Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
H angman…
We took a break for some of the guys to jog down to the gates and let the girls out. Some taking the time to see the girls down to Lainey’s car in the gift shop parking lot.
I watched Lorelai on the camera pointed at the porch as she waved and saw them off, her expression changing, dropping into a sort of weariness as soon as Death and the girls were out of sight.
She stood on the porch, hugging herself in the pretty shawl, closing her eyes and listening, taking in slow and even breaths, and I couldn’t help but just study her.
She was a beautiful young woman.
I wondered if that was solely the reason she had been chosen or if there was something more to it.
Had it just been a stroke of bad luck on her part? Wrong place, wrong time? Or was there more than met the eye?
I only asked myself that because the club’s… services… had been employed and motherfucker, we didn’t come cheap. At all. You had to have some serious capital to not only tap us in the first place, but to pay so anonymously and in advance? That spoke to someone we’d done business with before – which is what we’d figured, to be honest.
The good thing about that was that it was a fairly short list for that kind of a thing – but it was a list that was growing.
We were making some choices about where to go from here when Syn had alerted that the girls were gathering up to go.
He’d told us all to piss, grab a drink, do whatever, while he and Fear had headed out to see their ladies off. I’d needed to tap a kidney, so I’d tossed my keys on the table and said to whoever go get the gate.
When I’d returned, it was to watch Lorelai linger on the porch… then finally go to bed.
Everyone was getting seated to continue the debate and puzzling shit out. We’d all stopped watching the cameras in front of us while we’d worked on the problem when sound started coming from Reaper’s tablet.
We all froze for a second and I put my eyes back on the screen.
Lorelai thrashed in her sleep, groaning, and pushing at invisible hands.
“Shit,” I muttered. I made to get up, but Syn held out a hand.
“Wait.” He watched intently with a deep curiosity. “Let it play out a minute.”
“You serious?” I demanded.
A sharp cry, and my eyes went back to the screen.
She was fighting like a wildcat, twisting up in the covers, curling in on herself as though to ward off blows, throwing her hands up in front of her face as a long, thin, broken wail escaped her.
The sound was soul crushing, heartbreaking in a way that I didn’t have the words to describe it.
“Yeah, fuck this,” Fear said, standing up.
I was already most of the way out the door when Death yelled, “Hey!” I turned back and caught the flying bundle of keys he lobbed in my direction, clapping them between my hands and shoulder checking the doorframe on the way out in my haste.
My shoulder screamed as I went down the steps, only half aware I had backup on my six as I moved.
I didn’t know how bad it could or would get, so as soon as I hit the outside, I broke into a lope down the street, pulling the humid night air into my lungs in ragged almost panicked breaths as I did everything to key my way through the gate and get through and up the steps.
I fumbled for a few heartbeats with the keys, looking for the right one in the dark, the adrenaline coursing through me as her screams reached my ears in real time, faint through the brick walls of the old house, and growing louder by the moment.
I got through the gate, tripping over the lip and catching myself hands to gravel. The heels of my hands stung, but I ignored them, pushing to my feet and going full tilt for the outside stairs up to my second-floor apartment. I burst through the door to the most heart-wrenching and feral sounds, as Lorelai fought the demons that only lived inside her head anymore, and I knew a thing or three about that.
I felt a lump form in my throat as I blew through the living room, into the hall and swept into my bedroom where she fought, kicked, screamed, and thrashed – all while in the grips of whatever night terror held her.
“Lorelai!” I called, and I dove onto the bed, pulling her body into my lap. She cried out, this pitiful, high-pitched, and frightened thing – her body coated in sweat, her long hair sticking to her temples and her face that was wet with tears and I wrapped arms around her holding her tight, to keep her from hurting herself.
Warmth and wet seeped into the fabric of my jeans as I realized that she pissed herself in her terror, but her silver eyes were open now, her chest heaving, expression panic stricken as she took in my face.
We hung in that moment for a heartbeat, then two, and her face just crumbled in the most heartbreaking way as she threw her arms around me and buried her face in the side of my neck and just sobbed.
“It’s okay, Sweetpea. I’ve got you, now. You’re okay.”
…but I knew nothing about this was okay. I looked up to Grim with Reaper just behind him in the hall looking in at us and with a determination that matched my brother’s name, I said to them, “Get the sheets, change the bed, I’m going to get her cleaned up. Get out of my way.”
