An Unknown Place (2 page)

Mac

What was I doing here? What was I thinking? After I got home last night I couldn't go to sleep. I kept thinking about the roofied guy laying in bed at the hospital. He had been tall, at least 6'4", with black hair and almost as dark eyes. His face had been molded by an artist and, by the way his shirt was hugging him, his body probably too.

It bothered me, for whatever reason, that I didn't know his name. It was eating me up. I dealt with people every day and didn't know their names and couldn't care less. Sometimes they'd even offer their names, but by the time they left their seat at the bar, they were just another memory in the junk drawer.

So, why on God's green earth was I standing outside of the ER entrance debating on if I should go in? I should just go home and go back to sleep. I had the day off and needed to feed Gulps, my fish. I shouldn't be here. Gulps needed me. As I turned to leave, I saw Cam strolling up to me, still in her uniform, arms crossed over her chest. She worked third shift, so she must've just gotten off.

"Whatchya doin'?" Cam had that look on her face that told me she knew exactly what I was doing.

"Just checking to make sure the doors here are working."

"Did you try them?" Cam, without asking directly, was seeing if I had gone in to talk to the hottie.

I slumped. She had me. She knew my story. She was literally the only person I had ever told about being raped. Her response to my story? (Other than using every name in the book to describe the “no good asshole”). "Just because someone wears a badge, does not make them trustworthy. It should, but it doesn't. And just because someone seems like an outright ass, doesn't mean they're all bad, either."

I knew she was giving good advice, but I just didn't have the patience or the frame of mind to accept any of it.

"What am I doing here, Cam?"

"What any red blooded woman would be. You just aren't doing it as fast." She put her arm out to me and I linked mine through hers. We walked through the front doors of the hospital, arm in arm. Cam led me up to the front desk.

"Jen, can you please tell me what room ya'll took hunky Mr. Kellan Freemont to?" She asked.

"Oh, Lord Camille. He is
so
hot. I mean we are all gushing about him –" Cam put up her hand, and Jen immediately stopped talking. Jen, who was a short chunky girl, attended the ER front desk. Jen blushed furiously and I could tell she was embarrassed for talking about the hunk. Good to see he had this effect on everyone. Well, everyone except Cam. But I knew his name now, so I didn't technically have to go see him, right?

"I brought him in, I know. What room." Cam was clearly tired from working all night and I'm sure she wanted to go home. Jen wrote a number down and handed it to her. Cam walked me to the elevator and pushed the up button, putting the piece of paper with his room number in my hand.

"You're here, so I know there's interest. Just don't let your brain get in the way."

The doors opened. Cam pushed me gently in, stepped a foot in to push the button for the 12th floor, and then got off. As the doors closed I could see the encouraging look on her face, and feel the horrified one on mine. What was I doing?

Kellan

"Kel, what the hell?! How did you let this happen?" Jake, my best friend and business partner screamed in my ear.

We were set to have a meeting with a new beer distributor today and I had to call and reschedule. They took it well considering I had been roofied and couldn't help it. But now we couldn't get another meeting for three months.

Jake and I owned a bar called Freemont's. Jake wanted to use my last name for the bar because it would pull in more business. I didn't want to use my last name because it might pull in the wrong business. I lost.

My family was known for their mob connections. While it had never been confirmed, every one of my Dad's business "partners" had been an uncle and they always gave me money when they saw me. To say the least, all that money I had saved up from my
uncles
came in handy when
I left home the day after I turned eighteen, putting myself through college with a ton of hard work and a lot of scraping by.

I started my own business after college and had been well-off ever since. I had decided to only go back home if I had to. I was thirty one and hadn’t been back. If I ever needed anything I knew my parents and my brother would be there, but I tried not to lean on the family…at all.

"There's nothing I could've done to prevent this."

"Bullshit. If you'd kept your dick in your pants, this wouldn't have happened."

"Are you blaming me for being drugged?!"

