by Holly Hart
Mac appears from the other side of the crane. He jerks his head at the groaning thug. “What do we do about him?” He asks, eyebrow raised.
I shrug. My eyes wander around the decrepit old warehouse. I know that the second the lab explodes, this place is tumbling down. “Leave him. He made his bed. Now he can lie in it.”
Mac grins. “Did I ever tell ye I love it when yer angry?”
I ignore him, and make for the sweet safety of the dockyard. Hell – anywhere but here. “Time to go, brother,” I mutter. I’m just a second too late.
That’s when the world explodes.
14
Frankie
The second I hear scratching at the heavy iron door, I leap to my feet. The sight of the white bandage around my finger, waving through the air, reminds me of a bunny’s tail as it disappears with alarm down into the depths of its burrow.
My heart thuds inside my chest. Now that the pain’s gone, so is my recovery. I’m back to being that same, scared little girl I was an hour ago. I hate it.
It’s Ridley, I assure myself. It can’t be anyone else. I (again) sidle towards the door, squeezing my bandaged finger for the little jolt of pain: just enough to clear my head. It doesn’t come. My finger’s numb already; I’ve asked too much of it.
This time, I don’t bring a make-shift weapon. In the event I need to protect myself, it wouldn’t have been any use. The door swings open before I have a chance to hide.
I let out a deep sigh of relief.
“This is becoming a habit,” Ridley grins.
“What is?” I grump. I know I’ve got a sour look on my face, but I don’t care. It reflects my mood: just like the sight of black clouds sweeping across the horizon gives warning a storm is on the way. Ridley should take the hint.
“Ye meeting me at the door like this,” Ridley growls, casting an unashamed glance up and down my body. “A man could get certain ideas.”
My nose twitches.
“Where have you been?” I asked, ignoring Ridley’s flirty insinuation. “And why do you smell of smoke?”
Ridley neatly sidesteps my questions. He holds up his hands as if he’s waving me the white flag, and swings the thick door closed behind him.
“Whoa there, girl: can’t you give a man a couple of seconds?”
For a second, I think Ridley says your man. For an even longer second, a vision of that future flashes across my mind. I see Ridley and me together; his arms wrapped around my body; the sound of children laughing in the background.
I blink, and it’s gone.
“I want to leave,” I say. Until the moment the words escape my lips, I don’t know that’s what I want. But the second I hear them, I know it’s true.
The thick, cheesy grin falls right off Ridley’s face. If I wasn’t weighed down by this burden of guilt, I’d want to laugh.
Ridley takes a step toward me. “What happened?” He says, eyes narrowing, until I have to squint to make out those glittering multi-colored orbs. He’s trying to read me – to pick out a story I would rather keep hidden.
It’s no business of his. It’s my burden, my pain! I don’t know Ridley, and he doesn’t know me. So why can’t he just leave me alone?
“Nothing,” I mumble, biting back my own body’s betrayal: a sadness clenching at my throat. Ridley’s gaze never wavers. It falls on my skin like the warmth of a super-heated, burning sun.
I try to dance past Ridley, but he catches me. He gathers me into his arms.
“What happened?” Ridley asks again. His low, deep voice vibrates through his chest and into mine. I grind my forehead into his chest. The fabric of his jacket rubs against my skin like a cheese grater. The sensation is somewhere on the border of simply uncomfortable, and pain. I know I’m pushing against Ridley’s sternum hard enough that I must be hurting him as well.
I don’t get why Ridley is being so kind to me. I’m nothing: and nothing to him; just an anchor to weigh him down. Why doesn’t he get that? Why can’t he just let me go?
“Why are you doing this?” I yell, pulling my head back and staring up at Ridley with accusing eyes.
A shadow of pain – maybe not pain; maybe sadness – flits across them like a cloud.
“Hit me,” I whimper. Then my voice strengthens with anger. “Hurt me. Just don’t look at me like that!”
The end of the sentence tumbles out of me on the last wisps of air in my lungs. It leaves me spent.
Ridley simply ignores my request. He stares at me for long seconds that feel like longer hours. His eyes flash.
