4. Mina
Chapter four
S omehow, I thought death would be quieter. Strange noises surround me, mangling together, in a cacophony of sound. There’s a weird smell here I don’t recognize. I try to look around, but everything is black. Are my eyes closed? I try to open them, but nothing happens.
I start to notice my body hurting… everywhere. At first it’s mild discomfort, but the more I notice it, the faster it grows into a deep throbbing pain, as if I’ve been hit by a truck. I didn’t think you were supposed to feel pain in death. Unless you went to hell, then maybe you would. My mother did tell me that’s where I belong, have I finally died and gone to hell?
Memories flash through my head. My mother. The knife . It all comes flooding back, and one of the noises around me grows louder.
It starts to separate from the others, drowning out all other noise as I focus on it. It’s a high pitched beeping sound, and it’s slowly getting faster and faster.
I flash back to the nightmare of being attacked by my mother again and pain ripples through my body.
The stabs to my shoulders. Beep.
The gash up my abdomen. Beep.
The cuts on my legs. Beep .
My finger. Beep. Beep. Beep.
My eyes grow damp, even though they won’t open.
“What’s happening?” a scared voice asks. I know that voice.
“Her heart rate is picking up,” another familiar voice answers.
Someone squeezes my right hand.
“But why?”
Max. I recognize his voice now. If I have their voices with me in death, maybe it won’t be so bad here. I try to squeeze his hand back as my breathing steadies, and the beeping starts to slow down.
More noises start to penetrate my mind. Somewhere, a door opens, followed by an unfamiliar voice. “Dom, it’s time. CPA is here.”
“I told you no!” Dom’s voice is sharp with anger, making my hand squeeze the person holding mine a little harder. Why is he so mad? Is he mad at me?
“Look, I’ve held them off as long as I can, but she’s seventeen, and there’s no sign of her mother,” the other man says. If I was dead, this was a very strange conversation I was listening to.
“I don’t care. I’ll marry her, then she’ll be under my care.”
The man sighs heavily. “Dom, you can’t marry a minor without her parents or guardian’s permission.”
“But she doesn’t have parents here!”
“Then you need to get her emancipated.” I hear a loud bang, like someone threw something against a wall.
“Chief! She can’t be emancipated while she’s unconscious!” Dom yells.
“But you can marry her while she is?”
“Ahh!” Dom groans in frustration.
Did Dom just say he’s going to marry me ?
As more of my senses come online, I start to come to the conclusion that this isn’t death. I think I’m in a hospital. As the noises start to filter through my cloudy brain more clearly, I make out the distinct sounds of beeping machines and the sharp smell of antiseptic. I recognize it from the few times I was given something to help heal my injuries.
But if I’m not dead… That means they’ve saved me, just like they said they would.
The door opens again, proceeding a woman’s voice this time. “Good afternoon, I’m Julie Peters, and this is Roger White. We are from Child Protective Services, and I’ve been assigned to Mina Davies case. Can you tell me what all the yelling is about?”
CPA? No! They’ll take me away from my guys. I can’t let that happen, but as much as I try, I can’t open my eyes or make a noise.
“You don’t need to be here. She has a family, she has us,” Dom says firmly.
Dom! He won’t let them take me away. He always told me that they’d take care of me, I just wish I trusted them enough to tell them the truth before it got to this point.
“That’s not how the state sees it,” she replies.
“You can’t have her.” The hand holding mine squeezes as Max speaks.
“I assure you, I’m just here to speak for her best interest. What is your relation to her?”
“I’m her boyfriend.” I grip the hand as hard as I can, which isn’t much. Hearing Max call himself my boyfriend sends a shiver through me that makes me desperate to open my eyes and look at him. Does he really mean that? Or is he just saying what he thinks will keep them from taking me ?
“I thought you were her boyfriend, or was it husband?” another man asks.
Husband?
I hear a small laugh. “I might have gotten a little ahead of myself, but I will be her husband one day, so it’s just semantics at this point.” I know that voice, too. Ben. What is he talking about?
“Look, not to be rude, but none of this matters. She’s a minor with no parents or guardian. It doesn’t matter who her boyfriend is. You can’t marry her without parental permission, and she can’t be emancipated until she’s awake and goes through the proper legal procedures to do so. She will be placed in the system for now until she’s fully emancipated or a parent or guardian steps forward,” the woman tells them in her no-nonsense voice.
