Nightshade

  Slipping out the knife, I opened it soundlessly and straddled the man’s legs. “What was that word you wanted me to say again, baby?”

  He reached for my waist and smiled, showing mostly rotted teeth. “I don’t plan on you being able to talk at all, bitch.”

  “Ah, ah, ah,” I said as I pressed the tip of the knife to his throat. “Name calling isn’t nice. Do you call all your whores such dirty words? Oh wait, I’m not yours.” I let out a long, wild laugh and pressed the knife harder against his skin, drawing a bead of blood. My laugh trailed off into a giggle, my lips falling into a pout. “Aw, poor guy. Did someone lose his appetite?” Another peal of laughter, and his bloodshot eyes widened.

  “You crazy? Back up off me, bitch.”

  I leaned away to press my free hand against my chest in mock admiration. “You noticed? It normally takes men until our third date for them to notice the crazy. Or maybe it’s the fourth. Or was it the fourth minute? Who can keep track anymore?” I leaned back in and said, “If I wasn’t worried about catching five different diseases, I’d slit your throat and drink your blood while you watched, unable to move because you were drowning in it. Now where’s my mom and why are you using her drugs, baby?”

  He struggled between me and the couch, but didn’t attempt to move me off him. “You’re a fucking psycho!”

  “We already established that,” I said calmly. “Where’s my mom?”

  “Get the fuck off me.”

  “Oh. Would you look at that . . . I have a knife.” I pressed it harder into his neck and drew a slow line down it. “Oh, oh, oh, does that hurt?” I sucked in a breath through my teeth and leaned close to whisper in his ear. “Now I’m going to ask one more time. If you don’t answer, the next line will be through your dick, and we’ll see who’s the bitch then. Okay, baby?”

  “She went out,” he yelled.

  I bit down on my lip and grinned.

  My mom was terrified of the dark. There was no way in hell she’d be caught outside this trailer at night alive.

  “Hm. Now I do believe that was the wrong answer. I also believe that was the last chance I’d given you. But, you know, who’s keeping track? Oh, wait . . . me.”

  “You’ve got the devil in you. You’re crazy,” he gritted out, the muscles in his neck straining from the way he was trying to disappear deeper into the couch. Away from the blade.

  I laughed as I moved slowly off his legs, never letting up on the pressure against his neck. I swayed back and forth once I was standing, twisting the knife as I did.

  “Nah, baby. I may be crazy, but if either of us has the devil inside, that’d be you. Now, I do believe I made you a promise if you couldn’t tell me where my mom—” I twisted, half a second from throwing the knife at whoever had just stepped through the trailer door and barely managing to keep it from slipping through my fingers when my mom came stumbling in.

  Sunglasses on her face. Still in the same ratty outfit she’d been wearing the last three days.

  “Momma?”

  She looked at where I was standing, then tilted her head back so she could stare at me from under her sunglasses.

  “I told you she went out, you crazy bitch,” the man shouted, his breathing ragged.

  My mom pointed at him, but just as suddenly, pointed into the kitchen at no one at all. “He ruined me. He’s going to ruin you too.”

  The man began yelling, trying to defend himself, but I didn’t listen.

  My mom wasn’t talking about him. She had only ever talked about one man my entire life. My dad. Didn’t matter that we hadn’t seen him since I was eight years old.

  “No, Momma, no,” I said softly as I walked up to her. “That’s not him . . . remember? We left him. Do you remember that?”

  She snorted. “Do I remember that?” Another snort and she jerked her thumb at me as she walked around me toward the table. “You listen to this?” she asked the man I’d left on the couch. “She thinks things happen that don’t. She ain’t right in the head.”

  “I noticed,” the man said as he wiped at the small trickle of blood on his neck, his glare fixated on me before he looked at my mom expectantly. “Did ya get it?”

  “Momma, what were you doing outside? It’s night. Momma, it’s eleven.”

  “See what I mean?” she asked the man before looking at me as she tapped on the sunglasses still covering her eyes. “No it ain’t, Jess. Wouldn’t have needed these if it was.”

