Chapter Sixteen
You have to look on the bright side. I learned that early. There’s always a bright side. In this case, the bright side is that Clara definitely got away safe. If I wasn’t sure before, now I know she’s definitely gone. Her books are missing, and the Madonna is gone too.
And I know Byron doesn’t have her. Because he’s torturing me trying to find her.
It’s such a relief that I have no fucking clue where she is.
Thwack.
I can’t be sure I wouldn’t give her up. I love her more than anything. More than my life, not that it’s worth much. I would gladly die for her, but the thing about death is, it’s not easy. Not when I’m tied up in a motel room. I can’t exactly swallow some pills I don’t have or slit my wrists when they’re tied down with rope. I can only endure every strike of Byron’s belt. I can only survive.
Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
Two of the men sit at the table where Clara and I ate meals together. I have the unsettling feeling they are waiting for Byron to be finished with me. That they are waiting for their turns.
“Where is she?” Byron says. I almost think he knows I don’t have the answer. I think he doesn’t care.
I shake my head.
Thwack.
My body jerks in the bonds. I’m tied at both wrists and ankles, face up. The whole bed shakes with the impact. And the pain…God, the pain is unbearable. It’s blinding. It’s all the lights onstage and all the hands touching me. It’s a snake bite, the lash of the tail and the sting of the teeth biting into my flesh.
But I have to bear it. Death isn’t easy. I can only survive.
Thwack.
I have more empathy for Candy than I could have before. If she’s felt even a fraction of this pain, no wonder she shoots up. I’d do anything to feel numb.
“Please,” I whimper.
I didn’t mean to say it. Didn’t mean to beg. He doesn’t deserve the satisfaction.
He does pause. He sets the belt on the bed. The mattress groans as he leans down toward me. “What was that?” he says, his voice deceptively gentle.
There are more men waiting outside, standing watch. I wonder if they’ve bothered to clear out the whole motel. It might be safer, just to make sure there are no witnesses. On the other hand, why bother? No one will have seen anything by the time the police come through. And if they did, Byron’s friends’ connections would cover it up.
“I don’t know where she is,” I whisper.
He leans closer, his mouth just inches from my ear. “Why should I believe you?”
I taste something metallic on my tongue. Blood? “Because I’m telling the truth.”
He leans back, smiling. “I’m not in a hurry, sweetheart. I’ve been waiting a long time to get my hands on you again. I intend to savor this. You’ll be praying for death before I’m done with you.”
What he doesn’t understand is that I’m already praying for death. I’ve lost everything.
My sister. I’ll never see her again.
Thwack.
And Kip. God, he was never really mine. But the hope of him was so sweet.
Thwack.
Even my father. I had waited so long for him to stand up for me. Did he mean it about my mother? That would mean he didn’t kill her.
Thwack.
But if she’s been alive all this time, it means she left me. Abandoned me to this life.
Thwack thwack thwack.
It’s too much. The physical pain. The emotional. My soul is on fire. My skin is ablaze. The edges of my vision turn crimson.
Byron looms over me, a smile on his face. And I am more afraid than ever. It’s never good when he’s pleased. “I know what you’ve been doing here. A stripper. Fuck, I’m glad I didn’t marry you. I’d have had to kill you. I guess I’ll kill you either way.”
Don’t let him get to you. He can fuck with my body, but I don’t want him to fuck with my mind. I have a sick feeling he’ll do both, and I won’t be able to stop him.
“I know about your little boyfriend too.”
My stomach turns over. “Your brother?”
Byron laughs, and dread settles deep into my core. “I’m surprised he told you about that.” There’s a gleam in Byron’s eye. “Did he tell you our family secrets too?”
A little. I know about Kip’s father and how he left them. I knew they grew up poor. Is that why Byron seemed to hate me from the beginning, because my family had money? “No.”
“The fucking jewels. They belong to my family. To me. I thought they were gone…but then you came here.” He leans close. “Where are they?”
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t know where the jewels are. Don’t know where your sister is.” He snorts in disgust. “You’re not much use to me, are you?”
“Then let me go.”