“Then I’ll adopt her,” Dom states. If my eyes were open right now, they’d be the size of saucers.
The CPA agent stutters for a second before she speaks. “Y-you can’t just adopt her like that. She’ll have to get approved for the adoption process first, as will you. It could take months.”
“Then I’ll be her foster parent.”
She sighs. “It’s the same thing. It will take months to get you approved.”
“She’ll be eighteen before we can go through any of these channels!” Tucker’s southern voice chimes in.
“Well, then you may as well wait. She’ll only be in foster care for a few months. Then, when she turns eighteen, she can move in with whomever she wants. But only when she’s eighteen and not a moment before.”
“This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard!” Max exclaims, sounding frustrated. I feel the same way, too. But I also feel so cared for, knowing the guys were trying every angle they could think of to be able to get me to stay with them.
“Her ID isn’t even real. You can’t place her in foster care if you don’t know her real identity,” Ben tells them, sounding just as frustrated as the others. He knows my ID is fake?
“Well, we will look into that. It’s all part of our process,” she tells them. “Now, if you will kindly give us some space, we need to speak with the doctor.”
“You want us to leave? You can’t even prove who she is. You don’t know her, but we do. We’re not leaving you alone with her,” Jasper spits out, sounding angry.
“I’m sorry, but it’s time for you to leave her in our care. I assure you, we’ll take good care of her, and I will have her call you to let you know she’s okay.” No, don’t leave me!
“She can’t even speak!”
“We’re not leaving her.”
“Over my dead body.”
A chorus of angry voices rise around the room on my behalf. If there was a time for me to wake up and tell the truth, it would be now. Squeezing Max’s hand as hard as I can, I use his reaffirming grip to give me strength as I grapple to open my eyes. It takes me longer than I’d like, my eyelids as heavy as lead when I try to blink.
I hear Max’s whispered voice, sounding like he’s inches from my face. “Sweetheart? Are you in there? Are you coming back to me? To us? This would be a really good time for you to wake up.”
I squeeze his hand to let him know I heard him and he softly gasps. “Mina?” I try to turn my head towards his voice, but I don’t think it moves at all. I try to pry my eyes open, but it’s just so hard, like being stuck in that state between sleep and awake. Tears of frustration start to build, but I try to fight through it. I can do this.
Voices continue arguing around me, but Max’s voice is a steady anchor in my ear. “That’s it, Sweetheart, you can do it. Come back to me now. It’s been a little rude of you to sleep through the first few days of being my girlfriend, but I can probably find it in my heart to forgive you.”
A smile tries to form on my lips, and the room seems to go quiet.
“Now, I know I didn’t actually ask you, but I was going to, and you sort of decided to take a long nap, so I had to make the decision for you. You should have heard how mad Atlas was when I told him. He had the biggest pout on his face.”
I can picture it, and it makes me want to smile even more. I keep trying to pry my eyes open, and the tiniest sliver of light breaks through before everything goes dark again.
“It’s not my fault, though! When Ben proclaimed himself your husband, I knew I had to act quick to be hubby number two. Since Dom is going to adopt you, I guess that makes him your daddy, so then he’ll be my daddy-in-law. And since Jasper is my twin, we’re a package deal. You knew that, of course, so that’s four of us. Then the others can either get in line to be brother husbands, or they can be your daddies too. Whatever floats their boat, you know?”
“Max, if you ever call me daddy, I swear to god I’ll stab you in the dick,” Atlas growls.
“Atlas! I can’t believe you just said that. Did you forget she was stabbed? Multiple times?”
The room falls silent and tension simmers in the air.
“Shit, I’m sorry Malishka, I didn’t mean it,” Atlas says from my other side .
“Come on, Sweetheart, open those gorgeous green eyes. I want to see you.”
I take several deep breaths and push all my energy into opening my eyes. They strain and flutter as I finally start to blink heavily. I open and close them for a minute, but everything is blurry. I keep blinking until things finally start to come into focus. The first thing I’m able to see clearly is Max’s smiling face looking down at me.
“Hi, gorgeous,” he says with a huge smile. He looks exhausted and his hair’s a mess. Usually it’s in his signature bun on the top of his head, but it hangs limply around his face right now, like he couldn’t be bothered to style it.
I can’t help but smile up at him. I suddenly notice how dry my throat is and try to move my hand to touch it, but my arms won’t budge. I turn my head to look at them, but nothing seems to be restraining me.
