Promises and Pomegranates: A Dark Contemporary Romance (Monsters & Muses Book 1)

by Sav R. Miller

  How Mateo’s presence always seemed to ruin them, and they’d end with me being accosted with a chemically-laced cloth until I passed out.

  The image lashes against my brain so quickly, I see a quick burst of white light. Then it’s shifting, molding from my imagination to something more concrete, something real.

  A memory, not just a dream.

  Kal approaching me on my balcony back home, removing a syringe from his coat pocket. Me giving in immediately, just because I didn’t feel like fighting it.

  What was the point, when he’d find me regardless?

  For only the second time I could recall, I’d been given a choice. A shitty choice, but a choice nonetheless: marry Kal or watch him slaughter my loved ones. And after, probably me.

  I knew he could do it.

  Even worse, I knew he would.

  That’s the problem when you associate with men like him; the kind who ooze power, know how to wield it, and know what to do to keep it. The kind who will spit in your face, then offer a handkerchief to wipe it off, so you end up owing him something instead.

  The kind with very little to lose.

  I haven’t had one of those nightmares since I’ve been on the island. Maybe that’s because the nightmare manifested.

  Whatever the reason, when I see Vinny pull out a similarly shaped object, uncapping it with his thumb, my instincts kick into overdrive for the first time since all of this began.

  “Uh...” Gwen says, moving back down the bar toward us, eyeing the needle in Vinny’s hand. “Did he tell you to drug her?”

  Vinny scoffs. “He said to keep an eye on her. I can’t very well fuckin’ do that if she isn’t here, now can I?”

  “This is definitely not going to end well for you,” she mutters, shaking her head.

  But she doesn’t stop him.

  He pounces like a hunter zeroing in on its prey, hands vying for my neck, and I lean into the movement.

  He’s stocky, but it’s clear the second I grab his wrists that he’s only concerned with glamor muscles; he loses his grip easily, the syringe falling from his fist and clattering to the floor. He bends to get it, shoving his elbow in my face. It connects with my eye, and I stumble back from the sudden brunt force, pain lancing across my forehead.

  I can already feel the bruise, blood coagulating beneath the surface of my skin.

  Satisfaction rolls through me like a thick fog, settling deep in my soul as I focus on the pain, using it to propel me into action.

  Raising my leg, I kick upward, aiming for his groin.

  When my shin makes contact, Vinny groans long and throaty, like a man with sudden tonsil issues. He doubles over, losing the needle again, and I kick once more for good measure, then walk around as he writhes on all fours, gripping his ears with my fingernails and driving my knee into his forehead.

  Putting his arms up in surrender, he ducks his head, one hand dropping to the floor. I glance up at Gwen, who’s watching with a bored expression on her face, like this kind of thing happens all the time.

  Given the complete disinterest of the other customers, maybe it does.

  Pushing my purse strap farther up on my shoulder, I lift my foot and drop it onto Vinny’s fingers, reveling in the crunch of his bones beneath my weight. He squeals like a gutted pig, his other hand stretching and twitching as if having sympathy pains.

  I start to turn away, my eyes back on the exit, when I feel a sharp sensation prickle on the back of my calf. Glancing down, I see Vinny’s hand wrapped around the needle from before, which he drags quickly from where it’s just penetrated my skin.

  Panic floods my chest, and I look up at Gwen, who stares with wide eyes, mouth slightly parted.

  “Vinny...” she says, an edge of worry creeping into her voice.

  He rolls onto his back, tossing the needle behind the bar and grabbing his crotch. “Whatever. She had it coming.”

  My chest tightens as the seconds pass by, my feet apparently frozen in place as I watch Vinny go fetal on the floor. My heartbeat kicks up, pulsing so fast and loud it’s all I can hear between my ears, and fear claws at my throat, making it difficult to breathe.

  I turn around, unsure of what to do, or how long it’ll take for whatever he just injected me with to kick in.

