Chapter 10
SIENNA
We’re riding down a very dark and unkempt stretch of road, haven’t passed a house or another sign of civilization in a while. If we go any further, the night will just swallow us up. And that’s precisely what I want.
But then lights appear in the distance, and we pull into the parking lot of a large, three-story house that’s seen much better days. Music is blaring from inside, interlaced with laughter, loud voices, shouts, and screams.
Motorcycles, pickups, and other cars are parked in no particular order in front of the building. Little groups of very rough-looking men and women are standing here and there around the parking lot, and I’m sure there are many more of this type of clientele inside.
All conversations stop as we park and I climb off the bike. It’s a mild night, but the wind is icy and I’m so cold I’m shivering. Though I’m not sure if that’s just because of the wind.
He eyes the closest group of bikers, all of whom are ogling me very suggestively, then takes off his jacket and drapes it across my shoulders.
That just makes them laugh.
“What you got there, Unholy? A real-life princess?” one of the men yells out. “You sure she’ll like it here?”
“I’m sure you should mind your own business if you know what’s good for you, Poison,” Zane says in a tone that’s even darker and rougher than what he used to speak to Kurt.
“And keep your eyes off her,” Zane adds. “That goes for all of you.”
He wraps his arm around my shoulders and only then do I finally stop shivering. It’s not a loving embrace. Just a practical one—to show I’m under his protection and so he can lead me inside. He’s right to do it, because I actually might not be able to walk inside on my own.
“What is this place?” I whisper as we walk.
“It’s the only sort of motel I can stay at, being a fugitive and all. After I did what I did.”
There’s a silent for you tacked to the end of that sentence. Even without him saying it, I hear it loud and clear. I reduced him to this. And I’m suddenly not sure there’s anything I can do to ever make up for all he lost because of the lies I told.
“And they call you Unholy. That’s because of me too,” I say as he holds open the door and the heat, sounds and scent of too many people living rough hits me.
Puke, laced with the sweetness of alcohol and unwashed bodies. I’ve never been to a place like this, I never wanted to come to a place like this. But I walk in on steady legs, my head high, showing no fear. Because I belong here more than he does. And because I’m no longer scared to face anything.
“I earned that name many times over since I killed that priest,” he says and leads us to the side of the bar and towards a dark, rickety wooden stairwell.
The barroom didn’t exactly fall silent as we entered, but a lot of people are staring at me like they’d never seen a woman before.
“Let’s have a drink first,” I say. “Before going up to the room.”
Now he’s looking at me like it’s the first time he’s seen a woman. “You want that?”
I shrug. “It’s been a hell of a day.”
He shakes his head, but walks over to the bar to pick up a bottle of bourbon and a couple of shot glasses from the woman behind the bar. The ogling gets worse and more unpleasant as soon as he leaves my side.
“We can drink in the room,” he says when he returns. “I’d rather not have to kill anyone tonight for looking at you too much.”
I gasp, can’t help it. Because the way he said it made it sound like killing is something he does all the time now. And because I like knowing he’d kill for me still, kill to make sure everyone knew I’m his, even after everything I’d done.
He walks towards the staircase, but I just stand there, rooted to the spot while all that rushes through my mind.
“You coming?” he asks, looking at me over his shoulder, his brilliant ice-blue eyes glinting even in the dim light in here.
I jog a little to join him by the stairs. They creak so bad I’m afraid this whole building will collapse if I step too hard, so I’m very glad to know his room is on the first floor.
Not so glad to find it’s even filthier than the barroom downstairs. I smell all those nasty smells from downstairs, and I’m sure it’s because they’re ingrained into the walls and floorboards of this place. And especially into the thin mattress that’s more dusty black than the original white.
I think the smell of my own puke might be added to the other stenches if I try to lie down on it.
Or if I even look at it too long. I’m pretty sure that huge brown spot on it is actually blood.
But I won’t complain. And luckily there are a couple of wooden chairs in the room, one of which holds Zane’s stuff. I sit in the other one.
He sets the shot glasses on the windowsill and pours the bourbon.
“I think I owe you an explanation,” I say to his back.
He turns around like I’d just hit him with a whip or something.
“And you think that’s gonna solve anything?” he asks venomously. Maybe a little sadly, too.
He strides over, holding both the glasses in one hand and uses the other to dump his stuff from the other chair so he can sit down too.
He hands me one of the glasses and downs his in one go. All while I’m still stunned, trying to find something to say. But there’s nothing to say. He’s completely right.
“I hate it that I made you a killer,” I say. “I hate it every day.”
“Come on, don’t pretend you ever think of me.”
He returns to the windowsill and brings the bottle, this time not even bothering to pour. He just takes a long swig directly from it.
“I still think about you all the time,” I say. “Believe me or not, it’s the truth.”
He grins and it makes his eyes look very mean, not like anything I’ve ever seen them be.
“I came here to kill you,” he says. “What do you have to say about that?”
“What is there to say to a thing like that?” I drink my bourbon. It burns like pure liquid fire, but I feel a little more alive afterwards. Then again, maybe that’s because his eyes are telling me I might not be for very long.
“I’d deserve it,” I say, since he’s still waiting for my answer.
He shakes his head and drinks some more bourbon.
“You know I can’t and won’t trust anything you say ever again,” he says. “You’re very good at saying what people want to hear, aren’t you? Especially me.”
“I’m not very good at anything, never been,” I say and drink the rest of my shot. “Except lying. You’re right about that.”
And loving him. I was good at that too. Until I wasn’t and all was lost. So yeah, I wasn’t very good at that either.
“The priest never raped me,” I say. “It was my stepfather. He’d been raping me for years before I met you.”
I hold out my shot glass for a refill, but he’s just staring at me, something moving in his eyes the way water still moves under ice. I have to wiggle the glass in front of his face before he notices and pours me another drink.
“It got worse after I met you, because he was jealous,” I say. “I don’t even know why I said it was the priest. He’d tried it on with me, but I fought him off. And I was just so mad at him for even trying…”
“So your stepfather’s the one I should’ve killed,” he says quietly.
I drink, not even feeling the burning this time. “I never thought you’d kill anyone, Zane. If I had, I’d have told you not to. It wasn’t worth it.”
“I thought it was worth it,” he says. “I was doing it to protect you. To give you justice.”
He sounds like things are breaking inside his mind. Then again, maybe I’m just imagining that because his voice is so toneless that the undertone could be just about anything.
“I never wanted you to become a killer for me,” I say quietly, my voice too shaky to speak any louder because of all the emotion his words brought up. “I wasn’t worth it.”
“I couldn’t stand the thought of anyone hurting you,” he says in a quiet voice.
Murder is wrong. It’s terrible. But he did it for me and only me. And no one’s ever done much for me in my whole life. Not my mother when I told her what her new husband was doing to me. Not my own husband. Not anyone else.
He stands up suddenly and pulls his jacket off my shoulders so roughly the zipper scratches my arm.
“But I was right,” he says harshly. “This conversation was completely useless. It changes nothing.”
His eyes are suddenly brighter than when the sun reflects off ice and I’m afraid he means to make good on his intention of killing me now. I wouldn’t welcome it. Not because I don’t deserve his revenge, but because it would mean spending eternity without him. And I’d only just gotten him back.
“You make yourself comfortable,” he says with a sneer. “I’m going out.”
I want to ask him to take me with him. Or to stay. But he’s gone before I find my voice. And then I’m alone in this disgusting room, the noises—screams, laughter, voices, music, creaking and banging—coming from everywhere. I’d prefer silence. I’d prefer him here with me.
But I’d never yet gotten what I’d prefer, not when it mattered, anyway. So why should now be any different?