If Tomorrow Never Comes (4 page)

That
evening, a stormy mood followed him to his apartment and hurled the door
shut.
 
He never noticed that keys flung
on the kitchen table almost crushed a cockroach.
 
Jerking open the refrigerator door finding
his customary can of beer was not a difficult feat considering the appliance
rarely stored anything else.
  
Popping
the top, angrily swishing a stray cat constantly coming and going at will
through the open window off the only chair, he settled down to guzzle the nerve
numbing liquid and smoke a half pack of cigarettes.
  

Much
later than intended, confident the fire inside had been smothered, he checked
on his captive.
 
Discovering that once
more she’d refused nourishment sent his blood pressure skyrocketing into the danger
zone.
 
Despite all the vulgarities
sputtered, she never uttered a goddamn word.
 
Making matters worse, he knew she was not a junkie, surely by now she
would have done anything for a fix, anything.
 

A
full-blown case of anxiety was a reasonable expectation considering that if his
captive died his ass was grass and McMaster's the lawn mower.
 
If he were honest, he’d admit his mood swings
were due to stewing over two long grueling years that had been futile in collapsing
Scorpios’ empire.
 
So much for blood,
sweat, and exhaustion, he fumed.

No
wonder he gave Jordan a dark, glaring look that in itself would disintegrate
any living thing.
 
In defense,
tiger-eyes, now sunken and cloudy, flickered with wild insolence, incomparable
eyes incredible, captivating, and frightening golden globes capable of tugging
curiosity to the forefront.
 
So
hypnotized was Jake, he didn't move, couldn't move from wondering what
possessed the mind behind the demons eyes.
 

Since
the first day he delivered food, he didn't dare get too close.
 
Upon placing the bag on the toilet seat, she
lashed out slicing his arm wide open with a razor blade.
 
An attack that knocked his competence right
on its ass considering he believed he'd frisked her thoroughly. Retrieving the
sharp edge weapon was a feat that yielded a multitude of bites, scratches, a
black eye, and bloody nose.
 
Apart from
the fact that he considered her to be a vicious animal an unnatural force drew
him to her.
 
If it was the last thing he
did, he had to know what turned her into such a barbarian.
 

Jordan was as
stubborn as Jake was.
  
In only
twenty-one years, she had endured a lifetime of heartaches and tears, lessons
that made her street smart and strong, and a force to reckon with.
 
Having a roof of cardboard and a mattress of
cold, hard concrete, her address any street or alley with sufficient space for
her tiny huddled body, she had no other choice.
    

In view of her
plight, one might find it difficult to believe that Jordan became a friend to
every homeless person encountered.
  
In
doing so, death became no stranger.
 
She
watched the black knight strike in the form of, aides, drug overdoses, alcohol,
muggings, and suicides, helplessly observed friends selling their bodies and
souls, and cried for the numerous children who died in their mothers’ arms from
the lack of food, warmth, and medical attention.
 
Even now whenever surrounded by quiet, she
continued to hear deaths horrible shrill, the reason she rarely slept. Life’s
atrocities had gradually whittled away at a heart leaving only a small portion
beating ever so slightly.

Experiences that
left no doubt in her mind she could cope with anything the arrogant, conceited,
egotistical DEA officer standing before her dished out.
 
He was nothing more than a criminal was, a
kidnapper.
 
What nerve he had, telling
her she smelled when he was no different.
 
Although he may have bathed more, his clothing smelled of body odor.
 
He never shaved.
 
Never washed the straight, oily hair pulled
back into a ridiculous ponytail, a dirty blonde color with sun bleached streaks
mixed with gray.
  
A wiry mustache and a
several day old beard made him look like a wolf man except for the hideous
earring worn in one ear that reminded her of a pirate, for God’s sake.
 

There were other
disturbing characteristics besides his gruff manner, like his hypnotic emerald
green eyes, and for an old man, the impressive way he filled out a pair of
jeans and tee shirt.
  
Despite
considerable effort, his physique continually drew her eyes; knives and bullet
wounds had inflicted the numerous scars on his arms.
 
She couldn’t determine his age, maybe forty
or so, she guessed.
 
Despite the years of
wear and tear, she found it surprising he continued to bring men to their
knees.
 
Then again, the ache in her jaw
testified to his strength, if he had wanted to, he could have crushed her.
 
Did he know she was a female all along, how,
not liking for one second the direction her thoughts were racing, anger shoved
them aside.

Who, in hell, did
the maniac think he was?
  
A DEA agent
wasn't a God everyone worshipped.
 
What
did he think she knew?
 
What could she
tell him?
 
To betray Scorpio meant the
worst kind of death.
  
Well, she'd teach
him to bend a knee.
 
He'd never break
her, never!
 
Someone tried years ago; a
crippling memory that made her repeat the vow uttered a billion times nobody
would make her do anything she didn't want to ever again, nobody.

Suddenly, she felt
ill, hot one minute, chilled the next.
 
Her stomach felt queasy, as though she'd vomit any second.
 
Accustomed to not eating or drinking for days
at a time, the weakness as she tried to sit up was puzzling.
 
Her eyes magnified the food in front of her,
all she'd have to do was eat and drink.
 
Spitefulness intervened.
 
She'd
die before giving into this bastard.
 
What did she have to lose?
 
With,
no future, no one, death would end her misery.
 
A rare bout of fear flashed high inside.
 
Never before did she feel so alone, so tired.
 
Hadn't she suffered enough, why Morgan, why
now?