  Gwen doesn’t come after me even when my feet start forward, moving me to the door. Pushing it open with shaking hands, I squint against the sunlight and ignore the cool sea air, taking a moment to let my eyes get used to the drastic atmospheric change.

  Heart in my throat, I glance up and down the alleyway, realizing I’ve somehow exited through the wrong door. Unsure of how I got turned around, I grab the handle to get back inside, finding that it’s locked behind me.

  Swallowing, I shuffle down the alley, my eye throbbing with each step I take until I come to a stop back on the main street.

  I don’t see Kal anywhere, and the idea that I’ve actually been abandoned resurfaces, making my stomach cramp. Confusion solidifies in my psyche, rejection weaseling in and making me feel like an idiot.

  Just because he gives you his credit card and a couple of orgasms, doesn’t mean he’s interested in more.

  Besides, I shouldn’t even want more. Barely any time has passed since our forced union, so what exactly did I think was going to happen? That he’d reciprocate the level of obsession I’ve held for him my entire life, and somehow we’d find a way to make it work despite the outside obstacles hell-bent on keeping us apart?

  No, Elena. This isn’t a Disney movie or some romantic poem.

  Stupid, stupid girl.

  Letting my attraction defy reason, it’s been keeping me locked inside that house without even trying to escape.

  Casting a glance up and down the street again, I purse my lips, considering.

  Sucking in a lungful of air, I ignore the unease rippling inside of me and straighten my spine, adjusting the hem of my dress with one hand.

  And then, I run.

  Chapter 15

  The second my sister opens her mouth to spew venom, I’m hit by a wave of nostalgia that damn near knocks me off my feet.

  For the slightest blip in time, I’m a kid again, standing on the sunken concrete porch of a little house in North Carolina, rain stitching my clothes to my skin. Droplets of water roll off the end of my nose as I wait, hoping that maybe this time the man who helped give me life will answer the door.

  My fist curls around the scrap of paper in my trench coat pocket, my mother’s goodbye, something I’ve read so many times at this point, I know the words by heart.

  Auden’s Funeral Blues scribbled by cancer-riddled hands, a single space above the address of a man she never spoke of. A man who, thirteen years prior, met a dark-haired mystery in a nightclub, took her home, and never contacted her again after that.

  It wasn’t until she sought him out with evidence of their tryst together that she learned he was married.

  His wife had just given birth to their first son.

  He didn’t want me. Told my mother to take care of the problem, and not to come around again.

  She didn’t.

  Take care of me, that is.

  And I spent the first decade of my life without the knowledge that I was a reject. The product of a bad decision, brought about because my mother was practically a saint, and she didn’t want to punish anyone else for her mistakes.

  Still, the universe didn’t reward her.

  Which is why I found myself on my sperm donor’s doorstep, praying that thirteen years may have lessened the blow of having a child outside of his marriage. That maybe he’d be happy to have another son, like a built-in friend for the one who wasn’t a bastard.

  Throat tight, I wait in front of the door like I’ve waited four other times this week, my knuckles red from all the knocking. The downpour doesn’t erase the sound from my head; in my mind, the knocking never ceases, even after I drop my hand.

  I don’t know what I’m expecting, in all honesty. My mother’
s been six feet under for less than a day, and I’m already out trying to find a figurehead to replace her.

  Maybe I am as evil and selfish as my grandfather always says.

  A light flickers on in the big bay window at the front of the little white house, and a second later the door creaks open. Hope blooms in my chest like the sunflowers to my right, bright and wide, ready to absorb any ounce of potential nourishment I can get.

  Instead, a little girl with onyx hair spilling down her back appears, clasping the door in her hand. She blinks at me through the storm door, big doe eyes reflecting an innocence mine never have.

  Her pale, moon-shaped face turns up, a thousand-yard stare taking me in, processing silently.

  Now, with that same little girl staring up at me again as an adult, I can’t help the pang that comes next as I return to the present. I ran when I saw her back then, and everything in me wants to repeat that scene, to get as far away from my sister as I can before my existence ruins her.