  I wanted to make her look out the door she’d left open, make her realize that it was night. But if she saw it—if she actually saw the darkness—she’d lose her mind. She’d be uncontrollable. Inconsolable.

  So I quietly took the few steps to the door to shut it and froze when I looked up and saw my mom dig bags upon bags of coke out of her jeans pocket.

  My blood felt thick as tar trying to pump through my body. My racing heart faltered.

  No . . . no. That was . . . that was so much money.

  That would kill her.

  “Where did you get those?” When she didn’t answer, I snapped. “Momma, where did you get those?”

  My stomach dropped when I got a look at the bags. Of the nearly indiscernible symbol imprinted on them of an overlapping skull and Celtic knot.

  Goddammit, Beck.

  The man on the couch grabbed her hand to take a few of the bags, and my mom screamed.

  Screamed like someone was killing her slowly.

  Screamed like someone was beating her within an inch of her life.

  Screamed like someone was ruining her . . .

  “He ruined me,” she screamed at the man. “You ruined me. It’s in you, it’s inside you—always inside you. Everything you touch, you ruin. You ruined me.”

  The man was now trying to scramble away from her, but my mom had latched on to his arm.

  The guy who had passed out earlier stirred back to life, took less than a second to process what was going on and then crawled toward the door yelling that there was a fire.

  The older man had cuts up and down his arm from my mom’s nails when he finally ripped free. “You’re crazy,” he shouted as he ran after the first man. “Both of you.”

  I forced my most seductive grin as he passed me, then let it fall and ran for my mom when the door slammed shut behind him.

  I gripped her wrists so she couldn’t scratch me with the same nails that had just scratched the man and spoke in calm, soothing tones. “No one’s here. No one is ruining you. You’re okay.”

  “He’s going to ruin you,” she continued to scream. “Run, Jess. Run. Don’t let him ruin you.”

  “Momma, no one is here. No one is going to ruin us.”

  “Fight back.” She choked on a sob. “Fight back and don’t let him ruin you, Jess.”

  I released one of her wrists long enough to knock off her sunglasses, then grabbed her wrist again.

  “Look at me,” I yelled, then lowered my voice again. “We’re okay. No one is here. It’s okay.” When she stopped screaming and began nodding uncontrollably, I said, “Come on, Momma. It’s nighttime. It’s time for you to wash your hands really, really well, and then go to bed.”

  She cocked her head slowly. “It’s night?”

  “Yeah, Momma.”

  Another nod. “It came so fast tonight, Jess. I had no warning that the darkness was coming.”

  I held back a sigh and blinked rapidly against the burning in my eyes. “I know. Come on, let’s go clean you up.”

  I was crying.

  I couldn’t help it.

  I needed to stop or he would find me.

  Squeezing my eyes shut tight, I tried to make the sounds happening around us go away.

  Breathe in. Breathe out.

  Slow your heart. Dry your eyes.

  Blend in to the walls and he won’t find you . . . again.

  My lips moved, but no sounds left them. It was all in my head. Always, only in my head.

  Jentry always made me swear to never make a sound. br />
  I jerked when something heavy hit a wall not far from where we were, but I didn’t dare wander out to look.

  I couldn’t.

  I was busy being invisible.

  “See nothing. Hear nothing. Be nothing,” my twin said from where he stood, silently gripping my hand beside me.

  “Nothing,” I mouthed back.

  I flinched when Momma screamed.

  “No. No, don’t you touch her. Don’t touch her. Jess, run. Don’t let him ru—” Her cries cut off suddenly with a sound we knew well.

  A sound that meant Daddy had put Momma to sleep for a while.

  “We need to help Momma,” I said, my voice wobbling because I couldn’t be brave like my brother. “We have to.”

  No one else ever did when nighttime came.

  Jentry’s hand tightened around mine. His body shook so hard it made mine shake. It made me visible.

  I looked at him. His shoulders were rising and falling roughly. His eyes were angry.

  He looked so much like Daddy like that.

  I hated it.

