Slayton hesitated; he shook with rage and something else I couldn’t fathom. He looked at his fisted hands and squinted his eyes closed. The entire time the crowd was cheering “Slay him! Slay him!”
Slayton dropped to his knees and hit the guy who was out cold, then again...and again. I don’t know how many times, I closed my eyes and focused on the pain in my arm caused by the hold Channing still had on me. Halfway wondering if it was the only thing holding me up.
I knew victory was declared when the room cheered. Channing didn’t let me go, not until we were told to turn and kneel facing the room. Malcolm had gotten up with his guest and was mingling with the others, the ones that were not doing lines of coke or fucking.
When the doors on the other side of the room opened, my breath hitched, but it was all for nothing. The gladiator that was out of control, the one I was sure was possessed, came in with a roar. He was in the middle of getting his applause when Slayton was led in. Rage was ripe in Slayton’s stone stare as it landed on the crazy fighter.
They started to circle each other. Some in the room egged them on, but then Malcolm nodded for them to be broken up. “Tomorrow, I’m sure,” he said. “Relax now,” he absently ticked his head toward the other girls and me.
The one next to me clutched my hand. I squeezed hers back. Slayton never bothered to look where Malcolm was telling him to. At first, I thought it was just a sign of defiance, but then sickness climbed up my throat when I saw one of the men who had been in the room send his girl to Slayton, she was on her knees in a beat. Slayton had her hair fisted in his hand when I had to look away not only because I couldn’t watch, but because I had a beast charging at me.
“Only one,” Channing said so loudly I shook. “I didn’t realize he was right behind me still. That it was his legs I was pressing back against each time I flinched. “Slayton gets a prize, too.”
Slayton looked up at the sound of his name, the snarl that came from him told me for sure the boy I knew was long gone. His fist relaxed in the girl’s hair as his stare dropped from Channing to the line of girls he was standing behind.
The second his eyes landed on mine, terror sank into me. I felt butterflies, but they died quickly when he looked at the other girls. Slayton pushed the girl on her knees before him aside and stalked closer to us. She’d managed to get his jeans undone, wondering what else she had done didn’t help my confused state of mind.
“Slayton gets first pick,” Malcolm said from across the room only offering half his attention to what was going on—like he was only minding his pit bulls fighting over a bone in the yard.
The other gladiator protested, even with a gun trained on him, but I wasn’t paying attention to him. I was focused on Slayton looking at every girl but me, how he’d passed me over twice. The second time he left my line of sight he pounced back, and the next thing I knew he’d pulled me up and hustled me face first to the wall.
I could hear others laughing, even cheering, adding to the scramble of my thoughts. Did he recognize me? Was he even him anymore? Was he really raping me? There was no stopping the pooling tears, the whimpers as I felt him jerk my dress up, the growl that left his chest when his hand landed on my bare ass as his knee edged my legs apart.
The more aggressive he was, the more rallied the others became. At least, I assumed. The other gladiator had picked his girl; they were feet from us, and she was screaming. Slayton’s touch was painful not only because it was familiar, but also because of the trembling madness I could feel behind it.
I’d done as the blond said, I was well lubed, primed for him. When his hand moved across my hot flesh finding me that way his grip on my neck only became harsher, more punishing.
Then I felt the head of his cock. It was at the base of my spine, pressed so hard against me I was sure if I’d lived through this I’d be bruised there. His arms wrapped around me as tightly as he could. Then I felt a thrust. But he wasn’t in. To anyone behind us, maybe even to the side of us in the dim room, it looked like he was ramming the hell out of me.
I don’t know how long it lasted, just that when I felt his come across my back I felt like I’d ran a marathon with a gun at my back. Slayton jerked my dress down hiding the wetness, then gripped my neck and pulled me like a rag doll to face the others.
He grabbed the whiskey bottle from the table, then pulled me out of the room, to the sound of applause and words like, “I knew he’d give in sooner or later.”