"No. I'm blaming your dick for taking a crazy bitch, a bitch you barely knew, to Vegas with you. If you hadn't taken her, none of this shit would've happened. We'd be in the meeting we're supposed to be in!"

"Alright, man. Take a breath. Since I'm here, how about I go out to The Strip Brewery and see if I can strike up a meeting with them?"

We had been trying to carry The Strip's beer for a while and they had avoided a meeting at all costs. I knew the reason they were avoiding it was because they didn’t wanted to get involved with the mob. I had to show them that I wasn't involved with the mob, so I figured, since I was here an extra day, I might as well do a little work. Normally, Jake did the talking at the meetings. He was better at it and sometimes my temper got a hold of me. I could hear his sigh through the phone.

"Can you handle it?" 

“Yeah, I've got it," I clipped out. I could feel my temper rising.

"Let me know how it goes." Jake hung up without another word.

As I put my phone on the weird table hanging over the bed, I looked up feeling like someone was watching me, and found Mac standing at the door, shifting from foot to foot as though she was unsure what to do. How a woman that looked like her could ever be unsure, I didn't know.

"Well, look who it is."

She stepped into the room and I moved to sit up. I had one of those ass-showing gowns on, and knew I must look like shit. I didn't do hospitals. That and the fact that a nurse had been in every hour on the hour to take my blood pressure, poke and prod me, had left me with little sleep. Even though I knew I looked like death warmed over, a few of them even flirted with me. I didn't have the energy to deal with the attention, though. Especially when all I had thought about were the pair of beautiful caramel eyes looking at me now.

"Come to find out my name?" She still hadn't said anything. Normally, women talked my ear off. Apparently, I was the girl.

"Kellan Freemont." She said. The look on my face must've given me away: shock. "I had to ask Cam, the paramedic from last night, to help me find you here. She knew your name."

I shouldn't have been as excited as I was about her reaction to me, but it didn't seem like she had any recognition as to who my family was and I loved that. I also loved the way she looked in her ass-hugging holey jeans she was wearing with a white t-shirt. It was non-descript, but perfect on her.

"And you are Mac..." I let it hang so she knew I wanted her full name. I didn't think she'd have just one short name, like Cher.

"Mackayla Montgomery. My friends call me Mac." She got a light in her eyes, like she was about to laugh.

"Mac. You tend bar in the airport. What else do you do?" I asked, feeling like an idiot middle-school boy who just found the first girl he wanted to feel up.

"I bartend at any of the bars in the airport. We get passed around if a place is short staffed. It's easier to do it that way with security clearances and what not." I felt a surge of jealous possessiveness flare up in me. Her mentioning getting passed around did not sit well with me, even though I knew it was a platonic pass around.

"You bartend anywhere else?" 

"I used to bartend at The Strip, but decided it wasn't my thing."

And I saw that damn mask hide her from me again. I liked it before, now it annoyed me. But I knew my luck must've changed, because here Mac was and I knew I would be needing her.

"How do you feel about a little trip to your old employer?"

“Why?"

"I am trying to get them to allow my bar to carry their beer."

"I would've thought Lynn'd jump on that. Unless it's a hole in the wall." Okay, I didn't know who the fuck she was talking about now. Maybe she was talking about another bar called The Strip.

"It's not a hole in the wall, it's a very nice bar. You're talking about the same brewery right? Because the only one I've talked to there was Michelle." Mac threw her head back and laughed. And I felt my heart constrict.

"Michelle is Lynn's alter ego. How do you not know who the owner of The Strip is? Michelle is the name she gives to someone she doesn't want to meet or see." Mac frowned at me. "Who are you?"

"Just a guy trying to make a living."

While that wasn't totally true, it also wasn't a lie. That is all I was trying to do. I couldn't help who my family was. I was only attached to them through blood and name.

"If you're lying to me I will chop your balls off."

Woah. Where had this Mac come from? She seemed so sweet before. But I recognized the fire in her. It was akin to my own.

