Being Zolt

by D. L. Raver

  “Whatever.”

  The line went dead. I let out a long breath and sat in the nearest chair. “Are you all right, Delaney?”

  “Sure. Just nervous. Marcus won’t rollover without a fight. Don’t underestimate him.”

  “We won’t,” Irelyn said and sat next to me. “We’re prepared. Thanks to my brother and his list, we know the sex club’s member’s names.”

  “Is that how you found me?”

  “Yes,” I answered. “Your name was on the list with a star by it. We figured you must be someone important.”

  Delaney started pacing. “Won’t all the people who have been involved with Marcus—with his club and other illegal activities—won’t they be in as much trouble as he will be?”

  “We’ve got him, Delaney. Marcus will be stripped of most everything and forced from the state--and possibly the country when all is said and done,” I said, placing one ankle over the other knee.

  “How? I don’t understand,” Delaney asked as she continued her pacing. She looked extremely pale, and I worried she’d pass out from stress, from her illness, or from a combo of both.

  “We have this, Delaney. This is what we do,” T-bone said, coming out of the corner.

  “I’m sure you do, Mr. Stanley. It’s just that Marcus won’t ever give up. No matter what happens, he’ll never give up on me, ever. He’s always said that and I believe him.”

  “He will now. The reason Marcus has been so powerful is that he has kept the membership secret. No one knew who else was in the club. They all wore masks when in the common area. But we’ve brought them all together and united them against Marcus. These aren’t just any men; these are men of considerable wealth and power on their own. Together, they can force him to yield by freezing his money, threatening to turn him into the Department of Justice, or any number of things. Some of them have extensive criminal connections that Marcus wouldn’t want turning on him. He’s done for, and I guarantee he won’t see this coming.”

  “But he’ll be free?” Delaney asked. She stopped her pacing and played with the zipper of her jacket.

  “I know what you’re thinking, Delaney,” Irelyn said, her voice quavering. “It has taken everything in me not to kill him myself. Because of Marcus, my family is gone. But I won’t stoop to his level; stripping him of his power and money will be torture enough. We have the means to make sure he never gets them back.”

  Irelyn walked over to Delaney and took both of her hands in her own. “Marcus is done. He’ll be out of all our lives for good. In just a few hours, you’ll be free.”

  “It’s not that I don’t believe you; I do. I believe you all believe this will work.” Delaney stepped back from Irelyn and wrapped her arms around herself.

  I found myself wanting to comfort her, but I didn’t know how. I ran my hands through my hair to relieve some of my frustration.

  “I know Marcus in ways you all don’t. He’ll find a way; he always does. He swore to me only death would keep us apart.” She turned her gaze to me, and I saw the fear spark in her brown eyes.

  Irelyn’s gaze darted to mine and I shrugged. What else could we say to convince her? Nothing. All we could do was prove we had this under control. The three of us would make sure whatever time Delaney had left would be spent Marcus-free.

  Irelyn, Delaney, T-bone, and I waited outside the ranch house for Marcus to arrive. My attempts to keep Irelyn out of this fell on deaf ears. My wife refused to stay home, arguing that Kenna would need her. Since I couldn’t refute her logic, I gave in. The only reason Cory and Peter weren’t here with us, as well, was because we decided not to tell them; we didn’t want them involved if anything were to go wrong.

  Irelyn had ahold of Delaney’s hand; the two of them held on to each other with a death grip. Poor Delaney trembled, and she constantly licked her lips as if she couldn’t keep them from drying out. Even I worried that something we hadn’t planned for would happen.

  I pushed back the knot of dread, trusting T-bone had this in hand. But this was Marcus, and as much as I hated to admit this, he seemed omnipotent. I stepped protectively in front of Irelyn, and she grabbed my hand.

  The sound of tires on gravel made us all jump a little; a black Mercedes drove up the tree-lined drive and stopped.

  Marcus exited the vehicle with an expression of utter hatred on his face. His beady, gray eyes were narrowed, and his brows were drawn together. The wrinkled shirt and jeans he wore made me think he hadn’t changed clothes in a while.

