by K. J. Dahlen
Bull wrapped his arm around her shoulders and hugged her close to him. “Honey you have to stop. Your throat can’t take that much more abuse.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “He had a copy of the autopsy report in that file. Someone strangled her. As if that wasn’t enough, she was tortured first. Someone beat the hell out of her then strangled her to death. No one deserves that.”
Bull pushed her face into his chest and held her while the rage grew inside him “No baby, no one does, especially a woman.” He closed his eyes at her pain. “Hush now. Hush. I don’t want you to hurt yourself anymore.”
Charlie eventually calmed down. His closeness was something she was used to but decided she couldn’t get used to it quick enough. His scent pleased her and in his arms, she felt safe.
Then out of nowhere, Bull’s belly growled.
Charlie chuckled. “I take it that’s your body’s way of protesting the lack of food?”
Bull laughed. “Yeah, you could say that.”
“Well then, how about you and me fix something for supper while the other guys are busy with the paperwork?” Charlie whispered.
“That’s a great idea.” Helping her to her feet, they went to the pantry and began looking for something to cook for seven people.
Chapter Ten
An hour later, the smell of good food brought the others down to the table. Charlie had fried chicken and mashed potatoes for supper for the guys. She sat with Bull aside from the rest and drank her shake while everyone else ate regular food.
“Bull I didn’t know you could cook,” Tank joked as he shoveled food into his mouth.
Mustang snorted, “He can’t boil an egg.”
Bull smirked. “Charlie made supper. I followed her directions.”
Hawk snapped his head in her direction and smiled. “Damn woman, you got kitchen skills, I’ll give you that. This is delicious.”
Charlie smiled then paled as Judge pushed his half eaten plate aside and stood up, leaving the room.
No one said a word at his actions but Bull’s fingers curled into fists. He started to push his chair back but stopped when Charlie laid her hand on his arm and shook her head. She lifted her tear filled eyes and told the entire group, “I didn’t poison the food and his actions don’t matter to me. I don’t know what he has against me but I didn’t do anything wrong. Please eat.” With that, she got to her feet and followed Judge up the steps.
She ignored the man, went over to the bed, and laid down, curling into a ball. Pulling the covers up over her shoulders, she closed her eyes and let her tears soak into the pillow as she silently cried. A few minutes later, she allowed herself to fall asleep but her sleep was disturbed. At first, it was by feeling of unease that kept getting stronger as time passed. The door to her subconscious began to open and memories long repressed began to filter out. Memories she thought she didn’t have. Memories of her mother and a time in her life when she was loved by at least one person, the same person who nurtured her. The same person who held her and rocked her tiny body to sleep at night, the same person who sang her lullabies.
She felt safe and warm in her mother’s arms as she remembered her childhood however brief it had been.
Hours later, the room was quiet as the guys settled in for sleep. Bull had checked and rechecked the security system and had done a final sweep of the cameras outside. Then without looking at the others went over to the bed Charlie was sleeping on. Lifting one edge of the blanket, he slipped in behind her and wrapped his arms around her slight body.
Slowly he pulled her into his arms. With a sigh, he closed his eyes and allowed his body to rest.
The creeping unease in Charlie’s soul was getting stronger as the moon rose in the night’s sky. Memories long forgotten flooded her mind when the door finally opened. She was remembering her early childhood. She could see her mother’s face again finally.
It had been so long since she’d last seen her she’d forgotten what her mother looked like. But she was remembering her now. They had been living in a small one bedroom apartment. Her mother didn’t have much but what she had Charlie remembered her mother took pride in.
But then suddenly, things changed. The light in her mother’s eyes was gone and she began to be afraid. She didn’t smile anymore either nor was there any Charlie and mommy time like there had been before. She checked the windows and made sure the door was always locked. She had tried to keep it together but babies are like any animal, they know when something isn’t quite right.
