Dominus Read online

  “No, Mum. You haven’t.”

  “Shhh.” She patted my arm, forcing a wan smile. “There’s no good in pretending. I have been a terrible mother.”

  “Not true—”

  “Honey, even though I haven’t acted like it these last few months, please treat me like the adult I am. You know the truth. I’ve let you and Ajay down. But”—she held up her hand to ward off my interjection—“things are going to change. They are. I promise.” She wiped the tears. “I can’t keep doing this to the two of you.” The tears wobbled her voice. “This is not what your father would have wanted. He wanted you to finish school. He wanted you to be the best. It would kill him to know how we live. It’s killing me too.” She swallowed, then gave a sniffle as she straightened. “And so this is the start.” She patted my thigh. “We’re going to live as a family.” She turned from me as a sudden burst of emotion choked anything else she could say. When she pulled herself together, she turned back to me. “It’s going to be all right, Sable. Everything is going to be all right.”

  “I know it is.” But I didn’t. In my heart, everything was falling to pieces but in a different direction from the fall I’d felt when Dad had gone to jail. How could I have not known this man, my father? His had been a wicked betrayal, which left me questioning who I was. The daughter of a murderer. Was I as tainted as he?

  The ghost of his actions would forever live with us, but he was in jail, locked away from us. If not for the visits, I could pretend he no longer existed. Not so Jax, the creep who for some reason decided to target me. He could only have gotten my number through illegal means. And what did he want to show me? Nothing I would want to see. I had to shake the guy. But how?

  “I’m going somewhere tonight.”

  “Oh, you are?”

  “With a friend.” A male teacher from my school, actually.

  “That’s wonderful, darling. I’m glad to hear you’ve made friends. Your daddy would be happy to hear as well. Yes, of course you should go.”

  “Thanks, Mum.” I leaned over to hug her and upset the tray but was quick enough to right it again without losing any of the food onto her lap. “I’ll be back before twelve.”

  Her eyes flicked between both of mine. “I know you will.”

  Dad would’ve grilled me. He would’ve known exactly who I went with and where I was going. Mum’s naivety and belief in everyone’s good virtues meant she wouldn’t ask.

  I stood, trying to push aside the heaviness in my stomach, like an iron ball rolling down my throat and sinking everything through to my feet. I wouldn’t tell her about Holden because she would tell Dad, and I would be fried under his fiery glare and made to endure a long lecture about how boys would only distract me from my potential at our next visit. But withholding the truth was a lie and hadn’t we all been lied to enough?

  Not a lie this time but a secret, that I was being stalked by a creep, possibly a dangerous creep, who’d gone to great lengths to get my number and now wanted to drag me into something that couldn’t be legal, like my father’s secret life. I would withhold this information because I had to spare her the burden of knowing. She needed to get better, stronger.

  Jax wanted to force me to develop a dangerous secret life of my own, and I was powerless to stop him.

  Holden came up beside me, in his hand an offering of alcohol to toss into the communal tub, which was what you did at these sorts of parties. I had to take his word for it.

  “Ready to go?” he said to the drum of a heavy beat coming from over the sand dunes.

  I walked alongside him down the narrow path to the beach, conscious of his hand hanging loose beside my own. We weren’t up to holding hands because this wasn’t a date, or was it? We’d not been clear. And did I want to date him? Relationships were not something I thought about. Dad had been dead against them. Apparently I needed to find my way first, establish myself in this world before I allowed myself to be distracted by someone else. And who’d want to date me now? It would mean revealing so many secrets too embarrassing to reveal. I wasn’t ready to open my life up for scrutiny.

  So what would happen at the end of the night? Would Holden expect a kiss? A feather touch on the cheek, or maybe the lips, at the end of tonight was probably safe enough, but definitely nothing else.

  I flicked a glance at Holden, thankful the moonlight kept the heat in my cheeks hidden. While looking, I couldn’t help but notice he had a decent set of lips, which flared a rapid jig of my pulse at the thought of his breath mingling with mine.