I whimper. Am I paralyzed? The thought terrifies me, and the beeping noise starts to speed up with my heart rate. If I can’t speak or write… No, no, no. It can’t be true. I squeeze my eyes tight shut with worry.
“What is it?” Jasper asks from my other side, as he holds my left hand.
My throat is so dry, I worry if I don’t get a drink right now, my throat might close over. Hoping he understands, I open my mouth wide.
He frowns. “Your mouth… hurts?”
I make an exaggerated swallow. It hurts, and I grimace.
“Your throat! You want water!”
I nod in relief. Max holds a straw up to my mouth, and I drink greedily. It instantly soothes my parched throat. I keep sipping until the cup empties and Jasper is right there with another one. I drink until my throat finally doesn’t feel like sandpaper anymore .
“Alright, now she’s awake. It’s time you boys leave so I can speak to her in private,” the woman, Julie, says. I grip the twins’ hands as hard as I can and shake my head.
“See? She doesn’t want to talk to you,” Max tells her smugly.
She sighs. “It doesn’t matter. She’s underage.”
I shake my head again and look at Dom. He stares at me, his eyes narrowing as he tilts his head. I stare back at him, willing him to read my mind. I’m not seventeen!
Wishing I could type or write to make him understand, I look at my right hand. I can feel Max’s grip, so I’m not paralyzed. I try wiggling my fingers, and they barely move. Frustrated, I throw my head back and blow out a breath.
“Max, can I sit there for a minute?” Dom asks, coming to my side.
“Sure.”
Max releases my hand as Dom takes it and sits on the edge of the bed. We stare at each for a moment and I start to wonder what he’s thinking.
“Come on now, I’ve been quite patient. Everyone out. Chief, can you please have them leave?” The CPA agent says briskly, clearly getting annoyed with nobody listening to her.
“She was violently attacked and has been in a coma for twelve days, she literally just woke up. We’re the only people she knows, and you want us to just walk out of here?” Gideon asks angrily as he stands behind Dom, facing her with his arms crossed. “Not going to happen. The least you can do is give us a few minutes to make sure she’s okay and understands what’s happening.”
Dom’s thumb strokes over my hand and my attention moves back to him. He’s staring at me so intently, as if he’s trying to see inside my head. For once, I wish that was possible. I squeeze his hand as hard as I can, which isn’t very hard at all.
Dom’s eyes narrow again. “You want to tell me something?”
I nod.
“Something important?”
I nod emphatically.
He continues to stare at me for a moment before he pulls out his phone, opens it, and holds it where I can see it, guiding my hand over the keys. I try to press the buttons, but my fingers have no strength. Tears of frustration trickle down my cheeks.
I wish I could just speak!
Wait… my eyes dart to Atlas, who’s standing behind Jasper, staring at me with his arms crossed. Did I… Did I call him for help? The last moments before I passed out are a little foggy, but I swear I spoke… just that one word. Help.
I’ve always felt sick when I’ve attempted to speak in the past, but these men have helped me overcome other obstacles, why not this one too? I lift my chin again, and Jasper places the straw in my mouth so I can take another sip.
The guys have all gathered around me now, and I glance at each of them, clutching Dom and Jasper’s hands, afraid that they’ll be forced to leave if I let go.
“Okay, guys, I’m sorry, but it’s time to go now. She can call you from her foster home when she’s settled,” the man—the police chief—says, sounding regretful.
The guys look heartbroken, and I don’t want to be the cause of that pain. I also don’t want to live another day without them in my life. Staring at Dom, I swallow, then open my mouth and quietly rasp out, “I’m twenty-one.”
Dom’s eyes widen as pure shock covers his face.
“What did she just say?” Gideon asks, moving closer.
“I… I’m not entirely sure…” Dom trails off and I look at him, pleading with my eyes for him to give me a voice. “But… I think she said she’s twenty-one.”
Thank god! I nod my head excitedly, even though it causes pain to throb through my skull. Relief fills me, knowing they finally know the truth.
The biggest smile I’ve ever seen splits his face, and I look around at the others, who are also grinning. Max even starts laughing as he clutches his side and rests his forehead on Tucker’s shoulder.
“You heard them. Your services are no longer required here,” Gideon turns and tells the CPA officers, who are both staring at me with shocked expressions.
