by Kay Maree
“Trust me, if I could be a vegan, I’d do that too. I’d live off carrots and radishes. Lemons too.”
“Not me,” Joe mutters. “I like meat.”
“Raw diets are the best,” Tibby says.
“Oh, and yes. On that, we agree,” Joe smiles and licks his lips.
“She was talking to the vamp. Don’t be rude,” Brenda says. “I don’t blame you for not wanting to feed. Sounds gross to me.”
“Brenda, say ‘shit.’ Or say ‘fuck.’ Or ‘ass.’ I dare you,” Joe says. “It’ll be like, what’s that shit called, Morgan? The kind of therapy where you have to do it in order to face it?”
“Exposure therapy.”
“Yeah, that. Say shit. If you can say it, maybe it will help you with cursing in general. Ya know, that witchy bullshit.”
Brenda brings her hand to her mouth like she’s about to burst into tears at any moment. But Joe has a point. Exposure therapy is not a thing I’d thought of before in treating our wholesome witch. While I can’t egg him on and tell her to do it, I also know my silence speaks volumes.
“Why does she have to swear?” Jasmyn asks.
It’s an innocent question and totally fair. But from inches away, I hear Mason sigh. I want to tell him that if he’s so bored, he can leave any time. It’s not that I don’t love my job. In many ways, I do. The therapeutic break-throughs where the universe is right and monsters leave our weekly meetings to do what they were meant to do are satisfying as hell. But the constant drama and petty shit gets old. Maybe Mason has a point. I quickly find myself sighing too as Joe takes over the group. I’ve learned that some curses just can’t be broken. And that’s okay too.
~*~
I smile at Colton as he asks me about my shift. There’s something nice about coming home to a man who’s been with you from the very beginning. “It could have been worse. I could be in Exley.”
“Well, there’s always that,” Colton laughs.
I laugh too. For as much as they drive me crazy, I wouldn’t trade my freaky clients for anything. Like my tiny man, who’s not so miniscule these days, my flight out of fairyland and into reality has taught me so many things; mostly that it’s really not about the happy ending. It’s about the journey. And with Colton by my side? Well, hell, we can do anything. Regina’s curse—now known in both lands as Cassandra’s—has been lifted. And it’s the one and only thing she said that was really ever true: “Love is a powerful thing.” With love, even an ordinary human being can do all the impossible things. I close my eyes and wish that for her and every single one of the freaks too.
About the Author
USA Today Bestselling Author Erin Lee is a dark fiction/reality author and feminist therapist chasing a crazy dream one crazy story at a time. She is the author of Crazy Like Me, a novel published in 2015 by Savant Books and Publications, LLC, Wave to Papa, 2015, by Limitless Publishing, LLC and Nine Lives (2016). She’s also author of When I’m Dead, Greener, Something Blue, Freak and 99 Bottles. She also penned Losing Faith, a novella with Black Rose Writing. She is co-author of Black Rose’s The Morning After. She is also author of the “Diary of a Serial Killer Series” and “Lola, Party of Eight Series” formerly with Zombie Cupcake Press and From Russia, With Love formerly with Bella Tulip Press. She is a co-author of the Moving On series, including bestselling The Ranch and Moving On. Other horror and upcoming titles include Pawn Takes All and Scary Mary.
Lee is the founder of Crazy Ink Publishing, a multi genre publisher specializing in multi-genre anthologies for all kinds of crazy. Through this venture, she hopes to give readers and authors alike a taste of other realities and worlds so that they can escape into the words.
Lee holds a master’s degree in psychology and works with at-risk families and as a court appointed special advocate. When she isn’t busy dissecting the human experience, she enjoys escaping from reality through reading and spending time with her muses and canine companions and therapy dogs – Thomas the Terrier and Milo Muse.
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Screwed
Book 1 in the Tools series
THE DIRTY DOZEN – DAMSEL EDITION
Natasha Thomas
SCREWED
Copyright ©2020 by Natasha Thomas
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.
Natasha Thomas
[email protected]
www.natashathomasauthor.com
www.facebook.com/NatashaThomasAuthor
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
Screwed / Natasha Thomas. –February, 2020- 1st ed.
Dedication
For Kimberly…
I made you wait long enough, but I promise it will be worth it.
Xxx
Chapter One
Lani
“Lani, he’s seriously going to kill you this time,” my best friend and partner in crime, Cindy exhales.
Chuckling a little to myself, I continued to put the finishing touches on my most recent masterpiece, and pray to the God’s above for just five more minutes. Truthfully, to make it perfect I’d need ten, but I’d settle for half that in a pinch.
“Can I ask again why the hell you’re doing this, and why of all the cars in this lot it has to be his that you semi-permanently deface?”
