Chapter 6
Emit
Harley cut me, left me lying on the tiles, bleeding from the eight-inch gash across my chest, and stole my truck to get away from me. Good girl . It’s what I deserve for being a selfish monster, taking what I wanted, where I wanted, how I wanted. Sure, I might have made her cum a few times, but that doesn’t make up for my behavior…although I’m not sure I would have done anything different except offer her water sooner.
Hmmm.
My head swims when I grab the quartz kitchen countertop and haul myself up, breathing deeply a few times until my blood pressure evens out, and then I begin the painful process of patching myself up. I could go to the hospital and have a professional do it so I won’t be left with a gnarly scar, but I won’t. And not only because the staff would have questions and end up calling the police on my behalf, leading to my own arrest once they catch wind of what I did to sweet little Harley. I won’t call because I don’t want her getting into trouble for defending herself, knowing my old colleagues won’t go easy on her after attacking a former police officer, even if, again, I deserved it.
As I clean up the evidence of our crimes, I wonder if I should go after Harley, beg her to forgive me and come home willingly— because this is her home if she wants it. And if she doesn’t, could I romance her? Take her out on dates? See if she’ll learn to trust me? Choose me?
Or should I leave her alone and let her live her life searching for Mr. Right? Probably.
When I lay down that night, rolling in the smell of Harley on my sheets, breathing her deep into my lungs while I fuck my hand, I think about her young pussy stuffed with my cum, my baby growing in her belly if she doesn’t think to get the emergency contraceptive in time—if she can even afford it. And if she does get pregnant…with her desire to have a loving family, I know she’ll keep it.
If that happens, if I sit on my ass instead of going after the woman who is meant to be mine, what happens if she meets the sweet gentleman she’s always dreamed about? What if she lets him kiss and caress her belly? Rub lotion all over her body and massage her adorable feet at the end of a long day? Plant his inferior seed deep inside her while she’s growing my child? Hold her hand at her prenatal appointments and watch her pussy stretch wide when she gives birth? What if she dares let another man raise our baby as if they are his, then allows him to father the next one?
I sit up fast in my bed, tearing my sheets apart with my bare hands at the idea of some other man usurping my role and sole purpose in life—to be the one and only man Harley will ever need. I will never let that happen . Not ever. There’s no letting her go. I took her once, and I’ll take her again. I’ll romance her from the comfort of our home until she gives in.
At this time of night, this far from the city, waiting for the expensive Uber is maddening, but it gives me time to plan what I will say and how I will take her if she resists me. More than likely, she went to her brother’s house. It’s easy enough to find his address online, and I laugh at the fact that he ended up in the neighborhood my realtor tried to sell me on.
The drive is silent, the Uber driver flicking his eyes nervously to me in the rear view mirror every few minutes while I stew, my blood pounding faster when I spot my truck parked on Luther’s street. The driver speeds away the moment my boots hit the ground. Good. Fewer witnesses.
It’s World War III when I make it to the front door, kids screaming on the other side, an adult shouting at them to shut the fuck up and fucking go to bed already . Marsha. With her personality, I had an inkling she wouldn’t be a great mother, but I didn’t know she’d be this horrible. The grudge I’ve held against Luther for the last seven years shatters. I ought to thank the scumbag for doing me a favor by taking the nasty bitch off my hands.
The idiots didn’t bother locking the front door, and I step right in without knocking—not that they would have heard me over the chaos anyway. The place is a dump, with a sour stench in the air, hoarded trash pushed into the corners of the living room instead of being bagged up and tossed out.
Marsha, who looks like she’s aged twenty years, gasps as the other two adults, a baby, and three youngins look up as soon as I slam the door closed behind me, nearly all of them in tears. The sight of Harley soothing an infant who looks just like her in her arms nearly bowls me over with the need to take her down to the carpet and rut her, breed her right then and there.
“Holy shit! Hi, Emit!” Marsha skips toward me with bright green eyes. She tries to throw her arms over my shoulders, and I shove her away where she lands on the couch.
I rip my shirt and bandage off. “Harley! I’ll be the man you want—you need! I don’t care that you almost stabbed me. I’ll let you carve me up anywhere you want as many times as it takes for you to get even and forgive me.” I pound my chest until the wound reopens, spilling more blood to show her how serious I am. “I promise, I’ll do anything, baby, anything—”
“Emit, thank god!” My woman comes tearing across the living room, looking at me like I’m her savior. She almost trips over a cracked bin containing a measly number of faded plastic builder blocks, the baby sucking on his thumb in her arms. If she’s this relieved to see me, of all people, not anywhere close to being done with my rehearsed apology, what must these people have done to her?
“Oh, baby, what happened?” I catch her in my arms, her forehead buried in my chest right over the middle of the wound, making me hiss at the searing pain.
“Take me home—take all of us, please!” Harley resists when I grab her biceps and try to pull her away to look at her face. She’s even more haggard than when she left my house, a bright red impression of a hand marring her left cheek.
