Monk by Ivy Black

Domino PreviewChapter Three

Ashley

“Girl, he isn’t gonna kill you,” Maggie says. “He’s a coward and a lot of other things, but he’s not a killer.”

“You didn’t see him last night, Mags. He was… crazed. I really think he would have killed me if I hadn’t backed down. As it is, he slapped me. Again. Twice this time. Hard. He wasn’t playing around.”

“That son of a bitch,” she mutters.

We’re sitting at Maggie’s dining room table. She lives just a couple of streets over, so I packed Cole up this morning after Ryan left for work and have been pouring my heart out to her all day. As she looks at me, her face clouds over and there’s genuine sympathy in her eyes, as well as a flash of white-hot anger.

Maggie, a tall, willowy blonde with a body to die for and more men in her life than she can keep track of, has been one of my very best friends since grade school. Together with our friend Missy, we were the power trio back in our halcyon days of high school, back when the boys all wanted to sleep with us and the girls all wanted to be us. It was the high point of my life, sadly enough.

Back then, we believed the three of us could, and would, take over the world. We all had big dreams. We’d all said we were tired of being poor and decided we were going to be rich, and that we’d all get the heck out of Erwin. You can’t really dominate the world from a small, podunk town like Erwin, can you?

Of the three of us, only Missy had actually escaped the bondage of our hometown. She’d gone to California to chase her silver screen dreams. She’d gotten a few parts here and there but nothing major. Eventually, she had left Hollywood to settle down with a stuntman she’d met on one of her films. Missy has a family now and is living a nice life, though she’s as far from the dreams of world domination as Maggie and I are. But then, maybe she feels like she’s won, anyway.

Like me, Maggie had married shortly out of high school. Leonard was a good guy and I liked him a lot. Cancer took him way too young. Now, she’s a successful lawyer, content playing the field, and having a good time doing it. And as much as I hate to say it, I envy her that. But then, the truth us, I envy Missy and her staid and domestic life. She’s got a gorgeous and incredibly loving husband and has a good life out there.

And what do I have other than a cold an abusive boyfriend? I’ve got no career to speak of. Although I am educated, I’ve got no particular skills and even limited experience in my field. Getting a job in my field right now would be pretty much next to impossible. About the only good thing to come out of this relationship is Cole. He’s the light of my life and my entire world. My little boy is the only thing I feel like I’ve done right in this life.

I glance over at Cole, who’s parked in front of the TV watching cartoons. He’s laughing and singing along with the characters and the music. My eyes sting and my vision blurs as they well with tears.

“You need to get out of here, Ash. If he’s slapping you now, it’s not going to be long before he can justify beating on you with a closed fist,” she says.

“He’s already justifying it,” I reply. “Says it’s my fault. That I push him too far.”

“See? All the more reason for you to take Cole and get the hell out of Erwin.”

The tears fall and I can’t seem to stop them. I wipe them away, but they’re replaced by more in the next heartbeat. Maggie pulls me into an embrace, and I bury my face in her shoulder, doing my best to stifle my sobs so as to not scare Cole. I glance over her shoulder and see him looking back at me, quiet concern on his precious, innocent face.

“Mama okay?” he asks.

Sitting back, I quickly blink back my tears and wipe my face. I give Cole my best reassuring smile.

“Mama’s fine,” I assure him. “Everything’s okay. Just watch your cartoon, baby.”

Cole looks at me for another long moment before turning back to the television. I turn back to Maggie and she gives me a weak smile.

“He’s too smart for his own good already,” she says.

“He’s definitely too smart for my own good.”

She sighs and takes my hand in hers, giving it a gentle squeeze. “I told you a year ago that you needed to get out of there.”

A frown pulls my lips downward and I nod. She had told me, had warned me that things were going to get worse if I didn’t do something like pack up and leave, and I didn’t listen.

“I wanted to believe he’d change, Mags. I wanted to believe we could work through this.”

“You’ve been hoping and waiting for him to change for years now, honey. I hate to break it to you, but that asshole is never going to change. He is who he is,” she tells me, and not for the first time.

“He didn’t used to be like this. You knew him back then. You knew how different he was. How kind he used to be.”

