When Nothing Is All You've Got

by Kirsty Dallas

  Shadow groaned loudly as he reached his own climax; his fluid movements became jerky and uncontrolled as he hammered a few hard strokes before stilling.

  It felt as though I was slowly floating back into my own body, and my limbs turned to mush as I relaxed beneath Shadow. Each drawn in breath returned oxygen to my lungs, and each long exhale blew out the fears and reservations. Soon, Shadow was a languid length of hard male, and his breathing was once again even and controlled. I could feel the lingering remnants of orgasm where our bodies were still intimately joined. I should have felt vulnerable and trapped, but instead, I felt curiously at peace, enjoying the feeling of Shadow’s body blanketing mine. I felt oddly protected and rightly so. This man had never willingly hurt me; he had protected me when I had been at my most vulnerable. Somehow, in the depths of darkness, I had found a glimmer of light. When he pulled back, until our bodies were no longer joined, his body slipped to one side, and he threw a possessive leg over both of mine. His arms wrapped around me a little tight, but not uncomfortable. We were like a twisted mess of limbs and flesh, entwined like the thorny branches of a rose vine.

  “We need to talk,” Shadow finally murmured in my ear. “But I need a few moments to recover. Get some sleep, and we’ll talk when I wake up.”

  I bristled at his authoritative tone, even though a nap sounded good. For the first time in my existence, I closed my eyes and fell asleep . . . and I wasn’t alone.

  18

  SHADOW

  We’d never got the chance to talk. Instead, I’d woken from a short nap to a raging hard dick and a beautiful woman wrapped around me. I’d be dead not to take advantage of that. I hadn’t slept beside a woman since before being sentenced to the Underworld, and it had never felt quite like this. Perhaps time had muted the feelings I shared with Alanis, but I couldn’t recall the driving force that made me want to live inside Nada every second of the day. As it was, today I was supposed to be collecting the latest production of moonshine from Claire and Rocket. Instead, I was pinned to Nada’s bed with the boneless woman breathing hard and fast across my chest. She’d just ridden me like the finest rodeo queen, so there was no way I was sorry I was here instead of running around like a bitch for Kingsley.

  My fingers followed one of the raw puckered scars on her back, my stomach coiling with guilt. This was from me, a mark in her skin forever reminding me of how I had hurt her.

  “I know what you’re thinking and you can’t just quit it right now,” Nada murmured, her head lifting from my chest, and that dark chocolate gaze coming to rest on mine.

  “You can read minds now, tough girl?” I asked with a raised bow. She didn’t so much as blink, her full lips cast in a frown.

  “We’ve all done things we’re not proud of down here and we’ve done it in the name of survival. You did what you had to do to and I won’t ever hold you accountable for those scars, they are on Kingsley. So,” she said, resting her chin on one fist. “What’s your real name?”

  As far as a subject change went, it was a good one. Nobody had ever asked me that. Most people respected that when they entered this world they left the other behind, sometimes names and all. It wasn’t unusual for Nada to be curious, but it was hard to push the name through my lips. It hadn’t been spoken since the day I was entered into the system.

  “How come you don’t know it? I thought you knew everythin’.”

  “Your file says your name is Shadow. No surname, just Shadow.”

  I grinned and quietly thanked Dejohn. He’d been the one to register my brooding, hot tempered ass into this facility, and when he’d asked me for my name, I’d boldly claimed Shadow. He had the real thing written on a piece of paper beside him, but apparently, he had been happy to let me embrace my new title. Shadow felt fitting, it felt right. In that moment, it’s all I wanted to be, a Shadow. I wanted to disappear into a dark room and never find my way out.

  “Moses, Moses McLeay,” I murmured, forcing the memories of that godforsaken day away.

  Nada pushed herself up and placed her chin on one palm. “Moses? Like from the bible?”

  “Yeah, but only in name. I was never religious. My brother was the good son; I was a lost cause, right from the day I took my first step and pushed my momma’s favorite vase off the coffee table and broke it.”

  “You have a brother?”

  “Had.”

  “Even though you’re here and he’s out there, doesn’t mean he’s no longer your brother.”

  “He died, when we were teenagers.”

