Out of the Ashes (Marked as His Book 1)

by Rossi, Monica

  Dax’s heart was in his throat, she’d called out to Fern as she ran. Her high pitched child’s voice cutting through the other noise, singing a one word song that all children cried out in joy, in pain, with fear or delight. Mommy.

  “You know Seanna,” Fern said holding the cup of coffee up to her lips, “Who would have thought it would be so hard to find a job that doesn’t want to pay taxes on you.”

  “Don’t you worry sweet girl, you’ll find something soon, I know it,” the woman nodded her head, nursing her own cup of coffee.

  It was the last coffee they’d have for a while. Seanna had been kind enough to hide Fern away the best way she knew how, but now the little bit of money Fern had managed to take with her was dwindling, even with the work she’d managed to find so far, she was going to have to stop cutting even the little luxuries, like coffee.

  And she couldn’t expect Seanna to support her on the little bit she earned sitting with the elderly during the day and children during the nights.

  No, the simple fact was Fern was going to have to either get a job or rethink everything.

  There was no way she could go back to Tim, but there was also no way she could sit by and let Katy go without. These were the days she really missed having a family. Even if they had been distant and cold, her mother would have never let her grandchild go without. Or her daughter for that matter.

  Come to think of it she would have been able to get out of her situation so much easier if she’d just had someone to call for help.

  And the sole living relative she had, her “sister”, wasn’t exactly her biggest fan. If she called her then she’d probably turn around and call Tim just out of spite.

  No, she was on her own. She had to make it work, because there was no other option.

  “Have you checked with that daycare end of the street?” Seanna asked.

  “Yeah, that was one of the first places I checked. They said they couldn’t chance paying someone under the table because they’d lose their government funding if they got caught.”

  Seanna nodded with understanding. “Well something be coming up for you, best believe it, you just trust in the Lord God and you’ll find what it is you need.”

  Fern wasn’t sure that the Lord God was so keen on helping her avoid paying taxes and was about to say so when her phone rang. Another unknown number.

  “Who is it,” Seanna asked.

  “I don’t know, the number isn’t in my contacts,” she answered.

  “Could be one of de places you talk to bout a job?” Seanna suggested, “You answer it and see.”

  She looked down at the number again but hesitated.

  Seanna’s eyes softened with understanding, “Here, hand it to me, I’ll answer it and see who tis.”

  Fern handed the phone over to Seanna gratefully. She knew she was going to have to get over her fear of the unknown but today wasn’t the day it was going to happen.

  “Hello,” she listened as Seanna answered and then watched as the woman’s eyes widened with fear, “No, you have the wrong number. Nobody here with a name like that, “ a pause, Seanna put a hand to her chest, “No, I don’t know that person. No, goodbye.”

  Fern realized she’d clutched Seanna’s arm tightly and let it go, “Who was it?”

  “I don’t know but they asked for Felicity.”

  Chills ran the length of Fern’s body. It had to be Tim. But how could it be? The phone was one of those cheap little Wal-Mart specials and she didn’t even have her new name linked to the account, she just went and bought a new card that added time every month. There was absolutely no way this number could be traced back to her new identity unless she’d specifically given someone the number, and there was even less of a chance that it could be linked to her old life.

  So how had he done it?

  Money. Private investigators and money. She didn’t know how or where she’d slipped up but somehow she’d made a mistake and now she was going to have to deal with it.

  She started making a mental list of all the things she had to do. Pack, but she’d pack light, she didn’t know how far she was going to have to go, there was no way she could haul everything with her even if she didn’t own that much. Maybe she could somehow get Seanna to ship them to her when she got to wherever she landed. She didn’t have much money but it would do to get her away, she’d worry about surviving whenever she got there. Wherever there was.

  “I’ve got to pack,” she told a wide eyed Seanna who nodded.

  “I’ll help, I’ll start with the babies clothes, you go get yours,” they started to part ways and get to work when the phone rang again freezing them in their tracks.

  Fern looked down at the screen. Another unknown number, but a different one from last time.

  She didn’t know what to do. She wasn’t sure she could stay brave if she heard his voice and on the other hand she needed to know if it was him, needed to know if she’d been found before she went running for the hills.

  She took a deep breath and pressed the green button.

  “Who is this?” she demanded, her voice harder and stronger than she’d expected it to be, and she felt a shimmer of pride at the fact that she wasn’t cowering.

  “Uh, it’s Dax, did I catch you at a bad time?”

  A breath she hadn’t known she was holding rushed out of her as a surge of relief ran through her body that was so strong her legs gave way. Luckily she was right in front of the couch and managed to just sit down hard instead of completely falling on the floor. She wanted to cry she was so relieved. It was just Dax. She must have put down the wrong name on the consultation paperwork she’d filled out in the tattoo shop.

  She mentally chided herself for being so sloppy, she couldn’t let that happen again.

  “Hello?” she heard her phone say. She’d taken it away from her ear and had it cradled in her lap.

  Dax was still on the line. Of course he was, and of course she acted like a crazy person when he’d called. Of course.

