“Hey,” Andie said, squeezing his hand gently.
“Are you all right?” Jack shifted his position, but still held onto her hand.
“My head is killing me, but other than that …” Andie said softly, a tiny smile adorning her face.
“Beverly’s going to make breakfast for you, and she’ll have aspirin as well,” Jack told her. “I had a doctor come in and check on you while you were out. You need rest, so if you’re planning on leaving, you might be delayed for a few days.” Andie nodded, but said nothing. She didn’t want to talk about that, and it would seem Jack didn’t either.
There was an awkward silence that hung between them, and Andie sucked in her cheeks to give her something to do. Something made her grimace, however, and she had to release her cheeks. Jack frowned upon seeing her face, and nodded. He leaned forward, to sweep hair away from her face. A bruise decorated her cheek, and he dropped his fingers so they gently touched the mark. Andie watched his eyes darken upon seeing it.
“Thank you,” she whispered, lacing her fingers through his. “For everything.”
“Listen, And …” He paused, unsure how to proceed. “There’s something you need to see.” Certainly, she could wait to see this video until she felt better. The thing was, he knew Andie. He liked to think he knew her better than almost anyone else. Which was how he knew she would never forgive him if he had footage of her sister and waited to show it to her until later. He also knew she was strong enough to take it. “It’s Keirah.”
“Keirah?” She furrowed her brow, but even that took a lot of her. She opened her eyes and managed to focus on Jack, a light at the end of a dark tunnel. “What about her? Is she okay?”
Jack pressed his lips together as he turned on the television directly across from Andie’s bed. “I suppose that depends,” he finally said, turning back to her.
“On what?”
“On what your definition of okay is.” Without warning her, without telling her not to get worked up, he played the video. Andie was going to feel how she felt regardless of what he might say beforehand, and he would be there to weather the storm.
The door to the grey interrogation room opened and in walked a short, portly man, channeling his inner gangster with a beige fedora on and trench coat that went to the middle of his calves. He smelled like cheap cigars and his eyes were so grey they looked almost transparent.
“Well,” he said with a slight Boston drawl. “Look who we have here.” He flashed her a dry grin. “You know, our town is full of crooks. You’re nothin’ new, toots. However, you wanna know why I wanna talk to you?” He raised his bushy brows, but Keirah remained impassive, save for the fact that her eyes were narrowed in his direction. “’Cause of your friends, toots. You know, Noir, he don’t have any friends. He has people he works with that he ends up shooting afterwards. He worked with you yesterday, and lookie here. You’re still alive.”
The detective who had yet to formally introduce himself stopped talking, as though he was waiting for her to respond in some way. Instead, her face remained the same; impassive but suspicious.
“Now, we’ve been keepin’ you here without nothing for five hours,” he continued when he realized she wasn’t going to say anything. “I tell you what. You tell us everything you know about Noir, we’ll let you walk, charges dropped, everythin’. You walk out of here, live your life as though nothing happened. You’d be free.”
Again he stopped, and Keireah could tell by the growing wrinkle etching vertically between his brows that he was growing frustrated by her lack of response to his ministrations. Still, she remained silent, unresponsive, and she almost looked slightly bored. She was Noir’s lover for chrissakes! Did he really expect her to be afraid of him?
“You don’t start talkin’, we’re gonna have to make your stay here pretty uncomfortable,” the detective warned, and then to further his point, he cracked his knuckles.
Keirah knew cops weren’t allowed to physically beat the people they were interrogating. Hell, she hadn’t even been charged with anything. However, the dark smirk that touched his features told her otherwise.
“Hard way, it is,” he said before chuckling dangerously.
Andie flinched. “I can’t watch anymore,” she murmured. “So she’s been arrested? Clearly. Look at that outfit. Is she his partner now?”
“I tried, And,” he said, almost pleading. “I swear to God, And, I tried. But she …”
“I know.”
So that was it, then. Keirah had chosen her side, and she wasn’t looking back. She was gone.
Why didn’t she feel it, though? Why wasn’t Andie crying?
Maybe because Jack was looking at her like he expected something out of her, and she didn’t want to make a fool out of herself. But maybe it had to do with the fact that somehow, someway, she knew it. Once Noir got a hold of Keirah again, Andie knew her sister was lost to this world forever. And for some reason, Keirah wanted it that way.
She was gone, and that was it.
So why wasn’t Andie crying? Why didn’t she feel sad?
Because everyone leaves, Andie, a voice calmly reminded her. Everyone leaves. Your father left you when you were young. Your mother kicked you out when things got too hard. And now your sister has chosen her path, and it has nothing to do with you. You’re used to not being the first priority, Andie. That’s the way life is. People blow in and out of your life like leaves in autumn and leave when things get too hard or when they find an easier way, even if it means sacrificing you. Eventually, Jack will leave too. He has to, and that’s okay. He has a bigger purpose than starting something with you. The safest bet would be to cut your losses and get out now, before you get even more heartbroken.
