by Cheri, Ann
CUT (New Adult Romance)
Copyright © 2014 Ann Cheri
All rights reserved.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
About The Author
Acknowledgements
This book is dedicated to my best friend. May you run fast, and never let the pain catch you...
-Ann Cheri
☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼
For most of my life I wanted to be bad.
Everybody rebels against their parents somewhere along the line. They want to be different. My father was the most feared judge in the county, and that left me with only one direction to go. I tried shoplifting with the cool kids, smoking with the bad ones, and started dating the worst of them, a boy named Jude. Dad got me out of trouble when I got caught trying to sneak a CD player and some lacy underwear out of the mall. My mother’s lung cancer made me promise to give up the second bad habit.
For better or for worse Jude stuck around.
At seventeen years old he was already damaged. His fists were covered in scars and his body already rippled with muscle. It was no secret that he’d spent time in juvenile hall for a laundry list of petty and not so petty crime. Towering over six foot two and sporting several tattoos he was a fearsome sight. Jude was everything my daddy hated. A dropout, a criminal, a badass. Being with him made me feel… Alive?
He took my innocence in the backseat of a stolen Chevy Impala. Maybe I should have left it at that, just a crazy story to tell my friends someday. Of course, that’s not how my story goes. I was just a stupid girl too lost to stop.
It wasn’t long before the thrill of doing something bad was fading… Maybe I should have seen the abuse coming. Jude wasn’t the kind of boy who would treat a girl right. He was only out for what made him feel good. A pusher… A user… It wasn’t long before I realized what he really was…
Jude was a killer.
It was a fairytale romance, but not the happy bubblegum versions they put on TV. It was the Brothers Grimm kind of fairytale, where death is real and bad things happen to good people… When the beatings started, I blamed myself. A dark and twisted part of me almost wanted it. I kept telling myself I deserved the pain.
That’s when I started cutting myself, putting the little lines across my arms to signify the passage of my life.
Every single brain cell I had left tried to fight it. The right thing to do was run away. Run to daddy and beg forgiveness. Fear made me stay, and my body betrayed me. I knew what Jude would do if I ever left him. He would come back, he would hurt me and take away everything I’d ever loved… My mind shut down because it was easier. Just give in, let it happen, accept that this is the life you’ve chosen. In the heat of the moment it was what I needed.
One year became another, and soon, I was eighteen. There’s supposed to be some magic in that. Everyone talks about becoming a full fledged adult like there’s some special epiphany people have when the earth has went round the sun a sufficient amount of times. For me, nothing changed. I was the same stupid girl I’d always been. A slave to my own dark fantasy.
Funny how with practice you can barely notice the pain of the bruises, or the sharpness of the cut. The blade runs across the curve of my shoulder leaving a tiny bead of blood in its wake. I feel nothing. I haven’t felt anything in a long time.
I wasn’t ready to admit it, but I needed salvation.
I didn’t want to be a bad girl anymore…
I didn’t want Jude.
That’s when I met Marcus Black.
☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼
The warehouse was colder than I would have liked, especially dressed like this. I stared down at my tattered jeans and the t-shirt torn down the middle to show off a little too much of my body. Jude’s arm wrapped around my waist in his usual possessive way. I was on display, but he was making it clear whom I belonged to. It didn’t matter that I had barely turned 18 and most of the men in this room were old enough to be my father. To Jude, I was a piece of meat to put on display.
And my ribs hurt.
The plume of black and purple wouldn’t show for another day or so, but I refused to show him my tears. I winced as he gripped me tighter, leading me through the sea of leather and thunder. Another bruise, another day, another tiny line to cut into my arm, or my thigh, or maybe the curve of my hip.
Jude had graduated from street thug to something more. He’d caught the eye of the Rampant. Everyone north of the border knew exactly who the Rampant were. They ran an underground fighting ring, but really, even that was just a front for their true purpose.
The Rampant handled drugs. If you wanted a fix, you knew exactly who to talk to. Just find the man with the leather vest and the skull emblazoned across the back…
They claimed they wanted Jude, but I knew the truth. The Rampant were after me. A life living with my big-shot judge of a father had taught me what would happen next. It wouldn’t be long before Jude would be forcing me to mule drugs for the gang, just like he did to me back in Texas. To anyone on the outside, I was a sweet and scared little girl, caught up with the wrong people. Even if I was caught, the state would go easy on me. Nobody wants to send a judges daughter to prison. In many ways, I was Jude’s get out of jail free card…
The thought terrified me. I wanted to run, but where could I go? I couldn’t run home. My father could never safely take me back after what I’d done to him. Even if he did offer to help me, Jude would follow me there. He would follow me anywhere, and hell would follow with him.
