Hard Love

by Shana Vanterpool

  I loved dark and beautiful things. They went together. Roses on thorns. Rainbows after a storm. Brando in a suit. I could sense his façade was just that, a façade. I’d never find comfort in a normal soul. His had to be as twisted-up as my own. My eyes drifted to my left, studying his large, manly hands on the steering wheel as he cut through the late afternoon traffic.

  His hands were sexy. Strong, long fingers, with a dusting of hair encroaching on the space between his knuckles. He was wearing a black suit with a dark gray tie, and matching shirt. The few times I’d seen him, he wore a suit as well. My eyes skimmed over his arms and moved on to his face. My heart flip-flopped around like a fish out of water as my demons danced in darkness.

  Stunning.

  His hair was as black as mine, this intense onyx, cut medium on the sides and slightly wild on top. His face was hard and beautiful at the same time it was sharp and alluring. I wondered if he was too. His lashes reminded me of raven feathers and his eyes were this deep dark forest green. But the kicker was the beard. The fucking beard killed me. It grew in perfectly, lined up around his supple pink lips and it was long enough to imagine it scraping against my inner thighs.

  I had to make that a reality.

  Brando cleared his throat a second before his gaze shot to mine. I couldn’t hide my want. And he could try all he wanted, but I saw the ever-so-slight flare glowing on the edge of his eyes. He wanted me.

  For whatever reason, he wouldn’t make a move, I knew that. Leaving it up to me typically gave me power I craved, but in this case, I wasn’t going to blow up a good thing.

  He averted his gaze. “Madison?”

  “Yes?” came her soft reply.

  “This won’t take long. An hour at most. We’ll need your final statement to close the case and my captain will write it off. There will be additions to the final written report, but I don’t get the impression that you care. He’s gone, and you’re here. That’s what matters, doesn’t it, sweetheart?”

  Not only was he sexy, he was sweet, too.

  “Yes,” Madi whispered.

  Brando pulled up outside of the police station in Denver and killed the engine. We all got out and I hung back, inhaling the scent of Denver in the fall. The chill was subtle in the air, and the breeze still had a hint of warmth in it. Klay kissed Madi goodbye and then she and Brando took off for the police station.

  Klay put his hands in his pockets and joined me, leaning against Brando’s passenger door.

  “She’ll be okay,” I assured him, reaching up to push the furrows in his brows down. “She got this far, she can manage a little report.”

  His dark blue eyes met mine and his lips lifted infinitesimally. “I know.”

  I met Klayton when my world was seconds from ending. I never told him that when it was the worst, I contemplated things I couldn’t today fathom doing. I was a seventeen-year-old homeless, rape victim. I barely survived. I’d been starving and empty when I walked past his tattoo shop that fateful night. It was the name that caught my attention. Guns & Ink. It was so … me. Poetic, meaningful, jumbled, artistic, out of place—I found myself walking into the shop, and the first eyes I met were Klay’s.

  Even now, my heart burned at the thought of all he’d done for me. I owed that man my life too many times over. He asked me if I could ink, said he needed another tattoo artist in his brand-new shop, and I lied and told him I could tattoo. I’d never given a single tattoo until that night. But I could draw. I could draw better than I could think. I was fragile, a shell barely intact, and Klay wasn’t much better. We got together perfectly as we fought and screamed. Things got better for me … and worse. Klay made me feel safe, showed me that not all men were evil soulless monsters. But I was still damaged no matter how hard I tried to be better.

  Then Klayton went to prison for two years for beating the ever-loving-shit out of the man who raped me. Losing him for two years was almost as hard as wanting to end things. I kept Guns & Ink alive. I worked fifteen-hour days, went to sleep hungry, and struggled to find artists to fill slots and to pull in customers. I kept Guns & Ink open, so when Klayton got out, he’d have his dream waiting for him.

  In my eyes, Klayton deserved nothing but brutal happiness. I knew how long he lived without it. And his infinitesimal smile was better than a mega-watt grin any day.

  “What are you looking at?” he grumbled, frowning at me.

