Violent Skies (Monroe Motors #1)

1

Idon’t believe in ghosts.

“You aren’t real.” My voice shakes.

But he’s standing at the end of our bed as the lightning crashes outside my window. I count under my breath, waiting in the dark for the next flash, and inhale sharply as his face appears.

“You’re dead,” I whisper over the sound of rain and thunder.

He’s dead.

Tears escape, but I can’t move. It’s like I’m frozen to the mattress, subjected to the torture of seeing him over and over.

Flash.

Koa’s face is tight and angry, his jaw clenched, and his eyes full of a harshness I’ve never seen before. “You’re dead,” I repeat as the thunder booms.

I curl my feet up under the quilt his mother made us for our wedding and hug my knees to my chest. “You left me,” I whisper as the lightning flashes.

I’d give anything to have you back. “You’re sleep-deprived, Cress,” I grumble to myself and wait for the room to turn white again. The storm outside is getting worse.

“Leave me alone.” I snap, his form still frozen in time.

I close my eyes, wrapping my hand around the cross that hangs from my neck. But Koa is there too, his soft smile, paired with his warm Samoan features and his caramel eyes. He’s mocking me. I swallow the sadness and pray that when I open them, he’ll be gone. It’s just a nightmare.

The thunder booms, and I count again, waiting for the lightning.

When I open my eyes, he’s gone.

Something crashes in the kitchen, and I tense, dread coursing through my veins as I angle my body toward the door.

But the darkness is all eclipsing, and the thin flash of lightning that touches the hallway walls does nothing to quell the fear that stirs.

It’s when the glass shatters that I’m on my feet, reaching under my bed for the hammer that I keep tucked close to the nightstand.

I roll it into my palm and tug my cardigan closed as I creep over the old carpet and through the dark into the hallway. I know better than to call out into the void without knowing what’s waiting for me.

Narrowing my eyes, I wait for the lightning so I can survey the guest room door and bathroom at the other end of the hall before slinking out against the wall.

I avoid the pictures hanging and creep to the archway that leads to the living room.

Its wide windows are covered in heavy curtains, blocking most of the light provided to me.

My hand shakes around the handle as I angle my head around the corner just trying to source the sound of the breaking glass.

My soft steps are muffled by thunder roaring through the roof.

Something heavy crosses the old wooden flooring in the kitchen, the creaking sound echoing out into the dark house.

I freeze, my heart in my throat as I slip back toward the couch with my eyes on the room around me.

The lightning flashes, and a body twice my size crosses through the kitchen.

Tears sting at my eyes as the panic swells.

My keys are in my purse… on the kitchen table.

I drop to my knees gently, avoiding the spots on the floor behind the couch that I know will give me away.

Holding my breath, I start to crawl, the pendant bouncing free of my tank top and swinging loosely around as I move as quietly as I can.

“She’s gotta be here somewhere,” a voice comes from the hallway, gruff and low but clear over the storm.

More glass crashes, and around the edge of the couch, through the darkness, I watch as the framed photos from our wedding crash and hit the floor, shattering into pieces and casting the light with the most heartbreaking glimmer.

“Check the garage, make sure she didn’t slip out…

” footsteps move around me, and I pause, holding my spot and waiting for them to distance themselves from me.

Lightning snaps out and illuminates the kitchen to show two burly bodies throwing drawers from their places beneath the counter.

My belongings explode to the floor and dance along the linoleum as they tear my home apart.

What do they want? I wait until they turn their backs on me and crawl to the cover of the love seat.

I have nothing, I barely make enough to keep this place…

the only valuable possession within the walls was Koa, and he’s gone now.

What would he do? I press my forehead against the scratchy tan fabric to focus.

“She’s not in there, but, man, the car…”

Don’t touch that. Agony ripples through me. That’s his.

A sharp pain rips through my scalp, and I’m yanked off the floor, my feet flailing on the hardwood as my hand swings backward with the hammer as hard as I can. I connect with muscle, hard, and I know I’ve done some damage because I’m thrown across the room into the wall.

I hit the drywall with bruising force, and the air rushes from my lungs, but there’s no time to catch my breath. I scurry across the living room floor around the coffee table toward the kitchen. I just need to get outside.

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?

” A fat hand wraps around my ankle and yanks harshly.

I feel it in my hip, and I cry out. My skin scrapes against the wood as I claw with my free hand, but his strength wins out, and he flips me onto my back.

I kick out with my other foot and catch him square in the jaw, but his grip doesn’t falter.

