Going Under

  Going Under

  LeTeisha Newton

  Going Under

  Copyright © 2017 by LeTeisha Newton

  Cover Art: © 2017 Boundless Tales Designs

  Editor: © 2017 Beyond Def Lit

  Formatter: © 2017 eBook Builders

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental

  Contents

  Other Books by LeTeisha Newton

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  Thank You

  About the Author

  Coming Soon

  LeTeisha’s Bookcase

  Other Books by

  LeTeisha Newton

  Dark Romance

  The Lost Series

  One Hour Girl

  Scarred

  Phenomenal

  Military Romance

  A SEALed Fate Series

  Protecting Butterfly

  Protecting Goddess

  Paranormal Romance

  Claimed Trilogy

  Taken Trilogy

  Romantic Suspense

  Corporate Hitman Trilogy

  Dedication

  To Wrenny,

  For jumping down my throat to get me back on track when I thought about spiraling. That’s what friends are for. Always.

  Acknowledgements

  Thank you to the Dark Vixens, my reader group. You guys got the ARCs before anyone could see it, and you helped sooooo much with getting this squared away. Did I mention you all are AWESOME?!

  Thank you Anne Conley. You are amazing in so many ways, and your critiques helped bring Going Under to a new place entirely.

  To the ladies of BaBB — I am so thankful I found you, and I can’t imagine a better place to be.

  And finally, I’d like to point to my editor, Tiffany Fox. You get me, reel me in, and bash me over the head if I’m feeling particularly hard-headed. But you make my words sing, and that is a wonderful thing. Thank you!

  1

  Melody

  Piss and sulfur in the alleyway clawed at my nostrils. I recognized it, wallowed in it. Hell, not too long ago I lived in it, wading through filth and destruction for that blissful next hit. Coming to places like this always brought the itch back. Reminded me how far I’d come and how easy it would be to plunge back into that way of life.

  One hit and I’ll be good.

  “Who’s it going to be tonight?”

  I scanned the crowd huddling outside of a club up the other side of the alley, where I frequently searched for my Mr. Right Now. My skin crawled and the back of my throat was on fire. I coughed to relieve it, but the burn only intensified. The tiny holes up the inside of my arm could have been craters filled with black ooze, they hurt so bad.

  But you still came out here.

  Yeah, I did, because the streets made sense to me. I worked a dead-end job at a gas station as the Ivy League education sat useless in my brain, unused by the “worthless drug fiend” I’d become. Three years ago, I put down the needle and never picked it up again. My family and friends watched me destroy my life with enough interventions and promises to do better that they didn’t believe I ever would be.

  And maybe they were right.

  I tiptoed my way through refuse in the alley, where the messed-up parts of my soul felt right. When you hear you’re trash enough times, you start to believe it. The hot, humid night air worsened the rancid scents. A homeless man grumbled as I passed his cardboard box, but I ignored him. I kept my head on a swivel, trying to stay as quiet as possible. Silly, when part of me wanted to be recognized, needed the drug underbelly to take notice of one of its own coming home.

  “You looking for a good time?” a young man asked.

  I looked up at a stumbling co-ed and passed him by. He wouldn’t give me what I needed.

  “You don’t have to be a bitch!”

  I turned and smiled, swinging my hips as I approached him.

  “That’s more like it,” he crooned.

  Stupid little shit was playing games he didn’t understand.

  “You want to spank me while I call you daddy?” I asked him.

  His smile spread, and he gripped his cock through his jeans. “Call my Big Daddy.”

  “How big are you?” I was close to him, just inches away. Close enough to taste the alcohol on his breath.

  “Big enough for you.”

  “I want you to make me bleed. I want you to fuck my pussy until I’m clawing your back and screaming for you to stop. Slam me into the wall, drag me to the ground, and play out your little rape fantasy you had about the girl you never could have. Can you do that for me?”

  When his smile faltered and he stumbled back from me, I laughed. “Don’t play games you can’t win.”

  “Crazy bitch.”

  These streets were mean, dirty, and unforgiving. The cops didn’t come this way often, and when they did, it was to scrape dead bodies off the ground, most of whom had died of O.D.s.

  He was a rabbit staring down a wolf. I swallowed, hungry for the danger, as he ran away. I craved the sight of violence and wildness. A bit of evil to wash away all the good. I got hooked on drugs because of an addictive personality, and with drugs gone, I’d replaced one vice for another.