  I wrapped my arms around his chest and held him to me, ignoring his arms hanging limp down his sides. Klay didn’t hug. His strength came in allowing my weaknesses. “I love you, you big grump, that’s all.”

  Sighing, he brought his arms around me too. “I love you, too, brat.”

  Klayton and I had never been anything but platonic. I considered feelings for him when we met, but that was nine years ago. There was nothing to consider now but this. I squeezed him to me and then let him go.

  “Wanna take a walk?” I nodded at Brando’s Charger. “The cop’s car is locked. Our bags are safe.”

  He nodded, slugging away from the car and heading with me down the street. It’s a no-brainer where we ended up. The building was a hair salon now. Klayton moved Guns & Ink from Denver two years ago to get Madi away from her pain. We thrived in Portland like we never had before, and he’d even made me his business partner in Guns & Ink. It was split three ways between Madison, Klay, and me. Things were the best they’d ever been.

  Which meant my demons were about to come out and play.

  Chapter Three

  Brando

  My house was rancid.

  I spent a few hours a night there, tops, and between running in to change—when I didn’t do so at the station—things tended to rot.

  I cringed coming in, dropping my bag on the ground and stomping over to the windows on my right. I shoved the patio door opened as well, and then turned on the overhead fan in the living room to help get the rot of forgotten food out of the house.

  That was my life. Coming home to an empty house full of rotting food. A crash of something dark and twisted slammed into my chest. In an effort to escape, I ripped my suit jacket off and then my dress shirt and undershirt, letting my truth loose. The tattoos on my arms and torso burned in glee, happy to be set free.

  No one would trust a cop who looked like a criminal. Thankfully, I’d been smart enough as a pissed off teenager and in my early twenties to keep the ink off my hands. I couldn’t say the same for the rest of my body. Before stepping into the shower, I faced myself in the wide-stretching mirrors over the double sink. There were two sinks. But only one of them got used.

  My ink decorated much of the skin on my shoulders, biceps, and forearms. It traveled across my chest and my abdomen, leaving little of my skin uncovered. I looked like a fucking pissed off thug—because that’s what I was.

  A thug who’d broken enough rules to do his best now, to follow every single one.

  I stepped under the shower spray and closed my eyes. When I did, I saw them all. The pit of bodies, the bones of women who probably fought as hard as Madison. I retched, spewing the contents of my stomach into the bottom of the tub.

  I didn’t want to know their names. I didn’t want to spend years putting their DNA into the database and coming up empty, or worse, putting a name to the bones. I slid down to the bottom of the shower and let the water pour right into my eyes as I fought so hard to see something clearly.

  Sleeping that night was as futile as any other night. I tossed and turned, never closing my eyes. In the morning, I felt like I was walking on sharp objects and stumbling every single step of the way. Ethan and I had a meeting with Captain Gutierrez for the fifteen victims. A strategy and performance meeting.

  I stumbled into the station dressed head to toe in black. My hair was combed perfectly and I’d even given my beard a trim. The beard was a must. It covered the scar that existed under my left jaw. I’d grown used to it over the years and the only way I could deal with it was to make sure it was trimmed sharply.

 
That’s how I dealt with life. Keeping it trimmed, sharp, and orderly.

  When inside, I was messy, dull, and twisted.

  Pretenses were a blessing.

  And a curse.

  Captain Gutierrez and Ethan were in the conference room when I came in. I sank down in a free chair and nodded along. Piecing together fifteen skeletons could take eight months. This case could take years to close with all the corporal and emotional hang-ups.

  Sweat broke out across my brow and trailed down my temples. My mouth tasted like metal and coffee, a sharp unpleasant taste that made it hard to swallow. I didn’t want to be there. But where was there without here? Being a detective righted so many wrongs. Without my job, I’d just be wrong again.

  “Hawkins?” Captain called. His deep frown suggested it hadn’t been the first time.

  Ethan was staring at me, his gaze intense for once.

