I put my cell back and ran for my car at the bar. My hands shook around my keys as I struggled to get them into my lock. Once inside my car, I slammed the locks down and let my terror loose, hyperventilating as I forced my car in drive and drove home.
I got my cell phone out and called nine-one-one. When the operator answered me, I told them that there was a girl screaming at the address of his place. I said she was crying for help on the second floor, barred windows. I said he was raping her, that he’d raped others. When they asked for my name, I hung up and drove home. I told no one. I went to bed, and stayed awake all night, pulling heat from Trixie’s little body.
Every single horror I’d ever felt reopened that night. I was seventeen all over again, and my world had broken down to nothing but fear and tears. When the sun peeked through my curtains, and I heard Madison and Klay finally get up Monday morning, I exhaled in relief. Monday and Tuesdays were our weekend. I didn’t want to be alone.
I bolted from bed, leaving Trixie to sleep. Madison was on the counter and Klay was between her legs, hands possessively, lovingly, cradling her neck and head as he kissed the hell out of her.
Tears burned in my eyes at the sight of them. I had never felt more alone than I did walking back to my room on my own, when that was the last thing I wanted to be.
Chapter Thirteen
Brando
Something was wrong.
Cat wasn’t at work on Wednesday. I didn’t pry at first. I had a client coming in first thing that morning and wanted to give her what she asked for. But it bothered me, all day, that Cat’s eyes weren’t anywhere near me. I could feel them in the room, their warmth tracing my face as I worked. Their fire leaving behind ash. I could work, think, and breathe because she was there.
Klay came into the main parlor as I was sketching. His station was beside mine, and he sank down in his seat, pulling out antibacterial wash to scrub down his chair.
“What’d you do?” he asked, looking at his chair as he talked.
“What are you talking about?”
“Why is Cat holed up in her room?”
That didn’t sound like her. That sounded like me. I’d ordered furniture online, paid a heartburn inducing fee for them to carry it all up and set it up. After which, I’d fallen onto my brand new bare mattress and stayed that way all weekend. My ribs and back had gone from a ten threshold of pain to an eight, but long periods of time spent bent over clients had created an ache in my ribcage that refused to go away. “I don’t know, Klay. I haven’t talked to her.” I called. Monday night, and Tuesday night, but she didn’t answer.
“I don’t know what the fuck’s wrong with her.” He scrubbed the chair harder, making the leather squeak.
“I’ll come by after work.”
“Good.” He still seemed bothered. He sat back and ran a hand through his hair as Isaiah came out from the back. “What’s up, Izzy?”
He nodded at us both in greeting, a quiet kid who reminded me of myself at his age. Lost as he tried so hard to find himself. I hoped he managed to do so. I’d found nothing but further proof that I was lost. And it was starting to wear on me. No matter where I went, no matter what version of myself I chose to portray, I still didn’t feel alive.
My client was a welcome distraction. I took her in the back since her tattoo was under her breasts. Thankfully, this one didn’t make it hard on me. I could still see the look in Cat’s eyes when that redhead gave me her number, and I couldn’t shake the idea that I was the reason she wasn’t at work.
What kind of guy did Cat think I was? I glared at my hands as they moved over my client’s olive-toned skin. Her face was scrunched and she’d put her headphones in to calm down; but her bottom lip was seconds from being torn through. She’d wanted angel wings under her breasts, thick swaths of black ink and gold shading. Some of the wings fell away, traveling down her mid-section to her navel. It would take eight hours to do. If I couldn’t give Cat what she needed, why would I waste my time on another woman?
I hadn’t left to be an asshole. I’d left to protect her.
I tried to shake off the bad feeling in my heart, but it only intensified. I let my client take an hour break at noon. I’d gotten the outline done. Shading was coming next. I spotted Madison in the breakroom eating lunch with Klay, and decided I’d rather not have that conversation.