The woman shakes it off before she’s able to respond. “Now wait a minute, I need proof of her age before I can leave.”
“I told you her ID was fake. You were willing to take her away on the basis of her ID being fake, so why can’t you leave her on the same basis?” Ben asks.
“Well, it doesn’t work like that,” she huffs.
“You can’t take a twenty-one-year-old woman away against her will,” Gideon tells her.
She looks between us all, looking frustrated before she finally concedes. “I’ll be back after I talk to my superiors,” she says as she and her partner storm out of the room.
“You be sure to do that!” Ben yells after her .
“I’ll talk to you guys later. I’ll go see what she plans on doing,” the police chief says as he follows them out. Ben shuts the door behind him and then turns back to me. It’s just the eight of us now. My eyes dance around between them all, wondering if they will be mad I had previously lied about my age. But it’s not like I ever told them I was seventeen, my mother did.
Max and Jasper start laughing, and Ben moves in and leans down closer to me. “Are you really twenty-one, or did you just say that to get them to leave? Cause if you did, it was brilliant!” he says with a smile.
“It will only hold for so long, though,” Gideon adds from the foot of my bed, where he now sits.
“Move.” Atlas nudges Jasper out of the way to come to my other side. He’s been silent up to now. He holds my hand delicately and stares into my eyes.
“Malishka.” I smile at him and sigh.
“Are you really twenty-one? Honestly?” he asks.
I nod, and a huge smile crosses his face.
“I wish we knew that sooner, we could have gotten you out of there weeks ago,” he says with a frown.
“Why were you in high school?”
“How do you feel?”
“Are you alright?”
Tucker and the twins all talk over each other, but I keep my eyes glued to Atlas. I can see he needs me right now, and I want to be there for him. I want him to know how much it meant that he answered my call for help.
I take a deep breath and rasp out so quietly, it’s barely a whisper in the quiet room, “Atlas.” His eyes widen with surprise. “You came for me. ”
I start coughing and a straw is quickly brought to my lips, and I drink down as much as I can while I watch him. I can’t stop the tears of happiness that escape. He pulls my hand up and kisses the back of it. I’m surprised when I notice my fingers are heavily bandaged, but what surprises me most is the glossy sheen in his own eyes.
“I will always come for you, Malishka. I’m so sorry I didn’t get there sooner.”
I shake my head, wanting to tell him it’s my fault for not asking for it sooner, but my throat is sore and I don’t want to hurt it anymore. My whole body hurts and I realize now just how tired I am.
“Angel,” I hear Jasper say from beside Atlas. “I gave you the perfect nickname. You sound like an angel.”
I blush and roll my eyes at him. My voice is terrible and raspy.
“Kitten, your voice is beautiful. I didn’t know you could speak,” Dom says from my other side.
I shrug my shoulders and he gives me a sad smile.
“Move in with us!” Max suddenly yells, making me jump.
“Tact, man. Use it,” Tucker grumbles at him, and Jasper runs his hand over his face, clearly exasperated with his brother.
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t wait any longer! I mean, she’s not a minor, and there is no way we’re letting her go back to that hellhole of a house. I want her to know she has a home with us.” Max beams at me.
My sweet twin. He’s so thoughtful and kind. I hadn’t even had the chance to process what happened with my mother or where I would live.
Do I want to live with them? For so long, I’d imagined moving out on my own, getting out from under my family’s thumb. I never really thought about living with anyone else. But as they all stare at me expectantly for an answer, I know what I want to do. It’s clear I can’t take care of myself, and I’m not too vain to admit I need them. They said they would help me, but I wonder if they really mean that, knowing recovery might not be an easy road for me.
“Malishka?” I turn to look at Atlas. “We would all love it if you came to stay with us. For as long as you want. You need help to recover from what happened, and every one of us wants to be by your side as you heal.” I glance around quickly at the others and they all smile or nod at me, confirming their agreement with him. “Malishka, please stay with us. I need you.”
“ We need you,” Dom says from my other side.
I can’t imagine what they need me for, but a smile covers my face as I nod in agreement. Max cheers loudly as they all seem to sigh in relief.
I lift my chin again, looking at Jasper for another drink. He indulges me, and as my eyelids grow heavy. Dom smooths my hair down and says, “sleep, Kitten. We’ll be here when you wake up. We’re not going anywhere. You belong with us now.”