"Noted." I cleared my throat. I was going to tell her about my family, really I was, but there was a knock on the door. We both looked and the doctor was standing there with my chart.

"Alright, Mr. Freemont. I'm going to look you over and make sure everything checks out and then you can get outta here," The doctor said.

I looked over at Mac and her eyes were big. She moved toward the door. I was losing her.

"Wait, you can stay. I'm sure it won't be that invasive, right Doc?"

"As long as you don't mind her seeing you turn your head and cough."

"Can you just wait in the hallway?" I asked.

I wouldn't have minded Mac being there if it was her hands down there, but with the Doctor doing it – might get a little weird. She nodded and went out the door, pulling it closed behind her.

I was suddenly, irrationally worried that she wouldn't be there when I got done with this little ball squeeze.

Mac

As I stood in the hallway waiting for Kellan I got nervous. When we talked, it felt natural. I was comfortable, until he brought up the Michelle/Lynn confusion. Lynn had been my first, and for a while only, friend in Vegas. She owned The Strip Brewing Company and she was a kind hearted person. She was also the one who had taught me how to stand up for myself. 

Kellan had blanched when I had brought up chopping his balls off, but at least he knew I was serious and wouldn’t stand for being jacked around.

I didn't know why Lynn didn't want to do business with Kellan, but I was going to ask her. 

The doctor exited the room a few minutes later with a thumbs-up and left me standing there, holding up the wall. I decided to get a drink of water from the drinking fountain down the hall. As I walked back toward Kellan's room, he was exiting, still pulling on his clothes. He whipped his head around. Once he saw me his expression calmed. What the hell was that? I felt my nerves flare to life again.

Maybe I should have a forgotten appointment I needed to get to instead of going with him.

I finally made my way over to him.

"I have this weird feeling that you're going to slip through my fingers," He said.

I could tell his honesty shocked him almost as much as it shocked me. I scratched my forehead, my nervous tell.

"You're only here for a short time, right? So I'm inevitably going to slip through your fingers."

"I guess you have a point there. Doesn't mean we couldn't stay in touch. I live in Maryland so it’s on the opposite side –" He said, and stopped talking. I’d frozen when he’d said Maryland.

"I won't visit Maryland ever again. But, yes, we could keep in touch."

Why had I told him that? Good Lord, something must be wrong with me. Maryland is where I had moved from to get away from the man who had ruined my life. And there was no way Kellan was going to want to talk to me long distance. He was too good looking, and seemed like he was a bit of a player, to do something like that, especially with the friend status attached to it. But of course, I had to bring up Maryland, too. Damn I was an idiot.

As all of the panic ran through me, I also patted myself on the back for opening myself up to the possibility of keeping in touch with him. I had attended many support groups and been told repetitively that little steps were just as important as the big ones.

"Why won't you visit Maryland?"

I shut down. I wanted to go crawl into a hole and die. I was still so embarrassed by what had happened to me. I fought back my demons so I could continue to stand and looked up into his eyes steadily. I said my tagline I used when this subject had come up over the last few years.

"Haven’t you ever just hated a place so much you didn’t want to go back?"

I watched his face morph from confusion to understanding, which was weird. Normally, people told me
nothing could be that bad
or
no
or
you can't hate it there that much
. But it looked like Kellan had a similar place on the map.

"Yes, I have."

So I was right. That made things much easier for me. Less explaining.

"But I'll be there. That has to make it a little better."

I knew Kellan was joking when he said it, it seemed to be his thing when a subject got too serious. I just nodded. Not wanting him to know that
nothing
could make me go back there, not even him.

"Let's hit the road." I looked down at my phone and saw it was almost noon. “Lynn will only be there for another fifteen minutes. I’ll text her and ask if she can stay longer.”

"That'd be amazing. Thank you."

It was such a simple thing, that thank you. People said thank you all the time. But rarely did I catch a meaningful thank you.

"You're welcome, Kellan." I texted Lynn.

