Stark
She was young . . . so young.
She was also small, except for her baby bump. It was hard to look at. She was hard to look at, but luckily Nassir’s knock-out wife was great with skittish young women who had everything on the line. She was leaps and bounds ahead of the rest of us when it came to assuring the frightened teenager that nothing would happen to her. She soothed her, calmed her, and generally made the girl believe that she was making the right choice. Keelyn Gates cut her imposing, quiet husband a look, practically demanding that he make sure her words to Julia Grace were true. In the end, it was decided that Nassir was the better bet to keep the teenager safe after she filed a formal complaint with Titus against her stepfather. The cop told us that the police department was in disarray with the sudden loss of not only the assistant commissioner, but also several beat cops and a couple of higher ranking officers who had all been on Goddard’s payroll. Titus was currently running the station and trying to do the job of twenty men. He grudgingly admitted that the girl was better off under Nassir’s protection. His name carried more weight than a police badge; no one could deny it.
The girl seemed skeptical, but when Noe promised her that no one would touch her, she appeared to relax. She had a lot of faith in my little thief and Noe was just as impressed by the teen. The fragile looking young woman was smart, far smarter than someone with her privileged background needed to be. When she caught wind of what was going on back in the city, she tracked down another kid who was good with computers and asked him for help getting her message to Noe. She didn’t want to be able to be tracked if Noe had been compromised, so he came up with the book cipher. He was also standing in Nassir’s opulent, extravagant office looking a lot lost and a little like he was going to get sick. He wanted to help Julia, which was admirable, but he had no idea what kind of shark-infested waters he offered to dive into by being a helping hand. They were both just kids; I couldn’t blame either of them for being overwhelmed by everything that was going on.
In fact, watching him rub her back and protectively hover over her while she listened to Key softly tell Julia Grace that there were lots of options when she was ready to decide what she wanted to do with the baby, I realized he was more of a man, more of a standup guy than I had ever been. My dad was still behind bars because of the choices I made, and no matter what I did, neither my mother nor my sister were coming back. The last member of my family was on the hook because of me, and it was about time I did something to rectify the situation.
“Do you need me for anything else?” I’d paid for the kids to get back to the Point, and even with Keelyn taking care of Julia, I was still going to owe Nassir a thousand more favors for taking the girl under his wing. The man didn’t do anything out of the kindness of his heart. Mostly because he didn’t have one. That was probably why we got along as well as we did.
Noe gave me a questioning look that I wasn’t ready to give her answers for. “I have something I need to take care of, and I’d rather do it knowing you’re safe and sound with Nassir.”
That sent her eyebrows shooting up, but she didn’t question me further. She’d been doing that a lot the last couple of days, looking at me like she wanted to say something, but staying silent. We were as close physically as two people could be. I was all over her every chance I got and she was all over me. We were like two people who were starving, ravenous, and greedy. We couldn’t get enough, and I hated that it felt like we had to have our fill of each other because we both knew it was only a matter of time before the food ran out. I could touch her however I wanted, take her without complaint, but ever since we agreed that revenge against Goddard belonged to his stepdaughter, she had been drifting away. She wasn’t challenging me, pushing me, and fighting me every second of every day. She wasn’t poking and prying at all my soft spots she’d uncovered over the last few weeks. Her hands always found their way to the mechanical heart on my chest, but I didn’t miss that she no longer seemed interested in fixing it.
“How long are you going to be gone?” She sounded carefully curious instead of concerned.
“Just a couple of hours.”
Nassir grunted and leaned back in his fancy leather chair. It was black. All it needed was a couple of skulls and some flames and he would look like Lucifer sitting on his throne of fire and lost souls.
“My lawyer is on the way over. He’s going to represent the girl. When we’re done here, Key is going to take her and her little friend to one of her safe houses. We’ll keep them stashed there with a security detail until Goddard is behind bars. The cop agreed to keep us updated on Goddard’s status. We’re all lucky his lady likes me as much as she does.” He sounded amused and I didn’t miss the way his wife rolled her eyes. “Not much you can do here until the legal ball gets rolling.”
Nassir’s wife had made it her mission upon coming back to the Point and going into business with the dark, dangerous man she slept with at night, to make sure that anyone who felt trapped here had a way out. She was the only person who could get you out of the Point alive and intact with very little effort. She was the downtrodden and destitutes’ only savior. She was the only one who could cut the ties this place wrapped around its citizens. It was an odd combination, she and him. She was like an avenging angel dressed in very little wearing sky-high heels. He was the devil incarnate, dressed better than any A-list actor on Oscar night. No one questioned their connection because it was impossible to miss. She didn’t move without his eyes tracking her, and he didn’t breathe without her watching the steady rise and fall of his chest. It had been blown wide open by a bullet not too long ago, so there was no surprise that she appreciated the fact Nassir was still around to give everyone hell.
The teenager looked at Noe with wide eyes and her small hand clamped down on her forearm. “You’re not leaving me, right?”
