Chapter 18
I don’t like this.
The guys wouldn’t take no for an answer, so I had to let them go. I bite my nails nervously, pacing back and forth, from one end of the apartment to the other.
I had to let them go. Right?
I didn’t have to. I know that. But Ty said he’d be careful, that he wouldn’t be the first to start something. That he’d go in, get my stuff and get out.
But I know Mickey. Mickey’s going to try to tell him some shit that will ruin what Ty and I have.
Mickey’s going to do whatever it takes to make sure Ty never looks at me the same way again.
Because for some fucked up reason, Mickey wants me in his possession.
He’s obsessed because I never fell at his feet.
He’s a typical spoiled little boy, he wants what he can’t have.
Ultimately, he wanted me to give in, to thank him for picking me, to willingly be his little doll, his little plaything, his little money maker.
And I never did. I never will.
Obsessed.
I take a deep breath to try and calm myself down, but it does nothing to actually calm me down.
Don’t you hate it when people say that when you’re stressed, angry or worried?
Calm down. Does it ever actually help? I think people just like to hear themselves give some kind of advice, even if it’s shit.
It’s after four in the afternoon. They should be back by now.
I’ve been beside myself, unable to eat, barely able to sleep once I heard the door shut at six. I ran to the door after my brain fully woke up, and just as I was about out the door, I heard the rumbling of Ty’s bike.
There’s a fucking pacing line in the ground from how much I’ve been walking back and forth.
“Goddamn it, Ty, where are you?” I snap, running a hand through my hair.
Maybe I should go out and check the shop. I thought only Asher was working today, but maybe Ty stayed. Maybe everything’s fine and they just haven’t had a moment to come back to the apartment.
But… What if something happened? I can’t just sit here doing nothing.
That’s it, I’m going. I walk towards the door, grabbing a set of keys I hope are the house keys and the moment my hand touches the doorknob, I hear the familiar rumbling of a motorcycle.
My head drops in relief and I can finally take a full breath.
I rip open the door and run down the stairs of their old apartment building, make it to the front door of the building just as Ty kicks his leg over the side and pulls his helmet off. The smile I get from him is so loving and pure, my heart beats faster.
There’s no marks, no black eyes, no broken nose, no blood. He’s okay.
“Daddy,” I sigh in relief and run out, jumping as soon as I get close enough to him and his arms wrap around my hips, holding me close.
“Roxie,” he says equally as awed, speaking my name into my neck before pulling back to look me in the eye. “You stayed here, good girl.”
“Oh, don’t start that with me.” I smack his chest, but then wrap my arms around his neck and hug him to me again. “You’re okay.”
“I’m okay,” he repeats and sets me down softly.
“Where’s Asher?”
“I dropped him at the shop. I wanted to come see you and ease your mind about me seeing Mickey.” To add insult to injury Ty pats my head like I’m a fucking child and I shove him.
“Careful, Terecino, you’re getting a little too cocky.”
The way his dark eyes light up and his lips turn up in a bright grin makes my whole being feel better. Like I can finally set some of this weight down because I know he’s here to help me carry it.
“I just like that fire you’ve got, baby. Come on, let’s go upstairs. I have an hour before I have to get back to the shop.”
“You have to work today?”
“Yeah, I wasn’t able to move some of the appointments and truthfully, I can’t take much more time off.”
I know that. I swallow down the guilt that’s starting to form in my chest and take his hand, threading our fingers together.
“Come on then.” Pulling him inside, he follows me up the stairs, smacking my ass the whole time. “Stop it!”
“I can’t help it, Rox. You’re wearing only my shirt and panties.
I can see the curve of your ass and just a little fucking flash of your covered pussy.
And you expect me to keep my hands to myself?
” We make it to their slightly opened door and he crowds my space once we get inside, shutting the door with his foot.
“I do expect you to keep your hands to yourself,” I say breathlessly, liking how his hands graze just underneath the hem of the shirt I’m wearing. “But I want to hear how it went first.”
Ty chuckles in my ear, pressing his chest to my back.
“But you look so good,” he whispers.
“I’ll still look this good in five minutes. Come on, Daddy, tell me.”
I can hear his sharp inhale at the name, and his slow, shaky exhale makes goosebumps break out over my arm and warmth bloom in my core.
