I get up without a word and walk out of the kitchen, barely making it into the hallway when chaos erupts. I head toward the library, where Seven stands in the doorway, looking worried as he stares back at the kitchen.
“What are the odds that ends well?” I ask.
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“On who you want it to end well for.”
I think about that for a moment, as Lorenzo’s furious voice echoes out from the kitchen, followed by Leo shouting right back.
“What are the odds it ends well for anyone?”
“Not very good,” Seven admits, turning to me. “I should head home. Take care, Morgan.”
He walks away, heading for the front door, as I go into the library. Buster lays on the table, surrounded by a scattering of needles and thread. He bought a sewing kit. Unbelievable. Shaking my head, I pick up the bear, running my fingers along the rough knotted stitches on its side and chest.
Grabbing a needle, I carefully thread it, tucking what remains of Buster’s damaged ear in before doing my best to sew it closed so no more stuffing escapes. I’m trying to ignore the fighting in the kitchen, but neither guy is holding back.
Even the happiest homes aren’t always happy.
The angrier they grow, the more uncomfortable it feels, so after a while I snatch up the rest of the sewing kit and take the bear upstairs. Leo’s bedroom door is open, Melody sitting on the end of the bed, listening to the sounds from downstairs.
Look, I know I’m not any older than her, but I’ve been through so much that it feels like I’ve got a few lifetimes under my belt. When I look at Melody, I very much see a kid, one who has spent her life sheltered from the world, and at the moment, she looks scared.
It stirs up the mother in me, the woman who taught her little girl to face her fears. Monsters are real, but they only really have power if you let yourself be afraid.
“It’ll be okay, you know,” I say, stalling in front of the bedroom, capturing Melody’s attention.
She sighs. “I hope so.”
“It will,” I say. “No matter what.”
“Leo knew he wouldn’t take it well,” she says. “That’s why he hasn’t brought it up until now, but I pushed him to... I feel like it’s my fault.”
“It’s not your fault,” I tell her. “Leo’s allowed to have his own life, so don’t feel guilty. Lorenzo’s just...”
“Insane,” Melody mutters.
I laugh. “Well, yeah, but mostly he’s just worried. He’ll calm down.”
“You sure about that?”
“Pretty sure,” I say. “He might not like it, but he’ll deal with it.”
She smiles when I say that, but it doesn’t last long, as a loud noise echoes through the house, the sound of something banging, things clattering.
Yep, flipped the table over.
Bye-bye, pancakes.
Melody looks worried again, but I laugh lightly, turning away. “Of course, he has to throw his little temper tantrum first, but it’ll all work out in the end.”
I head to Lorenzo’s bedroom, making my way into his bathroom, searching drawers and cabinets for a first aid kit. He at least should have one of those, right? He might not give himself stitches, but he ought to have bandages. I manage to dig up a roll of gauze and take it into the bedroom, sitting down on the bed to finishing fixing up the bear. I wrap the gauze around his burned leg, covering it like a makeshift cast, and stitch a line of thread along the edge of it to secure it to the bear.
I hear stomping on the stairs eventually before Leo’s bedroom door slams, followed moments later by another set of footsteps. I listen as they hesitate at the top of the stairs, like he’s deciding where to go or what to do, whether to drop it or keep the fighting going up here.
“Don’t do it,” I mutter under my breath. “Just let it go.”
Lorenzo stands there for an entire minute, debating, before he exhales loudly, almost a frustrated growl, and makes his way to the bedroom where I am. He appears casual, unruffled, but I can tell it’s all an act.
My heart races, skin tingling when his gaze meets mine. He’s teetering on a brink. I know what it’s like to detach from reality, to shut down to keep from feelings things. I pity whoever might cross this man if he ever truly lets the coldness consume him. He’s clinging to a life raft right now. The moment he says fuck it and lets go, everyone’s going to drown in the waves he creates because he’s not going down alone.
