I know I won’t be left alone for a moment, and once my mother is safely in her own room, Cobb turns to face me.
“Don’t give me any trouble,” he snarls at me, his voice miles away from the sweet tone he uses on my mother. “You mess with me, you will fucking die. Though I think I don’t need to make that clear, after daddy dearest?”
I can only stare at him, hatred filling me to the brim. I can’t react. That’s what he wants - a knee jerk reaction, so he can punish me. So I stay quiet and obedient this time. Like a puppet.
Cobb smiles before motioning for the guards to bring someone else to the room.
A petite, plain looking girl enters, her gaze fixed on the floor and her cheeks lightly blushed. She’s twisting her hands in her lap, and my attention goes to her fingers.
She’s missing a pinkie on her left hand, and noticing that makes me shiver. I don’t ever want to find out how she lost that finger.
“Adrienne, this is Hannah,” Cobb introduces us. “She’ll be your personal maid.”
“You mean she’ll be watching my every move and reporting it to you?” I ask bitterly, and Cobb gives out a hearty laugh.
“Precisely,” he grins at me with no amusement in his hard smile. “I’m glad you’re catching on so fast, sweet thing. Why don’t I leave you and Hannah to get acquainted while I take care of your mother.”
He tips my chin back with a long pointer finger, and I raise my rage-filled gaze to his cold eyes.
“Don’t do anything stupid now, sweet thing.”
I don’t reply, and he lets go of my face with anger, twisting my head to the left. He leaves the room with his entourage and then it’s only me and the maid.
I collapse on the floor immediately after the door closes, too weak to stay up and argue, shaking. She can pick me up from the floor or ignore me. At this point, it’s all the same to me.
The girl kneels down next to me, gently pushing my hair off my face as I sob.
“Are you alright?” she asks me softly, and I just shake my head.
She looks at me with concern, and I decide she might actually be a decent human being. But that doesn’t change things. There’s nothing she can do for me in this hellhole.
“Is there anything you need?” she asks, almost desperate to make me feel better.
She’s one of those people, then. The ones who try - and mostly fail - to try and make others happy.
“I don’t know,” I sniff. “I… I don’t want to be here.”
“I know,” she whispers.
Our eyes meet, her grey gaze filled with concern.
“I… May be able to give you something for the anxiety. Would that help a little?”
I nod lifelessly. I don’t care at this point, to be honest. I just need something to numb the pain.
She slips a packet from her apron and gives me a few pills. I hold them in the palm of my hand while she gets some water, then wash them down with the cool liquid. I hope they kick in soon.
Before I get the chance to talk to Hannah some more, there’s a rap on the door. She’s the one to open it, because I’m still in a crumpled heap on the floor. I hear her talking to a man in hushed tones, and closing the door after he leaves.
“Miss Adrienne?” she calls out to me.
I look up, tired and worn. Whatever it is, I’ll have to deal with it. I know Cobb won’t go easy on me. Not now, not fucking ever.
“Yes?”
“Mr. Cobb has requested your presence in the hallway,” she tells me with an apologetic look.
“Oh, for God’s sake,” I murmur to myself, picking myself up from the floor.
I smooth down my dress, looking helplessly at Hannah. There’s nothing she can do though - I assume even giving me the pills could get her into trouble.
“I won’t tell anyone you helped me,” I tell her.
Her face lights up with a smile, and she looks so beautiful, I wonder why she doesn’t smile more often. Then I’m reminded of who her boss is. Her missing pinkie. Both our smiles falter.
I head outside, my heart pounding. Life has been dealing one blow after the other lately, and I don’t know how much more I can take. All I know is that I need to stay strong for my mother.
And my dad.
Two
Memphis
The wall feels cool behind my back as I lean against it, taking a deep breath. It hurts, breathing like that, but I know it will be worse later if I give into the desire to take shallow gulps. It would only make the injury last longer. I can’t afford to be weak. Not now.
