by KL Donn
“Uh, yeah, sure. Let’s go.”
She smiled sadly at him before heading out the door they’d walked in only minutes earlier, waiting by his truck for him to help her climb in.
Once they were on the road, neither said anything. Ev didn’t call Case on his unwillingness to talk to her or show her who and what he really was. And she should have, too. With the way he’d forced her to open up to him, she should have fucking demanded everything from him.
Now he was left wondering why she hadn’t. He had to know what was going through her mind. If only he had the courage to ask her.
Where the fuck are your balls, Private? He could practically hear his old sergeant screaming in his ear. Did you suddenly grow a fucking vagina? Boy, you best get back in line and check yourself at the door! This is a balls only squad.
He hadn’t heard those words in more than fifteen years. It seemed appropriate they would come back to haunt him at a time where he felt like the pussy his sergeant used to accuse all of them of being. It wasn’t a phase in his life he missed all that much, but no matter how many times he’d been called a pussy, the Sarge was always right. Time to man the fuck up.
“I’m sorry,” he blurted into the quietness of the cab of his truck as he drove into the city limits. Fuck! He’d waited the whole hour. Casey, you fucking moron.
“Nothing to be sorry for,” was her soft reply.
Isn’t there?
“You aren’t ready,” she continued.
Fuck that I’m not!
“One day you will be,” she kept going.
I’m ready now!
“Hopefully,” she looked to him, “it will be sooner rather than later.”
Wait a fucking minute!
“I live down in Ellwood Park, the first complex off Jefferson St.,” she instructed, and his anger blossomed tenfold. What the fuck was she doing living in that hellhole?
Ask her, you mute dickhead!
“I work the rest of the week. Maybe I’ll see you around?” She smiled sadly like she thought they were over as she hopped out of his truck and ran through the so-called security door to her building.
They weren’t fucking over!
What the fuck is wrong with my voice?
She ran from Case before he had a chance to shatter her already fragile heart. His silence was damning. Not a single word on the hour’s drive from his home to her complex. She was confused about why he’d shown her his leg when he clearly wasn’t ready. Or maybe he was but regretted it. She was shocked. She hadn’t expected it. With no warning about it, she thought she’d handled it well. Clearly, he didn’t like her knowing.
With every word she spoke, his face seemed to grow angrier and angrier. She had a hard time holding her tears at bay, and for the first time since moving her sister and nephew in with her, she felt relief at being home.
Home.
What a joke.
She hated where they lived. Hated the neighborhood. Hated nearly everything about her life except for dancing, Andy, and a few moments where she entertained the idea of what she and Casey could have been.
Unlocking her door, Ev quietly made her way inside, hoping Lacey and Marcus were still asleep. The door clicked shut just as a hand gripped the back of her neck, slamming her into the wood. She knew better than to cry out. When she did, Andy always came to see what was wrong, and she refused to be the reason the boy was traumatized.
“Well, well, well,” Marcus whispered in her ear, making her skin crawl with disgust. “Look who finally showed up.”
She wanted to vomit when he rubbed his groin against her lower back, and she felt his erection harden. With his hand still holding her still, he slipped his other around her front to slide slowly into her pants and under her panties where he caressed the fine hairs of her pubis that she didn’t shave.
“Please, don’t,” she begged. Tears threatened to fall the lower his hand went.
“But Evie.” She hated when he called her that. “I saw you were giving it to every Tom, Dick, and Harry.” He laughed when she tried to pull away from his wandering fingers as they dipped ever closer to her opening.
She felt his fingers probing and began to gag. When he managed to fight one finger inside of her, her stomach let loose and she vomited all over the floor, covering their shoes and ankles.
“You bitch,” he spat, spinning her around by the neck. His finger still trying to bury itself inside her. “You’ll pay for that,” he sneered.
She struggled to tighten her legs together to force him away from her body. Twisting and turning did no good, only earning her a slap across the face. Slamming her head back into the door, she was dazed. Her head was spinning, and she felt sick again.
“You’ll learn to love it,” he whispered sickeningly against Ev’s lips as he strove to claim them in a savage kiss while forcing two fingers inside of her. She felt the burn of tearing flesh as he scratched her most intimate places. She wanted to curl up into a ball and die.
She was dirty. Tainted. Used.
This wasn’t how her life was supposed to go.
He finally pushed himself away from her, a smug look on his face like he’d somehow won the ultimate prize…
Her.
His laughter rang hollow as she slid down the door, cradling her knee’s to her chest and burying her head as she felt blood dripping from where he’d violated her. Regret burned like acid as she thought about what would have happened if only she’d stayed with Casey. If only she hadn’t run from him and the feelings he evoked in her.
Her life seemed to be one out of control train wreck after another, and she was tired. Tired of fighting off demons, real and imagined. She was at her wit's end, wondering if pain was all there was going to be to her life.
“You mean to tell me, your ass pussied out when shit got real?” Casey couldn’t tell if Dom’s voice was filled with anger or laughter. There seemed to be a mix of both.
