Chapter 6
Brielle
I feel twitchy as I pace the floor in the big bedroom.
This is his space, not something I can, for a second, deny with his scent lingering in the air.
The bed is made to perfection, the corners crisp with military precision.
The only thing that even hints that this room is lived in is the book about the Roman Empire on the bedside table. There are no clothes hanging out of drawers. There isn”t a spot of dust on the hardwood floor surrounding the large area rug that dominates most of the room.
I sit in the oversized chair across the room, but it doesn”t last long. I”m antsy, feeling like a sitting duck in this room.
Although there was no sign outside, I have to assume this is Cerberus MC”s headquarters.
I heard the guy who drove me here ask where he should take me, but I never heard the answer. There”s no telling what sort of conversation traveled through those headpieces they were both wearing on the fifteen-minute drive from the house my stepbrother died in to here.
I shake my hands out down by my hips, but it doesn”t stop the tingling in my fingers. I make fists, clenching them and reopening them over and over, but it only helps a little.
Something tells me to run, but there”s another voice that also screams at me to stay.
Nathan made his promises, and, if anything, the man keeps his word. He doesn”t make idle threats. If it leaves his mouth, then it might as well be drilled into stone because he”ll see it through.
It”s how I know I”m as good as dead. I doubt the misery of my life will end as quickly as Xan”s did. There will be no bullet through my skull, at least not before he hurts me to the point that I beg for it, and even then, he”ll prolong my ending.
I feel exposed as I once again try to get comfortable in the armchair. There”s no chance in hell I”ll climb into the man”s bed. When he comes back and finds me there, he may think it means he”s able to take liberties I”m not offering.
I”ve heard the women in the house whisper about Cerberus. Although many of them, like myself, aren”t from the area, a lot of them interact with women from town at their jobs. They bring home all sorts of stories, ones I have to eavesdrop on because there aren”t people going out of their way to hold conversations with me.It”s as if their instincts tell them I can”t be trusted, and I guess, for the most part, that”s true. Look where even the slightest hint of a friendship got Beth today.
The closet beckons to me, but I do my best to ignore it. There”s no safety in there, despite what I thought as a child.
My mother married Nathan Adair when I was five and he seemed like a nice man. He’d dote on me and spoil me with gifts. I didn’t catch him watching me like many of the other men that my mother brought around.
He never faltered and never made me doubt him while they were dating. He treated me like his daughter, and Xan treated me like his sister. It lasted six months following their marriage, three months after finalizing the adoption that made me a real part of the family.
I remember the pride I felt that day, smiling for the camera as we stood beside the judge who signed the papers. The pictures from that day were still framed on my bedside table the day I ran this last time. When I tried to put it away once, Nathan made me lock my eyes on the images the entire time he hurt me.
I shudder, my eyes still on the semi-open closet door.
”There”s no safety in there,” I mutter, the threat of tears burning the back of my nose as I force myself to put my back to the temptation.
It took three more months before my mother would believe that the man she married was a lie, that he didn”t love us as he claimed. I squeeze my eyes shut, still able to hear the whispers of love Nathan would speak in my ear when he did unmentionable things to my young body.
Within two years, my mother had swallowed a bottle of pills, leaving me to face the monsters alone.
Incapable of fighting the pull any longer, I rush across the room and tug open the closet door, flipping on the light. It”s bigger than I originally presumed it would be.
I pull the door closed, shutting myself inside. As much as I want to keep the light on, I know I need to be able to see the shadows under the door to anticipate when my safety ends.
I crouch into the corner, the man”s clothes offering no protection the way a row of dresses offered by a woman”s wardrobe would.
My stomach growls, but I ignore the issue. I”ve gone longer than a day without eating, and I know I can handle even more.
I want to curse every bad thought I had about the shelter. I”d give anything to be there right now, undiscovered by Nathan and Xan.
Tears leak from my eyes, and I know better than to fight them any longer. It”ll be best if I can just get them all out so they won”t cause problems along the way, but even as they fall, I fear Nathan will somehow find me cowered here.
Emotions are useless. I heard him say it many times, all the while in a rage for something that happened to him.
The man didn”t consider anything but sorrow and fear as useless emotions. Anger was okay because it fueled one”s need to seek vengeance. Rage provided power and a certain level of equity needed to stay on top. He caught it often. He”d feed it any chance he got.
I tell myself I”m crying for me and the life I deserved rather than the life I was given, but I know better.
Tears streak down my face, tickling my neck on their trek into disappearing into my shirt. They fall for Xan. Not for the man he became but for the boy I met many, many years ago. He was already broken, his punishments already in full swing, but he never once whispered about his own pain. He”d lie and tell me that he fell off his bike when I”d catch him wince, knowing full well that he hadn”t been on a bike in days.
The first time Nathan lifted his hand to me, Xan stood bravely between me and his father. He was struck repeatedly for it, but he never told me he regretted it.
When he did it a second time, I saw it the moment Nathan decided to use his son against me.
My shoulders shake uncontrollably, and despite trying to stay quiet with my hands cupped over my mouth, I can”t stop the sobs.
I don”t want to think of my past. There”s nothing about it I can control.
I do know that Xan was a monster created by his father. He didn”t start out that way.
I”ll never be able to forgive him for what he did to me for years, but I can at least pray he finds peace in whatever place real-life monsters are sent to when they die.
I have no clue what the future holds for me, but I do know I”ll have no control over it.
My body feels heavy with grief as I lean my head against the wall of the closet.
There”s a part of me that wants to channel that strong girl Nathan tried to awaken inside of me, but I know leaving this room and demanding anything won”t be received well.
Even Beth can”t look me in the eye.
Everything I touch ends up broken and damaged, and I know that Cerberus will be no different.
The men and women who helped today wore those leather cuts with pride, but all it did was add their names and anyone associated with them to Nathan”s ever-growing list of people who have betrayed him.
Those people don”t get to keep breathing. They disappear or end up in the news because of some tragic accident that no one can seem to explain. Being here puts everybody in danger, and Kincaid, the club president, will do his best to mitigate those issues by getting rid of my ass as quickly as he possibly can. If the man was smart, he”d put a bullet in my head and deliver my body to Nathan. But then the man would want to seek vengeance because, as promised, he”s the only one that can put me in the ground.
Not for the first time today, I wish I hadn”t moved in closer to Beth, then maybe the bullet that struck Xan would’ve dropped me instead. The waiting to die feels like worse torture than the act itself.
I resist the urge to run my fingers over the scars lining my forearm despite the itch of need there.