Unleashed (9 page)

“Yeah,” Cort
says. He leans back and gives me a
what the fuck?
look.

“Do you f
eel like taking a walk?” I pull away and pretend to stretch out my back. I groan a bit for added affect. “I could really use some fresh air. I hate being slumped over a desk all day, especially when I’m making up for all those missed days. I just gotta take a break.”

“Alright, sure,” Cort nods at me. But he’s very perceptive, and he catches on to my plan to get away from Ezra’s Big Brother eye in the sky. I take Cort’
s hand in mine, and as I pass my desk, I quickly grab the letter and shove it into my pocket.

Chapter Six

Cortez and I settle on a park bench a few blocks from the Edge building. This is where I always go to get some fresh air and stretch my legs. After three decades of living a rural life, it’s strange to be surrounded by metal, glass, and concrete. I found the nearest patch of green the moment I moved here. I brought Cortez to this location because it wouldn’t look out of the ordinary to my stalker if I went to where I usually go. Not that my stalker is creating the sensation that is creeping down my neck again. I’m not sure who is watching me, but it’s definitely not Ezra. I try to rub the creepy-crawlies away, but it seems to only intensify the feeling.

“Do you f
eel that?” I wildly look around. There are too many people to just pick out one as the source of the sensation. Whoever it is could be hiding in plain sight.

“What?” Cort gaze
s around in confusion.

“It feels like someone is watching
us. My intuition is picking it up, making my skin crawl,” my tone holds hints of paranoia.

“I don’t feel anything,
Kat. Maybe you’re just stressed out after everything recently. You’ve been through a lot.” Cort rests his arm over my shoulders and pulls me into the safety of his embrace.

“Yeah, I thought that at first,
too, like I was being paranoid. But I felt it twice yesterday. Basically, it’s every time I’ve left the building. I feel it again right now. But there’s more.” I reach into my pocket and pull out the reason that I know I’m not losing my mind. I  hand Cortez the note that arrived this morning.

Cort
opens the envelope and quickly reads the one line written on the generic, white paper. He meets my eyes with ones filled with terror- terror I’ve held off since I first read the note.

I take the paper and read it again and again
, until the words blur together from my shaking hand.

You will beg this time, bitch!

“I don’t know who sent it. It looks like it’s from Ray, but it can’t be. It has to be a copycat, someone who wants me gone. The people in your life would directly challenge me. Maybe it’s someone from Ezra’s life. Do you think it could be Adelaide?” My voice cracks and I hate appearing so weak. I need to have an open mind to figure out what is going on. I can’t be blinded by fear, which is what my annoying note writer is hoping.

Cortez draws me tight against his body and squeezes until I almost suffocate. He breathes into my
neck, almost hyperventilating. “Let’s get the fuck out of here. We’re sitting ducks. We have to talk somewhere Ezra can’t listen in. Our room at Restraint has a jammer on it.”

***
 

“We can’t go through this again. We won’t survive it
this time, and I just don’t mean our deaths,” Cort screeches. He grabs a cane from its home on the wall and violently beats the spanking bench until he’s out of breath.

“What do we do? Who do you think it is?” I curl up on the sofa cradling a pillow to my chest.
“Cort, it’s going to be alright. Please calm down,” I say in a soothing voice. I need him to be able to think, and his temper is amping up my fear.

The
cane breaks in half from the force of Cort’s hits. He stares at the piece in his hand as if it offends him. He slowly and deliberately picks the broken piece up off from the floor and whips it across the room. The cane spears the wall like an arrow. Cortez turns to me with wild eyes. When he finally sees how terrified I am, he schools his expression and walks towards me.

“I don’t know who,” Cort
says as he sits next to me on the sofa. “I’ll make sure Ray is still locked in Hell. I’ll talk to Ezra and see what’s going on with Adelaide. There is stuff with them I can’t tell you. It’s the same as when you made me promise not to tell him that we saw them fucking. I promised him something as well. You two need to discuss that yourselves. I wish I could explain, but I can’t.”

“What do we do in the interim?” I squeeze the pillow and bury my face into it.

“I’ll tell Aaron not to leave Ezra’s side. You and I need to stick together. Honestly, we need to stay in our building. No walking outside. If we go somewhere we need to go from one underground parking garage to the next. I don’t trust being in the open. Edge and Restraint have top of the line security.”

“Yeah, so much so tha
t Ava can hack into them,” I sarcastically murmur.

“
A close friend of mine created the system, and I had to know how to run it. I just showed Ava how to play around with the harmless stuff. Trust me, it’s secure,” Cort stresses. “Shit! What are we going to do?” He leans back and pounds his head on the back of the sofa.

“We can’t tell Ezra. He will put us on lockdown. What if this is some sick prank. I really don’t want to spend every second of my life trapped in our apartment with the workmen. It’d be the same as being in prison. We can’t allow whoever
this is to change us. They want to frighten me, so I won’t let them,” I boldly say, but inside I don’t feel so bold.
 

“Fuck…” Cort
draws the word out, “the workmen. I have to double check them.” He pulls my head into his lap and places a hand on my hair.

“Ah, been there
, done that- it’s not happening, Cortez,” I angrily warn as I try to sit up.

“I
already apologized for taking your mouth like that, Kitten. We’re past that. I just want to hold you. I’m not trying for anything, honest.” He starts petting my hair.

“Whoever this is
, they are connected to Ezra. We have to protect him from this, even from himself.” I roll my face on Cort’s thigh, drying the tears that have escaped.

“Agreed,” he
huskily says. Cort pulls me into his lap and crushes me to his chest. “I can’t lose him. There are very few people in my life that if I lost them it would kill me, but Ezra is one of them. I would never survive his loss.” Cortez’s voice is thick with tears and fear.