My humiliation wasn’t over outside of that room. The halls were full. Even though he was gripping my arm, the girls lining the way reached for him. “Want a willing pussy baby, I got you!” one said when she all but stopped our progress. He shoved her aside earning laughs.
My gaze darted from one girl in the hallway to the next looking for Sugar, then to the guard that was following us. And as stupid as it sounded, I was looking for Channing. I didn’t know what I was walking into, just that this was not my Slayton.
We turned down a less crowded hall. Then at the end of it, past guarded double doors, we found an empty hall. Slayton’s grip only grew tighter as we pushed past rooms with blood smears on the outside of them, ones with the sound of girls screaming, or maybe moaning, coming from them.
The second to the last door was the one we stopped at. The guard leaned against the wall, and Slayton pushed me inside. The walls were gray, a box spring and mattress were on the floor, a lamp sat on an end table in front of a stereo. A punching bag hung in the corner. There was a table by the door, one chair; clothes were on the floor by it.
He let my arm go and went to the stereo by the lamp and turned it all the way up. Then sat on the edge of the bed and drank the liquor like it was water. I stood trembling before the closed door as tears streamed down my face soaking my cheeks beneath the mask. Long moments later, there was a pound on the door.
I gasped and flew forward only to crash into his chest. I still couldn’t read his eyes; they were far away and cold. Staring at me, he took the dress I was wearing and jerked it over my head, then pushed me toward the bed, unwittingly I sat down as the pounding grew angrier. He nodded his head for me to lay back and I shook harder as I did.
Once I was in place, he charged the door and jerked it open. There was a guy there with a tray of food. He eyed me as he put the food down on the table, when he stood he rubbed his growing erection. “Leave your leftovers outside,” he sneered knowing everyone, including me, understood what leftovers he was after. “First bout is at four o’clock tomorrow. Final right after. Flight out at 8:00 the following,” he narrowed his stare. “If you make it that far.”
Slayton glared him down as the man went outside and leaned against the wall with the other guard, crossing his arms, making it clear he wasn’t going anywhere, and neither were we. Slayton slammed the door so hard I was sure it would break from its frame.
The only thing I knew for sure right then was I was locked in a room with a killer...but there were more on the other side of the door.
Slayton stood there with his back to me for the longest time, or at least it felt that way. Then he went to the tray and flicked the lid off. I could smell the steak and potatoes. He pushed what was there around then grasped a roll and moved toward me. As slowly as I could, I sat up. His hand was shaking, stained with blood seeping from his busted knuckles, but he held it out to me. It took all the courage in the world to look up at him, and when I did, I saw he wasn’t looking at me. He was fiercely staring at the wall.
When I didn’t take the bread he shoved it forward so close, it almost hit me. I grasped the bread and his hands. For precious seconds our hands trembled together, then he jerked away. He nodded for me to go to the plate and eat. Like that was going to happen. Then he went to the punching bag.
I flinched every time he struck, every time I heard his brutal growl rising over the music. When he stopped for breath and glared at me, I shoved the bread in my mouth like a scared child, praying I’d keep it down. He went on with his battle with the p
unching bag, with his shouting. There were a few times I thought I heard the men outside laughing, and braced myself for when they’d come in, but it never happened.
I watched as exhaustion washed over him, flinching every time his fist struck the bag. I kept thinking about how seeing him again was my only wish, my only selfish prayer for months. How I was sure it would happen—that I’d make it happen.
I was a fool...right then I was sure I was.
EIGHTEEN
Slayton
Pain was my lifeline. It was the one thing that told me I was still in here somewhere. That I was still human.
I didn’t know what month it was. What day. If it was light or dark outside. I didn’t know shit. I thought about giving in a million times. Just stand there and taking the fucking hit, have some sick fuck rip me to shreds with his hands. But every time the thought came, or right when a mind-bending hit landed on me, I’d see her fucking eyes.
