On the Edge of Love (Mama's Brood Book 1)

by Rucker, Shay

  Zeus went still after opening his shed, sensing danger. He pulled his blade, the compulsion to kill rebounding after all the days of being dormant. He scanned the darkness. Had it been Sabrina’s presence that had calmed the need to kill?

  Blade in hand and thumping against his thigh, he stalked the periphery of the shed. He inhaled deeply, scenting something wild and big. Probably bear, he dismissed. He went back in the shed and got two more small weapons, securing them, as he’d already done with his favorite blade, inside what looked like wounds and damaged flesh on his body. Only Dominic and the man who made the silicone prostheses for Zeus knew the damaged flesh wasn’t real.

  After pushing his Suzuki outside, he locked the shed up again and got on the bike. When it roared to life, he peeled off through the woods. He accelerated, imagining that he was balanced on the edge of a blade aimed straight in Sabrina’s direction. There were only two routes she could take once she hit the main road. He headed down the mountain in the direction they had come, hitting over a hundred miles per hour, until he saw the faded illumination of red taillights. He cut his headlamps and sped on in the dark until there was about seventy feet between him and his car.

  He followed her to a run-down motel on the outskirts of Big Sur.

  Cutting his engine, he watched from a distance as she walked to the motel’s office. He could make out the long-whiskered guy with stringy, shoulder-length, dirty-gray hair. She gave him a credit card, and he gave her a key card. Zeus waited in the dark as she drove his car to the back of the motel, only to see her come back to the front and slide the key card into the corner door farthest from the front office.

  He drove his bike forward, following the direction she had driven his car, and parked next to the Charger. He paused when his phone vibrated, and leaned against his bike as he reached for his mobile with no intention of answering it. He looked at the display, and Sabrina’s name was illuminated. She’d betrayed and abandoned him, and she was calling to say what, you’re a sociopathic rude fuck and I couldn’t stand being around you any longer?

  He wanted to crush the phone, but instead he stared at it as he tried to rein in his rage. The phone stopped vibrating and went black. He looked up to the starless sky. He didn’t know the best way to deal with this situation, and for the first time, the spirits in his blades were unnaturally silent.

  The phone vibrated once, indicating Sabrina had left a message.

  There was no real point in listening since he would be in her room soon. Yeah, he wanted to yell at her for taking his car, for leaving his protection, leaving him. He wanted to fuck her into submission. He wanted her to tell him what he needed to do to make her stay, but he had a feeling none of it would happen if he went in and handled things the way he normally handled them. Sitting sidesaddle, with his legs crossed at the ankle, he retrieved Sabrina’s voice mail.

  There was a long moment of silence, followed by her voice.

  “Hey. I know it’ll be a while before you get this message, but…um…thanks for the blades. I hope you don’t mind that I kept them.” Another pause. He fought the urge to walk to the door and… “You’re a good man.” He frowned and looked at the phone as if it had morphed into Jesus on the cross. “My mama would’ve described you as a man with a few issues but nothing a little loving couldn’t take care of. I can’t be like that.” What the hell kind of sense did she make? If you care for someone, you’re not supposed to leave, are you? “I can’t afford to see if her advice will work out this time. It’s never worked before. As much as I call you crazy, I know your biggest problem is thinking you can do, say, and have anything you want. You really need to work on that.” He could hear the dry smile in her voice. Pleasure rumbled through his chest. “I’ve called the Brood and told them where to pick me up so you don’t have to worry about my safety. Your job is done. I do care, my blade-wielding sociopath. Oh, don’t be mad about your car. I’ll call again and let you know where to pick it up. Bye, Zeus.”

  He listened to the message four more times, and when her voice went silent the last time, he’d convinced himself the idea of keeping a woman in his life only a few hours at a time was genius. The moment he was compelled to keep one forever, look what happened. Chasing her down in his own car because she didn’t want to be like her mother. She has to learn to butch up, he thought as he walked toward the front of the motel. He wasn’t letting her go.

