Chapter 3 Cage
CAGE
I pulled my shirt over my head and sighed.
I had reluctantly agreed to let Sutton come along, mostly because I was way too tired to fight with her.
My heart was heavy. I still felt my father’s blood sitting against my clean, bare skin.
I looked down and saw the clean clothes, but I couldn’t get rid of the phantom imprint of those stains all over my hands. My jeans. My shirt. My arms.
“Here,” Sutton said.
Her voice ripped me from my trance, and I looked up, watching her as she held out a slice of pizza for me.
“You need to eat,” she said.
The vegetables piled high called to me. I’d never in my life found another person who enjoyed putting as many vegetables on their pizza as I did.
And the place Sutton always got delivery from had every vegetable available.
I saw the broccoli and the spinach. The freshly chopped tomatoes and the banana peppers.
It had olives, green peppers, red peppers, and even onions.
Mushrooms, strewn in with a bit of pineapple to cut through all the saltiness.
“Eat, Cage. You look like shit,” Sutton said.
I took the slice of pizza from her and practically inhaled it. I didn’t actually think I chewed it enough to know what it tasted like. She handed me another one. And then, another. And as she nibbled on her second slice, I’d inhaled four massive slices of the extra-large pizza.
“Isn’t your father going to be—”
“He’ll just assume I took a slice or two with me. I do it all the time,” she said.
I nodded slowly as I polished off my fourth slice of pizza.
I took her in with my eyes as she chomped on a piece of her crust. Sutton was beautiful.
She caught my eye the second she walked into that casino her father owned.
Which none of us knew at the time. Though, we probably should have assumed as such.
Her long black hair spilled in soft curls almost to the middle of her back.
She always wore bows in it. Like that somehow made the devious look in her dark brown eyes all the more innocent.
Her tan skin glistened, even if the lights were off.
Even if we stood underneath a pitch black sky, her skin always seemed to glow.
I’d only known her a few months. But I cared for her.
I’d never pressed anything beyond kissing with her because I didn’t want to toe any more of a dangerous line.
But after tonight? I understood how ruthless her father was.
I understood the lengths he’d go to in order to make sure I dropped dead.
If I could get Sutton away from him, I’d feel better about her safety.
Because if her father ever found out about us while I was away?
I wasn’t sure I’d ever forgive myself if something happened to her.
Plus, I knew once she had made up her mind, there was nothing I could to do change it. And she’d made up her mind to come with me. Her bag was packed. The plan was set. All we had to do was slowly climb down from her balcony to the grass in her father’s backyard and make a break for the woods.
From there, we could run to where I always parked my bike. In the brush, a few blocks from the house. Just in case his men went looking for any signs of intruders. But his men weren’t at the house tonight. They were all with him.
Looking for me.
“Ready?” Sutton asked.
“Whenever you are,” I said.
She tossed me her purse before tossing me another small backpack.
“Help me out with this stuff. You know I can pack light, but I’ll still need help getting it down to the ground,” she said.
“We’ve got a bit of a walk to my bike. But if we can keep up a steady job, it’ll only take us a minute or two to get there,” I said.
“Fair enough. Is there anything else you want from this room?”
I furrowed my brow. “Why would I want anything?”
“Don’t know. Figured I’d ask, just in case you wanted to take a pillow or something. You’re always talking about how nice my pillows are.”
“They’re nice because they smell like you. Not because I want to take one of them with me.”
She grinned. “Then, let’s go taint some other pillows with the smell of my hair so you can flirt with those, too.”
I chuckled, and her smile breathed a new life within me.
I slid the backpack over my shoulder, then tossed her purse strap around my neck.
I’d need one of my arms free to get down the balcony, then I’d need it again once she tossed her suitcase down.
Which is what I knew she’d do, since she wasn’t making any effort to try and figure out how to carry the damn thing down on her person.
“Okay, you go first, then I’ll—”
Her cell phone rang out with a ringtone we both recognized. And when her eyes widened, I made a mad dash for the balcony. I tucked myself away in the shadows as she stared at her phone, waiting for me to get out of sight.
Then, I stuck out a thumbs up.
“Hey there, Daddy,” I heard her say.
I stood there and listened as the phone conversation from her end told me everything I needed to know.
“Wow, done so soon? I figured you’d be out all night.
Extra pizza? Well, I’ve packed up a few slices already, but I could order another one?
