by Izzy Sweet
A little boy I don’t recognize, who can’t be more than five or six, sits on the bottom step, crying.
Lily and I rush over to help him. His mother reaches him first and squats down beside him, pulling him into her arms. She rocks and murmurs to her son until he quiets down.
Then she points an accusing finger at Adam.
“That little monster just pushed my Mason down the stairs.”
Lily gasps with indignation. “He wouldn’t.”
Lily and I turn towards the children while Lucifer approaches the woman, soothing her with an apology and a hand up.
Adam stands beside Abigail, his chin up in the air and his young eyes full of defiance. Lily looks at the little boy then back at Adam
“Adam?” Lily starts then thinks better of it. She presses her lips together and watches the woman walk off with her son before saying more.
I dismiss the rest of the bridesmaids, sending them off to the reception without me.
Once the woman and Mason are out of sight and Lucifer returns, Lily asks Adam, “Did you push that little boy down the stairs?”
Adam looks his mother dead in the eye and shows no remorse. “Yes.”
We both gasp and I feel Andrew joining my side. His hand covers my hand and his fingers squeeze mine.
The color draining from her face, Lily shakes her head in disbelief. “Why? Why would you do that?”
“Because he’s protecting what’s his,” Lucifer says as he comes up the steps.
“What do you mean, ‘what’s his’?” Lily asks shrilly, dividing her attention now between her husband and son.
“He was trying to kiss Abigail,” Adam says stiffly and that’s when I notice he and Abigail are holding hands. “I put a stop to it.”
“So you pushed him down the stairs?” Lily repeats in disbelief.
Adam nods his head and his lips begin to turn up with just the hint of a smile. “Yes. It was the most effective way to get rid of him.”
We all stare at him in shocked silence. Well, all of us except for one person…
Lucifer takes one look at us and laughs.
With pride, he walks over to Adam and then gives him a pat on the back.
And I’m filled with the most foreboding sense of dread when he says, “Like father, like son…”
The End
Playlists
Available on Spotify
Amy’s Playlist - http://spoti.fi/2rBXYMN
In The Air Tonight - Natalie Taylor
Call Me Devil - Friends in Tokyo
The Wolf - Phildel
Bad Dream - Ruelle
(I Just) Died in Your Arms - Epic Trailer version - Hidden Citizens
Real Life - Stealth
Burn - In This Moment
Kiss Me A Thousand Times - RAIGN
Oh Lord - In This Moment
All The King’s Men - The Rigs
Still Running - Epic Trailer version - Hidden Citizens
Holding Out For A Hero - Nothing but Thieves
Andrew’s Playlist - http://spoti.fi/2sjr007
Silence Speaks - While She Sleeps
Hooked - Fit For a King
Hurricane - Thrice
King of Mercy - Nine Shrines
B.M.F - Upon a Burning Body
Refuge - Northlane, In Hearts Wake
Eternally Yours - Motionless in White
Unbreakable - Of Mice & Men
War Is Killing Us All - Righteous Vendetta
Also by Izzy and Sean
Disciples
Keeping Lily (Lucifer & Lily)
Stealing Amy (Andrew & Amy)
The Pounding Hearts Series
Banging Reaper (Chase & Avery)
Slamming Demon (Brett & Mandy)
Bucking Bear (Max & Grace)
Breaking Beast (Alexander and Christy)
By Sean Moriarty
Gettin’ Lucky
Gettin’ Dirty
By Izzy Sweet
Letting Him In
Stepbrother Catfish
About Us
Izzy Sweet & Sara Page – The one and the same brain.
Sean Moriarty- The real life alpha bad boy that Izzy tamed.
Residing in Cincinnati, Ohio, Izzy and Sean are high school sweethearts that just celebrated their 10th wedding anniversary, though they’ve been together since they were teenagers – over fifteen years.
Both avid and voracious readers, they share a great love and appreciation for a great story, and attribute their early role-playing days as the fledgling beginnings of their joint writing career.
You can see more of our works at our website - www.dirtynothings.com
Keeping Lily
My husband traded me away to save his own life…
And now I belong to the devil.
One night and everything in my life changed. Two words and my world turned dark.
“Take her.”
Owing the most ruthless crime lord in Garden City five million dollars, my husband chose to trade me and my children away to save himself.
I was on the cusp of freedom, so close to divorcing that scumbag I was married to.
Now I’m enslaved to a man who is obsessed with me. A man so wicked and beautiful they call him Lucifer.
So alluring, he makes the angels weep with envy. He’s so powerful, I can’t stop myself from bending to his will.
He’s determined to master me, and he won’t rest until I give him all.
He wants my light, and he wants my dark.
He wants my body, and he wants my heart.
But most of all, he wants the one thing I can’t give him. The one thing I can’t bear to part with…
My soul.
Chapter One
Lucifer
“Motherfucker!” Comes out of my mouth in a growl as I shake my hand.
