by SR Jones
“No. I can’t settle for less than I deserve. My father, my mother, my uncle—they’ve all made me feel less than insignificant, unimportant, my whole life. The man I get to spend the rest of my life with needs to be able to make me feel special, and part of it is being able to say he loves me.”
“I get it,” she says, taking hold of my hand and giving it a squeeze.
My phone goes, and it is a text from an unknown number. My skin prickles as I read it.
“Daughter of the whore. You’re alive … for now. You won’t be for long. You screwed up big time when you attacked my men. You fucked up when you let your poorly trained attack dog think he had some say in my family and the business. We’re coming for you all, you unhinged bitch.”
My stomach drops as if on a rollercoaster, and I drop my phone.
“What is it?” Stella leans forward to grab it, and I try to reach it first, not wanting her to see the ugly words when she’s already worried sick and scared out of her mind.
This is my family, my darkness, and she shouldn’t be tainted with it. I’m too late, though, as her nimble fingers pluck my phone from the comforter.
She reads the message and her eyes widen. “Oh, God.” Tears shimmer in the deep brown depths of her gaze. “Tell me one thing. Promise me you’ll stay with Damen, no matter what, until this bastard is taken care of.”
I promise her as much because I have little choice. Costas is gunning for me, and he won’t give up anytime soon.
He hates me and hated my mother. It’s super personal for him.
“I need to go show Damen this,” I tell her.
I find him in the kitchen, talking to Andrius, Markos, and Alesso. His face tightens when he sees my expression and the phone in my hand.
“Show me,” he demands.
I do, and he clenches his jaw. “Motherfucker.”
“What is it?” Andrius asks.
Damen places the phone on the table, and the other men read the message.
“He’s a dead man walking,” Andrius tells me. “He also threatened Justina. I think he is taking more drugs because he’s making bad decisions left, right, and center. Be assured, Maya, he can’t get to you here.”
I’m not so sure. He has a biker gang working with him now, and I might not know much, but I know those guys are scary as hell. I once read an article that said biker gangs were more of an issue for law enforcement than any other kind of gang. They caused more trouble than the mafia. Were harder to infiltrate than any other kind of organized crime gang, and were loyal beyond any doubt to one another. So I’m not reassured by Andrius’ words.
“I can see you struggle to believe him,” Damen says. “Come.” He crooks his finger at me and heads to the back of the room, to the door leading to the cellar and basement rooms.
I follow him, Andrius close behind. We head down the stairs, and Damen leads me to a small door, which is locked with a padlock and chains. He takes his keys out of his pocket and uses one to open the lock. When the chains are off, he yanks the door open, pulling on an old-fashioned cord to turn on a stark bulb in the center of the room.
I gasp.
There are weapons everywhere my gaze lands.
Guns. Big guns, small guns, and what looks like two machine guns. Is that … is that a rocket launcher? Good lord. I am blown away.
“See? We have enough arms here to instigate a coup in a small nation,” Andrius says drolly. “You also have six Special Forces soldiers here, and my three men who are minutes away, staying in a house down the street.”
I wondered where his men had gone.
“If Costas is watching this house, he will think there are six of us. There are nine, never mind your uncle’s men who also will help if we need it. Damen is monitoring the chatter between the biker gang and anyone outside, and their messages, so we are hopeful if they plan an attack, we will know.”
“You are?” I ask Damen.
“Yes, what I can gain access to at any rate.”
“I still think someone should go to the club’s compound and put in some listening devices,” Andrius mutters.
“Who?” Damen asks. “Me? You? As if we can walk in there and start planting bugs without getting our heads blown off.”
“We can’t,” Andrius says. “But a woman could, and I know an excellent Russian spy who could do this for us.”
“No way,” Damen growls. “I won’t have her death on my conscience if it goes wrong.”
“It won’t go wrong. She will go there, screw their brains out and get them drunk, then place the cameras.”
“You want some woman to whore herself out for us?” I ask Andrius, incredulous.
