Keeping Karly (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (2 page)

“You can’t be serious!” I exclaim in shocked horror. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”

“Karly,” my younger sister says with an exasperated sigh, “Robert was one man. We’ve been through this. What he did was wrong, but it wasn’t an example of what happens at the club. The people there care about each other. Surely you saw the way they supported me while I was ill.”

Support? Yeah, right. More like trying to cover their asses so they didn’t get sued. And just like those assholes planned, Casey had refused to press charges against the man who’d done this to her. He’d damn near killed her, yet Casey had been brainwashed into believing she was protecting her “friends” by keeping quiet.

I hate them for it. Hell, I’ve written a number of articles for the local paper that expose the dangers of such a lifestyle. I even made certain that every impressionable woman in the area knows how deadly this club and the so-called Doms can be. I thought I’d managed to convince my sister to stay away from them.

But apparently I was wrong.

“Casey, please don’t do this,” I say, hoping that my fear for her might sway her decision.

“Why don’t you come with me?” she asks in a hopeful tone. “You can see that it’s not what you think it is.”

A part of me is tempted to go to the club in an effort to protect her, but considering some of the things I’ve written for all to see, I doubt I’ll be welcome. I might even be the one in need of protection. Who knows how men like that might react to me exposing their sordid, violent behavior?

I’m almost startled to hear my husband’s car pull into the garage. Hell, time really flies some days. Between writing my column for the paper, the exposé series I’ve been researching on fetish clubs, and the myriad of other little things that need to be done each day I really don’t have time to argue with my sister on the phone. I glance at the half chopped vegetables on the cutting board. Damn, dinner is going to be late.

“Casey, I have to go, but please promise me you’ll rethink about going tonight.”

“Karly, I’ll be fine. You don’t need to worry.”

I laugh humorlessly, annoyed at my sister, partially blaming her for the fact that dinner isn’t on the table and my husband just got home.

“Fine, just remember that the next heart attack will probably kill you.”

I hang up before she can respond. It was a horrible thing to say, but I’m not sure how long I can fret over the self-destructive behavior of my little sister. She’s an adult who can make her own choices. I have my own problems to worry about.

My husband walks in just as I turn back to the vegetables.

“Don’t tell me,” he says, sounding tired and annoyed. “Dinner is going to be late, again.”

“I’m sorry,” I say, still trying to rein my temper in. Shit, my sister has always been able to push my buttons. How did we manage to keep a truce for the past five months? I suppose life-threatening illness will do that to families.

“Sorry?” my husband asks in a tone of voice I haven’t heard in a very long while.

My hands shake as I surreptitiously slide the dirty chef’s knife back into the drawer and grab my smallest, bluntest vegetable knife.

“I really am sorry, John,” I say, trying to keep the quiver from my voice. “I had a meeting at the paper this morning, and the afternoon was really hectic, and then my sis—” I stop talking midsentence as his hand curls into a fist in my hair. I try not to react. I know that crying out or responding in any way will only make this worse.

Hell. I thought this part of our life was over.

It’s been nearly two years. Two years of peace. Well, sort of.

“I don’t give a flying fuck what you do during the day. You’re my wife. Your one and only job is to take care of me.” He twists his hand, pulling my hair painfully, forcing me to react even though I try not to.

The moment I reach above me, instinctively grabbing for his hands, trying to loosen his grip, he punches me in the ribcage. The sharp jab steals my breath, takes my ability to control my reaction. I twist, fighting him, screaming as he begins hitting me over and over.

Fuck. Nothing like this happened when my sister was here.

I really miss my sister.

* * * *

Bryce climbed the steps to Karly James’s beautiful home and couldn’t help but hope time had lessened the woman’s vehement hatred of all things Dominant. It didn’t really matter if it hadn’t. He was only here to say a quick hello to Casey before driving home to surprise his brother with his early return from Hong Kong, but it would be nice to get through this without having unfair accusations thrown his way.

He was about to knock on the stylish and rather expensive-looking front door when he heard a woman’s scream. His first thought was that Casey was playing—and he was actually a little relieved to think that she might be recovered enough to enjoy her previous lifestyle—but when something crashed to the ground rather loudly, his only thought was to get inside.

What he found horrified him.

It hasn’t been this bad in a very long while.

In fact, judging by my current state—disorientated, nearly blinded by blood, and curled in the fetal position—I’d say it’s never been this bad. Was the peace while my sister was here just the calm before the storm?

I don’t react to the loud crashing noises as my husband smashes my souvenir plate collection. How could I have let him know they meant something to me? Hadn’t I learned two years ago what not to do? Hadn’t I been listening when we’d found the secret to a happy marriage? I’d learned how to avoid John’s temper. I knew the way to keep him calm. I just had to do everything his way and our marriage was happy. How could I have forgotten that rule?

“Karly?” a man’s voice says close to my ear. I whimper, expecting another blow, flinching away from the soft touch on my shoulder. “Is Casey here, too?”

“No,” I say, feeling relieved that at least she isn’t here to witness my failure. I should have known. I should have seen this coming. I should have done my best to avoid it.

“Don’t move, sweetheart,” the man says as he moves away. I finally realize the voice is unfamiliar, that it doesn’t belong to John. Moments later I hear an angry argument, and then the internal door to the garage slams, the tires on my husband’s car screeching on the driveway a moment later as he leaves in a hurry.

I try to move, but a warm hand lands on my shoulder once more.

“Karly, stay still. I’ve called the ambulance. They’ll be here soon.”

“No,” I say as panic drills through me. No one can know. How can I explain?

“Sweetheart, you need medical help.”