CHAPTER 6

Shivering from the
frightful darkness, clutching her doll tightly to her chest somewhat helped to
ease the fear.
 
All the same, desperate
lungs sought air as a stream of tears’ soothed bright red cheeks caused from
the suffocating heat.
 
A rodents
scratching announced she was not alone in the claustrophobic space, one large
enough to gobble her alive should she dare to move, or sleep.
 
Each second intensifying the sound forced her
trembling body deeper into the niche.
 
Somehow believing it would help, frantic hands stretched a torn cotton
nightshirt over dirty bare feet.
 
Face
buried in the doll’s sparse hair, Jordan cried and screamed and cried, quietly,
very quietly.
 

Knees drawn to her
chest, palms pressed against her ears she strived to block out the horrible reverberations
of her mother’s screams piercing the door.
 
Those of flesh striking flesh, a creaking bed and animal like
grunts.
 
Trembling increased as she
wondered how long it would be before the monster came for her, a span of time
that depended upon his drunken state.
 
Meanwhile she must be quiet her mother begged each time before stuffing
her into the closet.
  
The only hiding
place in the one room apartment her mother believed would provide safety
whenever her clients were present.
 
For a
few years, it worked, until the time came when the door opening flooded the
small space with bright light that replaced one nightmare with another.
 
Fists would scrub blinded eyes; she would
swallow the gagging lumps of fear, the silent screams, in preparation for what
was yet to come. Plucked into bulging arms, she learned to do whatever
necessary to avoid another trip to the hospital where doctors whispered and
nurses cried.
 
Years and years of abuse
when unbelievably, no one came to rescue her, no one.

Illumination reflecting
off the walls closing in burst open golden nugget eyes.
 
Thankfully, she’d been proficient at halting
the runaway atrocity sleep had resurrected.
 
Masterfully her psyche had stuffed vestiges of the demons back into
their lair.
 
Despite shuddering, lips
quivering, most importantly she did not make a sound or shed a tear.
 
Once more she was proud of herself for
learning well how to hide pain and emotions at the tender age of ten.

Now she was
hurting all over from the foreign softness beneath her that brought on an
overwhelming homesickness.
 
She longed to
go home to her bed of concrete, walls of street noises, and roof of stars, her
intention when jerking upright.
 

Scanning her
surroundings, she realized everything that had happened was nothing more than a
nightmare.
 
The demons she believed had
left replaced by another sitting all too close to the bed.
 
Shock made her eyes bulge.
 
So horrible looking was he, she thanked
Lucifer for the sleep rendering him unarmed.
 
Thought processes briefly short-circuited returned telling her she was
no longer hand cuffed to anything that would hinder an escape.
 

Visions of freedom
bringing her fully awake, allowed detecting the brush of cotton against tender
skin, the sensation like a blaring alarm signaling that beneath the unfamiliar
flimsy long sleeve shirt she was naked.
 
Immediately, hands swept the quilt away.
 
Anger dancing like flames lapped at hatred, both gathering velocity while
frantically searching her mind for answers.
 
The only obvious conclusion, her captor had disrobed, and raped her
while she lay unconscious and defenseless.
 

Fool that he was
he didn’t know no man ever touched her and lived.
 
It didn’t matter that he happened to be an
infamous DEA agent.
 
He was an idiot, to
fall asleep.
 
How Scorpio could fear
someone so utterly stupid she’d always wonder?
  
The moron was making it unbelievably easy to slit his throat and
escape.
 
It was apparent that no one knew
of her kidnapping, or someone would have come to her rescue by now.
 
Jordan smiled maliciously.
    

____________

Other than
occasionally closing his eyes for minutes at a time, Jake rarely slept
soundly.
 
Granting the privilege plunged
him into hell where the past seared him with its embers.
 
Having survived the torture more times’ than
he cared to remember, he desperately tried to avoid the encounters.

His nightmare had
just begun when from out of nowhere an unbelievable force landed on his lap
sending the flimsy lawn chair backward with a loud crash to the floor.
 
Before realizing he was the victim of a
vicious attack, hands had already bludgeoned his face, nails clawed his skin,
and fingers pulled clumps of hair from his skull a stunned surprise that awakened
the demon within.

For a moment, he
didn’t know, and then he did.
 
“You
insane bitch,” Jake, yelled, having all he could do to fight off his attacker,
the suddenness to the assailant’s advantage.
 
An orange crate toppled over shattering a glass lamp.
 
His skull thudded against a wall a numbing
blow to his reflexes that made it impossible to free his foot trapped within
the collapsed chair.
 
Before he could
come to grips with what was happening, a hand retrieving a long, jagged piece
of glass had it aimed at his chest.
 
Impending death rolled him to one side, the sudden move propelling his
assailant to the floor.
 
With an awful
crack, Jordan’s head connected with the corner of a wooden chest filling the
room with an eerie silence.

Never before did
Jake come up against a hellion quite like his captive.
 
Dazed, with every inch of his body screaming
in pain, he struggled to a sitting position trying to collect his scattered
wits.
 
When his vision cleared, what he
saw scrambled what remained of his thought processes.
 
A witch, that’s what she was, only a witch
could make the legs extending from the cotton shirt shapely, enticing, too
perfect to his liking, flawless, god dammit.
 
Emotions speeding in the wrong direction brought relief that the
surprisingly well-proportioned body lay motionless.
 
Besides, mustering the strength to fight her
off again would have been impossible with desires far from honorable out of
control that he had not felt in a long, time and vowed he never would again.