  Zeus stood beneath the shadow of a tree and watched until the lights in her room went dark. He waited another forty-five minutes, walked to the door, and illegally let himself in. Moving through the dark, he stopped where she lay faceup on top of the bedcovers wearing her T-shirt and jeans. Her bra and shoes sat neatly on the worn wooden chair next to the window.

  “A part of me believed you would let me go, you’d finally be through with me, but another part, that instinctual part, knew you would find me.” She spoke through the shadows separating them.

  Zeus pulled out a blade and whirled it through his fingers as he looked down at her. He recalled the first time he saw her on the warehouse floor, remembering the unholy lust that had compelled him to touch her even then. There was no longer a part of her that he hadn’t touched.

  Ignoring her attempt at conversation, he cut a thin strip off the bed’s blanket, and he tied her hands to the rickety wooden headboard. Sabrina remained silent, angling her head to the side as she watched him. He pulled off his jacket and boots. The rest of his clothes soon followed. Kneeling on the bed, he lifted the bottom of her T-shirt and sliced it up the middle, laying her breasts and taut abdomen bare.

  She thought she could take the sight of her luscious form away from him and he would just let her? He undid her pants, gently pulling them down her legs. “Mine,” he proclaimed. Her body was his. And he kept what was his.

  He eased himself over her, covering her chest to chest, groin to groin. “Open for me,” he said, resting his temple against her forehead and settling his lower body firmly between her parted legs.

  “Zeus?”

  “Huh?” he uttered before capturing her mouth with his. He felt wrenched wide open when she kissed him fiercely, holding nothing back, taking him, making them inseparable again. He lost himself in her, felt her jerk her arms against the headboard they were bound to.

  “You don’t leave.”

  “Zeus…”

  “Never again, Sabrina,” he warned before crushing his mouth to hers, not willing to listen to anything that wasn’t a confirmation of the words he had just uttered. “Say it.”

  She moaned but didn’t say the words he needed to hear. He continued to pleasure her, stretching her tight inner muscles until her sobs became the sweetest penance. “I won’t leave. I won’t. Never again.”

  He came so unnaturally long and hard inside her he knew the blade spirits had to be binding them together in this life and the next. “You’re mine,” he said as he shifted and unbound her wrists, knowing nothing made in this material world could link them as completely as the spirits had just done. He collapsed onto the bed, exhaustion a hundred-pound cement block pulling him into the deepest fathoms of sleep.

  “And you’re mine. Forever. God and your spirits protect us,” she muttered.

  He hugged her to him as he fell into the depths, feeling a sense of utter completion.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Maxim woke to repetitive banging. The vibration resonated as if his head were submerged under sand. He peeled back eyelids that felt gritty against his eyeballs and looked around the room to see the latest Sabrina replica sleeping in a tight ball at the foot of the hotel bed. He briefly wondered if she was dead but recalled the restraint he was forced to wield due to circumstance and injury.

  Pushing the cover back, he stood up and walked over to the bedroom door, opening it. Reed stood in the dark hallway fully dressed and groomed despite the earliness of the morning. Maxim’s internal clock told him it was somewhere close to four a.m.

  “Reed.”

  “Sorry to w
ake you, but our man in OPD called with a hit on one of Ms. Samora’s credit cards. I called and confirmed it was a motel in Big Sur. The man who answered the phone stated a woman matching her description checked in alone a little after midnight and hasn’t checked out. We have a window.”

  “So she’s slipped her guard. No doubt she’s trying to find her way back to me.” Maxim looked behind him at the woman stirring on the bed. “I’ll meet you back at the cabin. Bring my woman to me there.” He paused. “Try to ensure she’s not harmed, Reed. I will be very disappointed if any more injury comes to her because of my men’s incompetence.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And, Reed…”

  “Sir?”

