by W Winters
“You fucking kidnapped me,” she scoffs, the control leaving her in an instant. I watch as her knuckles turn white from how she grips the book so damn hard.
I take another stride forward to the end of the bed, and now only a few feet and a puddle of cotton linens stands between us.
Bethany takes a half step back, but when she tries to take another, her heel hits the balled-up curtain on the floor behind her. The wall is next.
“You tried to shoot me.” My words cut through the air, leaving no room for negotiation as I add, “You should be dead for trying something so stupid.”
At my last word, she steps behind the bundle of fabric at her feet, pressing her back to the wall. Her body trembles even as she utters the words, “Fuck you.”
“I’m sure a well-read woman such as yourself has a wider vocabulary to choose from,” I taunt and then nod to the book in her hand. “What is it?”
She breathes in and out, staring at me and refusing to speak.
“What book are you reading?” I ask her with less patience.
“I don’t know,” she answers, not taking her eyes from me.
“Now you’re deliberately pissing me off,” I tell her without any attempt at hiding the irritation.
“I don’t know,” she repeats, raising her voice, and her words come out hoarse. All that screaming she did caused more harm than good.
“Bullshit,” I grit out and reach for the book, pissed off that she’s being so stubborn, so resistant. With a single lunge forward, I grip the book in my hand, the other finding her hip to pin her against the wall.
“No!” she screams out at me, ripping the book away, and the thin pages on top nearly rip off without the cover to shield them. She turns her small body away from me as I press my chest against her. Barely managing to turn herself to face the wall, she cradles the book against her chest with both hands, concealing it from me. “It’s my sister’s.” Her words are more of a cry than anything else, but the tone of them holds her explanation. “It’s the last thing she gave to me,” she bellows against the wall.
“I just got it yesterday; I don’t know what book it is.” Her voice lowers as her shoulders shudder. “There’s no cover and I don’t know what it is.”
So this is what it takes to make her cower? An attempt to steal a book from her?
She’s a trapped, scared, wild creature with nowhere to run and not sure how to fight, holding on to defiance because she has nothing else. I see her so clearly.
One breath, and then another. I stand there and just let her breathe.
“I believe you. Calm down.”
“Calm down?” she shrieks at me, her voice wavering.
“Lower your voice or you’ll stay in this fucking room until I feel like letting you out.” I practically hiss the low threat, backing away slightly, but still remain close enough that she doesn’t turn around. “Let me see it,” I demand, holding out my hand. “I’ll give it back.”
She’s still and quiet for a long moment as my hand hovers in the air.
“There are times to fight and times to give in,” I say calmly and then add, “I might know what book it is.”
Thump. My heart pounds in my chest as she still doesn’t react. Hope starts to wane, but before I have to decide what to do with her, she turns to face me, and hesitates only a second more before giving me the book.
“Do you read a lot?” she asks me as I skim the first page and then turn it over to examine the back.
Before I can reply, a small sigh of amusement erupts from her lips and then she covers her mouth. I can’t help but to watch as her fingers trail down her lips before she lets her hand fall to her side. “Sorry,” she says. “That’s a ridiculous question.”
“It’s a ridiculous situation, so it’s a fair question,” I answer her evenly, letting her see how easy it could be if she just gives in.
Holding the book out to her, I shake my head and say, “I don’t anymore, and I don’t recognize it either.”
Her fingers barely brush against mine as she takes the book back, and the heat in her touch is electrifying. So magnetic, I nearly slip my hand forward, desperate for more. Her lashes flutter as she moves away from me, pulling back as much she can and wrapping her arms around herself. “What do you want from me?”
The immediate response is disappointment, and something else. There’s a twisting feeling inside that feels like a loss, but I would have had to have possession of her in the first place to justify this feeling deep in the pit of my stomach.
“I have an offer for you and then I’ll let you go,” I tell her simply, acutely aware of the way each word sounds controlled.
“Is that a promise?” she asks as her gaze lifts to mine and she shakes her head in disbelief.
“Only because you’ll be coming back.”
In return she bites her bottom lip, effectively silencing herself, but the rage is clearly written on her face.
“You want to hate me.” I address her anger before anything else.
“Yes,” she answers quickly and honestly.
“That’s only going to hurt you.” The rawness in my words comes from a place I don’t recognize.
She answers me, but she chokes up as she says, “I’m fine with that.”
The twisting in my gut gets sharper. The seconds pass, and the air changes subtly between us, each of us staring at the other and waiting for the next move.
“What do you know about Marcus?” I ask her pointedly.
She shrugs like none of this matters, as if she isn’t breaking apart. “I heard my sister say his name. He had something for her.”
“What else?” I push her for more.
“Nothing.” She looks me in the eyes and says, “All I had was his name and yours when she left.”
“Nothing else?” I finally ask her when I judge her response to be sincere. “Nothing about the drugs?”
“You’re all drug dealers,” she bites back.
“Now Marcus is a drug dealer?”
“He must be. Just like you must be.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because my sister bothered to learn your name.”