I grabbed my sweatshirt off my station and took off for a sandwich place down the street. Why the fuck did I feel so hollow today? I ate, trying to fill those ugly missing pieces with food and cola, but it was pointless. They’d been there my entire life. When I made it back to Guns & Ink, I spent the next four hours finishing my piece.
The cut from that one piece paid for all my new furniture, but it didn’t make me feel alive.
I had a feeling that was because life had nothing to do with ink or tattoos. That was a story, that was art. Life had a lot to do with Catherine Abbott, and all the ink and magic in the world was a missing piece.
I helped Klay and Madison close, sanitizing the stations, refilling the breakroom, and mopping down the main parlor with an intense bleach and soap wash down. The shop gleamed when we were done, but my back and side screamed in acute pain. I hid my shaking hands on my way back out to my Charger, nodding along to Klay and Madison’s conversation.
It was almost eleven, and they were heading out to an all-night diner for a late dinner. Regretting not bringing my pills with me, I breathed shallowly, tapping my fingers on the steering wheel as I waited for the light in front of me to turn green. I still had a key to her place, and I slipped it in the lock, stepping into a black living room.
The moment I closed the door behind me, I heard the jingle of a collar and Trixie dove off the sofa, running at me in the dark. I couldn’t believe how much the little mutt had grown on me. I bent to pick her up and nuzzled my face against hers.
“What’s up, girl?”
She whimpered, wriggling in my hands.
“You want to go outside?” I guessed, and her whimpering intensified.
I turned the light on in the living room and found her leash slung over one of the kitchen chairs. I hadn’t thought to look for Cat’s car on my way in, wondering too late if she were even home.
“Let’s go take a bathroom break, Trix.” I put her leash on, combating her wriggling body, and took her for a short walk to relieve herself. When we made it back inside, I refilled her food and water bowl, watching her go to town on both.
Cat loved Trixie. If Trixie wasn’t her top priority, then what was?
I made my way down the hall to her bedroom, finding the door unlocked. The room was dark, but the TV was on, and the movie that played was low. Cat was curled up in a ball under the covers, her face pinched shut in sleep. Even unmoving I could feel the negative energy in the air. There was a storm in this room. It rained down on her.
I didn’t know whether to wake her and pull her out, or crawl into the storm with her.
I sat on the edge of her bed and lifted the covers away from her chin. “Cat?”
She mewled, tucking her chin into her chest.
I drug my knuckles across her cheek, sliding them over her supple bottom lip. The sight of her this close after being apart emotionally and physically had my soul in a knot. It wanted to untighten, but it knew better than to do it. It knew what happened when we let anyone in.
It knew better than to love.
I gritted my teeth against the pain and moved on my side, cupping her face in my hand. I lay on her pillow and watched her sleep. Resting, she appeared so young. Awake, she was strength, and that was beautiful, of course it was, but there was something about her vulnerability that was as well. I leaned close and pressed a kiss to her warm lips, finding them supple and inviting.
She moaned in her sleep and took a deep sighing breath, granting me access inside. I knew I should stop for a million different reasons, but her tongue was hot silk, and I needed it so badly in that moment I lost my self-control. My eyes slid shut a
nd I gave myself to this kiss. I knew she was awake when her hand settled on the back of my head and her fingers threaded in my hair, holding me even closer.
I was caught in lust and she was trapped in that fog of sleep and reality. There were no lies or fears between us. I felt the brutal desire in her body. The tightened muscles, the painful grip she fisted my hair with, and the erotic slow go of her tongue. We tasted the inside of the other.
If we could stay this way forever, nothing would ever be wrong.
We couldn’t. She’d wake, clear herself of the fog, and I’d come down from the high, fall right to the ground.
There was lust and there was truth, but unfortunately, there was also fear.
The pain in my side sent a rush of reality over me. I fought it, holding on to our fog for a moment longer. It was as if she felt it too, kissing me hard, holding me closer. I eased on top of her, and that was the exact moment our bomb detonated.
