by Deja Voss
I feel it in my soul. My devotion to Mani is more overwhelming than anything I’ve ever felt before in my life. My love for her is realer than anything I’ve ever known. I would die for her. I would kill for her.
“Mr. Romantic over here,” Gin says, patting him on the back.
“I practice what I preach,” he says, wrapping his arms around her and kissing her on the lips. “And if you ever call my woman a whore again, I’ll light you up like a fucking Christmas tree, brother.”
“I’m sorry, Gin. I’m sorry, man. This shit is out of control.”
“Go get your woman,” Gin says. “None of that caveman shit, though.”
She shoots me a wink, and I shut the door behind me and walk down the hallway, trying to figure out where I would go if I were in her shoes. Probably right out the back door.
I’m used to getting whatever I want. I’m used to showing up, dick swinging, and not taking no for an answer. My way or the highway. My usual tactics aren’t gonna fly with Mani, that’s for sure. Rowdy’s right, I need to be able to show her all I care about is her and her well being and making her happy. I’m still not sure it’s something I’m capable of, but I will fucking try my best. Worst case scenario, she goes off with Slick and I can at least sleep at night knowing I got her away from those assholes at the mansion.
It’s not long before I hear her sobs. My heart shatters in a million pieces when I realize where they’re coming from. I am sick to my stomach as I press my hand against the door of the utility closet.
“Mani, I know you’re in there,” I say through the slats. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I thought they were hurting you. I just wanted to keep you safe.”
Her sobs grow softer, and I feel like the biggest piece of shit on the face of the earth. I don’t know what Catarina and Stefano did to her, but the fact that she’s so broken she hides in a closet whenever she gets upset, the same kind of closet I liberated her from earlier, makes the harsh reality sink in. In her eyes, I’m not any better than the two of them.
Maybe that’s the truth.
I’m gonna try like fucking hell to show her otherwise, even if it means changing everything I know about myself.
“Can I open the door please?” I ask. “I promise I’m not going to hurt you. I’m not gonna yell. I just want to see your face.”
The door swings open just a crack, and I don’t know if I want to puke or cry seeing her all curled up like that on the floor. I did this. I am a monster.
I kneel down next to her in the crowded closet, and pull the door shut so it’s just the two of us and the darkness. She doesn’t fight when I wrap my arms around her and pull her on my lap. Doesn’t cry. Doesn’t do anything but nuzzle her face up against my chest. I wonder if she can feel my heart damn near exploding though my shirt. I squeeze her just tight enough to let her know I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. If she needs to hide in a closet, I don’t care. I’m right by her side.
“You probably think I’m nuts,” she says weakly. “everybody does.”
“I like when you talk to me. I wish you’d tell me more.”
“I’m really tired,” she says. “Don’t leave me.”
“Of course.” I press my back up against the wall, and close my eyes as I feel her breathing grow heavy. She wraps herself around me like a boa constrictor as she dozes off and the only reason why I think she’s a little nuts is because she’s able to find comfort in me.
Chapter Ten
Lean:
“Lean, wake up.” Her voice busts me out of my slumber and I’m immediately on high alert. I don’t think I’ve slept that hard or that long since before I got clean. She’s like heroin and oxycontin in one dose. The sound of her voice is like a million angels calling out my name.
“Jesus,” I mutter, my back aching from being propped up in the closet. It’s hot as hell in here and I’m sweating so hard, I could probably wring my shirt out and fill up a glass of water. “I don’t know how you normally sleep, but there’s these things called beds, you should try em out sometime. They’re glorious.”
I kick open the closet door just in time for my old man to walk past. He looks inside and shakes his head, shoving his hands in his pockets as he walks away, whistling to himself. It’s not the strangest thing he’s ever seen in this house, and probably not the strangest thing that’s ever happened in this closet.
“I need to go home,” she says. “As soon as possible.”
“Sure, babe,” I say, helping her up off the ground. “I bet there’s a bunch of people who really miss you. Where’s home? Beaver? Butler? Cranberry?”
She sucks in a deep breath, and the way her eyes are dancing all around worries me she’s gonna shut down again and not talk to me.
“I need to go back to the mansion.”
“Yeah fucking right you do!” I shout. “Are you out of your Goddamn mind? Mani, I don’t know what the hell those people put in your head, but if you go back there, they’re gonna fucking kill you. You want that? You’d rather be dead than be here with me? Is that what this is?”
She stands there and stares at me, pouting her lips.
“What, you can’t talk now? You got some selective mutism or something? Why is it as soon as I get anywhere with you, you clam up? Don’t you see Mani? I’m only trying to help you!” I’m yelling. I know I’m yelling, but I don’t care. This woman has already broken me down in every possible way, and every time she pushes me away, she’s stabbing me in the stomach. “Maybe you are just some stupid weirdo. I don’t know why I even wasted my time.”
Her hand across my face feels like fire.
“Get off your God complex, Lean. You think you’re helping me? You think you can just swoop in and be the hero of the day? The winner? You don’t even know the game you’re playing, let alone the rules. All you did was make my life a million times more complicated.”