They’d jerk me out of the pit of self-pity I was in and demanded I stand up. That I fight. That I kill. I hated her for the longest time. Some part of me still does. No...it’s not her I hate. Not the angel that keeps fucking showing up at my darkest hour and demanding that I live in this fucking hell...I hate that I love her.
I hate that she showed up too late and left too fast. I hate not knowing where she is. Who’s touching her. I hate knowing my grave has already been dug, and some lucky asshole is going to hold her when she’s old and gray. I hate the temptation she is.
When I make it back to this shithole of a room and turn the music up to hear it and not the screams from the other rooms, I lay there and stare into my memories of her. Recount how I got here. If it was right or wrong for me to be there.
As soon as I left the hospital months ago, Channing and six other guys were waiting on me. I would have never made it out of there with Ember. Knowing she was safe, taken care of, and oblivious inside was the last time I remember feeling relieved. Like I’d won.
I was hauled here, thrown in a room half the size of the one I have now for five days. No food. No water. No bathroom. Then I was pulled out, put in the middle of a ring with hundreds of assholes all around me screaming. In the ring with me was a scared shitless kid.
I glanced up to the glass box. I knew what this was—a test. But I wasn’t so sure I wanted to take it. Which was the easier way to die. Malcolm’s expression was placid. He was pissed at me and had lost what little trust he had before I decided to lie to him about Ember. Most of the guys with him had the same expression, each ready to act on any order that came their way.
Channing’s expression was fierce, scolding. When it was all said and done, I’d made a fool of him. Never acted the way I’m sure he promised Malcolm I would. To beat it all, Channing was not an idiot, he knew I was running when he found me at the hospital. He sent the other guys on with me and waited outside. He was waiting for Ember to step out right behind me. I knew she wouldn’t. Father Donnelly knew the kind of men who had their grips on me. When he left with Ember, no one would know it was her, or would even think to follow a priest and a nun.
What I didn’t know was how far Ember had gotten before my crew figured out she was gone. If they even cared to follow her. For all I knew, if I failed that first test they set before me, they would hunt her. They’d rip her apart and make me watch. Right as the gut-wrenching thought crossed my mind, Channing gave me one nod, like he was reading my thoughts and was telling me I already knew the playbook.
I slowly drew my stare back to the kid before me. There wasn’t a fighting bone in his body. I was betting he was an addict, and a piss poor gambler. He’d been sentenced to die. I was appointed the executioner.
Either I took his life, or they’d take mine. Once he was down, gone from the fucked up life he’d lived I’d be in my new prison. If I ever made it out, every crooked cop on the payroll would pull a bullshit witness that would claim they watched me kill this boy in some random alley. Before I even made it to trial, someone would take me down in jail.
I don’t care who you are. How desensitized you think you may be, no one can kill without feeling a part of them fade away. No one with any kind of humanity could.
I wanted that kid to fight back.
When it was over, and the sick fucks cheered, Malcolm cracked a grin. But I wasn’t back in the fold yet. They took me back to my cell. Three more times I was pulled out and faced the same test. Three times I doubted my choice, and felt a piece of me die.
Then one day, the cell door opened. Channing was there with the guards. He glared me down as I was taken to the other side of the warehouse. I cleaned up the way I was told, ate until I was sick. They let me sleep that night. I dreamed so deeply that I was sure it was my life, that where I was had been a nightmare that I’d lived beyond. Ember was there in my dreams, snow was falling from a dark sky, and I marveled at how clear and happy her gaze was. How safe she was.
I took it as a sign she was. Used it as my courage when I fell short on finding my own. For the next week I was at Malcolm’s side, watching the fights. The first time he pushed a girl on me, I nearly threw her into the wall, my hands were gripped tight enough on her arms for real fear to flash in her eyes. I caught Channing’s glare from the corner, a warning that I was still on shaky ground.
I almost gave in. But fuck no. I hated those whores before Ember came into my life. Giving in now would have made it seem like I was playing them all. “Leave me the fuck alone,” I gritted through my teeth. Malcolm sneered but never stopped his business conversation to give me shit about it.
