Holly’s interest was immediately piqued. She couldn’t help it. Anything to boost business – to get things closer to the way they’d been when Tommy was still alive. If this man was still interested in carrying on business Tommy had spoken of before he died, perhaps the opportunity was still available.
“What kind of assistance?” Despite her interest, running a business had long turned Holly into a shrewd businesswoman. She could certainly smell when something stank – and she’d need Kirk Luckston to tell her the details up front before she sat down with him.
To her surprise, the man’s mild smile only widened. “Might we speak in your office? The details of the deal are a bit sensitive, I’m sure you understand. That is…unless you’d like me to come back another time.”
“No.” The word escaped Holly before she could stop it and she immediately recanted. “I mean, No. I have time now.”
“Wonderful.” Kirk gestured towards the office, stepping aside. “After you.”
Holly cast him a small smile before leading the way towards the north end of the restaurant. On the way, she passed the table where Maddy sat. She wasn’t surprised to see that her daughter didn’t eat any more broccoli with cheese than she had without. Maddy was, and always had been, a picky eater.
“Thanks, Emily.” She touched the blonde teen’s shoulder as she passed. “I’ll be right back. Give me twenty minutes, ok?”
Emily, of course, was still in hog heaven, despite Maddy’s frustrated expression. “Sure. No problem.”
Holly was reaching for the keys on her belt when Kirk spoke again. “That your daughter? Tommy’s daughter?”
“Yes.” Holly smiled fondly as she opened the office. “Madison. She’s sweet. Don’t let that sour face fool you.” She didn’t let it fool her. Even if she hadn’t seen Maddy smile in months, Holly knew that she still could. And one day, she would.
She just had to be patient.
“Alright, Mr. Luckston. Let’s talk about your proposition.” Leaning against the desk that still so reminded her of Tommy, Holly turned to face Luckston – only to watch him close the door behind them and turn the lock.
Almost immediately, the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. From the moment she’d seen him, something had unnerved her about Kirk Luckston’s smile, and now, Holly found her sense of unease growing.
“Just making sure that we have some privacy, Holly. You don’t mind if I call you Holly, do you?” The man turned to face her, his expression congenial – eyes still cold.
“Um…I do, actually.” She managed, pressing herself against the desk as the man advanced on her. Holly now noticed that he’d placed himself between her and the door – which meant there was no way she could get to help should she happen to need it.
“Do you?” Now Luckston was a mere two feet away, and Holly found her entire body tensing as he loomed ever closer. Warning sirens wailed in her head, and her stomach clenched in trepidation. She realized, far too late, that it had been a mistake to let this man get her alone. “Well, that’s unfortunate, Holly. Just too damn unfortunate.”
Holly grabbed hold of the first thing her scrabbling fingers found on Tommy’s desk – which just so happened to be a stapler. Before she could put too much thought into it, she swung the object forward towards Kirk Luckston’s face – only to have her wrist caught in a strong, jarring grip. When Holly opened her mouth to scream, Kirk’s opposite hand closed around her throat in a painfully tight grip, cutting off her airflow within milliseconds.
Luckston performed these actions with the ease of someone practiced in them – and not once did his expression change from one of congenial friendliness. “Now, Holly, I want you to listen to me.”
As if she had a choice. The man was choking her, his grip so tight that stars soon burst to life before her vision. “You’re not going to scream. You’re not going to yell. In fact, if you utter one peep to do anything other than answer when I speak to you, I’m going to take this stapler to places you can’t even imagine. Do we understand one another?”
Her heart pounding wildly, Holly nodded. Luckston let her gasp for air a little while longer before he finally released her. As air rushed back into her system, Holly began to tremble. She was caught between fury and terrible, crippling fury at the man who still held her. He plucked the stapler from her grasp to toss aside before locking eyes with her once more.
“That’s better. Now, I think, we’re ready to talk.”
Holly’s gaze narrowed to a glare. “What do you want?”