The punch to this piece of shit’s jaw sent tingling sensations up my arm.
Mickey Dalton sputters gibberish out of his busted lips. “I… I… Swear I will pay… just gotta…”
I’m tempted to keep this up, but fuck it. I have bigger fish to fry than this small time fucking gambler.
Looking over the man’s shoulder, I nod to Andrew. “Ensure he fully understands how much he owes. Remove his pinky.”
“Yes, sir.” Andrew nods.
“Wha… No!” Mickey shouts as Andrew heads to the table where he keeps a black bag stowed.
Turning around, I look at Simon, my right-hand man. “Where are we at with the other three files?”
“Two have been collected on, the last I was waiting on your judgment.”
“Marshall Dawson.”
“He has flat out refused to cooperate with any of our attempts to collect. He believes his status is untouchable. He will give us no answer on where he was or what has happened to our money.”
“Is he finally home?” I ask.
“Arrived earlier tonight.”
A metallic snip rings out into the room followed by a high-pitched scream. I turn to see Andrew wiping the blood on the guy’s t-shirt.
Andrew raises his voice only slightly as he grabs the man by the throat. “Stop fucking squealing, asshole. Lucifer doesn’t like hearing pigs fucking about.”
Walking out through the door and into the hall, I look to Simon. “How are the spreadsheets with Bart coming along?”
“Clean, with everything accounted for…”
“Yet, you still have doubts?” I ask him as we walk.
“I do. I just can’t explain why.”
“Keep an eye on him then.”
Simon holds an umbrella over my head as we walk out of the abandoned hotel. The shattered glass door slams shut behind us as he ushers me into the sleek black Mercedes SUV.
Getting comfortable in the backseat, I reach over and pull the file left on the other seat for me. The name Marshall Dawson is neatly typed on the tab.
I let out a quiet sigh to myself. I knew this one was going to come back as a thorn in my side.
Marshall Dawson is a waste of breathable air. The man used the connections he had with my father and another city boss to secure a loan from us. Five million in cash.
Five fucking million dollars with nothing to show for it.
Five fucking million dollars down the drain.
I took this on as a favor to Sean O’Riley. A favor to a now dead and buried man.
Shit like that doesn’t sit well with me. But when I went to the top to seek retribution, I was stonewalled. I was told the man who killed Sean, and all the surrounding issues, have been dealt with.
Fuck that. I want my pound of flesh.
Shaking my head, I open the file. It’s no use going down that train of thought right now. I can pursue it another time if I need to.
I slowly flip through the pages we have on Marshall.
It’s funny how we can put a file together on a person where he is reduced to twenty or so pages. I can see every payment he has made on his mortgage to how many times he has been in the overdraft with his bank.
I look at his legal outstanding debts, and I look at the five-million-dollar debt he now owes to me personally. Anger is slowly creeping through my veins.
Flipping through the pages, I look at his family life. Since he borrowed the money I have had one of my men keeping close tabs on his family. He is married to Lilith Merriweather, aged twenty-seven, and has two children, a boy and a girl. Both children under the age of seven.
I look at the picture of Marshall for a long time as we drive through the late-night rain. The man is closer to my father’s age than mine. How did he marry a woman so young? Money and his slimy charm must have played a large part of it.
I look through the pictures of his family quickly. The children are pretty in a child way. Blonde hair and blue eyes, they must take after their mother. Marshall must have married way out of his league.
My fingers stop as the picture of his wife comes up. Emerald green eyes, sensuous pink lips, high cheekbones, pale flawless skin and long blonde hair. All of those parts on their own would make her remarkable. Even if her face was overall plain just one of her features would stun a person. But together they make something otherworldly.
She is beauty incarnate.
Fingers tracing the lines of her lips, I frown. How the hell did that man marry a woman like this? I flip further through the pictures of her. There aren’t many, but what I do see shows me that she is unlike any other woman I have ever laid eyes on.
She is perfection.
There is a rather candid photo of her putting groceries in the back of her red Volvo station wagon. Her hair is all over the place. Her slender legs are encased in yoga pants, feet in Uggs. Her daughter looks like she is giving her problems as she tries to watch her and still put groceries in the back.
Even this… domesticity calls to me.
There is a glamour shot of some type mixed in and I can see just how haunting those eyes are. They are calling to me, pulling me in to get forever lost. I can feel my hands curling into themselves. She is pulling me from where I sit in the SUV.
“Take me to Marshall’s, James,” I say to my driver.
Looking back at me from the front seat, Simon says, “Now? You don’t want to wait until tomorrow?”
“No. We’re going there now.”
The car makes a few turns as we pull off the freeway and then back on again.
My eyes drift out the window for a moment to look at the rain that has been pelting down on the city all week.
Looking back to the picture, though, I see something I haven’t seen before—a light. Inside I feel an ember flaring to life.
My muscles are going taut with expectation.
I need to see this woman; I need to see if what the pictures show me is true.