“Yeah, pretty much.” He took another drink of the coffee he wished was filled with bourbon. For three days after he dropped Ev off, he’d remained holed up in his cabin. So many times he’d gone to get her, drag her back there, and finally lay claim to her. Every fucking time, he’d chickened out. Afraid she wouldn’t give him the time of day.
“I get to be her watchdog while he begs for reports,” Ace said laughing at him. Case did beg and pester the other man as much as possible. He was watching his woman so, of course, he had to check in, make sure she was alright.
Wouldn’t be a problem if you’d grow a pair and check on her yourself, ya wuss! His fucking sergeant’s voice was stuck in his head.
He came over to Dom’s house in the early morning, as soon as he’d seen Dee and Jax leave for that Mommy and Me class they go to. He didn’t want to see the disappointment in her eyes when she realized he’d fucked up with Ev.
“Why, Case?” Dom’s question had him looking up. “What the fuck was so scary? Was she repulsed?”
“No.”
“Get sick at the site of your peg leg?”
“No.”
“Then get your fucking head out of your ass and fucking go get that girl before someone else does.” His anger was loud and clear.
“Hell,” Ace began, a wicked gleam in his eyes, “If you don’t, I will. That girl’s got a killer body and her innocence is begging for a real man’s touch.”
“Shut the fuck up!” Case grimaced. Anger and jealousy burned through his body at the thought of Ace or any other man touching her.
“Dom!” They heard Dee’s stressed voice as she slammed through the front door with Jax in her arms, running into the kitchen where they were sitting.
“Unca Case!” Jaxson squirmed to get free, running and jumping into his arms.
“What’s the matter, Princess?” Dom pulled her into his lap, and Casey had to look away. A desire so strong to have what they did burned his heart. You could have that if you manned up.
She glared at Casey as Dom
tried to soothe her. “What?” he finally asked.
Shaking her head, she seemed ready to spit nails at him. “Have you seen Evelyn the last couple of days?”
He perked up at the sound of her name. Her voice warned that he wasn’t going to like where they were about to head. “Not in a few days.” His answer was cautious.
“What about you, Ace?” She directed her glare at their new friend.
A new awareness entered his face. “I have.”
What the fuck aren’t they telling me?
“So you know then?” Dee asked him.
“Sort of,” was his answer.
Having had enough of the secret obviously going around, he yelled, “What the fuck is going on?”
“Watch it,” Dom warned him.
Fuck that shit. This was about his fucking woman.
Getting up, Dee walked over to him. The sadness in her eyes instilled fear in his heart.
“What’s wrong with her, Dee?” he croaked out as terror stole his breath.
She placed her hands on his face. “Something happened, Casey.” He held his breath, his heart cramping. “I don’t know what. But something is very wrong,” Pulling a piece of paper from her pocket, she handed it to him. “I got this so you could call her.” He gripped the small triangle with a shaking hand. “But, Casey? You need to go get her. Her sister was very nasty this morning, and I shudder to think of what might be wrong.”
Fear unlike anything he’d ever felt before ran rampant through him as he imagined all kinds of terrible things happening to her. Was she hurt? Was her nephew hurt? Did that fuck Hardy make her do something she didn’t want to?
He zeroed in on his so-called watchdog. “What the fuck haven’t you been telling me, Ace?”
Pushing his worry to the back of his mind, he let his rage take control. Standing up, Dee backed off as Jax jumped from Casey’s lap to follow Dee as she left the room.
Raising his hands in surrender, Ace stood. “Look, man. I knew she was different, but I couldn’t understand why. There was nothing to tell. She avoided me like the plague.”
“But you knew something was wrong.” It wasn’t a question.
“I did,” he confessed.
“Case, you need to calm down.” Dom’s quiet warning didn’t penetrate his aggressive mind. He was ready to beat Ace into the ground for not telling him about his concerns with Ev.
“I won’t fucking calm down, Dominic. This is my fucking woman! He knew something was wrong and failed to tell me.” He was lost in a white hot rage.
Dom walked closer, probably in hopes of diffusing the situation. All he did was make it worse by saying, “If she’s yours, then why the fuck are you letting another man watch her? Why the fuck are we sitting here having this powwow? Man the fuck up, Casey!’
Before he knew what he was doing, his fist shot out, nailing Dom in the face. He watched as his best friend fell to the ground stunned.
“Not everyone has the perfect fucking life like you do, Dom. Not everyone can be as fucking put together as you. Some of us are fucking damaged.”
Having had enough, he left, needing to get away from the fact that he probably just fucked up the only family he had. Running to his truck, he hopped in with one destination in mind.
Evelyn.
The crunching of paper as he gripped the steering wheel had him pulling his hand away to look at the forgotten note. Ev’s number was written across it hastily. He wasn’t sure what he was going to say when he arrived or how he was going to gain her trust enough to open up about what had happened. He dreaded what was about to go down.
Growing up in a household with strict religious parents wasn’t the easiest thing. They weren’t affectionate with him or his older siblings, or even with each other. Casey often felt like they had children out of Christian duty. He had no foundation for what a normal relationship should be like other than Dom and Dee, and even they couldn’t be considered normal. Not with how their tumultuous relationship began.
