After the Kiss

by Violet Williams

  I didn't even bother trying to convince him that it wasn't true. When he stripped me down and I'd asked him why, he'd recounted intimate moments. Lingerie I wore. Things I whispered when I was with Demetrius.

  He kept cal ing me a slut, a skank, a bitch. But there was one word that was false--a rat.

  He stepped closer, the neon light above turning his fair skin yel ow. "What do the cops know about my father's operation, Ebony? Quit with the lies. Tel me everything you know."

  I shot my eyes to Charlie. He was hovering near the tray, his fingers curled as he danced them over the different devices.

  "I've told you everything," I pleaded. "Please believe me, Max. Please!"

  He looked down at me like I was an ant. "I did believe you. Every time you told me you were different. That you'd never lie to me and-"

  "You promised you'd never hurt me," I said hoarsely. One of my eyes were tight and it was becoming difficult to see out of it. Courtesy of Charlie.

  I trained the other eye on Max. He said nothing. When I saw Charlie brandish a scalpel, I decided to risk it. After al , if they were gonna kil me anyway, what did it matter?

  I licked my cracked lips. "I did lie. You're right.”

  He gave me a vindicated smile. “I knew it.”

  “Wait,” I said softly. “I lied to you, but I lied to myself most of al . Even when you showed me time and time again what kind of person you are, I stupidly believed I could be the one who changed you."

  "I make her shut up?" Charlie said thickly.

  Max shook his head. “Not yet.”

  The side of my face hurt from even moving my lips, but I pressed on. "I let myself fal for you, lying to myself every time I kissed you, every time we-" I let out a strangled moan. "I lied because I wanted us to work so bad, Maxhew. I real y did."

  I looked at him and saw a flicker of sadness. I held tight to it. "I almost loved you once. I felt it inside and I wanted it to grow into something real. I wanted it so bad I ignored the truth right in front of my face." I let out a bitter chuckle. "I knew we'd end up this way. That I'd final y be at the other end of your fist. Or your gun."

  "Is that why you spread your legs for him?" he said icily.

  "No," I said weakly. "I spread my legs for Demetrius because he was the man I wished you were. Caught up, but not without a conscience. A good man who had to do bad things but was haunted by it."

  He moved to me in a flash, his hand poised to hit me. I stared him down, final y finding the fighter inside.

  "Do it," I said softly. "You've already broken my heart. Why not my face too?"

  He faltered and for the briefest moment, I saw a flicker of who he was when it was just he and I. The kindness. The love. Fresh tears spil ed down my face. It hurt more than a thousand punches.

  I heard Charlie's boots crunch behind him. "Let me. It's okay."

  But it wasn’t. Max turned from me, letting out a bel ow of fury. "Ebony Rivers. Mother fucking Theresa." His back was taut in the dim light. Impossibly stil . "You think you're better than everyone else. Smarter. But I bet you never thought to be careful of the things you said."

  He let out a bitter chuckle. "Girls always have to unload on their best friends."

  I stared at his back in confusion. "W-What are you talking about?"

  "Liani came to me. Told me she had information…and a sick mother she couldn’t care for, without our help."

  His words were like a blow to the gut, knocking al the air from my lungs. Liani? She was the one who told?

  "No," I said shaking my head back and forth. "She wouldn't. She wouldn’t!"

  "As soon as I gave her a wad of cash I couldn't shut her up," Max scoffed. "She came to me two nights after I brought you here." He final y turned back to me. "I was going to propose to you."

  My bottom lip trembled as I gazed up at him. The sad thing was before Demetrius, even after he showed me how the Kournikovas made their money, I might have been dumb enough, weak enough to say yes.

  He cleared his throat. "But that’s al over now."

  I jumped when I heard a boom, the warehouse doors opening. The thought of more people coming, watching made bile rise in my throat. When the door to our room creaked open, I saw Boris and another man drag someone in. They dropped him on the ground in a heap at my feet.

  I looked up at Max. The question was on the tip of my tongue, but in my heart I knew exactly who it was.

  As Max began kicking him over and over, I screamed, squeezing my eyes shut.

  ****

  TONY/DEMETRIUS

  Out of the black, I picked out bits and pieces. Shards of pain and aches wrapped around my ribs, my face. I heard laughter, cruel and cold. Boris no doubt—and a handful of others. But when I heard the sobbing, it clutched my heart. It was the sound of tears that I'd heard once before.

  Ebony.

  I struggled to open my eyes. Ebony? Those bastards brought me to her? As my lids went from boulders to something I could control, I knew exactly what they had planned. They planned to pit us against one another. She'd do anything to keep me from being harmed and I'd betray everything I knew about the god damn case if it meant I could save her.

