by Sam Mariano
Dedication:
To Chad.
I always told you I’d dedicate a book to you someday…
isn’t it just like me to make it the one you’re never gonna read? ;)
#itstillcounts
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Irreparable Damage Copyright © 2014 by Sam Mariano
Irreparable Lives Copyright © 2016 by Sam Mariano
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Check out Sam Mariano's other books:
NEW ADULT
Because of You (#1)
After You (#2)
(coming 2017)
TABOO ROMANCE
Irreparable Damage (#1)
Irreparable Lives (#2)
STANDALONE
Beautiful Mistakes
(contemporary romance)
The Last Boss' Daughter
(coming 2017)
Author’s Note:
This book deals with some heavier topics, but I am not allowed to explicitly warn what those are in Amazon’s blurb.
In the interest of not upsetting anyone, you should know that rape is dealt with in this book.
If you make it to the end of this sample/first two chapters and still want to read the book, you should be good! I just want to give fair warning.
Thank you for checking out my book!
Once her parents and younger brother went to bed, Willow Kensington was psyched to finally have the house to herself.
Her 18th birthday had just passed, and between the cake, cupcakes, and the “birthday ice cream” her boyfriend had taken her out for, she desperately needed to burn some calories before indulging in some late night television.
After changing into her work-out clothes, she briefly considered putting in an exercise video. Since it was unseasonably cool out for June, she opted to go for a run instead.
Putting on some upbeat music, she did a few basic warm-up exercises, rotated her ankles several times each way, and set off along her usual path in their little suburban neighborhood.
By the time she made it back home, Willow was beat. The front porch only had four steps, but her muscles burned as she took the last two. Tugging her ear buds out, she shoved them in the front pocket of her sweater, attempting to turn the doorknob, but found it locked. Weird. Her mom or Ashlynn must’ve gotten up for some reason and locked it, assuming she was upstairs in bed.
Reaching into the hanging planter, she felt around the soil until she retrieved the spare key, thankful that she didn’t have to wake anyone up.
A half hour later, clean and wearing comfy clothes, Willow felt like a new person. She was still thirsty though, so she ran back downstairs to get a bottle of water.
As she stood bent over, peering into the refrigerator, the tiny hairs on the back of her neck stood on end; her body tensed and she had the oddest sensation that someone was staring at her.
Straightening slowly, she glanced to the left—half expecting to see her brother creeping up on her—but nothing was there.
Shoulders slumping in relief, she reached into the refrigerator, grabbed her water, and closed the door.
Two strong arms closed around her from behind. The water slipped out of her hands as the man anchored her arms against her body. She opened her mouth to scream and a third gloved hand came from off to the side, roughly covering her mouth.
“Hold her still,” a male voice barked quietly.
“I’m trying, she’s fucking squirming,” the other one muttered, pulling her more roughly up against his body. “Christ, stop moving!”
Willow thrashed even more, her protests muffled as she continued to kick and yank her arms wildly, trying to break free, trying to call for help. Her heart slammed against her rib cage and she could scarcely draw a breath—either because she was panicking, or because the man’s hand had most of her nose covered. A bit frantically, she wondered if she was going to suffocate—if they were planning to kill her? Would they leave her body in the kitchen floor for her family to find the next morning?
The one barking the orders yanked her arm straight, holding her forearm firmly enough to bruise it, and warned the other man again to hold her still.
Then she saw the needle poised above the veins in her arm.
She attempted to scream again, just as uselessly as before since her mouth was still covered. Her horror grew as the other man got the needle ready.
“No,” she cried, incoherently. She tried to beg, to plead, to bargain, but they couldn’t make out anything she was trying to say. Tears welled up in her eyes as she kicked backward, managing to strike her captor in the shin several times, but it only resulted in him cussing at her and squeezing her until she was afraid her ribs might crack.
The needle slid into her vein and she could only watch as he pushed whatever it contained into her body.
A sob tore from her throat as the one holding her shifted her weight, and she nearly got an arm free.
Willow tried once more to plead with them, but they had already injected her, so if it wasn’t just to knock her out, it was too late anyway.
There was no time to think about it—no time to even consider that these terrifying moments might be her last. Suddenly every part of her body felt leaden, and everything went black.
As the light flickered overhead, Ethan Wilde shifted in the uncomfortable plastic seat at the dingy Laundromat, missing the comfort of his home more than ever.
Leaving his family for extended periods was always hard, but leaving with a one-month-old son at home had been damn near impossible.
He didn’t have a choice though. When his inside contact told him Delmonico’s crew had a spot open for a smart, trustworthy guy, he threw Ethan’s name into the hat.
Well, Jack’s name. His fake name was Jack.
Now that he had four people at home depending on him, he should probably start thinking about getting out of that particular line of work. Or at least sticking to safer jobs.
While he waited for his clothes to dry, he sauntered over to the bathroom.
