Chapter 15 Willow
WILLOW
My breath catches as I watch something dangerous spark in Malice’s dark gray eyes. He looks pissed, maybe more so than I’ve ever seen him before. Even when he came barging in here, he didn’t look this mad.
The wood of the door is cool against my back as I stay pressed against it, hardly daring to breathe. He’s quiet for a long moment, staring at me with his face only inches from mine, and I don’t make any sudden movements, not sure what’s going on in his head.
“Take me to your mom,” he suddenly demands.
I blink, caught off guard by that.
“No.” The word is out of my mouth before I have time to think about it, but I double down, shaking my head. “No. I already tried to get the money back, Malice. It’s too late. She spent some on herself and lost the rest gambling. It’s gone. There’s nothing to get back.”
“It wasn’t a fucking request,” he bites out. “You’re going to take me to your mom’s place, or I’ll have Vic tell me where it is. And you won’t like it if I have to go that route.”
I can’t help the shiver that works its way through me at his words. This man is so brutal. He’s so dominant and hard, so used to getting what he wants and not being afraid to take it if he has to. I can never read him, never guess what he’s going to do, and that scares the shit out of me.
Is he going to bust into my mom’s house and kill her? Will he kill me if I don’t tell him what he wants to know?
Malice steps closer, clearly tired of waiting for me to make a decision. His hand comes up, and I flinch instinctively, but his fingers are surprisingly gentle when he tilts my chin up, making me look at him.
“Willow,” he says, and his voice drops, not hard this time, but deep and serious. Just like his eyes in this moment. “Tell me.”
I lick my lips, my mouth suddenly dry. My lips feel numb as they form the words, whispering her address.
He doesn’t hesitate. As soon as I finish speaking, he tugs me away from the door and opens it, striding out into the hall.
I follow him immediately, my heart fluttering like a bird’s wings. I can’t just let him leave, knowing he’s going to my mom’s place.
He takes the stairs two at a time, going down to the tiny foyer and out of the building. I follow him all the way to his car, and he doesn’t stop me when I grab the handle of the passenger door and get in.
Everything in me is screaming that I should not be doing this, but I can’t stop myself. I buckle my seatbelt, and I’m along for the ride.
Neither of us talks as Malice drives. The air in the car is tense. He’s like a statue, staring out the window with his tattooed hands gripping the wheel tightly.
His scent fills the car with something deep and smoky, and it feels like too small of a space to be in with him. It’s hard to breathe. He fills up every corner of the car with his presence, radiating fury and irritation and that dominant intensity that both draws me in and terrifies me.
I have to swallow hard, glancing out the window instead of looking at him.
It’s not a long drive to my mom’s place, and Malice is out of the car as soon as he pulls up. I have to scramble to keep up with him, and he bangs on her door the same way he was banging on mine.
Mom answers it after less than a minute, and Malice pushes his way inside with me behind him.
“Oh. Willow.” My mother glances past his shoulder at me, surprise registering on her face.
She smiles at me as if there’s nothing wrong, as if we didn’t have a huge fight the other day when I confronted her about stealing from me. There’s something about the way she carries herself that makes me think she might be high, and I have to take a deep breath to keep my emotions under control.
Her gaze slides back to Malice, and I can see her taking him in with an appreciative gleam in her eyes. “Who’s your friend, baby?”
“He’s not—”
Before I can figure out how to finish that sentence, Malice cuts me off, stepping right up into my mother’s space.
“You took something that doesn’t belong to you,” he growls. “That money was Willow’s, not yours.”
Mom blinks, her jaw dropping open. But she recovers quickly, finding her casual smile again. “I don’t know what Willow told you, but that’s—”
“She told me you took it.” His voice is unyielding. “And I’m telling you to give it back.”
My mother scoffs lightly, raising a hand as if to brush the whole thing away. “It’s not like that. This is a family matter that really doesn’t involve you. So—”
Malice takes another step toward her, looming over her like a god of death. “Too fucking late. I’m already involved. Now are you gonna give the money back, or am I going to have to make you?”
Usually, it takes a lot to make my mom back down.
She’s so secure in herself and her lies that I’ve seen her stare down bigger men than Malice.
But those men didn’t have that threatening air that he does.
Everything about him is dangerous and intimidating, and even though he’s not yelling or raising his voice at all, the threat is still right there, front and center.