“You were going to be my consolation prize. You and your father’s entire fucking empire. Did you know that? I couldn’t have the jewels, but I could have everything else.” He runs a finger over my breast, taking my nipple between thumb and forefinger. Rolling. Squeezing. “And you were my little jewel, weren’t you? I polished you, didn’t I?”
A tear rolls down the side of my face. “No,” I choke out, but it’s a lie.
Because he did polish me, until I shined, until I was both flat and sharp. He used me like a jewel—a thing to be worn and then tossed into a drawer.
“Not just you, Honor. You weren’t the only jewel in my crown.” His hand circles my throat. “Did Kip tell you about our sister?”
My breath catches. Any Emilys or Sylvias I should know about? But he never answered.
“She grew up different than us. She had all the things we never did.”
Suspicion is a dark vine wrapped around my lungs. Making it hard to breathe. Two poor brothers. A sister who grew up rich. It seems impossible. I’m praying it’s not true. I’m praying it’s not me.
His hand on my neck squeezes, cutting off my air supply. “Her name is Clara,” he whispers.
And I black out.
* * *
When I wake up again, it’s dark. There is a man sitting beside me. I recognize him from the dining table earlier. He is one of Byron’s men. He runs his hand up and down my belly, occasionally cupping my breast, kneading me. I don’t know how long he’s been doing that. My skin crawls. He brushes over a welt from earlier, and I gasp.
He looks startled—then amused. “You’re awake.”
My mind is still spinning from what I know. Kip. Byron. Clara. All of them, related.
And me too.
It all makes sense now, in a horrible way.
The hand tightens on my breast until I whimper. The other man from the table is leaning against the wall, watching. Both of them are dangerous, but the one on the wall scares me more. There’s something flat in his eyes. Something reptilian.
In the time that passed, the rope has loosened—just slightly. There’s more give than before. But I’m still not sure I could pull my hand free without breaking it. And if I did get free, there’d be nowhere to go. They’d just tie me up tighter. They’d just hurt me more.
The first man runs his hand over my body, poking at the bruises already formed, reaching down between my legs and shoving into my dry pussy. “Awake and ready for us.”
I’m not ready for anything they’ll do to me.
The bathroom door swings open, drawing a triangle of light onto the thin carpet. Byron. I never thought I’d be relieved to see him. But instead of coming to the bed, he goes and takes one of the empty chairs at the table. He crosses one leg over the other, settling in. His Italian shoes shine even in the dim light. His suit is custom-tailored.
From across the room he smirks at me. He speaks to his men but never breaks eye contact with me. “Find out where her sister went. I don’t care what you have to do to get her to talk.”
The man sitting beside me nods in greedy assent. His hands grow rougher. They aren’t torture, except the emotional kind. The same kind of shame I lived every night on that stage. I get the sense he wants to fuck me more than hurt me, though I’m sure he’ll do both before the night is up.
The sound of a zipper rends the air. The man by the wall hasn’t moved from his position except to lower his fly and take out his cock. He’s stroking himself, watching.
You were going to be my consolation prize.
I brace myself, trying to clear my mind. Like in the moments behind the curtain, waiting to go onstage. Like the moments when I hid outside my father’s study, listening to him order a hit, dying a little inside.
There’s no escape. Even death is closed off to me on this bed.
A knock comes at the door. I close my eyes, wondering how many minutes this will buy me. It will be one of Byron’s men, of course, maybe with a perimeter-check update. Or maybe they’re delivering coffee. The men in his employ are nothing more than lackeys on steroids.
The man by the wall doesn’t stop watching me, doesn’t stop stroking.
Of course Byron wouldn’t bother himself to get up, not when someone else could do it. That leaves the man touching me. He looks disgruntled to have to stop, but he’s not going to complain out loud. With one regretful pinch of my nipple, he stands and goes to the door. He’s not afraid here, surrounded by his own men, protected by a goddamn battalion’s worth of firepower in one tiny broke-down motel. He doesn’t check the peephole, he just swings the door open—and takes a bullet to the chest.
I stare at him, unable to comprehend what happened. Byron stares too, frozen for one sweet moment of victory. But from his position he can see out the door, and whatever he sees makes him snarl. He pulls out his gun and dives for the bathroom, taking cover as the shooting starts.
