Ember

 

I had to read the note in my hand a few times before the message really sunk in.

 

“Ember,” it said. “I’m sorry, but I had to go. Please forgive me. Selena.”

 

What the fuck? She’d taken off, just like that? I couldn’t believe how much of an idiot I’d been. Just a big fuckin’ dumbass, snoozing away, all drunk on pussy and these weird emotions bubbling up in my chest, while this girl slipped out the front goddamn door and took off for the hills.

 

The boys were gonna have a laugh at this one, that was for damn sure. And Prez was gonna slice my balls off and serve them for lunch. The cartel was gonna be pissed, Selena’s dad was gonna be pissed, and I was pissed. I’d been real fuckin’ stupid. One fuck with this broad, and I’d gone soft, just like I was one of the goddamn squares I hated so much. I let my guard down. I failed.

 

I turned and threw a glass tumbler against the wall. It shattered and exploded into a million pieces. I gritted my teeth, squeezed my fists, anything to disperse some of the anger that was seething in my veins right now. But there was nothing I could hit to fix the situation. The only culprit was me.

 

“Goddammit, Ember, you soft son of a bitch,” I whispered to myself. “Since when does a girl get into your head like that?”

 

True, the sex had been incredible. Not just hot, although it was definitely that. I got hard just thinking about her legs spread open in front of me while I feasted on her and watched her squirm under my tongue. But there was more to it. For fuck’s sake, I’d felt shit while we were banging. Emotions, or some shit, I wasn’t totally sure, but it had been unlike any of the other girls I’d ever had in my life.

 

Different that it had been with Red, for instance. Just two nights ago, I’d been bending that random slut over my bedpost and smashing her face into the pillow while I plowed her from behind. When I’d been ready to bust, I just opened her mouth and shot it down her throat, like she was a goddamn trash can or something. And as soon as I was done, she meant nothing to me. Nothing more than a hole to pump in and get my nut off.

 

Not like Selena, though. I’d wanted to come with Selena; I’d wanted to make her come for me. I’d wanted to own that sweet little body and make it rock with pleasure. Getting off on somebody else getting off? That was some pansy shit. It wasn’t Ember shit, that was for certain. And yet here I was, reminiscing about how Selena’s eyes had fluttered while I went down on her, how’d she’d moaned so softly when she pulled me inside of her, how she’d scratched my back and bit my shoulder and panted my name when she came hard on top of me. Who the fuck was this alien taking over my brain?

 

A memory from the night before came scything through my mind’s eye:

 

I laid back on the bed, still churning with the weird cocktail of emotion and endorphins that the sex had stirred up in me. Selena was curled up along my side. Her naked body was flush with the heat of our lovemaking. I watched her chest rise and fall. The skin on her wrists had been rubbed raw by the handcuffs. Without knowing what I was doing, I reached over and massaged the bruises gently, trying to work some life back into her limbs.

 

She winced at first, but gradually eased into it, staring at me in the face as I focused on pressing easily on the tender flesh where she had been hurt.

 

“You okay?” I asked her.

 

“Yeah. Hurts, but I’ll be fine.”

 

“Reminds me of the shit my old man used to do to me.” I didn’t know why I started telling the story, or even where it came from. I hadn’t thought about Pop since he died eight years ago. As far as I was concerned, I’d never wanted to talk about him again. And yet here we were. My mouth just opened up and I started blabbing like a kid.

 

“What? Like how?”

 

I couldn’t stop myself from continuing. “My mom passed when I was five. Cancer. It was just me and him after she was gone. He was a cop and a big drinker. Whenever he wanted to go out and get loaded, he’d handcuff me to the TV stand so I couldn’t go anywhere. It’d be fine at first. I’d sit and watch my cartoons – you know, kid shit.” I kept rubbing her wrists as I continued. “But then the cartoons would end, and he still wouldn’t be home. And the news would come on. I didn’t like the news, but it wasn’t so bad.”

