Atonement (Heart of Stone)

by Sidebottom, D H

  “You father…”

  He squeezed his eyes closed and fisted his hands. “Stop, you’re lying…” he roared as his fist connected with my already shattered cheek, pain searing through my face and blurring my vision as my brain struggled to keep up.

  He gripped my hair and pulled me off the bed, throwing me onto the floor as his boot connected with my stomach; his anger feeding his violence as I became his release for years of resentment at his sister’s desertion and an age of pain at her death.

  “You fucking bitch. You left her; you left her to die…” Each word accompanied a kick, a punch or a spray of spittle as his wrath erupted and he beat me relentlessly. He didn’t stop as each word became louder and angrier, “You killed my sister. How could she die when you can knock out even Mason? Why didn’t you help her? Why didn’t you save her?”

  I heard his final words as my heart slowed and my mind shut down. My throat choking on my own blood as my lungs laboured against the build-up of blood.

  “You will join her; she will get vengeance when you unite with her” He whispered in my ear as I felt the slice of the blade along my neck.

  Chapter 41

  mason

  “Bingo” Kade declared as he shot up from his chair and ripped the paper from the printer, everyone already piling from the room as Kade shouted the address to them all.

  “You’re with me” I yelled at Kade as he flew behind me and clambered in the passenger seat of my car. “Buckle up, you’re gonna need to.” I warned and shot off the driveway as I heard the click of his seatbelt in the socket.

  “Hurry, Mason” he rasped and I realised he was choked up.

  I had no idea where my next words came from, how I even voiced them but I said them, in fact I shouted them at him, “Come with us.”

  His head shot sideways as he stared at me, “Say that again.”

  “I said come with us, to Portugal, with Ava and me. Live with us.”

  He stared in shock as I shot him a quick glance. “Watch the fucking road, Ava doesn’t need us dead what with everything else” he growled as I slipped round a corner and mounted the pavement.

  “I mean it Kade, I want you with us.”

  “We’ll discuss this when Ava can provide input on your insanity.”

  I growled in response as I floored the accelerator harder and pushed the car outside its limits. Kade’s hands were clung to the edge of the seat as I entered the opulent neighbourhood, both of us squinting at road names, looking desperately for the one we wanted.

  “There” Kade shouted and I screeched to a stop, ramming the gear into reverse as I backed up with an alarming velocity. I turned, scanning the numbers on the huge iron gates that protected each wealthy home. “This one” Kade informed me with a slight hint of excitement. I was impressed with his hunger for violence. I could feel it pouring from him in thick edible waves and I smiled harder when my heart beat in rhythm with his, each of us taking pleasure in the thought of causing pain to this bastard who dared to touch what was ours.

  Ours? Where the hell had that come from?

  Sam and Greg pulled to screech behind us before they both piled out and Elijah joined us with both his men.

  “How we doing this, Mason?”

  “However the fuck you want as long as you get her out. But that bastard is mine, you all hear me?”

  “And mine” Kade growled out through his clenched teeth.

  I narrowed my eyes on him but he stared me out, “and yours” I acknowledged.

  “Okay, let’s do this” Sam said as Nate and Lucas pulled up, both of them virtually falling out of Nate’s car with desperation.

  “What the hell?” I started as Nate pushed his face within inches of mine.

  “Enough Mason, you put her through too much” he barked with aggression.

  Kade slipped between us, feeling the rise of my wrath with Nate’s hatred, “Nate, this isn’t Mason’s fault. The prick is after Ava. It’s Katie’s brother.”

  Nate’s eyes widened as he flicked a glance towards the house. His eyes were still narrow and blazing as he turned back to me, but he nodded in apology and pulled a small gun from the back of his waistband. My eyes widened on it and Nate just shrugged, “Let’s go in.”

  I nodded to Sam who plugged a device into the control pad and the gates swung open.

  Elijah, Neo and the other guy herded round the edge of the long driveway as me and the others took the left hand grass border, each of us pulling off the safety on our guns and checking the bullet load.