I wipe away the smear of my fresh blood on her forehead. “Did someone slap you?” I gently cup her jaw and don’t miss her wince. That wince has me ready to commit murder.
She nods. “Look at him!” She turns the baby so I can see him better, dandruff flakes and something nasty crusted in his light brown hair. When’s the last time he had a bath?
Marsha recovers and tries to get my attention as my eyes dart to the two pre-school-age boys, then to an older girl, who looks to be five or six years old, sitting on the bottom step of the staircase. Have any of the children had a bath recently? The girl is crying her precious little heart out in a nightgown too small for her. The material is worn thin and so faded that I can’t make out the cartoon character on the front. My chest cracks at the sight of her big brown eyes full of misery, silently begging for help, a slap marring her cheek as well.
Harley clutches my arm. “I told them I was calling CPS, and Marsha attacked me!”
“What the fuck?” I roar, guiding Harley behind me, staring at Luther slumped in his recliner.
Saying he let himself go was a kindness he doesn’t deserve. He’s repulsive, and it has nothing to do with his waistline. His hair is patchy and unwashed on his head, deep purple bags sagging below bloodshot eyes while he does absolutely nothing to console his kids or protect his wife from the man who barged in and shoved her.
Luther merely grunts, looking away, ashamed or embarrassed, or both.
Marsha, fed up with not being the center of attention, is back on her bullshit when she dances right up to me. “Aside from all the icky blood, you look amazing, Emit!” She darts in to latch her arms around my waist before I can stop her, burying her face in my chest, nuzzling me as Harley did.
My woman snarls something behind me while I grip Marsha’s arms, pulling her off me, no doubt bruising the shit out of her. I certainly hope so.
“I can’t believe it’s been so long since we were together. Did you miss me as much as I missed you?” Marsha purrs the question, running her hands up and down my back to caress my bare skin while I try not to throw up.
I recoil from the scent of her perfume, from her touch that feels like an army of spiders crawling up my spine. “Jesus Christ, get the fuck off of me.” I finally wrench her arms hard enough to make her cry out, her nails dragging across and breaking my skin. The only nails I want raking down my back are Harley’s as I make her cum and scream for Daddy.
“Oh, you. Always the jokester.” Marsha tries to laugh off the pain and slaps the back of her hand against my lower abs as if we’re just horsing around while her kids cry at various volumes.
I think I’ll start with killing her first—the only one in this hell hole who looks somewhat cared for, her tight tank top and short tennis skirt the newest, cleanest things in this house.
“Don’t touch me,” I growl, and the first spark of apprehension ripples across Marsha’s face as she quickly skitters back. “You,” I say, pointing a finger at Luther. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” I sweep my arms around the living room and to his sons, who inch nervously around their mother and me toward their Aunt Harley, taking refuge in her presence.
Luther has the audacity to look like I’ve slapped him . As if he doesn’t see anything wrong. It takes him a few tries to push up out of his recliner. “Go fuck yourself, Emit. Coming in here, judging me.” He tugs up the stretched-out waistband of his sweatpants, a dark barbecue stain next to a frayed hole near his crotch. “You don’t know the first thing about what it’s like having kids, so you can take your self-righteous bullshit and shove it up your ass!”
I’m sure my eyes bug out when I ask, “Then why did you have so many?”
Luther cuts an accusatory glower at his wife. “Fucking Marsha. She stopped taking her birth control because it makes her gain weight.” He says sarcastically, “And we can’t have that, can we?”
I laugh at how supremely stupid they are. “And pregnancy doesn’t?”
Marsha turns smug. “Nope! Good genes.” She slides her hands up and down her trim waist, vain and delusional enough to believe I could possibly be tempted by her.
“So why not get a vasectomy?”
“I wish I had,” Luther shouts, shooting a venomous glare at the girl on the steps, who flinches from her father’s bitterness.
I have seen and heard enough. Entertained their callous insanity long enough. This ends now.
I stomp toward Luther, shove him back in his seat, and lean down to get right in his face. “You hit the jackpot having these kids, and you don’t even know how lucky you are. A sorry excuse for a man, just like your father. But don’t worry, I’ll take them off your hands and show them how a real dad is supposed to treat them.” I drop my voice lower and smirk, trying to get a rise out of him. “And at night, when your little sister is sleeping, I’ll slip into her bed and show her how a good Daddy is supposed to fuck her, too.”
Luther doesn’t react other than to drop his shoulders, a smile tugging up the corner of his chapped lips. The deadbeat is relieved at the idea of someone taking his kids, and it has me seeing red. So I smash his nose with my fist, sending him rocking back in his chair with a nasal howl.
“And you,” I growl, pointing at Marsha, who had been creeping toward the back of the house, probably intending to leave, abandoning her children to whatever fate she thinks might await them at my hands. I smile at her.
Marsha slowly smiles as well, now sauntering closer on bare, manicured feet, mistaking mine as a friendly or even seductive smile, not giving a single shit about her injured husband.
