Prisoned: A Dark Twisted Erotic Standalone (3 page)

In the bathroom, with my makeup bag open and my cosmetics spread over the counter, my hand shook as I drew a strip of liner over my lids. I didn’t know why I was making such an effort. This was a funeral, not a reunion. Anyone who recognized me had seen me at my worst. I’d been twenty pounds thinner back then, my skin gray, my hair ratted. But still, I added more makeup to my face, curls to my long strands of dark hair. Perfume to my skin.

When I ran out of things to put on, I finally paused and took the time to really blink, to take in the face that stared back at me in the mirror.

I could dress her up. I could cover her face in makeup. I could brush her hair and make her skin smell clean. I could fix her teeth and add twenty pounds to her frame. I could fly her first-class and book her in a hotel suite.

I’d done all of that already.

But, under this cosmetic blanket, I was just a girl from the projects.

A girl who had been holding in the biggest secret. A secret I had never spoken to anyone.

The secret lived in this state, so why would I ever come back here?

If I were smart, I would grab my purse and rush off to the airport, catching the first flight out of here and pretending the last hour hadn’t happened.

I was smart. I just wasn’t as strong.

Anthony and I stood against the back wall of the chapel. There weren’t enough chairs for everyone in attendance. They were at least thirty short, maybe more. And no one here was dressed up…but me. I was in a roomful of torn jeans and wrinkled shirts. There was a thick breeze of stale cigarette smoke and heads full of greasy hair. My brother had at least put on a clean shirt.

Had I not been on autopilot before I left Tampa, I would have packed less black, shorter heels, and a jacket that wasn’t so starched. I should have known better. I should have paid attention. This wasn’t the kind of crowd who wore black suits and shiny shoes. This was the crowd who looked into the open casket and thought,
Fuck, will I be next?

The only other suit in here was worn by the man who stood next to the casket. His was blue—blueberry blue—with a stain in the middle of his tie. I just stared at it while he spoke about Billy and tried to decide if it was salad dressing or pizza grease.

It was either that or stare at the casket, and there was no way I could look at the latter any longer than I already had. Billy was in that box. A shiny dark brown box that glistened from the corner of my eye with a puffy white fabric that lined it.

This wasn’t the Billy I remembered. He was too clean. Too ironed. Too tucked in.

Too at peace.

Billy was the only person in this room who
was
at peace. The rest of us were from The Heart, and The Heart didn’t allow it. And, for those of us who were close to Paulie and were around after he died, we definitely weren’t at peace. The aftermath of his murder, the mourning. There was enough pain to last the rest of our lives.

But those weren’t the only things I remembered, the only things that made me hurt.

There were the things that had happened just moments before Paulie’s death and the second after, like the sound of the car’s engine, Paulie’s footsteps, the gun, the gasp, the feeling of the car door, the tires squealing on the pavement.

The words that echoed in my ears.

His
words.

The ones that had haunted me since the moment they’d been screamed at me.

I sucked in a deep breath and turned my head away from the stained tie and the shiny casket. I’d had enough of both. Obviously, Anthony hadn’t. He was looking straight at them. He was so calm, as if he were listening to a friend speak about plans for the weekend. How could he not be shaken by this? How could he not look at that casket and think there was something we could have done to stop Billy from overdosing? I assumed Anthony was here because he thought it was the right thing to do.

But it wasn’t right. Not even close.

“We should go,” I whispered.

When he faced me, there was so much anger in his eyes. “Stop it, Kyle.”

“This is wrong.”

“Go outside if you can’t handle it, and I’ll drive you back when the service is over.”

I should go outside. I couldn’t handle it.

My thoughts, my panic, my fear—it all came to a halt when I felt another set of eyes on me. Eyes that caused a whole new set of emotions. My heart was hammering so hard inside my chest, it felt like my lips were vibrating. My face filled with heat. My lungs felt too heavy to take a breath.

I slowly looked away from Anthony and searched for those unforgettable dangerous eyes. They weren’t always emerald; they lightened and darkened, depending on what he was wearing. I’d seen every shade on him. But it had been years—twelve—since I’d heard his voice and seen him in person.

He was the reason I survived The Heart. He was my happiness. He was my best friend, my family. He kept the three of us together.

And then he was nothing.

He sat in the last seat of the second row from the front, looking at me from over his shoulder. My dark brown eyes connected to his sea-green ones—lighter than emerald, thanks to his blue shirt. My lips tugged into the smallest of smiles…another autopilot moment. I had lost complete control of my body.

He had the power to do that to me.

Garin Woods.

His name echoed in my head. Over and over.

I’d expected him to be there, but I hadn’t considered what it would feel like when I saw him, that I’d be reacting this strongly, or that he would have changed so much. Before this moment, I could have drawn his face from memory or from the few faint pictures I’d seen online. But what I would have sketched was a boy—one who was underweight, who filled his belly with sugar just to make it feel full, who barely shut his eyes because he was always running, fighting, hustling his way through the dark.

My image wouldn’t have captured the gorgeous man who was staring at me now. He looked healthy and fit. He had color in his skin and shadowy black scruff on his cheeks and chin. Deep lines etched across his forehead and between his brows. There was even a difference in his eyes. They had a light to them, a glow that told me his life wasn’t full of darkness anymore.

Seconds ticked away, and still no smile, still no expression, besides the intensity of his stare. Then, he turned back around.

I was finally able to take a breath again, the heat in my body starting to cool, the tingling in my limbs subsiding.

“Do you want to wait in line to see him?” Anthony asked.

See him?

I blinked, realizing everyone had stood from their chairs and were moving toward the front. When I checked Garin’s seat, it was empty. He wasn’t near the casket, and he wasn’t on either side of the room. But, each time my stare crossed that shiny wood and that puffy white fabric, it felt like someone was clawing into my chest.