“Frankie,” he growls, looking down at the clenched fist at my right hand side. “Tell me what happened to your hand.”
Ridley’s voice hammers at me like a command. It reminds me of a schoolteacher addressing guilty children while they cower in fear.
“Nothing,” I mutter. “It’s not your business. Why can’t you just let me go? Am I your prisoner?”
I beat my fists against Ridley’s chest. This time, finally, little jolts of pain jangle down my nerve endings every time my right hand meets Ridley’s powerful muscles. Each tiny burst of pain clears my head: cools the stinging tears streaming down my cheeks; forces me to stop.
Ridley simply stands there and takes my punishment,like Atlas bearing the weight of the world on his shoulders. He doesn’t flinch. His sparkling eyes still look down at me, and I get the strangest sensation – it’s as if he’s trying to drink in my pain, trying to relieve me of my suffering.
I stop. I’m exhausted. My head sinks forward. My lungs gasp for much-needed air.
“Are you done?” Ridley asks. I expect to hear recrimination in his voice, or else disappointment, but I don’t. There’s a fine line between sympathy and pity, but Ridley walks it well. He lets the sound of my panting subside before he talks.
“Frankie,” he says. “I asked what happened to your hand.”
This time, Ridley doesn’t give me any wiggle room. My eyes flicker left and right – searching for an escape route, but there is none.
“I cut myself,” I mumble. My tongue stumbles over the words, betraying me like I’m a child telling a falsehood.
“You cut yourself,” Ridley repeats, loading the words with a sense of incredulity. “Forgive me, doll. I’m not buying it.”
I look up at Ridley. I can almost see the flash of anger in my eyes bouncing off his. I thrust my bandaged finger out in front of me. “Then what the hell do you call this?”
Ridley grabs my hand and pulls me towards him. He grins, and I can’t help but hide a smile, even though I’m way more than angry at his disbelief.
“You mistake me, doll,” he says. “I don’t doubt that you cut yourself –.”
“But you just said –.”
Another grin dances on Ridley’s lips. It stokes the fires of the irritation building inside me. I want to wipe that smug smirk of his face.
“You know exactly what I asked,” he says, his voice picking up my protest and throwing it aside like a rag doll. “I know ye cut yourself. It don’t exactly take a genius to see that. I want to know what happened.”
Ridley looks at me. If he’d left me nowhere to hide before, now he’s got a pack of dogs out, and they are hunting for my answer.
“You’re an ass, Ridley Byrne,” I say in a voice that’s somewhere between a mumble and a sullen growl. “You know that?”
“It’s been said,” Ridley laughs. “Though I’ll grant ye one thing, never by a girl as pretty as you…”
The unexpected compliment steals the wind from my sails. Ridley tips his head to one side.
“Ye were saying?”
I walk on the hot coals of the anger Ridley’s built inside me. The emotion and the pain and the stress of the last few minutes – heck, the last few weeks – it all builds to this. My voice comes out hard. I’m not taking any prisoners this time.
“If you really want to know, I did cut myself. I cut myself and I liked it. It made everything better. It didn’t hurt: it stole away
my pain; the real pain!”
Ridley’s cheeks flinch. His eyes suddenly close – not literally – and his face becomes inscrutable: a mask. I can’t read him, not anymore.
“What the hell does that say about me?” I ask. The last couple of words come out like a mouse’s squeak. “Have they really fu –”
Ridley pulls me towards him, clasping his arms around my body. God, just his warmth steals the tightness from my muscles. I feel like if I stayed here forever, Ridley would relieve me of all my aches and pains. He smells of smoke: sweat; and something else; something bitter and chemical.
He chuckles, breaking my train of thought. “Go ahead, gal. Believe me, I’ve heard worse.”
“Did they really fuck me up forever?” I ask. “Will I be like this for the rest of my life?
I look up at Ridley’s glinting eyes, searching for reassurance. I get it: in spades.
“Oh ye poor, poor gal,” he whispers, squeezing my shoulders tight. “They didn’t break you. Do you feel ruined?”
