Reckless Fear (The Black Vipers #1) (5 page)

Softly falling footsteps interrupted my peaceful sleep. Not enough to open my eyes but enough to be sensitive to the presence of another person in the room. I surrounded myself with the false security the hospital provided deciding I wasn't going to worry about it.

Normally, survival was my main objective and I considered everyone a threat unless proved otherwise. But right now, if someone wanted to kill me, I was perfectly content being an easy target. I was too tired and relaxed to give one shit about it.

I drew in a deep breath, willing my body to slip back into the dream free abyss the pain medication provided. I wanted to be taken deep. A place where my mind and body could get a reprieve from everything this life expected from me.

A light touch on my wrist pulled me back to the surface. I held my wrist off the mattress, knowing the routine. The nurse scanned my ID bracelet and gently laid my arm back down.

Her touch lingered softly on the top of my hand, brushing across my knuckles before slowly moving down my fingers. My body ignited.

It was a kind, intentional touch.  A thousand unspoken words passed through our skin on skin contact. Her touch…powerful enough to start a war, gentle enough to ease the worst of pains.

My eyelids fluttered as I struggled to open them. I needed to see the person capable of showing such depth of emotion with one simple gesture.

I caught a glimpse of the nurse as she rushed past the end of my bed, a new IV bag in hand. She immediately went to work programming the IV machine. My heavy eyelids opened and closed slowly as I turned toward her.

”Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” she whispered without looking at me. Her cheeks were flushed with the most beautiful shade of pink. She nibbled at her bottom lip as her trembling fingers lingered over the buttons on the machine.

Several silky strands of dark hair fell loosely around her face and she struggled to get them back into the low bun she wore. Her fingers hesitated at her neck, as her eyes dropped to the floor for just a second and then quickly back to the machine. She pulled back her shoulders, focusing once again on the task at hand.

My entire world came to a slamming halt.

A flurry of intense memories of a girl I knew came back with a vengeance as I stared at her olive skin. I gripped the sheets in my fists, hoping it would center me as a tremor started in my core.

The years had made her face and body more womanly, soft and curvy in all the right places. She was even more beautiful than I could have ever dreamed. My perfect type. My Sasha.

It had to be her.

It couldn’t be her.

My mind scrambled with possibilities as a train-wreck of emotions swirled inside my exhausted body.

The tightness in my throat threatened to choke me out as I tried to speak. I swallowed past the scratch, coughing suddenly.

She flinched at the sound and our eyes met for the first time. She let out a small breath and my stomach twisted with hope. This was my chance.

Her eyes lingered then dropped from my face. Dismissing me, she turned away.

She didn’t know me. She didn't remember.

My chest tightened and I inhaled sharply, rubbing my palm over the physical pain being near her caused. I closed my eyes, trying to fight the worthlessness washing over me.

Why would she want to remember me? Our time together was nothing more than a horrible memory for her. I’d been a weak, stupid boy who’d chosen his own fears and insecurities over her.

I blinked rapidly, trying to clear out the hazy edges of my vision.

“Are you having pain? I can get you something stronger than what’s ordered already.”

I couldn’t drag my eyes from her beautiful face. She stood with her hands on her hips, fingers digging in. I also couldn't trust myself to speak, so I just shook my head.

“Fine,” her tone terse as she walked around my bed. “If you change your mind, push the button”

I fought everything inside of me screaming to pull her into the bed and wrap my arms protectively around her. I’d whisper all of the promises I’d made before except this time, beg for a second chance to prove to her I’d finally become the fucking man she deserved.

My heart ached, knowing in front of me stood everything my life had been built on. All of these years longing for what she had made me feel so easily.

When she’d given herself to me, she’d done more than gift me with her innocence, she’d made me feel strong for the first time. She’d believed I was capable of taking care of her. That I could protect her.

No one had ever thought of me as more than a throwaway. I was discarded like trash by everyone…everyone except her.

I’d done so many twisted things in my life to get to where I was now. If I could just touch her once, it would make all the wrong I’d done in my life fade away.

But I was too afraid to move; suddenly I was a boy again, terrified and inadequate.

My mind began to spin. I was so weak, so tired.

Maybe she was a dream.

Maybe this was all a dream.

Maybe I was dying.

Had whoever was in charge of death taken pity on me and replaced all the emptiness and fear with this? A vision of the only purity I’d ever known. Could I be lucky enough to pass into the next life with her as my last memory?

I struggled to figure this all out before she was gone. I wanted to hear her voice again, feel her touch.

And then it became very clear.

Yes.

This was my death…in one way or another.

It was exactly the kind of painful ending I deserved. The great above hadn’t blessed me with serenity. Instead, he would torture me with her closeness. Leaving me with a vision of the one thing I’d wanted my entire life but would never have.