The man by the wall is the slowest to react. I guess stroking your hard-on can slow a guy down.
But he is also the most lethal. The least human.
When he realizes they’re under attack, he doesn’t even bother putting his dick away. He just whips out his gun and starts shooting, without a visual, his erection waving, unprotected. I yank at the straps tying me down. This is my chance to get away. I don’t know what’s happening—if this is some kind of fighting within the ranks—but I have to use this.
The bonds are too tight. No matter how I pull them, they only get tighter.
My muscles burn under the strain. Every yank makes the bruises and welts on my stomach and breasts ache. I’m trapped here in the middle of a fucking gunfight, completely naked. Even more exposed than the guy edging along the wall, gun at the ready, dick out.
He steps out to make his shot and takes a hit. His body ricochets back, falling to the ground. He’s been clipped at the side. Blood sprays. The attacker steps into the room and gives him another shot—this one to the knee.
The man steps forward, and the light from the bathroom hits his face. Kip.
His eyes are wild. He’s a goddamn gladiator like this, more animal than human, more fierce than merciful. He takes in my nakedness on the bed. Then he looks at the man writhing and gurgling on the floor at his feet. It’s not hard to see what’s happening here, and Kip reacts quickly—faster than I could have. He shoves his boot against the man’s exposed, limp dick and turns his heel. There is an awful, high-pitched primal sound of pain that is abruptly cut off by a final gunshot to the head.
My mind can barely catch up with what he’s done. He’s taken on two of Byron’s men—and won. No, he must have taken on even more of them, the ones patrolling outside. The ones who had been incapacitated, or dead, when he strolled up and knocked on the door, catching these men unaware.
He’s incredible. He’s a monster. I’m going to throw up. And with nowhere to go, no way to move, I’d choke on my own vomit.
Kip isn’t safe yet though. I try to tell him. “Bathroom,” I yell, but it only comes out as a wheeze.
It’s all right though. He seems to already know. His gun is pointed toward the open door, waiting to take his shot. But Byron didn’t get to be where he is by accident. He’s not only a fucking good criminal. He’s also a cop. “You don’t want to do this, Kip,” he calls. “Turn yourself in now and it will go easier for you.”
Kip shakes his head. “This is much easier.”
“You may have gotten through them, but you’ll never take me. You won’t make it out of this room alive.” There’s a pause, and his tone changes. “Unless we work together, like the old days. I know you have a thing for the girl. We can work it out. You can have her.”
Kip glances at me, and for one awful moment I wonder if he’ll go along with whatever horrible thing Byron plans to do to me. Then Kip’s eyes darken at the welts on my skin, and I know he would never do anything to hurt me. He’s here to save me. But Byron must have expected me to distract him, because he takes the opportunity to pop out of the bathroom and fire off a round.
Kip dives to cover my body with his, shooting back.
The thing about a bullet is, it doesn’t feel like fire after all. Maybe I’m numb from being tied up too long. It feels like ice instead. I’m hit, I realize. Hit in the side.
Be careful, I wish I could say. He doesn’t fight fair. No one does. Not Byron, not Kip. Not even me.
I fought as dirty as possible, keeping Clara away from Byron, keeping her safe—and I succeeded. This is the jungle, and only the fittest survive. Though I may not be very fit anymore, because I feel myself fading. Falling. Thank goodness for the rope around my wrists. Otherwise I’d sink down beneath the ground.
Instead I’m suspended, waiting.
There’s shooting back and forth—all around. That much I can tell from the blasts to my eardrums. But Kip is trapped. I’m the one tied up, but he’s the one in a vulnerable position—right in front of me. He can’t duck behind the bed where he’d be safe. I think he can’t even storm the bathroom because that would leave me exposed. The only cover he has is the second bed. He’s using it to protect himself—and shooting whenever Byron tries to aim out, so he’s forced to retreat. It won’t last for long though.
He’s going to get himself killed, and it will be my fault. Mine. I can’t let that happen.
I force myself back to reality. I’d been slipping before. The pain and shock of it had let me drift in a kind of unreality. But now I’m fully aware of every bruise and cut on my skin, acutely aware of how much I hurt. I pull my hand where it’s tied—nothing happens. The rope may have more give, but it’s still tight enough I can’t pull my hand out.
