Beneath These Chains

by Meghan March

  Her reason might seem ridiculous to her, but if I’d had a father who’d given a shit about me, I would’ve held on to everything of his. And knowing it was the only thing left and then losing it … her determination made sense. The part about pissing off her ma and stepdad also started to make sense.

  “You’re unfired.”

  Elle’s eyes snapped to mine. “Are you serious? You actually believe me?”

  Her question struck me as strange. “Why wouldn’t I believe you?”

  “Because it’s insane. A crazy long shot.”

  “And Con bought the place because of a crazy long shot. Chains might as well have some voodoo magic sprinkled on its doorstep, because apparently it specializes in delivering on crazy long shots. Besides,” I paused, “if you’re there, I won’t have to waste my time worrying about Rix tracking you down or getting a visit from Hennessy saying something happened to you. This is just as much for my peace of mind as it is for you.”

  “And it has nothing to do with the fact that if I stay you’re pretty sure I’m going to cave and agree to your proposition?”

  A laugh broke free from my throat. “When it comes to you, I’m not counting on anything. You’re one curveball after another.”

  Her lips twitched into a ghost of a smile. “Good. Maybe it’ll make you less cocky.”

  It wouldn’t, but she had finally unwound, and I wasn’t about to get her all pissed off at me again. I studied her for a beat and glanced at the clock, deciding that retreating was the best choice at the moment. “I better get going. I’ll see you on Tuesday morning. If you see anything or hear anything that rubs you the wrong way—or if you catch sight of Rix—you call me. Don’t think twice, just call.”

  “Okay. I guess I’ll see you Tuesday then.”

  I reached out with both hands and wrapped them around her hips before pulling her close. “I’m not leaving without another taste of you,” I said, lowering my lips to hers.

  Elle’s hands landed on my chest, pulling me closer, and there was no hesitation when her mouth met mine. I palmed her lush ass with one hand, buried the other in her hair, and kissed the ever-loving hell out of her—because who knew if it would be my last opportunity. She could easily decide over the weekend that what I’d put on the table wasn’t worth it, especially with the risk involved. It took everything I had to pull away.

  I steadied her and strode for the door.

  “Text or call me if you see anything that makes you worry. I don’t care what it is.”

  “Okay,” she whispered, bringing a hand to her mouth.

  “Tuesday, Elle. We’re going to figure shit out on Tuesday.”

  I bobbed and weaved, ducking the right hook coming my way.

  “Tell me you’re fucking with me,” Con grunted as I landed a punch to his ribs.

  “Not fucking with you,” I said, keeping my voice low and shaking off the sweat that threatened to drip into my eyes from beneath my headgear. “I’m serious, man. I need you to be cool with this.”

  He came at me again. Fuck, Con hit harder than he normally did during our sparring “demonstration” sessions. Probably because I’d just laid it out: I wanted Elle. I was going to have her. I just wanted to make sure Con had a heads-up.

  “You think Van’s gonna be cool with you fucking her best friend?”

  “I’m not fucking her—at least not yet. Wouldn’t do that without your blessing.”

  Just the thought of how good it would be when I finally did had my dick jumping in my shorts. Not the time or place, buddy. The moment of distraction was all it took for Con to land a shot to my jaw. My head flew sideways, and I stumbled back into the ropes.

  “That’s what you want? My blessing?” He was breathing hard, and I couldn’t tell if it was rage or adrenaline spurring him on. His hands were raised, but he didn’t strike again.

  “Yeah. Your blessing. I respect what you’ve got with Van too much to cause you problems by screwing around with her best friend. Wouldn’t do that behind your back.”

  Con dropped his hands for a beat, so I followed suit.

  It was a mistake.

  Quicker than I could react, his glove flashed upward and connected with my chin.

  My head snapped back, and I bounced off the ropes again.

  Raising my hands, I settled back into my defensive stance as I recovered.

  “And that’s why you don’t drop your hands, boys¸” Con yelled to the kids on the far side of the ring. “There’s always someone looking to take advantage of your weak spot. So don’t have one.”

  “You need to go another round to settle this shit?” Reggie’s rough voice asked from the corner of the ring. “Or can I get some of the kids in there so they can work on their skills?” Our head trainer wasn’t impressed with our demonstration.

  I looked to Con.

  He shook his head. “We’re good.” His eyes flicked back to me. “But this definitely needs discussing over a beer when we’re done here.”

  Having two days in row with absolutely no plans seemed like an invitation for trouble to me, so I popped down to Dirty Dog on Sunday afternoon to see if Yve, the shop manager, could put me to work.

  “Go get us some coffee, and then we’ll talk,” was her response. I’d done as I was told and crossed the street to hit the corner coffee shop. Returning with two steaming cups of her favorite chicory coffee, I’d set one on the counter and made myself useful, untangling a giant knot of vintage jewelry Yve had gotten at an estate sale for dirt cheap.

  “What did this person do? Try to fuck this up beyond belief? Jeez.” The intricate tangle of chains took my mind off the night before.

