Torched: A Dark Bad Boy Romance

by Paula Cox

  “Not me,” Patrick mutters.

  “No, not you, but a lot. And did I let them? No. Why? Because I don’t tolerate that shit. My rules don’t change just because I feel—feel something for the user. They don’t change at all. Get it?”

  “I guess so—”

  “Great,” I say. “That’s fantastic. Take her home, then.”

  Patrick bends down and scoops Hope up. She doesn’t make any sound now. She’s completely passed out, her eyes closed, her lips twisted into a sick smile, her chest rising and falling. He carries her to the car and lays her on the backseat, and then closes the door.

  “Where did she get the drugs?” he calls, standing half-in, half-out of the driver’s side. “Did you find the needle?”

  “She must’ve chucked it overboard when she was done with it,” I say bitterly. “She must’ve been too high to care. I don’t know. Just get her out of here.”

  Patrick sighs and closes the door, and then the car drives away into the night.

  Goodbye, Hope, I think, and then mount my bike and kick it into life.

  Goodbye, my love.

  I ride into the darkness.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Hope

  I’m moving. I know I’m moving, but not much else. I try and ask someone—anyone—why I’m moving, but no words form. I hear them. Where are we going? But my lips don’t move, except to smile foolishly. I curl up on whatever I’m lying on—a bed, the floor, a chair, I don’t know—and fight the urge to cry. The urge is almost overwhelming. I can’t think; thinking has become impossible. I can’t even feel. I don’t know where I am. I just want to wake up, but this isn’t a dream. I just want to be me again.

  I am numb all over, completely numb, from head to toe. I can’t feel a thing, just numbness. I can’t see. I can barely breathe. My breaths come in quick gasps. I open my eyes, but I see nothing. I listen as hard as I can, as closely as I can, but I hear nothing. I try and smell, but I smell nothing. I am completely disjointed from my body in a way I have never experienced. I start to question if I even have a body.

  Then I’m flying. Something has grabbed me and is carrying me through the air. On one level I am aware of this, but on another level I’m convinced I’m flying. I’m not sure how both ideas can exist at once, but they do, and fiercely. I’m flying, soaring through the air, suspended only by whatever this strange thing is which carries me.

  Now I’m dropped onto something soft. I roll over and bury my face in it, but somebody—something—turns me over and props something under my head, making me lean up, and then I am being spoken to. Words filter through a blurry abyss. I feel as though I am standing on the shore of a lake and somebody is standing on the opposite shore, shouting at me. The words are loud, but when they reach me they’re quiet.

  Finally, I stop trying to hear them and just close my ears, ignore it completely. I stare into nothing—blackness, never-ending blackness—and just float on whatever it is I’m lying on.

  Where is Killian? I want to ask, but words are my enemies right now. They won’t work for me. They’ll only try and mess with me. Where is he? But the truth is I don’t even know where I am, so even if somebody told me where it was, it’d make no difference.

  Just before unconsciousness takes me, I think: What the hell happened to me?

  I don’t have an answer.

  When I wake up, my head aches like somebody is sawing straight down the middle.

  I groan and lean up, rubbing the pulsing spot on my head. I look around. I’m in my living room, it’s nighttime, and Patrick is sitting on the armchair, watching me. He hands me a glass of water and two aspirin. I take them quickly, and then go back to rubbing my head.

  “What the hell . . .”

  I turn my legs so that I’m sitting up on the couch. I have no idea how I got here. One second I was with Killian, lying with him on the deck, and now I’m here.

  “Patrick, what the hell happened?” I ask him.

  He lets out a short, quick laugh. “Come on, Hope. Please don’t play games like this.”

  “Games? What kind of games? What are you talking about?”

  He ignores me, levels his gaze at me. “Why did you do it? Surely Killian spoke to you about how he felt about drugs? I can’t imagine he didn’t, what with Dawn going through withdrawal. He must’ve mentioned it. Where did you get it? Do you have a dealer? How long have you been doing it? Since you and Killian got together? Before? How long?”

  “Wait, wait,” I pant, holding my hands up in an attempt to defend myself against his words. “What are you talking about?”

  He slaps the arm of the chair. “Come on!” he pleads.

  When I continue to look at him blankly, he sighs. “The drugs,” he says, in the tone of voice you use when talking to a naughty child who knows exactly what they did. “The heroin, or whatever it was you injected into your arm.”

  “The heroin? I’ve never touched heroin in my life!” I raise my voice in protest, not caring that it’s the middle of the night.

  “Oh, right, so why have I been sitting here for the past six hours to make sure you don’t overdose, then?”

  I shake my head, trying to get it straight, trying to remember exactly what happened. “Listen, Patrick,” I say, staring at him, trying to make him see. “I swear to you, I have never touched heroin in my life. Never. Not once. I have never touched any drug. I never would.”

  “I want to believe you, but look.” He points at my arm.

  I look down. When I see it, I rock back on the couch and gasp. “How—” My words cut short. There’s a track mark right there, on my arm, and higher up on my arm is an outline in my skin where a belt has been tied. “How!”