  My stomach felt heavy when Daddy’s steps sounded outside the closet we were hiding in.

  Jentry turned so he was in front of me and grabbed my shoulders, being careful not to touch where I was already bruised. “See nothing.”

  Breathe in. Breathe out.

  “Hear nothing.”

  Slow your heart. Dry your eyes.

  “Be nothing.”

  Blend in to the walls, and he won’t find you again.

  “I’m gonna make it go away, Jess.”

  I opened my mouth to beg him not to leave just as the door was yanked open and Jentry was ripped away from me and slammed to the floor.

  The last thing I remember was black, angry eyes.

  And wishing Jentry could make it all go away.

  I helped my mom wash her hands and under her nails multiple times and forced her to change her clothes, and she finally crawled into bed. I collected the needle on her bedroom floor and another in the living room then dumped them in one of the neighbor’s trash cans. After going back in and making sure she had actually fallen asleep, I grabbed the bags she’d come back with, shoved them into my pocket, and headed out.

  “Take them back,” I said through gritted teeth when I neared him.

  Beck glanced over his shoulder. Fear flashed through his eyes when he hissed, “You think you can demand stuff like that?”

  “Yes. Now take them back.” I shoved my open palm into his shoulder. “How could you? After what you’d given her earlier, you gave her more than that a few hours later? Beck. I can’t afford this shit, you know that. Now take it back.”

  “I can’t,” he said low, but stern. “Go home. Now.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do or where to go.”

  That fear now burned in his eyes. “Jess, leave.”

  My body stilled as I tried to take in our surroundings, but there was nothing.

  Just me. Just Beck.

  I shook my head in quick jerks. “Take the bags back.”

  “I fucking can’t. For all I know, you’re bringing back bags filled with powdered sugar.”

  My brow pinched. “Beck, she was out at night. She screams if she sees the sun set, but you didn’t think twice about her being outside when it’s dark? She was so high she believed some idiots when they told her it was still daylight. She took the drugs for those men, and you know they weren’t offering to pay—because who would when she has her deal with you?” I tried shoving the bags at him, but he swatted my hand away. “I can’t afford this, and I can’t have it in the house. If she wakes up and sees it, she’ll use and use and use until it’s gone. Beck, please.” My voice cracked on the last word, but I couldn’t find it in me to care.

  I’d already failed in front of Beck too many times tonight anyway. Why keep pretending the seemingly fearless girl had no fears when he’d known differently for years?

  “Jess, for the love of God . . . leave.”

  “Is this payback? Has all of this been to get back at me for not giving you what you wanted all those years ago?” I slammed my open palm into his chest again and again until he snatched my wrist and pulled me close. “That was six years ago, Beck. This is my mom’s life you’re ruining. It’s my life.”

  His free hand snaked underneath my hair and secured to the back of my neck, forcing my head closer to his. “If you ever listen to me, listen now, Jessica. Turn around and go home.”

  My gaze locked with his, my lungs protesting the lack of oxygen as I once again tried to hear or feel anything or anyone else.

  Nothing.

  Just us.

  I took in a shuddering breath and shoved away from him. Throwing the bags at him, I bit out, “I refuse to pay for this. Give me a week, Beck. Just give me a fucking week. I need the break to pay you off and maybe buy groceries for the first time this month.”

  I took a step back as unease suddenly raced across my skin and gripped my spine.

  There, I thought with a rush of panic.

  In the time it took to take another step back, I’d already slid my knife from its spot at my hip. Flipping it open, I turned so the blade arced through the air at the person behind me as I spun—

  And came to a halt with my blade less than an inch from the base of his neck.

  I didn’t need to look down to know he had the tip of a blade pressed to my chest. I could feel it.

  I swallowed thickly—Oh.

  And the length of another to my throat. Hadn’t felt that at first. I forced my lips into a wicked grin.

  Beck was shouting . . . or maybe whispering.

  He was yelling at the chillingly beautiful man in front of me . . . or maybe he was scolding me.

  I wasn’t sure.

