“Just getting a glass of water,” he whispered as he got off the bed. “I’ll get you one, too.”
With my tilted vision I watched him leave the room, his firm, bare ass barely visible as he stepped out of the dark and into the faded light of the hall, where he disappeared around the corner. I could hear him searching around for glasses.
Suddenly the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. For no reason, I was terrified deep in my very core, the kind of scared you got as a child when you were certain there was a monster in your closet.
I was certain that there was a monster in the closet. I could almost see him standing behind the doors, feel his eyes upon me.
My instincts were going wild, telling me to flee, that something was very wrong.
That was when I realized there wasn’t anything in the closet
But there was a breath at my neck.
It happened so fast.
I opened my mouth to scream and a man placed his hand across it, clamping it shut, pressing my lips against my teeth. He told me to shut up, his voice cruel even though I was unable to make a sound, and the smell of stale tobacco filled my nose.
This couldn’t be happening.
What was happening?
Surely I had to be dreaming, but this was no dream.
I was ready to fight, ready to kick, ready to go. But when the man pressed the cold, hard end of a gun against the back of my head, I froze.
All hope drained out of me. Esteban was in the kitchen with no idea of what was going on. I wondered who this man was, and if there was just him, or were there others. Was he just a burglar? Or was he involved with Esteban somehow?
The man ripped me off the bed and I let out a muffled cry, my feet trying to find purchase on the floor. The man’s arm was very strong and the grip was very tight.
“So he thinks he can just fuck with me,” the man whispered, snarling into my ear with an American Southern accent. “That isn’t how we play it.”
So this wasn’t a home invasion. No, this was something much worse.
I watched in horror as Esteban slowly came back into the room. He was holding something in his hand, a small teapot, I think.
“Lani, I decided to make you some tea,” he said breezily. “Chamomile.”
Suddenly he stopped dead in his tracks. He saw us, taking in the situation in an instant, then he inhaled, his body tensing.
“Put the gun down,” Esteban said in a very calm voice. “She has nothing to do with this. Do not hurt her.”
“Do not hurt her?” the man yelled, nearly blasting my eardrums out as he sprayed my skin with spit. “I will hurt her, I’ll hurt her and make you watch. Then I’ll kill her and I’ll kill you. Unless you tell me where Natasha is.”
“I will tell you if you let Lani go,” Esteban said, as if he had been in this exact situation many times before. He was so calm, and I was so scared. “Please, just drop the gun and we can talk.”
“I’m not talking to you, I don’t trust you.”
“I’m naked,” Esteban said. “How could I do anything? You obviously have me in a tough situation.”
The man pressed the gun harder against my head and I cried out, but the sound was muffled. I was so fucking afraid.
Though it was hard to see Esteban in the shadows, I could see him frowning, the glint of worry on his brow. “I’ll tell you where Natasha is if you—”
“No!” the man screamed. “No ifs. You tell me now or she dies. It would feel really good to see her brains splattered on that wall over there.”
And in that moment, I saw it. I saw him pulling the trigger, I saw the explosion, the bullet going in, my brains going out. I saw my death, my very violent death, the death I’d been attempting for weeks. It was finally here, but I didn’t get to choose this.
Esteban’s words echoed in my head, from the time we were at the lookout. It’s a good sign to be scared. When you stop feeling fear, that’s when it becomes dangerous. That’s when you die.
And now, I wanted nothing more than to live.
“Fine,” Esteban said. He never came closer, just shifted a bit, but despite my horror I noticed something strange about the way he was holding the teapot. His posture was strained and the more I tried to focus on it, trying to make shape out of the shadows, the more I realized there was something wrong about the teapot in general.
Esteban went on. “Natasha was in the wrong place at the wrong time for the second time. The first time was when she tried to take off with our profits when she was just supposed to stay put. The second time was last night, when she sold you out in an attempt for forgiveness. But I don’t forgive that easily.” His voice sharpened, his body stiffening as he told the man, “Natasha is dead.”
The grip on my mouth loosened by a tiny bit. I felt like it was my time to try to do something, to try to fight, while this guy was in shock.
But Esteban didn’t leave anything to chance. He moved, quick as lightning, and there was a burst of light and a dull pop of noise.
The man loosened his hand around my mouth, slowly easing away until he fell away to the ground, collapsing in a heap.
I leaped back, falling back on the bed as I tried to get away.
Suddenly Esteban was at my side and he was holding my arms, trying to get me to look at him. It was still dark and I couldn’t see him all that well, but I knew enough. There was a dead man at my feet. I’d almost been killed. Esteban somehow shot him with a teapot.
He was talking to me, but I wasn’t listening. He shook me. “Lani. Please. Are you okay?”
I nodded absently, trying to find the words to speak. “Who . . . who was that?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Was he your job? Are you a contract killer?”
He shook his head. “No, I’m not. That’s someone else’s job, but he’s been gone. This wasn’t supposed to be this way.”
“You killed someone,” I said in horror, the realization slowly coming over me.
“I had to,” he said. “You would have been killed. Raped and then killed, that’s how these people work.”