 

Selena’s hand began to stroke my abs softly while she listened. Her eyes were full of concern and something else I didn’t recognize.

 

“But after the news, they’d start playing horror movies. You know, slasher films, all the scream queens getting gutted by crazy monsters, that kind of bullshit.”

 

“Yeah, I remember those.”

 

“And I fuckin’ hated them. I was just a kid, and they scared the living shit out of me. I’d try to hide or close my eyes, but I was too far away to change the channel or lower the volume, so even if I kept my eyes shut, I could hear the screams. I’d jerk and jerk and jerk at the cuffs, but those things were police issue. I wasn’t goin’ anywhere.”

 

“That’s horrible. I can’t believe he did that to you.”

 

“I’d get through two or three of those movies every night. Too much blood, too much screaming. Never did find a way to like ‘em…” I trailed off. My fingers kept touching, soothing.

 

Selena was quiet for a while, letting her hand do the talking instead. She touched my chest and my arms. Her fingertips trailed up and down my torso, almost like she wanted to make sure I was real, as if she wasn’t quite sure or some shit like that. After a while, she started talking.

 

“My daddy wasn’t a good father, either.”

 

I looked at her and said nothing.

 

“My whole life, he kept me shut away. I wasn’t allowed to play after school. I wasn’t allowed to have sleepovers or go to a friend’s house. All I ever wanted was to explore, but he said I couldn’t. When I was little, he’d laugh and say that I was a princess staying in his castle, and that he had to protect me. I’d giggle, and it would all be okay. But I got older and realized that it wasn’t for my own good. He didn’t care about keeping me safe; he was just jealous of everything. Once he gets his hands onto something, he doesn’t let go, and he treated me like I was another one of his things.” She didn’t look at me, just kept talking with her hand rubbing my chest and her eyes staring at the far wall.

 

“I graduated high school and told him I wanted to go to Europe. I’d saved up every cent I made for years to afford the trip. I told him he wouldn’t have to pay for anything at all. But he still said no.”

 

“What happened?”

 

“Nothing. That was that. Daddy has eyes everywhere. If I’d tried to go without his permission, he’d find me. And he never changes his mind. That was the biggest thing: he never changes his mind, about anything. Not about money or business, and not about me. He would have kept me there forever.”

 

A huge yawn ripped across both of our mouths at the same time. Selena smiled. “I’m really tired,” she said.

 

It had been a long ride up Mexico and across the border, and there was still some more road ahead of us until we reached New Orleans. I pulled the chain on the lamp, and we passed out like that – her nestled up against my chest, with one of my arms draped around her. Holding her. Like she was something that mattered to me.

 

And shit, I guess she was.

 

I snapped back to reality. The sun was streaming through the blinds over the window. The alarm clock on the nightstand read nine a.m. I figured that she’d had a least a couple hours’ head start. More importantly, I had no idea which way she’d run.

 

There was no way she’d go back home. If she hated her dad that much, why would she go straight back to him? She had to be going somewhere else. But where? I had not a fucking clue.

 

I stomped out of the room into the dewy morning air, brooding and racking my brain for some idea of where I could start looking. Crossing the parking lot, I pushed open the door to the front office. The clerk’s face dropped when he saw me walk in.

 

My eyes narrowed. “What is it?” I asked.

 

“Someone left an, um, a message for you,” he said. His voice was quaking with fear. What the hell had gotten into this little dipshit? How could a measly old message scare him so badly?

 

“Who? What kind of message?”

 

Instead of replying, he extended a shaking hand towards me. In it was a piece of paper. I snatched it from him and read it:

 

We have your girl. We want in on the deal. Bring her daddy and meet us at Knowlton Park at midnight. The Lost Souls.

 

I squeezed the note in my fist. It crumbled into a ball. The Lost Souls. Those spineless motherfuckers. They were a backwater MC who ran the territory around the Louisiana bayous, pushing drugs to all the redneck pieces of shit who lived out this way. No one liked them, no one worked with them, but they were always trying to stick their nose into other clubs’ business and steal a piece of the pie. This kind of stunt was exactly their style. Goddamn cockroaches. No matter how many times we’d squashed them during one deal or another, they always sprang back up, circling like vultures, just waiting to pounce when we let our guard down.

