Absolution (The Protectors, Book 1) (4 page)

Jonas

This was stupid, I thought to myself as I pushed the front door open and made my way past the empty walls of my new gallery. Even though I’d signed the lease almost six weeks ago, I still got a thrill every time I walked past the blank, brick walls. My agent, Candace, had been adamant that I should paint the walls white since I wouldn’t agree to tear them down all together, but when she’d found out I had no plans to display my own art on them, she’d been apoplectic. I’d listened to her rant and rave all the way up to my studio and never said a word, and then enjoyed the sound of silence as she looked over the six paintings I’d finished since my arrival in New York. And just like that, her tirade about the walls ended and I practically saw the dollar signs in her eyes as she studied each canvas. All the paintings had sold within a matter of days and she’d found me spots in two upcoming shows in other galleries, and after that she never once voiced an opinion on what I was doing with my gallery.

Which brought me back to the present because what I wanted to do with it meant I’d had no choice but to endure the company of a man I couldn’t figure out. In the week since Mace had accepted the job, he’d shown up every day at the exact same time, given me a polite greeting, explained what his plans for the day were and then had gotten to work. No venom in his voice, no lust in his eyes. Meaning I couldn’t tell if he hated me, wanted me, both or neither. In fact, the only thing I’d managed to figure out was the guy had a thing for coffee. Since I didn’t have a coffee pot in the gallery, he brought his own thermos with him and it seemed like he was endlessly filling his travel mug with it.

Buying Mace a cup of coffee from the café down the street where I got my daily latte had dumb written all over it, but the truth was, I wanted to extend an olive branch. Not that I necessarily needed to mend any kind of rift – I just really wanted to interact with him. Why? I had no fucking clue. I also wasn’t expecting it to have any impact because my other efforts so far had failed. I’d offered to help work in the studio space on more than one occasion but the second I nearly tripped over a pile of old paint cans against one of the walls, Mace kindly suggested to leave the work to him since that was what I was paying him for. I’d extended an invitation to lunch, my treat, the very next day, but that had been politely rebuffed as well.

The progress with the renovation was slow but only because Mace had found a whole host of problems with things that he said weren’t up to code. He’d patiently explained his findings to me but I’d been too distracted by his rumbly, strangely soothing voice to actually hear what he was saying and when he called me on it, I sputtered out an excuse about needing to call someone and told him to do whatever he needed to do to get everything up to code.

It was an odd thing to walk into my own space and feel like a stranger but that was exactly what happened every time I walked into the studio. Today was no exception and when I saw Mace, his back to me, on his knees near one of the electrical outlets, I actually leaned against the doorframe just to watch him work. I had no clue what he was doing but watching his large but nimble fingers work with the array of colorful wires had me wondering what those hands would feel like against my skin. My attraction to Mace wasn’t a surprise since he was a truly stunning man and any man, gay or straight, would be hard pressed to say otherwise. My lust was what I was having trouble dealing with. Just being in the same room with the man was as detrimental to my body as when I’d seen him in all his glory without his shirt. It was a reaction I wouldn’t have expected considering my past.

“You need something?”

I started at Mace’s voice and barely managed to hang on to both cups in my hands. I glanced up and saw that he wasn’t even looking at me and I cursed myself for the sliver of disappointment that went through me. While I was very aware of Mace and my reaction to him, he clearly didn’t have the same issue with my presence. I was beginning to suspect more and more that I was more like a gnat to him – always hovering around, a bit annoying but ultimately not worth the trouble of trying to get rid of.

“I brought you some coffee,” I murmured as I straightened and walked across the room. His eyes finally lifted to study me and then he was climbing to his feet and by the time I reached him, he was towering over me. “I wasn’t sure how long yours stayed hot in your thermos for,” I stammered.

I stood there awkwardly as Mace watched me, his ever present unreadable expression filling his eyes.

“Thanks,” he finally said as he took the cup from me. Electricity flooded my nerve endings when his fingers brushed mine but I covered the tremor in my hand by shoving it into my pocket and pulling out the cream and sugar packets I’d grabbed from the coffee shop. “I wasn’t sure how you took it,” I said as I opened my palm.

“Just black with a pinch of…” he began to say but stopped when I reached into my back pocket and pulled out a small container.

“Cinnamon?” I finished for him.

“Yeah,” he said. “How’d you know?”