I pull again, harder, twisting myself, as the bullets ricochet off the wall. One lands in the mattress underneath me, snapping a coil with a loud twang. Any second now one will hit Kip. He’s still blocking me. Still protecting me.
The hole is too small. It’s like I’d have to break my hand to get it out.
Something settles over me. Confidence. Recklessness. Sometimes they’re the same thing. So let my hand break. It’s a hard thing to break your own hand, in the same way that it can be hard to die. I have to let go of the survival instinct. I have to break myself.
I pull, using all my strength, straining at my ankles to build this much force. The bed creaks.
Something in my hand snaps.
Now my left hand is free. That gives me enough room to un-loop the rope from the pole, so my right hand is free. My left hand is messed up—broken?—but my right hand still works. I jerk myself up, unsteady on my feet.
And fall, stumbling to the ground. It’s safer here.
“Stay down,” Kip orders before firing off a round.
Safety doesn’t matter anymore.
If anyone will get shot, it will be Kip. He matters.
I crawl to one of the men on the floor and take his gun.
The thing about men is they always underestimate me. Because I’m small and weak. Because I have a pussy instead of a cock. And my father, he kept me locked up. For all those reasons, I am ill-equipped for the world. But one thing I know is violence. I’ve been around violent men all my life. I’ve been around them when they pulled out their guns, when they flicked off the safety. Been around them when they fired. And I was watching.
I aim and fire. The kick is enough to knock me backward, but there’s a brand-new hole in the wall courtesy of me.
And I have Byron’s attention. He’s smirking, of course.
So I walk toward him. Kip lunges for me, but I’m expecting that. I evade him and go toward Byron. I know I don’t have the aim to hit him far away. I don’t have months or years of target practice. And my hand is possibly broken. It feels like it’s on fire. But if I’m close, I can get him.
That assumes he won’t shoot me first. He could. At this point I wouldn’t mind much. But I don’t think he will. Because he underestimates me most of all.
We’re one foot away now. Kip is right behind me, about to expose himself, make himself vulnerable to save me. I can’t let that happen.
I aim the gun at Byron. Now he’s the one looking down the barrel. He’s the one counting.
“You wouldn’t,” he says coldly. Confidently. Not counting, after all.
I fire. I’m aiming for the center of his chest. The kickback from the gun and wrenching pain in my hand means I hit his shoulder instead. And it feels good. After all the times he slapped me, fucked me. Hurt me. God, my hand hurts. But it feels really good too. Sweet victory.
Though it doesn’t feel exactly like victory when he manages to grab me. He spins me around and puts a gun to my head.
He wants to use me as a hostage. And it’s already working. I see Kip’s eyes dark with anger—and fear. He’s afraid for me, because there’s a gun to my head. But I’ve already broken my own hand. I’m fucking invincible. He’s pointing his gun at us both, but I know he won’t shoot. He can’t, not without hitting me too.
“Hello, little brother,” Byron says, and that’s enough to shock me out of my plan.
Kip nods slightly. “I wish I could say I was glad to see you.”
Byron laughs. “Aren’t you? You’ve been searching for me for weeks.”
“Not you. Her.”
“Ah yes.” Byron looks down at me, moving the nozzle of the gun to my side. “She’s a good fuck. But not worth all this trouble if you ask me. Girls like that, they’re a dime a dozen.”
Kip looks furious. His nostrils flare. He’s probably going to say something to defend me. Or maybe he’ll just start shooting. I don’t give him the chance. Because I can defend myself.
I’m only Byron’s captive if I want to survive. I’m done surviving.
I reach down and grab the gun. He could have fought me if I tried to take it from him. I don’t. Instead I squeeze the trigger. I shoot myself. I cinch the trap. He doesn’t have anything left to bargain with now. He doesn’t even have my body to shield himself. I fall to the floor, and I hear the shots that kill Byron—one, two, three—before he collapses beside me.
Then Kip is there, turning me over, pressing a hand to my side, swearing and praying and pleading. “God, Honor. Why did you—Jesus. Please live. Please keep her alive. God, please.”