  I licked my chapped lips. I had to do this now. If I waited until I snapped, it would only compromise the entire investigation. I closed Madison’s case. That’s the only happy ending I had left to seek. Maybe Madison was it. Or the two years I searched for her abductor. In a stand-off that still hadn’t attacked my memory—although I had no doubt that it would with a mind like mine—the moment Madison’s monster was gone, so was my connection to this case.

  “Hawkins,” Captain repeated. “I’m talking to you.”

  I cleared my throat. “With all due respect, Captain, I’m going to have to step down from this investigation.”

  Captain’s dark brows settled into a thin line, and his shoulders stiffened. “What are you talking about? Ethan and you have been on this case for the past two years, Officer Hawkins. With all due respect,” he said, drilling me in my seat with his commanding demeanor as he used my own words against me. “You can’t be taken off this case.”

  “Technically, I was assigned to the disappearance of Madison Hart. That case was closed yesterday. I haven’t been assigned to this case officially.” My voice wavered, and my façade was starting to slip. Strength was so hard to dredge up when you didn’t feel it.

  It was easy to pretend. Everyone could pretend to be strong. But few could be.

  Captain put his hands on the table and leaned forward, putting us closer as he bored down on me. “Where is this coming from, Officer?”

  I shook my head, my eyes fluttering. “I can’t do it, Captain.”

  Our insides weren’t different. Cops were loyal, dedicated, determined—I could be those things. I was those things. He had to understand where I was coming from. After a few seconds, his gaze dropped and he nodded, running a hand through his hair. “We’ll put Connor on the case. You cool with working with Connor?” He glanced at Ethan.

  Ethan couldn’t even look at me as he nodded. I felt so inadequate in that moment I couldn’t form a thought that didn’t exist in that sick, disgusting feeling.

  “Take the Parson’s case,” Captain ordered gruffly, grabbing the phone on the wall and barking, “Get me Connor to the conference room.”

  I pushed away from the table, leaving behind the hundreds of pictures attached to the board of bones, of hair, of broken skulls, and murdered girls.

  The Parson’s case was a murder case. I read the file over at my desk. Cold for six months. Why would Captain give me this case? As I read it more closely, I realized why. The suspect had fled over the border. I’d never pull enough rank to warrant the FBI. Captain was giving me a break.

  Pity was worse than the bones.

  When I got home that night, I didn’t see the broken glass at first.

  My front door was unlocked, but I pegged it as my mind being misplaced lately. I closed it and dropped my bag. I took a step and my shoe crunched on the broken shards of glass from the side window.

  My heart stilled and my breathing slowed, giving my ears a chance to listen. I pulled my gun from my holster and undid the safety. The last time I used this, there was another gun pointed at Ethan and I. Madison’s attacker had been ready to go. He’d fired one shot into the floorboards right where the CSI team had looked before I emptied my clip into his fucking chest.

  I thought about calling this in before I purposely pushed the thought from my mind and stepped deeper into my house. The glass cabinet that housed my television was open and the TV was on the ground, along with my gun safe and my personal safe. I could hear grunting in the hall. I ducked behind the kitchen entrance and licked my lips, listening intently.

  “You hear that?” a deep male voice asked.

  The person who’d been asked didn’t respond. They were listening for me. Predators sensed other predators. It was in our DNA. In our fucking blood.

  There was silence. They knew I was there. I knew they were there. My clip was full. My existence felt transitory. I dared them to make the first move, thinking I had nothing left to lose.

  “You broke into a cop’s house,” I informed them. I didn’t pitch my voice so they’d have to think hard about my position. “A cop who doesn’t mind using his weapon.” I grabbed a coffee mug off my counter and then I launched it through the opening over the bar into the living room, a good twenty feet. It smashed against the fireplace and shattered.

  Gunfire erupted. I ducked and used the distraction to move close to the hallway. A quick glance over my shoulder showed me they’d moved. They were in the family room.

  I crab-walked into the hall and into my bedroom. The house was silent in the back. I slipped through the patio doors in my bedroom and traced the perimeter. The living room patio doors were closed, but they gave me a perfect look into the room. Two males, Caucasian, crouched behind the wall separating the living room from the family room.

