Fighting Fate

by Scarlett Finn

  ‘That’s why Dax is going to give her up, for one night.’

  ‘What?’ Dax and Trystan asked together.

  ‘You let your brother gain her respect and she can apologise for embarrassing him,’ Mauri said. ‘Then we can all move on from there.’

  Dax’s attention slid to Trystan whose depraved smug expression made Dax want to knock out a few teeth. ‘No,’ Dax said.

  There wasn’t even a slim chance that he would let Trystan have a night with Ivy, it wouldn’t happen. More than that, Ivy wouldn’t agree to it, which meant she’d spend the night being tortured, just like she’d predicted, and she would never forgive him, she’d said it herself.

  Trystan would probably be satisfied after a night with Ivy because it would give him the superiority over her that he craved, and it wouldn’t hurt that he’d be getting one up on Dax in the process. But while Trystan might be able to move on from that night, telling everyone that he had sampled Ivy, Dax knew that he and Ivy would never recover from it.

  ‘This is reasonable,’ Mauri said. ‘You let him have a night—‘

  ‘With my wife?’ Dax said, fixing Mauri under his scowl again. ‘Ivy is mine, every fucking inch of her.’ Speaking with such vehemence brought acid to his throat and his gaze fell. She was out there, somewhere, he didn’t know where, running for her fucking life and he’d let her go. He had let her walk out of that door, sent her out there alone, and now he didn’t know where she was or if he’d ever be able to find her.

  Moving toward the bedroom door, Dax had a singular focus. ‘Where the fuck are you going?’ Brad called. ‘You can’t just walk out on this.’

  Dax stopped in the open doorway. ‘I’m through, with all of you. Leave me the fuck alone and I’ll leave you all be. Hear me? We’re through. I don’t give a fuck about any of you, any of this. We’re done.’

  Setting himself back on his path, he began to search his pockets for his keys, then he remembered that his bike was still at the bar and to find Ivy he’d need the car. He had to find her, but he wasn’t sure where to start.

  He got out of the mansion and the cool air sucker punched him. Swaying on his feet, he squeezed his eyes shut, he needed to go home and sleep, but when he woke up she was the only mission he cared about. He had to find her and just hope that she would have him back, that she would trust him not to let her down again.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Once she had raided Dax’s storage unit Ivy had enough cash to get her clear across the country. The ten grand that Dax had given her was still stashed in the lining of the ottoman in their walk-in closet upstairs at the beach house, but she wasn’t going back for that, not a chance. She didn’t know if Bruno was there, or any of Starks’ other men. Walking back into the lion’s den was just a plain stupid idea, even for that amount of cash.

  Everything she needed should be here in the storage unit anyway. She had found a couple of grand, which should keep her going for a while. The car key she found in a boot in the corner of a closet, where she also found a sports bag with clothes in it. There were a few items of women’s clothing there, which she would rather not wonder too hard about. She changed her clothes, got water and other supplies from the unit then cranked the engine and set off across the country.

  She tried not to focus too hard on what had gone on between her and Dax. They were still technically married, and that was something that she would have to address if they really were broken up for good. But it wasn’t like she was in any hurry to get hitched, she’d made that impulsive decision with Dax, and it wasn’t one she wanted to repeat anytime soon.

  With no clear objective in mind she just drove, stopping whenever the mood took her. She spent a week here and a few days there. It was possible that the Starks were looking for her, though she doubted they would expend too much energy on resolving this humiliating episode, they would probably rather just forget about it. But that was the great thing about being a drifter. It was tough for people to find you when even you didn’t know where you were going.

  Six weeks went by and then she hit ocean, she had driven from the Pacific to the Atlantic, not directly, she’d gone north, south, east and west, but this was where she’d ended up. Standing looking out over the crashing grey waves, with Dax’s car parked a hundred yards away; she sank onto the hard grassy ground beneath her and took a deep breath.

  That was when the tears came. She sat on that cliff for hours wailing and staring, consoling herself about the love she’d lost and chastising herself for being pathetic enough to lose her heart in such a careless way. She cried for the humiliation of her kidnap, cried for every time Bruno touched her, cried for every time she wanted to give in and let them take the last of her, for every time she’d wanted to break.

  Ivy was human, she had weakness just like everybody else, but one thing she did not do was show that weakness without good reason. The tears came and went, she lay on the grass and let her emotions ebb and flow with the motion of the vast brine spread out beside her. It didn’t make her feel insignificant as Dax had once asked her, it made her revere the opportunities. Such a huge area that was teeming with life living in harmony, experiencing the circle of life, depending on each other to survive.

  Yes, they were insignificant, but they were supposed to be. The meaning of life was to get up and carry on, no matter what.

  No one would be there to dry her tears, so she dried them on her own and took another deep breath. It was time to start again and she would, this time with a broken heart.

  Dax would never give up his search for her, but he was beginning to wonder if it would ever be successful. His first step had been to find out where she went after she left his apartment, and that didn’t take long. He picked up his bike from the bar and took it to the storage unit thinking that it would make more sense to use the car to find her. He might end up needing a place to sleep and the car could carry more supplies.

