The Complete Secrets Series

by LK Shaw

  With lungs bursting from overuse, and a pain in my side, I collapsed against the wall, tears wetting my cheeks. A light caress across my shoulder had my head snapping up, but no one was there. Pure exhaustion had me wanting to give up, but my willpower grew and I dragged myself up off the floor, determined to find a way out. I kept going until suddenly a dim light appeared in the distance. My feet flew as I ran toward it, the stitch in my side growing in intensity. The light grew brighter as I finally reached a room with floor to ceiling windows.

  My eyes scanned the room until I zeroed in on the door. I wrenched it open and with a burst of speed took off outside. Laughter grew behind me, but I kept up my pace. Knowing I shouldn’t, but doing it anyway, I peered over my shoulder, never breaking stride. A deranged laugh emerged when I didn’t spot anyone behind me.

  My breath seized as I collided with something in front of me. I bounced off the obstacle and fell to my ass. I pushed my hair out of my face and black shoes filled my vision. As my eyes scanned upward over the black dress pants, black shirt opened at the neck, the gold of the necklace glinting off the sunlight, my whole body began to tremble and I tried to gulp in breaths.

  No!

  God, no!

  I was free.

  Please, not again.

  A sinister smile appeared, and I could no longer take in air. The man squatted in front of me, his forearms resting lightly against his knees.

  “Hello, malen’kaya igrushka.”

  My scream rent the silence. I shot straight up in bed, my heart pounding in fear. Bile rose, and I raced to the bathroom where I emptied my stomach. My sweat coated body collapsed to the floor and I rested my head against the cool porcelain. Faint laughter still resounded in my head. I slowly picked myself up off the floor, flushed the toilet, and locked the bathroom door. I turned the shower on as hot as I could stand and stripped out of my clothes. I didn’t even bother to check the temperature before I stepped in. I hissed as the spray hit my skin, which quickly reddened, but I didn’t care. I scrubbed and scrubbed every inch of my body, my tears mixing with the liquid that cascaded down my face.

  The water had turned almost cold before I forced myself to emerge. Almost lethargically, I dressed in my standard sweat pants, fleece shirt, plain gray wool socks, and sweatshirt. I listlessly twisted my hair up into a knot and headed outside. It was barely dawn as I walked around the backyard, the birds just beginning to wake and sing. Crickets chirped as the sun crested over the horizon. I wore a path in the grass walking around, too restless to sit still.

  Without conscious thought, my mind wandered to my meeting with Mr. Jeffries, Donovan, later this morning. I’d promised him I would tell him everything. I shuddered at the thought. It also made me wonder what he would think of me. Would he judge me and find me lacking? Then, I wondered why I cared. I lost track of time, but I continued to walk. Soon the sounds of the neighborhood waking up could be heard. Kids yelling, a lawnmower starting, birds singing, dogs barking. All the sounds I didn’t know if I would ever get used to.

  In the city, we didn’t have those noises. Cars honking, people screaming obscenities, police sirens. That’s what I was used to. What I fell asleep to at night. Suburbia was an entirely different world. My mind jumped to the future. What would I do after the trial? Where would I go? I couldn’t stay here forever. What if Kieran wasn’t convicted? What if he found me? Connor’s words returned to me about how they would pay for what they did to me no matter what. Oddly, it brought me a little comfort.

  Weariness unlike I’d ever experienced settled over me. I curled up in my regular spot in the Adirondack chair and I watched the koi fish swimming and playing in their water world, my head resting against the back of the chair, cushioned by my forearm. Suddenly, the air shifted and before I even turned my head, I knew Donovan stood in the doorway, motionless as a statue, observing me. An indecipherable shiver went through me.

  Donovan

  She looked so heartbroken sitting there. I knew the minute she sensed me though. There was an almost indecipherable shift in her posture. It intrigued me that she felt my presence before I made myself known. We both stared, assessing the other. I wondered what thoughts went through her head as she studied me. I hadn’t lied yesterday when I’d told her she was strong. She also possessed an aura that brought my Dominant side to the surface.