Luckston hit her – and not just a warning shot. He hauled off and slammed the flat of his hand into her jaw so hard she went reeling from the desk to the floor with a thud that jarred her joints. Pain exploded through her line of vision and she tasted blood in her mouth – and in that instant, Holly knew that this was not a man to be trifled with. Any thought she might have had of standing up to him was going to hurt.
A lot.
“What,” Kirk cracked the bones in the knuckles of the hand with which he’d struck her. “Did I just say?”
This time, Holly said absolutely nothing. She knew better. She touched her lip, wincing when she found the rent skin and her fingers came away stained red.
“There we go.” Kirk chuckled darkly, the edge of insanity in his voice. “I think she gets it now.”
The last time Holly had been so helplessly afraid was the night Tommy had been killed. Was tonight going to be like that night?
“Get up,” Kirk ordered curtly, reaching forward to take her forearm in an iron grip and yank her to her feet. With little ceremony, his hands encircled her waist and he set her on the desk before her, bringing them eye to eye. “Holly, we’re going to have a discussion, you and me…we’re going to talk about Tommy and what he owes my organization.”
Holly’s eyes widened in horror. What Tommy…owed them? She’d just paid off all the debts Tommy owed. They were climbing out of debt. “I know this may come as somewhat of a surprise to you,” Kirk continued, his emotionless gaze centered on her face, “But your husband had a bit of a betting problem. He got lucky once or twice and things went to his head. I won’t bore you with the details, but at the time of his death, Tommy owed us a lot of money. And we couldn’t just let that slide.”
Dear sweet God…who the hell had Tommy been involved with?
“Now, I want you to ask me how much Tommy owed us.” Kirk demanded, his imposing form towering over hers.
Holly swallowed thickly, her heart pounding in her ears. “How…how much?”
“A fucking shit ton, sweetheart. More than you can imagine. Which is why you’re going to pay his debts.”
Holly sucked in a breath. She’d just finished paying Tommy’s debts. She couldn’t afford to pay any more!
“I…I don’t have anything.” This time, when Luckston hit her, it wasn’t her face he struck. The blow was low, right across the old marks of her injury. The pain was enough to make Holly’s vision swim before her eyes as she croaked desperately, winded. Her body bowed sideways over the desk until Kirk took a fistful of her hair to haul her back upright.
“Wrong.” He corrected her, his minty breath filling her nostrils. “You have a pretty popular restaurant – lucky you. Tommy might have been an idiotic bastard, but he could cook. That I have to hand to him.” Holly struggled to catch her breath as Kirk’s grip on her scalp tightened. “And so, I’ll tell you what we’re going to do: I’ll be a gentleman. I won’t ask for the whole amount at once. You just have to give me fifty percent of your biweekly earnings for the next year or so, and we’ll call it even.”
If Holly hadn’t been on the cusp of being sick before, she was now. Fifty percent of the earnings? They were barely making ends meet now. How the hell were they supposed to operate on half that? “Personally,” Kirk continued amicably. “I think that’s more than fair. What about you?”
Did he really think she’d do anything but agree with him? She couldn’t scream – couldn’t call anyone to h
elp her. Someone could be standing right outside the office door and they’d never know what was happening beyond. Slowly, she nodded.
In reply, Luckston only jerked her hair hard enough to make her gasp in agony. “Answer me when I talk to you, you stupid cunt. Is. That. Fair?”
“Yes!” Holly’s answer was half sob, half cry, her entire body writhing in pain.
Luckston finally released her, letting her sag to the floor as she quivered violently. “Wonderful.” The bastard sounded elated. As if he’d just closed the business deal of the century. “Now…just so you know, this has to be our little secret. You can’t tell a soul.” He bent to a crouching position to take her chin in a firm grip, forcing her to look up at him. “If you utter so much as a single word to anyone you know, or the cops…I’ll kill you.” He paused for a moment, seeming to relish the thought. “And then I’ll kill your old lady in Wynwood.”