This may not be the type of death where I was buried six feet under, but the placing of a seed in my mind. The teasing of my soul. A haunting of my spirit that would follow me the rest of my life. She would never be mine.

I suddenly felt on fire as possessiveness fueled my body. I wouldn't lose her again.

“Sasha?”

Her eyes flashed to mine but moved to the other side of the room.

I lifted my hand out toward her, “Is it you?”

She turned away from the bed, grabbing something off the side table.

“No, my name is Julie.”

I dropped my hand back to the bed.

“Julie? No,” I shook my head, “that’s wrong. I know you. I know who you are.”

She held out a cupful of pills and pushed the water glass in front of my face.

“I’m sorry Mr. Everly. I don’t know who you think I am, but my name is Julie and I’m your night nurse.” She pushed the pills toward me again, encouraging me to take them.

I dumped the pills in my mouth, quickly washing them down with the water.

She busied herself around the room, marking on charts and checking monitors.

When she was finished she stood at the end of my bed, clip board in hand.

“Is there anything else I can get you right now?”

I swallowed hard, confusion rushing around me.

“Are you sure you’re not Sasha? You remind me so much of her.”

“Yes, pretty sure I know exactly who I am.”

A silence settled between us. Fuck this. Even if this woman claimed she wasn’t Sasha, something inside of me pushed on. I straightened myself in the bed, clearing my throat.

“Well, if you were her, I would tell you how much I’ve missed you.”

Her breaths quickened as she looked toward the door.

“Please, Mr. Everly. Is there anything else?”

“Yes,” knowing this wasn't the question she was asking but I didn't care about anything else right now.

“Sasha, I’m so fucking sorry I let you down.” A tear surprised me and escaped. Her face softened as she watched it roll down my cheek.

I pushed my head back against the pillow, pressing my palms against my eyes. “You deserved so much better. You deserved to be worshiped and treated like the treasure you are. Not taken to some run down shack, lied to, your innocence taken and then left.”

I let my arms fall onto the mattress on either side of me, keeping my eyes toward the ceiling, too ashamed to look at her.

“I’m such a fucking idiot. I was so young, so afraid of what I couldn’t give you, I never realized what I could. I was living in an abandoned warehouse. I had no money, no food. Nothing. I couldn’t protect you. I didn't even know how to save myself, how was I supposed to save you?”

“Why did you lie?”

Surprised to hear her voice, I lifted my head.

A sheen of tears glazed her distant eyes, in her mind she was a million miles away.

“What?” I questioned, unsure she’d really spoken.

Dropping her head, she whispered, “You said you lied to her, why did you lie?” Her questioning eyes found mine as she walked over to the side of the bed, gripping her clip board against her chest.

My head began to spin from the meds I’d just taken. I blinked, trying so damn hard to fight against it.

I took in a deep breath, shaking my head while I exhaled, “I don’t know Sasha, why does anyone lie? Because I’m a fucking asshole? Because you were, and still are, the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen? Maybe because in that moment, there was nothing I’d ever wanted more than to be the hero you needed.”

The room stared a slow spin. I laid my head back onto the pillow, unable to hold it up anymore.

“The way you looked at me that night, like I was your answer to your prayer.  I’d never had anyone look at me with such feeling. I wanted to be that for you, Sash. I wanted it so damn bad. I never meant to hurt you. Please…” My plea hung in between us, revealing the desire of my heart. I needed her forgiveness to go on.

“You have to believe me.” My eyes closed as softly falling footsteps echoed in my room once again, followed by the quiet swoosh of my door closing.

A cold sweat covered my entire body. My breaths quickened, and my weak legs shook from the stress of holding up my own weight for the first time in days. I tried to keep the spinning in my head at bay, but this damn pain was no fucking joke.

I tentatively paced back and forth, using my bed for balance, trying to clear my mind. I closed my eyes, telling myself to breathe deeply and keep it tight.

She’d been here. I knew it with everything in me. There was just so much I didn’t understand, but I was about to find out.

I limped to the window next to my bed. One thing I knew for sure, Maverick had ordered the hit that nearly killed both Braxton and me. If it hadn’t been for Stash, we’d be dead for sure.

Just like the badass he is, when the bullets started to fly, he’d run toward the trouble to save us.

“It was a no-brainer, brother,” he’d said. “We were either going to leave together or die together. Didn’t know which one, didn’t care.”

I sneered against the anger swirling in my chest. That fucker, Maverick, is going to die. I would show him exactly what the punishment is for trying to kill my brothers. It will look a lot like what I’d done to his old man, but slower. Much slower.

The blinds swayed, making a swooshing noise as the air conditioner kicked in. The gray of the stormy day came into full view. It was early morning but the sky didn't seem to know it.