  I moved back, using the brick column on the patio as cover. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and dialed Ethan’s number.

  “Cook,” he answered absentmindedly.

  “Two armed males are in my house right now.”

  He didn’t waste a second. “Getting in my car. Stay where you are. Have they fired their firearms?”

  “Eight shots. That’s either one clip, or they fired four each.”

  I heard a car door slam and the growl of his engine on the other end. “I’ll phone it into dispatch, give me a sec.”

  His line clicked. I lowered my phone to peer over the edge of the column to find that they’d moved. “Shit,” I hissed under my breath, feeling trapped.

  I cast my eyes over the yard. I beat myself up for not fixing the broken security lights. The yard had never been so damn dark before. Exhaustion had turned my brain to mush, and it started to fail me.

  “Brando?” Ethan’s voice was muffled, my hand lowered and my gun raised.

  I didn’t want to risk answering him or them picking up on Ethan’s voice. I hung up without looking and slipped my phone into my pocket, my senses struggling to pick up something.

  “We’re not going back to jail,” that same voice from earlier stated from my left. “You have two options, pig.”

  “Yeah? What’s that?” I could feel the predator, the one who didn’t speak, on my right. He was the real threat. The guy on my left was brave but stupid. The guy on my right was smart, letting the moron on the left take all the attention. But what the guy on the right didn’t know was that I could feel him far better than if I could see him.

  “You put your gun on the ground and kick it away and we put a clean bullet in your chest.”

  “What’s my other option?” I wasn’t lowering my weapon. Ethan never gave me his location or ETA. I didn’t know how long it was going to take him to get here.

  “Things get messy. Closed casket messy.”

  “Seems like a steep choice to make, to kill a cop for a TV.”

  “We’re not here for the TV,” he growled, and chills broke out over my skin. “What’s the code to the safe, pig?”

  I closed my eyes in misery, in resolve. They weren’t getting that fucking code. It was the only thing I had left, monstrous or not, I couldn’t give it up. Pasts, much l
ike pretenses, eventually catch up with you. In a move so quick, even my brain screamed at me to rethink it, I pointed my gun to my right and pulled the trigger as many times as I could before I felt the bullets tear into my back.

  I went down like a brick.

  But I still had the safe.

  My thoughts—and heart—stopped a second after I saw and felt the warm wetness of my blood pooling around my head.

  I didn’t see a light. I didn’t even see darkness. I saw a flash of eyes so brown they put every cup of coffee I’d ever guzzled to shame before my end swallowed me.

  Chapter Four

  Catherine

  Black ink smelled like magic.

  Like escape and reality at the same time. I bobbed my head to the alternative rock Isaiah, one of the tattoo artists at Guns & Ink, had put on, and pressed the sharp tip of the tattoo gun into the flesh of my client.

  Klay was bent over a woman’s leg doing a thigh piece. He was zoned out, had been for the past two hours, the buzz of his tattoo gun teaming up with mine and Isaiah’s to create a lulling indulgent white noise my soul loved to fade into. Madi was inventorying in the back and Miriam, the other artist, was cleaning up her station.

  The piece I was doing had kept me busy for a week. A full back tattoo, my favorite. I loved spending weeks on one piece, watching the additions become a whole I created. This piece was a collage of his vices. Dice for gambling, a seven and an eleven in a puddle of spilled whiskey. The bottle was on its side, and the end became a seat for his daughter, her dark locks swirling around her face. Her little hands held a string, like she was on a swing, but the threads she held were angel feathers. The feathers morphed into stars and the stars were raining down on the dice. Breaking the cycle.

  “Hands off your ink,” I heard Klay order. I glanced up in time to watch him roll his eyes at the look she gave him on her way to the bathroom.

  Some things never changed. Women still came to this shop for Klayton. Look, I got it. Klay was gorgeous, tattooed, and hard-edged—women ate it up. But Klay was tattooed because he loved the story; he was hard-edged, because that’s how he survived. And he was taken; where the fangirls used to sometimes annoy and amuse me, they pissed me off now.