Page 1 of Desperation

Prologue

Hannah

I once believed life couldn’t possibly get any worse. Stuck in foster care after my single mother was killed by a drunk driver and no other family willing to take me in, I bounced around from home to home until I landed in the residence of Dallas and Mildred Talmidge. Sounds like a sweet elderly couple who bakes cookies and does woodworking on the weekends, don’t they? Well, they weren’t.

Mildred was a forty something, high functioning alcoholic who smoked like a freight train. How she hid this from the social workers who placed the minors in her home was beyond me. Then again, maybe they didn’t care. There were so many kids in the system that they probably turned a blind eye to a lot of things.

Dallas was a serial philanderer who didn’t care to hide his indiscretions from his wife. It was almost as though he flaunted them in her face just to get her riled up. She was a loose cannon on a good day, so whenever one of his affairs came to light, we all knew to keep quiet and stay cramped in our rooms. I couldn’t figure out why she stayed until my bunkmate Jaycee pointed out the obvious to me. Mildred hadn’t worked outside the home in over a decade. When her son, whom she had at the ripe old age of fifteen, graduated high school, she convinced her husband to let her stay home and foster.

You’re starting to soften toward her, aren’t you? Don’t. She didn’t do it out of the kindness of her heart or because of some empty nest syndrome. No, she did it so she wouldn’t have to work but could still bring in the dough.

Still, she enjoyed the finer things in life, and her income as a foster “mom” would never afford her the Lexus she drove or the Michael Kors bag resting in the crook of her arm. So she tolerated Dallas’ office escapades and took her frustration out on us, her wards. We were forced to keep their house sparkling clean or risk going to bed without dinner and sometimes even lunch. The refrigerator and pantry had locks on them so there was no sneaking a snack in the middle of the night or when she was gossiping with one of her gal pals on the back patio. And even though most of us were bordering on the side of underweight, she never missed an opportunity to throw insults at us about our bodies, calling us degrading names like heifer and little miss piggy. The verbal abuse only worsened when her husband turned his wandering eyes toward me.

I’d heard stories from other girls in the house about things that happened to them at the hands of their foster parents, and I just couldn’t bear the thought of enduring such abuse. I had to get out of there and fast.

So when I met Drake Wilder, I jumped at the chance to make my escape. I was only seventeen, but I lied and told him I was already legal. If he knew I was lying, he didn’t seem to mind. It didn’t stop him from handing me a helmet and letting me hop on the back of his bike before riding off into the sunset. That’s where my fairytale was supposed to begin. He was supposed to be my knight in shining armor. Instead, my prince turned into a beast.

He rescued me from one horrible scenario, and for a time, I lived in euphoric bliss: young, dumb, and hopelessly in love. It took over a year for the honeymoon phase to wear off. By then, I was completely dependent on him. I’d dropped out of high school when I left foster care. I didn’t want to be found and returned to state custody, so I hid away in Drake’s house. He made enough money that I didn’t need to work, so finding a job wasn’t a necessity. I took care of his home and made sure he didn’t have to lift a finger when he was there. I cooked and cleaned and tended my little garden, deliriously happy I’d found my soulmate.

Until one day, his temper boiled over, and he pushed me. A surprised yelp left my mouth when my butt hit the floor, and tears sprang to my eyes. It wasn’t the pain in my rear end that had me crying, but the spike of fear and sting of betrayal. His face pinched in anger softened before turning ashen. He crouched in front of me, and I scurried away from him when he reached out a hand. My back hit the couch as my cheeks grew damp.

“Hannah, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean it.” He swallowed thickly, pain flashing in his whiskey colored eyes. Sobs wracked my body as he pulled his hands through his messy brown hair. “Please, baby. Let me hold you.” His eyes pleaded with me, and he looked so heartbroken and remorseful that I let him pull me into his lap and cradle me in his strong arms. He murmured his apologies into my hair, pressing kisses to the side of my head, promising me it would never happen again.

But it did happen again. Over the next two years, it happened again and again. But he didn’t just push me around anymore. His closed fists were leaving their mark on my skin, the purple and yellow discoloration proof of his anger. I had nowhere to turn, and he knew it. I hadn’t spoken to my family since they turned their backs on me, and the few friends I’d made in school were off at college, securing their futures. Drake had effectively isolated me from everyone I knew. I had no one to turn to for help, but I needed to get away from him. He was going to kill me. All it would take was for him to lose what little shred of control he had left, and I’d be a goner.

I was finally ready to leave. I didn’t care if I had to live on the streets or beg for food. I had to get out. But as soon as my mind was made up, and I began formulating a plan, everything changed. Drake made sure my life would be tied to his forever.