Charlie knew her mother wasn’t acting the same as before. Then her mother began playing a strange game of hide and seek. She’d tell Charlie over and over again to hide in a certain spot and not say a word. Charlie didn’t like this game and she cried whenever her mother asked her to play but her mother insisted. She had to hide and not say a word no matter what she heard her mother doing.
Charlie began to moan in her sleep as more and more memories came back in a rush. Twisting and turning to get away from the memories.
* * * *
Bull started in his sleep. Opening his eyes, he looked down at the woman in his arms and frowned. She seemed caught up in a nightmare of some kind. He tried to comfort her but that only made things worse as she began struggling against him.
When he loosened his hold, she turned to him and began crying. “No Mommy, no I don’t want to play this game anymore,” she cried out.
Bull frowned as he listened to her.
“No Mommy I don’t want to hide anymore.” Her arms and legs flailed in her struggles.
Bull felt as if she were trying to get away from him but she couldn’t go far. It was almost as if she were being held in place by another person.
“Mommy please don’t yell at me anymore. I’ll be a good girl I promise,” Charlie wailed softly as if she were a child. Her whispery voice carried in the stillness of the room. “Okay Mommy I’ll hide again. I promise not to come out no matter what I hear but Mommy please don’t let me in there too long. I don’t like that dark place.” Charlie made the motions of covering her head with her arms and curling up into a tighter ball. She began rocking back and forth.
Bull listened and felt her shivering as she remembered the past. His heart broke a little bit more as the young girl sobbed.
“No Mommy,” she whispered softly. “No don’t hurt my mommy.” She pressed her hand against her mouth as her eyes squeezed shut tighter. “Don’t you hurt my mommy. You’re a bad man to hurt my mommy like that.” Pausing for a few minutes she whispered, “Mommy?” a few minutes later she whispered again, “Mommy? Mommy are you there? Can this game be done now? Mommy, I don’t hear the bad man anymore, can I come out now? Mommy? Are you there?”
Sobs was all Bull heard then. He held her close to his body and his heart shattered as he put the pieces together. Pieces of a tragedy that never should have happened. He turned his head and brushed his lips on the top of her head. Gently, he rocked her back and forth.
“No mommy, you have to wake up now.” He heard the little girl whisper. “Please wake up now mommy. Mommy I need you, please wake up now. The bad man is gone. He can’t hurt you anymore. Wake up now Mommy.”
As he listened to her soft cries, Bull realized Charlie had been there the night her mother was murdered. She might even have seen the murder take place. Some bastard had broken into their apartment and while she was hiding, her mother had protected her child by giving her own life for hers.
Bull felt Charlie’s tears soak his chest as he held her close. Finally, after a long time she moved her head and peeked up at his face. In the low lighting, he found her soft turquoise eyes staring back at him. He brushed his lips against hers.
“I remembered it didn’t I?’ she whispered softly as fresh tears ran down her face.
Bull nodded. “Yeah honey, you remembered.”
“Oh god,” she wailed. “He killed her, the bastard killed her!”
“Hush now.” Bull tried to sooth her but there was no soo
thing Charlie, not now.
Her hands curled into fists and she pushed him away. “That bastard killed my mother!” She cried out as she beat on Bull’s chest. “He wrapped his swarmy, hateful hands around her throat and he wouldn’t let go. He hit her too. Knocked her down but she kept getting up again. They were both yelling and screaming at each other. He hit her over and over and I couldn’t help her. At some point in their fight, she ripped his shirt and that’s when I saw the tattoo on his chest. That’s how I knew it. I’d seen it before. She said part of the game was to stay hidden no matter what I heard I had to stay in my special place until she told me I could come out.” Her hand flew to her mouth as she gazed at Bull. “It was my fault she didn’t wake up. I didn’t stay where I was supposed to. After he left, I crawled out of my hiding place and I tried to wake her up but she wouldn’t wake up.”
“No sweet Chartlie.” Bull held her close. “That’s not why she wouldn’t wake up. She couldn’t open her eyes again. She was already gone.”