  Over the shrubs and dunes obscuring the beach, the occasional flame flicked skyward, releasing a few glowing sparks. As we neared, I dropped behind Holden as the path narrowed further. Around one more dune and the party came into view.

  “I thought you said Ajay could come.”

  This was not a child’s party. A couple of Ford pickup trucks were reversed so the rear bumpers faced the fire and people lounged on couches strapped on the backs beside large speakers that pounded out a bass beat and not much else.

  “I took the risk in believing you wouldn’t want to take your brother out on your date.”

  I swallowed my inhale. So he thought this was a date?

  “Fancy a drink?”

  “Maybe later.” No way was I heading home with alcohol on my breath.

  “I’m sure I can find some soda. I’ll be back.”

  Embarrassing, but at least he didn’t seem to care. He headed around the other side of the fire to a large tub half-buried in the sand. He placed his share in the ice, then straightened and palm slapped a couple of guys hanging around the drinks.

  I glanced around me, fidgeting with the ring on my finger. Everyone seemed to know someone here except me, and Holden looked comfortable laughing with some guys by the drinks tub. I sucked at starting conversations with strangers and had little experience mingling at parties thanks to Dad. At least I was hidden within a crowd of people engaged in their own conversations. A lot of the girls were dancing, dressed in slinky dresses or short-shorts and crop tops, making me look out of place in my denims.

  I scanned those around me, then looked across the fire only to have my heart seize up then lurch a few rapid beats when my eyes found Jax. My throat constricted into a thin tube, making it hard to breathe.

  I spun away from the fire before our eyes met, the shakes running throughout my body. Oh my god, he was here. Did he know I would be here? No, that was impossible. This was just a wild coincidence.

  Using the people around me as camouflage, I dared another look. He spoke to a short, petite girl, who, from the back, looked like a child. The firelight threw shadows on his expression, making him appear to frown down at her. Given the way he’d treated me through our last two meetings, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was grilling her with his unrelenting hard stare. If he was alone, I would march over and demand he give me the answers to all my questions.

  “So, what do you think?”

  Lost in my scrutiny, I jumped at the sound of Holden’s voice.

  I turned to him, wanting to erase the guy across the fire from my thoughts. “Who do you know here?”

  Holden stood alongside me, turning me inches to the left with his hands on my shoulders, and I shouldn’t be conscious of their size and warmth and the fact he left them there for longer than was necessary after he had me facing where he wanted me to look.

  “The group of guys standing by the tub of drinks. They’re regulars at Dyno. Duke, the guy with the blond hair tied in a ponytail, is one of my instructors.”

  With his hands still resting on my shoulders, he turned me farther to the left. “Hendrick and his girlfriend are also regulars.” This time he pointed, lining his arm up with my eyes.

  “Is this a Dyno Martial Arts party?”

  “Not quite, but there’s a few here. You should come some time.”

  “I know nothing about martial arts. And you must’ve seen how inept I was in gym.”

  “Firstly, no one knows anything ab
out martial arts until they start. Secondly, ineptitude is the result of lack of discipline and training. Both of which are in your control.”

  “You sound like someone I know.”

  “He’s a smart guy.”

  “What makes you think he’s a he?”

  “Am I wrong?”

  “The he was my father.”

  He stroked his chin while he quirked an eyebrow. “Not sure I want to remind you of your father, although they do say girls grow up to marry men like their fathers.”

  Jesus, did he just say that? “I’m looking for the opposite.”

  “Father issues?”

  I glanced at the fire. How did we get onto this conversation?

  “Got it, drop the subject.”

  He scanned the fire as if looking for a few more people he could point out when his brow creased into a heavy frown. I followed his gaze to find Jax at the end of it. Jax? No, it couldn’t be. There were enough people around Jax that it could be any one of them who’d made his brow furrow up in annoyance.