Lily
My husband, Marshall, is sleeping beside me, snoring loudly, and I have the strongest urge to smack him.
I want to scream in his pale, pudgy face. I want to tell him to wake the fuck up. I want to ask him why he’s back in my bed.
But I just lay beside him and stare up at the ceiling instead.
It’s time to accept reality.
Our marriage is done.
Dead.
Today was the final nail in the coffin.
First thing in the morning, after I get the kids off to school, I’m going to meet with a divorce attorney. I can’t go on like this. This is no way to live, this is just…existing.
And I’m sick of it.
After growing up dirt poor, I married Marshall thinking I would finally have financial security. I would always have a roof over my head. I would never go hungry again.
Foolishly, I believed his lust for me would turn to love. That like an arranged marriage, our feelings for each other would grow after time. If we had children, we could make a real go of it.
But this, the lack of love, the lack of care, isn’t worth it. I rather starve than stay in this loveless marriage.
Marshall has been gone for weeks, traveling on business. He’s gone more than he’s home. Ever since our first child, Adam, was born six years ago, he’s been finding more and more reasons to leave us.
There’s always some client on the other coast that needs his help. Or some corporation up north that has to have his expertise or they’re going to lose millions on… something…
It’s funny, even after almost eight years of marriage I still don’t know exactly what his job title or true profession is. Whenever I ask him about it he just brushes me off, doesn’t have time to explain it, or says I wouldn’t understand.
Like I’m some kind of idiot.
If I was an idiot I wouldn’t know about all the women he’s been hooking up with. I know that’s one of the reasons he’s always leaving us. He has a girlfriend in every city.
Yet, he won’t even touch me when I throw myself at him.
I sigh, looking down at the red nightie I bought from Victoria’s Secret and pull the blanket up to cover my breasts.
He won’t even touch me when I’ve taken great pains to dress up for him.
Suddenly my eyes feel swollen and my nose stings. I have to blink back my tears and take a deep breath. Rolling my eyes back up, I focus on the ceiling.
This shouldn’t hurt, dammit. This isn’t a bad thing, this is good.
This is… freedom.
I no longer have to pretend this is a real marriage. No more keeping up appearances on Facebook. No more making excuses for him with my family and friends.
No more trying to explain to the children that daddy is sorry but he had to miss their birthday—again.
This is a fresh start, a new beginning.
I’ve been doing everything on my own for years now. Losing him won’t make much of a difference.
Marshall suddenly grunts loudly and rolls over.
The air turns sour and I resist the urge to gag.
Gah, he is such a pig.
Chapter Two
Lily
I’m not sure what wakes me up. It could have been the light turning on.
Marshall’s loud, “What the fuck?”
Or the soft, menacing voice that says, “Hello, Marshall. I’m not interrupting anything, am I?”
Even under my warm blanket, that voice sends a chill down my spine and I peel my eyes open, shivering.
At first, the light is too harsh on my eyes and I have to blink several times before the strange man standing in our bedroom comes into focus.
This must be a dream, I convince myself and squeeze my eyes shut. I open them again but I still just can’t believe it.
There’s no way that man is real.
Standing in the center of my bedroom, the man is illuminated by a halo of light coming from the lamp. The light seems to love him, clinging to him. He’s glowing and so alluring, he looks almost angelic.
“What the fuck are you doing in my house? You can’t just come walking in here…” Marshall sputters. His fat fists grab the blanket, yanking it away from me as he pul
ls it up his hairy chest.
I gasp as the cool air hits my breasts and the sound draws the attention of the angelic stranger. He turns his icy blue gaze on me and I’m utterly stunned as our eyes meet.
With just a look I feel held by him.
Trapped.
Frozen.
Helpless.
He’s so beautiful it hurts to look upon him. The kind of beauty that’s so strong, so deeply felt, it’s like experiencing a piece of music that moves you and staring into the sun at the same time.
Tears prick my eyes and my skin tingles as I break out in gooseflesh.
His face is a composition of features so perfect that now that I’ve glimpsed them I fear all other men will be forever compared to him.
Chiseled cheeks, full, pink lips. A strong jaw and straight nose. Blonde hair so pale it’s nearly snow white and brushed back from his forehead.
It feels like an eternity passes as we stare at each other across my bedroom and then his eyes break away only to slide down, warming as they lock on the pale swells of my breasts.
A flush creeps up my chest. I’m not naked but in this little lacy nightie, I feel like I am.
I grab the blanket and Marshall cries out as I yank it back. He shoots me a dirty look but I give him my coldest glare and practically dare him to try and take it back.
Screw him, no one cares about his hairy man-chest.
The stranger watches our little tug of war, his lips curving with a hint of amusement.
Marshall finally gives up on trying to wrestle the blanket away from me and decides to steal my pillow instead. Covering his chest with my pillow, he hugs it tightly and puffs up as he says, “If you leave now, Lucifer, I’ll forget this incident ever happened.”