  “Oh hello,” she said, “I’m sorry but I thought you were going to be someone else.”

  “Well, I’m glad I’m not the person you were expecting,” he quipped.

  She laughed nervously in reply, and that led to a moment of awkward silence. She wasn’t sure what to say, she wasn’t used to social calls.

  “So, I was calling to ask you if you were still looking for a job.”

  “Yes, I am actually,” she replied, curious.

  “Well, Ma is getting pretty tired of staying up here all the time and with us being open on nights and weekends she doesn’t get much time off to go play Bingo.” His “ma” didn’t look like the kind of lady that would be caught dead in a Bingo hall, but she let the lie pass. “So I was wondering if you would like to work here. Maybe 3 days a week? The shifts are 12 hours, from noon to midnight, so even though it’s only 3 days you’d still get 36 hours.”

  She didn’t know what to say, should she ask for time to think about it? Was there anything to think about? She had to have a job, even if it was working for a man who brought out her… more basic instincts. She’d just have to control herself where he was concerned, of course she had to take the job.

  “Thank you, I’d love to come work for you. Thank you so much for thinking of me.”

  “That’s great, when can you start?”

  “I can be there tomorrow or whenever it’s convenient for you,” she replied.

  “Tomorrow will work fine. Ma will be so relieved to get some time off.”

  “See you tomorrow, bye,” she said, dazed that a job had literally fallen in her lap after her mad dash around the city trying to find work unsuccessfully. Well, that was one worry down, now if she could just refrain from acting like a fool around Dax she’d be ok.

  She looked into Seanna’s questioning eyes, about to explain, when a stray thought rambled through her head. Maybe Seanna’s Lord God was paying more attention than she’d given him credit for. She’d have to make sure she and Ka
ty prayed extra hard at bedtime, she had a lot to be thankful for.

  “So Ma… I need to talk to you.”

  “Oh lord, this can’t be anything good.”

  She stowed her lemon scented Pledge and rag below the counter. She usually started her day with all the cleaning chores that needed to be done around the shop. There didn’t seem to be a lot of business coming in at lunch time anyway, most of their clients walked in after work, or after a few drinks. And Ma said she liked to clean while the sun was shining so she could see everything sparkle.

  “No, it’s nothing bad. I just wanted to let you know that I’d hired someone else.”

  Her meticulously painted on eyebrows rose. “Replacing Sandy so quickly, she hasn’t even left yet Dax, how do you think that’s going to make her feel?”

  He hadn’t even thought of replacing Sandy yet, though he supposed that was something he was going to have to get to eventually.

  “No, I’ve got someone coming in to help you,” he said, trying to wince as the words left his mouth.

  She let that sink in for a minute, “I don’t need any help. I like doing this all by myself just fine.”

  “I know you do, but you work 12 hours a day six days a week…”

  “So do you.”

  He took a breath and let the words fly, hoping they didn’t come back to slap him, “And that’s too much for a woman your age.”

  “A woman my age, I’m only –“

  “And the girl really needs a job and she’s got a kid,” he had to rush to get in that part about her having the kid before Ma exploded without hearing him out.

  Her face softened, “Anyone I know.”

  “Not really, that girl who came in to get a tattoo but ran out.”

  “The one you called dibs on,” a slight smile quirked the corner of her lips, “and how do you know she needs a job?”

  He felt blood rushing to his face, could a man of his age and experience blush? “I might have followed her.”

  “You followed her? Dax, really, what has gotten into you? You didn’t used to be so creepy.”

  “Yeah, I know. I didn’t mean to be creepy but I saw her in the grocery store and she was asking for a job, but she needed to get paid under the table. Of course Vinny freaked the fuck out on her and she ended up running out of there too. So I followed her. She stopped at all kinds of places and she almost went into Cocktails & Cuties, but stopped just shy of that. Then she stopped by the park to get her daughter.” He looked down and the shiny clean countertop and then back at his Ma, waiting for her to say something. When she didn’t respond he continued, “She just has that lost feel to her, you know?”

  She let out a sigh, “Yeah, I know son. So when does she start? I want to have the place ship shape before she gets here.”

  Dax pulled out his phone and looked at the time, “uh, in about 15 minutes.”

  “What? Jesus Dax,” she huffed as she grabbed a bottle of Windex and some paper towels from under the counter, “A little warning would have been nice.” She huffed away, taking the cleaning supplies with her.

  He watched her go and smiled. He loved that woman more than almost anything else on earth. Smart mouth, smokers cough and all. And she really wasn’t that old she just looked it from having lived such a hard life. And the tanning beds. And cigarettes. But she still didn’t need to be spending every free minute she had working at the shop. He wanted her to have some free time to get her hair done or make some friends or yes even play some bingo if the mood struck her.

  She’d lived for so long without knowing much comfort, he wanted her to have some now. It really was lucky he’d found someone to take some of the work from her. Without a sympathetic story he’d doubt he could have ever wrested her away from the shop at all.

  Like many people who had been close to the edge, she felt panic if she wasn’t constantly doing something.

