Doc: a Club Alias novel

by KD Robichaux

  “We got this,” he whispers, and I’m about to question him. How? How could this possibly go right when this motherfucker has a gun pointed at the woman I cherish more than life itself. But he cuts my thoughts off, “We’ve handled worse.”

  Brian quickly pulls the camera back out and sets everything aside, rising before us like a giant about to wreak havoc on the ants beneath his shoe. “Stay behind me,” he whispers, pulling his gun from the holster at his ribs just as Corbin pulls his from beneath the back of his shirt, gripping the stock, his finger resting beside the trigger, not on it. But I know how fast that finger can move.

  I stop breathing as Brian takes hold of the doorknob.

  Everything comes to a complete standstill.

  And as if someone pushes Play on a slo-mo reel, he twists the knob.

  Fast-forwarding to the speed of light, he opens the door inward, and all I see in the span of that second is Astrid’s head turning toward us in the doorway.

  Time slows down again, her long, blonde hair swinging out behind her, her eyes going even wider when she sees us there.

  And I don’t think. I just act.

  In real time once more, I take one stride toward her, my arm stretching across the open space, my hand wrapping around her raised wrist.

  Back in slow motion, her body flies through the air as I yank her with all my might, and her small frame slams into me. I hear a Pow! and then a metallic Dink-Dink! And with my body molded around Astrid, I turn just my head to check on my guys.

  Brian is down, his big body sprawled across the carpeted floor, and my gut clenches. My eyes lift to the bed, where the girl has collapsed on her side, Randy flat on his back on the mattress, but he’s still breathing. In fact…

  He’s laughing.

  I see red.

  I spin and put Astrid against the wall behind the open door, and I kneel down just long enough to take Brian’s gun from his hand. In three strides, I make it to the side of the bed and place the gun to Randy’s temple.

  Randy opens his eyes, his laughing turning maniacal as he looks up at me.

  He coughs, deep-red blood dribbling out the corner of his mouth, his teeth now smeared in it as he grins. “N-Neil Walker?” He blinks a couple of times. “Neil… Walker? Neil fucking Walker.”

  My mind flashes back to the hospital when I was eighteen.

  “Neil Walker?”

  I hear my name, but I can’t seem to make myself acknowledge the voice.

  “Neil Walker?”

  There it is again, but once more, I can’t lift my arm to show the doctor my presence, and everything around the waiting room suddenly seems to morph.

  “Neil Walker? Neil Walker? Neil… Walker? Neil… Wal… ker?” The voice starts out like a bad rendition of that scene in Ferris Bueller, when the teacher, in his infamous monotone voice, checks for attendance. But as my name is called several more times—or maybe just once, only the sound continues to reverberate in my head, spinning out of control until it’s unrecognizable as belonging to me anymore—my world suddenly starts to narrow, the sides, top, and bottom of my line of sight closing in as I get tunnel vision before the world just goes completely black.

  But this time, the world doesn’t go black. My vision tunnels, yes, but it’s to narrow my focus directly on the fucker who changed the course of my entire life.

  “Well, look at you, Nerdy Neil,” he murmurs, his words coming out slurred as the two gunshot wounds in his chest allow the life to drain from his body. “Didn’t you grow up to be big and strong?”

  “Yeah, I did. And I didn’t even have to rape and abuse people half my size to do it,” I growl, digging the gun deeper into the side of his head.

  He just chuckles. “Awww, now don’t be like that. These girls love getting paid all that money. What’s a little rough sex when they can turn around and just… retail therapy it away?”

  I don’t bother to verbalize my automatic response about the reasons retail therapy doesn’t work. I don’t even go into the reason why he’s such a disgusting, sadistic fuck who has done nothing with his life but ruin other people’s. I don’t get a word out, because he cuts me off.

  “And that’s just these girls. You know who I really enjoyed fucking, and I didn’t even have to pay her?” He cackles, widening his eyes up at me and lifting his brows. “Your Shelly giiirl,” he singsongs.