He shrugs. “This is what she does. She chooses to do it, and she is paid very, very well for it. Trust me, I am not okay with women being forced into these things, but Natasha chooses this life, and she is good at this. For her the sex is a bonus, not something she endures.”
“How do you fucking know it’s a bonus for her?” Damen voices my own question, but less politely than I would have.
“She is a bit of a psychopath.” Andrius laughs. “She likes danger, sex, violence.”
“Bit like you then. I’m surprised you didn’t get together.”
Andrius clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Let me know if you get over your faux morality anytime soon.”
After a thorough inspection of the weapons, during which more of the men come down to the room and begin to ooh and aaah over the guns as if they’re handbags and shoes, we head back upstairs.
Damen takes my hand and leads me to the library, closing the door.
“You need to know, I won’t let him get you, Maya. He has to come through me. He gets to you over my dead body.”
I sigh. “I know you will protect me. I know you’ll lay your life down for me.” I pause, and then I go and do it. I push at the thing between us, the thing I should leave alone. I had promised him time, but oh, no, here I go.
Like a dental patient who has just had her tooth removed and can’t stop poking the space it once resided with her tongue no matter how much it hurts, I go there once more. I open my big, stupid mouth, and I say, “What I don’t get is why?”
“Why?”
“Yes … why will you do all this?” I have asked before, and I ask again. “Why would you so willingly lay your life down for me? You keep saying there is nothing between us, but you certainly act as if there is.”
I see it the moment he loses patience, but I still don’t stop myself from talking. “I expected more from you. I’m disappointed. Big, bad man can’t tell the little lady she matters.”
His eyes are glittering dark as he watches me. “I’ve already told you how important you are to me. Trust me, it won’t last if you keep pushing like this. I’m already getting sick of this act.”
“How strange. You’ll lay down your life for someone you’re getting sick of?” I blink at him in faux innocence. I don’t get why I am doing this. My head is screaming at me to stop, but my heart hurts, and I am angry that he can’t see what’s in front of his nose. I’m also scared of Costas, feeling trapped, and lashing out at the nearest person.
“Don’t flatter yourself, princess.” I bite back a groan at his use of the old nickname for me. “I’d lay down my life for the piece of shit, useless, spoiled bitch of a mafia wife we had to babysit before you landed on our lap, and she meant nothing to me. It’s my job. Don’t go reading too much into things, you’re liable to get your hopes up and then find them sadly crushed. Stop fucking making me out to be something I’m not.”
He turns to walk out of the door without even looking at me. In typical Damen style, he doesn’t slam the door behind him, but shuts it carefully. That’s him. Calculated. Careful. Maybe the things he just said are true, and I am barking up the wrong tree with my determination to believe he loves me.
Maybe I’ll give him time, and at the end of it, get a big fat nothing. When instead, I could be picking up the pieces of my
fractured, broken life, and starting anew. It would hurt, but it will hurt a lot more if I wait and wait, and get … nothing.
Oh, God, am I fooling myself about his feelings?
CHAPTER TWELVE
Damen
After our fight, Maya avoids me for the rest of the day, and is already asleep, or faking it, when I get to bed. I’ve had a terrible night’s rest, and I’m pissed at her for poking at me and not letting me come to my own conclusions myself, in my own time. I shouldn’t have said the things I did to her, but she has an uncanny ability to push all my buttons in a way no one else can.
In a distinctly uncharacteristic move, I sleep in. It’s almost ten when I crack a bleary eye open and stare in bemused confusion at my phone. Ten? I never sleep in this late. I turn to look at Maya, but come up against an empty bed.
She’s already up and about, it seems. I sigh. I don’t want to bump into her at the moment. My gut tells me she’ll only start this argument again, and I don’t need this shit. I’ve got so much going on in my head, and she ought to grow up and get with the program. This isn’t a soap, where our feelings are all that matter. This is life and death, and we are in a war. She needs to understand this, and I’m not sure how to go about making her.