The fight still rings in my ears, like it always does. For the next few hours after every fight, I almost feel like I am still in there, still in the cage, facing down the monsters that are coming at me and that I’ll always vanquish.
That is why they started calling me Angel. The Angel of Pain. It is as stupid as it is true.
Rolling my eyes slightly, I start unwrapping my right hand, still bound tightly with the tape that had started out as white. Now, it is soaked through with blood, a sickly crimson color.
I do the left hand first, because it doesn’t hurt as fucking much. It takes some preparation to undo the right one, which still feels like it is rolled into a fist and would take a while to unhinge. One glance at the bucket of ice water in the corner gives me the motivation I need. I don’t want the damn thing to swell up, after all.
It is the easiest way to get Wilson to throw me in the ring again.
Gritting my teeth, I slowly undo the rolls of tape around my hand, my left hand shaking slightly as I do so. When it is all off, I toss the ball of sticky, bloody tape into the corner and gingerly flex my hand and stretch out my fingers.
Nothing is broken. A small victory.
My gaze stops on the wide scar that runs up the top of my right hand, all the way up to my elbow. Sometimes, it still hurts, but I don’t think it’s anything other than my imagination at this point. Scars that are six years old can’t cause you that much pain unless there’s something else there.
The memories of that night want to come to me, but I push them away, fighting against the all too familiar urge to bury myself in the darkness of the past.
Closing my eyes for a moment, I let my head loll back against the cool concrete wall. My short-cropped brown hair is slick with sweat and I know my body is leaving an imprint against the wall. I don’t fucking care. I stopped giving a shit about the cleanliness of this dump a while ago. It’s not like I’m treated any better than a dog in a cage at this place.
And that’s exactly what I am to Wilson. A fighting pit bull, kept safely in his crate until I’m needed. And returned as soon as I’ve ripped out someone’s trachea again.
Growling to myself, half with pain, half with annoyance, I haul myself up from the edge of my bed and stand up. I pause for a moment, fighting vertigo. My body’s telling me to sit the fuck back down and stop messing around. However, I’ve learned that listening to your own limitations is the one thing that’ll get you killed in this piece of shit hellhole.
95, I remind myself again, flicking my blue eyes to the dark wall across from me.
My room has no windows. It is underground and all I have here is a small bed, a cupboard, a sink and toilet, and plenty of open space to stare at. The walls and floor are pure concrete, gray and cold.
I pad across the floor to the wall, admiring my handiwork as I go. Ninety-four blood red streaks run across it, no real uniformity to them. Each one marks a fight I’ve won, a challenge I’ve come through while being kept as one of Wilson Cobb’s prized fighters. No one’s ever gotten so far, no one’s ever come out of this shit in one piece.
I’m going to be the first one.
Studying my knuckles for a moment, I pick the one that’s torn up the worse and run it down along the wall, leaving a quickly drying mark of blood behind it. Ninety-five.
I grin to myself, turning my back on it now and going to the bucket of ice water that was left for me next to the door. The door that’s
always locked. I know, I’ve tried it one too many times by now. Years in a cage gives a man a lot of time to exercise his budding obsessions, after all.
I kneel next to the metal bucket, take a breath and then slam both my hands into the ice. Immediately, my shoulders tense and I feel the muscles on my back flex in reaction. My body fighting against what I tell it is good for it. We have these arguments far too often for my liking.
My hands ball into fists the moment I shove them into the water, but I force them open, moving my fingers against their will so the ice can take down the swelling. I keep my hands in as long as I can before pulling them out with a palm-full of ice in each palm.
Standing back up, I rub the ice over my body, quickly working across all major muscles to cool them down. Tonight, I’m going to go through a rigorous stretching regimen, but before, I still have some exercise to look forward to.
The pleasant kind.
Where the fuck are they, I wonder, giving the door a marked glare.
