This Is a Dark Ride (6 page)

“I don’t have a paper dress,” she said. “And I don’t think the doctor uses generic dish soap.”

“Oh? So you’ve got one of those fancy doctors, do you?”

He thought he heard her laugh.

Brody turned and smiled at her. She was smiling a little bit too. Good, it would make this easier if she’d relax. He hoped she wasn’t hurt too badly, because if she was, he was going to have to call somebody. The police or an ambulance or something.

“Come here,” Brody said.

She stood up, her legs shaking so badly he feared she’d fall. Brody went to her and put his hands on her hips, holding her, guiding her to the sink. He lifted her, and she sat looking awkward and uncomfortable, her legs hanging down, her ass drooping in the sink. Brody pushed her legs farther apart, and she squirmed.

He reached around her and picked up the sprayer again. She jumped as the water made contact with her pussy, and made an attempt to close her legs.

“The water burns,” she said. Her hand clenched on his shoulder, fingers digging in.

Brody stood up all the way, pushing forward against her, one arm curling around her shoulders, pulling her to his chest. The water continued to spray, and it soaked the front of his pants, running down the front of the cabinets and pooling at his feet.

“Shh, I told you, I don’t want to hurt you. I’m just going to wash you off so I can see.” He let go of the sprayer button, and the water ran out of the faucet behind her. She rocked and slid forward on the sink.

Feeling more awkward than she looked, he knelt on the floor, eye level with her pussy. She wasn’t clean shaven, a fact that he noticed and appreciated. The last few women he’d been with had been completely bare, and he didn’t care for that as much as he did a nicely trimmed little bush. Bare seemed to be the
in
thing these days, judging by the pictures he’d seen in magazines, but he still preferred women to look like women, not little girls. A little bit of hair was a good thing.

She gasped as his fingers touched her, and he leaned his head down, looking carefully, as he gently spread each fold. Her opening looked sore and red, but that didn’t seem to be where the bleeding came from, so it wasn’t as bad as he’d originally thought.

He zoned out for a minute, his gaze taking in her secret pink treasures. So close, so fucking close… He mentally slammed that door shut—tight. She was trusting him right now, and there was Sam. Sweet, precious, perfect Sam, who’d gone through so much shit and still stayed by Brody’s side.

Sam…who’d never been with a woman. A little mental flash of Sam with her zipped through him. Sam learning what it was like being with a woman. Sam going down on her—now that was a sexy fucking thought.

Brody closed his eyes for a moment, imagining the taste of her pussy on Sam’s lips. He shifted his weight on his knees.
You’ve got to be kidding
. He was getting hard. He couldn’t remember when it had last happened, but it felt like a lifetime ago.

Forcing himself to go back to his task, Brody opened his eyes, her hot skin warming his cold fingertips. He found the source of the bleeding. She had a cut deep within one of her folds. It still bled a little but didn’t appear serious.

He touched it gently with the tip of his index finger, and she whimpered.

“Right here,” he said. “It’s just a cut, doesn’t look too bad.” He wanted to crack a joke about kissing it and making it better, but decided he shouldn’t go there. That was the last thing she needed.

She needed healing. She would require a lot of it, both emotionally and physically.

He stood up and shut off the water.

“You can go take a shower now, if you want.” He wanted her to leave the room before she noticed the effect that she’d had on him. His cock so hard that it ached. Poor Sam, this was probably how he felt most of the time. Brody had been neglecting him for months.

“I’m going to kill him.” Her voice was eerily calm.

“Who?”

“Bobby. The one who did this. I’ll see him somewhere. I’ll find out who he is. Somehow I’ll do it.”

“You don’t want to do that.” Brody shook his head. “Well, hell—you probably
want
to do that, but you can’t. Can’t just run around killing people. You want to call the cops now? I don’t have a phone, but the lady up the hall—”

“No!” Her voice was a shrill little squeak. “I don’t. What am I going to say? That he was supposed to pay to fuck me? That he wasn’t supposed to…” Her voice broke away.

Brody looked into the girl’s teary eyes. “It’s going to be okay.”

Okay
. The same fucking thing he’d been telling Sam for so long he’d forgotten how to say anything else. What exactly was okay? The people who’d done this to her seemed to think it was perfectly okay to rape and beat this girl and then leave her naked in the snow to fucking die.