  But when he pulled up to the storage unit and pulled out his wallet there was no key. She was a clever girl and a smile crossed his lips when he realised Ivy was the only one who could’ve accessed it. After busting off the lock and seeing that the car was gone, and some of the cash he had stashed too, he knew that she was alright, at least for now.

  Luckily, he had more than one stash of money in this locker and she had only found and taken one bundle. So he knew that she was in his car and how much money she had. Dax hadn’t gassed up the car after switching it out for the bike, so the first thing he did was trace which gas station she had used and which direction she’d gone in.

  From there the search was just as incremental and every time he thought he’d found her it turned out he’d just missed her. He hit a few dead ends and had to retrace his steps, and even took a few massive detours in his misguided pursuit of her.

  He’d gone clear across the country and still didn’t know where she was. Contemplating where her journey would have gone next, whether she would have turned back to go west or taken another route, Dax pulled into a motel and asked for a room.

  The woman on reception was older, maybe in her late-fifties, with curly grey hair and pointed glasses that sat on the end of her nose. She gave him a check-in slip, which he filled out and returned to her, then he started digging in his wallet for a credit card.

  ‘Oh, two in one week, that’s funny,’ the receptionist said as she transferred the information from his slip into the computer.

  He stopped, his thumb still in the pouch of his wallet pressed against his forgotten credit card. ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Your surname, I’m saying that we had another person with that last name this week. Do you have family in the area?’

  ‘What was her first name? Was it a woman?’

  ‘I can’t tell you that,’ the receptionist laughed and carried on typing, obviously not realising that the information she had could affect the course of the rest of his life. Dax considered turning on the charm, but then realised that he had none. He considered threatenin
g her, but being arrested wouldn’t help him find Ivy. So he adopted an uncharacteristic plan, he told the honest truth.

  ‘I’m looking for my wife,’ he said, hoping beyond all else that Ivy was using her married name and this wasn’t some huge coincidence. The receptionist stopped typing and peered over her glasses. ‘I made a mistake, in California, and she left me six weeks ago, seven now actually. I’ve been looking for her ever since.’

  ‘You followed her here? All the way from California?’ the receptionist asked. ‘How did you know she would be in North Carolina now?’

  ‘I didn’t,’ he said. ‘Like I said, I’ve been looking for her and it seems I’m always half a step behind her. I need her back. I love her.’

  ‘You cheated on her?’ the receptionist asked with an edge of displeasure.

  ‘No,’ he said, desperate to ensure that she didn’t cast her own life prejudices onto him thus tainting any goodwill she may feel toward him.

  ‘Then what did you do?’ she asked him, removing her hands from the keys and swinging her chair around so that she could meet his eye. It might have been nosiness, but he was asking her for information so telling her the truth felt like quid pro quo.

  ‘I let my father—‘though Mauri wasn’t really his father at all. ‘I let my family come between us and she knew I wasn’t, that I wouldn’t… I had to choose her on my own, she couldn’t make the decision for me.’

  ‘And now the decision is made? You chose her?’ He nodded. ‘That’s a lovely story, Mr. Harrow, but I can’t really do anything to help.’ Anger rose, but didn’t depressurise because she spoke again. ‘Ivy left here five days ago, she got a job, somewhere local and they fixed her up with a place to stay.’

  At least he knew that it was Ivy who had been here and she was using her married name. If she got a job then she was staying put, at least for now, and he doubted she’d have quit after five days. Though he knew that she didn’t have the best of luck when it came to employment, so there was a chance that she’d lost the job.

  ‘Can you tell me where? Did she leave any forwarding information?’

  ‘I could lose my job if I gave you information like that,’ the receptionist said. She didn’t sound particularly sorry and he wanted to shout that he didn’t give a damn about her job.

  ‘Maybe we could talk about something else,’ he said, opening his wallet and flicking through the bills that were there, hoping to see a reaction in her. He’d been bribing people all over the country for information on Ivy, he’d give his last now if it meant he finally caught her.

  ‘Oh no, no,’ the receptionist said, rolling her chair back to her computer to finish putting in the details from his check-in card.

  The door seemed to be closed and he bit his tongue to prevent himself from cursing at the unassuming woman. It was dark outside though he didn’t know the precise time. Needing to vent, Dax wondered if there were any official, or unofficial, pick-up fights that he could get himself into.

  ‘You’ve driven all the way from California?’ the receptionist asked, finishing up with the typing and closing down his file.

  ‘Yes,’ he groaned, wondering how he’d find Ivy now that he knew she had stopped moving… at least for the time being.

  She retrieved a key for him and came back to the desk, reaching for something else as she did. ‘That’s a long journey for one vehicle to handle. Maybe your car could use a service, just to check that everything is in working order, you know, before you carry on your journey.’

  With the room key she also gave him a business card, which he read. ‘Warner Autos?’

  ‘They’re the best in town,’ she beamed. ‘Local… you understand?’

  The way her eyes locked onto his was deliberate and her polished smile remained exactly where it was while she bobbed her head in the direction of the card. He wanted to leap over the desk and kiss the woman, not that he really did, but he’d never felt elation in his life. This was what genuine delight and relief felt like.