I have to give it to the girl, she’s nothing if not determined to make me see the error of my ways. Sadly, and I most certainly won’t be the one to disabuse her of the lost cause she’s invested in, there was simply no other option. Blake had pissed me off for the last time, so under the belief that it is my civic duty to correct his behavior, I have undertaken what is turning out to be some of my best work yet.
“You can ask,” I shrug between brush strokes, “But you’ll only get the same answer as the last seventy-eight times you questioned my motives.”
Heavy footfalls behind me have my head whipping around only to sigh in relief at the sight of the assholes brother, Brendan, not the asshole himself.
A muttered, “Fuck me,” followed by a disappointed sigh is all I get before Brendan sits down next to me. “Burke told me you were out here. Obviously, he doesn’t know what the fuck you’re doing though or he wouldn’t have let you past the front gates.”
Hmm, I ponder. he’s probably dead right about that.
Burke, the oldest of the four Kensington brothers isn’t known for his hospitality. if anything, he’s renowned for his gruff and unapproachable nature. Luckily, I happen t
o be the exception to that rule, but even then, his patience with me still has its limits.
Brendan and his twin brother Brody are the middle children of the family and the peacemakers. Both of them are lovers, not fighters unless one of their brothers or friends are in trouble that is. In that case, that’s when the gloves come off and it’s every man for himself because trust me when I say, those boys will defend those they love to the death if needs be.
Last but not least is the King of all the douchebags, Blake. My sworn frenemy since birth and the bane of my existence.
If it weren’t for the fact his family has lived next door to mine since the dawn of time and our mothers weren’t the best of friends, I would have buried his ass in the woods out in the back paddock a million times over. Unfortunately for me though, my daydreams of bugs eating his decaying carcass will never come to fruition seeing as his family and mine are willing to protect his betraying ass at every turn.
With a gentle nudge of his shoulder, Brendan asks, “What’d he do this time?”
If Cindy wasn’t my sister from another mister and the only person I can rely on without question to bail me out of jail, I would have crowned Brendan my best friend. He doesn’t judge. Instead, he listens, preferring to use his big brain to problem solve the numerous situations I seem to be finding myself in more and more often these days.
“He’s still breathing,” I reply acidly.
“Uh-huh,” Brendan nods in understanding. “Besides the obvious, though, what did my brother do to deserve such a tremendous effort expended on facelifting his pride and joy?”
Where to start, I muse with an eye roll. “It could be because he decided to tell everyone at school my v-card is a hot commodity that should be traded on Wall Street. Or maybe it’s because he tripped me over on purpose while I was carrying my lunch tray and I’ve had to wear lasagne and jello ever since. Or possibly it’s merely because he deserves to feel the pain of losing the beauty of his most favorite thing in the world seeing as he stole my charm bracelet daddy bought me off my dresser sometime while I was sleeping and gave it to his ho-bag girlfriend,” I finish on a shrug.
“You’re shitting me?” Brendan gapes.
“I tell no lies, kind sir,” I say, crossing my arms and leaning back to get a wide-angle look at my handiwork.
“Christ on a crutch,” Cindy mumbles before taking a seat on the ground next to us. “Does he have a death wash? No, really Brendan, tell me. Does your brother want to die by pixie because, at the rate he’s going, it won’t be long before all his dreams come true?”
“Bitch,” I mutter at the sound of the nickname I was given by the asshole in question at the tender age of three.
Granted, I’m barely five-foot-one and built kinda small, but come on people, good things come in small packages, don’t they?
“Look,” Brendan sighs. “I don’t know what his deal is, but if I promise to find out do you think you can abstain from defiling any more of his shit?”
“I make no such promises,” I automatically respond.
“She really doesn’t,” Cindy retorts with a sad shake of her head.
“Fine. But will you please go before he gets here and does something that will require your unique brand of retaliation?” He all but pleads.
“I suppose we could do that,” I nod.
Cindy grins, “I kinda wanted to stick around to see his face, though. I mean it’s not every day a guy finds his car has been painted to resemble the cloud mobile out of the Care Bears movie.”
This is true. And I would wholeheartedly agree with her if it weren’t for the fact that I think this might just be the one time I’ve taken his punishment a little too far. And while I can admit it, that doesn’t mean I feel bad about it in the slightest.
Standing up, I brush my butt off and extend my hand to Cindy. “Come on, we really don’t need to be here for that. Anyway, I’m sure we’ll hear just how fantastic my art skills are by dinner time, at which time he will thank me profusely for the wonderful makeover I slaved over all afternoon.”
“I wouldn’t bet on that,” Brendan grumbles, all the while his lips twitch at the corners.
And wouldn’t you know it, he’s right.
