You Loved Me At My Ugliest

by Evie Harper

  Most guys who come to his whorehouse are young men on vacation, or those on spring break and who want to lose their virginity. My uncle knows they’ll tell their friends, so if he keeps the girls satisfied and in turn, the girls make the men happy, the men tell their friends, and everyone wins.

  But recently, girls have gone missing. They head out with friends, to the beach or to dinner, or wherever they’re heading, and then never return. There are rumors that they’ve run off, but none of the women collected their last paycheck, and they’ve left their belongings behind, their clothes and cars. It doesn't make sense. Girls leave the brothel all the time and even more ask to work here. They aren’t forced to stay, so something isn’t adding up.

  Alexander takes the seat to my left. He’s a cocky, arrogant, asshole who knows how to turn the charm on for the women he wants in his bed, but to those who he doesn’t care about, he’s a down right bastard.

  Georgie sits in her office chair behind the desk and waits for someone to speak. She’s in her late fifties, with dark, frizzy hair, and a too thin body, and she wears black reading glasses. She always cakes on an excessive amount of make-up and her nails are sharpened like knives. I cringe every time I have to see her.

  “So why are you losing our girls, Georgie?” Alex asks, his tone accusing.

  Georgie offers a fake smile. “Maybe the girls are running away from your cock, Alexander.”

  Alexander gives her a withering look. “Fuck off. They love me here.”

  “Shut up, the both of you!” Michael booms, his strong American accent low and harsh, irritation evident. His voice is unexpected to most, hints of power that his frail body shows he’s incapable of.

  “Alexander, you need to keep that dick of yours in your pants. No decent woman is going to want you after you’ve fucked all of Acapulco’s whores,” Michael says in a harsh tone.

  He doesn’t give a fuck about any future woman in Alexander’s life. Michael just couldn’t stand a whore having an O’Connor baby and taking his name. I think it would send him to an early grave, but probably not before trying to take the woman with him.

  “Maybe I’ll marry one of those whores,” Alexander sneers.

  Michael laughs. “I won’t have you sully the O’Connor name by marrying a loose bitch.”

  “Sully the O’Connor name,” Alex repeats. “Our name stands for drugs and guns. How could a whore make our name worse than it already fucking is?” Alexander replies angrily.

  “Holy fuck, are you in love with a slut?” Michael asks angrily.

  “No,” Alexander replies back quickly, and from what I can tell, honestly. “Just don’t tell me who the fuck I can marry,” he grates out to his father.

  Michael sighs and says, “Jesus Christ, I’m too old for your bullshit, Alexander.”

  “If only that old age killed you already,” William adds, his tone flat, inserting himself into the conversation.

  Michael booms out a laugh and speaks to Georgie, “See how much my sons love me? Luckily, I have something they want, or I’d already be six-feet under.”

  “With a big hole through the side of your head,” Matthew finishes for his father.

  Michael grumbles and slumps back in his seat, exhausted. “To the head? Fuck, that’s an undignified way to die. No one will want to cry over my body at my funeral with half my face blown off.”

  All my cousins shake their heads at their father’s arrogance. No doubt questioning that he thinks they’ll give him a funeral to begin with, let alone anyone caring to come to one for him.

  This is how it is with them, all the cards on the table; they would love to end their father’s life.

  I struggled to end my own father’s life. In the end, I couldn’t do it, being an only child my parents were all I had, all I’d ever known as family.

  But my cousins have each other, and they’ve been plotting their father’s death for a long time. Mostly due to the horrific childhood my uncle put them through, but what tipped them to openly tell their father how much they hate him was when Michael had their mother brutally killed six years earlier.

  She’d left Michael over a decade before, but at the time, Matt, Will and Alex, were starting the progressive move to get out from under Michael and move to their mother’s home far away from their father.

  But Michael couldn’t let them go, just like Marco couldn't let me go. Michael saw his sons as possessions that he owned, and he’d do anything he had to do to guarantee the succession of the O’Connor name.

  My grandfather had a lot to answer for. He created two of the world’s most vicious human beings. How my cousins and I didn’t turn out just like them still surprises me.

  I owe my life to Lexi. Her kindness in my dark world never stopped shinning; instead, it grew brighter every year and my cousins? The way they speak of their mother has me convinced it was her who they thank at night, before they fall asleep, for being able to hang on to their humanity.

  If only my mother had been that strong. Nevertheless, she wasn’t and now she sits in a nursing home in San Francisco, withering away from the years of drug and physical abuse my father put her through. She’s no longer there; she's just a woman in a wheelchair who stares vacantly out a window. My father broke her many years ago; she’s been dead inside ever since.

  The sole reason Michael is still alive is because he has something they want. Something he's keeping a secret until just the right moment.

  “The girls have said Serrano’s men have been following them, hanging around at the nightclubs where they’re picking up.”

  Fucking Serrano.

  Serrano runs the cartel that resides on The Gulf of Mexico. Serrano is how Michael gets his drugs and guns into the U.S.