“You fuckin—” He spits out a wad of blood as the living room flashes white.

I don’t wait for him to recover. I use what strength I have on my back to swing the hammer wildly for a second time. This time, I make contact with his cheek, and I hear the crack as he falls back away from me with a bellowing wail.

The second body appears in the entryway as I dart off my feet to beat him to the entrance of the kitchen. I just have to make it to the back door. Once outside, run, scream.

I remember the conversation like it was yesterday, “It’s a better neighbourhood, Cress.

You’ll be safer here.” Turns out a nice house, on a nice street, means shit, Koa, I think as I scramble to gain my balance.

Unfortunately for these idiots, once a street kid, always a street kid.

I’m a hair faster and slide across the kitchen floor through the mess, only to be stopped dead in my tracks.

“No way out.” The third man blocks the back door with a smile on his face.

Boots crunch through glass behind me, and my entire body becomes paralyzed. I’m caught.

“There’s nothing here,” I say, trying to control the shake in my voice. “I’m an underpaid ER nurse…”

“The whiny ones are the worst,” the man at the door huffs as a commotion happens from the living room.

“We aren’t here for the money,” the one behind me barks, and I spin to look at him. “That’s someone else's job.”

Dread surges violently through my bloodstream.

Lightning flickers across the night sky and the bright glint of a knife flashes beneath my socked foot.

I throw the hammer as hard as I can, and it hurtles across the kitchen at the man as I snap down and wrap my hand around the handle of the knife.

The other rushes me from behind, almost catching my hair, but I feel his fingers graze my skin as I thrust forward and slide the blade through his shoulder.

He hollers, and I’m yanked back by the hair with so much force that it pulls at the scalp and burns so brightly that my eyes water.

“She fucking stabbed me!”

“I wouldn’t—” I yell, the nurse in me taking control. But he tugs on the handle and rips the knife free. The blood spills from him instantly without the plug. He starts to panic, his stupidly large body swaying sideways as he becomes dizzy.

“You should let me help him,” I hiss through my teeth. “He’s got about six minutes…” another hard yank, “before that becomes a fatal problem.”

“Enough,” he snaps and shoves me forward onto my knees before his boot finds my ribcage.

I’m tossed to the side, and I can feel the sharp pain of separation as my ribs crack.

The next breath I take feels like there's a raging fire in my lungs, but my palms find the ground.

The stinging spreads across them as the glass bites into the skin, but I get myself back to my feet as he moves around to help his friend.

“In three weeks, someone is going to come knocking, and you’re going to have the five hundred thousand in a duffle, ready for them.” He stares at me, paralyzed in pain and confusion. “Do you understand?”

“I don’t have that kind of money,” I spit out.

“Not my problem,” he clips.

The third man stumbles into the kitchen, his face dripping with blood and murder clenched tightly in his fist. “What are you waiting for? Kill her,” he groans, shoving past them.

“We were told to leave her alive.” He’s halted in his heavy steps by a hand around his bicep.

“She broke shit in my face!” He points to his face and tugs free of the grip.

The biggest of the three looks between me, and him, as I step back toward the back door with inching, cautious steps. His friends are a mess, and I’m within arm’s reach of the knob.

“She can handle a little more,” the one bleeding out spits.

“Don’t kill her,” the one clearly in charge orders, and all hell breaks loose again.

I dart backward and whip the door open, only for my head to be slammed against the frame by his massive, rough hand.

I’m halfway out, but the step is slippery, causing my foot to slide against the concrete.

His hand snaps out for me, but he only manages to get my cardigan.

I rip my arms from it, and his hold goes slack as he fires a string of curse words at me.

Fight.

I find my balance, and as he tosses the sweater aside to reach for me again, I lean back, letting him through the threshold, and I slam the storm door on his arm as hard as I can.

He screams out in pain as the old metal catches his forearm.

It bounces off his skin back towards me, and I steady myself before kicking hard and sending it back in for another clumsy hit.

I slip, falling to my knees in the rain, but crawl through the mud of the empty flower bed beneath me.

The garage is another ten feet, and I barely find purchase in the mud to get to my feet.

Upright, I move faster, the rain beats down on the newly formed cuts and bruises with a stinging throb as I push the door open and slam it closed behind me.

I rip the tarp back and clumsily fish the keys from the rusted toolbox.

Koa’s bright red Hemi Cuda stares at me, and I pray it starts as I rip open the door and fall inside.