Denied (7 page)

Monster (Present Day)

Unable to concentrate
on anything to do with work, Monster found himself pacing around his property, chewing at his knuckles and worrying himself crazy about what Flower might be doing. He’d never imagined he’d have been this anxious when he’d visualized her being back in America. In his mind, he’d thought it would bring him a peace of some sort, believing she was safe at home, but in the end it had only brought him more worry.

The phone rang and he snatched it up. He’d been waiting for news.

“I’m sorry, sir,” said the male voice on the end of the line, which he recognized as belonging to Sean Hamilton, “but things aren’t looking any better. She’s been to a rough neighborhood now.”

“What was she doing there?”

“I’m not sure, but …” he hesitated over his words … “she went with another man, and they stayed for about an hour. She’s going to get herself noticed by the wrong people if she’s not careful.”

“Dammit.”

“What do you want me to do? I can detain her for you.”

“No, don’t do that. Just keep an eye on her, follow her wherever you need to, and try to see she doesn’t get herself in any trouble.”

“I understand. What do I do about this other man? Do you want me to remove him from the picture?”

Instantly, Monster’s hackles raised. “Is he trying to harm her?”

A cleared throat came down the end of the line. “Not exactly. I’m afraid I saw him kissing her, sir.”

Something ice cold and hard lodged in his chest. “What son of a bitch put his hands on her?”

“I told you, sir.” He sounded flustered. “It was a neighbor.”

“Did he force himself on her?”

“No, not exactly, though she did push him away, eventually.”

Eventually. That word cut through him. How had his Flower allowed another man to touch her? His Flower who had been afraid of another person’s touch. How had she gotten over her fear so quickly and allowed another man to kiss her? His anger roiled deep inside of him. He’d sent her back to protect her from the dangers of his life, not so she could go out chasing other men the moment she’d returned. He’d thought there had been something special, something precious between them, but Lily appeared to have forgotten him within a couple of days.

He’d managed to convince himself that was what he’d wanted—for her to go back to her old life and be happy, to continue as though she’d never gotten involved with him. Yet now the stark reality of her getting over him stared him in the face. Lily was his. She was
his
Flower, and he wasn’t going to stand by and do nothing while some other creep picked her.

“I’m coming over,” he told the man he’d hired.

His surprise was evident. “Coming over? What, as in, to America?”

“Yes.” His tone was curt. “Of course that’s what I mean.”

“Right. What would you like me to do until you get here?”

“Exactly the same as you have been doing. Keep your distance, just watch her. If it looks like someone is going to hurt her, step in, but otherwise don’t even let her know you’re there.”

“What about this other guy? What if he tries to take things further with her?”

“Just make sure he doesn’t,” he snapped. “If I catch him in bed with her, I’ll cut off his cock and make him eat it.”

Monster slammed down the phone. His hands shook with his fury. His anger and jealousy was all-encompassing, blocking out all other thought. He tortured himself with the idea of another man touching her, of him pulling off her clothes and suckling on her beautiful nipples. Would she throw her head back in the way she did with him? Would she gasp and moan if this strange man buried his face between her creamy white thighs and licked her? Would she lace her fingers in his hair and push his face deeper, arching her back and crying out as she came, just as she had with him?

With a roar, Monster stood, his fingertips hooked beneath his heavy mahogany desk, and he lifted and flipped it, sending everything sitting on top—his computer and phone, and stacks of paperwork—crashing to the floor. The desk sat on its side like an upended beast too large to right itself.

What had he been thinking by sending her away? He’d die before he allowed her to have a life without him in it. He owned her, and she owned him. He wouldn’t allow another man to take what he owned.

Monster’s mind turned to the practicalities of flying to America. It was times like this he missed his right hand man, Tudor, the most. Previously, he would have simply told Tudor what he needed, and the older man would have arranged everything for him. Monster still hadn’t found anyone to take his place. How could he? He’d known and trusted Tudor his entire life; finding someone like that again was near impossible.

With Tudor and his cook, Marianna, both dead, and with Lily now sent back to America, Monster found himself utterly alone.

He had a fake passport—the best money could buy. He’d had one for years, just in case he’d needed to flee the country, but of course he’d never needed to use it. He also had access to a private plane, so he wouldn’t be subjected to the monotony of domestic travel.

Monster pondered what he would do when he reached America.