  “Oh.” Nada seemed lost for what to say. It didn’t surprise me. The cordial ‘I’m sorry’ was not something she would have learned down here. Nor did I want to hear it. Why people had the driving need to apologize when someone died was beyond me; it wasn’t like it was their fault.

  “How?” she pressed, and I tried hard not to grin. In moments like this, she still seemed so innocent, her curiosity crossing lines she had no idea she was stepping over. I couldn’t be angry at her naivety; in fact, I savored it. It was refreshing and real.

  “Huntin’ accident, at the cabin my family owned.”

  “Oh,” was all she managed to reply.

  “Yup.”

  “What’s Christmas like?”

  Grinning, I held back the laughter at her sudden redirection in conversation. “Cold.” She slapped my chest, and I grunted. She had as good a slap as she did a right hook. “It’s . . . happiness, I guess. After my brother died, I moved away from home and no longer celebrated the holidays. But before, I remembered racin’ my brother down the steps Christmas Day to see what gifts had been left under the tree. We ate too much, Dad didn’t work, and Mom smiled all day long and baked. We all laughed, a lot. It’s happiness.”

  “I can’t even picture it in my head,” Nada confessed.

  I kissed her forehead as she collapsed back across my chest.

  “Not everyone had it as good as us. The war left a lot of people with nothin’; people who had homes were suddenly livin’ in squalor, and people who had food were suddenly beggin’ for scraps. I was born after the war had ended, but I grew up seeing the scars it left behind, not physical scars, but deeper scars, ones that told tales of loss.”

  “I can imagine that,” she whispered. “It’s sad that I can understand pain and loss better than I can understand happiness.” She wasn’t crying; her voice was steady and her words sounded more like a casual passing remark than something deep and heartbreaking. “Moses,” she murmured.

  “You realize I can’t allow that word to leave your lips again,” I teased, rolling her over and pinning her hands above her head. There was only a passing flicker of trepidation in being trapped beneath me, then she relaxed, blowing away the fear on one long breath.

  “Why not? I like it. It suits you.”

  “I don’t want others to know,” I quietly admitted.

  Her head tilted slightly to one side as she considered my words. “Then I won’t tell a soul. But can I use it when we are alone?”

  “Yeah, tough girl, you can use it when we’re alone.”

  “My name’s Nada, not tough girl.”

  “And you don’t care what it means, you own it, and I wouldn’t have you any other way.”

  I hadn’t forgotten the night she’d claimed her name with bold defiance.

  “Damn straight,” she said with a smile.

  Raising my head, I captured that smile on my lips, tasting it, taking it into my soul and heart. It warmed me, this girl warmed me. How could I ever have thought her cold? She was like a blazing hot sun in this dark world. She was all I needed and all I wanted. There was no way I was ever letting her go; her father would just have to fucking accept my claim on her.

  19

  NADA

  The closer I drew to the heavy closed door that led off the arena, the louder the music got. I’d been summoned to Lick Her by Kingsley, for God knows what purpose. From the sound of things, he was having a party, and since the doors were closed, i
t one was of those private, fuck-fests he was famous for. I’d managed to steer clear of such gatherings with little resistance; Kingsley wanted me here about as much as he wanted a good case of syphilis. Why he was calling on me now had me truly baffled.

  Solo grinned as I approached the door. “Enjoy,” he murmured as he opened it wide for my entry.

  The scent of NIM, moonshine, and sex slapped me in the face, and I tried to breathe through my mouth rather than my nose. The room was brightly lit by garish lights that hung like diamonds from the ceiling. That was new. My gaze became riveted to the unusual lights, and my fingers rubbed together when I wondered what the smooth, glistening surface would feel like.

  “About time you graced us with your presence,” Kingsley’s voice wrapped around my neck and choked any wonder right out of my system.

  Lowering my gaze, I took him in. Furniture had been dragged into the wide open room, and he was reclined on a dirty old sofa, his pupils were heavily dilated, and his button-down shirt was open, baring his pale chest. Women in various stages of undress were collapsed over him. More filled the room, some openly fucking his soldiers, others blissed out and obviously enjoying the liquor and NIM.