As if on cue, I hear steps outside in the hallway. I know it’s a narrow, tunnel-like thing that runs past tens of cells just like mine, filled with men who have chosen or have had it chosen for them to spend their lives in Wilson’s possession.
I toss the remainder of the ice back in the bucket and roll my shoulders back, an expectant smirk spreading over my lips. I hear the locks being undone and I cross my hands over my chest, still barefoot and in the compression shorts I wore in the ring. That’s how they like me after all.
The ring sluts.
The door opens and Sage stands there, tall and glowery and as unamused as he always is. The girl next to him is a pretty little brunette I know all too well.
Sabrina.
Sabrina with the big tits and the loud mouth. I keep having to gag her to make her shut up because there’s only so many ‘oh God, Angel, please fuck meeeeeee’-s that I can take before I want to make her ninety-six on the damn list.
“Violet, how nice to see you,” I greet Sage with a grin, receiving a glare that should for all intents and purposes open up the ground beneath my feet and swallow me up.
It doesn’t. I smile wider.
I love pissing him off. It’s our little game. He calls me a fucktwat, I call him a girly flower or plant name – who names their son Sage anyway – and we all have a good time.
“Watch it, bird boy. I can take her away as easy as I can let her in here, you know,” Sage says, his face emotionless as he holds Sabrina back for a moment.
She pouts, sticking her lower lip out as far as she can. That little mouth of hers looks as inviting as it always does. She’ll feel great, gagging on my cock and then begging for more.
I hold up my hands as if I’m admitting fault here, begrudgingly shutting up.
“That’s what I figured,” Sage mutters, shoving Sabrina forward.
She practically shrieks with joy, throwing her arms around me and bouncing up and down a few times, rubbing her tits against me in the process. I can’t say I mind. The ring bunnies are one of the few joys I get to taste in Wilson’s dungeons. Well, them and the sweet taste of victory, of course, though that’s sort of started losing its luster at this point.
I run my hand through her hair and tip her chin up with my thumb, looking at her eager face, beaming up at me. She practically has tears in her eyes, she’s so excited.
No wonder, I bet no one fucks her in the ass as hard as I do.
“Hold it, cowboy,” Sage says, quirking a brow. “We still have business to attend to.”
“What?” I hiss, looking up sharply.
“Boss wants to see you. You can have your dessert later,” Sage says, motioning for me to follow him.
Slicking my tongue over my teeth and tasting blood in the process – did I chip a tooth this time? – I let go of Sabrina and take a step towards the door. If I don’t play along, I’ll have no pussy for tonight.
“Aw, Angel, do you have to?” she pleads, putting on her sweetest voice.
It doesn’t work on me, but she doesn’t have to know that.
“I’ll be back in a minute, baby,” I promise, glancing at her as I pull the door closed behind me. “Don’t touch any of my shit.”
I leave her in the room with a confused look on her face, looking around herself for anything that she could even theoretically rifle through. I have one bag of clothes next to the cupboard and a pile of exercise equipment in the corner, that’s it for personal possessions. Not exactly a treasure throve of information.
Sage flips the switch on the automatic locks and I hear the clicks, whirrs and rattles that come with shutting five separate deadbolts. The door is solid steel. Even I couldn’t take it off the hinges.
“So, what’s this about?” I ask, walking in front of Sage like a convict.
Sage’s hand keeps hovering over his gun, even though I’m there voluntarily. Must be a force of habit, or he has seen me take out one too many guys in the ring. Either case, I can’t really blame him for being sensibly afraid for his health.
“You’ll see, Memphis,” he tells me, finally using my real name.
Memphis.
It sounds like another memory from a life I used to have and could never taste again.
Maybe one day.
After all, one-hundred isn’t so fucking far anymore….
Three
Adrienne
Walking out into the hallway with Hannah following sheepishly behind me, my nerves are killing me. I need to get a better hold on myself if I want to fool Cobb into thinking he can’t get to me.