It exploded inside of us, sending shrapnel through our body parts and tearing through our organs. Pieces of her ended up inside of me, and parts of me lay scattered inside of her.
Cat’s lips stilled abruptly. She pushed me off by my shoulders and pressed her cheek into the pillow. “What the hell, Brando?” she hissed; a single tear trailed down her temple and disappeared into her hair. “Get off me, would you? I don’t like men on top of me!” She seethed, shoving at my shoulders even harder.
I couldn’t move. I was trapped. Locked in her haze. “Why are you crying, Cat?” I rested my full weight on her, shoving my face in her neck. She smelled so good, so light and clean. I inhaled the skin behind her ear, easing between her legs. There was resistance in her body, but she brought her legs around my waist anyway. Her hands settled on my shoulder blades. I kissed along her neck, dragging my tongue down the throbbing pulse in her throat. The taste of her burned on my tongue.
Maybe that’s why I kept myself at a distance. Being hungry was fine. It wasn’t the hunger that drove us crazy. It was the sustenance that drove us mad. Having what would satiate you so close but being unable to indulge, was twisted torture.
“Hmm?” I rumbled, pulling the soft pliant flesh of her earlobe between my teeth.
“Get off of me,” she begged, but her arms and legs tightened around me.
The warble in her voice shattered a bit of my hunger. “Why are you laying in the dark?” I kissed up her temple, pausing there to kiss the thrumming heartbeat. It pounded against my lips.
“Why do you care?” she shot back, digging her nails into my shoulder blades.
She was hurt. But beyond that she was fragile. I could sense her breaks in the way she held me.
I kissed across her forehead as her arms wrapped around my neck, holding me even closer. She pressed her face in the crook between my arm and neck, and then she sobbed. Deep gut wrenching sobs. I rested my head in her crook as well and slipped my arms beneath her to hold her there.
“What happened?” I thought I did this. But I didn’t do all of this.
Her head shook against me. “Doesn’t matter.”
“Anything that hurts you matters to me. What happened?”
She sobbed harder. I fought her grip and eased onto my elbows, staring into her tear-soaked eyes. There was such torment trapped in them. Such pain. It shocked me. That was too fresh to be from the past. That pain was brand-painfully-new.
“It’s mine to deal with.” She closed the door on her torment. “Why are you here?” And opened the door on her hurt for me.
“Klay was worried about you.”
Her jaw set. “Well, you can run and tell your boss that I’m fine. Get. Off.” She shoved me hard once more, sending me onto my side and then onto my back.
I stared at her ceiling. The dark in the room throbbed around the edges. I was a complete bastard. “Tell me what you think of me,” I spoke up.
“Just go, Brando.” She rolled onto her side, giving me her back.
“I need to know how to fix this.”
“What’s the point? Fix it today, break it tomorrow. It’s only a matter of time before this blows up in my face.”
I smiled sadly. She wasn’t the only one invested in this. This existed because of us. “I’m trying to protect you.” My sad smile faded to dust.
She was quiet for a few moments, the soft sounds from the television between us. “Protect me from what?”
I had a safe in real life. But I also had a safe in my heart. I had certain things locked up tight that I would never open. Set those memories loose, and I might as well find a cliff to jump over. I didn’t get this far in life remembering. I got this far in life running, forgetting, and creating new pretenses to hide all the truths I didn’t want to keep.
Love was a weapon in my world. As soon as I fell, I may as well destroy it myself.
“Me.”
“Am I dreaming? Or did you come into my room, kiss me like I was everything, and then hit me with the line it’s not you, it’s me?”
“It is me,” I insisted.
“What’s so dangerous about you?”
I didn’t answer, wouldn’t put words to my past.