Holly inhaled sharply at the mention of her mother. “It would be easy. The bitch is out of her mind anyway. She’d probably invite me in.” Holly’s eyes shut tight as she felt tears of frustration and fear coursing down her cheeks. “And then,” Kirk chuckled lowly, obviously amused by her distress. “I’ll kill your little girl too. Tommy’s last living legacy.”
Holly reacted instinctively. Her eyes popping open, she launched herself at Kirk with a low cry of outrage as the mother lion in her roared. “You motherfucker!” She actually managed to grab a hank of his hair, ripping it out as she tore at him with her fingernails. “You touch her and I’ll fucking kill you! I’ll kill you!’
In an instant, she was slammed backwards against the corner of the desk so hard something in her back popped and only Kirk Luckston’s hand covering her mouth stifled her scream of pain. She expected him to be pissed – to kill her on the spot – but instead, he merely grinned, a trickle of blood running down his temple from his scalp. She’d delivered several shallow gashes across her face with his fingernails but, disgustingly, the man only licked the blood from his lips. “Fuck, Holly! You’ve got more spirit than I thought! I like spirit.” Holly was horrified to feel the bulge of the man’s erection against her lower stomach. When he reached down to rip the hem of her shirt open with his free hand, she wailed against his hand.
“Shut up,” Luckston hissed, his eyes narrowed in hateful glee. “Or I swear to God I’ll knife the little bitch right here and now.” Holly immediately fell limp. She was in no position to attack Luckson again – and she had no doubt that he would carry out his threat without a second thought.
Once she was silent, he only laughed softly, divesting her entirely of her shirt so she lay half on the desk clad only in her black cotton bra. “Bit of a disappointment in the lingerie department, Holly, but you’ve got some nice tits.” To emphazise the statement, he palmed one roughly in his hand.
Inwardly Holly screamed in protest. No one had ever touched her except Tommy. No one.
Outwardly she forced her face and mind to go blank as Kirk groped her. She couldn’t let herself feel anything. Not when her daughter’s life was on the line.
“Goddamn, Holly. You smell good.” Kirk buried his face against her throat and the scent of his cologne made her sick to her stomach. When he bit her there, leaving a dark mark, she winced, but said nothing. Luckston inhaled deeply before seeming to compose himself. With a longing sigh, he straightened, tugging his tie back into place before smoothing his hair. “I think I’ve got a good idea.” The man’s hands curled around Holly’s thighs, bared where her skirt had hiked high on her hips during their struggle. “Instead of charging interest on Tommy’s losses, I’ll just have you. Whenever and however the fuck I like.”
Holly’s stomach twisted violently, but she forced herself to swallow the bile.
She said nothing.
“I’ll take that as assent.” With that, the man moved away from her, giving Holly’s thigh a last squeeze before lowering her skirt back into place. “Now,” in the space of five seconds, the man’s demeanor changed completely. He reached for a box of tissues on the edge of the desk to clean himself up, dabbing the blood from his face almost delicately. Within two minutes, one could hardly tell that he’d been manhandling her or smacking her around her office. In fact, Kirk Luckston looked no more dangerous than he had when she’d first laid eyes on him.
But now, Holly knew the truth.
“Unfortunately, I don’t have time to mess you up the way you so desperately need, Mrs. Wilder,” Kirk quipped, his smile scathing, “So it’ll have to wait a few weeks. The next time we see one another, I’ll expect my first payment. Don’t disappoint me.”
Leaning over, the dastardly man reached past her. Holly winced, thinking he meant to hit her again, but, instead, Kirk just plucked a family picture from the surface of the desk. It was a framed picture of her, Tommy and Maddy at the little girl’s sixth birthday party – one of Holly’s most treasured possessions. “Nice photo.” Kirk took a moment to admire it before tucking it into the breast pocket of his suit jacket. “I think I’ll keep it for the time being. Be a good girl, Holly, and you might get it back.”