  “He really loved you, you know,” Patrick says quietly. “Killian has a tough time loving anyone. He’s been like that since Dad died. But he really loved you. I could tell. I think he would’ve given everything for you, Hope. Everything he had. You can’t imagine how hurt he is right now.”

  “But I didn’t do it—”

  “You were on a boat, just the two of you, and there’s a track mark on your arm. Plus, you were high. I know high people and you were high. Do you really expect me to believe you?”

  “I’m telling you, I didn’t.” My voice is pleading. I hate it. But I’m telling the truth. I’ve never touched drugs. And I would remember it, wouldn’t I, if I had? I would remember shoving a needle in my arm. I would remember sneaking a needle onto the boat. “I didn’t.”

  Patrick stands up and rubs his hands together, as though washing his hands clean of me. “I’ve done my part,” he says. “He’s angry, betrayed, but he wouldn’t want you to overdose. You’re okay now, so I’m leaving.”

  “I didn’t do it!” I scream at him, waving my arms frantically.

  I know I’m not making myself look particularly stable, but he just won’t listen.

  Patrick picks up his jacket from the back of the chair and walks away from me, toward the apartment door.

  “He loved you,” he says, and then leaves the apartment.

  I’m left staring down at the track mark, wondering how something like this happened.

  It’s the middle of the night—or early morning, depending on how you look at it—and I know Dawn’s probably asleep. I also know it’s cruel of me to wake her, after everything she’s been through. But I can’t stop myself. I have to talk to somebody, I have to let this out, I have to have somebody believe me.

  I open Dawn’s door, turn on the light, and creep in. She’s on her back, snoring softly. I pull a stool close to her bed and tap her on the shoulder. She opens her eyes, smiling when she sees me. I can’t help but smile back. Dawn always has that effect on me. Despite everything, I smile back.

  “Is something wrong?” she asks sleepily, propping up on her pillows.

  I quickly tell her, starting with the boat ride and ending with my conversation with Patrick.

  “How could this have happened, Dawn?” I ask her. “Seriousl
y, what the hell? There’s a track mark in my arm, and I don’t remember the last few hours. But I don’t remember injecting myself, either. Surely I would remember that? When you take drugs—sorry to put this on you, but please—when you take drugs, do you ever get so out of it that you don’t even remember taking them? Is that possible? But surely you remember taking them, at least? Surely you remember that?”

  I realize I’m bombarding her with questions and stop myself.

  “I don’t know,” Dawn says, looking at me uncertainly.

  “What? What don’t you know?”

  “You really don’t remember taking them?”

  “No!” I cry. “That proves I didn’t, right?”

  Dawn shakes her head slowly. “No, it doesn’t prove anything, not really. It’s like when you get really drunk. Sometimes you get so drunk you can’t even remember your first drink. It’s the same. Sometimes you get so high you don’t even remember what you took, or how much . . .” She trails off, still looking at me uncertainly, head slightly tilted, eyes narrowed, as if she is trying to unravel some mystery.

  “What is it?” I demand. “Why do you keep looking at me like that?”

  Dawn holds her hands up, her small, delicate hands. Or, at least, that’s how I see them, as her child’s hands. In reality the nails are chipped and the fingernails are scarred and tough from burns and fights, from her drug days.

  “First, let me say that everything is going to be okay. Whatever happened, you and Killian will be together again. I know that. You two are perfect for each other. I saw you at the meal, how you talked like nobody else was there, the way you looked at each other. I know you’ll be able to sort this out.”

  “There’s a but coming, isn’t there, Dawn?” Even my own sister doesn’t believe me . . . Wait, you don’t know what she’s going to say—

  “But, I’m not sure . . . how did you get high if, like you say, you were on a boat, all alone, just the two of you? Look, sissy, you can tell me anything, you know that? Our family has a history of drug use. You’ve stood by me more times than I can count. What sort of sister would I be if I didn’t stand by you now? Hey! Where’re you going?”

  I walk from the room and close the door behind me, standing in the living room with my fists clenched, bouncing against my thighs, bruising them.

  I need to talk to Killian.

  I rush to the couch and grab my cell, sunk in the cushions.

  “Come on, come on.”

  I’m sitting on the edge of the toilet seat, in total darkness save a sliver of starlight which darts through the narrow window and the light of the cellphone, staring down at Killian’s name. I’ve called him three times already and each time it’s gone to voicemail.

  “Come on!” I snap, when it goes to voicemail for the fourth time.

  I jump to my feet and walk back and forth, the tiles cold on the soles of my feet, pressing the call button again and again, and each time it rings for half a minute and goes to voicemail. I imagine Killian sitting on his bike, staring down at his phone, seeing my name and ignoring it.

  The image makes me want to cry, but I blink away tears and press the call button over and over and over and over . . .

  Voicemail, voicemail, voicemail.