Should that scare me? Probably.
Does it? Nope.
“I know how you’re feeling,” I say quietly.
“I’m fine,” he says, sounding fine, but I know he isn’t. He’s so damn far from fine there isn’t even a word for what this man is.
“I have a kid.”
“I’m aware.”
“So I know how you’re feeling,” I say again. “You want to wrap them in bubble wrap and protect them from the world, but you’re only human. We can only do so much for them.”
“Your kid is what, four?”
“Five,” I say. “She turned five after he took her.”
“Five,” he repeats, strolling into the room. “Pretty Boy is in his twenties. And besides, he’s not my kid.”
“True,” I say. “Doesn’t change how I know you’re feeling, though. You raised him. You want to keep him from harm.”
“I want him to not be such a fucking fool,” Lorenzo says, sitting down beside me.
“He’s just hopeful,” I say, “and he’s in love.”
“He’s a fucking fool,” Lorenzo says, lying back on the bed, covering his face with his forearm.
“It’s sweet,” I tell him. “Just because you don’t want all of that doesn’t mean there’s no worth to it. And really, lets be real... did you expect him to live with you forever? He’s grown, and you and him... you’re different people. He wants to cuddle and watch rom-coms with his girlfriend. You want to shoot at things and steal couches that were molested by strippers. This was kind of inevitable.”
His arm shifts. I can feel his gaze.
I don’t look at him, though, only getting a slight glimpse from my peripheral. If what I said pissed him off, he doesn’t say a word about it, just staring at me in silence as I tinker with the bear.
After a moment, he reaches out toward me, his hand on my back, gently rubbing it, sending sparks up my spine. I turn, caught off guard by the tender touch, and finally look back at him.
“Are you trying to fuck right now?” I ask. “Because we just had sex, like, an hour ago, before you ruined breakfast.”
He laughs, sitting up, his hand leaving my back to instead ruffle my hair. What the hell? He pushes up off the bed, strolling toward the bathroom.
“I need to shower,” he says. “I smell like pussy.”
“You go do that. I’m gonna... do something, I don’t know.”
“Do whatever you want, Scarlet,” he says, which is quickly becoming his favorite sentence—even though he totally regretted it last time he said that. “Just do me a small favor and keep yourself out of trouble, because I’m not in the mood to play White Knight right now.”
Kassian used to tell me I was stupid.
So pretty, yet so stupid. That is why you cannot be trusted to make decisions, suka.
How many times had he told me that? How many times had he used those words to justify the brutality he inflicted upon my life?
So many times I lost count.
I never once bought it, never once believed his bullshit, but sitting here at a wooden picnic table on the Coney Island boardwalk, I’m wondering if maybe he was onto something about me.
Stupid. So stupid.
I shouldn’t be here.
The boardwalk is packed, despite the weather still being cool, the amusement park not far off behind me, so close I can hear the rumbling of the Cyclone and the faint noise of the Wonder Wheel running, excited screams and children laughing and music playing... the sound of happiness.
br /> I can still remember the first time I felt it, the first time I saw the lights illuminating the Coney Island night sky and heard the laughter and thought ‘this is where I’m meant to be forever’. Standing right here along this boardwalk, dirty and tired, having no food or money, fourteen years old and on my own.
Still so much a child at heart but looking way too much like a woman on the outside.
Enough to capture his attention.
Enough to pique his interest.
The late-July air had been sweltering, a touch of sunburn on my sweat-sticky skin, sand clinging to my legs beneath my cut-off jean shorts. I was thirsty, and hungry, my stomach angrily growling as I walked along, passing vendor after vendor on the boardwalk, the array of smells assaulting me.
I just wanted some food.
“Excuse me, do you have some change you can spare?” I asked, again and again, to people who passed, getting a nickel here, a quarter there, but most offered me nothing more than repulsion. Get a job. Get out of my face. Fucking scum. Disgusting piece of shit. The words bounced off of me, never getting under my skin, because I was in the city of dreams.