Okay
was a word that didn’t fit what things should be, not for her, or for Sam. Things should be good, and he wished to hell he knew a way to make them that way.

She started to cry again, and he held her, not thinking about sex or drugs or alcohol, just feeling. Being.

It only lasted a few moments, but those brief seconds were good. Then her head felt too heavy against his chest. All he could think about then was taking a few sleeping pills and closing his eyes.

She wrapped her arms around his neck, and suddenly things felt just…too intense. Too much. He didn’t want to care about her, but he didn’t want to hurt her, and yet mostly he didn’t want to hurt Sam. He’d already hurt Sam. Lied to Sam. Took Sam for granted.

“Thank you, Brody,” she whispered, her voice muffled against his chest. “The wings on your back suit you, ’cause you’re my angel.”

Outside Krieger meowed. Brody felt emptier and emptier inside. He couldn’t remember if he’d given the cat anything to eat today. He had trouble remembering anything—except that the apartment smelled like fresh cat piss and he had her here, naked and all beat to fuck. Everything was fucked-up. Sam was going to blow a gasket.

“You should get some rest,” he said, pulling back from her.

“I’m not pretty, am I, Brody?” Her voice sounded very childlike.

He smiled at her, aware that she wanted something he couldn’t really give to her. He could feel the pain in her, pain that went beyond whatever ordeal she’d been through tonight. So much pain in everyone, him, Brody, her—even that poor fucking cat. Everything in his life was damaged. Nothing was
okay.

“Oh, sweetheart, don’t sell yourself short.” He probably didn’t sound sincere, but if she thought he was some fucking angel who could somehow transform her shit life, she was sadly mistaken. The only thing he could do was make things worse. Like he’d done to Sam.

“I’ve seen you before,” she said. She’d told him that earlier, but he hadn’t admitted he’d seen her before too.

“Yeah. Probably.” He wiped a tear from her cheek with the pad of his thumb. “I’ve heard about you.”

“You…heard about me?”

“Yeah, you’re the new girl. The one from up by the liquor store, that everybody’s talking about.”

Her eyes got wide. “Who? Who’s talking about me?”

“Just…you know? Everybody.” He grinned just enough to give away the fact that he was teasing her. “Everybody’s saying there’s this new girl up on the corner, and she’s real pretty.”

She smiled back at him. “You’re full of shit. Nobody’s saying that.”

He traced his thumb over her swollen bottom lip. “No. But you know what? If anybody was saying that, they sure as hell wouldn’t be lying.”

“You ever been with a hooker, Brody?”

“I imagine I’ve been with just about everything by now,” he said. “Only fell in love once, though.”

“I’ll bet she was pretty,” Angel said solemnly. “I’ll bet she was way prettier than me.”

“You two are nothing alike. That doesn’t mean you aren’t pretty.”

He lifted her from the sink and set her down. She stared at him for a minute and then went to the sofa and wrapped herself in the sheet he had left there. She looked at him the way Krieger did, behind a haughty “I can take care of myself” front she needed someone to care for her. Someone to love her.

“I’m going to take a shower,” she announced.

“Bathroom’s right through that door.” She’d probably need another shower by the time she got done in there. It was filthy. He hadn’t really cared until now, but it was embarrassing that he lived like this. Sam wouldn’t clean it, not anymore. “It’s um…it’s pretty bad. I’m not much on cleaning, you know?”

“It’s okay. I appreciate you letting me use it.”

He seriously doubted she’d feel that way once she saw the state of the bathroom, but he managed a cordial smile until she disappeared through the doorway.

He was completely screwed. He couldn’t take care of a cat, couldn’t take care of the man he loved—there was not chance in hell that he could take care of her or make anything even remotely
okay.

He paced while she showered, his skin feeling two sizes too small. He wished he could climb out of it for a while. He took several sleeping pills and sat down on the floor. His arms began to itch uncontrollably, and he scratched at them until his skin glowed pink. It didn’t help. They still itched. She had that same pit inside of her, that same hollowness…the same ache. Like Sam. Like him. Why was she here? Why was it him who had to find her? Caring about her was only going to jeopardize what was left of his ragged relationship with Sam. But Brody couldn’t let her go. Not back out there, and just maybe, if she really did have a place to go to…if he really thought hard—if he could focus long enough to actually think about what he was feeling deep down inside of him right now, he might still want her to stay.