“Smelled it,” I said as evenly as I could. I hadn’t given much thought to how my attention to such a small detail would look. Desperate and maybe even a little stalkerish.

“What’d you do, steal this from the coffee shop?” he asked as he walked over to the table that he’d somehow managed to pry free from the floor at some point and had placed in the center of the room. He put down the coffee and carefully pried the lid off.

“Uh, yeah,” I said with as much indifference as I could.

Mace removed the cap and turned the cinnamon over to sprinkle some into the coffee but when nothing came out, he flipped it back and then glanced at me before removing the entire lid. I felt heat crawl into my cheeks as he looked at the safety seal still in place and then at me.

“Guess they forgot to take that off before putting it out for their customers,” I said sheepishly.

I was surprised to see a small smile tug at the edges of Mace’s mouth. “So unprofessional,” he said, though his tone held no doubt that he didn’t buy my story about me stealing the cinnamon. Since the last thing I wanted to admit to was that I’d bought the cinnamon specifically for this moment from a small market down the street, I tore my eyes from him and glanced around the space.

“How are things going?”

“I’ve almost got everything re-wired so I should be able to start working on the ceiling in the morning.”

I nodded like I knew what that meant. I hadn’t even realized the extensive water damage that had occurred to the ceiling tiles until Mace had pulled one down to show me the mold that had started to form.

“I was thinking you might want to consider some different lighting options. I know you guys probably prefer natural lighting but since you’re pretty limited in terms of windows in this room, I can install a few fixtures in the ceiling and then you can put in full spectrum fluorescent bulbs to mimic the natural light as much as possible.”

“Yeah, that would be great,” I managed to get out. I’d known the lighting would be an issue in the windowless space but hadn’t thought it was something Mace would have even considered. “How did you know about the lighting?”

Mace shrugged and sipped at his coffee. “Did some research.”

“Really?”

When there was no response, I glanced over my shoulder and saw Mace studying me over the top of his coffee as he sipped it. Whatever easiness I had spied in his gaze a few minutes earlier was gone and while he wasn’t looking at me with contempt, I still couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something off between us. It made me both nervous and frustrated. Nervous because there was a dangerous quality to Mace’s silence and frustrated because I wasn’t sure what I’d done to deserve such scrutiny. If I were smart, I’d head up to my apartment and get to work so I could ensure I had enough cash to fund my pet project but I hated the idea of hiding. I’d promised myself that after the events of four years ago, I’d never do it again.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” I asked as I turned my attention back to the damaged walls, already knowing the answer. Mace’s silence annoyed me since I knew without a doubt that he was still watching me but I didn’t turn around. I should have been more aggressive. This was my place after all. If I wanted to help, I should have just told him I was going to.

“You know how to patch holes in drywall?”

“No,” I admitted before forcing myself to turn around. “But I’m a quick study.”

*
* *

“Looks good.”

A ridiculous surge of pleasure went through me at Mace’s words. I’d like to think it was just the nuance of receiving praise for something I didn’t have a natural talent for, but I knew better. I wanted Mace’s praise and would have taken it in any form.

“Thanks,” I said as I studied my handiwork. Patching holes in drywall wasn’t something that took a lot of skill but I still felt absurdly proud of what I’d accomplished. “It’s really real,” I whispered.

“What is?”

Shit, I hadn’t even realized I’d said the words aloud.

“Nothing,” I said quickly and then turned to put the patching supplies on the table, but promptly slammed into Mace who’d somehow managed to sneak up behind me while I was lost in my reverie. His hands closed over both my upper arms and I instinctively froze. We both hung there like that for several long seconds and I found myself overwhelmed by the strength in his fingers as they pressed into me. I wondered if hands like his could deliver aching pleasure as easily as they could deliver punishing pain. And while my body wanted one of those things, my brain could only process the other. Because it was what I knew.

“Jonas, look at me.”

My heart seized at the sound of my name on his lips. He hadn’t called me Mr. Davenport anymore but he hadn’t used my first name either – not since the day I’d tended his injury in my apartment. I wasn’t even aware I’d dropped my eyes until he gave me the gentle command. I swallowed hard and did as he asked. The look was back…the one where it seemed like he was trying to figure me out.

I waited for him to say whatever it was that he was going to say but his eyes just stayed on mine until I finally felt him release my arm. His free hand came up to stroke over my cheek and I couldn’t hide the tremor that shot through my whole body at the contact. It wasn’t until I saw the chalky white substance on his thumb that I realized he’d only been wiping away some plaster from my face. I stepped back and wasn’t surprised when he instantly released me.