“What name is that?”
“Cross.”
“So when you said you know all about Marcus and the drugs…”
“I wanted to …” She can’t finish. Her lips press into a thin line before she finally says, “I wanted it to sound like I had you.”
Time moves quickly as I stare at her and she stares back.
“I wanted you to feel like you weren’t going to get away with it,” she whispers, breaking the silence and rubbing her arms.
“That’s all you know?”
“One of you had her killed.” She croaks the quick response and I can see the frustration on her face from not being able to keep it together.
“It wasn’t me or anyone who works for me,” I tell her calmly, keeping my voice low and steady and looking her in the eyes just like she did me.
When she doesn’t react, I add, “You have questions; I can give you answers.”
“What happened to my sister?” she asks me without allowing a second to pass.
“I don’t know exactly, but I can find out. And more importantly, it’s not going to happen like this. I have a way of doing things and a desire to handle things in a certain manner.”
She stares at me like I’m the devil and she’s searching for a way to escape. There’s no escaping from this though.
“You’ll get the answers you want and pay off the debt your sister owed.”
“What do you get?”
“It will be tit for tat. I seem to remember you mentioning Marcus and something else about drugs?” I press and she blanches. “But I like things done a certain way. When I have questions to ask and I need to make sure the person giving me an answer is telling the truth.”
“What way is that?” she asks in a single breath. The nerves are making her shoulders shake slightly.
There’s no way I can tell her; I have to show her instead.
“Every ten minutes is a hundred dollars.” I make up the amount on the spot and before I can calculate anything else, she questions, “Ten minutes of what?” She doesn’t bother to hide the trepidation in her voice.
I can see her nervousness, the anger barely hidden.
“I’m not going to lie, Bethany. One of the reasons I didn’t kill you where you stood in your foyer is because I find you…” I trail off as I debate on the next words I want to say, but take a risk.
“I think you’re beautiful and I love the way you fight me.”
Her lips part, her breathing coming in short gasps, and her chest flushes with a subtle blush that trails up her neck. The compliment leaves her more amenable. Her eyes widen, the depths of the darkness taking over as what I want sinks in.
“And what do you expect me to do?” she asks and her words are rushed as if she doesn’t already know.
“You’ll see.”
“I’m not a whore.” Her barb is immediate and raw. “I don’t care what my sister owed you.” She lowers her voice to add, “I don’t owe you anything.”
A smirk tugs at my lips and I lean forward, letting my palm rest against the drywall just above her right shoulder. Bringing my lips to her ear, I tell her, “I don’t have to buy sex and if and when we do fuck, it will be because you’re begging me to be inside of you.”
“Fuck you.”
“Those words again.” I tsk and then add, “You do owe me.”
“I don’t owe you shit. The person who killed my sister owes you, not me.”
With her raised voice, the tension rises as well until I tell her, “Three hundred thousand dollars.”
“I don’t… my sister…” She struggles to finish her sentence, choking on her words, letting the number hit her. Three hundred thousand dollars.
That’s more than she’ll make in five years of working her ass off at the mental health hospital. I know what she makes, and every cent she has to her name was in the file Seth gave me.
I can see the way number piles on top of her; the very idea that she would have to pay that amount suffocates her. Stealing the life from her for only a moment before she tries to back away from me, but there’s only the wall behind her. Nothing more, and nowhere to go.
“You have no choice.”
“Jenny couldn’t have…” It’s not the debt that causes grief to settle in the depths of her eyes, it’s the very idea that her sister owed that much money to men like my brothers and me.
“You have questions and want answers. I want my bar to be free of your bullshit.” Although my words are harsh, my voice is calm, as soothing as it can be given the situation.
Her gaze whips up to mine, and she battles the need to hold on to the anger as my eyes roam down her body. The sleeve of her shirt is ripped, probably from her own doing. Her nails are chipped—again, probably from the way she’s struggled in all of this and then destroyed everything she could get her hands on.
“You have aggression and you need a release; I can give you that.”
She breathes a little heavier then says, “I want to leave.”
“I want an answer.”
Silence.
“You have a debt, an inherited debt and I’m giving you a way to pay it, free and clear.”
“I don’t owe you shit,” she whispers, her pain laced in between each word, woven in the air between us. But more than that… I can hear the consideration evident by the lack of her animosity.
“It’s your house, Thirty-four Holley Drive? Your sister was on your deed, wasn’t she? I’m guessing she helped you get the loan before she fell down the path that took her away from you?”
I’m an asshole, a prick. I’m going to fucking hell for this. With every second that passes, Bethany struggles more and more to fight, because she can barely hold herself together. “She used your home as a marker for this loan. It’s going to be paid.”
It’s cruel how I stand here, watching these words strike Bethany over and over. Each time taking a larger piece of her sister’s memory and changing it. Changing how she remembered her. And how she feels about her now.
I am the devil she thought I was.
“It’s not about the money for you though.”
My statement brings her gaze to me as I add, “And I’m not interested in taking from you what you don’t want to give.”