She storms off down the hallway, and Rowdy pops his head out of his bedroom door.
“I think you fixed her, bud,” he says with a chuckle. “Probably not the way I would’ve done things, but hey, at least you made some progress.”
I bring my hand to my face and I can’t help but laugh.
“Shut up, Rowdy! You’re not helping!” she shrieks.
“Shit,” he stammers, pulling his door closed.
I just watch in amusement as she hits the end of the hallway, realizing it dead ends and pounds her fist on the wall.
“At least indulge me in breakfast,” I shout. “Then I’ll let you get back to whatever the hell it is you need to go. If that’s alright. Or are you gonna hit me again?”
I extend my hand to her, and she takes it reluctantly. “Come on. You need a shower, and I need some coffee, and maybe a bag of peas on my face. I had it coming. I know. I’ll let it slide this time.”
“I’m sorry,” she says softly. “That’s not like me at all.”
“You sure?” I ask. “I kind of like this side of you.”
Maybe that’s what drew me to her in the first place. This woman who was so beaten, so battered, so destroyed, she never lost that fire in her eyes. How she could go so deep inside her own shell to the point that she couldn’t even talk, but if the right buttons were pushed, she went from rag doll to real live wild woman in the matter of seconds. It’s intriguing for a guy like me. I’ve seen it all in my day, but nothing like this.
This woman is going to be my ruin one way or another.
Chapter Eleven
Mani:
I take as long as possible in the shower, not only because I’m trying to formulate my escape, but because I know what’s waiting for me on the other side of the door. It smells like bacon and eggs, but I just slapped a man across the face and told him off.
A man who has done nothing but gone out of his way to help you.
I like the way his soap smells. I rub it all over my body and even in my hair. I know it won’t be long until I have to go back to the mansion. Ella needs me, and I’m certain St
efano and Catarina are already on the hunt to find me.
I relish the feeling of the warm water running down me, relaxing my aching muscles. It feels so good to shower in private. I laugh at the thought, such a silly simple luxury I’ve gone without for so long. I wish that voice I used with Lean was one I could use to get me and Ella out of that situation. I wish I could slap Catarina on the face and grab my sister and go, and I start to wonder if this Slick guy is really who everybody says he is. Could he really make us disappear?
If I disappear, I’d never get to smell this soap again. I’d never get to feel his arms around me. I’d never get to sleep in his bed, or make love to him, or ride on his motorcycle. If I stick around, I fear the same thing will happen. They won’t just kill me. They’ll do whatever it takes to ruin him.
I turn off the water and wrap myself in a towel he has hanging from the rod on the wall and it smells like him too. I look at myself in the mirror and am shocked at the difference a night in this house has made from that feral person I saw in the restaurant mirror. I smile, and it startles me, almost more than hearing my own voice.
I wish I could live in this moment forever. I’m safe in this bathroom, and the outside world doesn’t exist.
There’s a soft knock on the door, and I pull the towel over my body, covering myself tightly. “I’m not trying to peek. Gin brought some clothes if you want em.”
I look at my ratty jean shorts and halter top stained with blood and sweat and crumpled up on the floor and literally anything sounds more appealing than that right now.
I open up the bathroom door, and his eyes meet mine. I feel myself blushing, and I don’t know if it’s because being nearly naked in front of him feels like a kind of intimacy I’ve never experienced before, or if when he stares at me like that, I feel like he can see inside my brain.
God, he’s gorgeous like no other man I’ve ever seen before. He scares me and he delights me. I’ve never had anybody fight for me or advocate for me, and yet I know if he wanted to, he could destroy me. It makes my knees weak.
“You’re so pretty, Mani,” he says.
I look down at the floor, at his big black boots, and my eyes travel up calves, to his thighs, to the massive bulge in his jeans. I quickly grab the clothes and slam the door shut behind me. Either he’s hung like a horse or happy to see me, either way, I’m not prepared to mentally process that one, although I’d probably die a happy woman if I let him take me here and now.
I get dressed quickly in the leggings and tank top. They don’t fit great, but they’re comfortable and they cover up most of my bruises except for my hands.
Lean is sitting at this little table he has set up in the ‘kitchen’ area of his bedroom. I think it’s kind of amazing how this house is set up, lots of little apartments inside one big building. All these guys live together and somehow manage not to kill one another.
He’s changed into a fresh black t-shirt, and the way his bicep muscles bulge as he pours a cup of coffee from the pitcher on the table makes my eyes and mind wander to somewhere dark. I spent the whole night in those arms.
“How do you take your coffee?”
“Just sugar, please,” I say. “Lots of it.”
“Whatever you want, babe.” He motions for me to sit down at the table and there’s a heaping pile of bacon, eggs, and toast sitting there for me. I try not to drool as I shove a piece of the sizzling hot bacon in my mouth. I probably shouldn’t go full blown cavewoman and scarf this down, but my stomach has other ideas.
“Eat up, I can make more.”
I can barely mutter a thank you in between bites, and it’s not because I’m afraid to talk to him.
“I don’t want to take you back to that house, Mani. I don’t like that one bit. What’s the deal with you and Stefano? Is he your old man or something?”