  But he spends most of his time in Acapulco collecting, packaging and sending the products to Tampico for delivery. He has a warehouse in Valle De Rio where he has men receive and guard the product until it’s loaded on to a small plane.

  He uses his connections to get the products on to a boat and then his personal couriers take the product to San Antonio, where the drugs and guns are picked up and divided to gangs across the U.S. for distribution.

  It’s all very simple and made much easier when you’ve paid off or blackmailed all eight chiefs in the San Antonio Police Department.

  “Serrano? What could he possibly gain from taking the girls?” I ask, but I know no one will have an answer because Serrano doesn’t have brothels. He only deals in drugs and guns, so why the fuck would he want whores?

  “We need to retaliate,” Alexander says, and stands angrily from his chair.

  “No!” Michael shoots Alex down straight away. “This will need to be a private conversation I have with him. He’s too important to the business to destroy that connection without a meeting or at least proof first.”

  Alex looks to Michael with wide eyes and an open mouth, but it’s Matthew who speaks. “You said the same thing when he started giving himself a 5 percent discount on the product, and you did nothing. Now he’s taking our girls, to possibly use them himself, or just fuck with us, and you’re going to let that go as well?” Matthew’s voice raises the more he speaks.

  Michael stands from his chair slowly, using his cane to help him up. He then pins Matthew with a dangerous stare. “You dare to question my actions?” His voice is low, gruff. “You question your father? I fucking run this business, not you.” Cheeks flaming red, Michael’s eyes pop while he shouts. His neck muscles strain as he continues to spit harsh words at his son. “You take my orders and that’s all you do, you ungrateful piece of shit. You’ve always been the dumbest one out of your brothers.”

  Matthew pulls his black and silver handgun from under his suit jacket and points it at Michael. “Only dumb thing I’ve done in my life is let you live too long,” Matthew informs his father in a deadly tone.

  I quickly jump out of my seat and over to the exit to get out of the line of fire.

  Michael doesn’t move; he stays standing,
staring his son down.

  William strides over to Matthew. “Hey, now, we all just need to calm the fuck down a bit and think about what we’re doing.” Will attempts to calm the situation.

  “Do it,” Michael orders, his voice emotionless. “Then you’ll never find her.”

  Matthew’s grip loosens on the gun, and his knees wobble slightly. Defeat slams into him, but then Michael smiles and Matthew’s features change from frustration to rage. His finger tightens on the trigger, and both William and Alexander are screaming at him not to do it.

  The moment I know he’s going to shoot is when I see his muscles bunch up in his forearm, ready to pull the trigger. The pop sounds within the room and suddenly, Georgie’s coffee mug explodes into pieces.

  I turn my back to the room and cover my head, protecting myself from the broken porcelain pieces flying across the room.

  When there is only silence, I twist back around and find Michael standing in the same position with a blank, emotionless look on his face.

  Michael angles his head to a scared and shaking Georgie in the corner of the room and gestures to Matthew with his hand. “See what I have to deal with from my children.”

  He then shifts his gaze to a red-faced, heavy breathing Matthew. “Get out of my sight. Go let off some steam with one of the girls here, and for the love of everything, wear a condom.” An eerie calm laces his words.

  And with that, Michael sits back down in his chair.

  William angrily whispers to Matthew as he forces the gun out of his hand and pushes him out of the room and away from Michael.

  I take my seat in the middle again and look to Alexander; the only sign of any emotion is the ticking in his jaw. I’ve been living with them for nine months now, and I’ve found this is a common occurrence in the O’Connor Acapulco home, more so lately though. I sense my cousins’ determination fading, and I’m afraid they’ll do something they’ll regret.

  Michael looks to Georgie as she shakily sits back in her seat.

  “Thank God for manipulation. Now, where were we?” he asks.

  Michael and Georgie continue to talk about the girls, but only in regard to advertising for fresh girls and possibly purchasing a new building over the Acapulco mountains, somewhere out of sight and hidden away.

  Michael is a man no one could ever understand. The same stood for my father. They had the identical sick need for power yet went about it in different ways.

  When I came to Acapulco to talk with my uncle about my father’s death, he treated me as an enemy. I was tied to a chair for three days, tortured and questioned about what had happened to my father and where The Collection was now.

  I told him the American government had infiltrated the slave house and the secret location of The Collection. They had killed everyone, even the victims. They had to, because they didn’t have permissions from the Colombian President to be there at all, and they couldn’t leave anyone alive to talk of the mission, which would never be in the American history books. Of course, my uncle then thought I turned rat, and that I was in with the American government to bring down my father, with my plan to do the same to him.

  How close he was.

  I informed him I’d been giving a warning from an American friend, and I was able to get out in time, but couldn’t warn my father because not even I knew where The Collection’s secret hideaway was. I endured another day of being tortured and my story didn’t changed. My uncle finally decided he believed me. While being unstrapped from the chair by Alex, my uncle asked me the one question I prayed he wouldn’t know the answer to.

  “What happened to that girlfriend of yours? The one Marco said was a doctor.”