  I hear Astrid’s gasp behind me, and I turn my head to see her look of shock as she realizes her boss and the young man who raped my childhood girlfriend are one and the same.

  Before I realize what’s happening, I hear one last Dink! My head swivels toward the bed to see a new hole in Randy’s wrist, and he cries out once before the sound turns into more laughter, the gun he was raising now being picked up from the other side of the bed by Corbin.

  I was so not made for this shit. But this vile piece of shit can’t leave this room alive. He has no remorse, still taunting, his soulless eyes full of sadistic mirth at the anguish he’s caused his whole life.

  “You just wait, Nerdy Neil. You just wait. I’m untouchable, invincible… no judge will ever convict me. Fuck, some of them are downstairs right now, and another couple in these rooms. They’re in my pocket. Just when you think your life is finally back to normal, and you’re finally going to get that happily ever after, that’s when I’m going to come in once again and take it aaall away. Just like I did before. And also like before, there will be nothing you can do about it. There will be nothing you can do to stop me from forcing your pretty girl to take my cock, just like I made Shelly—”

  I bellow in rage, my hand shaking as my grip on the gun tightens to the point of pain around the metal. My mind battles with my heart. I need to wipe the earth clean of this motherfucker’s evil. I’m within my own code, life for a life, because there is nothing that would convince me he didn’t kill the girl they found in the woods. I haven’t been able to bring myself to look over at Brian again, but the girl next to us on the bed hasn’t moved even a twitch with all the chaos surrounding her, and I’m pretty sure she’s gone too.

  But I swore an oath when I became a doctor, made a promise to do no harm. And that’s the only thing making me question everything. Making me question how this night will play out.

  “Ooh, and it wasn’t Shelly’s sweet little cunt that started it all for me. No, it was when I found out I affected her so much she killed herself. Sacrificed herself because of me. She’s the only one who’s ever given her life, and I’ve spent mine trying to match the feeling of what it was like to read she’d committed suicide. Now I have to do aaall of it myself. Selfish little whores. But watching them stop breathing is a close second.”

  So that’s it then. He’s turned into a serial killer. He’s tried to recreate what he felt when my Shelly ended her own life because of him, by murdering other women while raping them. And now I know for a fact he’s taken lives with his own hands.

  And as he opens his mouth to continue his taunts, to resume his insults and sadistic promises, I place my finger on the trigger, bending close to his face so only he can hear me.

  “You might’ve taken my Shelly from me, but it’s because of you I have the life I do now. I’ve made a living out of putting fuckers like you in the ground, Elias, and I never thought I’d see the day when I got to add your stone to the cemetery you started yourself twenty-four years ago.” I let my wrath take control of my features, and when he looks in my eyes, his laughing taunts stop and I see fear creep into his eyes for the first time in our lives.

  And just as I slowly squeeze the trigger…

  Delicate fingers wrap around my hand holding the gun.

  I turn to look over my bicep, huge and flexed with my rage, and I see Astrid’s angelic face. Her features are soft, eyes loving but worried, and she gives me a small smile.

  “You don’t need to do this, Viking,” she says gently, glancing down at Elias and then back up at me, her eyes twinkling. “This isn’t who you are, my love. You’re a healer, Nei
l. But this man is too broken on the inside. You can’t heal him, so you need to just walk away.”

  “She’s right, brother,” Corbin says on the other side of the bed. “There’s no going back once you take someone’s life. You’ll have to deal with it for the rest of yours.”

  There’s a groan from the floor, and I see Brian’s head come over the end of the bed as he sits up. “Fuck, .45s fucking hurt like a son of a bitch,” he growls, getting to his knees and pulling the neckline of his shirt down to show the bullet stopped by his black bulletproof vest, and my finger leaves the trigger as relief fills me.

  “Nah, man! Smoke his ass, Doc! Fuck his shit up, bro!” Seth yells through the earpiece, and I see Corbin shake his head.

  “No need, Viking. Look,” Astrid whispers, and I follow her gaze to the man on the bed, his soulless eyes now lifeless as well as they stare unseeing at the ceiling.