I picked up the still sobbing woman in my arms and lifted, knees and back screaming at the unfamiliar distribution of weight in my arms as I walked her across the hall into the small bathroom, kicking the door shut behind us.
I set her ass on the edge of the sink and wrapped my arms around her tight, as she clung to me. I pressed her head to my shoulder and turned my own to press lips against her damp hair, the salt from her tears and sweat a light tang against my tongue as I flicked my tongue out to wet my dry lips.
“Easy baby, it’s me, it’s Hangman. I’ve got you, breathe. Breathe for me darlin’.”
I let her lose it. I let her cry and wail and let it all out soaking my tee with her snot and her tears and I wanted so fucking bad to take whatever it was, to draw out her pain and mold it between my hands into a knot the size of a baseball and shove it right down the motherfucker’s throat that’d caused it.
I wanted to watch him choke on it. I wanted to watch him burn with the fever of her abject terror and I wanted to kill him slow. I wanted to watch it choke off his air and I wanted to watch the panic in his eyes as it hit him that this was it – this was how it was going to end. Choking on her sadness, choking on her pain, suffocating on her fear.
She calmed, slowly, and clung to me with such a strength that I didn’t dare try to disentangle myself from her until she was good and goddamn ready. I didn’t want to set off another panic, but by the same token, I wanted to get her out of her sweat and urine-soaked things and into the shower.
I felt a fresh wave of hatred wash through me at the thought of this beautiful creature, a grown ass woman, wetting the bed like a fucking child in sheer terror.
A light knock fell at the door and she jumped. I tightened my hold around her with one arm and reached for the knob with the other. She shrank in on herself, using me as a meat shield, hiding herself against the front of my body as I cracked the door and twisted my head on my neck at an awkward angle to see who wanted what.
Reaper stood in the hall, a long length of satin and lace hanging limp in his hand.
“Thanks, bro,” I murmured, taking it from him. He nodded silently and I shut the door, and somehow, I think the small interruption broke the spell of fear and terror that Lorelai was under. She let me go, slowly, reluctantly, and shivered on the edge of the sink. No, shivered was the wrong word. She wasn’t cold. She trembled. She trembled so much and it jerked the hell out of my heart strings to watch it.
“I’m going to turn on the shower, and we’re going to get you cleaned up. Okay, Sweetpea?”
She nodded, a little too rapidly, and I nodded too, right along with her, but slower.
“I’m so sorry,” her voice cracked and she stuffed both of her hands over it to keep the keening and broken sobbing trying to escape trapped behind them.
“Shhh, ain’t a damn thing to be sorry about,” I soothed. “You just sit there a minute while I get things going.” She nodded, her hands still firmly pressed against her mouth and just trembled, shuddering with the horrors inside her head.
I’d been there. My horrors different from hers, sure – but no better and no worse. Trauma was trauma, and I couldn’t imagine hers. I didn’t want to. Any time my thoughts started to drift in that direction my blood pressure spiked and I saw red, and she didn’t need me to be angry right now. She didn’t need me to be murderous, or hot headed. No, she needed me to be the cool, calm, and collected one right now.
She needed permission to fall apart and permission was more than granted. I would clear the way for her. The faster she got through this, the better – but at the same time, everything in its own time. Everything was on her time now. That was just how it needed to be.
I got the shower going, and even though it was small and I was a big bastard taking up my half and the middle of the room, I wasn’t going to leave until she told me it was okay.
When the water was warm enough, and the small space started to fill with steam I turned back to her.
Her hands were pressed to the tops of her thighs, her nails digging into the skin which was dimpled at all five of the points of her fingers. It was an improvement over her holding in her whimpering sobs, but still. I gently covered her hands with mine and worked my fingertips under the palms of her hands. She gripped my hands back and her silvery eyes met mine.
“Can you stand up for me, baby?” I asked her gently and she swallowed hard and nodded, slipping off the edge of the counter and rocking against me. I put my arms around her and she stood stiff for a moment before leaning into me and wrapping her arms around my waist.
“Come on,” I turned her gently in the direction of the shower and thrust her into it carefully. She made a small noise of protest at being shoved into the shower stall with her pajamas still on, but I didn’t think she would be good with getting naked just yet.
I stepped in with her, fully clothed and didn’t give a rat’s ass about getting my clothes wet.
“You’re getting wet!” she tried to protest and I captured her face gently between my hands and turned it up to face me.