  “Come.” He took my hand. “I want to introduce you to some of the guys.”

  I should think of his hand taking mine and holding it firmly while he led me away, but instead I agonized over sparing one last look toward Jax. An invisible elastic stretched taut between us as Holden led me farther away. I needed to know his secrets. At the very least his reasons for pestering me, which had to be bad.

  Unable to stop myself any longer, I risked another glance in Jax’s direction only to see the petite woman had been replaced by another with long, flowing raven hair. From behind, her snug denims hugged her ass. Long legs stretched longer with a pair of expensive-looking high-heeled boots. Boots on a beach?

  I wanted to ask Holden who they were since he so obviously knew them, but remained tight-lipped as he led me away. I’d say he wasn’t keen for me to meet them.

  Chatting with Holden’s friends consumed a large part of the next twenty minutes. I kept quiet the whole time, having nothing to say that would fit with the conversation. Holden talked and laughed like there was nothing lurking behind us that needed constant attention, unlike me. Knowing he was there, just over the other side of the bonfire, stabbed at the back of my head.

  In my periphery, I could see someone approach. I turned to see the raven-haired beauty stride our way. My breath stalled. I glanced away to hide my stare only to find Holden’s eyes glued to her approach and hers likewise on him. Her mouth curved up in a killer sexy smile. The three of us were locked in this dark pantomime, although I was the spectator rather than a participator. The invisible bond that linked the two repelled me to the outside. Holden was safely ensconced within the shield of their private moment, this mysterious woman and him, with me shut out. His eyes never left her. The time ticked. She passed, maintaining eye contact with him as she went. Holden kept looking. The woman’s mouth curved up into another seductive smile.

  On the woman’s passing, the spell broke. Holden un-paused and looked down at me as if just waking from a dream.

  “You know her?” I tried to keep my voice light. I would appreciate an explanation for his behavior, but since we weren’t dating for real, he didn’t owe me one. More importantly I wanted to find the link between him and her, then all the way to the end—to Jax.

  “That’s such a long, complicated story. I can’t go there right now. There’s nothing between us except tortured memories.”

  “You didn’t look tortured.” I had no right to interrogate him like this.

  “Shocked is the accurate word. I haven’t seen Elva in some time, which is a good thing.”

  “If you know each other, why didn’t either of you say hi?”

  “The way our relationship ended wasn’t conducive to warm welcomes further down the line if we ever ran into each other again.”

  I wanted to say something along the lines of she didn’t appear to think so but held back. Time to stop the conversation there. Truth was, I didn’t care what Holden thought about her. I didn’t care about his and her relationship history. I only cared about them, or at least one of them, Jax, and if she was linked to him, then she was part of my worries as well.

  Holden turned back to the group we were with and picked up the thread of the conversation as if it had never been broken.

  The fire was large enough to create some sense of distance, but an invisible thread wound its way from Jax to me. Resisting the urge to look became impossible, but I feared turning only to meet the dark depths of his eyes.

  Finally, the war in my head won out. I scanned the distant side of the fire to see he was no longer there. A little further searching, I found him lounging on one of the couches at the back of the truck, one leg slung over the arm rest. His expression distanced him from those gathered around. While they laughed, he stared ahead into the fire with the look of someone whose mind was elsewhere, his face an unreadable mask.

  I wanted to read it, search through the thoughts that masked his hard features, and know what encased him behind an invisible wall. A series of tattoos ran the length of the back of his arm, snaking all the way down to his fingertips, much like the one I’d seen on the underside of his forearm.

  After a while, he raised his drink to his lips. I followed the swallow as his Adam’s apple went up and down and resisted the urge to swallow myself. A shiver ran down my spine. I remained within this dark web of fixation. I’d lied to him on the train. There was a mystery about him, a cruel mystery, probably a dangerous mystery I wanted nothing to do with but for some reason felt compelled to follow.