For months now he’d been slipping away in the night from our little dirty motel room, doing little jobs the Rampant had given him. They were an underground cage fighting club, but that was just a front for their true business. I knew they were getting Jude’s hands dirty, and I tried not to ask questions when he came home to clean off the blood.
As Jude paraded me through the clubhouse I wished I had run away. I kept my eyes forward as we walked, feeling the men on either side dressing me down lewdly. Music blared and bottles lifted in recognition.
“Jude,” a deep voice called.
“Black,” Jude replied, turning me to face my destiny.
Black?
I tried not to look, turning my face to stare across the open space. Armed men stood on either side of a big roll-up door, and a row of sinister looking black cars sat just outside. The men were spread about drinking and laughing. A trashy looking topless woman moved through the wreckage with uncommon grace, cleaning up after the insanity. Others in varying amount of clothing were dancing and carrying on with the men. Cocaine was lined out on a glass table but only the women seemed to be touching it.
And in the center of it all, was the ring.
It wasn’t made for boxing, that much was obvious. A cage surrounded the big square, concrete for a floor and no ropes to separate the fighters inside from the metal chain link that surrounded them. It was empty now, but I could still see the dark stained floor. Blood was spilled here, and no amount of scrubbing was going to wash that clean.
Oh God… What the hell am I getting myself into…<
br />
“This your old lady?”
My attention snapped back to the boy Jude was talking to. His eyes sank into me.
“We’re not married yet, but she’s mine,” Jude said quietly, menace in his voice.
“Beautiful girl…”
Beautiful…
I shivered as his rough fingertips pressed against my cheek, stroking lightly down my face. The words echoed in my mind. Jude was always so aggressive, so hard lined, it had been a long time since anyone called me beautiful. Jude’s words served only to tear me down. He told me every night that he’d be the only one who could ever love such a broken little girl. Sometimes, he’d watch me add a new scar to my skin. He seemed to enjoy it.
A little breath caught in my throat, my eyes tracing the lines of this new boy’s face. He wasn’t like the others in the room. For one, he was younger. His devastatingly handsome looks and athletic build looked better suited for a high school football field than a drug selling fight club. Even so, he seemed to be important. Two beastly looking men flanked him on either side, their sinister eyes running over my body.
“Thank you,” I whispered under my breath, taking a moment to star into Black’s crystal blue eyes. For some reason, the smile that grew across his face was calming.
“Boys, watch over the little one here while I have a little talk with Jude,” Black said.
Jude’s arm unwrapped from my side and I suddenly felt very alone. The two beastly men filled the empty space, one of them pressing a blue bottle into my hand.
“Drink up, he’s gonna be awhile.”
I smiled weakly at my new companions, but tossed the beer onto the long wooden bar. “Thanks, but no thanks. I don’t drink.”
“Pretty girl’s too good for a beer huh? Don’t worry princess, you’ll be begging for one sooner or later. I’m Acre, and this is Marlo.”
If a rowdy clubhouse like this could have a silent moment, I was living it. It felt like the eyes of the world were on me as I choked on my own voice. Even the girl cleaning up across the room seemed to be watching, impossible as that was…
“This is where you tell us your name.”
I laughed, and the sound of the room seemed to come crashing back in. “It’s Kattlyn.”
“Kat… I like that,” Acre said, smiling to Marlo.
“I said Kattlyn.”
“I like Kat too. C’mon Kitty Kat, purr for us,” Marlo said, lifting me off my feet and spinning me round, tossing me up on a wooden bar that ran the far length of the warehouse. Over my new companions shoulders I glanced around in a panic. If Jude saw me like this, there would be hell to pay. I’d seen him in a jealous rage, and I didn’t want to see it again. These men might be big, but Jude had an advantage. He had no regard for his own life, and that made him dangerous beyond words.
I’d been attracted to that very quality, once…
“Lookin for your boy toy? He’s over in the corner. Take a good look while he’s still got a face.”
“What’s he doing?” I asked fearfully. A circle had formed around the cage, and just inside the welded box I could see Jude and the man called Black. Men and women cheered and hollered as Black lifted a sleeveless leather vest up over his head.
“That’s his ticket into the club,” Marlo said, standing tall enough to watch the action. “Black doesn’t give a vest to just anyone. You want in, you have to take it from the club President.”