  I swear I heard a growl as he glanced in my direction.

  Walking around to the passenger side, he opened the door to the backseat and jerked Kenna from the car.

  She stumbled forward and almost lost her footing, but out of nowhere, Sloan appeared and scooped Kenna into his arms, holding the whimpering woman close against him.

  “I’ve got you, Kenna,” Sloan said, his Irish accent almost a coo.

  She didn’t look the worse for wear physically; though, I recognized the blouse and skirt, she’d been wearing the last time we’d seen her. Knowing Marcus, he probably hadn’t given her anything else to wear. What struck me most were her wide, green, haunted eyes; I could only imagine the hell Marcus had put her through.

  Tears streamed down Kenna’s face and heard Irelyn suck in a breath. She made a move in Kenna’s direction, but I reached behind me and wrapped my arm around her, making her stay put.

  “Del, come to me.” Marcus held out his hand in Delaney’s direction.

  I looked back at her and saw the apprehension in Delaney’s face as she made her way to Marcus.

  We had gone over the plan several times. Before Marcus could leave with Delaney, T-bone would intercept, taking her from Marcus. His new reality would be revealed to him. Marcus had lost at his own game. The plan was simple and straightforward, and it couldn’t fail.

  “Are you okay, Del?” Marcus ran his hands over her, inspecting her. It was too weird to see him care for someone other than himself.

  Maybe the bastard did have a heart after all.

  “Fine,” Delaney said, her voice void of emotion.

  Marcus leaned in and whispered something in her ear, and her entire body stiffened as she shook her head.

  A cool and unnatural wind rippled through the trees, making the knot of dread in my stomach turn into an avalanche of foreboding.

  I glanced over at T and saw the same reticence in his dark-eyed stare. I took several steps back, taking Irelyn with me. Even though things had gone off without a hitch so far, I was starting to think we’d been overconfident.

  “In the car, Del.” His face hardened and his lips thinned into a straight line.

  “Marcus, don’t. Please. Let this be over.”

  “In. The. Car. Now!”

  “Please, Marcus.”

  “You don’t get it, Del. They took you from me. They need to understand, once and for all, I’m in control. No one fucks with what belongs to me.”

  “No, Marcus, I don’t belong to you, not anymore. It’s over. They outplayed you this time. There’s nothing left. But I’m here, and I will give myself to you again freely, but only if you leave with me now. Do the right thing for a change. If you love me, do the right thing.” Delaney’s voice broke as her tears came.

  I glanced around, still not understanding why Delaney had deviated from the plan, and I studied the playing field, searching for what I had missed.

  T-bone and I shared a glance, knowing he was probably wondering the same thing.

  Both of us came to the same conclusion at the same time, our eyes darting to the girl in Sloan’s arms.

  Kenna!

  “It’s Kenna, Sloan! There’s something on Kenna!” I yelled.

  Marcus cackled with delight.

  Sloan put Kenna down and began stripping her out of her clothes.

  Irelyn freaked, screaming at us to stop, but it was Delaney’s sudden movement, a flash of steel in the sunlight, and a painful grunt from Marcus that made us all stop in
our tracks.

  Delaney stabbed Marcus in the chest, and from the placement of the blade, I was pretty sure she’d hit his heart.

  “Del?” Marcus choked out, staring dumbfounded at the dagger protruding from his chest. His body slumped forward as he fell to the ground.

  Delaney followed him down, cradling his head in her lap. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she caressed his face.

  “Why, Del? Why?” Marcus asked as blood saturated his button-down shirt and the ground below him turned a muddy red.

  “You left me no choice. This is not the person you were meant to be. Not the boy who did anything to protect me; the boy I loved. Somehow, you lost him and let this monster—one worse than your father—take over. I couldn’t let you keep hurting people, Marcus. I couldn’t.”

  “But I love you. Only you. Everything I did was for you.” Marcus’s voice was harsh but loud enough to hear the hurt and betrayal in it.

  “I never wanted you to love me like this. All I ever wanted was you. But you changed, and you hurt too many people. I’m sorry, Marcus. So sorry. Please forgive me.”