  When I opened my eyes I let out a grunt of anger and gut wrenching hurt. Ebony was chained to a chair a few feet from me and the only thing that distinguished her from being a stranger was the fact that I recognized her pale pink lingerie. It was speckled with red and I couldn’t find the source. One of her eyes was nearly swol en shut, the other blood shot and darting around wildly. Her lip jutted out unnatural y, easily twice its size with a gash across it lengthwise. Blood was smeared on her face, on her neck, and on her chest.

  When I tried to move toward her, I hit a brick wall. The bastards had tied me up, my binds loose enough that I could get a good view of what they'd done but far enough away that I couldn’t hold her. I couldn’t tel her everything would be alright.

  A strong man wasn’t supposed to cry. I'd seen corpses, young and old. I'd seen the ugly face of humanity, over and over again. But al that sickness, al that evil, didn’t move me like she did.

  Ebony Rivers, a senior at State, studying to be an elementary teacher. Fal semester exams should be in ful swing. She belonged in the library, camped out, hunched over a battalion of textbooks. The things she'd seem and experienced at the hand of the Kournikovas should have been fiction, not reality.

  Instead, she was in the thick of it, wearing the col ateral damage. After I promised no one would ever hurt her again.

  I tore my eyes away then cursed myself for being a coward. For being unable to stomach what they'd done to her, because of me.

  The words were sour on my tongue, but I said it anyway. "Ebony, I'm so sorry..."

  I braced myself for the onslaught of a few choice words of her own. Cal me a bastard. A liar. Blame it al on me. But she didn’t do anything except hang her head and cry. I tried to move to her and was met with metal banging against steel.

  "God damn it"' I roared my frustration, erupting in a cry of anguish. When she gasped at my outburst, her hiccups like machine gun fire tearing into me, I reined it in as best I could.

  There were safeguards in place, things that would rocket to motion if I didn’t check in with the chief, but I didn't dare say a word. Even if it would bring her comfort. If the Kournikovas knew hel was about to rain down on them, what would keep them from just putting a bul et in both our heads?

  I cautioned a look back up at her, renewed anger making me tremble when I breathed deep and the unmistakable smel of urine. She'd soiled herself. On top of everything they'd taken, they'd chipped away at her dignity.

  Red dominated my view and I bal ed my hands into fists. Fuck the captain. Fuck protocol. That snot nosed punk wouldn’t walk out of this breathing.

  Put it on the back burner, I ordered myself silently. Make sure she's okay. That's al that matters right now.

  Her head was stil bowed, her kinky braids slowly swinging back and forth. She was repeating no over
and over, shaking her head from side to side.

  "No, un uh," she whimpered. "Not like this."

  She was probably going into shock and rightful y so. Up to the night Max forced her to watch the murder, I could tel that she tried to rationalize her boyfriend's pathology. She pretended that he had issues, but his father did the heavy lifting. Had the bastard took part in the torture or just watched as she was beaten?

  I steadied my voice. "Ebony? Look at me."

  She continued to shake, her words tumbling over one another. "Nononoung-"

  I put authority behind my voice. "Ebony!"

  She stil didn’t look up at me, but she stopped shaking. It was a start.

  "Look at me, Ebony."

  She went stoic, so stil that my heart leapt to my throat. God only knew the damage they'd done. What if she was unconscious?

  "EBONY!"

  She snapped her head up and looked directly at me. No, past me. She was staring at me cautiously. Like she couldn’t believe I was real y there, like I was another trick. Something engineered to bring her further pain.

  "Ebony," I said softly. I slid closer, to the point of pain, until the metal cut into my wrist and added to the chorus of agony that sang my name, verse after verse.

  A string of drool dribbled down her chin as she let out a sob. "Anthony."

  It had never brought me such joy to hear my name. "I thought I would always be Demetrius?"

  A smile, a mangled, beautiful one, cut through her face. "I figure under the circumstances, death and al , I could say your name." Her smile drooped. "At least once."

  "Don't talk like that," I said firmly. "We're gonna be just fine."

  She gave me a skeptical look. "Are you okay?"

  Her question made tears flood my eyes. It was December and we were both trembling with cold and fear in some god forsaken warehouse. While just breathing was a job and a half, it was clear they brought out the big guns on her. I put her in this shit and she was asking me if I was okay?

  "I love you,” I said forceful y. “I love you so much, Ebony.”

  In the past when I’d said it, even with Katie there had been pause, wondering if I truly meant it. Love, after al , was a wife who took beatings to spare her son. Love was something that was snatched away in an instant. But looking at Ebony, I knew it was true. I loved her.