The happiness Garin had caused was completely gone.

“Kyle?”

“Yeah,” I said, looking back at Anthony. Guilt was darker than any memory I had. “No, I mean. I don’t want to get in line. I think I need some water.”

“There are drinks in the next room. I saw them when we came in. I’ll take you.”

I walked next to Anthony, keeping my eyes down, not wanting to make contact with anyone. When we reached the refreshment table, I poured myself some water. I never brought the cup up to my lips. I just kept my fingers wrapped around the plastic and let the coolness soak into my skin while I concentrated on my breathing. It was becoming more labored than I liked.

“You should eat something,” Anthony said. “You barely touched your lunch.”

I looked at the trays of cookies and finger sandwiches. “I’m not hungry.”

I wasn’t thirsty either. I just needed to get away from that room, from the casket.

From all of it.

“I think I should go,” I said.

“You need to go say something to Billy’s mom first, and then I’ll take you back to the hotel.”

My breath…I couldn’t catch my breath. “You want me to talk to…Billy’s mom?”

Anthony nodded.

“Not a bad idea, Kyle,” Garin said from behind me. “I’m sure she’d like to see you since you never said good-bye to her either.”

I turned around, my eyes finding his. The spark of happiness that had shot through my limbs earlier quickly turned to guilt.

I squeezed the cup between my fingers and palm, so I wouldn’t drop it. “Hi, Garin.”

He broke contact to look at my brother. “Anthony,” Garin said. The two of them shook hands. “It’s been a while.”

“It has been,” Anthony agreed. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

He didn’t?

It was so strange to be standing in this circle. Anthony, almost identical to the person he was twelve years ago. Garin and me, nothing like the shells we once were. There were so many secrets between the three of us now.

“The old gang back together…how sweet,” Anthony said.

The sarcasm was so thick in his voice. It made me shiver.

Why the hell would he say that? Now? When Billy sat in a coffin in the other room?

It felt like Anthony’s hand had just torn at the hole that was already gaping in the middle of my chest. And, when I took a breath, it felt like he ripped it open even further.

“A funeral isn’t the kind of reunion I had in mind,” I said.

“Oh no?” Garin said. “I’m surprised to hear you even talk about a reunion.”

Now that I was standing so close to him, I could finally see the pain in his eyes. The anger. The coldness. There were so many layers to it, and they’d all been caused by me.

“Saw your sister the other day,” Anthony said. When he coughed, I could smell the weed on his breath. “Her kid’s real cute.”

I wasn’t surprised Anthony hadn’t told me he had run into Garin’s sister, Gina. He never talked about Garin or Billy to me.

But I was surprised to hear that Gina had a child. She was the same age as Paulie and Anthony. The three of them had been as close as the three of us. And Gina was into everything they were—hustling, drugs, and all the violence that went along with that lifestyle. The last I’d heard a few years ago was that she was in pretty rough shape and had been admitted to a rehab center in California.

“She had a baby?” I asked.

“She adopted one.”

Garin’s teeth weren’t gritted, but they may as well have been. The pull of his lips, the look in his eyes, the tone of his voice all told me he didn’t want to discuss Gina or her daughter. He wanted to say something to me, and I had a feeling it wasn’t going to be pretty.

I didn’t deserve pretty.

I knew this was going to get me in trouble, but I didn’t care. “Do you want to talk?” I asked Garin.

“Not here.”

“Well, I’m—”

“Not here, Kyle. We’ll go to a bar or something.”

I was afraid of what he would ask, what he would want to know, but I owed him this. Even though I couldn’t tell him the truth, I owed him at least something.

I tried to calm the emotion in my chest as I looked over at my brother. “Are you going to come with us?”

His phone beeped, and he pulled it out of his pocket. “Fuck,” he said, reading the screen. “Something happened with work, and I have to go take care of it.” He glanced between Garin and me. “I’ll pick you up from the bar later.”

“I’ll give her a ride,” Garin said.

“Then, I’ll pick you up at the hotel in the morning and take you to the airport.”

“I have to be at the airport by six. I’ll just take a taxi.”

I’d spent more than enough time with my brother today. But I’d be seeing him again on the first when he made his monthly drive to Florida. He’d stay at my house for about twenty minutes, checking things out, leaving what he needed to, and then heading to my mom’s. She now lived on the other side of Tampa, and that was where he would sleep until he drove back to Jersey.

“Kyle, you sure about this?” Anthony asked.

It was a warning.

“Yes,” I said, giving him a hug that was all for show. “I’ll see you soon.”

Anthony gave me a final glare, and he went over to Billy’s mom. I wondered what he could possibly say to her to make this right. How he could look her in the face and lie. It was all so easy for him. He had no hole in his chest, no guilt in his heart.

We had nothing in common.

“I can’t believe you came back home,” Garin said.

Home
. There was that dreadful word again.

I slowly shifted my attention to him. Those eyes. That face. So much dark scruff I wasn’t used to seeing on him. So much anger that was warranted.

“Honestly, I can’t either.”

That was the most honest I’d been all day.

“You’re heading back tomorrow?”

“Yes.”

“Flying out to…”

“Florida. I still live there.”

“Right.”

I knew he was living in Vegas, that he was the general manager of The V, a high-end hotel and casino on the strip. I Googled him more often than I should have.

Silence passed between us, but I still felt his emotion, his questions. I most definitely felt his coldness. “Garin—”

“Don’t. Let’s go.”

“Aren’t there people here you want to talk to?” I asked, grabbing his arm to stop him from moving. His eyes told me I needed to get my hand off him, so I immediately lifted it. “I just meant, I can wait for you outside if you want.”