2005 （Breaking free from Chase）
(Breaking free from Chase)
I remember our first meeting as if it were yesterday…I met him at the police station, when they took my statement.
I looked like a cheap whore: smeared makeup, unkempt hair, black fishnet stockings, black lace panties, and a long, checked shirt that barely covered my ass.
I felt naked in the endless sea of curious eyes—but after finding the letter pinned to the fridge with a magnet, my first thought hadn’t been how I looked. It had been freedom. Mom and Dad.
At the police station, everyone was looking at my body—only Cyrus looked me in the eyes, searching.
He was standing outside the room, in the corridor, his wrists and ankles circled by clinking cuffs, linked by a thin chain. I cast an incredulous glance at the rattling metal and rubbed my wrists, which had spent a long, long time bound in rough rope.
He watched my movements with narrowing eyes. I had no intention of telling him that I, too, had been bound, but he deduced it. Bound… and not just once.
While I was waiting for my parents, a woman with a kind smile draped a checked blanket over me.
She also set a mug of warm tea in front of me, which I sipped slowly.
For a short time, I forgot about the man in the corridor—but then I heard a commotion.
For a second, I thought that Chase was crazy enough to come for me here to the station, but it was only Cyrus who had broken free from the guards flanking him.
He was huge and wild, like a cornered, raging black bear.
Wide shoulders, strong arms with bulging biceps… The man, packed into tight clothes, exuded raw strength. The cops couldn’t overpower him—he shook them off like they were nothing. Some slammed into the wall and slid down, limp.
A few steps away, a man in rock-themed biker clothes—just like his—started swearing as someone pressed a taser to Cyrus’s neck.
His huge body—at least 220 pounds, I thought, all muscle and bone—crashed onto the dirty black-and-white checkered linoleum.
The building seemed to shudder, and a cloud of fine dust lifted from the floor.
My mouth hung open.
The number of punches, kicks, and baton strikes that rained down on him made me wince.
The stale air—reeking of cheap coffee, weathered furniture, old paper, and dying, rotting flowers—grew heavy.
Words burned in my throat. I wanted to stop those men—he didn’t deserve to be beaten to a pulp on the ground. My nails dug into the soft armrest of the chair. I wanted to stand, but a voice in my head stopped me.
What if he’s a predator like Chase? What if he’s hurt people, too?
I watched the scene in silence, my eyes wide, my lips slightly parted.
When they took away the other prisoner—whose voice we could still hear echoing down the corridor for a while—Cyrus said, “Okay, enough, Lewis.”
His deep voice rumbled through the room, authoritative and commanding.
The cops stopped disciplining him. They quickly unchained him, and someone offered a hand to help him up—but he just growled at the officers around him, who nearly pissed themselves.
He got up quickly, with a dexterity that belied his size.
He straightened his rumpled clothes and wiped the blood seeping from a cut above his brow with an arrogant movement.
He started walking toward me, his expression severe.
The rocker chains at his side clinked softly.
The old floorboards creaked under his weight.
His boots were worn, his overall appearance unkempt.
Shabby brown hair had slipped loose from his hair tie and fallen to his shoulders.
His masculine, hard features were shadowed by several days’ worth of stubble.
Considering he’d just been beaten to hell, his movements were almost effortless.
When he reached me, his smell hit me first. He smelled like a bar on two legs: the bitter tang of cigarettes, stale beer, something faintly spicy—it must’ve been his perfume—and a trace of manly sweat, visible on his suntanned skin.
He had a strong jawline and a long, proportionate nose that matched his face and wide brow.
He was huge, like a pro wrestler. His black tank top clung to his torso, showcasing his muscled chest and abs. He had tattoos on his arms.
Is every criminal this gorgeous? I thought—and immediately wanted to slap myself.
But the thing was… he was gorgeous, too.
A sinfully attractive face, and an outrageously beautiful, muscled body.
Dark eyes full of temptation. Full, soft lips—and a smile that could see straight through you.
His mind, however… his mind was a harmonic mixture of the darkest night and the cruelest nightmares.
My attention turned back to Cyrus. I watched with furrowed brows as he picked up my folder and left without a word.
I didn’t know why, but I stood up and followed him.
We walked until we reached a dark, closed door, its surface pocked with indentations… made by fists. He went in, then turned back and looked at me.
I couldn’t say anything to him. The questions were on the tip of my tongue—what had that whole thing with the other cops been, the scene everyone had just witnessed? But I was ashamed of my smile, because I was missing a few teeth. I looked down at my bare toes sticking out of my torn stockings.
Cyrus stepped into the office and closed the door in my face. I stared at the worn nameplate.
Cyrus Phoenix
Lieutenant