Me:
Can you stay for a little while longer? I have someone I want you to meet.

Lynn:
Sure. Boyfriend? <3

Me:
Just a friend. But I think you'll like him.

Lynn:
You know I don't swing that way. ;) I’ll wait, but don’t take too long.

"Alright, we're set." Kellan led me out the front door toward a sleek black classic Jaguar sitting in a spot outside the emergency room exit. "Nice ride."

"I called for a car while the doctor was doing his exam.”

I laughed. That had probably been an interesting phone call, with a cough between every other word. I hadn't missed the fact that Kellan, whether deliberate or not, had a way of making me laugh. I had laughed more in my time with him than I had in a long time.

There was a man standing next to the Jag in a black suit. He had a military cut and looked official. He made me very nervous. I stopped walking toward the Jag, and Kellan looked from me to the military guy I couldn't take my eyes off of. I knew that not every military/cop/etc. was a bad guy. I knew that, but I had a fear of those types that was completely validated by my very bad experience.

Kellan

I couldn't figure out what was going on with Mac right now, but I got the distinct feeling that whatever horror was crossing her mind had something to do with her aversion to Maryland. I jogged up to the driver and handed him a hundred dollar bill.

"Won't need 'ya today, just the car. Thanks man." 

"No problem." The guy pulled out his phone and walked toward the parking garage. I looked back at Mac and she still had her eyes on the retreating driver's form. I stepped in front of her stare and she blinked, coming out of whatever trance or memory she’d been stuck in.

"You alright?" I asked gently so I didn't scare her.

"Of course. I'm fine." She didn't look fine, but I'd let it drop for now. I didn’t want to push her too hard too soon.

I opened the passenger's side door for her and she just looked at me. 

"Are you going to get in?" I asked her.

"Yes, I am." I had been holding the keys in my other hand. She grabbed them and walked to the driver's side. "I live here. Makes more sense if I drive.”

She had me there. I shrugged and got in the passenger’s seat.

We pulled up to The Strip Brewery and it was nothing special. The building stood toward the end of the strip. I had high expectations for the most talked about micro brewery in Vegas. I was unimpressed by the outward appearance. It looked like a giant warehouse, with exposed brick on the front. There was a sign declaring it The Strip Brewing Company that was made entirely out of bottles. It was a kick-ass sign, I’d give
Michelle
that.

Mac got out from behind the wheel of the car and I felt relief flood through me. She should not be let behind the wheel of a car, or any other motor vehicle, for that matter. The girl drove like the car’s trunk was on fire and she was trying to put it out…with evasive maneuvers and speed. I commented about her driving on the way over and got the response: Everyone in Vegas drives like this. But I looked around and not everyone in Vegas drove that way.

I shut my door and Mac locked the car. She turned to go in the bar and I knew I was about to lose my chance to tell her about my family. I wasn’t stupid. I knew a woman like Mac would talk to her friend about why she wouldn’t do business with me. It was probably the only reason she had come with me, to find out what kind of scum I was so she could put me behind her.

I could tell just from the few short encounters I’d had with Mac that she was not only smokin’ hot, but she was also hardened. Something had happened to her and it had changed who she was. She had enough trust issues pluming out of her butt that she looked like a peacock. It just made trying to get her sweeter.

“Mac! Wait up.” She stopped and turned to me frowning. I hated that look on her face.

“Don’t you want to go in? Isn’t that the whole reason we’re here?”

“Yeah, but I’ve gotta tell you something.” Mac put her hands out in a go ahead motion and I turned into a chicken. What if telling her ruined our awkward friendship? “Alright, so it’s about my family.”

“Uh huh…” She was encouraging me, which only made it harder.

“They live in New York. And, uh…are kind of known for their mob connections.” Mac froze. I knew she would. I knew she should run as far from me as possible. “I moved away when I was 18 and haven’t been back.
Please
…” I didn’t know why I was pleading with her. It didn’t make sense for me to do this. I had nothing to apologize for. I had worked my way through the shit storm my family had created around me, and I still was.

