“I heard your mom died a few years after you left. A drug overdose.”
He nodded, but didn’t say anything.
“Did you go home for her funeral?”
“I was overseas. Besides, she wasn’t there for me when Will and I needed her. I didn’t have anything to say to her.”
She had been a worthless mother and the few times that I actually talked to her had been just horrible. She was not a nice person and she didn’t care about anybody but herself.
“Can I get you anything?” he grumbled.
“Could I have a wet washcloth? I feel disgusting.”
He nodded and left the room, walking into the en-suite bathroom. He returned with a bowl of steaming water and a washcloth. “Sit up.”
“I can do it.”
“Don’t be fucking stupid. You can hardly move.”
I didn’t appreciate his tone, but I sat up as best I could. I was wearing a thin tank top that he gently pulled off me. If it weren’t for his help, I wouldn’t have been able to do that. He dipped the washcloth in the water and wrung out the excess water. I shivered as the warm cloth brushed against my skin. It felt so good to have the grime washed away. I was all too aware of the hair growing in my armpits and my legs, but it would have to wait until I could shower on my own.
“Axel said that Slasher beating you was a regular thing,” he said quietly.
“Yeah.” Oh, God. We weren’t really going to have this talk right now, were we? I didn’t want to discuss what my life had been like. I didn’t want Chris to look at me with pity or disgust. I just wanted to move on with life, whether that meant Chris was there or not.
“How often did he…”
I knew what he was asking and I didn’t really want to talk about it. “Not as often over the years. He lost interest in me pretty fast. He only kept me around because of Axel,” I said, refusing to look at him. I was over that part of my life. The beatings were the worst of any of it because they came so frequently. It seemed like every time my body healed, Slasher was back at it again, pissed at me for something else I had done.
“Why did you choose the name Axel?”
“Slasher wanted something that sounded badass. I wanted something normal. We compromised. You should have heard some of the names he wanted to give him.”
He ran the washcloth around my breasts, gently washing them and running the cloth down my stomach. It wasn’t sexual, but I also didn’t miss the way he stared at my breasts. When he was finished, he cleared his throat and helped me get dressed again, tucking me back in.
“I need to know what he did to you,” he said fiercely.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“Chris, that part of my life is over. It happened, but it didn’t destroy me. There’s nothing good that comes from rehashing shit that I can’t change. I don’t want to talk about it and I don’t want to see the anger on your face. Don’t ask me again. The answer will be the same.”
His nostrils flared, but he nodded and walked toward the door. “Does Axel know I’m his father?”
“No. I always thought it was safer if he didn’t know.”
He nodded and left, leaving me to stew in my room. I needed to talk to Chris about what would happen from here. I didn’t know if it was safe here and I didn’t know if he wanted to get to know Axel. There were so many unanswered questions and I didn’t even know where to start with him. He wasn’t the same person I remembered. The years had obviously changed him as they had me. I didn’t even know who I was anymore. Where did I go from here? One thing was for certain, I had to keep Axel away from Slasher and I would do whatever it took.
✯✯✯✯✯
As the day went on, I found myself getting bored. Usually, I was at work and kept my mind busy. Lying here, I had too much time to think about my life and what had become of me and my son. It was painful to think that I had allowed my son to go through his short life surrounded by drugs and murder.
I got up out of bed and sat in the chair Chris had been watching me from. It felt good to sit up, but I was still bored. I glanced around the room and took in everything. There wasn’t much to it. It was a masculine room, but there wasn’t anything that told me who Chris was now.
“Mom?”
I was so lost in my thoughts that I hadn’t heard Axel knock on the door. He looked around and when he saw I was alone, he came in and closed the door.
“How are you feeling?”
“Better,” I smiled. “Clearer. It’s nice to not be on those drugs anymore.”
He took a seat on the edge of the bed and glanced around the room. “So, what are we gonna do now?”
I sighed and chewed on my lip. “I wish I knew. For now, I just want to get better. We’re safe as long as we’re with Chris.”
“How do you know?”
I saw the wariness in his eyes. He wasn’t a stupid kid. He saw over the years how a man could tear someone apart. He didn’t trust anyone.
“I know Chris. There’s no way that he could ever do anything to hurt either one of us.”
“You haven’t seen him in years,” he scoffed.
“He was my boyfriend. He was always a good person. I know that didn’t change.”
“If he was such a good person, why didn’t you go to him sooner? Why did you stay with Slasher?”
“Axel, you know the way of the gang. It wouldn’t have been as simple as calling up Chris and asking him to take us away. I didn’t tell you this, but I had been working on a plan for the past two years. There was a man I worked with at the hospital. He knew that I was in a bad situation and he was teaching me to fight. I was going to make my move soon, but when I found out Slasher was going to initiate you into the gang, I knew I couldn’t wait any longer.”
“I just don’t get it. I know how Slasher is, but I don’t understand why you didn’t leave.”
I looked at him in confusion. “What do you mean?”
He ran his hand over the back of his neck and stood quickly, pacing the room. “You should have left a long time ago. You should have left me!”