I brush my teeth, run my fingers through my hair, and stalk out of my room, feeling as pissed as I imagine I look. I storm across the landing and downstairs, hoping to find Maya and tell her in no uncertain terms to back the fuck off.
As I hit the bottom step and round the corner into the hallway, I slow when I see Ms. Ramos coming out of the library. Oh, yeah, Maya has therapy this morning.
“Damen.” She marches up to me and shakes my hand as if we’ve never met before.
“Ms. Ramos.” I like to keep it formal. I don’t want to give Maya cause for jealousy. Why I care, I don’t know, but I do.
“How are you?” she asks me with this solicitous look that shrivels my insides because it means she wants to talk.
“Fine,” I bark out.
“Can I have a word with you for a moment?” She indicates the library she came from a moment ago.
I follow her to the door she holds open, and stop in surprise when I see Maya isn’t there. “Where’s Maya?”
I glance at my watch again. “Didn’t your session start twenty minutes ago?”
“It was supposed to,” she says. “But Maya wasn’t in the right frame of mind. We had a brief chat, and she went to do her own thing. I decided to wait for you. I heard you come down the stairs. Or at least, I hoped it was you. I was thinking I might have to send someone to get you before my appointment time ran out, and I had to go to my next meeting.”
What? What is she going on about? And where the fuck is Maya? She better be in this damn house. If she’s tried to leave, I’ll chase her down and kill her myself.
I turn to start shouting her name, when Liam strolls out of the kitchen, steaming mug in one hand.
“You seen Maya?” I ask.
He nods. “She’s outside with Andrius and Alesso.”
Thank fuck, at least she’s safe. But why is she with them and not Ms. Ramos?
Speak of the devil, one of them at least. Andrius comes into the house, through the kitchen, and saunters past me. He slow jogs up the stairs, whistling a creepy and discordant tune, the weirdo. I don’t know what it is. Probably some freaky Russian shit he’s known forever.
Why the hell isn’t she in therapy? This is making me more pissed.
“What’s Maya doing?” I demand of Andrius.
He shoots me a cool look, pausing on a step. Stopping whistling, he says. “She’s having a coffee outside. Alesso is with her; she’s safe.”
Safe maybe, but she isn’t where she should be. Liam ducks back into the kitchen, and Andrius continues on his way upstairs as I turn back to the expensive therapist, who right now isn’t doing her job.
“Why aren’t you with Maya, Ms. Ramos?” My tone is no nonsense, but she seems unbothered by it.
“I thought we might have a chat, Damen? As I said, she didn’t feel up to a long session today, and said all she needed to.”
What? I take an automatic step back. “Is there something wrong?”
Oh, God, is she suffering major PTSD and can’t tell me? Why does Ms. Ramos want to talk to me? It can’t be good. What if Maya’s having suicidal thoughts? A hot feeling washes over me, making my skin prickle. It’s foreign. Unusual. I’m realizing it is anxiety when Ms. Ramos holds the door to the library open wider and gestures for me to go in.
“Shall we?”
I don’t want her empathy crawling all over me, her gaze examining me, searching for all my hidden cracks. The hot feeling only increases. Fuck this shit. I stop and don’t take another step. Her brows raise, and she gives a small sigh and nod. “I can see what Maya means.”
“Excuse me?”
“You have serious communication issues. You can’t talk about feelings … at all, and it’s making Maya unhappy. Deeply so.”
“Can’t talk about feelings?” I shake my head. “You want to know what I’m feeling right now? Fucking irritated.”
“Yes, I can see that,” she says. “Also, maybe a little anxious?”
I run my hand around the collar of my t-shirt. “No.”
“Okay.” She doesn’t call me out on my shit. “That’s good. If you’re simply irritated then you can swallow it down, can’t you, to give me a moment of your time.”
“I don’t think it’s … what’s the word, ethical? Yeah that, it’s not ethical is it for you to talk with me.” All my plans of doing exactly this, sitting down with someone to talk, fly out of the window as reality hits. I. Don’t. Want. To. Do. This.