  I exhaled slowly as I met the front door with a swift kick and it banged noisily on the wall. I grimaced as I checked the area. Sam and Greg flanked me as they proceeded to open doors and check the downstairs as Nate and Kade followed me up the stairs.

  I halted at the top and flicked my head to the side, listening for the murmur I thought I heard.

  Adrenaline engulfed my body when I heard a soft but pain filled cry. Kade heard it too as he shot towards the doorway but I grabbed the back of his shirt and pulled him back, “Wait!” I whispered, nudging my head to the side to silently tell him to slow down.

  He nodded and stood beside the door as I counted on my fingers and as I got to one, I kicked it in. The hinges cracked forcefully as the door splintered and fell into the room with a crash.

  Holy Jesus Christ!

  Kade whimpered as my soul screamed in pain at the sight of my wife’s mutilated body, her blood coated the carpet as Brad leant over her, sliding a slick blade through Ava’s pale freckled chest.

  The whiteness embraced me; the pure malevolent wrath that my spirit morphed into overtook every inch of my system, its dominance burning the blazing ferocity inside me. My mind twisted into the monster that structured my rage and my body hardened in preparation for the fight. The fight that I needed to tame the beast within.

  My eyes flickered as an evil calm ran through me and I stepped into the room.

  Brad screamed in a wild rage as he dragged Ava by the hair to the back of the room and thrust the knife against her throat, “Don’t move, Fox.” His voice was a raspy whisper and I knew he had lost it. This was bad, his mentality had gone beyond any reason and I knew I wouldn’t be able to talk him round at this point. He was out for blood.

  As simple as that.

  Kade appeared beside me and I heard the scuffled noises of the rest of the guy’s on the landing outside the bedroom. I did a quick scan of the room, looking for any hint of his life that I could use to placate him.

  “Brad, what’s all this about?” I asked as I tried to embrace the calm that surrounded my body; it would be the only thing that got me through this.

  “She needs to atone for her sins Mason, she’s bad, and she’s evil. Look at her, she’s a fucking whore.”

  “She’s not bad Brad, why is she bad?”

  “She left her to die,” he spat as his eyes narrowed on her again, his hatred physically burning into Ava’s body.

  She was still unconscious and I struggled to focus on the rise and fall of her chest. Kade shuffled almost invisibly beside me, millimetre by millimetre and I swallowed as my rage tried to overwhelm me, its fury telling me to launch for the bastard and tear his head from his neck in one single movement. I smiled internally as the image filtered through my mind, Brad’s face contorted in torture as his screams pleased my soul.

  “She didn’t leave her to die,” I inched forward but Brad pushed the knife further into Ava’s neck, her trickle of blood seeping down the length of the blade and I clenched my teeth to stop myself from flying across the room. I wasn’t close enough to get to her and knowing he could sink into her throat before I could reach him, I held my hands up and backed off a little.

  Kade didn’t.

  “She didn’t leave Katie that night Brad; she tried her hardest to save your sister.”

  He scoffed at my words and curled his lips with distaste, “Fuck that bullshit, that’s what she tells us Mason but I know… I know what evil is inside her. She
helped them; she laughed as Katie screamed in torture. Ava is a tough bitch, there is no way she couldn’t help Katie.”

  “But look at her Brad,” I nodded my head encouraging him to look at Ava but he continued to stare at me. Shit, I needed him to turn, even for a second, so I could nudge forward. I saw Kade through the corner of my eye as his feet slithered across the carpet gradually. “Look at her. Does she look like she can protect herself?”

  I swept my arm out exaggeratedly to get his attention on me. It worked; he watched my arm swing through the air as Kade launched himself at Brad.

  All five men outside the door piled in as I hurled my body into Kade and Brad. There was blood everywhere as they tumbled to the floor, Kade on top of Brad as he rolled him away from Ava.

  I slid to the ground beside her and pulled her onto my lap as the other’s assisted Kade and pulled Brad into a hold. They wouldn’t touch him, they knew he was mine.