Noe looked at Julia almost the same way I looked at her when she asked me for help, uncertain and unsure. She’d already put her neck on the line for this girl and it had gotten her kidnapped and tortured. But once again proving she was so much better than me, she patted Julia’s hand and told her, “Of course, I’ll stay with you. I’ll even go with you to the safe house.”
Nassir gave me a knowing look. “I’ll keep an eye on your girl. If you’re not back by the time she’s ready to go, I’ll pull Booker from the club and have him escort her. He seems fond of her.”
The taunt hit its target as I narrowed my eyes at him. “I owe you. Both.”
Nassir lifted a midnight eyebrow and smirked at me. “You do.”
It was my turn to smirk when Key shifted from where she was standing and leaned over so that her hands were flat on her husband’s desk. She shook her head and told me, “We’re happy to help, aren’t we, honey?” She didn’t give Nassir a chance to answer before she stated, “This one is on us, Stark. We need all the good karma we can get. The lawyer is on retainer and he’ll be excited to represent a client who’s easier to deal with than my husband, for once. Go, do what you have to do.”
I turned to say something, anything, to Noe but she wouldn’t look at me. Her head was bent close to the teenager’s, but it was clear she was actively avoiding looking at me. I couldn’t tell where her head was at, but it wasn’t on how things were going to play out between us when all of this was over. Revenge had gone cold, and so had whatever was building between the two of us.
Leaning forward so I could tap knuckles with Nassir, I paused when he muttered quietly, “You’ve never been one I’ve had to worry about, Stark. Don’t become more trouble than you’re worth.”
It was a warning, one I wanted to heed, but with the way things were going it felt like trouble was endless.
“We need each other, boss. Best not forget that.” I wouldn’t have challenged him before Noe. She reminded me that I was one of a kind and irreplaceable. Not many men could stand in Hell next to the Devil himself and not get burned. I was one of them.
Those black eyebrows shot up and the smirk was back. “I don’t know if I like you when you’re firing on all cylinders.”
I shrugged and made my way over to the elevator that was the only way up into the office. I wasn’t too concerned with what anyone liked or didn’t like about me. Well, anyone besides the little thief who still wouldn’t look at me. I cared a whole hell of a lot what she thought about me, I just wished she would pick an emotion and stick with it. I was having a tough time following the swings of being her favorite person to being one she could hardly stand to be in the same room with.
There was one other person’s opinion I cared about and I needed to go see him. It had been too long, and there were questions I needed to ask that I was done letting him avoid.
I needed to see my father.
My truck ate up the distance between the city and the outskirts where the prison was located. I’d made the trip more times than I could count when I was finally free of the iron grip of the DoD. It was always hard to see my dad. The way he’d aged, the way he’d changed. He was haggard and hateful in the way only a man who had lost everything—his family, his career, his patriotism, his sanity, and his freedom—could be. He was never happy to see me when I came for a visit, and I had a feeling that after today he would ask me to stop coming altogether. If a teenaged girl could face the man who had taken everything from her, if a teenaged boy could walk into the unknown by her side because he thought it was the right thing to do, then the least I could do was tell my dad the truth.
The reason he was still behind bars was because of me. Because I couldn’t be who he wanted me to be. I couldn’t be who my mother wanted me to be. And I sure as shit was never going to be what the government wanted me to be.
Getting through security sucked. I hated being searched and poked and prodded. I hated answering their stupid questions. I hated that I was forced to go through all of this to spend thirty measly minutes with my father. It always left me feeling violated and dirty. If it was that unsettling for me, I couldn’t imagine what endless hours under that kind of observation and scrutiny had done to my remaining parent.
I sat stiffly at the metal table trying to ignore the other people around me meeting with inmates. The crying and fevered whispers made my skin itchy and had tension coiling tightly around the base of my neck. There was no happiness in this place, no light. It was no wonder Benny had been willing to do anything in order to make sure he never walked inside these walls again. And I totally understood why Bax had gravitated toward someone as bright and clean as Dovie. She was the opposite of everything that made this place what it was.
It took a while for my dad to show. The look on his face as he was led toward me, hands cuffed together at his waist and ankles shackled, made it clear he wasn’t exactly thrilled with my surprise stop in. His hair was longer than the last time I visited him and the lines around his eyes and mouth appeared deeper. He was turning into a stranger who used to look exactly like me, but every day those similarities seemed to slip away, both physically and emotionally.
He lifted his chin at someone across the room and waited impatiently while the prison guard situated him on the opposite side of the table. There was no missing the click as his feet were locked in place to the ground. There was no running from your fate in the Point, and if your fate led you here, it felt like all hope was lost.
“What are you doing here, Snowden? You didn’t mention in your last message that you were coming for a visit.” His voice was flat and empty. The same way my insides had felt until Noe brought an earthquake with her into my life. All of my fault lines were rubbing up against each other now, breaking off the brittle, breakable parts and shaking them loose.
“I wasn’t planning on coming to see you but there’s been a lot of stuff happening in my life lately, and I realized I needed to have an honest conversation with you, Dad.” I folded my hands on the table in front of me and willed him to look me in the eye.
His graying eyebrows pitched low over the top of his nose, and his mouth settled into a hard line. “Can’t do much with honesty or conversation in this place, Son.”