  Suddenly, a weight I’ve been carrying for twenty-four years lifts from my shoulders and my heart, and as I blink away the last of my wrath, an image of Shelly appears in my mind, her young, sweet face smiling at me as she twirls around and walks into a bright light.

  I turn the gun around in my hand, holding it by the barrel as I hand it over the bed to Corbin, who then walks over to Brian and helps him up. He puts the gun in his holster at his ribs, and I turn around to face Astrid. She wraps her arms around my waist, her head hitting the center of my chest as she squeezes, and as my arms fold around her, her body begins to quake.

  She held strong for me when I needed it, making sure I didn’t lose myself in one of the hardest moments of my life. And now that it’s over, it’s like the dam holding back all her fear and every other emotion finally breaks, and it comes out in a flood.

  “All right, guys. Tell me I wasn’t the only one who heard that bit about the judges partaking in the uh… escort services. Notifying our friends at the precinct now, so get your asses out of there while the body’s still warm,” Seth tells us in our ears.

  And with that, we make our way out of the room, across the landing at the head of the staircases, and to the open elevator. We take it down to the first floor, and Corbin separates from us, stealthily slinking through the door to the nightclub. Within seconds with Seth’s help using the surveillance cameras, he finds Heather in the crowd and returns with her in the hallway, and we pause only long enough at the dressing room for her and Astrid to gather all their things.

  “You’re clear. Go, go,” Seth says, and we hurry out the back door, letting it close all the way as we make our way to the parking lot. Astrid hands me the Audi keys out of her purse, and Heather, Corbin, and Brian get back in her car.

  We’re already through the front gate and on the main road when a fleet of squad cars and SUVs marked SWAT pass us heading in the opposite direction, and I see them turn into A Secret in my rearview mirror.

  Chapter 25

  Astrid

  One week later

  “Surprise!” people yell when Neil and I hit the top step of the staircase leading up into Club Alias. I jump, squeezing tighter to his side, feeling him chuckle as my eyes take in the group before me.

  A slow smile spreads across my face, the nervousness I felt on the ride here disappearing in an instant the moment I see my sister and all our friends-turned-family standing in the center of the dance floor.

  The club looks different than the last time I saw it, when Brian and Clarice got engaged. Or maybe I’m just seeing it with new eyes, knowing the full story behind it and the men who own it.

  Now, I’m able to take in every detail. The lights are dim, the disco ball above the dance floor sending out shards of light as it spins, reflecting the lasers coming from the DJ booth. There’s a bar at the back, and I see a sprite of a woman standing behind it wearing a mask around her eyes, a wide smile on her face. There’s a giant horseshoe of black leather booths surrounding the center of the room, and just beyond their high backs, I see alcoves with heavy black curtains pulled to the side, a light above each one. From my spot at the entrance, I can’t see into what Neil calls the “playrooms” but just seeing they’re really here, they’re really real, sends a spike of excitement through my veins.

  The music is low at the moment, but I know it must get loud in here when there are more people. Neil’s hand lowers to the small of my back and leads me forward to the people we know and love, and when we reach them, I’m enveloped in a hug by my sister and her giant belly, Clarice, and Vi. I hear the men doing the man-hug slapping thing, and then each of us pairs off with our man.

  “Come on! Let’s sit in the VIP booth,” Twyla chirps, taking hold of my hand and leading me to a booth that’s larger than all the rest. We take turns scooting in until I have Neil on one side of me and Twyla on the other. Beside her is Seth, then Brian, Clarice, Vi, and then Corbin on the other end.

  “How are y’all tonight?” the girl from behind the bar asks, and she smiles huge at me.

  “Great, Dixie. And yourself?” Vi prompts.

  “Wonderful. Mikolas will be here later. He’s at the studio working on his album,” she replies, and then her eyes turn to Neil. Her face softens, and she asks him in the sweetest voice, “May I, Doc?” and gestures with her open palms facing up toward me.

  “Of course, Dixie girl,” Neil responds, and her face splits in a wide grin as she reaches across him for my hand.