“I would never leave you behind. What kind of mother would that make me? Do you really think I could ever just walk away from you?”
“But the things he did to you-I heard it. I saw the bruises all the time. I wouldn’t have blamed you for leaving. He could have killed you any one of those times.”
“Axel,” I said softly. “You’re my life. If I had left without you, I never would have been able to live with myself.”
He sat down hard on the bed, his shoulders slumped. “I just feel like this is all my fault. Like you could have gotten away if it weren’t for me. You wouldn’t have had to deal with him all these years.”
I leaned forward, ignoring the pain from the movement and grabbed his hand, squeezing it tight. “None of this is your fault. Slasher is the worst kind of human being and what that gang stood for-that’s not something you just walk away from and live to tell about. Even if I had left without you, they would have come after me. They still will, but I’m ready for the fight now.”
It was quiet for a while as we sat there together. I wanted to say something more reassuring, but there was really nothing I could say or do. It’s not like I had given him any kind of hope that I could do more for him.
“One day, we’re going to have a different life,” he promised. “I swear, this is not going to be our life anymore.”
I appreciated the sentiment behind his words. It was like he was vowing to protect us, but the truth was, he was still a kid and he was no more capable of taking care of himself against the Blood Devils than I was. He must have seen the disbelief on my face because his jaw hardened as he shook his head slightly.
“I know you think I’m just a kid, but I’ve seen more in my life than most kids my age. I’ll do anything to make sure that we don’t go back to him. We’ll run, we’ll hide, we’ll fucking fight back.” I scoffed at his language, but he just raised an eyebrow in challenge. “I’m
not a kid anymore, Mom. Don’t treat me like one. We’ll beat this together.”
I nodded, knowing that he was right. We were way beyond pretending that he was still in need of my protection. If we were going to come out on top, he needed me to treat him like the adult that he had become instead of the scared child I still thought of him as.
“Okay. We’ll do this. Together.”
CHAPTER SIX
Chris
“WHAT THE FUCK is going on, Chris? How is she wrapped up with the Blood Devils?” Ice asked as I joined him outside on the porch. I didn’t know what to tell him. I had never really told anyone but Cap about my association with the Blood Devils. Jules was sitting in a chair, sipping a cup of coffee, acting like he didn’t have a care in the world.
I leaned against the porch railing, facing the two men that I knew would always have my back no matter what. “There’s this asshole, Slasher. He’s now the leader of the Blood Devils, but seventeen years ago, he was the man who murdered my brother.”
Ice’s stare was ice cold, just like his nickname implied. Julius just raised an eyebrow at me, as if to tell me I had some explaining to do.
“My brother was trying to take care of me. I was just a teenage kid and he was looking for any way that he could take care of me. He knew what he was doing, but he couldn’t see another way. I was going to join to have his back. I knew he was getting involved in some shit that he shouldn’t be going near. I thought I could save him. Ali was my girlfriend. Apparently, after they killed my brother, Slasher took Ali as his own.”
Jules stood, shoving his chair back in the process. “What the fuck do you mean?”
“Exactly how it sounds. Axel is her kid.” I ran a hand over my scruff and sighed. “My kid. I didn’t know. I didn’t know shit about what was going on. After my brother was killed, I just walked away from everything. I went to a recruiting office to join the Marines, but I didn’t meet the requirements. The sergeant could see that I was desperate. He and his wife took me in and made sure that I was ready when I turned eighteen. They gave me my life.”
“Does the kid know?” Ice asked.
“That I’m his father?” I shook my head. “I just found out. That’s something Ali has to be with me for. I don’t know the first fucking thing about being a father, let alone to a kid that’s almost an adult.”
“Have you talked to the kid yet?” Jules gaze was penetrating, obviously wondering if I had tried to make a connection with the kid.
“A little. I talked to him before I knew he was mine. It doesn’t sound like he liked his life much. Slasher beat Ali frequently. He said he didn’t get it as much, but that’s still too fucking much.”
“I know this is fucking hard,” Ice said, “but the sooner you tell that kid that you’re his father, the sooner you’ll have an idea about what to do next. One thing’s for sure, the Blood Devils will come for them and we have to be ready. You need to be sure that Axel is on your side and he won’t go back to Slasher.”
✯✯✯✯✯
I avoided Ali for days. I just didn’t know what to say around her. I felt terrible that her life had turned out so shitty because of me. I had walked away from her and she suffered for it. How did I even begin to make that right? I knew I was being a pussy by not talking to her, but I figured that she probably needed the space too. At least, that’s what I told myself.
I couldn’t stay away from her forever though. We had to make a plan. The guys were getting irritated with me. It wasn’t safe for us to stay at my house for much longer. The Blood Devils probably knew where she was now and every second that I delayed put us in danger. The fact was, if I was going to keep her and my son safe, I had to take them to a safe house where we could properly protect them.