Mom looks away for a second, and she actually seems to shrink a little. All I can do is stare on in shock as she looks cowed for the first time in her life.
“Fine,” she says, her slurry words dripping with irritation. “I took the money. I needed it, okay? But it’s all gone. Just like I told her.”
She jerks her chin in my direction, but Malice keeps his focus entirely on her, his shoulders set and his hands curled into fists.
“I think that’s a lie,” he says softly. “No, scratch that. It’d better be a lie. Because we’re not leaving here empty-handed.”
Mom’s eyes go wide, and she takes a step back. “I… I don’t…”
“I’m gonna start counting. If I get to ten and you’ve got nothing to show me, you’re not gonna like what happens next. One. Two.”
My mom’s eyes dart around the room as he counts. She looks at me like she wants me to step in, but I just stand where I am, rooted to the spot, almost holding my breath.
“Five. Six. Seven.” Each quiet word cracks like a whip.
I’ve never seen my mother this freaked out before. She licks her lips, breathing faster and wringing her hands together, glancing around the living room as if she’s looking for an escape route.
“Eight. Nine—”
“Fine!” Mom blurts. “Fine. Not all the money is gone. I have the rest of it in a cash bag upstairs.”
She glances at me almost resentfully, as if I betrayed her somehow by bringing in someone who can stand up to her better than I can.
My throat goes tight, and I have to work to hold her gaze and not look away.
I hate that she’s always using me. That even now, she’s blaming me for shit that she instigated. I hate that she lied right to my face, telling me some sob story about losing all the money gambling, just so I’d go away and she could keep the rest.
Malice steps back, looking satisfied. He folds his arms and lifts his chin, pinning my mom with a hard stare.
“Go get it,” he says, leaving no room to argue. “All of it, everything that’s left. And give it back to her.”
Mom doesn’t even try to argue. She goes upstairs and then comes back down a few minutes later with a bank bag. With a sullen look, she thrusts it out toward Malice, but he shakes his head.
“Did I tell you to give it to me? Give it to her,” he repeats, nodding at me.
My mother’s lip curls, and she all but throws the small envelope-shaped bag at me. I take it, curling my fingers around it tightly.
“Is that all of it?” Malice demands.
“Yes,” Mom spits back. “Or do you want to go searching through my underwear drawer to make sure?”
He basically ignores that comment, leaning down so he’s right in her face again.
“Don’t you ever pull shit like this again,” he says. “If you touch so much as a single fucking dime of Willow’s money, you’ll pay for it. I don’t do second chances.”
Before my mother can splutter a reply, he grabs my arm and drags me back out to his car.
I get inside and buckle myself in, feeling like I’m in a daze. I’m just… stunned, and I don’t know what to say. The whole thing happened so fast, and this is one of the first times in recent memory that my mom has had any real consequences for something that she did.
I’ve stood up to her before, but she always finds some way to flip things around and avoid taking responsibility.
It’s weird, but I’m grateful to Malice in a way, and it changes how I look at him a little.
“Has your mom done shit like that before?” Malice asks.
The sudden question almost makes me jump, his deep voice breaking the silence in the car. I glance at him, and his eyes are still focused on the road, the steering wheel gripped tightly.
Part of me almost wants to laugh as I consider my answer. The list of crappy things my mom has done is long. From lying to me and stealing from me to letting a john grope me for a little extra money. I take a deep breath before the tide of awful memories can take hold.
“Yes,” I answer. “She’s… it’s hard. She’s not my real mom—not by blood, I mean. She adopted me when I wasn’t even two years old, when I had no one else. She gave me a home, and I’ll always be grateful for that. But it hasn’t always been easy.”
My stomach twists as I speak, my cheeks flushing with embarrassment at admitting so much personal shit to this man I barely know. Now that Malice knows she stole from me, part of me worries he’s going to see me as weak for the way my mom has used me.
So what if he does? Why should it matter what he thinks?
I don’t have an answer for that, but the thought keeps pricking at me.
Glancing down at my lap, I drag my fingers over the fabric of my jeans. “I guess you’re probably wondering why I put up with it,” I whisper. “Why I haven’t cut her out of my life yet.”
Malice shakes his head. “Nah. That part, I get. Sometimes the people you love turn your love against you, and it’s the most brutal weapon in the world.”
I look over at him as we pass through an intersection, surprised at his words. They’re revealing, and they show a side of him I haven’t seen before.