Dessert? Um, sure. What about those cannoli’s from the bakery up the road?
I know you can always get them to open when they usually aren’t.
Best birthday presents ever,” she said, giggling.
I shook my head as I stayed pressed against the outer wall of the mansion.
“Daddy just take some deep breaths. You sound upset and stressed. If you eat like that, you’re going to make yourself sick. Yes, just try for me. Or don’t. Fine. Okay,” she said.
I rolled my eyes. Sometimes, it made me sick how she doted on her father.
But I knew exactly why he was upset and stressed.
It was because of the shootout. Because they saw me get away.
Because they probably went back to find me and I wasn’t there, which meant they hadn’t actually harmed me in some way.
I peeked around the corner just as Sutton hung up the phone, then watched her sigh heavily.
“We have to go now if we’re going to go,” I said softly.
She waved her hand around in the air, though. Brushing me off, as if I were some mosquito buzzing around in her ear.
“Sutton, if your father sees me here—”
“I need to order another pizza, hold on,” she said.
I walked into her room and placed my hand against her phone, stopping her from punching in the number.
“It’s either now or never,” I said.
“My father is fifteen minutes from this house right now,” she said.
“All the more reason for us to go.”
“If we go and I’m not here, he’s going to come after me. After us. You know this.”
“And we’ll run. You’ll be safe with me.”
“How do you know that?” she asked.
I furrowed my brow. “How do you not?”
“Look, it’s not that simple anymore. If we just stay in—”
“I’m not staying in town, Sutton,” I said curtly.
Her eyes whipped up to mine and I saw that fighting spirit rear its head at me.
“If your father sees me here, I’m going to be dead.
We’ve been taking this risk for months. Staying nights at your apartment.
Coming to see you here whenever you spend the holidays and shit with him.
And for what, Sutton? He’ll put a bullet in my head without a second thought, and you want to risk that just for me to stay in town?
For me to ignore my father’s dying words? ” I asked.
“I’m not asking you to ignore them. I’m asking you to postpone them until I can get out of here with you,” Sutton said.
“At some point in time, you’re not going to be able to volley yourself between the goodness of this world and your father. At some point in time, you’re going to have to choose a side.”
“But right now, isn’t that time.”
“You want to come with me, but you want to do it on your dime because of your father. You have a chance to get away from this madness and him, right now. Just come with me, Sutton. Like you just fought me over.”
“He’s my father, Cage. And whether or not he’s a good man, he’s still my father. The daddy I love. If we’re going to do this, we do this right,” she said.
“A good man? Sutton, your father is never going to be a good man,” I said.
“I’ve been working on it. On some things. He has a good heart. He loves me. He cares about the people that are employed for him. Mostly,” she said.
“Are you even listening to yourself right now? Your father is ten minutes out and we’re standing here, arguing if the man that killed my father and slaughtered my damn crew is a good man!”
“Every man has to provide for his family, and my father has done just that. He gives me the world, and he takes care of those he employs closely. You’ll never be able to convince me otherwise of that, no matter the tactics he uses to make sure he can take care of people. Of me. Of those he works with.”
“Your father is the reason I’m in this position in the first place, Sutton!” I roared.
I watched her wince, but it didn’t cause me to back down.
“Your father and his goons tossed my crew with broken necks from buildings! He littered my father with bullets! Your father is the most heartless, ruthless human being on this planet! He’s nothing but a lowlife mafioso out there skimming casinos and using the money to purchase other casinos so he can sink his talons further into this city.
And if you want to defend someone like that? ” I asked.
Sutton’s nostrils flared. “You’ll what?”
I slid her backpack to the floor, then dropped her purse at her feet.
“We barely know one another. You’re not coming,” I said.
She paused. “What?”
“You should just stay and be with your father.”
“No, that’s not the plan, Cage.”
“Just because you say it isn’t doesn’t make it true. I have to go,” I said.
“Cage, wait! Stop!”
Her hand came down onto my arm and I shrugged it off. I strolled onto the balcony and hopped over, not bothering to climb up or down anything. I dropped two stories and landed on my feet, bending my knees as I set my sights for the tree line.
“Fine! Just get the fuck out of here, you useless piece of shit!” Sutton shrieked.
“Don’t mind if I do,” I murmured.
Then, I made the quickest break I could have ever made toward the tree line as headlights came barreling down the road off in the distance.