“Black is the club president?” I asked incredulously. Marlo just laughed, reaching out and tapping a finger on my nose. “What, you don’t think he’s old enough? His old man ran his club for twenty years. Don’t let his boyish good looks fool you baby girl. Black is every bit as dangerous as I am.”
“Don’t listen to him Honey,” Acre said, slapping Marlo upside the head. “This big stupid lug wouldn’t hurt a fly. Black, on the other hand…”
I held my breath as Jude stepped forward, reaching up confidently. The vest swung out of reach, Black’s left arm coming round the side and smashing into Jude’s face with a resounding crack of flesh and bone.
“JUDE,” I screamed over the cheers! He was a monster, and I hated him now more than anything in the world, but Jude was my monster. I needed to help him! My legs tried to leap off the bar, but Marlo grabbed my thighs and pressed me back down into the wood. Black turned his head for a moment, his crystal blue eyes boring holes into me even at this distance.
I stopped struggling. Between the circle of legs and leather, I could see Jude laying flat on the floor, his face obscured by the crisscrossing pattern of metal between us.
“Only one way into the club Kitty Kat. Jude’s gotta prove himself,” Acre said, grinning ear to ear. “He knew what he was signing up for. This isn’t his first time in the cage.”
Black moved in on Jude’s collapsed form, laying into him with a hard kick from his vicious looking boots. Jude’s body shook but he didn’t move. The cheers from the room were dropping off quickly as excitement gave way to the disturbing sound of several swift kicks smashing against Jude’s unmoving side. Black looked down, laying a foot on Jude and shoving him hard. Tears welled up in my eyes. As fucked up as he was, as fucked up as everything had been, a part of me needed him. I couldn’t admit that he was bad for me, because that would only make the life I’d led so much worse… Could I live with myself knowing everything I’d done was one big mistake?
Black jammed his foot under Jude’s body, lifting hard to roll him and pulling me back out of my own head. People had spread out a bit, giving me a better view… That’s when I saw it.
Murder eyes.
I’d seen them before. It was the look Jude gave me just before he’d ball up his fists. The same look he gave people just before he destroyed them. I’d seen Jude pummel enough street thugs and school jocks into submission to know what was about to happen. Jude’s eyes glinted as he rolled, his hands rocketing up and twisting Black’s leg with practiced speed. I gasped as he sprung upward, Black’s arm coming down against the concrete with the joint popping right out of the shoulder. Everything felt like slow motion as my heart raged. The leather vest was still falling but Jude made no move to grab it. He was atop Black instantly, pummeling him into the ground with the scarred and broken fists I was so familiar with. I could feel every blow, every crushing smash.
“He’ll kill him,” I said, my voice shaking as Jude continued his grappling attack. There was no mercy in Jude, he would stop when he felt like stopping. The last man who stepped up against Jude was in the hospital for six weeks. And he was lucky he didn’t tell the police who sent him there…
“No, he won’t,” Acre said, still smiling as Black managed to swing an elbow into Jude’s chin, knocking him off balance. His functioning arm wrapped Jude’s head and a leg kicked out, bringing him down hard on his skull as they spun. Releasing him, Black and Jude stumbled to their feet, each spilling blood. The vest lay between them, but clearly this wasn’t about the club anymore. This fight seemed more personal.
Jude lunged but Black’s years of experience came to the surface as he dodged smoothly and planted a vicious body shot with his still working arm. Wind knocked clean out of him, Jude fell, gasping as Black’s foot came down on his face. I shook with fear as the boot rose, ready to come crashing down again, but a cheer erupted in the crowd and Black froze in place just inches from Jude’s temple. My eyes quivered, tears clouding my vision, but I saw it too.
Jude’s arm was outstretched, his hand holding the jacket, lifting it ever so slightly from the floor.
Black reached down, grabbing Jude’s arm and pulling him to his feet. He might not have seen it, but I did. The murder eyes were still flashing over Black’s shoulder. Jude wouldn’t let this go. Sure, he wanted into this club, but Jude wasn’t looking for friends. He was looking for power.
Black pushed Jude off. With his nose bleeding and cheek swollen, Jude lifted the vest over his head and the room erupted. I watched him slip it over his shoulders. Across the back it said RAMPANT above a
large shattered skull, each small piece of the emblem sewn on individually like some kind of macabre collage.
He was in. And that meant I’d better get comfortable, because this awful place was my new home…
☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼
“Where are they taking him?”
Acre and Marlo turned, teeth flashing. “Don’t worry bout it, we’ve got a little asian girl in back who’s a miracle worker with a needle and thread.”