“I know what you mean. If I lost some people in my life
, it would hurt, others it would kill a small piece of me. I think I would rather die than lose one or two of you,” I admit, and I’m shocked to realize it’s true. I hadn’t realized how much Ezra and Cortez have come to mean to me. I drop all pretenses and just meld myself to Cortez. I bury my face in his neck and inhale. I realize that Cortez and Ezra smell almost exactly the same, a perfect melding of their natural scents mixed with a little of mine. It’s the scent of home.

“I don’t know how to ask this without insulting you, Cortez. I’ll say I’m sorry in advance. What about Divina?
Would your wife be that angry at me to taunt me?”

Cortez’s
body shakes against mine in silent laughter. “You act as if Divina is the wicked witch.” He continues to laugh, but fails at silence. He starts to snort.

“What?”
I sound as embarrassed as I feel.

“Alright, it’s time for this conversation. But, first, why do you hate Divina?”
He bites back his laughter.

“I don’t hate her at all, Cort. I’m not doing you for her sake. It’s disrespectful to both of us, her and me, if you were to make love to me. I only asked because the note was directed at me. I don’t know if she knows about me or not.”
I try to pull away again, but Cort doesn’t allow it. If anything, he tightens his hold. The thought of wives and fiancées makes me angry, angry at myself for sharing a bed with them last night. It’s emotionally cheating, and I would hate the woman who would do that to my husband. I’m a faithless piece of shit.

“Of course Divina
knows about you. She’s been begging to meet you for weeks. Rest assured, she is not the one sending you scary notes.” Cort wipes tears of laugher from his eyes as he responds to me.

“
I don’t understand.” I squint up at him. “Why would any wife be okay with that? Doesn’t Divina have any self-respect?”

“Divina is family, not only my wife, but Ezra’s cousin. I’ve
known her just as long as I have Ezra,” Cort says with affection. “We were raised with each other by our mothers.”

“Do you love her?”
My voice sounds small and sad. Cort hugs me closer and nuzzles my ears.

“Yes, as a sister or a friend. There are some strange circumstances to our marriage
. Think of it as Royal England and we were keeping the fortune in the family. My mother-in-law, Pearl, is Ezra’s aunt. Diane and Pearl both know about how Ezra and I feel about one another. They worried that their dynasty would be lost if neither of us ever had children, especially since it’s impossible for us if we were together. This way their fortunes are secure, Ezra would get the entire inheritance regardless of what happens.”

“I don’t understand, wouldn’t Divina want her share? Why is it all Ezra’s?”
Confusion thickly laces my voice.

“
Divina will never have to work a day in her life, and she never has. She will want for nothing. Divina has lupus,” Cort’s voice is filled with heartache and pain. “She can’t have children, and we are thankful for every day her health holds out. Ezra is his family’s heir- the Holden family. It’s just Pearl, Diane, Divina, and Ezra. None of the ladies can bear any more children, age and disease. It was important that they protected their assets. We aren’t talking about some pocket change here. They are twins, and Diane sees all of us as her kids. She and my mother were very close. Our marriage was insurance for the future.”

“Yeah, but
Divina’s half would go to you,” I say. Cort just shrugs as if saying
yeah, so?
“I still don’t understand,” I say in confusion.

“Sometimes I think we have to hit you upside the head for you to get a clue. I guess I need to spell it out. I am married
, in name only, to Ezra’s cousin, to ensure the fortune stays in the family. Diane and Pearl see Ezra and me as partners. They are secure in the knowledge that their fortune is in safe hands.”

“
I’m confused to why Divina didn’t just fall in love and get married. It feels like she is just giving her life up to Ezra, like he’s a spoiled prince or something,” I mumble, feeling the feminist in me rising up.

“Divina’s
disease is bad, Kat. There are no guarantees for her. She didn’t want to find someone and worry that they wanted her for her money. Life is too short, especially hers if she isn’t careful. This is less stressful for her.”

“Yeah, but Divina
needs to live while she has the chance. I don’t get selfless people.” I shake my head angrily.

“Trust me
, Divina lives just fine.” Cort chuckles to himself. “This is for the family. If you can’t marry the love of your life, isn’t it better to marry for the love of family?” There is sadness in Cort’s voice, and I know he wishes he could marry the love of his life. Our state allows same-sex marriages. I’m confused as to why Cort didn’t just marry Ezra in the first place.

So I ask,
“Why didn’t you just marry Ezra?”

“I’m not gay, and Ezra isn’t,
either. Not really, anyway. It wouldn’t have impacted my career, but it could possibly destroy his. Ezra is the media’s golden boy. That’s why we don’t let anyone at Restraint know who we are except the Masters and a few people who are in our lives. The rest of the members can’t know. I don’t like wearing that hood. I liked it better when the dungeon was our own personal playroom, but things change.”

“
Restraint wasn’t always like this?”

“No, when it first started
, it was just Marcus, Dexter, and Ezra bullshitting. They opened the club, and a few years later, Marc declared the dungeon open for business. It was a good idea until the chaos started. It snowballed, and now we’re having a hard time containing it.” Cortez pulls me farther into his lap until I’m straddling his hips. “Enough talk of monsters, marriage, and mergers.” He mischievously grins.

“I’m still not having sex with you, Cort
.” I shift off his lap until I’m firmly on a sofa cushion.

“Why not?”
Cort’s crestfallen tone makes me feel bad for denying him anything. He looks into my face trying to read me.

“I have to meet Divina
first. You could be lying to me, and frankly, I’m just really confused. I don’t think having a relationship with anyone is a good idea right now. I need to get my life in working order.”