Precisely three minutes later, I hear the roar before his words hit me with the weight of a sledgehammer. “Goddammit, Lani. I’m gonna tan your ass when I catch you.”
If, jerk face. If, you catch me because I sure as hell don’t plan on making it easy for you, I smirk as I hightail it the hell out of there.
Chapter Two
Blake
Eight years old...
Watching my older brother Brendan as he sits down on the curb next to the devil in disguise has a strange emotion swirling in the pit of my stomach. I can’t put my finger on it, but it feels a lot like jealousy. Not the kind of jealousy I feel when one of my pain in the butt brothers steals my stuff or gets to go for a ride on the back of my dad's bike, but something deeper, darker. Something that makes me want to punch Brendan in the face for daring to talk to the girl I claimed as mine when we were three years old.
The first time I realized, Lani Emerson Scott was born to be my other half it didn’t surprise me. We were born thirteen days apart, to parents who have been best friends since they met their junior year of high school. Lani and I learned to crawl then walk together. Her first word was Bake - she couldn’t say my name properly at first - and mine was Lani. I taught her how to climb a tree, ride a bike, and hide the evidence of our midnight kitchen raids. And if that wasn’t proof enough that we were destined to mean something to each other, the fact that I told my brothers when I was five that I intended to marry Lani someday, sure as hell was.
In the beginning, they laughed. My eldest brother, Burke who is five years older than me said I’d change my mind when I grew up, but he soon learned there was no point arguing with me when I set my mind on something. Or in this case, on someone.
My twin brothers, Brody and Brendan, the betraying bastard I’m glaring daggers at currently, didn’t bother denying my claim. Both of them know Lani belongs to me, so they figure their time is better spent screwing with me however they can, as often as they can.
Like now for example.
“Hey, little brother,” Brody quips, slinging his arm around my shoulders.
At exactly eighteen months older than me to the day, Brody and Brendan aren’t that much bigger than me, but they are stronger. His arm feels like it weighs a ton, and it only gets heavier when he leans in further.
I know one day I’ll be bigger than them - my dad says I’m already growing like a weed - but for now, I have to bide my time and take what they dish out until the day comes that I can kick their asses for messing with me all the time.
“You know Brendan’s her favorite, right?” Brody snickers.
“No, he’s not. I am,” I state fervently.
As often as they do this, I know I shouldn’t bite because it only makes things worse, but I can’t help it. After all, I’m not known for keeping my temper reigned in.
“Sure he is. Look at how she’s all cuddled up to him. One day, Lani’s gonna see the light and they’ll get together. Just you wait and see,” he chuckles before jogging back toward the house.
He’s lucky he ran because mark my words, Lani is mine and God help anyone who says otherwise when I big enough to defend my claim.
Chapter Three
Blake
I’ve promised it a thousand time and thought about it a million more, but so help me, this time I’m gonna follow through. Lani’s ass is mine when I get a hold of her.
“Take a deep breath, brother, and remember that you love her before you kill her,” Brendan tries to reason with me.
I know he’s right. Fuck, do I know it, but that does nothing to abate the rage simmering just below the deep-seated lust and unconditional love I have for the demon from hell.
My baby.
She actually defaced m
y precious baby.
Part of me can’t believe it, but the other part can’t quite get past how proud I am of Lani for coming up with such brutal retribution. Sure, I’ve been teaching Lani for years how to hit people where it hurts because payback’s a bitch and all that, but I didn’t think she’d ever use all that knowledge against me.
In hindsight, I should’ve seen it coming. I sort of deserved some sort of retaliation after the clusterfuck today turned into. But my baby being vandalized? No, that was a step too far.
“Motherfucker,” I curse as I try to no avail to scrub another layer of powder-blue paint off the driver's side door.
“You’re a dumbass,” Brendan huffs, sliding to the ground beside me. With his arms crossed over his chest, he adds, “What’d you think she’d do after all the shit you put her through today? Lani’s not the smile and nod or cry and hide type, bro.”
“Yeah, no shit,” I mutter, foregoing my paint removal detail for now.
Tomorrow, I promise myself. Tomorrow, I’ll spend all day giving my baby the attention she deserves and putting her to rights.
My 1970 cherry-red Dodge Challenger was literally a piece of shit when I found her rusting away in the back of a salvage yard two years ago. She may have only cost me nine-hundred dollars to buy, but it took two years and every cent I’ve earned working for my old man during that time to restore her to the beauty she was before Lani got her hands on her today.
To say, Betty - yes, I named my baby - is my pride and joy would be an understatement. There is only one thing that means more to me, but right now, she’s dead to me so I choose to focus on the one woman in my life that’s never done me wrong, aside from my Mom.