He could bring Lily back here. Just whisk her away again as he had before. But that would do no good. If he did that, they’d be right back to where they started, with Lily back in Cuba and still in danger. Anger and frustration rose within him. Why couldn’t she have behaved herself, just this once? Why had she gone running off to the police, and was now involving herself in God only knew what? He’d made sure there was enough money in her bank account to keep her content for a long time to come. She could have booked a vacation somewhere relaxing to recover, but instead she was traipsing all over the city like some kind of vigilante out to get revenge.

Perhaps that was exactly what she was doing.

A sudden certainty filled him. She wanted to get revenge on him for what had happened to her, and if she couldn’t take it out on him, she would go after the men he had initially hired.

Fuck.

He wished he could turn back the clock and do that part of her journey differently. He hadn’t known back then what he did now. He’d thought the traffickers were simply a way of moving women who needed to be moved. Never once had he given any thought to how the woman might feel—why would he? Women had been a commodity to him his whole life, creatures to be used and enjoyed, and then thrown away. It would be like caring how the cow felt about its journey to becoming a steak. Did he give thought to that before he ate? No, he simply enjoyed his meal.

But Lily had changed all of that.

She’d made him care.

Monster (Present Day)

For the first
time in his life, Monster found himself aboard an airplane.

He sat in a seat beside the window, his hands gripping the armrests tight enough to turn his knuckles white. Trying to distract himself, he looked out over the wing of the small plane and onto the private airstrip. They were still on the ground, but his mouth ran dry as paper, his heart a heavy stone lodged in his chest.

After everything he’d been through in his life, he’d never have believed the thing to throw him most out of his comfort zone would be boarding a plane. The confinement of the cylindrical metal body instantly made him claustrophobic, and they hadn’t even taken off yet. The small circular windows were barely enough to peer out of, and even though he imagined the comfort of the private aircraft was far greater than any kind of commercial plane, he felt cramped into the seat. He couldn’t imagine spending hours inside this thing, thousands of feet above the earth, with no way to get out, but if he intended to go to America to face Flower, he had no choice. It would take days to make the same journey by boat, and, if he were honest with himself, he wasn’t sure he’d feel any differently about being on a vessel either.

Fear and anxiety were a sign of weakness, and Monster didn’t do weakness well. It made him disgusted, ashamed of himself, and he fought to suppress the emotion as much as he could, but still it kept clutching him in its grip, causing his heart to beat harder, the air shallow and thin in his lungs.

It was strange. After growing up with all those years under his father’s tyranny, keeping him hidden away like a freak, he thought he’d have been used to being locked away with no access to the outside world. Perhaps it was his experience of recent freedom that made him afraid, or had it been inside him all along—the trauma of the memory of spending all those years locked away, now afraid to find himself in the same position.

A sudden memory flashed in his head and heart, stealing his breath. It played in his mind as though watching a television screen …

Monster (Twenty-seven Years Earlier)

Monster was a
child again, a small boy, five years old at most. Voices filtered toward him from down the hallway, all male voices, raised and urgent. His door hadn’t been locked at this point, though he was always told to stay in his room unless instructed otherwise, and up until now he’d never thought to disobey the rules his father had laid down. Wanting to know what was happening, he chewed on his lower lip as he eased open his bedroom door. Instantly, the voices grew louder, and he shrank back again, his heart thumping. He knew he shouldn’t go down there. His father would be angry with him, but fear that something would happen to his father filled him. What if these men did something to hurt his father? Monster was only young, but he was old enough to understand what it meant to be hurt. Though the threat of his father hitting him because he’d come out of his room without permission hung over him, the risk wasn’t enough to quell the fear of something happening to his father. If that happened, he’d be completely alone. Yes, there were the people who worked for his family—the man called Tudor often came to his room to bring him food—but his father was the only one who cared about him, even if he showed it in strange ways.

Easing his body through the gap in the doorway, he crept out into the hall. He moved lightly on his bare feet for fear he would be heard. His heart fluttered like the wings of a trapped bird in his chest, and every muscle in his small body tensed. Though the men spoke loudly, he was certain they’d hear his heart’s drumming and the shuffle of his feet against the floorboards.

One man spoke strangely so his ‘s’ sounded like ‘th.’ “You must stick to the volumes you’ve promised. If you take money for a deal, you must deliver.”

He heard his father’s voice. “I know that, asshole. I’ve been running this business for almost ten years now. But if my supply gets busted, I have to find a new one, and I can’t do that instantly. I’m asking for a little time, that’s all.”

“We don’t have time!” The voice lifted another decibel.