  A cloud of white snagged my attention, and I gaped at the innocent dressed in a see-through robe, completely bare beneath it. She was serving drinks from a tray; her face was impassive but the horror behind her eyes was there for all to see.

  “What are you doing?” I gasped. “She’s innocent.”

  “And for that reason alone, nobody is touching her. We are merely enjoying the view, right, Shadow?”

  Kingsley’s smirk was directed to my right, and I turned to take in the sight before me. Shadow was clearly drunk. His eyes were glazed over. One hand held a glass of moonshine, his other grasping the ass of a naked woman who was straddling his lap. My gut churned with nausea, and I didn’t know whether the adrenaline suddenly filling my body would cause me to throw up or kill someone. Shadow appeared clothed beneath the whore’s wandering hands, but he certainly didn’t try and discourage her as she sucked his neck. She was marking him, and the spurned woman in me wanted to make her bleed. I wanted to make him bleed more.

  “He’s not yours. He’s mine.” Kingsley’s voice dragged my attention from the horrific scene and back to his equally repulsive presence. “And you’re not his. You’re mine, too. I thought you might need a reminder.”

  “You brought me down here to watch Shadow fuck?” I growled out. “News flash, old man, been there, seen that.”

  Kingsley’s smile left his face, and he pushed the two women from his lap as he staggered to his feet.

  “How dare you speak to me that way!” he roared.

  “I fucking dare,” I spat out. “You can beat me, you can torture me, you can abuse the innocents, and try to play games with my heart, but it won’t work, because my heart is as cold as yours. There is no pain. I feel nothing.” I glanced back at Shadow and the woman writhing in his lap and snorted. “I’d be careful, though. Yesterday, Meg there was banned from the whore house until her outbreak of crabs disappears.”

  Shadow’s gaze hardened as he watched me, still unmoving under Meg’s attention.

  “Sounds like jealousy to me,” Kingsley chuckled.

  “Nope, just don’t want to catch anything from him if I decide to fuck him again. Are we done playing games here?”

  Kingsley was pissed, but in his drunken state, he could barely be bothered to care. Waving a hand, I was effectively dismissed, and didn’t spare Shadow so much as a backwards glance. Walking away from Lick Her, I looked a vision of calm serenity. I cloaked myself with indifference and ignored the few soldiers who loitered outside the door. The walk back to my room was the longest walk of my life, for while I looked calm on the outside, on the inside a storm was brewing. My throat pinched tight, and my eyes watered. When I turned the corner that arrived at my room, a single tear fell down my cheek.

  I stopped short when I saw Dejohn standing at my door.

  He turned to face me. “Nada?” His worried gaze took me in. “Wot’s wrong?” He’d only ever seen me cry a handful of times, most of those before I turned ten “Wot happened?” he demanded as panic overtook his worry.

  Someone squeezed past us in the corridor, and I turned my head to hide my tears. Dejohn immediately took my key and unlocked the padlock that kept the feral inmates out of my room, ushering me to privacy. Pressing the heel of my palms to my eyes, I tried to hold back the pain that wanted to exit my body in the form of tears. I breathed deeply and swallowed, but it was no use. They fell, and much to my abject horror, my body began to shake in quiet sobs, all the while Dejohn looked me over, trying to find the source of my pain.

  “He . . . he . . . he called for me,” I said through hiccups.

  “Who?” he asked, ducking to look me in the eye.

  “Kingsley,” I spluttered. “He’s at Lick Her, having a party.”

  Confusion clouded Dejohn’s eyes for only a moment, then recognition hit home.

  “Did yuh see someting that hurt yuh?” I nodded, trying valiantly to wipe away the stubborn tears that just kept falling. “Ah, girl, yuh bin fooled. He’s trying to hurt yuh, through Shadow.” I shook my head and closed my eyes tight, hoping he wouldn’t ask me to explain further. It didn’t appear I needed to as Dejohn drew me down to the bed and sat quietly at my side while I got my sobbing under control. “Yuh listen to mi, Nada, an’ listen good, Shadow wouldn’t have had a choice.”

  “Everyone has a choice,” I snapped. “He chose to be Kingsley’s lap dog.”