Once inside, he took the opportunity to check his email. He hadn’t been able to check it for a while but he had a second phone on him in case he got a chance.
After 50 new emails loaded, he scrolled through, most of it inconsequential or irrelevant, given his current location. Only two emails marked urgent. He tapped the first one, a missing 14-year-old girl, Hispanic, there was a picture attached along with the last seen information, $5,000 reward. Couldn’t look for her while he was neck-deep in his current operation, but he’d keep an eye out. The chances of running across her were pretty slim, but the girl in the picture looked older than she was, so even though none of the girls back at Delmonico’s seemed 14, he could check it out.
The next urgent email was from the family of yet another missing girl, desperate to locate her and able to pay for extra eyes to look. That one was older, prettier—newly 18, light brown hair, gray eyes, 5’5” and 115 lbs, $10,000 reward on that one. He took a look at her photo, just on the off chance he stumbled across her, but that one he expected even less. Back at Delmonico’s, there were exactly zero beautiful white American girls. Too risky.
He didn’t want to risk respondin
g, so instead he closed his email, fiddled with his paper clip, and ripped the SIM card out of his phone. Tearing off a piece of paper towel, he wrapped it up and dropped it in the toilet.
The sound of the toilet flushing nearly drowned out the sound of his other phone going off—the one Delmonico’s crew used to get in touch.
“Yeah?” he answered, shouldering the door open to make his way out of the bathroom.
It was just Tito telling him to pick up a case of beer.
The machine had stopped and everything was dry, so he shoved all the clothes into the laundry basket. Everything would be wrinkled as hell, but it didn’t matter.
Outside, he threw his basket of rapidly wrinkling clothes into the backseat of his beat up Toyota, slid behind the wheel, and headed to the store to pick up some alcohol.
---
Turning the key in the ignition, Ethan heaved a sigh, trying to get his head back in the game. He probably shouldn’t have checked his email. While he was living amongst the rats, it was easiest to pretend he was one of them until he believed it himself. Reminders of his real life made it harder to stomach the guys he was about to spend his evening with.
The street, sparsely lined with trees, was packed full of little rectangular homes, many converted into apartments or duplexes, stacked one on top of the other. Given that two people couldn’t walk side-by-side between the houses, there wasn’t a lot of perceived privacy, so it wasn’t the kind of place you would expect criminals to imprison up to a dozen young women.
But that’s what they did.
The house on the left contained a normal family—balding dad with glasses, seriously pregnant mom, and a little blonde girl with a My Little Pony backpack. They never so much as looked toward the house, even when Ethan was coming or going during the day and they were outside.
To the right was a brick building that Delmonico owned and rented out to four heroin addicts. Not the greatest of tenants, but they also weren’t going to report any suspicious goings-on, even if by some miracle they noticed any.
They were hiding in plain sight.
So was he, so he couldn’t exactly criticize their technique.
Upon entering the house, he made a conscious effort to adopt a much douchier demeanor. Glancing in the living room as he stepped into the grungy kitchen, he saw Chuck sprawled in the corner of the couch, but nobody else. There was no way anybody left Chuck there by himself, so Tito must be around somewhere.
Shoving the case into the barren refrigerator, Ethan grabbed one of the cold stragglers from the last case, popping it open and making his way to the cheap, old floral-print couch.
“So, did I miss anything good today?” he asked, plopping onto the opposite corner and tipping his beer back.
“Kinda,” Chuck responded, but he didn’t expand on that.
“Did Lane figure out when we’re moving the first bunch yet?”
“Nah, not yet. Max is still beatin’ around the fuckin’ bush. Why, you got a hot date or something?”
Scoffing, Ethan said, “I wish, the only action I’m seeing lately is Tito kissing Lane’s ass.”
The other man grinned. “I know that’s right.”
They made inane small talk for a while. Chuck was one of the dumber criminals Ethan had come across, and it seemed like dumb luck that he wasn’t in jail. Lane, the leader of that particular crew, knew that, so it wasn’t surprising that Chuck didn’t know anything. Most likely they would wait until the last minute to give specific dates and times. He wished they would hurry so he could pass along the intel and get the hell out of there.
The group of girls they were moving to Max’s included a 15-year-old Mexican girl named Lorena—the girl he was there for. Some teens looked older than they were, but not Lorena—she looked younger. The few times he saw her, it had been difficult to stay in character. Every time she appeared, her face was a mask of terror. He didn’t even want to think about what was happening to her behind the closed door of the room the girls were stashed in. It turned his stomach just to walk by that room, so he made a point to stay out of it.
Some of the guys made a point to go into it, but he tried not to think about that.
He wished it surprised him, but he had a pretty clear picture of how shitty people could be.
Just a few more days and they could all go home.
Tito emerged from one of the house’s three bedrooms—the one the guys slept in, not the girls. That was a relief. He looked uncharacteristically tense though—Tito was usually a pretty chill guy.