When he enlisted in the Army, his parents had washed their hands of him. Telling him they expected more from their youngest child. His brother and sister had done as the two of them wanted and joined the path to complete salvation as they called it. He still didn’t get it.
For as long as he could remember, he’d never felt the need to connect with a higher power the way his family did. Most of his earlier life had been spent feeling as if there was something wrong with him. Hell, his family had no problem with pointing it out as often as possible. So he started fighting back, refused to go to church, started partying, just plain-out being a pain in the ass.
Then he met Dom who was angry over the loss of his sister. They fought like cats and dogs. Could never be in a room with each other without fighting over stupid shit. In their own way, they’d been friends. It wasn’t the healthiest friendship, but it was like beating the crap out of each other was a way to purge the negative emotions from their home lives.
Just before high school graduation, a recruiter from the Army had spoken at their school. He remembered sitting there thinking of all the things he could do if he joined. The travelling, seeing the world, helping where support was actually needed. He could get an education out of it while he was there, too.
When the recruiter was about to leave, he and Dom approached the man at the same time. Both with questions about the different branches of the military. Army Rangers had appealed to them both, and for once, they planned something together that didn’t involve a bloody nose or broken bones.
A few months later 9/11 happened.
That next day, the Army was shipping them off for training and the fight of their lives. Both men became inseparable, climbed the ranks together, fought together. They watched some of their brothers fall as they soared into new lives.
For seven years, the bond they created was all that kept pushing them through.
Then the impossible happened…
Casey was being sent home to a family that thought that the injuries he sustained were what he deserved, and a country that wasn’t equipped to deal with the emotional toll his sacrifice had caused.
Every day, Casey fought an uphill battle he was never sure he could win. Then Dom and Jax came along and gave him hope for a better life. One that wasn’t filled with cheap booze and cheaper hookers. He wasn’t proud of his past, but he did accept it as part of what made him the man he was now. If he could let go of his insecurities and stop pushing the one and only woman to ever get him to feel anything away.
Arriving at the shitty-looking apartment complex he’d dropped Ev off three days prior, he cringed at the dilapidated building. The thugs sitting on stoops in front of nearly every door made him angry. They could hurt her if they wanted to. She was so tiny, so helpless.
Not knowing which apartment was Ev’s, he texted her.
Case: Kitten?
Waiting for a response was torture. He didn’t even know if she were home or at the club.
Well, Evelyn had gotten her wish. Lacey left and took Andy with her. Marcus landed in jail somehow and hopefully, wouldn’t be back anytime soon.
None of it mattered, though. She had been abandoned again.
Left with nothing but her pain.
She somehow became enveloped in her lost sense of self. Not recognizing who she was anymore, what she was doing, or where she was going. Loneliness encroached on her every waking hour.
When Lacey left, she’d accused Ev of trying to steal Marcus from her. It didn’t matter that she had no interest in him or that the only man she truly wanted didn’t think she was good enough to share his deepest secret with. Even after he demanded all of hers.
She was always left behind, never good enough to love. She was Evelyn Paige Moore, the girl everyone forgot.
It was a sad, lonely existence. One she wasn’t convinced she wanted to be a part of anymore. She hadn’t moved from her prone position on her small bed since she collapsed earlier
that morning from exhaustion. Dark circles ringed her eyes from lack of sleep. Every time she closed her eyelids, she felt Marcus’s fingers invading her again. Just the thought of him touching her had her gagging.
She wasn’t sure, but it felt as though her cheeks had sunken in from not eating. She tried to, but her stomach would roll, and she’d feel queasy for hours, so she stopped altogether. Of course, it was stupid. She was weak from lack of nutrients, but no matter how many times she tried to force herself she just ended up tossing it out.
Ev’s phone beeped, drawing her from the depressing thoughts. Reaching over the side of the bed, she felt around for her purse. Pulling her phone out, she saw a text waiting for her.
Unknown: Kitten?
Casey. She sighed, whether from relief or pain remained to be seen.
Evelyn: Yes?
It wasn’t long before he responded.
Casey: I’m so fucking sorry.
Before she could think up a response, he was messaging her again.
Casey: I shouldn’t have shut you out.
Can we talk?
Did she want to speak to him? He ran hot and cold so often she kept feeling burned.
Casey: Please, Evelyn.
Evelyn: Talk.
The last thing she wanted was for him to see her so broken and lifeless. She was wasting away, and he didn’t need to see that. She didn’t even like seeing it.
Casey: Can I come up?
Evelyn: No.
Her response was immediate. His life was so much better than hers; she would just taint him. He had enough problems without having to deal with hers.
Casey: I need you, Kitten. So fucking bad.
Evelyn: I can’t.
She was almost caving.
Casey: The first time I saw you, I knew you were going to be my everything. I knew that you were my game changer. I’m scared, too,
Ev. Please let me in.
Tears rolled down her cheeks. “Oh God,” she moaned turning into her pillow, trying to wipe the pain away. He had no idea. No clue how much she needed to be someone’s everything. How much she needed to be wanted by someone, to be loved so thoroughly it was suffocating.