Angel stood in the bedroom doorway, staring at him with eyes greener than any he’d ever seen. She was wrapped back up in the sheet, and her hair was still wet from the shower. The girl looked at Brody the same way that Sam did, something shining in her eyes. Adoration. Not some phony, moon-eyed look, like the ones the groupies used to give him when he sang. This was raw; there were real emotions behind those gorgeous emerald eyes. There was the same honesty in her gaze as Sam.

“Feel better?”

She sat down heavily on the sofa and swayed back and forth. “Not really, but I think I’m sleepy. I still don’t feel clean. Could I have a piece of paper and a pen?”

Brody found an old liquor store receipt and a blue pen with a chewed-up cap on the coffee table.

Her hand shook when she held it.

“What do you want to write? Maybe I can help you?” There was an almost laughable statement. He was aware that even on a good day his hands shook ten times worse than hers were right now.

“No. I want to do it. Just in case.”

“Nothing is going to happen to you.” He watched her scrawling on the back of the receipt, and then she folded it into a little square and pressed it into his palm.

“Keep this.” She lay down on the sofa, staring up at the ceiling for a moment before her eyes slipped closed.

He started to unfold it, and her eyes snapped open as the paper rustled. “You’re only supposed to look at it if something happens to me.”

“Okay.” He refolded it and laid the tiny square on the coffee table.

Brody sat down on the floor beside the couch. “Those pills are probably kicking in. You’ll be able to sleep good tonight.”
I don’t have any more or I’d take them all. I’d take them all until I was high enough to deal with this shit.

“Thank you,” she murmured, and she again closed her eyes. “Brody?”

“Hmm?”

“Thank you for helping me.”

“It’s just what decent people do.” Decent people… Those would be people who weren’t like him, wouldn’t they? When was the last time he’d been a decent person? He stared at the little white square of paper.

Her hand found his, and she held it. He could feel her shivering.

“I’m sorry,” he said, smoothing the thin, ratty sheet down on her with his free hand. “The apartments in this building don’t have thermostats. The whole place is set to one temperature or something… I’m not really sure how it works. I just know I can’t turn up the heat.”

“It’s okay. I’ll get warm.”

Brody laid his head back against the old sofa. “You know what? One of these days—real soon—I’ll get you an electric blanket.” He was aware that the way he worded what he’d said, he was making it sound as though she would be staying here. The way things were right now, he wasn’t even certain if
he’d
be staying. Sam had every right to kick him out, and when Sam came home and found her here, he very well might.

“You don’t have to buy me anything.”

“No, but I will. What color do you like?”

Her sleepy voice was barely audible. “Purple. My favorite color is purple.”

He let her hold his hand until her breathing got slow and deep. Brody pulled his hand from hers, trying not to wake her. He wondered how in the hell he would ever be able to afford to buy her an electric blanket and why on earth he’d said that.

Brody left her lying there sleeping, picked up the square of paper, and went to the bedroom. Lying sideways on the bed, he stared up at the ceiling, listening to Krieger crying out in the snow. Brody thought he might cry too if he could, but he didn’t think he was able.

Slowly he unfolded the paper. He was already betraying her, but he tried not to give that much consideration.

His name is Bobby and he killed me. He said I should be thankful that I get to die, because it is more tragic that someone like me should be alive. He said I am a parasite…that I only take up space. I have spent most of my life feeling that way, but I didn’t want to die. My name was Angel Nichelle Molchene.

Brody stared at the childish, shaky printing on the paper and at the dried blood on his fingers from cleaning her up. The genuine tragedy of all of this was that someone like that piece of shit Bobby existed.

He crumpled the receipt into a ball and tossed it in the direction of the dresser. It bounced off the top of a pile of clothes before falling between the dresser and the wall. He should go and wash his hands, but he didn’t feel like moving right now.

Brody rubbed his eyes as another of his recurring headaches began thumping in his temples before settling in his skull behind his eyes.