  “If the mutt happens to be there, leash him and put him in a cage so Eddie can tame him. Might as well extract as much pleasure from the dawning day as possible.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Maxim shut the door and turned to see the woman sit up on the bed. He watched her tie a blue wrap dress around her body. How could he have ever used her? She lacked the radiant earthiness of the woman he truly wanted.

  The escort donned a black trench coat, which fell to just below her knees. Maxim was impatient to get to his cabin without notice, but first he had to deal with the matter at hand.

  The woman looked at him and waited in surly silence before pulling out her phone and running her fingers over the keyboard in rapid clips before sliding it back into her pocket. “It’s been real, sweetness, but I’ve got to get going.”

  He waited for her to leave and raised his brow when she continued to stand there expectantly.

  “It’s extra if I stay past midnight.”

  Of course.

  Maxim walked to his bedstand, picked up his wallet, and pulled out a few bills totaling a thousand dollars. He held on to the money as she grabbed for it. “Do you have a card?” he asked. He knew he wanted to feature her in one of the discipline rooms during Basir’s unauthorized Consortium gathering.

  She smiled. “That’s cute. Like I’ve got Fortune 500 pussy. Just have your man call the service again, and Darwin will handle the rest.”

  Once she’d left, Maxim hastened to the bathroom to wash off the last traces of her vulgarity. She had been a desperate man’s diversion. Being cooped up in the hotel room these last few days, recovering from the wounds the bodyguard had inflicted on his body, had left him with little choice. He couldn’t go out and hunt down someone of Sabrina’s caliber. Plus, the San Francisco police were keeping a watchful eye on him. No doubt he had the Oakland PD to thank for that bit of extra care.

  Eddie was the only person in the living room when Maxim entered. Both he and Eddie wore shabby jeans, scruffy sneakers, and SF Giants hoodies. Urban disguise. He grinned.

  “Looking good, sir. How are you feeling?”

  “In sore need of retribution.”

  He would see the mutt who had mauled him dead and dismembered before the day was done. First would come the lesson where Zeus would know pain, the punishment for stealing Sabrina away. Then, but only after he was broken and begging Maxim for forgiveness, death would follow.

  “I’ve had our men set a false trail for the cops and anyone else who has you under surveillance. We’ll let the team create a little space for us, then head out.”

  Maxim nodded. “And let’s have me back in town in enough time for Sabrina and I to put in an appearance at Basir’s secret gathering.”

  “Of course, Mr. Kragen. I’ll see you downstairs in thirty. Remember, I’ll be in a brown 1992 Honda Civic.”

  Maxim smiled. “Charming.”

  Once he was alone in the suite, Maxim retrieved the small bag he was unwilling to let anyone else touch. Inside were items he had bought for Sabrina—designer clothing, accessories, diamonds, and other precious jewels, all infinitely more expensive than the common canvas bag that bound them. He wanted to spoil her with all the finer things she’d gone without since leaving his care.

  Making his way out of the suite, hood concealing his identity, he took the elevator down to the garage. He waited in the shadows until he spied Eddie in the ragged Honda. Eddie pulled up to him and popped the trunk, coming around to help Maxim fold himself inside of it.

  “Only for love, Eddie.”

  The densely muscled black man grimaced. “If this is what comes from lovin’ a woman, I pray love never finds me.”

  “Trust me; you’ll thank God and the devil when it does.”

  “Yet another reason to stay an atheist,” Eddie mumbled.

  “You say that,” Maxim said knowingly. “But when the right…er, person, comes around, you will be absolutely powerless.”

  Eddie shut the trunk on Maxim’s declaration.

  Eddie would see. Just the sight and smell of Sabrina had ignited an awareness, a compelling connection that would always identify her as his. Though the day in her apartment had ended in his shame, shame was sometimes a necessary evil. It helped to reorient one to his own humility, his own humanity. This was a truth his father and his father’s cronies couldn’t seem to understand. From shame came resolution, a call to be more, be better. He had to be better for Sabrina. She would soon see he was stronger and wiser. She was intelligent enough to conclude the talking ape watching over her was little more than an idiot. A man with limited future options, Zeus could never be wise, but once he was caged, Maxim would grant him the gift of a slow and painful death.