Rain came down in steady sheets, mercilessly covering everything as lightening streaked across the sky. There was something about the uncontrollable element of a storm that resonated with me. I appreciate the way a storm moves along its path, overpowering its surroundings and demanding respect. It’s how I lived my life.

Holding myself steady with my hands, I leaned onto the window ledge, sighing as I pressed my forehead to the cool glass. Things had totally gone off the deep end in the last five days.

The door to my room cracked open and I turned.

Nancy’s mouth dropped when she saw me out of bed.

“Tight. What the Hell?”

“Where is she?” I grabbed at my side, walking toward her, growling as the pain crashed into me in waves. I stumbled, falling against the end of the bed.

Nancy hurried toward me.

“Where is who? And why are you out of bed by yourself?”

She helped me back into bed and I blew out the breath I was holding.

“Sasha,” I said through gritted teeth. “I know she was fucking here last night and I want to talk to her.”

Nancy rushed around, grabbing supplies and mumbling under her breath. She lifted my sleep shirt, pulling back the dressing covering my wound, and went to work.

“I don’t know who you’re talking about. Was it a visitor? Did you ask your night nurse, Julie?”

I grabbed her arm and she looked at me. “Sasha was my night nurse.”

She looked as serious as a fucking heart attack. “I don’t even know anyone named Sasha. Julie was your night nurse.”

I dropped her arm and rubbed my hands over my face.

“Fuck,” I growled out. Maybe I was losing my damn mind. Suddenly I wondered if any of it was real. Was I so whacked out my mind would play this game?

No. It wasn’t a dream. It had felt too real. There was no denying the way I felt when she touched me.

“Nancy, please. I know she was here. Are you sure there isn't some way it could be her?”

Her face changed from frustration to concern. “Tight, I think the pain is starting to get to you. I’m going to get you a pain pill.”

“No. I’m done with those damn things. I would rather have this pain and know for sure what I’m seeing is real. Pain is just pain. This not knowing if my mind is playing tricks is fucking unbearable.”

****

I laid in my bed, clicking through the channels like a madman and checking the clock every thirty seconds. Her shift started an hour ago. The anticipation of seeing her again had me crawling out of my own damn skin.

I’d refused my pain pills all day and it made me want to kill someone. The pain was intense, but nothing like my desire to see her again. And this time I would be of sound mind.

One of two things would happen tonight. Either she would confess to being Sasha and tell me why she lied, or I would end up in a padded room for harassing this poor woman with my hallucinations. Nancy promised to be the first one to sign the committal papers if I scared her friend.

I prepared myself for either.

My door creaked and I almost lost my shit.

I dropped the remote onto the bed and waited for her face to appear. My heart thundered like a damn cannon going off inside my chest. I tapped my fingers on the mattress, the extra energy in my body needing a release.

She marched into the room on a fucking mission, her orders obviously to ignore me at all costs. Eyes straight ahead, cold expression on her face. I watched every move she made thinking,
“She would make a damn fine old lady with that bad ass exterior.”

I smirked for a few reasons.

First, it was without a doubt her. She could lie all she wanted, I really didn’t care.

Secondly, she looked fucking hot in her light blue scrubs.

And third, she had just turned this into one of my favorite games. She thought she could out stubborn me. Silly girl.

She carried a clipboard in one hand and dressing supplies in the other. Stopping momentarily, she dropped the supplies on the bedside table and then hustled her cute little ass to my IV pole.

I’d been so nervous about her coming back, but with her actually here in my room, all my nerves calmed. I felt like Tight again—confident. Some people would say, arrogant, but I prefer the word cocky for various reasons.

I made a secret promise to myself. She would be mine, end of story. Now I had to convince her to
start
the story.

I cleared my throat and propped myself up onto my elbows.

“Hello, Sasha.” I smiled at her, throwing out the first game piece.

She rolled her eyes and it was fucking adorable. I couldn't help but roll my tongue over my bottom lip. I wanted a taste of her so badly. My dick twitched in my pants in agreement.

“I’m not Sasha,” she sighed, her eyes trained on her clipboard.

“Pretty sure you are,” I countered.

She walked around to the side of my bed, looking at the IV med and scribbling something on her clipboard.

“Are you hurting?”

“Like a motherfucker,” I said with a smile.

“Need pain meds?”

“Nope. What I need is for you to admit you’re Sasha.”

She dropped her hands to her sides, her shoulders slumping forward.

“Why would you even want me to be her? Sounds like you were a real prick to her. Why would you want to see someone you obviously have no concern for?”

“To apologize. And you’re wrong, I have great concern for her.”

“And you think she’ll forgive you?” She pulled the table with the supplies over to the side of the bed, snapping on a pair of gloves and arranging the packages.

“I can only hope.”

She turned toward me and hesitated. I watched as her eyes clouded with confusion.

“Lay back,” she said.