“Oh god Bull,” she cried out as she fell into him sobbing. “The bastard killed my mother.”
“I know baby. I know.” He just held her as she sobbed new tears.
Without moving the rest of his body, his eyes scanned the room and he found five pairs of eyes staring back at him and Charlie. Five pairs of eyes that held sympathy and horror at what they’d all heard tonight. One by one, each head nodded and they laid back down on their own beds.
Finally, the tears were done and a calmness took over Charlie’s body. Bull felt the difference but he didn’t break the silence they were held up in. Charlie lifted red rimmed eyes to his. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?” Bull was astonished. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
Red fused her cheeks. Dipping her head low she murmured, “I’m sorry for crying all over you. You didn’t need to hear all that shit.”
“I’m just glad I could there for you when you needed me,” Bull told her. “Is that one of your nightmares?”
Charlie shook her head. “No I’ve never been able to remember anything like that before. It was like all the bad stuff was locked away behind a closed door. Tonight the door was finally opened and that’s what came out.”
Bull held her for a long time before he said, “It sounded like you were there the night your mom died. Were you?”
Charlie nodded. “Yes.”
“Did you actually see the murder or just hear it?”
Charlie began to tremble. It took a few minutes but she finally told him, “I could see and hear everything that happened that night. My hiding place was the closet. It had a louvered door. I was supposed to hide in the back and cover up with whatever was on the floor but that day I didn’t. I watched through one of the slats on the door.”
“Oh god baby,” Bull crushed her to him as the rest of his heart shattered at her admission. “I’m so sorry.”
Charlie took a deep breath and let it out with her words, “Don’t be, it’s good that I can remember it. I needed to relive the actual event to remember it. It let me remember my mother again. I’d forgotten what she looked like, how she always smelled so good. I forgot how she laughed and how her eyes were the same color as mine and how they sparkled every time she laughed. I’d forgotten all of that until just now.” She snuggled into his side. “Now I remember my mother again.”
A long time later Bull asked, “Do you know the man who hurt her? Who was there that night?”
A few minutes later Charlie nodded slowly. “Yeah, I know him and so do you.”
“Who is he?” Bull asked.
“His name doesn’t matter at this point.” Charlie’s voice got hard. “He’s a dead man anyway. If you don’t kill him I will.”
Bull was surprised at the venom in her voice. He could feel the hate emanate from her warn soft body. It came in waves and each wave got stronger and stronger until he could almost taste it. At first, Bull didn’t know how to react. This was a new and not so good Charlie. He always knew she could be tough, she’d already survived more than most but never like this. He snapped his head level to hers. “Who is he Charlie? I don’t want you anywhere near the man who could do something like that.”
Charlie’s eyes were hard and unforgiving as she stared back at him. ‘You won’t be able to stop me. He’s a dead man walking at the moment but not for long. I will live long enough to send that man to hell on a one way ticket. After that, my life can be over but not before. Not before I blow that man to hell.”
“Who is he Charlie?” Bull demanded. “What’s his name?”
Her lips curled into a sneer. “His name? You want his name? His name is Conrad Bane, or Amir Hussian, or maybe you like Adhir Malik better. I recognized the tattoo on his chest from the picture you showed me earlier. It doesn’t matter what his fuckin name is. He’s a dead man.” She stared at Bull for a long minute, her eyes still hard then she broke. “She called him my father. Before he killed her she told him he had a kid and that she named me Charlie.” She lowered her head back to Bull’s chest and sobbed, “Why Bull? Why did he have to kill her? Was he there that night looking for me? Would he have killed me too? Why?”
“Hush now.” Bull tried to sooth her. “I don’t know why he did what he did and I don’t know if he would have killed you too that night. No one can know what’s in another man’s heart or mind. Conrad Bane is a true bastard and you were right, he doesn’t have a soul. I don’t think any of them do. His brother Salim was the same way. I don’t know, maybe it was the way they were raised. He’s still got two more brothers back home. I can’t imagine they are any different.”