  I wanted to care for and nurture her.

  Keep her safe. Protect her.

  But I also wanted to teach her how to regain her control and power.

  The key to that was trust.

  Finally, Phebe rose from her perch and I remained still as she walked slowly toward me, her eyes never leaving mine. I stepped off to the side, giving her plenty of room to pass me without brushing against me, but that’s as far as I moved. We were going to be in close proximity until the trial was over. She needed to get used to my presence. Once she stepped on the deck, she broke eye contact. She stared straight ahead as she stiffly passed me, but I could see her throat bob as she swallowed hard. I followed behind her, keeping enough distance between us that I wasn’t breathing down her neck, yet close enough she knew I was there.

  Phebe took her place on the couch, the same one she’d occupied yesterday. When I saw she was settled, I headed to the kitchen. I rummaged through the fridge. It wasn’t the greatest breakfast food, but I quickly put together a sandwich. I grabbed two bottles of water, set the sandwich on a plate, and headed back to the living room.

  Bridget had told me Phebe was barely eating anything. Hardly any of the groceries she’d bought had been touched. I wasn’t sure the reason, but she needed to eat. It was second nature for me to take care of a woman. I set the plate next to her and screwed off the cap of one of the bottles and held it out to her. At first she ignored my offering, but when she saw I wasn’t going to budge, she took it out of my hands. The other bottle I placed on the coffee table in front of her.

  “Eat. Drink. Please.” I gently instructed as I took my own seat on the chair opposite her. While I waited to see if she did what I asked, I reached into my briefcase I’d set on the floor when I’d first arrived. As I pulled out my legal pad and pen, I caught movement in my periphery. I hid a smile as Phebe picked the sandwich up and took small, delicate bites with sips of water between them. I waited until she’d finished the sandwich before I began.

  “Thank you for eating.”

  She nodded as she sipped the last of her first bottle of water before setting the empty bottle next to the full one. I anticipated that before we were through she’d need the other one.

  “Are you ready to begin?”

  She swallowed hard and nodded as she scrubbed her palms on her pants.

  “How old were you when you met Mr. Underwood?”

  Phebe cleared her throat before responding. “I’d just turned eighteen. I’d gone to a club where he was DJ’ing. He approached me after the club closed and asked me out for after hours breakfast with him and some of his friends.”

  “Tell me about the charges on your juvenile record. They were all clearly before you met Mr. Underwood.”

  “My mom was rarely around when I was growing up. She just didn’t have any interest in having a kid. We got in a huge fight one day. Well, we were always fighting, but this one was particularly hateful. I asked her why she hadn’t just aborted me if she was that apathetic to having a child. She slapped me across the face and screamed about how disrespectful I was. She never did answer my question. She walked out of the room and we didn’t talk for a week. I never brought up the topic again.”

  Phebe grabbed the other bottle of water and took a long gulp after she screwed off the cap. Her finger plucked nervously at the label.

  “After that I kind of stopped giving a shit about anything. I mean, if my mom didn’t care about me or what I did, why should I? My grades dropped and I started hanging out with the wrong crowd. One day we were cruising around the mall and I saw a purse that I had to have. Of course, I didn't have any money. I got caught sh
oplifting it. I also just happened to have a small amount of marijuana with me. The thing that completely sucks is that it wasn’t even mine. Typical excuse, right? I may have been a rebellious kid, but I wasn’t a druggie. One of my so-called ‘friends’ had stuck it in my coat pocket. But, I was the one who got busted with it and the cops didn’t care when I tried to explain that.”

  Disgust was evident in Phebe’s entire face. Oddly, I believed her. She was so earnest in her telling that the truth rang out in her words.

  “And the assault?”