And dreams? I had plenty of those.
It took more than an hour for me to amass a pocket full of change. I sat against a railing in the darkness, out of the way of the crowd, counting it.
I needed four dollars for a coveted hot dog at Nathan’s.
I only had a little more than three dollars collected.
Sighing, I shoved the change back away. I tried to be a good person, I did, but desperation has a way of bending morals. Lying, cheating, stealing... I hated doing it, but sometimes, I ran out of options, and I had to do what I had to do, blurring the lines. Begging relied on the compassion of others, and I’d learned quite quickly that people weren’t always compassionate. I had to look out for myself.
Shadows moved along the boardwalk as I contemplated my next move. A pair of shiny black dress shoes appeared in front of where I sat. Before I could react, a flash of crisp green paper dangled in my face.
I thought it was a dollar... until I saw the zeroes.
A hundred dollar bill.
My eyes darted to the man holding it. He was handsome, almost like a work of art, dark ink coating his fingers and part of his neck, wearing a dark fitted suit, despite the heat.
“Take it,” he said, waving the money at me, his foreign accent thick.
“I, uh... I can’t.” I shake my head. “That’s way too much money.”
He curved an eyebrow. “Too much?”
“I just need like, another dollar. Just enough to buy a hot dog tonight.”
He crouched down, still holding the money. “What will you do tomorrow? And the next day?”
I shrugged. “Same thing I did today.”
“But you will not take my money?”
“No.”
He laughed, like that amused him, before standing back up. “Come on, I will buy you that hot dog you want, pretty girl, and I will not take no for an answer.”
Right there. Right there. Just a few feet from where I sit right now. Kassian Aristov had watched me for over an hour as I begged for change, hungry, before he waltzed into my world and took over my life.
He told me once it was my tenacity that intrigued him. I was steadfast, determined to take care of myself, and that got him curious.
He knew, right then, that I would be his. He wanted nothing more than to break me.
“Excuse me, is someone sitting here?”
I look up at the sound of the male voice... New York accent, thank God. A man stands there—dark hair, light eyes, five o’clock shadow along his jawline. There’s a little girl with him, clutching hold of his hand. Four, maybe five years old, with bright eyes and a big smile, her dark hair French braided.
“No,” I say quietly, offering a smile. “Help yourself.”
“Thank you,” he says as they sit down across from me at the picnic table, settling in with hot dogs and an order of cheese fries with two forks.
“Daddy, look!” the little girl says excitedly, grabbing the sleeve of his shirt and tugging on it as she looks past me, toward the rides. “Look at those things going all round and round still!”
He laughs. “I know, Jenny. I see. We need to eat now, so we can get home. We’ll come back another time, I promise.”
The little girl is too excited to eat, rambling on and on about the amusement park, climbing all over the table, giving her father a hell of a time. She’s not careful at one point, waving her arms all around, smacking her drink over and sending it spilling across the picnic table, splashing me with it.
“Jesus, Jenny, you need to calm down!” the man says, grabbing napkins, trying to clean up the mess, as he shoots me an apologetic look. “I’m so sorry. She got you, didn’t she? She’s just excited...”
“It’s okay,” I say quietly, looking at the little girl, who seems to be on the verge of tears. “I’ve got a daughter. I know how it is.”
“Yeah?” He laughs. “How old?”
“Five.”
“Ah, so you do know how it is.”
“I’m six!” the little girl chimed in.
“Wow, six?” I feign shock. “I bet that means you can count pretty high, huh?”
“To a hundred!” she exclaims. “You wanna hear me do it? I can!”
I’m about to say yes, because you don’t turn down a proposition like that, when her father chimes in. “As much as we’d all love to hear it, baby, we’ve got to get going.”
“Next time,” the little girl tells me, nodding. “I’ll do it when we come back because Daddy said we would!”
I give her a smile. “Make sure you practice.”