Chapter One

Devon

“What are you going to do while on leave, Kingsley?” my buddy, Lorenzo asked before slugging back the rest of his beer and slamming it down on the bar top. He motioned to the bartender to bring him another. We were about to head out for a much needed, long awaited break after a string of deployments and training exercises.

“I’m going to visit family,” I replied vaguely. I didn’t want to tell him the whole truth. I didn’t want him to know I was planning on getting out soon and was interviewing with a security firm during leave. I didn’t tell him that my mom was sick, and I didn’t know how much longer we had with her. I couldn’t bear the thought of losing her while deployed. At least with Cole Security, I could come back early from an assignment if she started to deteriorate. But mainly, this job paid more, and I could afford better care for her. I’d be able to pay someone to take her to and from dialysis three days a week and make sure she ate something that complied with her very strict diet.

“Well, have fun with that.” He smirked. “I’m not even telling my family I’m home. All they do is pester me about meeting the right girl and settling down.” The bartender appeared then and placed an open bottle in front of him. He took a long pull from it before wiping his hand over his mouth. “It’s incessant,” he groaned. “I have no desire to be like my sisters with a bunch of rugrats clinging to my legs.” Enzo was a triplet and the only boy. His two sisters, Natalia and Giada, had both married young and started popping out kids in their early twenties. I knew he loved his nieces and nephews, but he was all too happy to hand them back to their exhausted parents and go home to his tidy, quiet apartment after indulging them with candy and wrestling in the dirt. I couldn’t really blame him. Little humans had always made me nervous. Danger was like a beacon to them. They always sought out the one thing in a room that would hurt them and threw themselves at it. It was like they had zero survival instincts.

“If your mother finds out, she’s gonna beat you with that rolling pin of hers.” I chuckled. He shivered visibly, recognition flashing in his eyes. He was no stranger to her rolling pin. Or her wooden spoon. He’d been an ornery kid and had paid for his misbehaving by way of kitchen utensils.

“Whatever she had handy,” he’d once lamented to us. “She may be tiny, but she’s got an arm like Pedro Martinez.” Boston born, he worshipped the Red Sox pitcher after meeting him at training camp as a kid and most likely considered the comparison a compliment.

“What she doesn’t know won’t hurt me.” He grinned wickedly before bringing the brown glass to his lips once more. I shook my head and laughed before placing a few bills on the bar, settling up on my tab.

“I guess if I see you back at base, I’ll know you evaded her detection,” I joked, hoping he’d change his mind and go home. We didn’t have the luxury of seeing our families any time we wanted. We didn’t have day jobs and weren’t all guaranteed to make it home. Yet another reason I was ready to leave the SEALs.

* * *

It took nearly a week at home, spending almost every day with my mom, before I felt reassured enough of her health to venture out. I decided to spend a long weekend with my cousin who lived about forty-five minutes away. I hadn’t seen him in a few years and was ready to rectify that. We’d been close once, and he was more like a brother to me. He’d always been there for me, even when I didn’t deserve his loyalty, and I regretted not making an effort to see him sooner.

I threw my duffle bag in the passenger seat of my truck and took off on Thursday afternoon. I’d texted him a couple days ago just to make sure I had the right address but didn’t tell him when I was coming. I wanted it to be a surprise.

The case of beer I bought rested on the floorboard below my bag, and I thought back to all the times we snuck his dad’s Natural Lite and drank it behind the garage. My mind was a decade in the past when I eased on the brake, my truck gliding to a halt at a stop sign several blocks from my destination, when I was jolted forward in my seat. The sound of metal smashing against metal had me gritting my teeth. I glanced in the rearview mirror to see a big black truck right on my ass. I couldn’t make out the driver behind the tinted glass, but I could tell they weren’t making a move to back up or get out of the vehicle.

I pulled forward a couple of feet, cringing at the grinding sound it made. Throwing it in park and shutting off the engine, I exited my truck and slowly made my way toward the tailgate. I held my breath as my bumper came into view, exhaling it in relief when I realized the damage was minimal. I wouldn’t have to dig too deep into my savings to have it fixed. Since I hadn’t met my deductible yet, this repair was most likely all on me.

The other truck’s bumper hadn’t fared as well. The driver still hadn’t gotten out, so I walked to the door and motioned for them to roll down the window. My stomach sank as I waited. Seconds passed, and I feared they might be injured. Finally, the glass descended revealing a young woman with a thick mass of blonde hair piled atop her head and oversized sunglasses shielding her eyes, making her look like a bug. She was visibly shaking and wouldn’t meet my eye. Her grip was so tight on the steering wheel, her knuckles were nearly white.

“How bad is it?” she asked, her voice laced with fear and saturated with unshed tears. Her reaction caught me off guard, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. I shook off my unease and attempted to allay her fears.

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