  “No idea, but see that pink pendant dangling there? It was too good to pass up, even though it’s going to be a nightmare to get to it.”

  “I hope you’re right.” It was a cool looking piece of vintage costume jewelry, but I wasn’t sold on it being worth this giant pain in the ass.

  “So, how’s Con’s brother treating you at the pawnshop?”

  “Fine,” I mumbled, running into yet another snarl.

  “You just can’t get enough of selling other people’s old shit, I guess,” Yve said, leaning against the counter and staring at the ball of jewelry.

  “I guess you could say that.”

  “You know it’s a long shot, right? Finding what you’re looking for?”

  Yve was one of the few people who knew about my recent and obsessive search for the watch Dipshit had sold. She’d checked with dozens of her contacts to see if it had shown up in their recent buys, but she’d struck out so far.

  “I know … but that place seems to have some luck, and it’s not like I could work here forever. How many times did you threaten to fire me?”

  “Only because you’re a pain in my ass when it comes to rearranging all my favorite displays. If you’d just leave my shit the way I like it, we wouldn’t have a problem.”

  I looked up from my task. “Awe, I love you, too, Yvie.”

  “Don’t call me that,” Yve snapped. It was not her normal teasing tone; it was the harsh, serious one I didn’t hear out of her very often. And then I remembered. Shit.

  “Sorry. I didn’t—”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  We had enough issues between us to keep a dozen shrinks busy for a lifetime.

  “If you still really need my help, I could talk to Lord about working only part-time at Chains,” I offered, feeling like I’d left Yve in a lurch.

  She shook her head and used a pen to stab through the tape of another box of stuff from the estate sale. “It’s fine. I actually just hired a new kid. He’s cute as can be. Total hipster. Even his car is hipster-chic. A Karmann Ghia. I gotta figure the kid comes from money because most broke-ass college kids aren’t rolling up in a mint condition ’50s Volkswagen. So at least I know he won’t be stealing from me.”

  Yve’s mention of stealing reminded me of Bree. “You heard about the girl they found? Just around the corner?�
��

  The triumphant look on her face about finding a new ace employee died abruptly. “Yeah. I heard. Damn shame. Reminds you that no place is safe in this city. Makes me glad that you talked me into carrying.”

  “I met her,” I blurted.

  Yve’s eyes snapped up to mine. “Where the hell did you meet her?”

  “She worked at Chains. She got fired, and that was part of the reason I got hired.”

  “Convenient. Fucked up, but convenient.”

  I tugged at another knot. “I guess. But still. Crazy, right?”

  Yve yanked the cardboard flaps of the box open. One edge of the tape still held them together, and she jabbed the pen through it like she was stabbing a body.

  Morbid, Elle. Really effing morbid.

  “Let’s talk about something else,” she gritted when she finally got the box open.

  My mind scattered, trying to come up with another topic. Before I’d settled on one, my phone buzzed from its place on the counter. A text.

  Lord? I wondered.

  I grabbed it, nervous energy thrumming through me—until I saw the screen said Mother. She was lucky it didn’t say Queen Bitch of the Bottle.

  The text was succinct: I expect you at Sunday dinner.

  The day my mother learned to text was not a good one. Before, she’d just call, and I could ignore it and not listen to the voicemail. But with her damn texts, I couldn’t avoid reading whatever normally angry message she sent. I’m sure that was part of her plan.

  I thought about replying, but didn’t. Apparently she knew what I was thinking without me tapping in out on the screen.

  He’s out of town. You have no excuse not to be on time.

  The he in question was my stepfather.

  I never went to the house if I knew he was going to be there. Everything about the man rubbed me the wrong way. From the way he cut my mother down to the way she hit the bottle even harder when he was around, and then there was the way he still tried to control me, even after I’d made it perfectly clear I was outside of his influence. Just knowing how much he disapproved of my “disgracefully ambitionless lifestyle” made me more determined to piss him off.

  “You gonna stare at your phone or finish untangling that jewelry?” Yve drawled, picking up the ball of chain.

  I flipped my phone over on the counter and met her eyes. “Hand me that clusterfuck. At least that’s one thing I can attack and destroy.”

  Dinner was just as miserable as I’d expected it to be. Miserable, as in, if my stepbrother, DJ, made one more not-even-trying-to-pretend-not-to-be-a-dick comment, I was going to use my butter knife to commit murder. He opened his mouth, and I mentally promised myself he’d never make it to his twenty-sixth birthday without at least losing a limb.

  Being in my mother and stepfather’s home made me stabby—and that was putting it nicely. But considering the alternative was to take a cue from my mother, grab a bottle, and find the bottom as quickly as possible, I’d take the slightly homicidal tendencies.

  My mother had married Denton obscenely fast after my father had passed away. Why? Because she’d gone from being a high society wife to dead broke in the time span of a heart attack. No death of a loved one could be well timed, but my father’s was particularly bad. He traded stocks heavily, on margin, which could be great if you knew what you were doing, but if you happened to die just before the stock market tanked and the margin calls came in and no one knew how to respond, it was the set up for a perfect storm. It took me years to understand how millions could disappear so fast. With no one responding to the margin calls, his broker started selling off the stocks in his account to increase the equity … but my dad had favored tech stocks, and they were all in the toilet. It quickly became a vicious cycle: stock was sold at a loss, the proceeds didn’t cover the margin call, and so the broker kept selling.