Andie looked up, her pale green eyes meeting Jack’s jade green ones. She knew the voice was right. As much as it would hurt her to let him go, it would hurt her even more to be with him and not be the most important thing in his life, right? She wouldn’t want him to sacrifice his work for her, either. It was a precarious position to be in, and she didn’t want to inadvertently force him to make a decision when she knew, deep down, he would choose her. She needed to leave. They couldn’t be friends, not right away. They had to move on. That was the right thing to do, right?
Right?
“Can you hand me my cell phone?” she asked, her voice still croaking. “I need to call Carey.”
28
It had been three days. Three days.
They hadn’t even charged Keirah with anything. Hell, they didn’t even know who Keirah was.
She didn’t eat except when they fed her, and they only fed her bread three times a day. She didn’t drink until they gave her water, and even then they didn’t give her enough that would sustain her. She was only allowed to go to the bathroom once a day, and she wasn’t allowed to call anyone, much less receive some sort of defense attorney.
But most surprising of all, they actually beat Keirah up. It wasn’t too bad; she could move around, she could think, but her face, her neck, and her upper shoulders were pretty bruised up. She wouldn’t know for sure though; unless she was in the restroom, she didn’t get an opportunity to look at herself in the mirror. She hadn’t brushed her teeth or showered in the past three days. Even the clothes she was wearing—her Bombshell dress—were still on her body. It was damaged, torn in some places due to the physical activity the police put her through, but that wasn’t the worst of her fears.
In actuality, she wasn’t exactly afraid of anything, at least in her current position. What could they do to her that Noir hadn’t done to her before? It was almost as though he had been building her body’s tolerance up for activity such as this. Even if he hadn’t, it seemed to work. Her body had sustained injuries far worse than these. Of course it hurt. She felt the pain quite thoroughly in fact, but her determination and stubbornness seemed to be winning the fight.
Of course, this particular fact only upset the police officers, and they took it out on her even more. T
hey called her every derogatory phrase they could think of; whether it related to her body, her sex, or some name referring to how loose she was, it didn’t matter. They didn’t hurt her. As long as she knew deep down in her heart that her silence was beneficial to Noir, then she would endure anything.
It was silly, probably even downright stupid. But it was what she believed.
It was all she knew.
When Keirah wasn’t being interrogated by one of six different officers, she was kept in an isolated holding cell, four by six feet, with nothing but a bed. She wasn’t allowed to read anything, no books, magazines, or newspapers, nor was she allowed to write. She wasn’t allowed visitors, nor was she allowed any letters. She wasn’t allowed to watch or even listen to the nearby television, who constantly updated the city of Onyx with the status of who Bombshell was, what she was being charged with, and, most importantly, what her relationship with Noir was.
Of course, the police couldn’t tell the festering press anything because Keirah had yet to open her mouth and say hello, let alone confess to everything they had been asking her about. So the police kept rephrasing what they had been saying from the get-go, but continued to lie that Keirah had a defense attorney.
Currently, the young woman was lying in her cot, her head resting as comfortably as it could on the white pillow, her fingers laced together, resting underneath her head as her brown eyes stared up at the ceiling. It was cold, being kept in isolation, and she was certain if she remained here in the next couple of days, she would no doubt catch some kind of illness. After another moment, she dropped one hand and reached up to her face, wondering what damage had been done today. She was certain both sides of her face were bruised, but it didn’t mask the pink J stained onto her face.
They had asked about the J too. They thought it was her name, maybe her lover’s name. One even went so far as to claim it was the illegitimate child of Noir and Keirah, which caused Keirah to crack a smile. It caused her amusement. At first, it felt odd, smiling after so long, but she realized she was winning, and that caused her smile to deepen.
It felt good.
The other side of her face felt a little less bruised than the left side, and her bottom lip was swollen. She was positive that if she had a mirror she would see fingerprints littering her neck, but that was it. Her nose bleed from last night had stopped a while ago, but flakes of crusted blood still outlined the rim of her nostril.
She was sore, and so very tired. At night, nearly every hour, someone would pop in and wake her up just to wake her up. She had to admit, they were very good at fucking with her.
But she was incredibly stubborn.
She refused to think about her mother. She refused to think about Andie. She refused to think about Commissioner Jarrett. They would be ashamed of her actions. They would tell her she deserved to be in jail. They would tell her she was sick in the head for being in love with a man like Noir. She wasn’t the same Keirah. The girl they knew was dead and gone, and some other woman stood in her place. And that woman needed to get out of here.
“I want to get out of here,” she murmured to herself, though the tone she heard sounded foreign to her ears. Was this how she sounded after three days of not talking? She sounded horrible, croaky, and strained.
A small part of her wished upon whatever wishing star was shining down on her that Noir would help her escape from this prison, but the bigger, moral part of her reminded her that if he did something like that, the chances were greater that he would be caught and then everything she had done would be for nothing.
It felt like forever since she had been lying there, thinking about everything and nothing at the same time. In fact, she thought it had been a while since she had last seen an officer. Shouldn’t one have come around here, to mock her at least? There was an odd feeling crawling around in her stomach that she couldn’t quite decipher, but it left her uneasy.
“Hey.”