“Hello?”

The voice coming from the gallery broke whatever trance had taken hold of us.

“Yeah,” I called, my eyes still on Mace as I tried to figure out why I was so reluctant to walk away from him. There was no answer to be found in his eyes because while I was having trouble taking mine off of him, he wasn’t suffering from the same condition. “Coming,” I said loudly and then handed the supplies in my hands to Mace before hurrying up front.

I didn’t recognize the man standing in the middle of the gallery. I guessed him to be around 6’3 or so and in his late twenties or early thirties. His black hair was closely cropped and even from where I stood, his stunning blue eyes stood out. But it wasn’t just the unique, almost sapphire shade that had caught my attention – it was that they were shrouded with something so deep and so harsh that I felt an immediate kinship with him. He had the stance of someone in uniform - my guess was military or law enforcement – but he wore civilian clothes, jeans and a white button down shirt.

“Hi, can I help you?” I asked as I closed the distance between myself and him. His eyes shifted past me for a moment and I knew that Mace must have followed me.

“Are you Jonas Davenport?”

The stranger’s eyes weren’t on me when he asked, but I knew he was talking to me. I glanced over my shoulder and noticed that Mace was only a few feet behind me, his jaw drawn tight, his lips pulled into a frown and his eyes narrowed.

“I am,” I said as I turned my attention back on the stranger. I automatically extended my hand.

He shook it as he said, “I’m Cole Bridgerton.”

The name didn’t mean anything to me but I felt his hand tighten on mine just before he added, “I’m Carrie’s brother.”

Cole

The instant I said Carrie’s name, all the blood from the young man’s face drained and his mouth opened in surprise. He let out a small whoosh of air that had the man behind him taking a few steps forward and I wondered at their relationship. But I didn’t have time to dwell on it because Jonas’s free hand came up to cover his mouth. He had yet to release my hand.

“I…I…”

The combination of Jonas’s starts and stops as well as the pain that flooded his eyes had me second guessing my decision to come here, but his discomfort was a casualty of me needing answers more than needing to spare him any painful memories my presence would stir up.

“I was hoping we could talk. In private,” I added as my eyes shifted to the man behind Jonas. There was something about his hard eyes that had me instantly on alert. Jonas’s throat was working overtime as he tried to swallow and another rush of guilt went through me.

“Of course,” he said. I didn’t miss the tremor in his hand as he finally let go of mine and then turned to the man shadowing him. “Um, I’ll be back in a little bit, okay?”

The man gave him a barely-there nod but his eyes stayed on me. I didn’t miss the warning look in his gaze as his eyes raked over me. A strange sensation passed through me at the perusal but I didn’t have time to dwell on it because Jonas said, “There’s a coffee shop down the street if that’s okay.”

I nodded and followed him towards the door. The hair on the back of my neck stood up as I felt the gaze burning into me from behind. It was the kind of feeling that would have had me reaching for my rifle if we’d been anywhere else.

Jonas led me down the block towards the coffee shop but didn’t speak. I remained silent as I tried to adjust to the noise and chaos of the city. I’d only been discharged a little over a week earlier and I’d been warned on more than one occasion that returning to civilian life would be a challenge. The Navy shrink I’d been forced to meet with before I walked out of Naval Base Coronado in San Diego had gone over all the signs and symptoms of PTSD with me, and encouraged me to seek help if I felt I needed it. Who would have guessed that I would have happily chosen the debilitating disorder over the devastation I would have to face a mere seven days later?

Jonas kept his hands tucked in his pockets as we walked and he never once looked at me. In fact, his eyes never even left the ground and on more than one occasion, people coming towards us were forced to walk around him because he didn’t notice them. I was tempted to reach out and draw him closer to me so that we wouldn’t be taking up so much of the sidewalk but my gut was telling me he’d freak out even more if I touched him so I just kept pace with him. When we got to the coffee shop, he seemed to be on autopilot as he ordered a latte and when I went to pay for it, he didn’t even seem to notice. I’d already figured that my appearance in his life would be a shock, but his behavior was making me wonder if I was really prepared to hear whatever it was that he was going to tell me about my sister.