“These people,” I repeated. “You are these people.”
“Lani . . .”
“You killed Natasha.”
“You don’t know who Natasha is. She was no better than he was. There are things about my job that I don’t like, but we all take loyalty very seriously. We also take our safety seriously. For ourselves and for others.”
He sighed and looked away. “I guess I should have told you. But I was hoping to spare you the knowledge. This man and Natasha, I was supposed to . . . fix them last night. I’d only gotten Natasha. This man had left. I would have found him tonight . . . I was supposed to. But then there was you . . . and I’m a weak fucking man when it comes to you.”
I shook my head, trying to understand. I looked at his hands. Up close I could see he was holding a gun with a silencer. Behind him, an empty teapot lay on the ground. “How did you . . .”
“I told you,” he said, “that we take our safety seriously. I had the gun by me all night . . . after . . . well, after we used it, I loaded it, put on the silencer just in case. There’s another gun under your bed. I put this one in the kitchen. There’s another one by the door. All hidden, but I knew where they were. You can’t be too careful.”
“You hid it in a teapot.”
“Quick thinking,” he said, giving me a smile that didn’t belong at a crime scene. “I was naked, I had to improvise as soon as I heard the scuffle.”
Thank God for thin walls.
“You’re still naked,” I whispered, my attention going back to the dead body on the floor. I stared at the man with the bullet hole in his head. My eyes glazed over, unwilling to take him in, to pay attention to details. I didn’t want to see him, the man who almost killed me, the man I’d seen get killed. I didn’t know him, but I’d never had death at my feet.
“What do we do now?” I asked.
“Well,” Esteban said as h
e sat on the bed beside me. “You go make yourself an actual cup of tea and I’ll take care of the rest. Lani, this shouldn’t have happened to you. You shouldn’t have been a part of this. You shouldn’t have known. This was my problem, my job, my reason for being here. I fucked up. I got involved with you and I lost my head for a moment. I’m sorry.”
I nodded absently. I knew he was sorry. And I was, too. But I knew what I was getting into when I first saw him, when I first learned his name, when I first learned what he did. I knew he was bad and yet I wanted him. I wanted the thrill, to know what it felt to be alive.
And now, I finally had it. Now I had seen death, though not my own.
But it was enough.
I didn’t want to die.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“Are you sure you don’t want to come with me, see me off?” Esteban said.
We were sitting in my kitchen, drinking coffee as the sun streamed in through the windows. He had just set down his empty mug and was getting out of his seat, making all the big motions that he was about to leave.
Leaving me alone.
I took a sip of the Kona brew and shook my head. I wasn’t afraid anymore—not of that. I believed Esteban when he said he’d take care of everything. He’d spent the whole night making sure there wasn’t a trace of the incident, while I spent the whole night cowering in a state of shock. I definitely was still in shock, but I was coming around in ways I hadn’t anticipated.
I don’t know what he did with the body, or where he went for several hours in the dark of night, but I knew a man like him made no mistakes. He was the smart one, the good one.
He’d saved my life again, even if he was the one who invited danger in.
But then again, I was the one who had beckoned the danger the moment I stepped on the plane to Kauai. I had wanted nothing but oblivion, a place beyond death. Black space, dark shadows. I flirted with death so many times, from a mere handshake to full-on penetration. I wanted change in the most dramatic way; I wanted death to take me from my meager, loveless existence.
Until I realized that my existence never had to be empty.
Love was still out there, as were hopes and dreams and everything else I pretended I no longer wanted. Esteban opened my eyes, and he did so by showing me death, the devastating permanence of it. He dealt with death every day in his job, and here I was pretending I knew something about it. Pretending that death was a choice I wanted. It shouldn’t have been anyone’s choice. Not the choice of the man who tried to kill me, not Esteban’s. Not mine.
In the few days I’d known Esteban, he’d schooled me on what life was, and more importantly, what life could be.
Light.
Colors.
Paradise.
I slowly got out of my chair, not wanting to say good-bye. I knew I’d never see him again. He had my painting of golden seas to remind him of me.
I had nothing.
“Lani,” he said gently, his eyes swimming with compassion. He pulled me into him and wrapped his arms around me tightly. We held each other for as long as we could. Shallow, silly parts of me wanted to beg to go with him back to Mexico, to be a part of his life. But we knew our lives weren’t meant to intertwine that way. They were meant to meld for a sweet moment, nothing more.
He pulled away and kissed me softly on the forehead. “You’re valuable,” he said as he placed a cold green jade stone in my hands. “Keep painting.”
Then he turned and walked away. With my heart prickling, I heard him get on his motorcycle. The familiar roar filled my ears and then he was gone, the sound fading into the bird calls of midmorning.
I sighed, my chest feeling like an anvil had been placed on it. I squeezed the jade in my hand, knowing I’d never let it go. Slowly I turned and went to the back steps and sat down, staring at the paradise in front of me. The chickens pecked at the grass, not caring about my presence. They just . . . carried on.
And that was when I realized that Esteban hadn’t left me with nothing. I gave him a painting, but he gave me everything.