“Your family’s involved with the mob?” She was as still as a statue with the exception of her mouth.

“Yes. I’m only related by blood. Not by values.”

“So, your values are worse than theirs? Or better?”

“Depends on who’s asking. Better on some things by most people’s standards, worse on others.”

Mac sighed like she was exhausted. I didn’t blame her. I exhausted myself sometimes. But what I told her was true. I was honest in all of my dealings – business and personal. Part of the problem was my name and part of the problem was my money.

My personal life was crap because I had a hard time trusting any woman with who I was and how much I was worth. My name was just that – a name. It didn’t make me who I was, or maybe it had. If I hadn’t flown the coup when I was eighteen I may have turned out as a much different person. And of course the problem with my money was that gold diggers were always after my wallet.

“Well, that explains Lynn’s aversion to you.” Mac said.

“I have no affiliation with my family other than they are my family. I don’t do business with or for them.”

I ran my hands through my hair. Maybe pulling my hair out would help with the intense pressure I always felt when my family came up in conversation. Mac put her hand on my arm. I must’ve been grasping my hair harder than I thought. I loosened the grip I had on my hair and clasped my hands at the back of my neck. We probably looked crazy, her with her hand over mine, mine grasping my hair. Mac dropped her hand and smirked.

“Okay.” She believed me? So easily. It was so unlike my other conversations about my family that it caught me off guard. I thought I would’ve at least had to do a little more dancing for her to believe me.

I looked into her eyes, I didn’t know what I was expecting to see but it sure wasn’t the pain that was clearly there. She tried to hide it from everyone, I could see that and most of the time she did a good job of it, I had seen that too. I didn’t know where that pain was coming from but I wanted to soothe it. Damn. When did I get to be such a girl? I normally hit it and quit it.

Something in this girl brought a protector out in me that I hadn’t known was there. Without telling my arms to do it…I reached for her and pulled her to me, squeezing her tight. Trying to soothe the pain in her eyes. I felt her squeeze me briefly and then struggle to get out of my arms. That was strange.

Normally women wanted to hang all over me. This woman was nothing like any other I’d met. Just to see if she would stop struggling I hung on for a minute and felt like I was trying to hold onto a fish out of water.

I let go and stepped back. She stumbled and looked like a pissed off cat, I swear her back was arching. Her face was red and her eyes were huge. What was that about? She shoved my shoulder, turned and went inside.

Mac

I couldn’t get away from him fast enough. I was totally freaked out. How had I let my guard down? He had grabbed me. I knew he was trying to hug me, which was odd because he didn’t seem like the hugging kind, but after the initial moment, panic gripped me.

I couldn’t help but recall how it had felt to be held down. Yes I had been to therapists, a lot of them. They had all told me that the only way to really get over it is to move on, live my life and experience the world. Let’s face it, I wasn’t living a normal life like every other twenty six year old woman should be. Nope. I hid in a hole, a.k.a. my apartment, most days and the days I had to go outside of my safe haven, I hid in my well constructed shell: my head.

For some reason Kellan had gotten me out of my hole for a day, into the sun, and I should’ve been grateful. Instead I pushed him when he hugged me. I laughed humorlessly and ran my hands over my face, thinking that there was no way after my strange behavior that Kellan would’ve followed me into the bar. He probably packed up his nice-ass rental and went back to his hotel.

I turned around and saw him just as he came through the front doors. Guess I was wrong. I shouldn’t have been surprised. He was raised in a family of mobsters. But who was I to judge?

I ran away from home when I was sixteen. My home life wasn’t horrible. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t horrible. Most of the time, my mom and dad simply ignored me. It hurt me when I was younger and then pissed me off when I hit puberty. Why hang around if you were invisible? I floated my way around the east coast and when I was twenty one I settled in Baltimore, Maryland for about three years. After that, well I’d rather not voluntarily think about what happened the day that changed me forever.