  My father and uncle were not close at all, but now and again, they would keep in contact. I wanted my hands wrapped back around my father's neck again, to squeeze the life out of him for daring to mention or talk about Lexi to Michael.

  I slumped my exhausted chin to my chest and imagined Lexi in my head, her beautiful bright smile and flowing black hair. And then I pictured her dying in a fire, and with a flat, sad voice I said, “She was in the slave house when it burned down. She’s dead.”

  “You left her there?” Michael asked, surprise evident in his tone.

  I nodded. “I was given strict instructions only I was to survive.”

  Michael bobbed his head, seemingly satisfied by my answer.

  And with that I was untied, bed ridden for just over a week and then inducted into my uncle's drugs and guns business. A few days of torture and questions, and he trusted me completely.

  My uncle knows nothing about my father’s death, which did surprise me since he is a resourceful man, but after spending some time with him, I see how selfish of a person he is. He doesn’t care for my father or how he was killed. Michael only wanted in on what my father had now lost. He wanted to know if he could easily pick up where my father had left off. When I told him it would be harder than he thought, he gave up and looked to other prospects within his grasp.

  Quickly, I found my mission here almost complete. Michael wasn’t going to start a new collection, and he didn’t know about those I had helped to save. Now, he just needed to die. I couldn’t have him popping up one day in mine and Lexi’s life, threatening our happiness. I promised myself I would do this for her, be someone she could spend her life with and not have to look over her shoulder.

  However, I should have considered the possibility that my cousins hated their father as much as I hated mine. In fact, I found out they hated him more. Killing Michael would be as simple as putting a bullet in his head and dropping him in the middle of the ocean as shark food with my cousins as my allies. Not one person is going to investigate his death or care about their business deal when there are three O’Conner sons ready to take over as soon as their father dies.

  But yet again, I find myself stuck between doing what I should to get back to Lexi and what my cousins are begging me not to do... yet.

  Chapter Five

  Alive, for now.

  Alexa

  I’m lost. I’ve been walking west for over twenty minutes, and I haven’t seen any sign of the O’Connors.

  I’m in a remote area near the city with empty streets and vacant old stores and buildings. I haven’t seen another person for at least ten minutes. I’m not even sure what I would find, that they’d be walking the streets doing business? God, I’m such an idiot.

  I turn on my heel sharply to head back where I came from, but out of the corner of my eye, I spot a black limousine down a back street, sitting in front of a three-story, run-down, brick building that looks like a cross between a large house and an office establishment.

  It must be them. Who else would be driving a limousine around here?

  I look left to right. There is no sign of activity, so I jog across the road and up the street. I race up and stand beside the building and strain my neck around the corner to see if anyone is in the black car.

  I pull my head back around, roll my eyes and shake my head. Oh, for fuck’s sake, Lexi, limos have tinted windows.

  I decide to take a chance and just casually walk past the limo and glance back at the front of the car and see if there’s someone in the driver's seat.

  I step out from the corner, looking everywhere but at the limo and start walking. However, I don’t make it past the car because the wooden front door to the building opens outwards and hits me right in the face.

  I grab for my nose and forehead as they begin to pound with pain.

  “Shit, sorry about that.”

  The sound of the smooth voice has my head flying up and my eyes widening at the stranger's appearance, and not because he’s devastatingly attractive, but because he has the O’Connor strong jawline. I found them.

  The tall, handsome man in a suit, with short dark-brown hair, scrunches up his face and points to his own nose and asks, “Are you bleeding?”

  My sore nose and head forgotten, I quickly remove my hands from my face to look down at th
em to inspect for blood. I see none, so I wipe at my nose and look at my hand again, still nothing.

  I glance up at the man and reply, “Doesn’t look like it.”

  The man points to my head and raises his eyebrows in question.

  I touch my head and laugh. “I’m okay. It doesn’t hurt anymore.”

  “Phew.” He breathes out, clasps his hands together and looks at the sky. “Thank you, God, the beautiful woman won’t be suing me today.” He then looks back down to me and asks, “Perhaps she might have dinner with me though?”

  My head jolts in surprise and I also secretly thank God myself, because this couldn’t be more perfect. I can get close to him and find out if he can tell me anything about Joey.

  The man puts his hand out and introduces himself. “I’m Matthew.”

  I take his hand and smile, “Alexa.”

  The man looks me up and down and then his eyes widen. My heart begins to race. No, he couldn’t know about me.

  “Lexi?” In the distance, I hear my name in a voice I know all too well.

  I’m frozen, shaking hands with this stranger as my heart slows it’s racing beat to almost stopping.

  He’s alive.

  My heart restarts, beats growing heavier by the second. Air is breathed into my lungs as if there was never any there before this moment.

  I turn my head left, and the world around me spins.

  Joey’s strong body is powering toward me with purposeful strides.

  My breath catches from the determination and possessiveness in his eyes. God, I missed him. The fear and power he exudes, it’s addictive. His gaze on me has always made me feel sexy, wanted and cherished. His eyes burn their claim onto my skin.