  One of my legs shifts, as if trying to escape, but Violet notices and scurries in front of me, blocking my path. “Oh, no. You’re not going anywhere. You lure me to this shitty little island with a job that I just knew was too good to be true, the least you can do is explain yourself.”

  I clear my throat, glancing down at her all-black outfit, so ridiculously similar to my own that I almost laugh. Nature versus nurture, I guess.

  Steeling myself against the nerves fluttering inside my chest, I stuff my hands in my pockets and shrug. “I’d say you already know the reason you’re here, Violet. You won’t cash any of the checks I send, and you’ve blocked my ability to wire transfer funds into your bank account. This was the next logical step.”

  Her brows arch. “Actually, the next logical step would be to leave me alone, like I’ve asked you to a hundred times.”

  “Take the money I’m trying to give you and I’ll leave you be.”

  “I don’t want your money!” she snaps, turning a few heads of the people passing by on their way from the Dunkin’ Donuts down the street. “Honestly, Kal, it’s a nice gesture, but... it’s not warranted.”

  Clenching my jaw, I exhale roughly. “You’re drowning in debt, Violet. Let me help you.”

  “God, you don’t get it, do you?” Shaking her head, she turns on her heel, scanning the sidewalk as if looking for eavesdroppers. As if anyone in Aplana is at all concerned with the happenings of others—that’s why the island is primarily made up of tourists year-round. People come here to escape.

  Or, in my case, to hide.

  They definitely don’t come for gossip, and the locals know better than to put their noses in my business, even if they don’t know exactly why they shouldn’t.

  “Have a cup of coffee with me and explain it,” I offer, nodding at Dunkin’. Such an odd franchise for this part of town, given the number of mom-and-pop shops littering the streets, but it does surprisingly well.

  “I don’t want to have coffee with you. I don’t even want to be here, on this island. But I came, even though my best friend told me something sounded off. I thought, it’s an island with a population of less than a hundred people, what could possibly happen?” She snorts sharply, narrowing her eyes. “Just when I was starting to forget about you.”

  Her words are a barb aimed directly at my heart; it sinks inside the muscle, flaring so it latches on tightly and refuses to relinquish its hold. I rub at the ache they cause, taking a step back, wondering if I should go back inside and leave her be after all.

  “This is your problem, Kal. You want to force a relationship by fixing what you feel are problems. I didn’t ask for your help, and I know damn sure my dad didn’t, either.”

  I bite the inside of my cheek in silent protest. Her dad.

  Not ours.

  I don’t reply, letting the weight of her words pull them down between us, anchoring them to the space where I once stood.

  Finally, she exhales, mimicking my movement backward, shielding her eyes from the sun with one hand. “Did you... did you really kidnap that girl?”

  “Keeping tabs on me, sister?”

  She scrunches up her nose. “You can’t go anywhere back home without hearing about it. She’s a mafia princess, Kal. What are you even thinking?”

  Part of me almost laughs again at the condescension seeping from her tone.

  Like I’m afraid of the fucking mafia.

  “I know who she is, and I didn’t kidnap anyone. Elena married me of her own volition. If you want the sordid details of how she pursued me, then I her, I’ll give them to you as soon as you cash one of my fucking checks.”

  “Wasn’t she supposed to marry someone else? Some news reporter, or journalist?” Violet tilts her head, studying me. “You know they found his body, right?”

  Annoyance burns hot on the back of my tongue. “I’m not sure why that would concern me.”

  She presses her lips together, glancing down at the Birkenstocks on her feet. “It probably doesn’t, and that’s part of our problem.”

  Slipping my hands from my pockets, I reach up and tug at the collar of my dress shirt, shaking my head. “Actually, we don’t have a problem. In fact, per your request, we don’t even have a relationship.” I start to head in the opposite direction down the street, pausing once to see the astonishment coloring her features.