  If my dad had been alive, he would’ve just thrown more cash in the account to stop the hemorrhaging. That would’ve at least given the investments a chance to bounce back … but once they were sold, there was no way to recover.

  Within weeks, my mother went from being a wealthy widow to unable to make the mortgage payment without asking for loans from friends. The only money that could have been helpful was what my father had left to me—but it was trapped by the terms of a trust until I was twenty-one, and my mother had no way to circumvent the ironclad restrictions to give her free access.

  And then she met Denton. Two months. It’d been eight weeks since my father had passed away, and she’d had a ring on her finger and a healthy new bank account.

  I’d wanted to vomit at how quickly she’d moved on, but I guess desperation made people do things they’d never expect. Denton had been her way out of a situation she hadn’t been equipped to deal with. Part of me felt guilty that maybe the money in my trust fund could have saved her, but there’d been nothing I could do. It’d kept me in college, and that was about it.

  “You know, Elle, I’m sure I could put a good word in for you at the firm. Maybe they’d take you on as a file clerk,” DJ said, standing and crossing the room to refill his tumbler with his daddy’s booze. My stepbrother was only dumb when it came to common sense and controlling his drug habit. Because apparently you could do coke and still remain gainfully employed as a smarmy lawyer. He’d been licensed for all of a few months, and yet from the way he talked, you’d think the dick had his name on the building or something. Oh wait—he did. Except the Fredericks on the building belonged to Denton Sr., not little DJ. And that good word he could put in for me? I’d rather he choke on it. The day I put myself under Denton’s control was the day I turned in my self-respect—because the man sure as hell didn’t respect anyone but himself.

  “Not necessary. I’m quite happy where I am.”

  “Working a street corner might be the oldest profession, but that doesn’t mean it’s a real profession, Eleanor.”

  He called me by my full name and called me a whore in one sentence. Does that earn you bonus points, asshole?

  “Actually, I’m fucking for free these days, Denty Junior. I’m working at a pawnshop though. Maybe it’s one you’ve heard of, since you’ve been frequenting them to pay for your coke habit? I hope Mother Dearest has the silver locked up, or we’ll be eating with our fingers soon, won’t we?”

  DJ bared his teeth, and my mother lifted her head and stared. “A pawnshop? Really, Eleanor? It’s time to grow up and do something with your life.”

  Like she was?

  I didn’t reply, just stabbed into my poached salmon.

  The table went blissfully silent for a moment—until DJ opened his mouth again.

  “Yeah, Eleanor, aren’t you a little old—”

  I cut him off. “Aren’t you a little old to still be living at home, DJ? How about you worry about you, and I’ll worry about me.”

  “Enough,” Mother snapped, reaching for the bottle of wine near her glass. “We’re going to enjoy this meal without any further bickering from you two.”

  Enjoy the meal? That was a joke.

  I was only here because of good old Catholic guilt that I’d had a hand in my mother marrying an asshole and becoming a raging alcoholic. And even so, she was still my mother.

  One night, I can get through this, I told myself. And then I heard his voice.

  “Yes, listen to Virginia. Even I’ve had enough of your bickering, and I’ve been in the room for all of ten seconds.” Denton stepped toward the table, his hands wrapping around the back of my mother’s chair. He overshadowed her in every way.

  His cutting tone sent fingers of fury trailing down my spine.

  I had to get out of here before I let him get to me. I turned to my mother. She was staring at the bottom of her glass, and any animation on her face from only moments ago was completely dead.

  I wondered if she’d known he was coming home and the whole “out of town” line had been bullshit. More likely, he told her what he wanted her to know and came back early to surpri
se her in some twisted game of control. I lowered my fork and fished my phone out of my pocket. I couldn’t stay here. I officially needed a rescue.

  My fingers flew across the screen, tapping out a text, only stumbling when Denton’s cutting tone jarred my concentration.

  “Really, Eleanor. One would think you could manage to put your phone away for one dinner. We’ll have to start confiscating them at the door.”

  Which he’d probably try. But I was one person who wouldn’t bend to his whims. It infuriated him, and I reveled in it.

  “Dad, you’ll never guess where Elle is working these days.”

  Denton’s eyes landed on me, piercing and hard. “You’ve moved on from that little trashy tourist trap?”

  I bristled at his description of Dirty Dog, but said nothing. One would’ve thought that DJ would have kept his mouth shut because the whole reason I was at the pawnshop was due to his drug habit, but I could take a picture of him snorting coke and show it to Denton, and it wouldn’t matter. Denton was the epitome of a parent who raised a piece of shit kid, knew it, and did nothing about it as long as his kid didn’t embarrass him publicly and bowed to his dictates in all things. Other than that, DJ could run amok and still indefinitely ride the gravy train.

  I met my stepfather’s cold stare. “Yes.”