“I don’t care,” I said gruffly. “This is about you.”
She froze and stared up at me, searching my eyes, my face, and whatever she saw there had her stiff posture easing.
“You trust me, Sweetpea?” I asked her, swallowing hard and she nodded, still in the grasp of my hands.
“Okay,” I cleared my throat. “I’m here for whatever you need.” I let her go and she immediately tucked herself against me, her arms going around my waist as she broke down all over again against me.
I held her tight, kissed the top of her head a few times absently, and after a bit, I spoke low and careful, murmuring everything I planned to do before I did it, pausing to let her decide if that was okay or not.
I started slow by washing her hair for her, giving her murmured instructions when to tip her head back into the spray as I rinsed it for her.
When she was quiet, and relaxed, I asked if it was okay to push the thin spaghetti straps of her top off her shoulders. She nodded and I helped her slide her arms free. She pushed everything down over her hips and let it splat to the shower floor but was quick to wrap her arms around her chest, hiding herself from me.
Not that I was focused on her beautiful body – I wouldn’t let myself get the least bit distracted by it. Not what she needed. Right now, she needed care and careful attention.
I washed her clean, carefully running my hands over her shoulders and arms to start with. Over her back as she rested her head against my shoulder and stared vacantly, disappearing into her own mind.
I let her take refuge in whatever corner she found that she was comfortable in, and only stopped when another knock fell at the door and she yipped, clinging to me. I turned her, blocking her from view with my broad back and called out, “Yeah?”
The door opened, and Grim stuck his head in.
“Bed’s clean, sheets are running in the laundry. Take your time, bro.”
I nodded and said, “Thanks. Be out in a minute.”
“K,” he shut the door and I turned to face Lorelai who was looking up at me in what could only be described as a daze.
“I couldn’t move,” she said and her voice shook. “I tried, and no matter how hard I told my body to kick, bite, scratch, and scream – I couldn’t move. ”
“Shh, it’s okay,” I whispered, barely audible above the showerhead. “You’re safe now. You’re safe here, with me. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”
She stared up at me, her hair slicked back from her face which was drawn and pinched, pale with dark circles forming under the red rimming her bloodshot eyes… and for whatever reason the red seemed to make the silver of them even more luminous. Her bright eyes glowed and I saw a trust in them, an almost peace in their depths when they looked at me and damn, did it do something to me.
No, it didn’t make me pop wood or anything so crass in the moment – what it did was make me feel like a man. Like I was her big damn hero – and I couldn’t explain that one. I was nobody’s hero.
I swallowed hard and she shivered slightly as cooler air from out in the rest of the bathroom swept into the shower stall.
“I’m going to turn off the water and get you a towel. You wait right there for just one second.”
“Okay,” she whimpered softly, and I took my hands from her, reaching behind her and turning off the water.
“You doing okay?” I asked her, tracing a drowned wisp of her long hair off of her forehead and tucking it behind her ear.
She nodded and said, “I think I’m embarrassed more than anything now.”
“Mm-mm,” I grunted, shaking my head. I opened up the shower door and reached for one of the towels on the bar. “That’s one thing you don’t get to be.”
“What? Embarrassed?” she asked, flushing.
“Exactly. You can be a lot of things right now, in this moment, but embarrassed is the absolute bottom of the fucking barrel, Sweetpea. You got me?”
She nodded, and I wrapped the towel I’d retrieved around her shoulders, rubbing up and down her arms briskly over the cloth.
We got her dried off and the nightgown slipped over her head and I stood back from her as she wound her long hair up into the towel to keep it from dripping onto the peach pastel gown any more than it already had in a few spots.
“You trust me?” I asked her again and she nodded. “You remember Grim?” I asked opening up the bathroom door. Grim pushed off the wall beside my bedroom door on the other side. Lorelai nodded, mute.
“Go with him, honey. Let him tuck you in. I’ll be right there just as soon as I get out of these wet things.”
She looked apprehensively from me to him and I could see the struggle was real on her pretty face. She trusted me, but she didn’t trust anybody else right now.
“Trust me,” I whispered and she reluctantly took a step in the direction of the doorway.
Grim stood sideways in the hall, blocking the view down to the living room and holding out his hand for her to pass into his care without actually touching her. I could appreciate that. He gave me a nod and I him, and I closed the door again once she passed into the yawning chasm of my darkened bedroom doorway across the hall.
