the haze of fury that clouded my eyes.
Took me a second to realize the punch wasn’t delivered by the pussy who I had pinned on the floor, but by the bastard who’d appeared at the fringes of the hall.
Two on one.
Bring it on.
I didn’t care.
In half a beat, I was on my feet and had him rammed against the wall. His face slammed into the black-wallpapered plaster.
A scream pierced the space. The girl who’d started this whole thing stumbled around the pile of bodies I was making in the hall, wearing nothing but a thong and heels.
People scrambled from the main room, some to get out the front door before the cops showed and others vying for a front-row seat.
Before I could make sense of it, another asshole was on my back. Hauling me away from the bastard and tossing me against the wall. I hit it with an oomph, all that aggression spiking high. My muscles pulsed, my eyes darting between all three of the guys who’d ganged up on me.
Calculating my next move.
The first pussy pulled his beaten ass off the floor, wiping at his bloodied face. With my body pinned to the wall, he stepped up and delivered a sucker-punch to my gut.
I fucking growled, welcoming the pain, and the adrenaline only grew.
Ready to tear through them all.
Didn’t take a whole lot to throw off the piece of shit who held me against the wall. Nothing but a kick to his knee to send him fumbling back, howling in agony, and I went for the little bastard who was about to bear the brunt of the hostility roiling inside me.
Alcohol soaking my brain and repulsion saturating my spirit.
A hand landed on my arm, whipping me around. It was the same guy who’d served me up as a present for the little fucker I wanted to break in two.
“Get out of my club and don’t come back. You got it. We don’t do trouble around here.”
Don’t do trouble.
Fucking priceless.
I would have laughed if I wasn’t irate.
They just pimped out girls in the back room like a bad rumor.
It didn’t happen in the VIP room, my ass.
“That’s too bad because I’m in the mood to cause a little trouble.”
Just as fast as the crowd had gathered, they were being pushed back.
Shit.
There was Mack, tossing people aside as he stalked through the mass like a battering ram.
Talk about burly assholes.
He flashed his badge at the prick who had his meaty palm on my arm.
Everyone scattered.
Motherfucking rats with a light shined in their sewer.
The guy released me and backed away, his hands held up in surrender. But he clearly wasn’t what Mack was interested in. My best friend grabbed me by the collar and started to drag me down the opposite side of the hall toward the emergency exit at the end.
He shoved it open and tossed me out into the cool night.
I stumbled across the pavement.
The aggression burning all the way to my bones surged, emotions thick, too much, so dark I couldn’t see.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I managed to press out, my knuckle coming up to my mouth and finding I had a busted lip.
He laughed a hard sound. “I’m a detective in Charleston, Ian. It’s my job to know whatever shit is going down. Have a connection who works here. She recognized you, gave me a text when you got in that prick’s face and said things were about to get heavy. Was having a drink with Jace two blocks over since he’s in town for business, and I booked it over.”
“You have a contact? Inside? Here?” Incredulous, I spat the words at him, angry that he might have someone following me.
Paranoid and delusional, I knew. But when it came to Mack and me, we kept our jobs to ourselves. Our secrets tucked away because the two didn’t mesh.
No doubt, he knew I’d done some questionable shit in my life. Last thing I wanted to do was put him in a bad position, to have to make a judgment call when it came to right and wrong when the guy was always in the right.
“Don’t ask questions you don’t really want the answers to.” There was something in his expression, something that set me off kilter, a warzone in his eyes.
Like he was holding something back. Instantly, I was taken back to our conversation from two nights before that somehow felt like a century ago, when he’d warned me to cut ties with Lawrence.
God.
Maybe I really had gotten myself in too deep.
A loud truck engine rumbled at the head of the alley. It came to a stop, and Jace ducked out.
Great.
Just what I fucking needed.
My brother and best friend thinking they needed to wipe my ass.
Hold my goddamned hand.
I turned on Mack. “I was completely fine. Don’t need you showing up here like the calvary. I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”
He quirked a brow. “Says the guy who just about started a brawl. Those fuckers aren’t to be toyed with.”
“Seemed like good enough fun to me.”
He scrubbed a frustrated hand over his face. “Fine, man, laugh it off. But there’s shit going down in there that you don’t need to get involved in. I’m serious.” His voice went low.
“I was only there to have a drink or two to unwind after a long day’s work. Prick tried to swindle cash out of me. You should know me well enough to know that wasn’t going to end well.”
Jace edged closer to me like he was corralling a caged animal. Like I just might attack.
Wasn’t so far from the truth.
Adrenaline still pumped and burned, and I was itching to throw back open that door and hunt those pricks down. Easy prey.
Expendable.
Just like Lawrence Bennet was trying to make me.