Her lips part, bringing me closer to getting what I want.
“You want to do it, Bethany. You will do this. The curiosity will win out. And if you don’t go through me, if you go back to pounding down doors and calling the police…” I let the unspoken threat dangle in front of her, allowing her to come to her own conclusion. “I’m a powerful man, but even I can’t save someone from themselves.”
My words seem to strike a chord with her, stealing what’s left of her composure.
“I just want- “
I cut her off and say, “I can give you what you want. And you can give me what I want too. Or you can pay me three hundred thousand by the due date, which is in…eleven days.” I make up a date, and then regret the fact that I didn’t say tomorrow.
Bethany
I don’t know how long I’ve sat here, wondering why he let me go. I know I should be dead after what I did. He’s a criminal, and he could have done whatever he wanted with me. Before or after I shot that gun. He’s strong enough to, and he has the means to do it. I’ve learned that much.
The sun’s gone down, leaving my small living room bathed in shadows. My eyes burn, and my left ankle is numb from sitting on it for so long.
There’s a bus that runs from the next block over all the way to Jersey City. I’ve been thinking about that too. And whether or not I would be able to use my credit cards, or if he’d be able to track me. I don’t have enough cash to live without cards. I barely have any cash, in fact. There’s a lot of debt in my name if I were to run and somehow try to come up with a fake ID.
I guess I can add three hundred thousand more to that debt. My stomach sinks at the thought, somehow finding its way to my throat even though it’s in the opposite direction.
I’ve been waiting for some miraculous plan to smack me in the face. An easy way out, or even a difficult one. Something tells me Jase Cross will find me though. He’ll find me wherever I run.
I can hear my back crack as I slowly rise from the sofa. My body is so stiff and sore, an obvious reminder of what happened. I need to give in to sleep and rest, but I can’t bring myself to do it. To go lie in my bed when I’m so fucked.
Three hundred thousand dollars. What did you get yourself into, Jenny?
I have nothing. No money saved, only debt from school and from bailing Jenny out countless times. No answers to what happened.
He has answers. The nagging voice reminds me of that fact as I walk around my coffee table, leaving the book where it sits, and heading to the kitchen.
He wants to use me and pressure me into this when I don’t deserve this shit. And he’s the one with all the power. The one with all the answers.
Answers that belong to me. If he wants that debt to be paid, he’d better hold up his end of the deal. He’d better give me answers.
Grabbing a glass from the dishwasher and one of the many open bottles of red wine from my fridge left by all my unwelcomed guests, I decide on a drink. A drink to numb it all.
It’s what I relied on last night too, after hours of searching my sister’s old room for anything at all. Drugs she could have bought, cash she stored somewhere. I have no fucking idea how she owes so much, but her room was barren.
When Jase Cross dropped me off and told me he’d be seeing me soon, that was the first thing I did. Then I searched everywhere else. I searched and dug until my body gave out. And then I drank, somehow finding a moment of sleep, only to wake up with a pounding headache and that sick feeling still in my gut.
The way he said he’d be seeing me soon, before unlocking the c
ar doors and walking me to my front door, the way he said it was like a promise. Like a promise a long-lost lover makes.
Not at all like the threat it really is.
The cork pops when it comes out, that lovely sound filling the air, followed by the sweet smell of Cabernet.
One glass quiets the constant flood of questions and regrets.
Two glasses numb the fears and makes me feel... alive. Free? I don’t know.
Three glasses and I usually give in and pass out and everything’s better then. Until I wake up and have to face another day with nothing to take this emptiness inside of me away.
He has answers.
Jase fucking Cross.
Ever since he let me go, my wrists and throat have felt scarred with his touch, and his voice has lingered in the back of my thoughts.
I hate that he makes me feel so much. There’s a spark between us I can’t deny. He doesn’t hide it, and that only makes this all hotter. It’s in the way he talks to me, his candor and tone. The way his gaze seems to see through me while also seeing all of me, every bare piece of me. There is nothing that isn’t raw in the tension that ties us together. Raw and thrilling… and terrifying.
I shouldn’t find the arrogant prick so hot. He’s a criminal and an asshole.
It doesn’t matter if I want to fuck him. I still hate him. I hate what he does to earn a living and what he stands for. I hate that in her last months, he may have seen my sister more than I did.
Hate doesn’t do what I feel toward him justice.
He has to know there’s no way I can pay him three hundred thousand dollars.
He has to know and that’s why he’s given me this “out” – it’s coercion at best. I could take him to court, but I already went to the cops. And going to them got me nothing. Not a damn thing but Jase fucking Cross knocking at my door.
“I don’t trust him,” I whisper to no one, letting my fingertip drag along the edge of the wine glass before tipping it back, gulping down the chilled liquid. “I don’t trust anyone anymore.”
I almost called the cops. The very second I shut the front door after saying goodbye as if he was an old friend, not a bad man wrapped in a good suit, and pushed my back against it. I almost did it and then I remembered doing the same damn thing yesterday, and the day before and the day before that. No one can help me.