I turned to face myself in the mirror and took several deep breaths as the rage build like a bubble in lava, growing, growing, but I couldn’t let it burst. I gripped the edges of the sink counter until the material groaned under the rage in my grip and I looked back up into my own reflection. I wanted to punch the mirror. I wanted to watch all that silvered glass spider, crack, and fall into the sink in ruin. I just wanted to punch and keep punching until my knuckles were a bloody ruin and the pain came around to help me focus… but I couldn’t do that to her. I couldn’t make a bunch of terrifying racket in here and wind her up when I’d only just gotten her to wind down.
I got my shit together, got out of my wet clothes and boots, and wrapped one of the bath sheets around my waist. Lorelai was only going to be good for so long, I wanted to try and head any more panic off at the pass. She was in the absolute throes of a nasty PTSD loop or episode and I saw that for what it was. So did Grim, and Reaper, I was sure of it – but having Reaper around her felt a little like flying too close to the fucking sun.
I went out into the hall and glanced toward the living room to see more than just Reap gathered there. Grim’s voice, soft and even was coming from my room. Lorelai’s softer in answer, still trembling but stronger.
I slipped through the door and shut it behind me, turning to see Lorelai perched on the edge of the freshly made bed, Grim giving her some space, arms crossed over his chest.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“Seeing if Lorelai here would let Reap give her some better living through chemistry.”
I looked from Lorelai to Grim and back again.
“And what do you think, Sweetpea?” I asked her softly.
“I don’t know if I want to take any drugs,” she answered quietly and sounded unhappy.
I could see her point. A drug is what’d brought her here in the first place.
“It’ll help,” I hedged, to gauge her reaction.
She searched my face and I searched hers.
“What is it?” she asked, suspiciously, but she was still looking at me and her suspicion wasn’t for me. No, she simply looked worried, the emotion swimming just behind her eyes.
“A Xanax, or Ativan. Not really sure what he’s got on him to be honest, but he always has something.”
I nodded to her, I honestly thought it would be best or I wouldn’t have, but she was a mess. A nervous wreck. A beautiful disaster of a pile up of emotions she couldn’t even begin to sort through without help… and I could recognize that.
How has it only been like two days and you’re in love with her already? I asked myself… but it was true. It had to be true, otherwise why did this ripping, tearing, burning ache take up residence in my chest at the mere thought of letting her go? Which I knew I had to… but what I definitely hadn’t seen coming out of left field was how much it hurt to just even think about doing it.
“You think I should?” she asked me softly. I sat down on the bed beside her and picked up her delicate hand in mine, giving it a light squeeze.
“I think it would be best if you could just turn it off for a little while. Get some actual rest and give yourself a night to rally. I wouldn’t suggest it if I thought it was unsafe, or if I couldn’t be here for you, but I think you need it, Sweetpea.”
She looked a little defeated, and certainly extremely anxious.
“I’ll go get a glass of water,” Grim said quietly and he went out of the room.
“Reap is the kind of guy that hands out drugs himself in person,” I warned her. “You think you’re up to that?”
“Is he the one that I woke up to?” she asked softly.
I nodded, “He’s pretty sorry about that,” I lied, because honestly, I didn’t know if Reaper was capable of being sorry for something like that. The dude was honestly fucking weird beyond anything I’ve ever encountered. I wasn’t sure if he was a psychopath or what – but he sure as fuck wasn’t normal and he sure as fuck didn’t feel like a regular guy did. At least, I didn’t think so.
She nodded and held my hand a little tighter.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I promised and she nodded again, a little quicker this time, relief flitting across her fair face.
Grim came back with a glass of water and Reaper in tow. The fuckin’ weirdo kneeled down in front of Lorelai and unscrewed the cap on this pill bottle keychain thing and shook a tiny pill out onto his palm.
“You aren’t allergic to any medication that you know of, are you?” Grim asked and Lorelai shook her head.
Reaper presented her with the little pill and Lorelai took it, putting it in the center of her tongue. Reap took the water glass from Grim and passed it to Lore like this was some kind of fucking ritual or something and she took it, looking a bit dubious and drank most of the contents down.
“There you go,” I said and she handed the glass back to Reap.
“C’mon,” Grim said and put a hand on Reaper’s shoulder who stood up.
Reaper looked at Lorelai for a long moment before turning and following Grim out. They left the door open.