We found a quiet booth in the corner of the small shop. The awkward silence between us stretched as I tried to get a read on him. He was younger than I thought he’d be. My contact in the Chicago Police Department hadn’t had much information to go on other than a name but it had been enough of a starting point to lead me to his studio in a quiet area of Brooklyn. I’d expected someone closer to Carrie’s age…or rather, the age she would have been had her life not been cut short.

“How’d you find me?” Jonas suddenly asked and I looked up from my own drink to see that he was watching me.

“A guy I served with works for CPD. He was able to look up Carrie’s case for me and that’s when your name came up.”

“You’re in the military?”

“I was. Navy. I finished my last tour ten days ago.”

Jonas began chewing on his lower lip. “I’m sorry, she never told me her last name. I wasn’t even sure if Carrie was her real first name…it wasn’t unusual for kids like her – us - to use different names.”

With that one sentence, Jonas had confirmed what I already knew, but hearing it from his lips suddenly made it all the more real and I found myself struggling to find words.

“We didn’t know she was dead until a few days ago,” I blurted out.

Jonas’s eyes snapped up from where they’d been studying the lid on his cup. “What?”

Shit, this was not going the way I’d planned. I could feel my stomach rolling and I pushed my cup away from me and reached up to run my hands through my hair. It was already starting to grow longer than I normally wore it, and I wanted to laugh at the absurdity of one more little thing to get used to in a life that had changed overnight.

“They never told you?” Jonas whispered.

“There was some kind of mix up in their ME’s office and her DNA was never entered into CODIS. They finally figured it out and loaded it a couple weeks ago and matched her to a missing person’s report my parents filed after she disappeared eight years ago.”

“Oh God,” Jonas croaked as tears flooded his eyes. “Cole, I’m so sorry…If I would have known…”

I couldn’t stop myself from reaching out to cover one of his hands with mine. The warmth I’d felt earlier was gone and his skin felt cold and clammy against mine. I suspected mine didn’t feel much different.

“Jonas, I didn’t come here to blame you in any way,” I began. He nodded and I reached for a couple of the napkins the barista had given us and waited until he’d pulled himself together. When he seemed as composed as he was going to get considering the shit I’d just dumped in his lap, I said, “I was hoping you could tell me some stuff about her…the stuff that’s not in the police reports.”

Jonas managed a nod but when he didn’t say anything, I asked, “How did you two meet?”

“Bus station,” Jonas answered, still somewhat in a daze. He was undoubtedly still trying to process what was happening. While the circumstances of my sister’s death were limited, I knew enough to guess that Jonas had likely been caught up in the same life she’d found herself in after she’d fled our house in the dead of night, following a particularly heated exchange with our parents.

“I was…it was a good place to find guys looking for…” Jonas stuttered. His cheeks flooded with color and shame replaced the guilt in his eyes. He took a deep breath. “I’d just finished up in this alley behind the bus station when I saw her talking to this pimp. I could tell she was scared but I wasn’t sure if it was because of being in the city or if she was scared of the pimp…Anyway, I knew what he’d do to her, turn her into, so when I saw him walk away from her to take a phone call, I went to warn her.”

“How old were you?”

“Fourteen.”

It took every skill I had not to react to that. I’d struggled with the knowledge that at seventeen, Carrie was too young to understand the harsh cruelties of the world and would have been easy prey but Jonas had been even younger. I wanted to ask him how he’d ended up in the same situation as my sister but I knew it wasn’t my place. Jonas was already doing me a favor by linking me to the memory of Carrie and her final days.

“She listened to you,” I said.

Jonas nodded. “I think she knew what the guy was but she was so overwhelmed that I don’t think she really understood how much danger she was in. I took her back to my place. The first thing I told her was that she should go back home.”

A shadow of sadness flashed in Jonas’s eyes and I wondered if he wasn’t thinking back to whatever circumstances had forced him into such an ugly life.

“She said she didn’t have a home to go back to but she wouldn’t tell me what she meant. I figured maybe her folks” – Jonas’s eyes caught on mine – “your folks kicked her out or something.” His eyes dropped again and I noticed him rubbing a fingernail into the logo on the coffee cup.

“I told her she could stay with me while she looked for a job. She was really sweet and we hit it off right away and I was actually glad to have the company. We liked a lot of the same things – cheesy horror movies, Chinese food.” Jonas laughed and then said, “We couldn’t actually afford takeout so we’d save the oriental flavored ramen noodles for Friday nights and eat them while we were watching a late night horror flick…we called it date night except it was always early in the morning because I was working…”

Jonas’s voice dropped off and then his eyes went wide and he looked at me and said, “It wasn’t really a date night! She and I were never together like that…I’m gay.”