  I couldn’t focus on him or his words.

  All I saw, all I knew, was the man I was having a silent showdown with.

  Light green eyes set in a violent glare. Strong brow and nose, and full lips curled in a sneer. Dirty-blond hair pulled back in a low, haphazard bun. Muscular shoulders and a broad chest that strained against his shirt while still remaining lean.

  Every piece of him added to his overwhelming presence.

  Masculine, hard, dangerous.

  But those eyes . . .

  He was looking at me as though he hated me. It wasn’t the way Beck looked at me—like he hated me for the girl I had turned into . . . hated me for spurning him and giving myself to other men.

  This man’s hatred was as pure as it was overpowering, and it fascinated me all the more, considering this was the first time he’d ever seen me.

  Being mindful of the knife against my throat, I peered down at the thick blade pressed intimately just under my breasts. “Well, well, well . . . we sure don’t waste any time with going for the kill, now do we?”

  “You’re alive,” he informed me with a low rumble.

  My grin widened to hide the way his gravelly voice sent a shot of unwanted heat through my body. “And here I was, just going to nick you with my disease-covered knife.”

  He didn’t move, but his eyes narrowed.

  I lifted one of my shoulders. “Sorry, I didn’t have time to wash it in a tub of bleach after making the last guy bleed. I had business to take care of, as I’m sure you heard. Speaking of hearing things,” I continued quickly, not giving him the chance to speak, “it’s not nice to eavesdrop. It’s also not nice to sneak up on people. And while we’re on the subject of sneaking up on people, you need to work on remaining silent.”

  “Jesus fuck, Jessica,” Beck mumbled behind me. “Stop talking. Please stop talking.”

  I dropped my knife and closed it, but my movements slowed when I started putting it back into its place at my hip. Lifting a brow, I said, “It’s polite when someone drops their knife for you to drop yours as well.”

  The knives pressed harder against me, forcing me back until I was pressed against the wall. He took another step toward me, bringing us closer than before
, and I looked at him from under my eyelashes with a taunt on my tongue.

  “Kieran, no,” Beck yelled, cutting off anything I may have said as he rushed toward us. “Don’t touch her. That’s Jess . . . this is Jess.”

  The blades were immediately withdrawn so they weren’t pressed to me, but were still close enough that I couldn’t risk moving.

  I forced back every impulse to demand to know why Beck had told this man about me at all. But while I may have made stupid decisions in my life, I wasn’t stupid enough to take my eyes off the man holding my life in his hands.

  So I stood there, waiting to see what his next move would be while my heart rate betrayed my calm exterior.

  Each rough breath forced my chest to brush against the tip of his knife like a lover’s caress. Something the man’s eyes lingered on when his gaze slowly moved over my body.

  It wasn’t the look I got so often. It wasn’t the look of a man unable to stop himself from taking in what he so badly knew he should look away from. It was a look that was as assessing as it was disapproving.

  Asshole.

  Once his eyes were locked with mine again, he curled his lip and spoke in that same, low tone. “I’ll drop when I’m ready.”

  “Ooo, someone likes it with a side of crazy.” I touched the knife pressed to my chest, and mumbled nonchalantly, “Okay then. Ten per minute. Money increases once we actually start doing something. Then again . . . maybe I should raise your price since you’re involving knives.”

  That hatred from before swirled in those eyes—and I wondered for a moment if I might have preferred the judgment and disapproval to the look he was giving me then . . .

  Because that hatred shook something inside me that I hadn’t been aware of before that night, and I wanted to go back to being unaware of it. Needed to.

  “I’m not paying for you,” he bit out, as though he was disgusted by the thought.

  “Huh. Sounds eerily like what I was trying to tell Beck. In that case, this has been so much fun, and I would say we should do it again, but, well . . .” I shrugged and let my eyes drag to where Beck was staring at me with a horrified expression before looking back into a pair of lethal eyes. “He pisses me off and you’re just a little boy who likes to play with his knives because you can’t satisfy other needs. So, I think I’ll pass on the repeat playdate, boys.”