He was resigned to a life spent behind bars and didn’t realize the key to his freedom was sitting right in front of him.
“Dad,” I blew out a breath and lowered my head so I was staring at the top of the table. “You don’t belong in here. You lost so much and I . . .” I trailed off when he suddenly leaned forward on the table, hands curled into fists so hard his knuckles turned white.
“Snowden.” My name was sharp and hard, the same way he said it when I was growing up and not performing up to his high standards. It wasn’t enough to be advanced and special, no, I had to be superhuman and remarkable. “I had a family, a wife I loved more than anything. I had a nice house and a good job. You and your sister were good kids, better than I ever deserved.” His voice dropped lower and one of his fists hit the table with a thump. “I wanted something more than I wanted any of that. I gave it all up for revenge.”
I blinked at him and leaned back a little on the very uncomfortable bench. People called him crazy, said he was off and not all there. I always thought he was eccentric, the product of a mind that other people didn’t understand. I was the same way. But staring at him now, looking at his wild eyes and flushed face, I wondered if maybe there was more truth to the claims than I wanted to admit.
“Dad, I wanted revenge, too. That’s how I ended up in the wrong hands.” They exploited my weakness, my love for my family.
My dad shook his shaggy head and scowled at me. “No, Son, you wanted answers. You wanted proof and a reason why. I wanted everyone to pay. I wanted them to suffer and burn, the way they caused your mother to suffer in that explosion.”
I bit back a gasp and leaned even farther back from the stranger who was once my father. “Dad?” His other fist hit the table and I caught one of the guard’s moving closer out of the corner of my eye. My dad was getting all worked up and it hadn’t gone unnoticed. “What are you saying?”
He shook his head at me and sat back on his side of the table. “I loved your mother, Snowden. Loved her more than anything. She deserved better than what happened to her. I don’t regret anything. I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.”
Was my dad admitting to selling government secrets to the enemy? Was he really a traitor? Did he really not care about what kind of damage he might have done to millions of innocent people?
“The DoD offered to get you out, Dad. They told me if I stayed, if I got my shit together after Savina’s death, they would spring you. They said they would clear your name.” I sounded as bewildered as I felt.
“They lied. They always lie.” He sounded so certain and I couldn’t disagree with him. They promised to keep my sister alive, and here I was, alone and lost without her.
“I could go back. Push them to let you out.” It’s what I should have done when they first put the offer on the table but I was too scared, too turned around, to do the right thing.
“If you go back, they’ll use you to kill, Son. They’ll take whatever is in that brain of yours and make it into something deadly. They won’t care what the cost is to you. They’ll bleed you dry and dump the empty husk like trash. They killed your mother to get to you, Son.”
Did they? I wasn’t so sure anymore. It was all cloudy and convoluted in my mind. The silken strands of that intricately woven web were twisting around reality and this broken man’s beliefs. I had lost my sister, but he had lost everything. It was enough to send anyone over the edge of sanity.
“They might come for me anyway.” Goddard was all over the news, and so was the fact that someone had hacked into the city’s database and his computer. The black suits that came for me once would be back if they knew I was doing more than running background checks on Nassir’s clients and working girls. Like the man said, I was firing on all cylinders again and that was hard to hide.
“Let them come. You’re older, wiser, and a hell of a lot harder than you were as a teenager. They taught you to fight, so fight. They knew your weakness, Snowden. They exploited it. Don’t let them do that again.” His voice was hard and there was no getting around the warning.
Immediately, I thought about Noe. Was she a weakness? I didn’t think straight around her. She confused me and distracted me, but she also woke me up. I was sleepwalking through my days, going through the motions of living my life, but then she crashed into it and sent everything spinning. She kickstarted something inside of me and I couldn’t imagine going back to being numb. She had me feeling things I’d never felt before. Things I couldn’t name because they were so foreign. She forced me to be strong.
“I don’t want this to be where you spend the rest of your life, Dad. You’re all I have left.” He shook his head before I was done with the sentence.
“No. You don’t have me. You have a life out there, time to make something work for yourself, time to make a difference. I got what I wanted, Snowden. I got my revenge. I made the enemy just as strong as those bastards are. Knowledge is power and I armed the other side with as much as I could. I made the fight fair.” He banged his hands at the table and motioned to the guard who came over to tell him to keep it down. We both got to our feet, him watching me with cold eyes, me watching him with a new realization. “The only thing I know how to do is punish. If you need me to hurt someone, to make them pay, that’s all I got for you, Son. Next time you come for a visit, you let me know ahead of time.” It was like a knife in the center of my chest. He needed to prepare himself to see me, because while I was still holding onto him, he had let me go long before.
“I’ll see you soon, Dad.”
He didn’t even turn around to look at me as he was guided out of the common room.
My dad was a bad man, a sociopath, and a betrayer. The good guys wanted to turn me into a killer. The heroes hardly ever won. The only people in my life who had bothered to try and make it better were the criminals and the felons. I owed the villains everything. They took me the way I was with no questions asked.
He was right. I knew how to fight and I finally had something . . . someone I was willing to fight for.