  She shrugged. “I punched someone in the face who touched me in a way I didn't appreciate. He called the cops and pressed charges. Since he was the one with the broken nose and I was the one with the bruised knuckles, they arrested me for assault. Coincidentally, the single witness somehow only managed to see the punch and not the touching. Go figure. I was lucky though, and the judge threw out the case. Regardless, the charge wasn’t expunged from my record. Shortly after that, I met Kieran.”

  Anger burned through me. This woman had been dealt a shitty hand in life.

  “Connor told me he explained that your father, Charles Santiago, is dead. You said he wasn’t part of your life. Did your mother ever talk about him?”

  “She always talked about how much she hated him. How he took advantage of her. She was a bitter woman, Mr. Jeffries. Bitter and unhappy. And she tried to make everyone else around her just as miserable.”

  “Please, call me Donovan. Did she ever mention anything about Mr. Santiago’s criminal activity?”

  “Nothing specific that I can recall. I mean, I knew he was some type of mob boss, but she never went into details. Regardless of her hatred, I think there was also a significant amount of fear of him as well.”

  “Did you ever seek him out?”

  She looked at me like my question was ridiculous. “Why would I do that? It was clear he didn’t care about us. I already had one parent who made it glaringly obvious that she was ambivalent toward me. Believe it or not, I’m not a glutton for punishment. I used to make up stories about how he was called away for work and that the reason he couldn’t spend time with me was because he was busy out saving people’s lives. It was easier to deal with the neglect that way.”

  With each word that passed her lips, she painted a clearer picture of her previous life. And why she had been drawn to Underwood. If she’d grown up without the love and care she clearly needed, it’s no wonder she lapped up the attention shown to her by Underwood.

  “How long were you with Mr. Underwood before the drugs started?”

  “Honestly, I’m not sure. I just remember waking up one morning and realizing that we hadn’t been struggling to buy groceries from week to week. Our money seemed to be stretching further. At first I thought Kieran had been offered a steady well paying job at some club, but then it struck me that he was home more often than not. I knew that people stopped by frequently, but they were all mutual friends so I didn’t really think about it. Man, I was so naive.”

  She let out a self-deprecating laugh before sipping more of her water. She shifted on the couch, pulling her legs up underneath her.

  “This had gone on about six months when one day I came home early from the grocery store when I realized halfway there that I’d forgotten my list at home. When I walked in the house, I heard voices coming from the back bedroom. When I opened the door, there was Kieran and a stranger. On the dresser was a small mirror, a razor, and two lines of white powder. A baggie laid next to the display and the stranger was half-bent over the drugs with a rolled up bill in his hand. I quickly shut the door, but they’d both seen me. Kieran chased after me. He grabbed me, digging his fingers into my arms deep enough to bruise them, and told me I better keep my mouth shut about what I’d just seen. It was the first time he’d ever laid hands on me.”

  I absorbed what she’d told me and I processed it. Something she said struck me.

  “You said it was the first time he’d laid hands on you, not the only time.”

  Her eyes flashed toward me before she looked away again. She chugged the remaining amount of water and distractedly picked at the label. Piece by piece she tore it off, crumpling the bits in her hand, pushing them down inside the plastic before screwing the cap back on. She unconsciously tapped the bottle against her thigh in a nervous gesture. I remained quiet, letting her tell me her story in her own time.

  “No, it wasn’t the only time.”

  Whereas before Phebe’s voice held emotion. Anger, disbelief, shame. All of those were missing now. There was a sort of detachment to her words. As though the pain was too great to bear. Her gaze returned to mine and at first I thought her eyes held a blank glaze, but when I looked a little deeper, agony was hidden in their depths.

  It was buried so deeply, I don’t think she even realized I could see it.

  But, I did.

  I saw it so clearly that it touched a part of my soul I’d forgotten I possessed.

  Softly, I asked my next question. “Tell me about another time.”

  “After a while I couldn’t take the drugs anymore. I tried to leave. He didn’t take too kindly to me walking out on him. He rained down punches with a fury that shocked me more than the strikes. He was so angry, I didn’t think he would stop.”

  “Why did he stop?”

