Darkest Perception_A Dark and Mind-Blowing Steamy Romance

by Shari J. Ryan

  "Ah," Everett says, snickering. "I know moms get tired, but this woman has a certain … look about her that doesn’t scream ‘soccer mom.’"

  "It doesn’t matter. She’s either going to prison for life or dying due to her addiction, so she makes a perfect test subject for Harley."

  "Did Roberts send you Shawnda or did you find her on your own?"

  "I found her. I don’t want him know we possibly have Isabelle yet. Not until I know for sure."

  Everett runs his fingers through his hair and rolls his eyes. "Oh, you’re just being a nice citizen and cleaning up the streets of Boston. How nice. How do you know about her daughter and husband?"

  "There’s a search warrant out for Shawnda’s arrest," I tell Everett. "Look, when you spend all your time hunting people down, you tend to find what you’re not looking for sometimes too."

  "I hear ya, man," Everett says, pulling out his phone. The video is just showing Harley and Shawnda in a stare down, and I’d kill to know what’s going through Harley’s head at the moment.

  "Isabelle Hammel is known for her skills and psychiatric research, which means she’s likely versed in high-level interrogation techniques. If she wanted to, she should easily be able to persuade a person to do what she requests without so much as lifting a finger. Her knowledge and training could make her a walking weapon," Everett says, reading something off his phone. "The only problem is, no one has seen or heard from Isabelle in almost a year now. She could be dead, but confirmation is still needed."

  "Dude, you think I don’t know about this shit? I haven’t been searching for Isabelle blindly just because Philips told me to find her. In any case, I’m not sure how accurate the description of her skills are. We need to find out."

  "So, do you think Isabelle is still alive?" Everett asks.

  I lean in to get a better look at the video, watching what’s happening in the room. Harley’s acting like she's doped up too, which she's not. Or if she is, she's damn good at hiding it, but she sure as hell isn't detoxing.

  Holy shit.

  Did she just—Damn.

  "Yeah, I do think Isabelle is still alive," I tell Everett.

  "What the fuckety?" Everett shouts, while catching a glimpse at the video. "You gotta be shittin’ me, dude."

  "I have no words," I tell him.

  "You think that chick’s Isabelle?"

  "I still have no idea. I mean, she looks like Isabelle, but I can't connect the hows and whys of this. She wore fucking Burberry scarves everyday back when we took that class together. This shit doesn't just happen, you know?"

  "It can," Everett says. "It can go both ways. Look at us hot beefcakes now versus five years ago."

  I ignore his humor. I can't laugh when I feel like I'm sitting at the top of ninety-degree-angled roller coaster.

  7

  Harley

  Shawnda lifts her head again, with a narrowed look in her eyes this time. "You want to be the one who walks out of here, don't you?"

  "Nope," I lie. "I'm not going make it more than a few days anyway. I've been living off crumbs, and my new home is the curb outside. Honestly, I don’t want to be the one who walks out of here, you know?" I tell her.

  "Yeah, I don't want to be that poor fucking loser either," she says. Her head falls back a bit, as if she were about to fall asleep, but then she manages to right her posture as I take a few steps toward her.

  I reach for the blade. "Do you mind if I—"

  "No way, you're not making me be the one who goes out there to get tortured by those shitheads."

  I retract my hand, leaving the blade where it is, and she grabs the edges of the table, shaking it around from her uncontrolled tremor.

  She’s not ready yet.

  If I weren’t playing mind games, I’d call her a moron since both of us can use the blade to do what we want, but she can’t think in a straight line, so suicide in succession hasn’t crossed her mind.

  "We've all tested the waters before …" I say to her.

  "You're full of it," she replies.

  I slap my hand over my chest and gasp. "No way, I can't lie. I have this thing where my eye twitches every time I fib. It's my freaking tell-all. It's gotten me in so much trouble, so I gave up on even trying to make up stories," I explain with theatrics.

  "Well, your eye ain't twitchin' right now," she points out.