With that, the man turned on his heel, unlocking the office door to slip from the small room and close it behind him.
Holly remained on the desk, her shirt in shreds, face body throbbing from where Luckston had hit her. Her chest heaved up and down as she tried to calm down – to tell herself that everything was going to be alright. That, somehow, she could handle this.
But deep down, she knew better.
There was sheer insanity in Kirk Luckston’s eyes – he was a loose cannon, and there would be no predicting what might happen if she didn’t meet his terms.
Slowly, Holly straightened, shedding the scraps of her shirt before tossing them into the wastebasket near the desk. As she rifled through the closet for a spare, her hands trembled. She couldn’t break now. She couldn’t. It would give everything away, and that would be the end.
For her mother…for Maddy. For Tommy’s business and all he’d left behind.
Holly had to be strong. There was no other option. She had to keep her family alive. But while she sought a way to do so, she felt something strangely like resentment creeping into her heart. It seemed the laundry list of secrets the man she loved had kept grew with each passing month.
And Holly didn’t know how many more she could take.
Chapter 5
Shane had to be out of his mind.
He switched off his bike, still straddling the warm machine as he gazed down the drive at the neat, small house before him.
What the hell was he doing here?
He had no plan of action – no inclination of where to start – and God knew his father hadn’t helped. It was a struggle just to get the old man to talk to him, let alone gleaning any information about what he’d missed over the years.
And yet…his father was the first person he went to.
The day after Alex visited him, Shane headed towards the outskirts of Miami – and the repair shop his father had owned since he was small enough to remember anything. Of course, his wife had never approved. It was one of the many things that led to their inevitable divorce; but Shane supposed that made things easier for him. Had he shown up at his mother’s house, he had no doubt the woman would have thrown him out. She made quite clear that he was no son of hers when he was arrested at age nineteen, and he doubted she’d changed her mind since then.
His father, on the other hand…Thomas Wilder had at least written to tell Shane that his brother was dead. It wasn’t exactly a gesture of the greatest warmth, but it was something. The only connection Shane had.
His old man hadn’t exactly welcomed him with open arms. It was clear to Shane that his father had abandoned any and all notions of family when Tommy died. He was an angry, stubborn old man whose first words to his only living son were to demand what the hell he was doing in his shop.
The following days hadn’t gone much smoother. Shane had to prove his usefulness around the gr
oupings of crippled cars and vehicles on the lot before his father would even speak to him, and even then, Thomas had only rained him with judgements on his character. How he couldn’t just ‘show up’ and make things better. Shane’s counter had been that the old man was getting too old to continue running the shop by himself and that he needed to simply accept his son’s help and shut the fuck up.
“Tommy would never speak to me that way!”
Thomas’ gruff answer earned only a grunt from Shane, who’d been working on a nineteen seventy four Chevy at the time.
“I’m not Tommy.” He repeated the answer he’d given his father as he looked over his dead brother’s yard, with its carefully tended flower beds and pristine green lawn.
Of course he wasn’t. All this – it was Tommy’s dream. The picket fences, puppies and backyard family barbecues in the summer time. Tommy always had his life so perfectly together. First he was going to get a football scholarship to a prestigious university, then he was going to major in culinary arts and open his restaurant. He was going to marry Holly and they were going to have two perfect children that would grow up in the kitchen.
It was a certainty Shane had never had.
Even when Holly got pregnant, Tommy’s plan didn’t change. It just accelerated. He got everything he wanted faster, and to hell with anyone he had to steamroll to do it.
Shane played football not because he expected to get a scholarship, but because he liked the violence of it. He liked taking huge kids who thought they were better than him down a few notches, and he liked impressing the cheerleaders.
Especially Holly.
He remembered the first time he and Tommy had seen her. She was with Kelly, the two of them leaned over their biology books during fourth period. The first time her honey brown eyes locked with Shane’s he felt as if someone had yanked his heart right out of his chest and offered it to her on a silver platter.
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