  “I shouted that I was pregnant. Only then did he stop. Otherwise, I think he would have killed me.”

  Her entire body shifted in a way that I knew she was physically bracing herself for what we both knew was coming next.

  “What happened to your baby, Phebe?”

  A single tear traced a wet path down her cheek. “She died.”

  Phebe

  “After I buried Avery, I suffered horribly with postpartum depression. I didn’t care about anything anymore. My baby was dead, and I wished I was in that grave with her. I was almost twenty one years old and I wanted to die. I was in a complete fog for six months, so I never paid attention to what Kieran was doing. For the most part, he left me alone. I think he grieved in his own way, but he didn’t feel the pain and torment I did. To me, that equated with him not caring our baby was dead. It’s when my love turned to hate. I hated this man with every fiber of my being. My hatred was the only thing that brought me out of my depression. I was done. I was finally getting away from him.”

  My heart continued to ache for Avery. For now, though, I was all cried out. My tears had soaked the pillow last night. I was too exhausted to cry right now. Besides, the renewed anger at Kieran kept the grief at bay.

  Donovan spoke, pulling me back to him. “According to the paperwork I’ve seen, you’re twenty-five. So, for five years you’ve been planning your escape?”

  “Yes.”

  “How? That’s an awfully long time to not have set your plans in place.”

  I laughed bitterly. “Do you have any idea how much money Kieran has? How many friends he has? Planning to leave someone like Kieran doesn’t happen overnight. It takes time, patience, and a lot of money. A lot.”

  “You said Kieran gave you money. Your bank account proves you have a significant amount of funds. You also have an extremely valuable car in your name. It would seem you had the means to leave.”

  “None of that money is Kieran’s.” I spit out. “Every penny in my account is mine. Money I earned. Money I spent five years busting my ass to earn. As for that car, it’s mine in name only. It was Kieran’s baby. I’ve never even driven it. I took public transportation or walked if I wanted to go anywhere.”

  I took several cleansing breaths to calm myself down. I knew Donovan was only trying to figure things out. I didn’t need to take my anger out on him.

  “Once I began to recover from my depression, I knew I had to leave. I knew it would require a lot of money, planning, and patience. I had no skills and Kieran had already nixed the idea of me going to college when I’d approached him about it once before. Which meant, I needed to find a way to earn money without formal schooling. I was
walking around downtown one day and spotted an art gallery. The pictures were breathtaking. As I wandered around, the owner approached me and we started talking. She was an older woman, close to my grandmother’s age if I’d had one. I don’t know what it was about her, but she was so easy to talk to that I found myself spilling out my story. She listened to every word without judgment. She told me to wait and she walked to the back of the gallery before disappearing into the back. Within five minutes, she reappeared holding a camera in her hand.”

  I remembered the weight of it in my hands and how I was terrified of even pressing a button for fear of breaking it. Muriel had been my only true friend. I missed her terribly and wondered how she was coping with my disappearance. I made a mental note to let her know I was okay.

  “She then told me her own story. About how she escaped a childhood full of abuse by taking photos. It was her way of bringing joy into the world. She gave me the camera, amidst all my protests, as well as the names of some books on cameras and photography and said I could come to her with any questions I had. I left and headed straight to the library. I devoured the information and taught myself everything I needed to know about lights, shadows, angles, equipment… everything. Of course, Muriel answered my questions and she let me do some shoots in her gallery. It wasn’t long after that she told me my skills rivaled hers. She placed some of my photos on display and imagine my surprise when they started selling.”

  Donovan whistled in appreciation. “So, that’s where your money comes from.”

  “Yes. I’ve been selling my pictures through Muriel’s gallery for years. The buyers pay her and in return, she pays me. We were also working out a plan on how I could sell the car. It was paid for in cash so there was no lien against it.”

  “You’re a little devious.”

  I shook my head, denying the claim. “Not devious. Desperate.”

  He acknowledged my correction with a nod. “So, once you had enough money, what was next?”