“Let’s get you tucked in, hm?” I said quietly.
“How long until it’s supposed to work?” she asked and her tone was anxious again.
“Not long,” I said slipping the towel off her head, her damp locks spilling around her face.
“I’m scared,” she confessed.
“I know, baby,” I breathed. “But you’re a brave girl. You’ve already been through too much, and you’re still here and you’re still fighting. I promise, it will be okay.”
She swallowed hard and nodded and I got up, holding my hand down to her. She stood and I pulled back the blankets and sheets. She got into bed and I tucked her in.
“Stay with me?” she begged and I nodded.
“Just let me put something more than a towel on,” I murmured.
“Oh!” she said, startled by the revelation and letting my hand go. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be,” I told her.
I went to the chest of drawers and pulled on a pair of shorts up under the towel. I let the bath sheet go and went back over, scooting into the bed beside her, and settling down with her. She cuddled into my side as before and laid her head on my shoulder and without thinking about it, I kissed her forehead. It just felt so natural.
I stroked up and down her arm over the blankets and she sighed and settled.
I thought she was asleep pretty soon after, but then she began to speak.
She remembered everything.
She told me everything.
As I lay there with her in the close dark, she bared her soul to the bone, laying every last bit of the worst thing ever done to her bare to gleam wetly with blood, sweat, and tears in the moonlight coming through the slats of the blinds.
I let her speak. Held space for her trauma and the horror that she’d suffered, and I let her fill that space to overflowing with her thoughts and her feelings.
If she could live through it, the very least I could do was stand sentinel as she gave witness to her experience.
When she’d been quiet for a long time, I pulled my lips from the top of her hair and whispered, “Rest, darlin’. I’m not going anywhere.”
I didn’t get an answer but for the deep and even breathing that filled the night.
I waited until I was certain she was out, and carefully worked my way out from beneath her.
I found a fair bit of the club in my living room waiting. Synister in my recliner, Grim and Reaper on the couch with Fear and Death. Haint sat at my kitchen counter and Shade next to him. Corvus was leaned against the mantle looking at me, his hands buried in his pockets.
I went to the kitchen sink and threw up. Spitting the acid from my mouth into the garbage disposal and running the tap.
I rinsed my mouth directly from the stream and spit a few more times, Torment sighing at my kitchen table and getting up.
“I’m fine,” I said, voice gravelly from the recent purge.
“Yeah, right.” He said, adding; “Move your big ass out the way, I’ll fix you something.”
“I’m definitely not fucking hungry,” I said and he shook his head.
“Not food, you dumbass. Something that’ll settle your stomach.” He got my whiskey out of the freezer and poured a couple fingers, sliding the glass down the counter in my direction. I caught it and downed it.
“How much did you hear?” I asked quietly.
“Hard to make most of it out, but enough,” Corvus said.
I looked over at Syn who had that blank, perfectly stoic mask of his in place.
“We’re going to go ahead with the plan,” he said quietly, evenly, and I nodded.
The plan we’d devised involved the good doctor who had seen her falsifying some hospital records. We were going to sneak Lorelai in and as far as the paperwork was concerned, she’d been at the hospital the whole time as a misplaced Jane Doe. She needed treatment. She needed to go home… and I needed to find who did this and make them pay. Sure as fuck couldn’t trust the cops to do their fucking job.
“I don’t think there’s honestly anything more that needs to be fucking said,” Synister declared, pushing to his feet. The rest of the boys followed suit.
“Best get back in there before she wakes up howling again,” Torment said and Grim snorted.
“That was a Reaper sized dose that just went into her slender frame,” Grim said. “She should be out until at least mid-morning.”
I nodded, grateful for the heads up.
“Thanks, brothers,” I said.
“Don’t mention it,” Synister declared and I knew that look. We all did. He was pissed past throwing one of his tantrums. He was pissed beyond anything, and I knew it had everything to do with him picturing Madisyn when she’d been at her most vulnerable, back shortly after they’d started hooking up.
“Night,” I muttered and held the door as they all filed past.
“Meeting fucking adjourned, I guess,” Corvus said as he went by.
“Yeah,” I muttered.
We were all on the same page, and there wasn’t anything about us that’d gone soft in the face of my Sweetpea’s pain. No, we were hard as fucking diamond on the issue and I think all of us were on the same page when it came to what needed to happen next.