“I will,” she says.
Her father shoots me a look that says he might not be too fond of my suggestion, like maybe she already practices too much, but I don’t feel bad for him, not at all.
He doesn’t know how lucky he is.
He doesn’t know how good he’s got it.
What I wouldn’t give to live in a house again swaddled with the incessant chatter of a little girl who just wants you to share in her excitement...
I sit here after they’re gone. Others come and go, resting for a bit before moving on, a few people politely greeting me but for the most part, I’m left alone. Six o’clock approaches, the beach closing.
Getting up, shoving my hands in my hoodie pockets, I keep my head down as I head down the boardwalk. It’s only a few blocks to the police precinct, darkness falling by the time I reach it. Shift change. Officer Rimmel, who usually works the front desk, is walking out, a young guy sitting there instead, one I’ve never encountered.
I always come in the mornings.
I’ve never been here at this hour.
“Hey there,” I say, smiling sweetly, trying to turn on the charm. “Any chance Detective Jones is still in the building? I meant to stop by earlier, and well, I got a little caught up with things and just made it.”
“I’m not sure,” he says, picking up the phone. “I can call up to his office. Who should I tell him is here?”
“I, uh... Scarlet.” Shit. “Any chance I can just run up there quick? It’ll only take a moment. It’s sort of a surprise, if you know what I mean.”
Gabe’s antics are notorious. Even a front desk rookie would know all about the way he is with female visitors. The officer hesitates before hanging up the phone, scowling and motioning toward the elevators. “Go ahead.”
I don’t linger, not wanting him to change his mind, hitting the elevator and heading straight up to the third floor. Gabe is locking up his office to leave when I get there, and I watch, following him to the locker room on the floor.
I slip inside behind him.
His locker’s in the far back, tucked away in the corner. He approaches it, starting to undo the combination lock as I creep closer. He turns the knob, glancing back, a look flashing across his face when he spots me. My stomach drops at the sight of it. Anger. Hu
nger. Something I don’t like. There’s a sinister twinkle in his eyes. He doesn’t raise any alarms, though, continuing what he’s doing, taking the lock off to open his locker.
It’s a fucking mess in there.
“Well, if it isn’t Miss Myers,” he says, his eyes flickering all around me. “You alone?”
“Of course,” I say. “Thought I’d catch you before you left. I felt bad about how I acted last time, bad about how we left things.”
He’s so easy. That’s all it takes. I can see the distrust in his eyes, but he’s not going to pass up an opportunity if he thinks one might exist. As soon as I’m within reach, he grabs ahold of me, dragging me closer. I wrap my arms around him, grimacing when he buries his face in my neck, kissing and biting at the skin.
Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.
I know, I know... ugh... look away.
“Where’s your little attack dog?” he asks, a bitter bite to his voice. “You know, the mutt you sent here to threaten me this morning?”
“Who?”
“Scar,” he says—although not long ago he claimed to have never heard of anybody called that. “Tell me you haven’t taken up with that guy, Morgan. I told you—”
“Anyone named Scar is trouble, I know,” I say. “He’s got his own motivations, though. It has nothing to do with me.”
“Sure seemed to,” he says. “Told me he’d cut off my dick if I ever touched you again.”
My eyes widen. He said that?
Gabe pulls back some to look at me, his hands roaming. It makes my skin crawl, and I ball my hands into fists, keeping myself from punching him.
“Doesn’t matter,” Gabe says, grinning. “Kassian... Scar... doesn’t matter who thinks they own you. Won’t ever stop us. Isn’t that right?”
“Right,” I whisper when he turns me around, shoving me against the row of lockers as he fumbles with his pants. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. My heart races as I panic, my body shaking, wedged between him and the cold metal. “Wait... Gabe, wait... condom.”
He sighs, reaching past me, shifting things aside in his locker but coming up empty. “Damnit.”
“Don’t you have some in your office?”
“Yes, but—”