  “I’ve been poor, you know. Most of my life, that was my identity. It sucks, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Not even on the man who still to this day won’t recognize me as his own.” Violet blinks, reminding me so much of the little girl on the doorstep all those years ago, staring up at me like I was a stranger.

  Which, I suppose I am. Even now.

  “I’ll tell Jonas you’re no longer interested in working here,” I say, moving back toward the front door of the Flaming Chariot. “See to it you’re off my island by sundown.”

  And with that, I head back inside.

  Chapter 16

  I don’t get very far, since I’ve not been given any time to explore the island outside of Kal’s home, and therefore don’t know anything about the layout.

  I run until I’m blocks away from the bar, hyperaware of the wind kicking up the skirt of my dress each time my feet hit concrete. At least I wore underwear today.

  There’s a bus station at the end of a connecting street, and I duck in as soon as I reach it, trying not to feel immediately paranoid about the lack of people inside.

  To be fair, it seems as though this island doesn’t have a wide variety of folks, anyway. I’m sure the majority of them travel by foot or car.

  At least, that’s what I tell myself as I approach the ticket window, searching for any sign of life inside. The lights are off in the office, the computer screens black. It looks like no one’s been here in weeks.

  Groaning to myself, I lean my head against the counter, mentally assessing my body for signs of the drug Vinny injected me with.

  It’s been several minutes and I don’t feel any different, except more on edge than ever as I wait for symptoms to set in. Exhaling, I walk over to one of the plastic benches in front of the window and flop down, pulling my phone out.

  My sister’s name flashes across the screen, requesting a video call, and I decline, exhaustion clouding my brain. The phone vibrates again, an unsaved number I know by heart popping up, making the organ clench inside my chest like a closed fist, barring itself from further hurt.

  I decline that call too, slumping on the bench and dropping my head to rest on its back.

  Tapping my fingers on my bare knee, I contemplate my next move. There probably isn’t very much time, considering Kal knows Aplana and I don’t, and he’s also probably tracking my phone. I’m only minutes from the bar, and I know the first place he’d look for me would be an apparently abandoned bus station.

  Because he’s smart. A predator at his very core, alert and cognizant at all times, like a lion lying low in the grass before an attack.

  I could hide in a bathroo
m or a storage closet. Maybe try to find a door that locks, or mask my scent with the soil from one of the potted plants near the exit.

  But deep in my heart, I know it’s useless. Kal didn’t take me as his wife for no reason, so there’s no chance in hell he’d ever give me up for anything less.

  With a hand that feels like lead, I turn my phone over, wondering if Mamá was right to try and rescue me from this life.

  At least with Mateo, I wouldn’t have been a prisoner to the feelings inside me; they’re volatile waves that ebb back and forth, tossing me like a ship as I try to decide between my infatuation and my fear. Lately, the former’s been winning out, my sex-starved brain short-circuiting when any part of me comes into contact with my husband.

  The latter, though, is the option that makes sense. I should fear him. Should be spending all of my time figuring out how to get as far from him as possible, rather than melting into a needy puddle any time he’s around.

  Maybe if I hadn’t been so openly wanton, he wouldn’t have taken me to that bar, and I wouldn’t have been attacked.

  Maybe if he hadn’t left you alone, you wouldn’t have been.

  My phone rings again, that same number popping up; against my better judgment, I answer, hitting the speaker button with my pinky as the rest of my body starts to feel like it’s taking on water.

  “Where the fuck are you?” Kal’s voice is cold, hard steel, hurled at me like a lightning bolt.

  A lazy smile works over my lips. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  “I’m not in the habit of asking questions I don’t want the answer to,” he says darkly. “You know better than that, Elena.”

  I make a face at the window. “You sound like my dad.”

  A long, pregnant pause stretches through the line between us, heat scoring my cheeks.

  “Yeah?” Kal clips. “Then get back here so I can discipline you properly. Put you over my knee, show you how I feel about you running away from me.”