Monster tiptoed past the staircase, to peer into the room where his father stood with three men he didn’t recognize. He was able to read his father’s body language, perhaps even better than the men his father met with. His face was like stone, all except for a twitch at the right corner of his mouth. Others might mistake the inflection for the hint of a smile, but Monster knew otherwise. This was his father when he was holding back from striking out. Monster had seen it often enough when he’d done something to displease the man—not eaten the food he’d provided, or been unable to answer simple mathematical questions because he’d been flustered, or had a bad dream and wet the bed. At those times he’d see his father holding himself back, but then something would happen. Often the bad thing had nothing to do with Monster, such as his father spilling something, or missing a phone call because he’d been occupied with something else, and he’d just snap.

Monster didn’t want his father to snap with these men. He was terrified if he did, something bad would happen. There were more of them than him, and they would probably have guns.

He knew his father wouldn’t be happy to see him out of his room, far from it, but Monster would rather take a beating than see his father killed.

Pushing his nerves down as far as he could, he gave a little cough.

Instantly, his father’s eyes locked on his. Monster read the anger in their depths, his amazement the boy had dared leave his room unattended. He knew his father didn’t want people to see him—knew he was different, though he didn’t quite understand why.

Though his father had seen him, the older man didn’t immediately race off. Instead, he turned to the men he’d been fighting with and said, “Please excuse me for one moment.”

Then he turned and stalked to where Monster stood, hiding beside the doorway.

He caught sight of the fury in his father’s eyes, and turned and fled.

Regret filled him, together with sick dread, as he ran back down the hallway, toward the protection of his room, but he didn’t get that far. Instead, his father’s iron fingers locked around his upper arm, pulling him to a halt so hard he lifted off his feet.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” his father hissed in his ear. “You want to be seen?”

“No,” he whimpered. “I heard you fighting …”

“That was none of your business.” He’d reached the closet in the hallway. “If I can’t trust you to stay in your room, you can stay somewhere with a lock on the door.”

He yanked open the closet and threw Monster in. Monster landed on his bottom, his back slamming against a metal bucket. The mop propped inside it fell to one side, and, in front of him, the door slammed shut, encasing him in darkness. A second later, he heard the sound of the lock clicking into place.

Monster let out a cry, his hand pressing to the spot in his lower back where the metal had hit him. But no one offered to kiss his bad spot better.

He pulled his skinny legs up to his chest and pressed his face against his knees to try to stifle his sobs.

What if something happens to Father and no one knows I’m in here?

The thought brought on fresh tears and he sank his teeth into his knee to muffle the sound. His father wouldn’t appreciate hearing him crying, and he’d want his guests to hear his son’s cries even less. Part of Monster wanted to jump to his feet and bang his small fists against the door and shout for help, but he knew he’d never do such a thing. He was different—a freak. If the other men saw him, they might take him away to a place even worse than his father’s house. At least here, he had a warm bed, and books, and meals when he was hungry—well, most of the time, anyway. If outsiders saw him, they might take him away and lock him in a dark hole where he couldn’t offend anyone else with the sight of his face.

His father would come and let him out as soon as the men left, he reassured himself. He wouldn’t leave him in here for long. It was just to teach him a lesson, a lesson he deserved. He’d been stupid, he knew that now. He’d never leave his room again without his father’s permission.

Through the closed door, he heard voices and doors slamming. Had the men left? He tensed in anticipation, hoping his father would let him out, while frightened of what would happen when he did. But the door didn’t open.

Monster sat, huddled in on himself, waiting. Time passed, and though he hadn’t even realized he’d fallen asleep, he woke to find himself curled up on the floor, a number of items digging into his body. An ache filled his bladder, and he cupped his hand over the top of his penis. He needed to pee, and badly, too.

Getting back to his feet, he risked banging on the door. His small fist didn’t make much sound, but it wasn’t as though his father didn’t know he was in there. He banged again, but the urge to urinate grew so strong, he knew he didn’t have time to wait for a response. Hurriedly freeing himself, hopping up and down in his urgency, he let out a sigh as a stream of hot urine hit the bottom of the metal bucket. The sound of liquid hitting metal was loud and hollow in the confined space.

He finished, did up his zipper, and sat back down with a resigned sigh.

Monster didn’t want his father to find the bucket off pee, but there was nothing he could do about it. He lost track of time, alternating between sitting and dozing, and crying as he banged on the door. Finally, he gave up and tried to make himself as comfortable as possible, curled up on the cold, hard floor, his hands tucked beneath his cheek as a pillow. He was horribly thirsty—so much his throat hurt—and a gnawing hunger had settled into his tummy. Was it the next day already? He had no idea.

He never wanted to anger his father so much that he’d end up here again.

He’d learned his lesson …