She purses her lips. “He did used to be different. But that was then. This is now,” she says. “He never fully recovered from his injury. Not up here, or down here.”

Maggie tapped her head and her heart to emphasize her point. And she’s right. The injury healed and he’s suffered no ill effects from the fusion surgery. But it’s his mind and his heart that never recovered. He’s changed because of it and definitely not for the better. It’s something Maggie has been telling me for some time now, and something that deep down inside, I know in my own heart.

But I keep wanting to believe he’ll change. I keep wanting to believe he’ll find his way out of whatever dark place he’s wandered into.

“If he hasn’t changed by now, he’s not going to, Ash. This is who he is now. It’s who he’s always going to be,” she reiterates.

I bite my bottom lip and look away. Deep down, I know that. Have known that for a long time. And mixed in with wanting to believe that he can—and will—change, I have to admit that I haven’t left because I’m afraid. Looking up at Maggie, I keep gnawing on my lower lip to keep it from trembling. And when I speak, I pitch my voice low to keep Cole from overhearing me. It would probably only scare him, which will add to my own heaping pile of anxiety.

“I’m scared, Mags. If I leave, I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

She squeezes my hand tighter. “You’ll figure that out, hon. The first step of this journey is to get you and Cole out of here. Do you really want him growing up around that? Do you want Cole thinking that Ryan is the example of a man? Do you want him learning to be like his father?”

I shake my head vigorously. “God, no. You know I don’t.”

“Then, you know what you have to do.”

“I know what I have to do. I just don’t know how to go about doing it. I mean, it’s not like I’ve got a pile of money sitting there.”

“No, but you have some, right?”

Ryan would never let me work. Said my place was in the home, keeping the house clean and raising our son. I tried to protest, but he wouldn’t hear of it. Over the years, I’ve been socking away money when and where I can whenever I’ve managed to get my hands on a little extra. Ten here. Twenty there. And on the rare occasion, a hundred or two. It’s a decent little pile of money, but even that nest egg isn’t enough to take and start a new life somewhere.

“I have some. But it’s not enough to get an apartment. It’s not enough to do much of anything, honestly.”

“That’s fine. I’ll loan you—”

I shake my head. “No. Out of the question. I won’t accept charity.”

She gives me a soft smile. “Don’t think of it as charity. Think of it as me investing in you.”

“Uh-uh. I won’t ask you to lend me money.”

“You’re not asking. I’m telling you this is what’s going to happen. I make good money, Ash. I’ve got a house that’s already been paid outright. I have a car. I’ve got everything I need. My money is just sitting in a bank account collecting dust. I want to do something good with it.”

There’s no denying that a little more money would help get me out of this hellhole. But I just don’t feel right taking money from my friends. Never have and never will. It’s just not who I am. When I look up, I see that she’s eyeballing me critically, and I can tell that she’s reading my mind as she’s always seemed able to do ever since we were kids.

“Screw your pride, girl. That’s all this refusal to take a loan from me is. Pride,” she tells me. “If for no other reason, take it to get Cole out of here. It will give me a lot more peace of mind knowing he’s far away from Ryan. It’ll make me feel better. Please, just take it and get the hell out of Erwin.”

“How will I get out of here without him knowing? And where will I even go?” I ask miserably.

For as long as I’ve fantasized and daydreamed about getting out of here, I haven’t actually formulated a concrete plan, since I never thought it was an actual possibility. But when I look up, I see a mischievous glint in Maggie’s eye as she looks at me.

“As it turns out, I’ve got some thoughts about that.”

I laugh despite myself. “Do you, now?”

She nods. “You’re damn right I do.”

We spend the rest of the afternoon making plans for something that I never thought would be a possibility. Something I never dared believe would, or could, ever come to pass. And when we’re done discussing it, I see that it’s more of a possibility now than I ever thought. In fact, it’s becoming a reality.

When we’re done creating my escape plan, I feel something that has been in drastically short supply in my life ever since Ryan got hurt. Something I thought I’d never feel again in my life.

I feel hope.

* * *

A woman on the run. A cartel set on retaliation. An MC in the crosshairs.

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