  She squeezes my palm between both of hers, and I watch, astonished, as tears fill her pretty eyes surrounded by the black lace mask. “I’m so honored to finally meet you, Goddess,” she says, and it’s startling to hear anyone but Neil call me that. “Your master has been such an important part of my life for years, first as my therapist and then as my employer. I don’t know where I’d be in life if it hadn’t been for him. Certainly not married to the man of my dreams after a life-changing adventure to the Czech Republic for sure.” She giggles, but I’m still stuck on the fact that she called Neil my “master.” It’s both titillating and humorous. “Could you even imagine the me of six years ago stepping foot on a plane to cross an ocean, Doc?” She shakes her head.

  “I can, but the image isn’t pretty,” Neil says with a chuckle.

  She smiles. “Anyhoo, I’m just so happy Doc has finally found a woman worthy enough to own his heart, because it’s such a very special one, and I know you’ll take care of it. After all, surely any sister of sweet Twyla is one hell of a lady, and I look forward to seeing you here often,” she tells me, and then she lets go of my hand to step to the edge of the table in the center of our group. “Now, what can I get y’all to drink?”

  We all place our orders, and then she’s off to fill them.

  “Well she’s an absolute doll baby,” I say, and everyone nods in agreement. “So, anyone want to tell me what’s going on? This is not what I expected for my first real night at Club Alias. Where are all the boobies?”

  Seth lets out a single bark of laughter before my sister reaches over and pinches his nipple. “Ow. Rude.” He glares playfully at her before leaning over to kiss her cheek then pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose.

  “As you know from our sessions, I was a little worried about bringing you here and exposing you to all the Doms and subs at once. We have no say on the scenes they want to act out in the public areas, and I thought giving you a few hours to just enjoy the setting itself first, to kind of ease you in, would be a good idea,” Neil explains, and I nod.

  “Oh. Okay. But I told you, even when I saw what Randy was doing to Kristin, I didn’t like… get triggered or anything. I-uh… I even tried to help her until… um. Yeah. That happened,” I remind him.

  “Even so, I’d rather you wade in through the shallow end instead of jumping in headfirst off the highest diving board.” He reaches beneath the table to rest his big hand on my thigh, his palm hot on my bare skin. “Plus, this way, you get to experience everything in the open. Every other time, all of us would be wearing masks and going solely by our Dom and sub names.”

&nb
sp; “Ah, is that why Dixie called me Goddess?”

  “Yes,” he replies.

  “But she called Twyla by her real name,” I point out.

  “I don’t really come to the club much, sis,” she reminds me, leaning back and rubbing her pregnant belly, and I snort.

  “Awkwaaaard,” I drawl.

  “Hey, that’s not fair. I came a lot while I was pregnant,” Vi inserts. “All that extra blood in your system makes for some intense orgasms. We christened every single one of these playrooms, so have fun imagining that next time you’re in one.” And then she moos, and I literally choke on my spit when we all bust out laughing as I watch Corbin lean down to kiss the side of her neck.

  “So I’ll have to get used to calling you what, Seven—” I point to Seth. “—Knight—” I point to Brian. “—Sarge?” I ask Corbin, and he nods. “But what about the girls?”

  “No one is supposed to address our subs by name while we’re at the club. That’s why Dixie asked Doc for permission before speaking to you directly. But since Clarice and I are switches, she sometimes goes by Mistress when she’s topping that evening,” Brian explains, and it’s admittedly arousing to think about the sexy, curvaceous, yet tiny brunette dominating the over six-and-a-half-foot hulk of a man.

  “Get it, girl,” I tell her, reaching across the table with my fist. She taps her knuckles to mine with a grin before turning it toward Brian and puckering for a kiss, which he gives her.

  “So, I’ve got Twyla’s maternity shoot coming up, and we just did birthday pics for Corbin and Vi’s oldest. Doc, are there any photoshoots in the near future for ahhh, you and your goddess here?” Clarice asks, and my eyebrows shoot up. While she is one of the best photographers I’ve ever seen, it is way too soon for Neil and me to be taking any kind of professional photos.