  “Baby. Ava…” I almost shouted at her and I frantically pulled my rage back, I needed it for later.

  Blood covered every part of her and I tried to wipe it from her face but the blood from her body had seeped onto my hands and I just made it worse, “Baby, please.”

  “Mason” I heard Sam say but I stroked at Ava’s cheek again, desperately trying to wake her.

  “Ava…” I shouted this time, almost shaking her to rouse her. “Ava!”

  “Mason…”

  “What?” I snarled as I turned to Sam. He moved aside and my heart shattered inside my chest as I saw Kade. His eyes were dead and staring ahead as Elijah furiously fisted his heart to restart it and Neo pressed his knuckles into the open wound in Kade’s neck.

  My whole body shook as a roar of fury surged through my empty soul and my spirit exploded in grief as my lover died in Elijah’s arms and my wife took her last breath in my arms.

  Chapter 42

  mason

  Everything felt surreal, almost vapour like and I stared at the wisps of dust floating in the air as they caught the stream of sunlight in the room.

  They hovered before me, the dust practically taunting me that they were free and I would never be. I studied them, my soul trying to leave my body to dance with them, to frolic in the sunlight and leave the shell in which it was held prisoner.

  The particles moved and cavorted in the filth of the dirty hospital waiting room, collecting new fragments of earth’s unnatural refuse and extending its play area.

  They moved and shifted, forming a shape as they grouped together and I finally shifted on my seat for the first time in five hours.

  I stared in disbelief as they transformed in appearance and a structure took shape. My lungs refused to accommodate the air in them as the hairs on my body stood to attention at the sight before me.

  My eyes imperceptibly swept over the form as it stood clear before me.

  “Katie…” I whispered instinctively. Although I had never seen her, I knew.

  She smiled softly at me, the specks of random atoms floating around her caught the sun and I blinked as they reflected Katie’s light at me.

  The elements moved as she tilted her head and regarded me, her eyes scanning my body as though she was deciding if I was worthy or not. Her eyes lifted back up to mine and she smiled again.

  Fragments shifted and reformed until her fingers appeared at her lips and she kissed them, twisted her hand, nodded and blew the flakes of dust at me.

  I blinked at the sting in my eyes, squinting as I reopened them to catch sight of her again but she was gone; just a cloud of grains and flecks floating back to the floor.

  I looked around the room but everybody remained motionless, each of them as anxious as I was for news.

  “They’re gonna be okay” I choked out as tears fled from my eyes, their desperation to fall had them flowing down my cheeks in a torrent of release.

  They all turned to look at me and I smiled with a sigh of relief as I closed my eyes and sent up a prayer of thanks. The first time I had ever thanked god, but it definitely wouldn’t be the last.

  epilogue

  Ava

  3 months later

  “Where the hell is he?” I grumbled to Mason as I checked my watch for the thirtieth time.

  Katie and George were sat on Nate’s private plane with Mason’s mum as I stood on the tarmac with Mason waiting for Kade.

  “He’ll be here” he sighed as he pulled me into a side hug. His voice was strong but I could feel his apprehension.

  Kade had agreed to come with us to Portugal after all and he was late as usual. His recuperation had taken longer than mine, his release from hospital only being granted a few days ago. I knew he struggled with the sight of his scar. It was jagged and ran the length of his throat from his jaw to his collarbone but neither Mason nor I noticed it anymore.

  “I have a bad feeling, Mason.”

  He frowned but then smiled as he tipped his head towards the departure doors as Kade strolled through.

  My stomach sank as I took a look at him. His footing faltered as he fixed his eyes on mine. “Where’s his luggage, Mason?”

  He was quiet beside me and my soul starting panicking. “Kade?” I swept my eyes over his face as he came before me, his heart displayed openly as he rolled his lips and swallowed gently. “Don’t do this, Kade, please.”

  Mason slipped his hand in mine but I snatched it back, “Kade?”