  A distant musical laugh and my attention snapped to the woman beside him, Elva. From the back, she was a woman to make every other jealous. From the front, she was something else. A total knockout. Everything about her was perfect, from her straight nose, glossy thick hair to her plump lips and fine chin. She sat close to Jax, the sides of their bodies touching. It made sense he would have such a beautiful girlfriend. But to be his girlfriend, she would be into the same stuff as him.

  I turned back to Holden, scrutinizing his profile. There was little I knew about him, but he was friendly, quick to smile, and so far seemed warm and inviting. The golden boy with an entrepreneurial flare. Dad would’ve loved him. Jax was the opposite. Danger oozed from every pore. A gang leader, drug dealer, or pimp, he could be any or all. I had to know why he was targeting me, make him stop. If he knew my number, he might know where I lived, and then he would know I had a younger brother, an easier target for whatever sick ideas he had in his mind. I had to talk to him.

  “Can you excuse me for a moment?”

  Holden looked about to ask a question. I watched the query form then slip away. “Don’t get lost.”

  I nodded then weaved my way through the throng of people, which seemed to have grown from when we had arrived. The music continued its crazy bass beat. More women joined in dancing to the tune, while the fire crackled, sending up sparks to the clear sky. Every so often, the gentle breeze would shift, driving the smoke in a new direction. I walked through one chimney of smoke, hand over my nose and mouth, while I headed for the trucks only to see the space next to Elva vacant.

  I turned to the fire, scanning the faces.

  “Is it me you’re looking for?”

  I spun away from him. “Only because I demand answers.”

  “But if I gave you answers, I’d lose my leverage.”

  “For what?”

  “You’ll find out.”

  “I’ll call the cops.”

  “But would you? My guess is you wouldn’t want to be on their radar any more than you have been already. And if they start digging into you, what might they find?” The firelight danced in his eyes—the lair of the devil.

  A coldness swept through my body. It felt like my insides were rattling through a mini earthquake. “What are you talking about?”

  “Your naivety is a crime.”

  “I’m sick of this. I’m sick of you. If you dare threaten me, threaten my family, I wi
ll do what it takes to hurt you.”

  In the silence of his stare, the air between us turned to spikes.

  “I don’t know how much clearer I can make myself.” As the quiver inside my body, ramping up my pulse, moved to the outside, tremoring my hands, I moved past him, determined to get away. I’d said more than I thought I would dare.

  He snapped out his arm and latched on to my elbow. “I haven’t even begun to threaten you.” His low voice was laced with a deadly warning, as were his eyes, even in the golden light of the fire with his face partially shadowed as he looked away from the fire at me. There was no mistaking his intention in saying those words.

  He let go, raising his hands in surrender. “Besides, it’s not my intention. I only want to blow your mind.”

  Drugs, I knew it.

  “Forget it. I’m not interested in anything to do with you.” I turned to leave.

  “Sable.” The steady calm of his voice ran a chill down my sweatshirt. I looked over my shoulder.

  “I would respond to my message favorably if I were you.”

  “You haven’t sent me a message.”

  “Not yet, but I will.”

  Chapter 5

  Mum had returned. She stood in the kitchen, showered and dressed. The miraculous change was mirrored by the fresh smell of her coconut soap and the sun shining through the kitchen window, lighting the room with its warm glow.

  Her cheeks were hollow and her hair hung limp but she smiled when I entered for breakfast. The first real smile I’d seen in two long, dark months. All the same, I regarded her warily, not sure how to take this sudden turnaround. “I didn’t hear you get up.”

  “I wanted to be quiet. Thought I would make you both breakfast as a treat.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  “But I want to.” She came over and placed a hand on mine. “You’ve held together what’s left of our family long enough. It’s time I became the mum again. My children need me. You need me.” She swept me close. “When the police turned up the other day, it was the wakeup call I needed.” Gently pushing me to arm’s reach, she said, “I know you, Sable. I know you would never have done what you did if things weren’t so bad.” She closed her eyes. “It’s all my fault.”