  "Yeah, because I want this shit to be over. I've wanted everything to be over for so long, and there hasn't been a motivator as big as this situation we’re in right now." I pinch my thumb between my teeth and glance up toward the ceiling, giving the appearance of thinking things through. "You know, you look like a good person who can straighten out. I’m seriously just a loss cause at this point. You deserve a chance. I don’t. Trust me." As I look back over at her, I force a quick blink in my right eye.

  I never thought I’d be using my knowledge to hurt anyone.

  "You're lying, you see? You twitched. Your eye just fucking twitched," she shouts, pointing at me as wrath oozes from her words. This woman has destroyed her life and I can’t imagine how she landed herself here. Unless, maybe she ended up here the same way I did. I’m just not detoxing.

  "Look, you're right. I want out. I don't want to die right now. I'm hoping someone will give me food and shelter tonight. That's all I want." Another blink, and three more for good measure.

  "What the fuck? You're talking out of two sides of your mouth, and you're lying about it all." Shawnda’s breathing heavily and she pounds her fists down on the table over and over. "Goddammit, you little shit."

  I hate knowing how to push her buttons. I hate how easy this is for me. I could help her in any other situation.

  "I don’t—I’m confused. I’m being serious. I want to get the hell out of here," I tell her.

  Sweat is beading on her forehead and she’s becoming flushed. "No. No way. You bitch."

  "Okay, fine, I’ll do it so you can walk out of here, okay?" I ask. "Really." I grab the blade from the table and examine it, flipping it from side to side before I run my fingertip gently across the top as if testing the sharpness.

  "What the hell are you doing?" she asks while grabbing the piece of string from the tin.

  She’s breaking. I’m sorry, I want to tell her.

  "I just told you," I reply, giving her a look like she’s the crazy one, which she is.

  "Screw you, loser. I'm not going out there and feeding myself to the dogs for you." She uses every ounce of strength to stand up from the chair, holding herself up by the tabletop. With a quick lunge, she nearly falls on top of me as she snatches the blade from my hand. I move out of the way, forcing her to fall to her knees.

  "Whoa, wait! Stop! That’s my blade," I shout at her.

  I don’t want that blade. I want to take it from her. I want to tell her it can be okay if she just takes a breath.

  She looks up at me and smiles with a brown-tinted, toothy grin. "Fuck you," she says, slicing the razor’s edge down the center of her wrist.

  I don’t want to watch this. I feel like I’m trapped inside of a horror movie. Did she—yeah. I—um. No. She’s still upright. She’ll be okay.

  "Shawnda?" I shout. "Why did you do that?" I’m not sure why I’m still asking her questions since she just sliced her wrist. I must be losing my mind too. I need to stop. "Are you okay? You’re bleeding."

  "You can have the blade when I'm through if they don't get to you first," she says, laughing meekly as she reveals the piece of string from her other clenched hand. It’s obvious she’s a seasoned expert on this process as she wraps the string tightly around the same wrist she just slit. "Let's hurry this process up. Want to help?" she asks.

  I shake my head, refusing to touch her. Help? She wants to speed this up? Instead, I watch for a long minute until she falls to the ground. How am I still watching this? Shawnda’s head crashes against the cement with a thud, followed by a single high-pitched ping from the metal blade as it lands beside her.

  Oh
my God. I’m going to be sick.

  Holy shit.

  I can’t believe I just—I didn’t. I didn’t help her.

  This isn’t my fault.

  After staring for another few seconds, Shawnda’s chest stops rising and falling, and I turn for the door as a thick fog fills my head.

  Ten steps, and an unlocked door separates me from a hallway where Axel and the grizzly doorman stand, waiting for me with looks of pride. Sick fucks.

  "That was less than seven minutes, and you didn't lay a finger on her," Axel says, glancing down at his watch.

  I shrug with uncertainty. Is this it? Are these guys going to end me too? "You just forced me to watch someone fucking commit suicide. What the hell is wrong with you? What is this? Tell me, now!"