My throat closes up. I don’t know how to answer. I don’t know if I can answer. I’m lost for words. It’s like someone’s reached into my mind and torn up the dictionary.
I shake my head against Ridley’s chest. “No,” I mumble plaintively. “Yes; maybe; I don’t know.”
That’s the truth of it. My brain is jumbled: as if someone found a lifetime’s worth of hopes: fears; emotions; and memories and tossed them all into a washer, then a dryer.
Ridley squeezes me again. The pressure doesn’t hurt, but it reminds me that he’s there; as does the kiss of his breath stroking my earlobe. His lips can’t be more than a couple of inches from my ear. I can feel his heat, and the slight prickle of fresh double grazing my chin.
“I’ll tell ye then,” Ridley says, his voice hoarse.
I don’t know what to concentrate on. I feel I’m on a tiny rubber dinghy in the middle of the storm. I’m hanging on to Ridley’s every word. At the same time, I’m uncomfortably aware of how close we are: the heat of his skin against mine; every wrinkle in his jacket; the powerful thickness of his chest.
“Ye aren’t broken, Frankie. No more than I am. We’re both –,” he pauses, searching for the right word, or the perfect phrase to pull me out of this slump.
“We’ve been cast aside by society: chewed up and spat out. Ain’t nobody looking out for either of us, you know what I mean?”
Ridley looks down, his eyes searching for mine. It takes an effort of will, but I meet his gaze.
I nod. I want to say something, but I don’t trust my voice. Besides, my throat’s all choked up and my nose is full of snot.
Sexy? Not.
His voice is gruff, husky. It’s comforting, like the sound of a hacksaw grinding through wood. “Ye can either let yourself circle the drain regretting that crap for the rest of yer life, or ye can –.”
“Fight,” I whisper.
Ridley nods. He reaches up, wipes away the line of tears that’s staining my cheek. The skin on the back of his fingers feels rough and workmanlike, but the gesture is tender and caring.
“I’m going to,” I murmur. My voice strengthens with every word I say. “I’m going to fight. I’m not going to let what they did to me define me. I’m going to –.”
This time it’s Ridley’s turn to cut in. “To make them pay,” he growls.
For a second, his touch feels as cold as ice. I flinch, and the sensation sends a tremor running through me. But I don’t hold back. The fire in Ridley’s eyes heats my soul. It holds me spellbound. I don’t know how this happened, but somehow I stumbled into the path of perhaps the one man in Boston who could truly help me.
Maybe that’s why I do it.
Maybe it’s because I meant what I said; I’m not going to let the Templars carve my stone, or dictate the woman I’m going to become.
Maybe it’s simpler than that: just a man and a woman; pheromones and lust.
Or maybe it’s all of that at once.
I lean forward and plant my lips on Ridley’s. As my face moves forward for the kiss, I see a flash of uncertainty in Ridley’s eyes. Perhaps that might have hurt another girl. Heck, six months ago it would’ve hurt me too. But I’m not that Frankie anymore. I’m not so innocent. I’m wearing the scars that prove the life I’ve lived, and the pain I’ve suffered.
So I know that Ridley’s not holding back to hurt me, but to keep me safe.
“I don’t need protecting,” I whisper, pressing my body against Ridley’s. “You’ve done that already. Just – kiss me, will you?”
He doesn’t need asking twice. His lips graze mine, sending a shock of electricity crackling through me. His arm loops around my waist, pulling me against his firm, muscular body. I can’t help but feel that Ridley’s wanted to do this to me since the second we met. He waited for me to pull out the last Jenga piece, and now the tower’s tumbling down. But heck, if it feels this good, then I’ll ride it all the way.
Ridley is exhilarating, enthralling, utterly captivating. Just being beside him is enough to let me forget the past and more importantly: imagine a future.
I moan with approval as Ridley’s tongue dances across my lower lip. God, this man knows how to kiss. It’s exquisite. He’s firm when he needs to be, and then soft when desired. His lips, his fingers, and his body are a hive of perfect activity: acting in complete harmony.
I feel the fires of desire stoking inside me. Every touch: every kiss, every stroke sends them dancing higher. Then another flame sparks into life – burning blue and cold inside me – guilt.