  "Must be the injuries," she cracked, smiling again. It brought me warmth, even in the midst of bone rattling cold.

  "I figured under the circumstances I should say it." I winked, pain fluttering through my face at the smal gesture. "At least once."

  Her eyes glossed over and she parted her lips. "I lo-"

  The door slammed open and from the way the floor shook and rocked, it had to be Boris.

  I looked over and saw him waddling over, decked in a feather down jacket that made him look like a super-sized penguin.

  "Wel ain’t that sweet," he grinned from ear to ear. I watched him move to Ebony, his feet crunching on the bloody concrete.

  Ebony pul ed away when he stroked her head.

  "Keep your fuckin hands away from her!" I roared.

  Ebony was crying again, her pleas growing loud as Boris' fat fingers trailed down, bypassing her bruised face. I began yanking at my cuffs like a madman when I saw him tracing her col arbone.

  "Please," she whispered futilely. "No more."

  I paused, digesting her words. No more? That meant...

  "You touched her," I breathed in shock. He'd said he would, but I'd seen the way Max looked at Ebony. He loved her on some level. I never thought he'd let anyone touch her like that, even after he found out about us. I’d been wrong. Dead wrong.

  My anger came rushing out like a river. "You fat FUCK!"

  Just as his hand began to creep inside her bra cup, I heard the sound of tire screeches fol owed by yells outside the back room.

  Boris' yanked his hand away, a flicker of fear lighting up his pudgy face. "Son of a bitch."

  "You better give yourself up," I said hol owly, my gaze never leaving him. "Pray for protection. I guarantee you this: there's no place faraway enough or hole deep enough to get away from me. I'l kil you for touching her."

  He sneered at me and let out a string of curse words before pul ing a Glock from his jacket and rushing from the room.

  Even with the sounds of gunfire, I looked at her and she at me. The look of shame on her face shattered me.

  "I-I didn't have a choice," she squeaked, hanging her head. “I swear it. I couldn’t stop him. I couldn’t.”

  "I know," I said through clenched teeth. "I let them hurt you, if I could have been there, protected you-"

  "This isn’t your fault," she said gently. “It was Maxhew's. Only his." Outside the door Boris let out a screech of pain and I saw glee flit across her dark features.

  When the door swung open, Captain and a group of swat came storming in. Captain looked over at us, shepherding Maxhew. The cock sucker was limping, with blood leaking through his jeans.

  "You ok?" Captain asked gruffly.

  I nodded.

  He cal ed the medic to me, but I shook my head. "Help Ebony first."

  Relief flooded her face and I smiled at her, nodding slowly as they unbound her.

  I'd never let anyone hurt her again. Ever.

  The medical team circled around her, asking questions, trying to get her on a stretcher, but she wouldn’t comply until my cuffs were removed and a medic was sent to me.

  There was a question in her gaze. My eyes bore into her. My Ebony.

  "Everything's going to be okay," I told her firmly. "It's over."

  ****

  EPILOGUE

  The sun was warm on my face, toasty and delicious. I was thousands of miles from the warehouse and the horrible things that I’d suffered at the hands of the Kournikovas.

  Maxhew threw his father under the bus as soon as it was made clear jail time was on the table. It had been a foolish move in the end, considering he’d been summarily shanked in county holding.

  After his murder, I was immediately put in protective custody. I agreed to testify against the Kournikovas under two conditions. The first was that I’d spend the days leading up to the trial somewhere tropical. The second was that Tony would be a part of my security detail.

  I didn’t fool myself into thinking I’d prance into the courtroom and tel them that I’d seen Nikolai at the warehouse as he ordered the man’s murder and walk away and get my happily ever after. After the trial, I’d be getting a new identity. I’d never see my family or anyone tied to my old life again. But I’d be able to help get Kournikova off the streets—and after months of avoiding my reflection in the mirror, dreaming about the mess I’d gotten myself into, I’d final y be able to do something good. I’d be able to like the person reflected back at me. Maybe begin to see the woman Anthony loved.

  I took a sip of my pina colada and watched him bark orders at the two other men tasked with protecting me before they bounded away. When he wheeled to face me, he gave me a wave and I saw his lips form three words that sent a flash of warmth through me.

  I gave him a smile and said it back. “I love you too.”

  ###

  About Violet

  Violet Wil iams is a writer living in the Greater Sacramento area, saving the world via erotic tales…one e-reader at a time.

  Connect with Violet at: http://violetwil iamserotica.wordpress.com.