“I suppose this just justifies Judge’s hatred of me,” she whispered in the dark. “Now everyone else will hate me too.”
“No.” Bull shook his head. “This doesn’t change anything. Judge is just being an ass. He’ll either accept you or he won’t. It doesn’t really matter to me but I accept you for who you are. Right now, this very minute.”
Charlie shook her head. “But it does change things and you know it. I know it too. When Judge finds out Conrad Bane is my father, he’ll want to put a bullet in my head and I can’t say that I blame him.”
Bull sat up and leaned over the top of her. Looking her in the eyes he told her, “No one is going to put a bullet anywhere on or near you. You’ve have nothing to do with Bane your whole life and finding out he’s your father doesn’t give you a magical connection to him. You hate him almost as much as we do. You want him dead almost as bad as we do.”
Charlie smiled faintly and raised her hands up to wrap around both sides of his face. Leaning up she brushed her lips against his gently. “You know that and I know that but the only thing Judge will see if that Bane is the man who fathered me. And in the long run that will make all the difference in the world to him. The fact that Bane’s blood is my blood is all that man will see. You know it and so do I. And when he puts a bullet in my head to him it will be just like killing a piece of the man who took your friends away from you. He won’t care that I’m an innocent that I never asked to be born of his blood. None of that will matter. All he will see is that another small piece of the Malik line is gone.”
“I won’t let him do it.” Bull snarled.
“Hush now.” Charlie calmed his ire. “Lay down with me for a few minutes will you? I want to feel safe again.”
Bull laid down beside her. Wrapping his arms around her, he pulled her close to him. “I make you feel safe?”
Charlie nodded as she laid her head on his chest and listened to his heartbeat. “Yeah, you make me feel safe. I never knew I was missing that. I never realized just how alone I was until I met you.”
“Well, you aren’t alone anymore,” he whispered. “Wherever you go, I’ll be right there standing in front of you. I got your back now and I’m not giving it up.”
Charlie patted his chest. “Don’t make promises you might not be able to keep,” she whispered low. “None of us know what each day will bring. Conrad Bane
is looking to spill the blood of both of us. He won’t stop until someone stops him.” She turned her head. “Besides I don’t want you in front of me I think I’d want you standing beside me.”
Bull smiled in the darkness surrounding them. “Go back to sleep babe. You need some real rest. Tomorrow will be here soon enough.”
“What are you going to do tomorrow? Your time will be up and he’ll send his Ratz after you.”
“You let me worry about tomorrow.” Bull commented. “I’m not giving up or giving in to that bastard.”
“He will kill you,” Charlie whispered. “I don’t think I could watch him take another life right in front of me. Once was one time too many.”
“He’ll have to find us first and besides, I’m not that easy to kill.” Bull assured her. “Salim found that out the hard way.”
“Conrad is not Salim.” She reminded him.
When she didn’t say anything else, Bull assumed she had gone back to sleep. After a few minutes, he let his own eyes close and as he fell asleep, he turned on his side and snuggled in with her.
When she heard his gentle snores, Charlie knew Bull was asleep. Very slowly, she extricated herself and slowly made her way to the second level. She went over to the refrigerator and got herself a bottle of water. Going to the corner of the room that would allow her to watch ever open area, she slid down the wall pressing her back to the stone brickwork.
Charlie zoned out after a few minutes as she thought about the events of that night. Remembering how her mother had been acting days prior to that night she realized her mother had known, she’d always known he would come after her.
It would be one reason why she’d taught the hiding game to Charlie. That way if Conrad caught her, Charlie would still be safe. Charlie brought he knees up and wrapped her arms around them. Tipping her head down, she rested her forehead on her knees.
Her eyes were burning as she realized she had no tears left to cry. She realized her mother had protected her the best and only way she could. She got up and went over to the cabinet where she had put the file Bull had given her on her mother, the one from Conrad’s flash drive.