  Marcus raised a hand to touch her face, but he coughed, stopping his hand from reaching its intended destination. Blood ran from the corner of his mouth, and with one last gurgling breath, life exited Marcus Xavier’s body.

  “Take her shoes off.” Somehow Delaney found her voice through her tears. She looked up from the dead man in her arms. “Strip her. He said Kenna will kill them all. Explosives, maybe; I don’t know.”

  “Fuck,” T-bone mumbled as he pulled off Kenna’s shoes and tossed them into the empty field.

  I pulled Irelyn to me and held her close, just as Sloan did the same with a naked Kenna. T opened the back end of the Suburban and found a blanket for Kenna and covered her.

  The tableau was too fucking surreal. I tried to take it in, grasp what had just occurred, but I was dumb-stricken by it all.

  Marcus Xavier had bled out before our very eyes, betrayed by the woman he loved, and who, by all accounts, loved him. All the shit of the last weeks had come to an end and we had won. The man who’d taken so much from so many people was dead.

  I wanted to thank Delaney for being so brave and for making an impossible choice. But how did you thank someone for doing the unthinkable?

  I had assumed when this day arrived, I would be ecstatic, but in the wake of his destruction, the victory came hollow. His death didn’t fix my leg. It didn’t heal the deep wounds my wife still nursed. It didn’t give Kenna back the time he’d taken from her or heal her wounds. And it didn’t bring Chris or Irelyn’s parents back, either.

  The only saving grace I could see in this all was Irelyn and I were free to forge a happy ending for ourselves.

  As I held my trembling, sobbing wife to me, I vowed to do exactly that.

  Two Months Later

  “Tell me what my birthday surprise is,” I said, pinning a naked Irelyn to the bed underneath me. I held her arms above her head and pushed into her but didn’t move. If she refused to volunteer the information, I would torture it out of her.

  The one thing my wife hated was being denied a mind-blowing orgasm, and I’d made sure to work her into a sexual frenzy before I slammed on the brakes. The stupid part of this plan, however, was that I tortured myself needlessly, as well. I already knew what she planned for my birthday surprise, but trying to get it out of her had been too delicious to forego.

  “No,” she countered in a raspy voice and bucked her hips against me, trying to get me to move. When I didn’t budge, she worked her muscles, clenching and unclenching my cock from the inside.

  “Fuck,” I grunted. My wife knew how to work me, and if she kept this up, I wouldn’t last much longer.

  “Yes, please.” She wiggled under me and I gave in, fucking her hard and fast, kissing her at the same time.

  I slid my hand between us and found her clit, flicking it with my thumb and forefinger.

  Irelyn screamed my name as she came, her release triggering my own.

  “Happy Birthday,” she said and kissed me deeply.

  “Thank you,” I panted and rolled off her to lie on my side. “By the way, I know what my surprise is.”

  “How?” She turned on her side and frowned at me.

  “T told me. He didn’t want me to freak out.”

  “Damn him. And? Are you excited?” She bit the side of her thumb and gave me a cautious smile—her eyes wide and questioning.

  “I think it’s time.”

  “You do? I mean, I can cancel if you think it’s too soon. It’s just that I want it to be part of our life.”

  “I know.” I kissed her softly on the lips, falling more in love with this woman. “I agree. Truth be told, I miss it. Plus, you love it. How can I deny you?”

  “Mmm. I do love it, but I love you more. I just want you to be happy, and I think you’ve missed this.”

  “I have,” I admitted. “So, get that sweet ass of yours out of bed and let’s go.”

  “Okay.” She bounced out of the bed and skipped her way into the shower with me trailing behind, silently praying that I was, in fact, ready to stand on a football field again. Even if I weren’t, I wouldn’t dream of taking this day away from her; it made me happy to see excitement return to Irelyn’s world.

  The month following Marcus’s death had been hard on us all. Delaney’s health took a turn for the worse after that day at the ranch. She’d loved Marcus, and taking his life had broken her will to live.

  T-bone had made sure to cover up the real reason for Marcus’s death so she wouldn’t be held accountable. The man had enough enemies that no one seemed to care about how and why he died; they were just happy he was gone.