“What do you want to know?” His voice drops and his hands drag down my arms slowly. So slowly that my entire focus is pulled to where his skin touches mine. “Focus, Roxie.” I can hear the smirk in his tone.
“Was he there?” I ask, my tone a mix between lost in the sensation of his skin on mine and fear that any thought or discussion of that asshole would make this little bubble burst.
I shouldn’t have been worried though. At the mention of “him”, Ty growls and his hands are no longer gentle, but biting into my skin possessively. He’s telling me with his hold that I’m his, totally and completely his.
“He was,” Ty’s words are clipped and short, but he steps into me even closer as if he’s trying to become my shadow.
“And?”
“And I wanted to beat him within an inch of his life, the fucking asshole,” he snarls, and one of his hands leaves me before he leans down and whispers, “Close your eyes.”
I close them and he moves around me. “Open them.”
When I open my eyes, I smile brightly.
My worn, torn, battered sketchbook rests in his hands.
“Oh my god,” I whisper brokenly, taking the book gently. “You got it.” Tears start to prick at my eyes because this book… It’s everything. It was my lifeline in that hell. “Is it…”
I almost don’t want to ask if he found the drawing. The only thing that really matters.
“It’s there. I made sure of it,” he says with a soft smile, opening the book and flipping through until he finds where the folded paper is tucked in between the pages.
“Oh my god,” I repeat, softer, more thankful than I think I’ve ever been.
“That’s not all,” Ty says with a smirk and pulls out a roll of bills.
“What’s that?”
“Your winnings.”
My eyes widen, terror clawing its way into my body, and why is it so hard to breathe?
If Ty brought the money back, that means my debt… I owe Mickey so much money now. So much money now. I don’t…
“Baby, breathe.” Ty sets the money to the side and steps back into my field of narrowing vision. When I don’t meet his eyes, he presses his hands to my cheeks and lifts my gaze. “Roxie, baby, tell me what just happened. You’re safe, I’m here, carino.”
“I’m never going to be able to pay him off,” I say so quietly, it’s almost just an exhale.
“You don’t owe him anything else.” Ty’s dark eyes are so sincere and determined. I know he believes it, but I don’t think he realizes what it means to owe Mickey Frank.
I do.
“Ty.” My hands wrap around his wrists, holding onto him to bring us closer. “You don’t understand.”
“There’s nothing to understand. You owed him money. You gave him everything, everything, Roxie. You’ve paid him everything you owe with interest.” He’s so confident that it’s going to be okay. The way he’s looking at me, it tells me he thinks this is the end of it.
He doesn’t know what I do. Or…maybe he does, but he just doesn’t know it as intimately and as brutally as I do.
That if you disrespect Mickey Frank, you’re as good as dead. Unless you can give him something; flesh, money, or work.
I pull Ty’s hands from my face gently, never breaking eye contact.
“That’s not how it works with him,” I say quietly. “You should’ve left the money.”
“It’s too late now.” Ty lets me move his hands, but threads our fingers together. I breathe a little easier knowing he’s not leaving or pulling away. “But please, trust me when I say, I won’t let anything happen to you.”
My heart clenches in my chest and I know it’s completely obvious on my face just now how much his words touched me. I believe that he will do everything in his power to keep me safe.
But what he doesn’t quite realize now is that I will do everything I can to keep him safe too.
“I… I have one more thing,” he says softly, his voice rough and low. “It’s not a good thing, but… I think it could possibly be healing.”
I narrow my eyes and tilt my head, my white blonde hair falling over my shoulder.
“What?” Guilt and terror make my blood run cold. What did he find? What was he told?
Ty takes a step back, and reaches into his back pocket, pulling out a lump of fabric.
“What…is that?” Nausea crawls up my throat and I’m suddenly very glad that I wasn’t able to eat earlier.
It looks like underwear.
Old underwear…of mine.
“He said these were special,” Ty says, rage and murder lacing every word he speaks, but I know in my bones that none of it’s pointed at me.
His fists grip the fabric so tightly I just know he wants to destroy them himself.
“I can only imagine what these were trophies of, and you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.
But I know he hurt you. I know he deserves to have his hands and feet cut off, to be left bleeding out for what he did to you.
So here they are. His trophies. The things he thought he had over you.
They’re all in your hands now and yours to decide what to do with. ”