The hallway is filled with several guards, with Cobb standing front and center, grinning at me in that evil way of his. One day, I’ll wipe that smile off his face, and I’ll enjoy every second of it. I can’t wait to see his empire crumble around him.
“What is it?” I ask in a clipped tone, crossing my arms protectively in front of my body as I face Cobb. “You wanted to see me?”
“Indeed.” He grins that wolfish smile again, the one that makes my skin crawl. “We’re going to take a little trip down to the basement.”
I narrow my eyes at him, already knowing he has another game of his planned out for my benefit. He motions for me to follow him, and I don’t really have a choice in the matter, as two guards shove me forward.
I stumble, and my gaze connects with Hannah’s helpless one. I can tell she wants to help me, but she’s too afraid to make a move. Again, her severed off pinkie comes to mind, and I shudder at the thought. That poor thing, she must be scared out of her mind.
Surrounded by guards, I follow Cobb down the hallway and down a flight of stairs that leads into the basement area. I look around to see if I can see a trace of my mother anywhere, but she’s nowhere to be seen. My heart swells with pain for her and I briefly wonder when I’ll get to see her again.
If ever.
But I don’t have too much time to dwell on those thoughts, as Cobb leads us down the rickety stairs into a space that resembles a dungeon more than it does a basement.
“Welcome, welcome,” he says in a proud tone, like some kind of circus director.
I feel such an overwhelming surge of disgust for him I feel bile rising in my throat. And as he walks us around the grounds, my feelings for him only grow from hatred to despise. I wish I could bash his head in, but I can’t get too close to him. As if suspecting I have something sinister on my mind, Cobb constantly makes sure there are guards separating us.
I keep my gaze trained on the floor as we walk through the dungeons, but after a while, curiosity gets the better of me. I slowly lift my eyes, and drink in the sights before me.
On either side of the hallway, cells line the walls. Proper cells, with bars preventing the inmates from escaping. No windows, no privacy. Most of them have a toilet and a bed. The bad ones just have a cot and a bucket in the corner. The stench down here is horrible, and I cover my nose to stop myself from breathing it in.
The cells are all empty. Not a prisoner in sight.
Finally, I start hearing noises a little way ahead of us, and it makes my heart constrict in my chest. Now, I’m getting scared. I’m wondering why Cobb forced me down into his dungeons, and my fluttering heart decides he definitely does not have good intentions.
Then again, does he ever?
“Why are we here?” I ask, hating how I stutter a little when I say the words.
I gulp down the lump in my throat and wait for Cobb’s answer, but all he does is look at me over his shoulder and grin that smirk I’ll wipe off his face one day.
A guard shoves me forward, and the farther we walk, the louder the noises get. My heart is threatening to beat right out of my chest by the time we reach our destination. As soon as I see what awaits us there, I feel anxiety pooling in the pit of my stomach, thick like tar and weighing my whole body down.
“W-what’s this?” I stammer, my eyes traveling over the rows of unfamiliar faces.
There are men standing against the walls, their eyes trained on me. There is no other way to describe them but as soldiers. They are all muscular, dangerous, ripped as hell. And all of them are looking at me like I’m something delicious they’re about to devour for dessert.
The chatter quickly dies down as Cobb walks into the center of the room. The guards we came with surround me, close enough to make me feel claustrophobic, and far apart enough to make sure all the soldiers’ attentions are fixed on me. I retreat, taking a few steps back. I don’t feel safe here.
My back bumps into the rock hard body of a guard, and I look over my shoulder, feeling frightened. The guard doesn’t move, but he doesn’t look at me either. He just stares ahead like he’s a freaking statue.
Wilson must run a tight ship.
“What’s this, Wilson?” I repeat, my voice shaky and scared. It sounds so small, the echo barely there in this horrible place. “What’s happening?”
Savage: A Bad Boy Fighter Romance Page 2