“Are you okay, man?” Jace asked, caution in his tone, eyes searching me, forever the protector. He zeroed in on the cut on my lip, like I was a two-year-old who’d fallen and scraped his knee.
“I’m fine. You didn’t need to come over here.”
“You sure about that?”
“One hundred percent.”
Jace turned his attention to the back of the seedy club and shook his head.
Not like it was some big-ass deal that a lowlife like me would show up at a place like this to see some tit at the end of the night.
But Jace knew . . . he fucking knew, and it grated on me.
He knew my predilection.
The compulsion.
Right then, it felt like he was reaching in and searching through all the shit I didn’t want him to see, the scars and the agony and the bottled pain.
Too much like that girl who was driving me crazy.
Grace.
Sweet, sweet Grace.
Grace who had immediately filled my mind when the girl inside had been climbing all over me.
The one I couldn’t have, and I was aching to take.
“You don’t have to hang on to it any more, Ian. I know
you blame yourself. By now, you have to have realized, it wasn’t your fault. She chose that life, not you, and there was nothing either of us could do to stop her.”
The second the words left Jace’s mouth, a fiery bolt of fury shot through my body.
Flames at my insides.
I’d felt it coming. What he’d been wanting to bring up. Revisit what was buried.
Not a fucking chance in hell was it getting uncovered.
I pointed at him. “Don’t fucking go there. You don’t know. You weren’t there.”
He laughed a bitter sound. “Are you kidding me? You think I didn’t go through it for all those years, too? You think I didn’t do everything to take care of you?”
Of course, I knew. Of course, I did.
My chest ached, and he pushed on, not stopping as he angled his face toward mine. “You think it didn’t kill me that I had to leave you, Ian? With her? You think that when I found out what happened, I wouldn’t have given anything to be there with you?”
My throat locked up.
It was my fault.
It was my fault.
But I couldn’t say it. Couldn’t admit it. Couldn’t stand losing my brother when he finally found out what I’d done.
He’d gone to prison to protect me. Me. And while he’d been gone, it was me who had committed the greatest crime.
I backed away. “Just . . . don’t. Anything you’ve got to say? Save it. Because it’s done and over and there isn’t anything that will change it. I buried any pain I had with her, so don’t stand over there thinking that you need to come and save me. I have everything I want. Everything I need.”
Sorrow passed through Jace’s eyes. Grief and injury, not to mention the protection he’d always felt for me.
My knees rocked.
I forced myself to stand. Not to show the weakness that threatened to knock me off my feet.
“Is that what you want to tell yourself?” Jace asked, no challenge in his voice, just pity.
I wanted none of it.
I pointed at him as I took a step back. “You got your family, Jace. Reclaimed what you needed. What you wanted. Set your life up the way you’d always deserved. Why don’t you do me the favor of letting me live mine?”
Hurt blanketed Jace’s features, and I blinked, trying to block it. Unable to stand the thought of causing my brother any more pain. Of him being disappointed in me when the only thing I’d wanted to do was make him proud.
Be as good as him.
What a fucking joke.
“Just . . . I’m going to go home. Let’s leave it at that, okay?”
I swiveled toward Mack, throwing out a taunt. “Unless you have something to say about what went down in there and need to take me down to the station in cuffs?”
So yeah.
I was being a dick.
Dividing.
Distancing.
But I knew better than to allow myself to get too close.
“Come on, man, don’t fuckin’ be like that. We came because we care about you. Same as you’d do for either one of us.” Mack took a big step forward like he was going to wrap me up in some kind of pussy embrace.
Before he could get to me, I spun on my heel and started to walk away. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
This conversation needed to end.
“You’re hurting, Ian. I see it. Mack sees it. Faith sees it. You don’t need to suffer alone anymore. We all love you and want the best for you. Only thing standing in the way of that is you.”
Leave it to Jace to get in the final word.
I slowed for a moment, eyes pinned on my shoes, before I shook it off and headed up the alley without looking back.
He knew better than to think I was going there.
I left my Mercedes in the parking lot, not even giving a fuck that it probably wouldn’t have wheels come morning, and thumbed into my Uber app. A couple minutes later, I hopped in the back of it before it could even come to a full stop, and I slumped into the dingy seat. I didn’t say anything the whole ride, just tried to breathe through the memories that nudged at my brain.
Trying to take hold.
At my building, I jumped out at the curb, rode the elevator, and moved into the emptiness of my condo.
Darkness and shadows.
The memories followed me there. No matter how hard I tried to stop them, they pushed to the forefront.
Squeezing my eyes against the onslaught, I went straight for the bar and poured myself another drink.
Hoping I’d be afforded some kind of mercy. Hoping I could bury it deeper.