  * * * *

  “Stop touching it!”

  “It’s mine. I’ll touch it when I want.”

  “You sound like a child.”

  “I sound like a man speaking the truth.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Let me see it.”

  “No.”

  “Zeus…”

  “No.”

  “Okay, keep it, but when you rub it bald, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  “I won’t.”

  She angled her head, peering up at him with patience he knew was false. He couldn’t care less. He wasn’t handing it over to her. He had given her his lifelong protection, his body. He’d given her a free pass for stealing his car, and he’d extended the bond of the blade to her. He wasn’t offering up any more pieces of his eroded soul just for her to poke around in.

  “Why’d you pull it out if you didn’t want me to touch it?”

  “Because.”

  She waved for him to continue, but he remained silent. The truth was he didn’t know why he’d pulled it out.

  She jumped up and straddled his legs, pressing a hand against his chest as she tried to pry the ring from his fist. She was so weak.

  If she were smarter, she’d take her blade, cut the flesh and tendons that allowed him to make a fist, and pick the ring right from his palm. Instead she sat on top of him, stirring his body to readiness.

  She grabbed his head, splaying her fingers over his ears as she pulled his face closer to hers.

  Zeus leaned up and kissed her. Just a little taste.

  Sabrina groaned in defeat and slid down to lie beside his chest.

  “I just want to see it for a minute,” she whined, sounding like the child she’d accused him of being.

  He shook the gold band in his hand. Maybe he could stand to be a little benevolent if it ended in her expressing her gratitude. “There’s a cost to everything, Sabrina. You willing to pay?”

  “Yes.”

  He shook his head. “Bad bargaining. Always know the price before you commit.”

  “Whatever. Just tell me what you want, Zeus, and I’ll give it to you.”

  It’s been over an hour, his dick reminded him. More than an hour was too long. Too long, too long, his dick chanted.

  He opened his palm, and the delicate gold band gleamed.

  Sabrina picked it up reverently and stroked it as if enraptured. He would’ve only been half surprised if she began to salivate and call it my precious.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said, sliding it onto the ring finger of her right hand. It
only went halfway down before stopping.

  “She must have been a tiny thing,” Sabrina reflected.

  “Sisters said she was. Sister Agnes said it was a miracle she was even able to deliver me.”

  “How big were you?”

  “I don’t know. Average, I guess.”

  “What does your birth certificate say?”

  “Eleven pounds, four ounces…twenty inches long.”

  Her eyes bugged, and she blinked at him like a sleepy owl. He reached out and twisted the ring around her finger. “What?”

  “Condoms,” she whispered. “Jesus Christ, we really should have used condoms more than we did.” She struggled to pull away from him, but he pinned her thighs against his.

  “I’m clean, Sabrina. No worries.”

  “No worries?”

  Why did she sound so panicked? He had enough money to take care of her, his kid, and ten others if they had them. “Jesus Christ, I could be pregnant with God-fucking-zuki. My goodness, what she must have gone through to give birth to a fully formed toddler.”

  Zeus turned his head, blindly looking at the motel room’s wall.

  “Think that’s why she left?” He’d wondered about the answer to that question for the first few years of his life, but then he’d decided the why wasn’t important. He had to live with her decision no matter what the answer was.

  The panic Sabrina had shown a few moments before quickly transformed into something much more serious. She pulled the ring from her finger and held it in front of his face. “She left you with the only valuable possession she likely had. Look at the inscription inside.”

  “It’s her name.”

  “Zahira Sauvageau. Did you ever search for her?”

  “She left me.”

  Sabrina stroked the left side of his chest as if attempting to soothe a heart that had long ago forgotten how to ache. The languid caress eased the rage that surfaced when he thought about the woman who hadn’t believed he was worth keeping.