  "We didn’t force you to watch anything," Axel says. I’m trying to hold myself together the best I can even though I want fall to my knees and let all my pain escape the cold facade I wear like a mask. Maybe they didn’t force me to watch, but I had no choice in taking part in Shawnda’s decision. Axel places his hand on my shoulder and squeezes gently. "She would have done that within the next day whether you were in there or not. Don’t be so hard on yourself." I shrug his hand off my shoulder and take a few steps away from him. They must be kidding. "Really, you did her a favor."

  A favor? No, I could have helped her. You assholes could have helped her. "I don’t want anything to do with you—either of you, but you told me you'd feed me. I just need food. It’s the only reason I’m here. Please. I went along with your sick test. Now it’s time to keep your commitment to me."

  "Oh, are you hungry?" Axel asks as if I didn’t just tell him to feed me. He could at least be a little less obvious about trying to get under my skin. I’m not up for it.

  Watching someone slice her wrist is the end of the line for me. How could anyone want that ending for someone else? How can I just stand here, about to take food from these monsters?

  I’m so hungry. My desperation caused this.

  "I don’t think you need to ask me if I’m hungry." With my body on overdrive, my arms are unsteady and shaking a bit, so I hide the proof of what may look like anxiety behind my back. Any sign of weakness will kill my momentum and I can’t let that happen. They may think my skills of being able to convince someone to kill themselves is a powerful thing, but it scares me to know what I’m capable of. I’m so ashamed of myself.

  I follow the two men down the hall, passing several other utility-like doors. I wish I could see through them, curious as to what is on the other side since I still have no understanding of what "business" these men are conducting down here.

  We take a different stairwell than the one we initially walked down, and Axel opens a door that leads into the hotel. I nudge the grizzly doorman to the side and make my way up to Axel, grabbing him by the arm.

  He stops and looks down at his arm first, acknowledging the simple fact that I touched him. I’ll assume by his darkening glower that I shouldn't have.

  Tough shit for him.

  "What?" he grunts, pulling his arm from my grip.

  "I shouldn't be in here dressed like this," I mutter silently beneath my breath while feeling as though all eyes in this lobby are boring into me. By the looks on some of their faces, it’s like they’ve spotted a dumpster rat scurrying through the lobby.

  Axel glances over to the front desk and the bellhop guy, nodding at him without any expression on his face. "You're fine," Axel says.

  We continue walking, and the grizzled man returns my earlier sentiment and nudges me along the way. This isn’t a game, I want to tell him. I’m not just some chick they’re planning to play footsie with under a table.

  I try my best to ignore the continuing looks from everyone around me as I trail behind the men, following them into a dark restaurant. With a glance in each direction, I'm a bit relieved to find the place mostly empty. It’s almost like the ambiance is hiding what shouldn't be seen, and it's probably the best place for me at the moment.

  We’re seated immediately, placed in the far corner at a round, dark, glossy table with three lit votive candles placed in the center. The two men are quiet as a woman in all black—pencil skirt with a button-down shirt—hands us leather bound menus. With her inky-black hair tied tightly in a bun on the back of her head, the only prominent feature on this woman is her cherry-red lipstick.

  I expect the men to check her out as she passes by, but they're more interested in the menus, just as I am.

  There is little to choose from, but the Chef's Special—rib-eye with all sorts of fixings and complementing side dishes—look like a last meal if I were to have one. Though I've decided on what to order, I keep my menu in front of my face, avoiding the tense silence and cold stares.

  It seems like only a couple of minutes pass by before the woman in black returns to the table. She has her hands folded behind her back, and her gaze fixes on me first, summoning my order with just a slightly raised brow.

  "I'll have the Chef’s Special, please."

  The men give their orders, straightforward and quick, allowing the waitress to leave as precipitously as she arrived. Without our menus—my only source of hiding—I’m forced to lift my gaze, noticing that the last of the patrons who were eating here have gotten up and are leaving. Unfortunately, I believe, we now have one-hundred percent privacy at our back table.

  "I assume if your intention was to kill me, I'd already be dead by now too, so what did you want with me?"