“I’m going to make your life a living hell the same way you did to these kids.” Her smile drops, and I motion to the girl on the stairs. “Come here,” I say softly.
The girl jumps up, rushing toward me with absolutely no survival instinct, just like Harley, letting a man she doesn’t know, covered in blood, sweep her tiny frame up in one arm. Either that or her life has been so awful, her heart so neglected and abused, that anything is better than living with her parents.
“What’s your name, princess?”
“Marsha Junior,” she says unhappily. Her mom really is a piece of work.
“Screw that. What do you want your name to be?”
Without hesitating, she says, “Princess.”
I crack my first genuine smile of the evening. “You want to come live with me and your Aunt Harley, Princess?”
She hugs me tight around my neck, and I take that as a resounding yes .
Harley, until now, had been quietly observing us, and something hot flashes in her eyes as I get closer. She turns when I lower my hand to her back and gently but firmly hustle her and the boys, who have their skinny arms wrapped around her thighs, out the door ahead of me with zero discussion.
“Emit!” Marsha shrieks from behind, grabbing the waistband of my jeans to stop me, her pitifully deficient maternal instincts finally kicking in. She swings in front, crocodile tears in her eyes. “Thank you!” Then she hugs me tight after slipping her arms between her daughter and me, excluding Princess from the hug.
“What the hell are you thanking me for?” I try to peel her off, finding Harley over her shoulder, loading the kids into a sparkling white SUV in the driveway. She must have stolen their car keys. She’s good at that.
“Thank you for rescuing me. I know you didn’t mean it—what you said back there. That it was all for show so Luther wouldn’t try to stop us.”
“Stop us from what?” I snap.
Marsha bats her lashes. “Stop us from being together again, just like we were always meant to be.” Princess’s chin quivers, fresh tears in her eyes when her mother says excitedly, “Harley can take the brats, and then you and I can start fresh without all this baggage.” She rolls up on her tiptoes to kiss me.
I grab her face before she can plant her nasty lips on mine and shove her away hard enough to snap her neck. “Goddamn, traitorous skank.”
Harley spins on her heels, screeching, “Why don’t the kids have car seats?” And then she hauls ass across the lawn like an enraged mama bear, grabs Marsha’s hair with both fists, and rips her backward, taking her down to the ground.
The little psycho princess in my arms laughs. Laughs! This family is so deranged, they make me look sane.
Marsha is screaming, twisting around in the grass, fighting back. And my woman is losing. Too exhausted, too spent to keep the upper hand. If I wasn’t furious before, I am now when Marsha rolls on top of Harley and slaps her again. I set Princess down, ready to jump in, when the girl lets out a battle cry and wraps her thin arms around her mom’s neck, choking Marsha hard enough to make her lips turn blue.
“Holy shit! Get her, girl.” I laugh, then remember I’m supposed to be the responsible adult here and should probably intercept instead of encouraging her. I give Princess another thirty seconds, letting her work out her rage on her abusive mother while I scoop Harley up to help her onto her feet.
I ease Princess away, pushing her gently toward the SUV. “I can take it from here. Go look after your brothers.” And then I lift Marsha up and simply toss her a few feet away toward the house, pleased to see she’s as filthy now as her kids.
All the while, Luther has been standing quietly in the open doorway with one hand over his nose. He doesn’t go to Marsha. Doesn’t go to his little sister. Doesn’t go to his kids that we’re about to kidnap. Doesn’t try to stop me. Doesn’t care about the neighbors who step out on their porches due to the disturbance, their phones either held up to record us or pressed to their ears. He simply watches me, heaving out a big sigh when we hear sirens in the distance.
Then it’s just a waiting game as I lean against the SUV with Harley tucked under one arm with Aiden, Princess under the other, and the boys hanging on to us. All these souls depend on me to be a better man, and I realize they’re all the one . Not just Harley but the whole family. They’re mine.
Marsha pitches toward the first cop cruiser that pulls up, throwing herself at the officer who is even taller than me and looks like he eats iron for breakfast. I smile when I recognize my old colleague, Dominic, who has his own gaggle of kids. His spouse, Taylor, is a social worker with a fierce passion for protecting the most vulnerable members of our population, and I’m sure they won’t be too far behind him. Marsha’s in for a world of hurt.
I wave to Dominic, and he fobs off Marsha to the next officer who pulls up. She looks pissed to be brushed off until she spots his replacement, Shaun. He’s a younger playboy-looking man who’s got a smile for everyone—until you touch him, which Marsha just did by grabbing his uniform in a misguided attempt to come off as a damsel-in-distress. Shaun moonlights for me, and one nod is all it takes for him to slam her against his cruiser, cuffing her hands behind her back. This just gets better and better.
And oooh boy, Luther recognizes them as well, collapsing on his ass on the lawn, hanging his head between his knees. Dominic’s face transforms into cold fury when he looks each child up and down, then follows my nod toward Luther. Luther doesn’t resist when Dominic roughly drags him up and across the lawn while Marsha screams for help from the back of Shaun’s cruiser. What a wonderful night this turned out to be.