 

I’d let my guard down, and they’d taken my girl. Well, that was one mistake they wouldn’t get to make twice. I was gonna exterminate every last one of those sons of bitches.

 

Without saying a word to the terrified hotel clerk, I pivoted on my heel and stalked out to my bike. The roar of the engine kicking to life took some of the edge off my nerves, but I was still all kinds of keyed up. The adrenaline pumping through my veins cleared my head. I had only one thought on my mind: punish them.

 

I thundered down the road, hungry for blood. New Orleans was only an hour or so away. Selena’s father was about to find one hell of a surprise on his front step.

 

The time flew by as I rode. The rumble of the highway on my bones felt good and natural, like this was where I was supposed to be. Soon, the city skyline came poking over the horizon, and before I knew it, I was weaving down streets in a tree-lined neighborhood, with massive estates looming on either side.

 

This was some rich motherfucker territory. On any other day, I would’ve been licking my lips, thinking about all the money lurking behind every gate, just waiting to be put to a better use. But not today. I had a mission.

 

I scanned the house numbers as I passed until – bingo, there it was. I idled up to the gate and pressed the button on the intercom. Some house servant answered.

 

“Hello? Please state your name and business.”

 

I spat, “Tell that motherfucker that if he wants to see his daughter alive again, he better open up the goddamn gate and let me in.”

 

The servant didn’t bother to answer. I heard the phone clatter to the floor and panicked footsteps receding. The gate swung open on silent hinges. I picked my foot off the pavement and peeled through.

 

I parked my bike on the circular driveway in front of the mansion. A peacock waddled by in front of me, looking haughty as hell.

 

“Peacocks, good Lord,” I muttered to myself. I could already tell that this bastard was gonna be a real piece of work.

 

A squat, sweaty little man came prancing down the steps. This must be the servant. “Please, sir, come in right away,” he urged, waving for me to follow him. I chuckled. I didn’t think I’d ever been called ‘sir’ in my life.

 

I went up the staircase and into the house. The front room was massive, dotted with crystal chandeliers and expensive-looking art hung all over the walls. I whistled. “Some digs you got here, compadre,” I said to the servant. He looked too nervous around me to be capable of much conversation. I sighed and pulled a cigarette out of the pack, raising it to my lips. “Got a light?”

 

“There is no smoking in the residence, sir,” he stuttered.

 

“Never mind,” I told him, fishing a lighter out of my jacket pocket. “Got my own.” I lit the cigarette, dragged, and exhaled towards the high ceilings. I’d thought about blowing it in his face, just to teach this prick to lighten up, but then thought better of it. I was a gentleman, after all.

 

“Can I take your coat?” the man asked nervously. He was sweating like a pig. I just looked at him and kept smoking without saying a word. He withdrew his hand and didn’t say anything to me again.

 

I heard footsteps stomping down the staircase to my right. I looked up to see a stout old man with a grizzly three-day beard barreling his way downstairs. His face was screwed up like he’d been sniffing at a pile of shit his whole life, and he had beady eyes that looked meaner than a fight dog’s. I hated him already.

 

“This is Selena’s father,” said the servant, trying to restore some sense of etiquette to the situation. “Mr. Baudelaire, this is… I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

 

“Ember.”

 

“This is Ember,” he finished. He glanced back and forth at both of us. Seeing no response, he turned and left the room.

 

The old man eyed me up and down. “You’re the man they sent to bring my daughter back to me?” he asked.

 

“The boys weren’t exactly falling all over themselves to play babysitter for a thousand-mile road trip,” I drawled, continuing to smoke my cigarette.

 

“And I can see they sent the worst of you. You had one job. How did you manage to fuck that up?”

 

“She ran away.”