She doesn’t sit, and I get the feeling she’s ready for me to bolt, and might do something ludicrous like try to stop me.
“It’s perfectly ethical. We do this quite a lot of the time. Family therapy. Talking with spouses. If the client wishes us to do it, then we do.”
“Well, I am not family, or a spouse, not really, and I don’t want to talk.”
Something flashes in her eyes, brief but strong. Anger, I think. “Okay, fine. Don’t talk to me, but in that case, you have to let Maya go.”
“What?” I laugh. Actually laugh. “You don’t get to tell me what to do. She isn’t going anywhere; it’s not safe.”
“I am sure there are other people who could keep her safe. The police, for example.”
“Oh, right. Yeah. Change her name, hide her away somewhere on some island so no one can find her. She’d have to cut all ties.”
“What ties would those be?” She cocks her head to one side.
I’m stumped for a moment.
“Her mother is dead. Her real father hasn’t exactly been there for her. The man who brought her up wants to sell her off like an asset. Her cousin is trying to kill her, and you … well, as you say, there are no feelings, so you’re a … nothing. You aren’t important in this either. She has no ties. Other than her friend, Stella.”
“Yeah, well, she needs her friend. And right now, her friend needs her, so she stays.”
“Do you want to break her?”
Oh, screw her. I take a step toward her, and she instinctively takes one back. “Be very careful, Ms. Ramos.”
She is scared, I can see it in her face, but she stands her ground. “Do you want to break her? Because if you keep her here as your … pet, she’ll break. She’s a brave woman, one of the bravest I’ve ever met. But she’s stuck in limbo, and she needs more than you’re offering her. It would be better for her, if you don’t love her, to let her go.”
“No.”
She watches me for a moment, and then turns from me and walks toward a shelf of books, trailing her hand over the spines. “I find your choice of career interesting.”
Talk about a change of subject. She has my brain scrambling to catch up. “Protection work for the mafia?”
“Before that. Going into the military. I mean, you could say, with your ea
rly family life, you simply swapped one war zone for another.”
I freeze. In my mind I’m wrapping my hands around her neck and squeezing. I can’t give this shit I’m feeling life, so I lock myself down and don’t move a muscle. She must have a death wish, and if I don’t get out of this room in a minute, I’m going to do something I’ll regret. My skin feels too tight, and I try to loosen my collar again.
“I think you have a form of PTSD.” She turns to me, and I bark out a laugh.
“Then you’re a shit therapist because I had the psych eval when I got injured, and I am fine. Sorry, but not all of us come back from war with night terrors or fears of loud bangs. I’m fine.”
She smiles at me, and it’s genuine. Soft, almost sympathetic. “I didn’t say you had combat stress, did I? There are different forms of PTSD, one of them is complex. It happens when a person is abused as a child, or witnesses abuse. When their family life is chaotic. Scary. When they can’t rely on those around them.”
“You know nothing about my family life.” I hope to hell she’s picking up on the ice in my voice because I’m scared if she keeps pushing at some point it will become fire, and then I won’t be responsible for what I do. “Neither does Maya.”
“I haven’t discussed it with Maya. I remember the stories is all. So, I looked you up.”
“Well that’s definitely crossing an ethical line.”
“Yes, it is. But see, I can see how much you care for Maya. I witness it whenever you look at her. In the way you keep her safe, need to know where she is, want her by you. You need her, and you hate it, and I get why. Complex PTSD can make it hard to trust ourselves, let alone others. But you have two choices. You either do the scary thing, the hard thing, and you start to face up to your past, and the scars it’s left, or you let her go. You can’t keep her here like this. Treating her like an assignment, but one you have in your bed every night. You need to sort your head out—for her. Maya needs you, Damen. She needs you like she’s not needed anyone before, and that terrifies you; I get it. But see, here’s the thing.”
She pauses and then comes right up to me and takes hold of my hand. I tense my jaw and keep very still because her in my space, while she’s saying all this shit, is not comfortable.