Cover and conceal.
Forget.
It was no use.
They came harder and faster.
Closer and closer.
Panic started to set in.
God, night after night, I couldn’t stop it. When would this bullshit end?
My lungs fisted, and I grasped my head in my hands, trying to refuse the images. The sounds that haunted me like phantoms stalking in the night.
I wanted to run. To scratch the fucking unbearable sensation from my skin. I stumbled into my bedroom. Such a fucking pathetic pussy because I went right for the desk and tugged open the drawer.
I pulled out the silver music box I kept hidden inside.
I lifted the lid, and the dancing angel popped up, one of the arms broken off and the entire body angled to the side, the music it twirled to warbled and distorted.
Just like the image I kept of my mother.
I turned the box over and ran my fingertips over the design engraved in the bottom. A full circle with a Roman Numeral one in the middle of it. It was the same design as she’d had tattooed on her shoulder.
It was the reason I’d gotten the date of her death marked on me the same way as she had this marked on her.
Because I’d never really known when she’d started living and when she’d started to die. If my father had been the reason for her spiral or if she’d been a junkie whore all along.
A rasp of agony left my lungs, and the room spun like a bitch.
And I hated.
Hated her for being so weak. For making promises she never kept. For allowing the sorrow and pain.
I hated that I’d been the monster who had ultimately destroyed her.
I hated myself most that I didn’t know how to stop loving her.
Forever and ever.
Seventeen
Ian
Four Years Old
Ian grinned and snuggled down under the covers. He loved the way his mama’s fingertips felt as she ruffled them through his hair. His mama was so pretty, the prettiest mama in the whole wide world.
Her voice was soft and made him feel warm inside. So soft as she read to him in the darkened room, on her knees on the floor next to the mattress where he slept. She almost sang the words of his favorite book, the one he begged her to read to him over and over again.
Love You Forever.
He’d accidentally ripped one page out, but his mama remembered the words, and she sang about how he would always be her baby.
Page after page.
Even when he was a big, big boy.
And when she finished, she sat up on the edge of the bed, and playfully she pulled him onto her lap before she breathed out a long sigh and cradled him close.
She pressed her lips to the top of his head. “Love you forever.”
“Wuv you more forever.”
She hugged him and then settled him back in his bed, and he smiled when she leaned down and kissed him on the forehead, the cheek, the corner of his mouth.
“Kisses are forever, too,” she whispered. “And they’re only for the ones you love most.”
Ian smacked a bunch of kisses all over his mama’s pretty face. “I wuv you most forever and forever.”
His mama sighed. “I have to go. Ms. Roseann will be here with you.”
As soon as she said it, his chest felt weird, like it was too big and too small all at the same time. “You got
to go?”
She touched his cheek. “Yes, baby, I’ve got to go. Work is important. Mama has to make money to feed you so you can grow as tall as a tree.”
Ian tried not to cry, to be brave and big like she told him to be, like his big brother Jace was. But Ian didn’t like it when she went to work. When it was dark outside and he wasn’t sure she would be there when he woke up.
It made him scared.
She sent him a tender smile.
“Goodnight, Love Bug.”
“Night, night.”
She pushed to standing and slowly crossed to the opposite side of the room where she leaned down and tucked in Jace who was already sleeping, before she quietly inched back across the floor toward the door.
His Mama’s shoes were high and shiny, as shiny as the white dress she wore that he was sure was covered in diamonds, just as sure as he was that she must be a princess from one of his favorite stories.
With one last glance back at them, she stepped out and left the door open a crack. Ian strained to listen to the muddle of voices out in the living room, their apartment small enough that he could hear most anything.
The front door shut and Ms. Roseann turned on the television. She laughed from the other room, and Ian pressed his eyes together. Quick to fall into sleep.
* * *
Glass shattered, and Ian jolted awake.
Fear drummed in his heart. He tried to swallow, to press his eyes together tight and pretend he wasn’t there.
“You fucking whore. You do what I say, when I say.”
“Screw you. I don’t belong to you.”
Something crashed, and the walls shook, and he could hear his mama crying behind the man’s mean voice. “That’s where you’re wrong. I own you. Don’t fucking forget it.”
Tears leaked from Ian’s eyes, and he tried to burrow under his covers. To cover his ears. He wanted to disappear when his mama came home from work with a man.
Their voices different but always the same.
Terror rippled through Ian’s spirit, and he wanted to save his mama. But he was too scared.
Quiet footsteps moved over the carpeted floor.
His big brother was there.
Ian breathed out in relief.
Jace pulled back Ian’s covers, crawled into bed beside him, and wrapped him in his arms.
All of Me: A Confessions of the Heart Stand-Alone Novel Page 19