  ‘I understand. They’re open tomorrow?’

  ‘First thing,’ she said. ‘Though they’re busy they’ll fit in time for special customers, it’s not too far from here.’

  ‘Maybe I’ll take a ride over there in the morning.’

  ‘Like I said, the best in town, who knows, maybe after you see what they’ve got you won’t feel the need to keep on travelling.’

  ‘No,’ he exhaled, letting himself smile. ‘No, maybe I won’t.’

  ‘Well, enjoy your stay, goodnight,’ she said and walked away to return to the novel she’d put aside when he came in.

  One night’s sleep and then he’d see her, he’d go over to that mechanic’s place and find out what Ivy was doing there. Her job didn’t matter though, what mattered was that he finally had the chance to lay eyes on her again, and that was the only thing that mattered.

  ‘Warner Autos,’ Ivy answered the phone in the back office of the garage as was her job. So far she’d been getting on very well with the owner of the garage, who was one of the busiest guys she’d ever known.

  He didn’t say much when she met him, but he hired her and gave her an advance, so she was going to work her damndest for him. All her job consisted of was answering the phone, booking in cars, ordering parts, and basically just dealing with the day-to-day paperwork. It was nothing too taxing, but it made her feel needed because she was the only one dealing with the running of the place while Blase Warner, the garage owner, was absent.

  When she got the job, Blase told her that he managed the apartment complex next door and he’d just had a unit become vacant. It turned out that the place housed other employees of Blase’s businesses and employees got a discount, so she jumped at the chance of the cheap, modest apartment. Most of the men who lived there were scary as hell, or they would be if she hadn’t dealt with her own share of thugs. The majority of the men were ex-cons and they worked here at the garage or as security in Blase’s nightclub.

  The only people residing in the apartment complex who didn’t work for Blase were his family members and their girlfriends, who were the only two women there at all. Ivy was the only female living there alone, but she didn’t feel intimidated or scared. The Warners were all decent men, and her door lock was secure, so she was fine.

  This was her, starting a new life. On reaching over to hang up the phone after the call ended, the diamond on her finger caught and reflected the light, as it so often did, and Ivy paused. Every day she thought about Dax and every day she thought about going back to him. She could just show up at his apartment, or at the Stark mansion, or at the beach house. But she still didn’t have any assurances that he wouldn’t turn her over to Trystan and his men.

  One year. She had decided to give it one year and if he hadn’t returned to her by then it wasn’t going to happen; that had been her decision and she had to be firm in following it through. She couldn’t be weak and beg him to take her back, it had to be his decision to want her… or not.

  ‘Ivy!’

  There was nothing delicate about the men around here and although she’d only been here for a week they were already starting to warm to her, and her to them. If she could make this work then this could be a place for her to belong; the thing she’d always wanted most. At least she’d wanted it most until she met Dax and then she had discovered what true craving was like.

  Spinning around in her chair, she glanced through the Plexiglas screen which framed the upper space between her back office and the outer workspace. Men were working on various cars and the radio was playing, but all of that disappeared when she saw who was next to the worker who had called for her attention.

  ‘Shit,’ she breathed and flew up out of her chair.

  The mechanic who was next to Dax didn’t look happy and they were exchanging words. Another mechanic saw this and alerted others. Ivy was terrified that this would turn into a brawl if she didn’t move quickly.

  Getting out of her office, she dashed the length of the shop f
loor and dived in front of Dax. ‘I’ve got this, thanks, Pop.’

  ‘Dude says he’s your husband,’ Pop said. The tall black man was terrifying to look at from afar, but he had never given her a cross word.

  ‘Funny that,’ Ivy said. Groping behind her she managed to snag Dax’s wrist. ‘I’ll just… I’ll take him out of your way.’

  Dragging Dax across the room, past all onlookers, she got him into her workroom then slammed the door, which was odd because this door was never, ever closed, except when the rest of the garage was.

  ‘Dax,’ she breathed. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘What the fuck are you doing working in a place like this?’ he demanded, closing in on her. ‘Those guys out there are dangerous.’

  ‘No one is dangerous, Blase assured me that—‘

  ‘Who is Blase?’

  ‘Blase Warner,’ she said. ‘He’s the owner of the garage, he gave me this job. He’s a really nice guy and—‘

  Dax’s palm slammed onto the wall behind her. The startling action made her fall back against it. ‘Are you fucking him?’

  ‘Oh good god, that is your main concern? I haven’t seen you for seven weeks. The last time I did see you, you were ready to feed me to the fishes and the first thing you ask me is if I’m fucking my boss?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said with no shame or apology. Grabbing her hand, he jerked it up and squeezed her ring finger. ‘You’re wearing your wedding ring, and using your married name.’

  ‘So why would I be sleeping with another man?’

  ‘You’ve been faithful?’ he frowned.

  ‘You haven’t?’ Tilting her head, she folded her arms and waited for his answer. By bringing her limbs up she had eliminated the last of the space between them, so her folded arms were now pressed into his torso.

  ‘I haven’t had time to look at a fucking woman. I have spent the last seven weeks chasing your damn tail across the country. Why can’t you stay put, woman?’