  Axel folds his hands neatly on top of the table before offering a response. "First, we ask that you do not mention a word of our business outside of our workspace. Second, the position changes daily, so it’s hard to specifically explain what we want from you." The grizzly doorman has his head cocked to one side, staring at me with a blank expression. What the hell is with these two? "There is no real answer to your question, so if it is a deal breaker, you have no commitments to us. We are all here because we are doing something we believe in," Axel says, accenting his final words to offer a definitive end to his non-explanatory explanation.

  He may be done answering me, but I'm not through asking questions. "Forcing someone to kill herself?" I question. "I told you I wasn't up for anything illegal. Never mind inhumane. So, what’s your explanation—are the paramedics on their way to handle the dead body that’s sprawled out in your office, or will she just rot there?"

  The doorman throws me a witty look as Axel glances around the restaurant before settling his baleful gaze back on me. He unfolds his hands and straightens his suit jacket. "Keep your voice down," he demands. "Again, I’ll remind you ... you didn't force anyone to do anything; you merely highlighted the reasons that low-life murderer needed to move forward with a decision she had been struggling with after selling her child and killing her husband."

  A murderer? "She was a murderer? You locked me in a room with a goddamn murderer?" They could have mentioned that to me before I felt the guilt burning in my stomach as I didn’t help her overcome the demons she was fighting. Still, she obviously needed help—murderer or not. "I didn't highlight anything," I argue.

  "You're right," Axel says. "So, tell me. How did you persuade her to make that decision?"

  Needing a pause in the building pressure, I wrap my fingers around the ice-cold glass of water, feeling the condensation drip down my palm as I press the thick rim to my lips. I take small and slow sips, feeling the seconds tick by as the sensation of glaring looks tries to break through my thoughts. Axel clears his throat and tilts his head to the side, doing his best to make me more uncomfortable, I assume.

  It's hard to consider I did anything different from anyone else in my situation would have done. I rest my glass of water back down on top of a cocktail napkin, keeping my gaze set on my blurry reflection against the water as I gather the necessary words to summarize my actions. "When I walked into the room, I noticed how badly she was sweating, as well as her knees bouncing up and down. Then, when one of her hands scratched th
e other, I noticed the track marks covering her arms. Considering her apparent anxiety of going through detox, I assumed what her weakness was." My words come out on their own, as if pre-rehearsed from the case studies I took part in throughout my education. I clutch the glass of water back into my hand and replace it against my lips, needing more water as if it will offer a surge in confidence and bravery.

  The grizzly doorman snatches the glass from my hand, causing a small splash to land on my lap. "Finish what you were saying," he says.

  "Everett," Axel snaps. "Take it easy."

  Everett—the bearded, grizzly doorman. He must be Axel's right-hand man.

  "I was doing what was needed to stay alive," I hiss, repeating what I already said. "What else do you want me to say?"

  Axel shifts his weight around in his seat, resting an elbow on top of the table as he scratches his coarse shadow of facial hair. "For some reason, I can't help thinking it was all a coincidence," he says.

  "A coincidence?" I question. "A woman slicing her wrist with a blade you left in the middle of the table—I'm not sure I'd call that a coincidence, maybe more like a setup."

  "Sure," Axel agrees with a grin so slight I may be imagining it.

  A male waiter, also in full black attire, arrives at our table with two armloads of plates. He places each one down in front of the appropriate person, then takes the folded napkin from in front of me and whips it out to the side before draping it over my lap. Embarrassed for forgetting dinner table etiquette, I offer the waiter a quiet apology.

  The scent of food makes my stomach gnarl in pain, and I do my best to prevent drool from seeping out of the corners of my mouth. I take a large bite of the mashed potatoes, followed by three more before my throat tightens around the food. I may choke, but this is going down one way or another.

  "Take it easy," Axel hisses. "You don't want to get sick."

  I wash the first few bites down with water and cut into the steak. While ravenously eating as fast as the food will go down, I forget I'm not sitting at the table alone until I need more water. Since their focus is on me rather than their food, I realize I’ve probably been a fun form of entertainment for the two of them.