“Everything okay?” Ethan asked, catching Tito’s eye.
Nodding jerkily, Tito said, “Yeah, I guess.”
“I brought the beer.”
“Good man,” Tito replied, making his way into the kitchen.
“It’s not cold,” Ethan told him.
“I don’t give a fuck.”
Shrugging, Ethan turned his gaze toward the tv, which Chuck was laughing at. “We on our own tonight?”
He hoped so. Tito and Chuck weren’t so bad to kill a few hours with, but Ethan did not like Lane one bit. Some people, like Tito and Chuck, were in that line of business because they didn’t think they had any better prospects and they needed the money. Lane was in it for the power. For the ability to hurt people and be praised for it.
Lane was an asshole.
And probably a sociopath, if Ethan had to guess.
Heading back into the living room, Tito planted his skinny ass in the mismatched recliner by the couch. “Naw. Lane’s around.”
Of course he was.
Ethan merely nodded, focusing his attention back on the tv.
The door to the room full of girls swung open and out stepped Lane. As soon as Lane saw Ethan sitting on the couch, he halted. “You’re back.”
Lifting his eyebrows and smirking casually, Ethan said, “Didn’t realize I’d be missed. Had to do some laundry.”
“Jack brought beer,” Chuck announced.
Lane smiled thinly, nodded at Tito, then turned and walked back into the room.
Tito got up, setting his beer down on the coffee table, and headed back there with Lane.
A moment later Lane reappeared without Tito, but that time his entrance was much noisier and he wasn’t alone.
Stumbling to keep pace with him as he dragged her by the arm was one of the girls—not one he had seen before. The girl was pale with wavy brown hair down past her bare breasts. She wore a scanty black skirt, a blindfold, and rope bound her hands together at the wrists.
The girls were rarely brought out of the room by themselves, and when they were, it wasn’t good news. Lane usually seemed to prefer one of the other girls, but maybe he had a new favorite. Ethan felt a passing wave of sympathy for her—he couldn’t imagine the bastard would be gentle.
“Well, don’t be rude,” Lane said lightly. “Come say hi.”
Ethan rose to his feet, glancing at the girl. “She new?”
“Brand new. What do you think?”
Forcing a casual nod, he said simply, “Nice.”
Lane nodded his agreement. “She’s all yours. We saved her for you.”
Brow furrowing in confusion, Ethan said, “Uh, whaddya mean?”
Catching on faster than Ethan, Chuck offered an enthusiastic, “Nice!”
“She was acting up earlier,” Lane supplied. “She needs to be broken in a bit.”
“I don’t,” the girl cried. “I—I told you, I…I’m sorry.”
“Sorry only counts the first time,” Lane stated. “After the first sorry, you tried to kick me in the testicles.”
“I was afraid,” she objected, her voice rising.
Lane’s jaw clenched and his hand on her arm must have tightened, because she couldn’t see, but the girl shrunk away from him.
Good survival instincts. Lane didn’t seem like someone you should yell at.
The way she flinched though, he guessed Lane probably hit her in their earlier scuffle. Not that he should be surprised that Lane
would hit a woman. Not that Lane thought of the girls as people.
Christ.
Before Lane could react, Ethan cut in, “Seems like she figured out her place.”
Making a non-committal noise, he replied, “Still. Have a go.”
Chuckling uneasily, Ethan said, “I don’t know.”
Chuck chose then to chime in. “Aw, c’mon, you were just sayin’ you needed to get you some pussy.”
“Yeah, but this… isn’t what I meant,” he said, forcing a half-ass smile. “You don’t buy a bitch dinner first, you don’t feel like you earned it, y’know.”
Chuck uttered a bark of laughter. “Dinner—look here, Jackie’s a gentleman.”
Lane wasn’t amused. Frowning in Ethan’s direction, he said, “Don’t tell me you’ve got a weak stomach. It’s one of the few perks of the job. Everyone else has taken a turn—you’re the only one who hasn’t tried out any of the girls. What’s that about?”
Typically Ethan kept cool under pressure. With Lane looking at him for the first time with something akin to suspicion, he got a little hot under the collar.
“C’mon, don’t be a pussy,” Chuck said, approaching the terrified girl. He reached out and pinched one of her tits, causing the already trembling girl to flinch and a muffled sob escaped. “Look at these, don’t tell me you don’t want to hold onto these while you’re fucking her. She’s a lot better looking than the one I fucked. Hell, if you don’t want her, I’ll bite the bullet and break this one in.”
“You’re a real martyr,” Lane said dryly. “No, this one’s for Jack.”
Stifling a sigh of frustration, Ethan forced a casual smile and a nod. “Alright, alright, you talked me into it. Which room’s empty?”
Chuck started to point in the direction of the empty room but Lane interrupted, raising a single hand. “No room. Break her in right here.”
Ethan stared at the other man. “Right here? In front of you guys?”
“Is that a problem?” Lane asked coolly.