I knocked on the bedroom door, but didn’t hear anything. I cracked it open to see her staring out the window. She looked at peace for the first time in days. Even with her fading bruises, she was just as beautiful as I remembered. Her light brown hair was longer than when we were kids and right now, it was pulled out of her face on top of her head. Small wisps hung down and tickled her shoulders. Her blue eyes used to be so vibrant and full of life, but they seemed to have dulled over the years, which made sense. Anyone living the life she had would have all the joy sucked out of them. It would take some time, but eventually, the swelling would go down in her face and I would see her cute little button nose again with the small smattering of freckles spread across it.
“Can I come in?”
She shrugged, her tiny frame hardly moving as she took a shallow breath and blew it out.
“Ali, I’m sorry that I haven’t been around. I fucked up when I walked away and I ruined your life. I’m so fucking ashamed and I just didn’t know how to talk to you.”
She turned and looked at me, questions written all over her face. “Why would you think that you ruined my life?”
“I left you and Slasher took you.”
“That wasn’t your fault, Chris. I don’t blame you for getting out. I heard what happened with your brother. That would have messed anyone up.”
“But I didn’t even consider taking you with me. I just walked away. You were pregnant.”
“You didn’t know, so stop beating yourself up about it.” She was letting me off the hook too easily. I didn’t deserve her kindness or her forgiveness. “It wasn’t completely terrible. I convinced him to let me go back to school for my nursing degree. I was working on a way out of there. And Axel turned out great despite his surroundings. He’s really a great kid.”
“I can see that. I wish I had known him all these years.”
There wasn’t anything to say to that. Nothing we said could change the past.
“So, what did you do with yourself after you left that day?” she asked after a few minutes.
I sat down on the window seat with her and took off my cowboy hat, running my fingers through my hair. “I went to a recruiting office. I was going to join right away, but I wasn’t old enough. I had to wait six months unless I had parental consent.”
“Fat chance of that happening,” she smiled. Ali and I had grown up together. She knew my family better than anyone.
“The recruiter realized how desperate I was to escape. He gave me a choice. I could go home with him and he would help me get ready for the Marines, or he would give me $20 for food. Six months later, I was headed off to boot camp.”
“Wow. I can’t believe they did that for you.”
“They were better than my own parents. I still keep in touch with them.”
“How long were you in the military?”
“Ten years. I loved every damn day of it. It whipped my ass into shape and gave me something to live for.” Her eyes dimmed as she looked back outside. I closed my eyes, feeling like a complete ass.
“Have you talked to Axel at all?” she asked as she stared out the window.
“Just a little. I didn’t want to say anything unless you were there.”
“Now’s as good a time as any,” she said with a hesitant smile. “Are you ready for this?”
“No, but I think it’s time we got to know each other.”
“Okay. Let’s go talk to him.”
We stood and I walked next to her and she gingerly made her way to the door. She was doing a lot better, but her ribs were still hurting her. Her breathing had gotten a lot better over the past few days. We went down the hall to the living room where Axel was watching TV. He flicked off the TV when he saw us enter the room.
“Hey, what’s going on?”
Ali sat down across from him and took a deep breath. “Axel, I need to talk to you about something.”
“Okay,” he said, leaning forward on the couch so that his elbows rested on his knees.
“Axel, before you were born, Chris and I were a couple. We broke up and Chris left,” she said, glancing over at me. I could tell she was trying to sugarcoat things because she didn’t want to make me look like the asshole that walked away. “The day after
he left was the day Slasher took me. I made him think that he was your father because I knew it would keep you safe. But he’s not your father. Chris is.”
Axel just stared at his mom for a few minutes, obviously taking in all that she was saying. Then he looked at me and a faint smile touched his lips. “So, I’m not that guy’s kid?”
“No,” Ali replied. “I’m sorry that I let you think he was, but if Slasher knew that Chris was your father, he would have killed you. It was the only way I could protect you.”
Axel nodded slowly. “I know, Mom. It’s okay. Just knowing that I don’t actually have his DNA in my body is worth every year I spent with him.”
I cleared my throat, wanting to ask him so many questions, but we didn’t have time for that right now. “Axel, I know we have a lot to catch up on and I’m sure you have a lot of questions, but the fact is that the Blood Devils will be coming for both of you. They won’t let you just walk away. You’ve been here now for over a week and we need to move. If they haven’t connected Ali to me yet, it’ll happen soon and they’ll come at us full force.”
Axel’s eyes widened in panic. “I can’t go back there.”
“I won’t let them take you back. We’ll fight back against them, but we need to have a plan. I need to talk to my boss and figure out the best way to handle this. It’s not something we can deal with on our own. But in the meantime, we need to get out of here and go to a safe house.”
“Alright. Yeah, I’m good with whatever you tell me to do.”
“Ali, you okay with that?”
“I trust you, Chris. We’ll do whatever it takes to stay away from him.”
“Alright, then let’s grab our stuff and head out. I’ll talk with my guys and we’ll hit the road.”
✯✯✯✯✯
“Cap, we’re heading to the safe house. We need to put a plan in place to protect Ali and Axel.”
Whiskey: A Reed Security Romance (Reed Security Series Book 7) Page 5