If I hadn’t been hung up on Jonas’s reference to selling himself for money, I would have laughed at his horror-stricken gaze as he tried to convince me, the big brother, that nothing untoward had happened between him and my baby sister.

Jonas must have realized I wasn’t concerned about the nature of their relationship because he continued on his own. “She tried finding work but the few places that would hire her always fired her when she couldn’t produce a social security card. I didn’t want her working in the type of places that didn’t care but I guess she felt guilty…” Again, Jonas’s voice dropped off.

“She felt guilty that you had to work more to pay for her,” I supplied.

Jonas didn’t answer and I didn’t need him to. It was the logical conclusion.

Jonas’s gaze momentarily darted around the quiet coffee shop and when his gaze finally reconnected with mine he said, “Are you sure you want to hear the rest?”

I only managed a nod because deep down, I hadn’t wanted to hear any of it. I’d wanted to believe that my sister was off living some fairy tale life and that all this was some fucked up nightmare.

“She’d been living with me for a couple of months when I came home one day and found her packing. I thought maybe she’d decided to go home but when she wouldn’t look at me, I knew what she’d done. I tried to talk her out of it but she kept saying it was for the best.”

Jonas dropped his eyes again. “Mateo was the worst of them.”

As soon as the name of the man who’d murdered my sister fell from Jonas’s lips, I had to clench my jaw to keep from telling Jonas to stop. I already knew the violent details of Carrie’s death, but hearing the other brutalities her killer inflicted upon her before he finally took her life was something I had no way of preparing myself for.

“Did you work for him?” I asked, hoping the question didn’t offend Jonas considering he hadn’t actually come out and admitted he’d sold his body to survive.

Jonas shook his head but didn’t say anything and I knew there was more there.

“I told her how dangerous he was but she was convinced that he cared about her and that she could handle what it meant to be one of his girls. I’d see her on the streets sometimes after she left, but she wouldn’t talk to me.”

I realized as Jonas spoke that he hadn’t just been scared for Carrie; he’d missed whatever relationship they’d managed to forge in the time since they’d met. I desperately wanted to ask him more about what had driven him to that life but even more so, I wanted to comfort him, to take away the haunted look in his gaze. The observation confused me, so I kept silent.

“About a month after she moved out, she showed up at my door. She was pretty messed up and I could tell she was on something. It took me a while to get it out of her but she finally admitted that Mateo had made her make a video with a few guys and another girl.”

Bile crept up the back of my throat and I couldn’t stop myself from covering my eyes with my hand. Not only had my sister been brutalized in every conceivable manner, her torment had been captured on tape and even now was likely being watched by all manner of men who were getting off on what had been done to her. Tears stung my eyes and my skin felt too tight for my body. Even breathing suddenly seemed to take too much effort.

“Do you want me to stop?” Jonas asked softly, his voice uneven.

Yes.

“No,” I said as I took another moment to get myself under control. “Finish it,” I ordered more harshly than I intended. “Please,” I added, softening my tone as I dropped my hand. Jonas was watching me with concern and I didn’t miss the sheen of moisture in his eyes.

“Once whatever Mateo had given her wore off, she started talking about wanting to go home. I told her she should call her parents but she was scared about what Mateo would do to her for leaving him, so she said she needed to leave that night.” Jonas’s voice dropped as tears began to slip down his cheeks. “She wanted me to go with her. She said your parents…she said they’d accept me.”

“They would have,” I said automatically. Although my parents and Carrie had butted heads on more than one occasion, they would have welcomed Jonas with open arms. They were just those kind of people.

The spark of hope I saw in Jonas’s eyes was devastating. It was almost as if he was back in that moment – a scared, traumatized fourteen-year-old kid who was being given a second chance to be what he was supposed to be…a kid. The light in his eyes quickly died out as he snapped out of his reverie and remembered where he was and why he was there.

“We stopped at her place on the way to the bus station so she could pack. I was in the bathroom getting some of her stuff together when I heard someone knocking at the front door. She answered it before I could stop her.” A harsh sob suddenly tore from Jonas’s throat. “I’m sorry Cole, I couldn’t stop him. I swear I tried…”

Despite Jonas’s distress, I needed him to finish it so I said, “What happened?”