She sighed, still speaking with her back to me. “You want to know what I think about you, Brando? I think everything about you. I think you’re gorgeous. I think you’re strong. I think you’re funny. I think you’re sweet. I think you’re stubborn, and hardheaded. I think you’re smart and paranoid. I think you’re afraid. I think you’re beautiful when you laugh, like you can’t believe you have something to laugh over. You’re safe. You’re mine. I think you’re every single thing I’d ever want in a man. That’s what I think about you.” I could hear tears in her voice, the soggy inhale of her breath. “But I also think—no, I know—that you’re going to break my heart. I have a lot of questions that I’m afraid to know the answers to. Where’s your family? Why was I the only person in that hospital room with you? Why does it look like the scar on your neck came from someone slitting your throat? And what would be in a safe that you’d risk a back full of bullet holes to protect?”
I was impressed, and a little thankful. She saw right through me. From day one, she’d seen through every single wall I’d ever built.
“What do you think of me?” she asked next.
“I think you’re insightful. You see right through me, but you’re also still a woman. A woman who wants and fears that I don’t wonder the same things you do.” I didn’t want to do this, didn’t want to set my feelings free, but she had, and right then, there was nothing I wanted more than her feelings to mold around mine. “I moved out to put distance between us, not because I wanted that distance, but because you deserve it. Cat,” I breathed desperately, running a hand down my face. “It’s better for you to be away from me. That isn’t what I want, that’s what’s best for you.”
“Why?” She fell on her back, peering at me through her tear-slicked onyx lashes.
“It just is.” I tried to keep my tone down, but she had no idea how hard it had been to lose everything I knew and loved.
Because of my father. And his fucking inability to break free of the Hard Riders.
“Okay, okay,” she soothed, sliding closer to me. “I want to know one thing.”
“What?” I gave in, my tone defeated.
“What do you want?”
The answer was clear, had been since we met. It was all the in-between that sucked the bottom out of me. “You.” I looked at her. “I want you, Catherine. I want you so fucking much.”
Her eyes slid closed, and a morose smile played on her lips. She nodded slowly, the way one would when they heard the answer they’d always wanted.
Her lashes fawned open. Her mahogany irises glittered in the dark. “I can work with that. I have a feeling all that you’re running from will always chase you anyway. I know the feeling too, remember? We may not be running from the same things, but we run, Brando, we run our hearts out.”
I slid forward, putting my face close to hers. “Can I have you?”<
br />
Ours would never be a relationship that required titles and understandings. It was stronger than us.
Her hand settled on my face, and her thumb stroked my lips. “It feels like I’ve always been yours. You can have me.” She nodded, reassuring herself, or me, or everything between us, and then she pressed a soft kiss to my lips. “On one condition.”
I smiled. “What is it?”
“Give me you in return. I want you, Brando. I want you so fucking hard and so fucking much it drives me crazy.”
I cursed my wounds. I wanted to climb on top of her, slip between her legs, and make love to her rough and deep. Never coming up for air, never seeking out relief. “I don’t want to lose you,” I admitted, swallowing the pain. It cracked against me like a whip.
She saw the flare of fear. Saw my demons. “Give me you. All of you.”
She wanted to hear it. So I said it. “You can have me.”
Above us, the storm clouds prepared for thunder. The cracks in our souls braced themselves for impact.
The hurt in our hearts wondered how it’d fare this time.
When there was only ash left to burn.
Chapter Fourteen
Catherine
There was an almost unidentifiable shift in the air.
Where that had been desolation, there was hope now.
I defied my demons, I ignored my heart. I wanted Brando. Had him. Needed him. Would do my best in this war.
His tongue twisted with mine, feeding my soul at the same time we starved. I savored the silky, hot taste of him. I felt lit but forced down. Like dropping a lit candle into a glass jar and screwing on the lid slowly. My flame still burned, but for how long?
What was Brando so afraid of? I tore my lips free of his and gasped for air as his lips continued torturing me. I was still mad at him. I was still hurt. And I was still very much aware of what happened the other night. Part of me wanted to go back to Denver. To live in his house where we were both confused.
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