Page 5 of Property of Brute & Axl
“Your name is Finleigh. I’m Axl; he’s Brute.” There’s an amused twist to Axl’s lips that seems endearing.
Glancing between the two of them, I’m not sure whether to laugh or cry. “Those are your real names?”
Brute grunts like he’s been kicked, and I think it’s what serves as a laugh for the hulky man. “Obviously not. That’s something to worry about another day.”
Not when you don’t know anything, it isn’t. I keep that to myself, however, because truthfully, he scares me.
“Finleigh.” I repeat the name Axl told me. “Finleigh, what?” I mean, I must have a surname, right?
Axl clears his throat. “How about we take this one step at a time.”
My eyes dip together, and a frown creases my forehead. What the hell does he know?
“Why?” Panic bubbles to the surface, and my chest grows tighter with every breath I take. “Did my family do this to me? Is that why nobody has come forward? Who am I? Why did it take you two so long to find me?” The questions rush out as monitors begin going crazy. I fight with the blanket covering my body and stumble out of bed, narrowly missing hitting Brute with the shoulder I was shot in that still freaking hurts.
Both men seem to jump into action and grab for me, but our size differences make it easier for me to slip out of their grasp and into the bathroom, where I fumble with locking the door.
Sitting in the shower stall, panting to catch my breath, I reach up with my slinged arm. There’s a ripping and burning sensation as I turn on the cold water and get blasted with an icy shower, trying to force my body into remembering to breathe. Blood from ripped stitches swirls around me as a memory slams into my head, forcing a scream to the surface before everything turns black.
Just a little longer. Just one more cut. Just one more release, and I’ll call it quits. The heat of the shower water relaxes my body enough that the burn turns to a sweet caress.
The sting is a lover's touch. The fresh cut is no longer my shattered heart as I watch a tiny stream of blood slide down the inside of my thigh, into the water coating the bottom of the tub, and slowly whirling towards the drain.
The release of my pain escapes through the open wound as my lifeforce finds its way into another system. One where my heart doesn’t break, my mind isn’t played like broken games. One where breathing doesn’t matter.
Only escape.
Gasping awake, the memory flutters away like a butterfly from its cocoon. Gone. Forgotten. As if it were never there at all.
I’m sobbing into my bent knees as water continues to freeze my already ice-cold skin when I’m startled by the door buckling and crashing against the wall as Brute and Axl force their way in. The nurse shouts at them, but I don’t care. None of it matters because my goal is to feel nothing at all.
The physical, emotional, and mental pain cripples me like a weight on my soul.
I’m alive, but I feel dead.
My heart beats with life, but I don’t want to be here.
The worst of it all is I can’t say why I feel the way I do. Nobody is willing to tell me what happened before I was found, except that I was shot.
Twice.
Once in the head and once in the shoulder.
I was left for dead, but my body screams at me that there’s so much more that’s been done to me. This feeling in my chest wails that the shooting is only the tail end of my ordeal. I feel like I’m a casualty of life and can’t explain why.
“Finleigh.” Warm, callused hands grip my shoulders. It’s not gentle, but neither is it forceful. “You can’t stay in this water.” Brute’s gruff timber breaks through the emotions and brings me to the present as I finally register the water pounding onto me like tiny icicles stabbing my flesh.
Nodding my head in agreement, he’s quick to drag me from the shower and scoop me up into his arms, growling as someone tries to push their way in and get a look at me. I bury my face in his chest and inhale deeply—the first full breath since waking up in the hospital.
He smells like smoke, motor oil, and gunpowder. It’s unclear how I know what those things smell like, and certainly not my name, but I’m trusting that he won’t hurt me. I have to, or I’ll fall apart again.
“I need to know everything that’s happened to me,” I whisper into Brute’s throat as he sits down with me, someone draping us with a blanket.
“Gentlemen, I really need to assess her.” They both bark out “no” at the nurse’s stubborn tone.
Lifting my eyelids, they feel more swollen, and I realize I’ve been crying. Axl’s hazel gaze bores into mine. I can’t read him. The two of them keep their thoughts close to the chest.
“You want her to stay?” Axl finally asks me, his eyes darting to the nurse, who is scowling and has her arms crossed. Shaking my head no, she huffs and leaves.