  He remembered the first time he’d seen her. He knew what she was and she knew what he was and neither had room to judge the other.

  She’d been sitting on a bench outside of their motel room and he’d just spent his night making deliveries of his latest shipment of goods and he had just enough money to cover the weekly fee for the motel room, but not quite enough to buy groceries and a couple of new outfits for Sandy, who seemed intent on outgrowing everything as soon as she got it.

  She’d been sitting there on the bench holding her side.

  “You alright?” he asked, wary of a stranger sitting just outside the door where his brother and sister were.

  “Yeah, just taking a minute to catch my breath, it’s been a rough night.” She rubbed her bare arms, which must have been freezing in the night air, “You don’t look like you’ve had that great of a night either.”

  He remembered that he’d been jumped by a couple of junkies who thought they could take his product. They had been mistaken, but he probably still looked a little worse for the wear.

  “Yeah, just part of the job I guess.”

  She’d laughed, “Yeah, I guess the same goes for me.”

  It hadn’t been much of a start, just a moment of shared commiseration between an old prostitute and a young drug dealer, but it was what set them on this path to family. And he wouldn’t have traded it for the world.

  Because family was something he’d never really known until Joker, and Sandy, and Ma, and then finally Dexter had come into his life.

  His earliest memories had been of a drugged out mother and the revolving door of their home, where all the dregs of society came and went on a regular basis. He remembered being cold and hungry or sick and hungry or just plain hungry. Then he remembered a woman coming to take him away. He remembered her so clearly because he’d thought she smelled better than anything else in the world.

  She’d told him that she was going to take him away and find him a place where people would take care of him, and where he’d have clothes and food. She’d lied, but he’d believed her at that time. He’d never met someone who was clean, and who talked kindly to him and gave him candy before, how could someone like that be lying to him?

  She probably hadn’t meant to lie, she was just doing her job, but she had to be aware that most of the people who provided foster homes were just doing it for the money the state paid them. Or that had been his experience. There had been no magical loving home that had been promised, just more neglect and disappointment.

  Enough so that when he’d gotten old enough to sling something on the corner, he’d moved out without warning. Some people called it running away, he called it escaping. The same way Joker, Sandy, and Dex had had to escape.

  And to be honest, none of them had had anyone who was going to look for them very hard, anyway. No family that shed tears of worry when they’d left, who sat up at nights thinking about their lost little boy or girl. No, none of them had had anyone.

  Until they’d had each other. And that’s why their little family was so important to Dax, why it had hurt so much when Sandy had tried to deny it. Because their little family was the only good thing that had ever happened in his life, and he was going to hold on to it as hard as he could.

  What does one wear to their first day on the job at a tattoo parlor? Fern looked through her closet again, mentally trying on and rejecting each thing she put her hand on.

  She’d probably touched every item of clothing she owned at least three times. Everything was either too dressy or too business casual or too casual casual, nothing was just right. She didn’t even know what just right would be if she saw it.

  Fern didn’t own that many clothes, just the few she’d managed to snatch on her way out and the few she’d been able to buy in case she had a job interview. Mainly, around the house, she wore tee-shirts and yoga pants. But that wouldn’t do for work.

  But she didn’t know what would do. She pulled out a dress again and put it back and then pulled it out again. She had to wear something, time was slipping away and she didn’t want to be late for her first day on the
job.

  The dress would have to work, she could put a blue jean jacket over it to tone it down some.

  Decision made, she pulled the jacket out of the closet and threw it and the dress across her bed. She still had to put make up on and dry her hair before she could get dressed and she had to hurry.

  Her mind swirled with possibilities and her stomach felt like it had been invaded by butterflies as she got ready. It had been a long time since she’d been this hopeful, or nervous, about anything.

  She knew some of it had to do with the fact that she was going to see Dax, that she was, in fact going to spend twelve hours around him, but most of it was hope that this was going to be the break she needed to finally be able to support herself and Katy.

  She didn’t know what the future would hold, whether it would be here or elsewhere that she raised her daughter, but she did know that she needed money to do it.

  Living frugally, which surprisingly wasn’t hard considering the way she’d been raised and what she married into, she’d be able to save up and buy a new identity for her and her little girl and then they could go wherever they wanted. Maybe they’d even move to another country. She’d always had a romantic notion about living in a little French village, and she’d never told anyone about it so no one would ever look for her there. And, she knew enough French to buy groceries or ask where the bathroom was located.

  It was a possibility, but it all hinged on making this job work. And that meant no more acting crazy around Dax. Sure he was hot, sure he made her want to jump his bones, but she was an adult and she could resist the urge.

  She looked at herself in the mirror. She didn’t look half bad. Her gaze traveled over her form, looking for the unacceptable, a habit she’d probably never shake, and it landed on her cleavage. There wasn’t much showing, just a hint. But it was better safe than sorry. She buttoned the light denim jacket and nodded in satisfaction before leaving the room.

  Fern looked at the delicate watch on her wrist, one of the last gifts her grandmother had given her before she’d died, and quickened her step.