I fished my phone out of my pocket and dialed Doug.
I dialed home.
Doug picked up on the second ring.
“Honey?” I said into the phone, my voice soft. Tears were threatening my eyes, my lungs were starting to feel choked, aching for release.
There was a long pause. Finally Doug said, “Lani? What’s wrong?”
I couldn’t help it. I hadn’t heard concern in his voice for as long as I could remember. It was enough to open the floodgates. I cried, tears streaming down my face, and just bawled, everything flowing out of me, my tears taking me to another place.
“Doug, baby,” I finally managed to say, gulping hard for air, my lungs screaming. “Doug, I want to come home. I want to live.”
There was more silence, maybe just to let me sob, maybe to gather his thoughts and figure out what to say. Then Doug said something I didn’t think he would.
“I want you to live, too. I love you.”
The tears continued to come.
So much grief, so much sadness, so much betrayal, so much guilt. So much in my life had gone terribly wrong.
And yet there was so much hope.
And value in my hands.
THE END
About the Author
With her USA Today best-selling contemporary romance novel, Love, in English, and The Artists Trilogy (published by Grand Central Publishing), numerous foreign publication deals, and self-publishing success with her Experiment in Terror series, Vancouver-born Karina Halle is a true example of the term “hybrid author.” Though her books showcase her love of all things dark, sexy, and edgy, she’s a closet romantic at heart and strives to give her characters a HEA . . . whenever possible.
Karina holds a screenwriting degree from Vancouver Film School and a Bachelor of Journalism from TRU. Her travel writing, music reviews/interviews, and photography have appeared in publications such as Consequence of Sound, mxdwn, and GoNomad Travel Guides. She currently lives on an island on the coast of British Columbia where she’s preparing for the zombie apocalypse with her fiancé and rescue pup.
Karina may be found on social media at:
Facebook: Karina Halle
Twitter: @MetalBlonde
Website: www.experimentinterror.com
Website: www.authorkarinahalle.com
Books by Karina Halle include:
The Artists Trilogy
Sins and Needles
On Every Street
Shooting Scars
Bold Tricks
Experiment in Terror
Darkhouse #1
Red Fox #2
The Benson #2.5
Lying Season #4
On Demon Wings #5
Old Blood #5.5
The Dex-Files #5.7
Into the Hollow #6
And With Madness Comes the Light #6.5
Come Alive #7
Ashes to Ashes #8
Perception (Collection)
Dust to Dust #9
Other Books
Donners of the Dead
The Devil’s Metal
The Devil’s Reprise
Love, in English
Home
by Joanne Schwehm
Newly divorced Sophia DeMarco returns to her childhood home ready to pack up her past and begin her new life. What she discovers is there are parts in her past that aren’t so easily left behind.
I set the pen down on the long document and peered across the table at my now ex-husband. He seemed more like a stranger rather than the man I spent the last nineteen years with. His lips curled and I knew a smug look was next. I gracefully pushed my chair out from the table as my attorney took the paperwork and put it in her briefcase.
“After I file this with the clerk, we’ll be all set.” My attorney was matter-of-fact because to her this was work. To me, this was the end of something I thought would last forever.
I shook her hand and gathered my purse. “You h
ave my name-change papers, too, right?”
“Yes, you will be Sophia DeMarco as soon as these are filed.”
I was going to thank her when Jake’s voice startled me. “You changed your name?”
I let out a surprised half laugh. “Yeah. Did you think I would keep yours? I’m going back to my real name.” I looked at him as I leaned over the table. “I will never be referred to as Sophie McKenna again. Do you know how happy that makes me?”
Completely deadpan and devoid of any emotion, he said, “You’re a bitch. Thank God I’m free of you.”
Jake’s comment should have stung, but he had hurt me so much over the past few years that the comment didn’t faze me, mostly because I was so glad his last statement was now a fact. I picked up my bag and walked past him. Before I walked out the door, I looked at him one last time and decided to be the better person.
“Have a good life, Jake.”
He didn’t say anything but I didn’t care. I felt like I had just lost 190 pounds of dead weight and was ready to float out of there until I was greeted by Jake’s girlfriend, lover, or whatever the hell she was. She stood in front of me, smiling widely and rubbing her now-protruding baby bump.
I was so over all of this. Not saying a word, I continued to walk out the doors into the humid Pennsylvania air. I had a trip to make, and I wasn’t going to let anything get in the way of that.
• • •
Going home was something I had never intended to ever do. I shouldn’t refer to it as “home” because I hadn’t lived there since my father passed away eighteen years ago. My aunt Trudy lived in the house until she recently decided to move to Florida, which was probably more appealing than living in western New York.
I was surprised, to say the least, when Aunt Trudy called to tell me she would be moving. Since the deed was in my name and I didn’t want to live there, I decided to sell the house, and put it on the market. She had packed up most of the contents, but left my things for me to sort through. Now I needed to sign the sale paperwork, which meant I had to go home whether I wanted to or not, so I was meeting with a real estate agent tomorrow.
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