 

“Ran away? Why wouldn’t she want to be brought back home safely, to her father?”

 

I didn’t like his tone one bit. “From what I hear, you ain’t exactly Father of the Year, amigo.”

 

“How dare you insult me in my own home!”

 

I shrugged. “No skin off my back. I’ll just leave. Have fun getting her back.” I turned and started to let myself out.

 

“Don’t move, you greasy bastard,” he barked.

 

“Listen, buddy,” I said, spinning back towards him. The asshole was stocky, but I was a full foot taller than him and every inch as wide. I loomed over him, stretching up towards the ceiling and letting the smoke from my cigarette fall around his head like a funeral wreath. “Let’s square up a few things real quick. I don’t owe you shit. I can walk out of here right now and never think about you again. Wouldn’t bother me one bit. You, on the other hand, have a daughter being held by some real screwy bastards. If you care about getting her back, then you definitely don’t want me walking out that door.” I eased back on my heels to let the words sink in.

 

At first, I thought he was gonna hit me. His fists were seizing up like he was getting ready to swing. I honestly wished he would’ve. It woulda been a real pleasure to beat the piss out of a controlling scumbag like this.

 

But then, like he’d reached a decision, the red blotches left his face and he took a deep breath. His hands fell loose by his sides. That’s right, motherfucker, I thought to myself. Shut up and listen to me.

 

Finally, he turned and pointed for me to follow him into the next room.

 

I was glad he hadn’t called my bluff. I had a lot on the line here, every bit as much as he did. I was in deep with this girl. I knew it already, even though I kept shoving the thought to the back of my head. The thought of her getting hurt made my stomach churn. There was no turning back now.

 

I settled into a chair in front of a broad desk. Selena’s father took a seat on the other side, pressing his head into his hands. He didn’t look at me as he said, “Tell me what’s happened.”

 

I gave him the sequence of events: how I’d picked her up in Mexico, paid off the cartel, brought her over the border, then woken up to her gone, followed by the message from the Lost Souls. I left out the rough sex, even though part of me wanted to let this bastard know that his daughter and I had fucked until the cows came home. But I figured I’d let it slide for now. One thing at a time.

 

“The guys who took her are from a club called the Lost Souls. They run a fair amount of business up around here. Mostly drugs, some weapons or hookers on occasion. Whatever they can get their hands onto, more or less, which in this case happens to be your daughter.”

 

He sighed and shook his head, like he thought he could just wish the whole damn situation away.

 

“You ain’t Dorothy,” I told him. “Clicking your heels together and saying ‘There’s no place like home’ ain’t gonna fix a damn thing.”

 

“What do we do?”

 

“Exactly what they told you to do. We meet them, bring enough money to buy your daughter back, and then we split before they get any other stupid ideas.”

 

He looked at me for the first time since we’d sat down. I couldn’t read anything in those bulldog’s eyes of his. “Just give them what they want? That’s it?”

 

“Yeah, that’s it.”

 

He stood, pushing his fists into the desk. “I am supposed to pay these cocksuckers my hard-earned money?”

 

“That’s more or less the idea. Shit, I didn’t think it was that complicated.”

 

He slapped a hand hard on the wood. “I will not give them a single goddamn cent!” he thundered.

 

This motherfucker was insane. Spit was flying from his mouth, his jowls flopped with every word, and the rage boiling in his eyes was on a whole different level.

 

I didn’t understand his anger. Why couldn’t he listen to reason? This was the easiest way to get things done. If we paid them off, they’d slink back to whatever shithole they came from and let this psychotic son of a bitch go back to counting the coins in his vault, or whatever the fuck it was that rich bastards like this did with their free time. He could lock his daughter back up in the dungeon he’d constructed for her and it would be back to business as usual.