  “Now use dat clever head of yuhs. Kingsley would have used yuh, against im.”

  “What do you mean against him?” I murmured, trying to erase the image of Shadow with Meg from my perfect memory.

  “He means Kingsley threatened to kill you if I didn’t obey.” My eyes snapped up to meet Shadow’s drunken ones as he swayed in my doorway. “I didn’t fuck her. I played the game just like Kingsley ordered, and I left right after you.” My lip curled as I took in the dark bruise on his neck that Meg had left. Shadow lifted a hand to cover it. “I’ll cut it out if you ask me to. Better yet, I’ll let you cut it out.”

  Dejohn stood to leave, and I grabbed at his hand in an unusual display of need.

  “Come now, Nada. Yuh braver den dat. Yuh smarter den dat, too. Don’t let ’im win.”

  With a kiss to my forehead, he left, and Shadow stepped further into the room, closing the door behind him. My intellectual reasoning told me Dejohn was right; if it was Shadow’s life that had been threatened, I would have likely done the same thing. But my heart wasn’t ready to accept it, and when Shadow collapsed to sit beside me, I moved to put more space between us.

  “Don’t do that,” Shadow growled as his head hung in his hands.

  “Do what?” I snapped.

  “Don’t put space between us. I need you right now. I need to know that you are safe and Kingsley can’t get to you.”

  “I never needed your protection before now; I’m alive because I can fucking take care of myself.” I let the anger fly and stood in front of him, wild and furious. “What makes you think I need you fucking other women to keep me safe? Do you think I’d prefer to see that than have a gun pointed at my head? I’ve got news for you, Shadow, Kingsley has been threatening to kill me since the day I was born. He hasn’t, and he won’t, because I’m worth too much to him alive.” I clenched my fist, wanting to hit him. “If I were to be honest with you, I think I’d rather have a knife in my back than to see you in another woman’s arms.” Another damn tear leaked out of my eyes, and I clenched them closed to prevent another one from falling. Crying meant Kingsley had won. He’d found my weakness, and I hated letting anyone see such a flaw, even Shadow.

  When Shadow leaned his head against my stomach, I resisted the urge to step away. As angry as I was, it was misdirected anger; it was Kingsley who I wanted to see bleed. The only thing he had never taken away from me that I cared about was Dejoh
n, and he kept him alive because he trained me well. Now he was trying to take Shadow, and the defiant woman in me grabbed at his hair and held him close.

  “I’m sorry,” Shadow whispered.

  My heart almost stopped beating hearing his apology. I doubted Shadow ever apologized to anyone, and I knew it would cost him a lot of pride to utter those words. What happened wasn’t his fault. It was all on Kingsley, and Shadow was just doing what he needed to do to survive. Eventually, my fingers let go of the hair that I held in a vice-like grip, and instead they ran through his thick hair, marveling at how his shoulders lost all their tension merely from my hesitant touch. After a short moment, he abruptly stood and stepped around me. When he reached for my door, I panicked, wondering where he was going. Would he go back to the fuck-fest now? Would he finish what Kingsley demanded he start?

  “Where are you going?”

  Shadow paused. “I need to wash the smell of that whore off my skin and burn these clothes. I can’t bear to touch you while she’s on my skin.”

  “I’ll come with you.” I blurted out, and it appeared to shock the both of us.

  “If you come to the showers with me, I won’t be able to keep my hands off you.”

  I grabbed a towel and my backpack and turned to face him.

  “I’ll consider it fair warning, and Shadow?” He paused as he stepped through the doorway. “I may kill Meg if I see her again.”

  “I’ll make sure she’s buried deep in the Whore Pit, so you never have to see her again.”

  I knew it wasn’t Meg’s fault; she was a junkie whore following King’s orders. I didn’t really want to kill her, but jealousy apparently made me irrational. “After the crabs are gone, of course. We can’t have an outbreak of cock rot in the Underworld. Civil war would break out.”

  “Good idea,” I murmured as I followed him out of my room. “Just make sure someone else deals with her; the thought of you even looking at her makes me want to kill someone.”

  With a drunken grin that was oddly endearing to me, Shadow reached out his hand, and with a trust I didn’t know I possessed, I took hold of it.