That night he sent the biggest fucker I’d ever seen to rape my ass. I didn’t feel so guilty about killing that asshole...
By the next week, they were feeding me right, pushing me to condition. I’d gone from the bastard of the gang to a prized possession. The first fights were like the ones before—I was the executioner. Then real opponents came, men like me who had landed on the wrong side of their boss or managed to show a talent to the devil himself without knowing he did.
I hated those fights the most. Sometimes I was sure I was fighting myself, and I didn’t know who I wanted to win. Every night ended the same. More blood. More girls. More booze. Every once in a while, I’d get caught in some fucked mind warp and look down and realize a whore had her lips on me, that I was getting off. Then my mind would flash to Ember’s eyes, and I’d be useless to that whore in the next beat of my heart. Hearing the laughter at my back, the taunts.
She was slipping from me. I was slipping from me. It was getting harder to remember anything beyond her eyes. To remember being normal. Last week, I went down in a fight. I was just tired. I almost didn’t come ‘round in time. I wavered earlier this week, too. It was getting bad enough that Channing got in my face. Of course, the fuck was armed, because he knew I’d kill him the first chance I had. That’s where my mind was. He put me here. He took everything from me.
In his bullshit speech to me he told me Malcolm was cool with me fighting like a puss lately because it was changing up the bets, but it was time to stop playing fucking games. “What the fuck do I have to lose?” was what I shouted at him. “You gonna tell me to fight or you’re gonna kill me? Put me in jail then do the deed? What? Tell me what fucking threat you got that will make me give a damn!”
I would have never said that months before when Ember was close, but I knew by now she was not only gone, but a vague memory to the fucks in Malcolm’s outfit.
“Don’t test me, fucker,” he said before he left.
Tonight was like any other night. Two more fights, then I was done with this shithole. I didn’t know where I was heading, but I was sick of these four walls and the smell of piss and blood. The same fucking whores trying to get a bite out of me. Done. So done.
I had never really cared to fight before, never pumped up my hate and craved to give someone pain. But it was different when it came to Red. I had speed, and he had rage. There was no doubt about it, when it came to the last fight it would be hi
m and me. The part of me that still wanted to live had been watching him advance right alongside me. Watching how savage he became. I knew half the fight was outside the ring; intimidation. Getting in his fucking head. So I’d been working on that for days. I was still the favorite in the ring, but he was gaining on me. Our final showdown would bring in more money than the cage fights had all year.
I worked myself up so much that just the sight of him would have my blood boiling. Tonight, I took that girl that was given to me when I first came in. I was determined to fuck her and make Red watch. It was his handler, the bastard that gave the whore to me when I walked in. I knew Red would want her. I kept telling myself I could do this. That I needed to if I wanted to get in Red’s head before I faced him tomorrow.
The adrenaline from the fight I’d just fought helped me see that girl as who I wanted her to be. Or, at least, it tried. I kept telling myself I had to. No choice. Then...I could’ve sworn I felt Embers eyes on me. I felt the shame slam into me. Thinking back now, I might have heard Channing say my name, or something made me look his way.
There they were, those innocent angelic eyes staring up at me. I looked away as fast as I could, sure she was an illusion. It didn’t matter that she had a mask on and was dressed like Malcolm’s high dollar whores—I still knew her eyes.
I prowled, glaring at Channing, taking double takes on the other girls, checking my sanity. What the fuck did he do? Had I not paid for my sins? Had I not been through enough hell for killing that fucking bastard Vinnie? What was so wrong about defending Ember back then? Why was I punished for the one right thing I did in my fucked life?
I didn’t know. Just like I didn’t know what the fuck I was doing when I pulled Ember up and slammed her to the wall. Maybe I did. Maybe I knew in some fucked up way that I had to stain her, fuck her mind for the rest of her life just to get her out of that room. What would happen next I had no idea.