“I’m fine,” I manage to slur drunkenly. I try to lift myself off the ground to prove it, but his soft touch on my shoulder won’t let me budge.

“Grant, it’s me…Yeah I’m home, sort of…Look, I don’t have time to explain. I’m dealing with a situation. Can you find Casey James and bring her to St. Michaels Hospital?”

It takes me a while to realize he’s not talking to me, but I need to stop him. I don’t even know who this man is.

“No, ’m fine,” I mumble tiredly.

“No, Karly, you’re not,” he says as I try to sit up again. Damn, I’ve never had a concussion before, but I think maybe this is what they feel like. “Casey and Grant will meet us at the hospital.”

I want to nod, but my head hurts too much. I feel tears—or is that blood?—slipping sideways across my face to pool on the carpet that I’ve just had cleaned.

“It’s going to be okay, sweetheart,” the man says as he lifts my hand into his own. “You’re safe now. I won’t let this happen again.” I sob as I grip the man’s hand tightly, suddenly terrified of what my husband might do if he saw I was damaging the carpet.

Fuck. How could I have forgotten the rules?

* * * *

Bryce tried to rein in his temper. Only God knew what might have happened to Karly if he hadn’t come in when he did. At first glance he’d thought she was the victim of a home invasion, but when the man busy smashing up the place had turned and told him, “Get the fuck out of my house,” Bryce had revised his assumptions.

And none of them had been good.

Karly James, the woman who’d accused every Dom at the club of brainwashing and beating women under the guise of BDSM was actually a victim of domestic abuse herself.

He wanted to kick himself for not noticing. He’d been so angry and hurt by the public accusations she’d flung his way that he hadn’t stopped to wonder if she’d had more than one reason to interpret her sister’s lifestyle the way she had.

The siren of the ambulance was a welcome respite to his inner turmoil. He’d left the front door open when he’d come through earlier so there was no need to leave Karly alone, a thought that was solidified when her grip tightened on his fingers.

“It’s okay, sweetheart, I’m not going anywhere.”

“What happened?” one of the ambulance officers asked as they hurried into the room.

“Her husband attacked her,” Bryce said, even knowing that Karly probably would have liked to keep the identity of her attacker quiet. She sobbed louder, but didn’t let go of his hand. The ambulance officer nodded as he reached into the bag he’d been carrying. “And you are?” The question was just a little too casual to not be offensive. Clearly the man had seen too many horrifying outcomes to love triangles.

“I’m a friend of her sister’s,” Bryce answered as he pushed down the annoyance. The guy was doing his job, just trying to assess the situation and keep himself and his partner safe.

“So why didn’t you call the police?”

“I did,” Bryce answered through gritted teeth. Admittedly, he’d hesitated to contact the police. After what happened to her sister, having Karly arrive at the hospital accompanied by two men the police had spoken to the night of Casey’s heart attack was not going to look good for any of them—especially in light of the newspaper articles Karly had written. Thankfully, good sense had kicked in and he’d asked for both police and ambulance because, very simply, it was the right thing to do. Karly’s husband needed to be charged with assault, and if Karly even so much as thought about not doing it, Bryce intended to remind her of everything she’d said to Casey, hoping to convince her to have Robert charged.

Ironically, in the end it had been Casey’s decision to go against the advice of all her friends. It had taken some time, but eventually every member of the club had supported the idea of Robert being charged—even if it did personally expose them to uncomfortable scrutiny. At least that was what Grant had told him via email. Having been out of the country for five months Bryce could only go on secondhand information. He trusted his brother’s assessment of the situation, but with Grant’s idea of a long email being three whole lines and a phone call longer than a minute being a waste of time, Bryce was working on the bare bones of information.

Thankfully, the arrival of the police in the driveway cut off any further interrogation and the EMTs turned their attention back to their patient. Bryce didn’t blame them for their wariness—domestic disputes were often unpredictable—but he sure wished for a world where it wasn’t necessary.

The police officers asked several quick questions before agreeing to meet them at the hospital. They’d seemed reluctant at first to let him go in the ambulance with Karly, but once they’d verified his identity via his driver’s license and determined that a car had left the driveway in a skid-marking hurry the way he’d described they let him accompany her.

Their decision probably had something to do with the fact that Karly’s hand was wrapped so tightly around his that he was losing feeling in his fingers. No way was he going to leave her side when she needed someone so desperately to hold on to.

I wake suddenly, my heart pounding in terror.

I need to clean the carpet. Shit, I probably got blood all over it. John is going to be so mad when he gets home. I need to get it cleaned to a spotless perfection. I don’t want to disappoint him the way I did earlier with dinner.

But sitting up makes me dizzy. I swallow hard, unable to open my eyes, not certain where I am.

“Karly,” my sister says in a sad voice as gentle hands ease me back onto the pillow. I don’t fight them. I’m too dizzy even to mumble a protest, but I really need to fix the mess I made. Larger hands hold me and caress my arm softly as I try once again to sit up.

“It’s okay, sweetheart. We’ve got everything under control. Lie back and rest for a while longer.”

I know that voice. Thankfully, it doesn’t belong to my husband, but I can’t quite place who owns it. I know it’s the man who found me, the one who stayed with me while we waited for the ambulance, the one who saved me from my husband’s violent temper, but I can’t put a face to the name.

“Grant,” the man says, obviously not talking to me but someone else in the room, “go see if you can find the doctor.”

The man must have nodded because the only sound I hear is footsteps leaving the room.

“You don’t understand,” I say, my teeth aching from the pounding in my head. “I need to get it cleaned up before he gets home. John hates it when the carpet is a mess.”