13. Scattered （Hannah）

13

Scattered (Hannah)

I woke up in a sweat and smelled...pomegranate.

Jerking up, my stomach heaved. Just when it didn't seem possible, my body learned to hate the scent of that sickening fucking fruit more than ever.

“Hold her the fuck down. She moves too much. Bound to do some real damage if we let her kick and scream.” Dom smiled, sitting in a chair next to me, switchblade in his hand.

I watched him sink it into the open pomegranate, pulling a juicy red seed out on the tip. Several goons put their arms on me, pushing me back onto the bed. Pain ripped through my lower abdomen.

I looked down and saw blood. Emptiness. Something torn from me while I was knocked out.

Oh, God. Where's my baby?

I squirmed frantically. One of the men growled in my ear, pushed me down harder, clapped his dirty hand over my mouth, before I could scream.

“Easy, peach. You're not doing anybody a favor, flapping around like a fish out of water.” Dom's dark eyes focused on me while he leisurely fed more blood red fruit into his mouth. “You're wondering where he is, yeah?”

He? My heart skipped in my chest, confused, unsure if I should be celebrating my son if they'd murdered him.

“Will, go grab the kid, and show her.” The other goon who'd helped force me down walked into the bathroom.

A few seconds later, he strolled out with a baby carrier in his hand, the soft, sleepy little life I'd brought into the world tucked into a blanket. I let my eyes take him in, oblivious to the horror around us for a moment, marveling at the miracle I'd created with the man I missed more than anything.

“Take a good, long look, peach, because it's gonna be one of your last. Soon as you can walk, we're hitting the road. Whole fuckin' highway's crawling with cops. You brought them out of the woodwork, making us get so rough at the hospital.”

I looked at my baby helplessly. Why didn't this seem completely real?

Adrenaline swirled in my system, kicked my nerves every time I moved. But the pain, the happiness at seeing my son, and the hideous gravity of this situation painted everything in a surreal gloss. I lifted a hand, touched my head, and realized I was burning up.

Fever. Weakness. No wonder it didn't take much for the goons to force me down, no matter how much I tried to kick and scream.

“Please. Not Seattle. It's so cold this time of year...”

I stared at my baby, more worried about keeping him safe than catching pneumonia in the cold, gloomy Pacific Northwest. My infant son snuggled into his blanket, trying to burrow into the covers, hiding from the chill in the room. The bastards surrounding us were all wearing thick leather jackets.

It was cool here, but Texas was hardly a death sentence. Further north, that might be a different story, trapped with these reckless animals pretending to look after us.

Dom smiled. So evil, so smug, so vicious I wished I could just reach up, and tear his lips clean off his face.

“What? Why're you looking at me like that? Just fucking tell me,” I sputtered, noticing how weak my voice sounded. He had to lean just to hear me.

“You're getting real flustered over nothing, peach. Lucky you, we're not going to Seattle.” He paused, letting the mystery torture me. “We're heading for Miami.”

“Miami?” I shook my head. “What? There's nothing any of us want there.”

“Correction,” he said, holding up another pomegranate seed on his knife. “There's a big black market for kids.”

I glared through my weakness, rage filling my veins instead of fear. “Fuck you, Dominick. You're not even funny.”

“Peach, peach, we've worked together long enough to know I'm no comedian. You might laugh at the buyer I have in mind. Funny little man with an accent, he talks a lot about this island out in the Caribbean where a bunch of rich freaks pay good money to dance around naked and dress up in Druid robes. Some kind of cult for bored, high class assholes. I think it's just one big frat house for spoiled fucks into voodoo. Anyway, they pay good money for the fleshbags they sacrifice there on the big night, before they get too deep in the drugs and fucking their whores. They'll pay double for kids. Can't say I give a fuck if my man's making it up – and maybe he is – all I know is he's paid me top dollar before when I sold off a few girls. He's an A-plus buyer. We've got ourselves a rare opportunity to collect on your debt in one sweet deal, and we're gonna take it.”