I shouldn’t be feeling like this. I shouldn’t be happy when the other girls can’t be. I shouldn’t feel pleasure when I’m broken. I shouldn’t be free!
My body stiffens.
Ridley pulls back. He must’ve sensed my momentary hesitation.
“What’s wrong?” He whispers in that gravelly voice that will be the soundtrack to my dreams for as long as I live.
“Nothing,” I mumble. Already it feels like the spell is broken. Like that brief moment of pleasure and desire is nothing more than a punctured balloon. I desperately want it back. I want to feel happiness again, not pain.
“Can’t you kiss me again?” I beg.
Ridley strokes my hair. “Ye can tell me, doll: anything.”
“I don’t want to. Just kiss me.”
“Frankie –”
My face flickers with heat. I feel like a hormonal teenage girl: rage suddenly swirling through me like detritus in a tornado. I don’t know how Ridley does it. One second he has the fires of desire burning inside me, and he’s playing my body like a violin; the next he’s annoying me as effectively as a younger brother.
“Seriously, doll –.”
My throat lets out a growl that wouldn’t sound out of place in the tiger enclosure at a city zoo. “Don’t ye doll me,” I say, copying Ridley’s accent in a mocking singsong. I press my face forward against his, carried on a wave of anger and emotion.
I’m not myself. I’m not recognizing what’s happening in my mind. If I did, I wouldn’t behave like this.
“Fra –”
Then I do it. I bite Ridley’s lip: hard enough that I might draw blood. I don’t know. I don’t care. I want him to feel the pain I’m feeling.
But it’s not just that.
I want him to hurt me: because that kind of pain makes the rest of it go away.
15
Ridley
Fuck.
Instinct drives me to jerk my head backward and flee from Frankie’s bite.My eyes water. Her teeth scrape my bottom lip as I pull it back. I sure as hell wasn’t expecting Frankie to pull that particular rabbit out of the hat.
“What the hell –?” I mutter, touching a finger to my lip. I can’t tell if I can really taste blood, or whether I’m just imagining it.
Then I look into Frankie’s eyes. The bright, icy blue globes sparkle with a fiery intent. I don’t know what’s going on inside that gorgeous head of hers, but it’s obviou
sly serious enough to make her act this way. Frankie seems almost – I don’t know, possessed? Biting me isn’t just out of character, it’s like she’s being controlled by a completely different person.
I let out a deep, controlled breath. Frankie’s chest, by contrast, is heaving. I get the sense that I’m walking on thin ice, even if I don’t quite understand why. I also get the sense that I need to act carefully.
“Ye want to tell me what all that was about, doll?” I grin, dragging a finger nail down Frankie’s cheek. She shivers, closes her eyes, and then pulls her head back – all in one long, jerky motion. I’m kind of glad she does. I don’t know what possessed me to touch her like that. It was way too intimate. The last thing I want to do is take advantage of the girl – especially when she’s in a state like this.
I want Frankie. I want to touch her: to taste her; to take her. There’s no denying it. The second I came across her in the street, I knew I had to have her. But now that Frankie’s offering herself up to me on a plate, I feel a strange reserve.
“I thought you were a gangster?” Frankie inquires of me while pulling back and placing her hands on her hips. Her body language is screaming attitude.
“That’s one word for it,” I grin. “But I told you, the PC term is businessman. That’s what we’re using, these days. Makes fer less trouble with the law…”
Frankie shoots me a look of scorn. I’d like to say that it wipes the smile off my face, but it doesn’t. I know it’s irritating her. Hell, that’s why I’m doing it: I know I shouldn’t; but I’m not completely in control either, no matter how I’m acting. My heart is racing, and my palms feel slightly sweaty.
There’s only one reason.
Frankie’s not dressed up in some tight, body-hugging cocktail dress. (And what a body…) Her hair is pulled back in a loose ponytail, and that curvy figure of hers is drowning in my old clothes. Still, she looks sexier than any woman I can remember. Her cheeks are alive with a fiery glow; her eyes are threatening; they threaten me with pain or pleasure.