I look up from my plate and cringe.
He’s gonna think I’m a total whack job if I tell him the truth.
“Listen, I meet plenty of ladies whose boyfriends beat on them. You probably think you deserve it, but I promise, Mani, you don’t. You don’t gotta stay with him just because you think you’re in love. You guys got kids together or something?”
“He’s not my boyfriend. It’s complicated,” I say.
“He pimp you out?”
The room suddenly feels a lot smaller. I feel like I have to gulp for air just to get enough into my lungs.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t make you talk about this shit if you don’t want to. I’m just trying to figure out what I have to do to show you it doesn’t have to be like that, babe. Stefano doesn’t have the right to treat you like that.”
“He’s my step brother,” I blurt out. The breakfast in my stomach starts to lurch. I sprint back to the bathroom, knowing I made a huge mistake, hanging my head over the toilet as everything starts to spin around me.
“Mani.” He’s pounding on the bathroom door, as I’m puking my guts out. “Mani, I’m coming in.”
He stands there in the doorway looking at me with confusion on his face and concern in his eyes, and I feel so pathetic laying here on the cool tile.
“He’s gonna kill my sister,” I say with all the energy I can muster up. “I have to go back there or he’ll kill her. It’s in my contract. I’m sorry. I can’t stay here with you.”
There’s a loud pounding on his bedroom door. He walks over to me and pushes my hair out of my face. “Don’t go anywhere,” he says.
“Lean, we got a fucking problem,” a man’s voice booms. I crawl across the floor and peek out the door. It’s his father standing there, blood all over his hands and face. “Get out here right now.”
My blood grows cold as he shuts the door behind him and I’m left here alone on the floor.
Chapter Twelve
Lean:
“What’s happening?” I ask as I storm out in the front room of the clubhouse. I damn near throw up in my mouth when the smell of rotting flesh hits me. Bags’ corpse is laying in the middle of the floor, guts pouring out of his stomach. It looks like somebody slit him open and lit him on fire. “No!” I shout, dropping to the floor beside him.
“Who the hell did this?” I ask, even though I already know the answer. Carved in his chest are the words “SEND THE BITCH BACK”.
“Make sure nobody comes in here,” my dad says to Lazarus, who’s skin is turning a shade of green. He nods and takes off down the hallway.
In my mind I’m apologizing a million times over for every single time I doubted Bags, every time I put him through some shit, every time I treated him terribly.
“What the fuck do we do?” I stammer. The closer I get to him, the harder it is to breathe. I’ve seen a lot of dead bodies in my day, but this is some psycho shit.
“I’ll fucking handle it,” Brass, our enforcer says as he paces back and forth across the room, cracking his tattooed knuckles. “They don’t know what the fuck they just stepped into. Why the hell do they care so goddamn much? This bitch magical or something?”
“Take it easy,” I say. “Get him in the cooler or something.”
“Take it easy?” Brass shouts in my face. “Bags might not have been a brother but he was the most loyal prospect we ever fucking had. You blew a fucking gasket when that bitch got tased and you want to take it easy now?”
“Hey, hey,” my dad says, stepping in between the two of us, pushing us apart. “This ain’t the time to point fingers.”
“That bitch is Stefano and Catarina’s step sister,” I say. “They got her sister in there. We can’t just go flying in guns blazing.”
A scream so shrill it could bust out the glass in the windows comes from the corner of the room. I turn and look in horror as Mani stands there, her face white as a sheet.
“Get out of here!” I shout to her. “This ain’t something you need to see.”
“That’s the man who drove me yesterday,” she stammers. “This is my fault. This is all my fault.”
“Settle down, darlin.”
My dad walks over to her and puts his arm around her shoulder. “Shit happens. We’re gonna take care of this. We’re gonna make things right. Somebody get this girl a drink.”
He walks her over to a barstool, and slides it out. She sits down on it, her eyes never leaving Bags’ body. “I need to go back,” she keeps murmuring over and over. He places a glass of vodka and ice in her hands, and she slams it down in one sip. “You don’t understand.”
I rush over to her, trying to block her from the sight of Bags’ body, but it’s too late.
“We might not understand what these assholes want with you, Mani, but it’s personal now. They killed one of ours, and they sure as fuck aren’t getting you back now. They fucked with the wrong club.”
“My sister.” She rattles the ice in her glass as her hands tremble. “She’s very sick. She needs around the clock medical care. She has cystic fibrosis and she might die any day now. If she doesn’t have access to her doctors, I don’t know what will happen to her. Please, you have to help me get her out of there. You have to promise me she’ll be safe.”
Brass stops his pacing and bows his head. He lost his cousin to CF a few years ago, and just the mention of it gets him all sorts of worked up. “You put yourself through all that to make sure your little sister was alright?” he asks, blotting a tear from his eye.
“I don’t have anything. I don’t have any money, I don’t have a job, I don’t have a place to go. I can’t take care of her. My mom and my step dad are dead. It was my only option,” she says. I can’t stand to see her like this. It hurts me almost more than seeing her physically hurt, knowing the physical pain she’s been through. I wrap her in my arms as she sobs into my chest.