I screamed, my strength returning. It took three of his goons to hold me down while I kicked, banging my head against their shoulders. I bit into one asshole's hand and tasted iron. Snarling, he punched me in the jaw, forcing my teeth off his skin.

They overpowered me eventually, cuffing one hand to the bedpost, high over my head. It wouldn't take long for my arm to go numb, preventing any more accidents.

“Fuck's sake, peach, you're acting like a brat,” Dom said calmly, chewing more blood fruit. “You fucked me over, you understand? Got two of my boys killed. I'm man enough to let you live...in a sense. You'll be sold off for my time and suffering, but that funny little man I mentioned isn't interested. Broads with too much kick aren't really his type. We'll find you a buyer, peach, and you'll get to live out your days sucking, fucking, and maybe using your skin as an ashtray for your new owner. Pretty damned easy, considering a little fuckin' coding was too much goddamned work!”

He roared the last part. When I opened my eyes again, he stood over me, glaring like the maniac he was. He slapped me, and the room spun.

I thought I'd black out. Maybe it would've been sweet mercy.

But my baby's crying kept me awake. “No!”

I reached out for the child I hadn't even named, helplessly moving my hands, crying out for Dusty as much as I wanted a miracle.

“Get that goddamned kid out of here. Spike the fuckin' formula, whatever it takes to shut him up.” Growling, Dom hurled his half-eaten pomegranate at the floor. Seeds scattered across cracked wood and hit the walls like tiny shrapnel.

“More trouble than you're worth, bitch,” he said, leering in my face. “Story of this whole fucked up arrangement I was fool enough to trust.”

I stopped moving just long enough to realize he'd put his blade against my neck. Slow breaths. You can't pass out again, or it's all over, I told myself, forcing my eyes to stay open, fixed on the monster leaning over me.

“Don't make me regret keeping your ungrateful ass alive, Hannah. I'm not an evil man. You think I like this? Think I enjoy carving bitches up, or figuring out what pimp to send them to next, while I hand off their kids to get burned like a bag of fuckin' leaves?” He snorted psychotic rage in my face. “You forced me into this. Pushed me too far. Don't keep pushing, peach. You'll find out I'm approaching my limit real fuckin' fast. Keep kicking me in the balls, and I might decide you're not worth the trouble. I'll take the kid, cut my losses, finish what fever's started, and leave you to die on the side of the road.”

His eyes beamed hate, sick and brutally honest. Unmistakable evil.

He'd fed on enough pain for now. When I wouldn't give him anymore, he pulled away, his heavy shoe crunching a few stray seeds on the floor as he dragged his chair across the room.

I would have given anything to see Dusty's beautiful grey eyes one more time. Dom would kill me sooner or later, whatever gross incentives he offered in this game.

Regret ballooned inside me.

I'd made my mistakes, panicking and running when I shouldn't have. Hiding from the only man who ever loved me with his whole heart while our baby grew inside my stressed out body.

My life was about to be a total loss, and it killed me. Especially losing our baby without as much as a name to his little face. Much less a chance to let his father hold him, know him, love him.

More than anything, while I lay there tangled in the sheets, one hand cuffed to the bed, surrounded by these killers, I had one selfish regret.

I missed my husband's face more than my own life. Dusty's cool grey eyes, his expert lips, the salt and pepper stubble that used to scratch my face when he explored every inch of me.

I did everything I could to bleach it from my brain these last few months, on the run, and I'd failed miserably .

He was gone, but not forgotten. Robbed away by my own stupid actions.

Focusing on the mistakes wouldn't bring him back. So, I lay there in hell, struggling to remember every last detail of the man I'd loved with as much crystal clarity as I could get through pure delirium.

The next time Dom swore, barking an order to his men, I had a strange, sad smile on my face.

Dusty made me happy to the bitter end, and I wouldn't let anyone take that away.

The end was coming. I knew it the next time my eyelids fluttered open, and I heard a heavy roar outside, several loud engines, snarling and impatient.

Dom and his bastards moved around the room in a flurry. They were getting ready to load us up, and take us to the next world, one wicked way or another.

If there was any justice in the universe, it would be kinder than this one to me and my child.