The voice was low, quiet, and unfamiliar. But she heard it. She bolted up right on her bed, which caused her muscles to protest. She ignored them. Instead, her hearing was sharp and goose bumps erupted onto her skin. Was this an officer?
“Look, I know you’re known for not talking, so just listen. I haven’t got all day. And, quite frankly, neither do you. He’s coming for you. But you know this, don’t you? He’s coming for you soon. It’s absolutely necessary that you listen to what I’m about to tell you. Not just listen but, like, do it. Do what I tell you. If you don’t, all will be for nothing and you’ll die. Simple as that. When you see him—you know who—you need to get as close to him as possible. No questions asked, just do it. You got that? You hear me? I hope so.”
A crooked cop in Onyx.
Of course. Why wasn’t Keirah surprised?
She should feel relief. Noir was really coming to get her. But she just didn’t like it to be through some crooked cop.
And what did his message mean anyway? Get as close to him as possible or else she would die?
Before Keirah could contemplate that, a familiar goon that reminded her of one of the goats living under the bridge stomped in and led her into another interrogation room.
For the next twenty minutes, he threw questions at her with his sharp voice and backhanded her once before something stopped him. People were screaming now, rushing; there was tension-filled activity outside the room. The officer interrogating Keirah forgot all about the young woman and left the room, leaving Keirah alone.
She sat there a moment, contemplating what she should do.
It didn’t take her long.
Keirah slipped out of her chair and walked out of the room, trying to figure out where to go.
A loud, familiar cackle filled the room, overpowering everything else and causing everyone around to go silent.
And then, through the smoke and through the haze, there he stood. Tall, broad, and beautiful as ever. God, he was a sight for sore eyes.
It was then that Keirah remembered just what the mysterious voice had said. She had been leaning against the door frame, her whole body slacking due to the pain she was currently trying to ignore. But she pushed off against the door and headed toward him. He hadn’t noticed her, not until she wrapped her arms tightly around his waist and buried her face into his chest. Suddenly, she felt as though the world wasn’t on her shoulders anymore. She was safe.
Finally she was safe.
Noir chuckled at Keirah’s response to his performance and coiled his arm around her waist. “There, there, there, doll,” he murmured into her hair. Miraculously, it still smelled like sweet strawberries, despite the obvious lack of washing it. “Daddy’s here, and he’s not letting you go.” He grinned as his golden eyes narrowed at the surrounding police officers. “And just think! You’re just in time for the, well, for the show.” The last word he spoke seemed darker than usual.
Keirah couldn’t see anything, but she heard a ping, could feel Noir press some sort of button, and then heard an ear-deafening explosion from all around.
It was only when Noir had brought Keirah home did he realize what she had endured during the past three days. Currently, she was resting on the bed they shared, but she made sure to change out of the dress she had been in for a while. He would have to remember to grab her a new one because he really did like it on her …
As she slept, Noir took a chair and propped it close to the bed so he could watch her, so he could study her, and so he could be there when she woke up in order to let her know that she was back at the manor with him, that she was safe. Since she wasn’t doing anything particularly interesting currently, his sharp, golden eyes surveyed her features, wanting to try and decipher just what sort of damage had been done to her.
The first thing he noticed was that nothing permanent, at least on the surface of the skin, had been inflicted on her. Her face was swollen, purple, blue, with bruises scattered about. Her lip had been opened twice, maybe three times, with a cut of dried blood littered on her bottom lip. If she was
awake, he probably would have leaned over and kissed her bottom lip, sucking the metallic taste until the flavor ran dry. Even though they were only apart for three days, he had craved her body, her eyes, and her smile.
He was an addict, and she was his drug. He needed her more than he needed chaos.
Another thing he noticed was how much weight she had lost in three days. Her cheeks looked more sunken in and her skin was paler than before.
Those fucking cops tortured her.
But why?
It was then that he realized they probably questioned her, not about her own deeds of breaking the law, but of him, of what she knew about him. It was the only reason she would be this beaten up, lacking food and water, lacking a lot, really. Hell, she didn’t have a fucking lawyer to defend her—though Noir had connections to the greatest defense firms. And the only reason she looked like she did was because she hadn’t talked.
Keirah had kept her mouth shut and taken quite a beating to make sure that he and his whereabouts were safe. It probably affected him more than he allowed himself to feel, but it meant a lot to him. More than he would say. He wouldn’t even try to put what he felt into words.
He frowned and sighed through his nose. His feelings soon turned into anger, and he clenched his ungloved hands into tight fists in order to control himself. He needed to take it out on someone, but he’d be damned before he reached out and did so on Keirah, not after everything she had done for him.
Without fully thinking everything through, he reached out, suddenly completely calm, and brushed the pad of his fingertip across her cheek in order to push a strand of brown hair out of her face. Such a beautiful, delicate thing as Keirah should not be damaged to the extent that she was. There were times when he lost himself in consuming passion with her, and he wouldn’t deny that he absolutely loved the way she looked when she was crying or bleeding, knowing that he could cause her to feel such emotions.
But for someone else to do things to his girl? No way. Things were going to get destructive. No one could inflict such pain on his girl and get away with it.
Catalyst: Book 2 of The Dark Paradise Trilogy Page 22