  His shoulders heaved as he inhaled heavily, “We would never survive, Ava.”

  “What?” I scoffed in bewilderment, “What the hell are you on about?”

  Mason nodded in understanding. He stepped forward and palmed Kade’s cheek, “You know you can always join us if you change your mind.”

  He smiled softly at Mason and nodded, “I do.” Kade pulled Mason into an embrace, and I watched in anger as they embraced hard, both feeding their understanding and affection to the other before Mason took a glance at me and ran up the stairs to the plane.

  “Ava” Kade breathed as he took a step closer. I retreated, taking an identical step back, “Sweetheart, please.”

  I shook my head rapidly as I screwed my eyes up and refused to liberate the tears, “No.”

  His hands gripped me and drew me close. I struggled against him but he held me tighter, his arms wrapping around me as his body took my fury. “Why? Why Kade? It will be fine, it will work. I promise.”

  “Listen to me, Ava” His hands embraced the tops of my arms as he shifted me back a little so I could see his face. That was a waste of time; I couldn’t see him through the rush of my tears.

  “For now, maybe for a few months everything would be great but both Mason and me… we’re both so in love with you Ava that we’re eventually going to clash. We both want to own you, both of us want to possess every inch of you, we want you to be ours…” His finger tilted my chin until he locked gazes with me, “Our dominance over you will destroy us all and I couldn’t bear for either of you to hate me.”

  “Never, Kade, we could never hate you.”

  He smiled softly as he placed a gentle kiss on the tip of my nose and palmed my cheek, “And what if I started to hate you? What if we each started to wonder if either of us is spending too much time with the other, or if Mason gives you a better orgasm than me? Or… or if Mason started to think you loved me more and were plotting to out him. Or you begin to imagine things that aren’t there between me and Mason?”

  His eyes shone with love but they also held a need for me to understand, to listen to what he was saying and to accept his decision.

  I did understand and I knew deep down he was right but I selfishly wanted both men, wanted the best of both worlds. I wanted to have the cake, own it, possess it and devour it.

  “I’ll always love you Ava, always. You are my first love, the first woman who ever owned all of me. I need you to be happy, sweetheart. I need you to live your life now, not live in the shadow of two controlling men; two men who want everything of you, Ava. We’d drown you, suffocate you with
love and I couldn’t bear it if we broke you in our desire to make you happy.”

  My heart was bleeding so much I was sure I could feel the trickle of it over my ribs and down into the pit of me. “But… I love you Kade.”

  There, I had said it. For the first time in eight years I told this man I loved him.

  He closed his eyes as if savouring my declaration and as he opened them a tear leaked from the corner and spilled down his face and into the groove of his scar as if trying to heal it. Heal him.

  His eyes moved over my face as he burnt me to his memory and a choked sob left my throat as I palmed his face and brought his mouth to mine, telling him everything my heart had to tell him as I delivered my soul to him. He would own it now, carry it with him forever as it protected and cherished him from the inside. He would always possess a part of me.

  “I’ve loved you for eight years, Kade and I will love you for eternity.”

  He nodded as his tears flowed freely, his chest stuttering with his sobs as mine choked me.

  “As I will always love you Ava, forever and absolutely” he whispered as he rested his lips on my forehead.

  “Go.” Was the last word I ever heard from him, the last time I would ever hear the soft grate of his voice and the last time my heart would stutter at his closeness.

  I turned and walked; walked away from a part of my heart, a huge part of my life and all of my soul as I ascended the plane stairs and never looked back.

  Never once saw his face again.

  Never heard his words of love again.

  Never felt his tender touch again.

  Never saw the twinkle of fun in his eyes again.

  But never regretted his decision.

  He was right; we would have destroyed each other in our attempt at happiness, in our effort to share each other and in our greed.

  Mason had pushed aside his fear and his own wants in his endeavour to make me happy, but in the end would he have been happy? Would he have been content in life as he watched another man love and please me, another man own the part of me that should be exclusive to Mason.