  Irelyn, Brody, and I did what we could for Delaney, and in caring for her, Irelyn found a way to set her own grief to rest.

  We made Delaney as comfortable as possible, but she had given up the fight. Early, on a bright Sunday morning, Delaney Carmichael passed with Irelyn holding her hand. Marcus’s name was the last word she spoke before dying. I hoped that Marcus wasn’t waiting for her on the other side because I liked to believe that Delaney was destined for a much better place than where Xavier ended up.

  Per her wishes, we buried her next to Marcus. That had been a little over a month ago, and this was the first time I’d seen my wife truly happy since.

  Spending time with Delaney, learning the details about what Marcus had done to her and other women, and the international sex trafficking he’d been involved in, set a fire under Irelyn. Sweet Delaney had been the good counterpart to Marcus’s evilness.

  On the day of Delaney’s funeral, Irelyn made a decision about her life.

  “I want to set up the Delaney Carmichael Foundation for Sexually Exploited Women and Children,” she told me as we snuggled together in bed. “I’m going to go to law school and study human rights law.”

  “So, you have decided to do that. I like that idea,” I said as I stroked her hair. My wife was a selfless person, and it didn’t surprise me that she chose to spend her life helping others. Lately, she’d been concentrating on Kenna and helping her recover from her time with Marcus. The gravity of what Marcus had come close to accomplishing hit us all hard. One of T-bone’s men inspected Kenna’s clothing and found plastic explosives in her shoes, the detonator in Marcus’s car’s key fob. He had intended to blow us up at some point, and Delaney had saved all our lives.

  Knowing this made Kenna go off the rails. When we tried to help her, but Kenna denied all of us, including her brother. Sloan was the only person who seemed to have any influence over her. We all wondered what the hell was going on between them, but none of us broached the subject. We didn’t want to interfere with the only person she seemed to trust.

  Even I had been affected by the near death experience, and I finally allowed Brody to find me a therapist that specialized in Hypnotherapy. The memory of that awful day on the field was starting to retreat as a result.

  That was two mont
hs ago, and today, I would return to a place I thought I’d never see again.

  When we arrived at the Cardinals’ training facilities in Tempe, I squeezed Irelyn’s hand, reassuring both of us that I was okay with her reuniting me with my first love. In truth, my stomach had taken up residence at my feet.

  Training camp was in full-force with the season just weeks away. As we approached the field, I could hear the grunts and groans of the players working out. My heart sped up with the old excitement. I could remember, as clear as day, my first training camp on this very field. The same nerves from that day returned. I told myself I was being silly. That had been almost seven years ago, and I wasn’t the newly-drafted QB anymore. I was a man who had football stolen from him, and today, I was ready to get her back.

  “Are you okay?” Irelyn asked as we walked hand-in-hand onto the field. I guess my reassurance had failed.

  “Yeah,” I said and breathed in deeply. The smell of the turf and the sound of the coaches barking at the players were bittersweet, but also exhilarating.

  “Z-man,” T-bone said, coming up beside us, slapping me on my back. He shook Brody’s hand and kissed Irelyn’s cheek. “Brings back memories, eh?”

  “Yeah,” I said for the second time, other words failing me.

  “Oh, by the way, Joe Franklin was found dead in his apartment. His neck had been slashed and a deflated football had been shoved down his throat. Before you ask, I had nothing to do with it.” T grinned wickedly at me, and for a brief moment, I wondered if my once offensive lineman had finally made good on his promise to take out the man who’d ruined my career.

  “Wow! No shit?” I said and shook my head. “And you had nothing to do with it?”

  T-bone held up his hand. “I swear.”

  “What? Irelyn asked, cocking her head.

  “Nothing. I’ll tell you later.”

  “Okay.” She kissed my cheek. “Brody and I are going to go park it on the bleachers. Have fun.”

  She and Brody strolled down the field to the bleachers, and I took a moment to appreciate my wife’s body in her cutoff shorts and AZ Cardinals football jersey, the back reading ‘Hamil’ with a white number seventeen.