  As I pace, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. On impulse I turn on the light and stand there, staring at my reflection. Black rings border my eyes, my eyes are bloodshot, my skin is tired, saggy-looking. What the hell happened to me?

  “Please, Killian, please,” I murmur, dialing him again.

  And again, he doesn’t answer.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Killian

  As autumn turns to early winter, I work hard. I throw my mind and my body into my work. I think: if I can work hard enough, if I can end each day so tired that I can barely stand, if I can make my body ache with the pain of it and my eyelids heavy, then I will not think about her.

  The main bulk of our work over this period is protection and gun running. These are the most dangerous gigs, but they’re also the most profitable. As the streets of the Cove turn to ice and snow coats the roof of the club, the Satan’s Martyrs make more money than ever before. Money practically pours in through the doors. And at the end of each day I collapse into the office bed and close my eyes and will myself to think of nothing.

  And each time, I think of her, her, her. She leaps into my mind and she won’t leave.

  During the days, it’s easier. I’m riding, fighting, shooting, working. But during the nights, no matter how tired I am, I can’t help but think of Hope. At first, the thoughts are longing. I long to hold her in my arms again. I long to kiss her. I long to take her. I long to be with her in every way. I can almost imagine that I am with her. I smile and roll onto my side, hugging a pillow.

  But then I grip the pillow with angry hands, digging my fingers in, and my breathing comes labored and quick. I remember how she looked, high out of her mind, like some kind of sedated animal. My Hope, so full of life, so sarcastic and biting and kind and lively, lolling there like nothing more than a sack of skin and bones. Eventually, I have to jump out of bed and take three quick shots of whiskey to calm myself. Then I return to bed and the specter of Hope chases me into my dreams—

  My dreams, hell. My dreams are part of the problem.

  Sometimes, I’m rolling around in bed with Hope. Her perfect body is open to my hands. In the dream, whatever I want to touch is where my hand rests. If I reach for her face but I suddenly want to touch her pussy, she is magically moved so that her pussy is what I am reaching for. I lose myself in her body. I come inside her sweet tight warm hole over and over. She moans in my ears, sweet moans which tell me she is coming just as much as I am. Those big breasts, that curvy ass, those gorgeous legs. I wake up rock-hard. I can’t make it go away. So I have to sort myself out, closing my eyes tight-shut and thinking of Hope.

  Other times, we aren’t fucking, but laughing. The dream never lasts long enough for me to know what we’re laughing about. All I know is we’re laughing at something we find very, very funny. We sit in the box of the ferris wheel at the amusement park, giggling into the night. Hope looks achingly beautiful when she laughs, elfin face thrown back, dark eyes black in the night, and yet somehow still twinkling. When I wake from those dreams, I have a goofy-ass grin on my face and I’m still laughing. Then I remember her, the way she was and what she threw away, and the laughter dies.

  The last dream comes the most often, and when I wake from this one, I’m sweating through my sheets. Once, I woke from this dream screaming into the night.

  When I enter the dream, I’m standing at the foot of a long, wide staircase. The land around the staircase changes each time, as does the material of the staircase, but it is always long and wide. Sometimes the land is rolling sand, sometimes rainforest, sometimes jungle and sometimes cityscapes. And sometimes the stairs are wooden, marble, stone.

  Whatever they are, I walk up the stairs, my legs burning, sweating, panting, struggling to get to the top as fast as I can, struggling to reach something. I have no clue what it is. Though I have dreamed it before, in the dream I never remember. Only afterwards.

  Each time I reach the top, I see a double bed, the sheets bright white, emitting their own light. Atop the bed lies Hope, naked, one leg folded seductively over the other, her head propped up with her hand. She’s lying on her side, giving me fuck-me eyes that are impossible to ignore. I’m yanking my clothes away before I can give it any thought. No man could resist Hope when she’s lying there like that, ready to explode in pleasure. No man could even try. As I undress, I look down, not wanting anything to snag, to delay the pleasure.

  When I’m finally as naked as she is, I look back up at her.

  Blood pours from hundreds and hundreds of track marks, covering every inch of her. Blood pours from her forehead, her eyes, her mouth. Blood pours from her arms and breasts and legs and belly. Blood pours from her pussy and her ass. Blood oozes from the track marks.

>   When she talks, her voice is muffled with blood: “Don’t you want it?”

  With bloody hands, she lifts up two needles, brandishing them at me.

  “It’s fun.”

  Her words are too clear. It’s as though the blood is not muffling her at all, although it sounds muffled.

  Aiming the needles, she springs from the bed like a javelin, ready to pierce me.

  Tonight, I wake from this dream, sweat coating me, chest heaving.

  I rub my eyes and rise to my feet, walk across the room, and scoop up the whiskey bottle from the desk.

  I think I’ll need more than three shots tonight.

  I’m sitting at my desk, sorting out the men’s pay, when Patrick knocks at the door. Two swift knocks, and it’s like he’s pounding me in the head with a hammer and a nail. I overdid it on the whiskey, that’s for sure.