 

There weren’t any appealing alternatives that I could see. A counterstrike was completely out of the question. It was impossible to attack the Lost Souls directly. They’d be holed up in some backwater bayou, and they’d spot us coming from a mile away. If we agreed to the rendezvous and tried to pull some tricky shit there, like an ambush, then they’d just pick us apart. I had no doubt they’d bring plenty of firepower to make sure things went smoothly. Worst case scenario, Selena would get killed in the crossfire, and there was no way in hell I was gonna let that happen.

 

Mr. Baudelaire had fallen back into his chair, seething with his nostrils flared like a bull in the ring. He leaned forward and jabbed a finger in my direction. “Do you understand? Not. A. Goddamn. Cent. I will not do business with scum like these, these…” He waved a hand around.

 

“Lost Souls,” I finished.

 

“These animals,” he countered.

 

Suddenly, a snaky voice slithered from behind me. “There is another way,” it hissed.

 

I spun around in my chair. I’d thought the room was empty except for the two of us, but now that I looked, I saw a thin little man reclined in the far corner, draped in shadows. As I watched, he rose to his feet and paced towards where I sat.

 

The sun coming in through the window reflected off his bald head. He inspired instant hatred. I’d never disliked someone on first sight as much as I despised this slimy shit. His eyes were slitted and calculating, his mouth drawn tight, and he licked his lips between every word.

 

I turned back to Selena’s dad. “Who’s this charming piece of shit?” I asked.

 

“I am Pincer,” the bald man said.

 

“Your parents must’ve not liked you very much.”

 

“I never knew them,” he replied, spinning to stand by Mr. Baudelaire’s side.
 

“Well, then, I rest my case.”

 

“You are very glib for a man who has failed at performing one very simple task.”

 

“You’re very short for… actually, I got nothing. You’re just short.”

 

Pincer’s smile did not look friendly. “Enough, both of you,” ordered Mr. Baudelaire. “Pincer, finish what you were saying.”

 

Pincer tented his fingers and licked his lips before continuing, “As I was saying, there is another way. We arrange a group of our men in the woods around the drop-off point. We exchange the money, as per the request, and extract Selena. As soon as she is in our possession, we collapse in on the enemy from all angles, annihilating them utterly.”

 

“That’s gonna be a fucking bloodbath if you go through with it,” I interrupted. “You’re gonna be shooting from every side. You’re just as likely to gun down your own men as you are any of the Lost Souls. Fuck it, you’re just as likely to gun down your own goddamn daughter!”

 

“Sit down.” Mr. Baudelaire’s voice was sharp. I didn’t even realize I’d risen to my feet, or that I was breathing heavily and shaking with rage. “You have lost all credibility by letting my daughter get away from you in the first place. I wouldn’t trust you to rescue a beignet from a goddamn café right now.” He turned to Pincer. “Gather your men. Stake out the park. I will send a message to the Lost Souls to communicate that we are accepting their extortion. Then, tonight, when we meet them, we will let them know that they will pay for what they have done.” His fist crushed a fragile sculpture that had been swinging on his desk.

 

“You’re gonna get everyone killed,” I started to say, but he cut me off again.

 

“Pincer, escort our friend here to the street. We will no longer be needing his services.”

 

I looked up to see the business end of a gun staring at me straight in the eyes. Pincer’s grim smile flashed on the other end of it. “Time to go, my friend,” he said.

 

I stared back and forth at them. No one budged. These motherfucking maniacs were about to send Selena straight to the slaughter. I didn’t give a rat’s ass if either of them were to swallow some lead, but not her. I couldn’t let that happen.

 

I had to figure out a way to intervene. If I didn’t, the only girl who’d ever meant anything to me was going to drown in a pool of her own blood, all because her father was a lunatic who refused to listen to common sense.

 

I stood up and stubbed out my cigarette on a pile of documents on his desk. The burning paper hissed and crackled.

 

I had to try one more time to convince him to reconsider. “You already lost your daughter once by acting like an imbecile,” I said. “Don’t make the loss permanent.”

 

His gaze was icy as he looked up at me. “Go home, Ember.”

 

Fuck him. I was on my own.

 

“I can see myself out.”