She laid her hand on my chest and I wished so badly she didn't have those gloves on. She pushed me back to the mattress, roughly pulling back the tape around the wound, making me instantly wish I would have waited until this was over to irritate her.

She turned around to grab her supplies.

“So, tell me. Why do you want her back?”

“You mean, you? Why do I want
you
back in my life?”

She shook her head slightly as she turned back to me.

“I want
you
back in my life so I can do it right this time. I’m a different person now—-a man. I want the chance to show you how much you have always meant to me.”

She took a deep breath and I noticed the tremor in her hand as she cleaned the skin around where that fucking prick Maverick shot me. I’d been lucky it was a clean shot, but it still hurt like a mother. I hissed at the burning sensation, pushing my head against the pillow as she wiped across the wound.

“Sorry,” she whispered.

I closed my eyes, waiting for the pain to fade.

“It’s okay, once I put a bullet in the asshole who did this, it will all be worth it.”

She straightened abruptly and I opened my eyes, finding her lost in her own thoughts again.

I reached for her, unable to resist the burning desire to sweep her into my arms.

“Hey,” I said softly.

She recoiled from my touch, her eyes filled with hatred.

“She would be crazy to get involved with you.” She leaned away from the bed, shifting her weight to one foot.

“Look at you. Hospitalized with a gunshot wound that you’re lucky to have lived through. Wearing the cut of an outlaw biker gang and suffering from caveman syndrome so bad you try to pull out your own catheter. And today, you refuse pain meds.”

Grabbing a handful of gauze and the tape, she bent back over me, finishing the job so she could no doubt get as far away from me as possible. My heart thundered realizing I was fucking this up big time. I needed to do something to turn this back around.

“Why would she want to come back to you? What do you have to offer?”

My mouth worked before my brain had time to catch up. “I have a big dick and I know how to use it.”

She lifted an eyebrow, tilting her head to one side while snapping off her gloves.

She made no attempt to hide the fact her eyes were skimming over my bare chest and zeroing in on my groin, heating my skin and making me feel more alive than I had in years.

Her eyes met mine again and I recognized the hunger. She was coming around.

“I’ve had bigger.”

The. Fuck.

I pushed myself up against my pillows. Stretching my neck from side to side, trying to release the knot of tension her words had just caused.

“Sasha, don’t talk about having sex with other men around me.”

She stilled, her back as straight as an arrow. “Are you serious?” She turned back to me. I could feel the anger radiating off of her in flames. I knew I’d pissed her off. It was an asshole thing to say, but the truth was, there was no way I could lay here in this bed with her talking about sleeping with other guys.

“I have never been more serious about anything in my damn life.” I made sure my eyes connected with hers and there was no question about how I felt.

Her mouth opened like she was going to say something, but then snapped shut. She bit her bottom lip and for a second, I thought she might draw blood. It was fucking sexy.

She finally spoke, her voice raw and trembling.

“So help me understand. You take this poor girl’s virginity, lie to her, promise you will save her and then leave her like a piece of worthless trash. And then you actually have the balls to think she has saved herself for all these years? Waiting for her prince on a fucking Harley to come and rescue her? You have no idea what she went through after you left.”

And there it was.

“I’m sorry.” I’d never meant anything in my life more than I meant those words.

Her hands squeezed into fists at her sides. “Now you’re sorry? What if she looked for you? That’s right, a fifteen year old girl, scouring those dirty and disgusting streets hoping to get a clue where to find you.”

I dropped my eyes to where my hands were folded in my lap. “I was scared. I didn’t know what to do.”

She let out a bitter laugh. “You were scared? Of what? Let me paint you a picture of what fear actually looks like. When she realized you weren't coming back for her, she stopped living. She didn't eat, she didn't sleep. You were her last hope and you walked away. Do you know how long she wondered what she had done wrong? Why she hadn't been good enough for you?”

“Holy shit. It wasn't you. You were perfect-too perfect. I was a stupid kid who didn't know what the hell was going on. I wanted to come back, I really did.”

“But you didn't come back, did you? No. Because it was a childish dream romanticized by two kids who thought they could overcome all the bad in the world together. That’s what I believed, you just lied about it.”

“Sasha, please,” I whispered.

Her head dropped forward and her hands covered her face. I could hear the pain in her voice. “You didn’t come back for me.”

My cold fucking heart shattered into a million pieces. I wanted to lie, to make up some sort of reason why I’d left. Something that would make this all better. But I just couldn't do that to her again, so I spoke the truth.

“No, I didn’t come back.”

She straightened herself, wiping the tears from her eyes.

“Did you ever think about me?”

“Every day.”

She covered her mouth with her hand trying to control her emotions but mine were out of control. I wanted to climb out of this damn bed and take her in my arms. I wasn’t sure if I even had the right to try to comfort her from the pain I’d been the one to cause but it wasn’t going to stop me.