  Hard, rough sex from some stupid drunk who didn’t care who I was, or where I came from, was just what I needed. An uninhibited few minutes where temporary euphoria filled my veins as I came. It was easy not to care about a faceless slut from the alley, and I knew how to look the part. I could play the role. I knew how. My navy minidress rode high up my thighs, exposing most of my legs. Before I left home, I’d styled my hair in a messy fall around my shoulders and laid my makeup on thick.

  Large brick buildings scratched the heavens on either side of the alley, filling the low space with smarmy darkness. I stepped over stagnant puddles of oil, trash, and liquor, teetering on high heels. A rat squeaked as it sprinted from one trash heap to another. I stilled as it crossed my path. I still fit in here, despite how much I’d cleaned up my act. To the left, a bit further up along a small side street, the back of an abandoned restaurant now served as an entrance to Felthill Chicago’s largest crack house. Fiends streamed from it in waves and scattered like cockroaches into the night.

  “What you looking for, pretty thing?”

  I froze and looked up at my old dealer. He didn’t even recognize me, not anymore, but I recognized him. Tony had treated me good, as good as a drug dealer could. He kept me high and warm; at least, that’s what I thought. Until my mind cleared of the fog and I realized waking up to him between my legs wasn’t normal. That I didn’t want his touch, and that I threw my body and life away for that next high. His sort of danger came with a forced needle in the arm filled with heroin and a cage with invisible bars from which there was no escape.
That wasn’t the sort of party I was looking for.

  I cleared my throat and forced myself to stand tall. “Just heading to the party. Seems I lost my way.”

  He frowned at me, stepping closer. My feet ignored my message to move, to take me the other way as fast as possible. Instead, I lifted one eyebrow and cocked my hip, my trademark stance.

  “Damn, Mel, you done got uppity and shit, huh? You want Rico to take care of you?”

  “I don’t play anymore.” I took one step, but he mirrored me. I wouldn’t be able to get by him unless he allowed me to. My mouth went dry with familiar fear, a claustrophobic reaction to what he would demand from me.

  “You can wait a few minutes here with me.”

  Tony crowded closer with a cruel smile, just like he used to. No, this wouldn’t work. I was in more danger now with him than in some alley with a stupid drunk boy who was a little rough with his hands. I hated that part of me opened up like flower petals with Tony’s eyes on me and I realized I could get some dope, that I wanted sex like he could give me. That my teeth ached to get a taste. I wanted the rush, the high, but not the control that came with it. I didn’t want to lose who I was inside because I craved dirty things they could do to me.

  Men like Tony didn’t understand that.

  I took a step back and lifted my arm between us. “It’s not like that anymore.”

  “Fuck that. I’ve been missing that sweet puss of yours and I’m thinking I need a taste again. Want a hit? You get real wet after you get some from Rico. You remember how it tastes, don’t you?”

  I was sick. Still sick. Had to be when the mention of a hit factored higher than his threat. Three years. I’d been clean for three years, and I still fought the itch. I had to force myself not to curl inward and cross my arms. Fought to not use my fingernails to dig into the soft spots on the insides of my elbows.

  You’re stronger than that, Melody. Always will be. You do things on your terms now.

  “I’m not into that anymore. Let me go by.”

  “I’ll make you feel good, baby, I promise.”

  He lunged for me, and I dropped to the ground to avoid his outstretched hand. I scrambled on the dirty asphalt and slipped past him before I stumbled to my feet.

  “You fucking bitch. Get back here.”

  He was fast, faster than me. He bunched my dress into his fist and yanked me back toward him. I didn’t bother screaming. No one would help me here. No one cared. Instead, I fumbled into my clutch and grabbed the mace. I needed a few seconds. A few moments to get away and race through the alleyways to freedom. I remembered the bolt holes, had used them before. As he turned me to him, face twisted with rage, I forced my hand right into his face.

  “Let me go,” I raged. Not giving him a chance to respond, I depressed the plunger on the mace and emptied the entire contents into his eyes.

  “You fucking bitch!” he roared, but he let me go before he clawed at his eyes.

  I used that to get away. My only focus was on escape. I ducked through boarded windows, raced through broken doors, and slid through trash. But I’d made it. My heart pumped adrenaline through my veins, but I was safe. And I hadn’t accepted a hit. Hadn’t gotten dragged back in. I’d have to change my plans for tonight. I’d wait a little and then head back home.

  But my blood thrummed in my veins, remember the bite of danger that came with Tony. Rico, he called himself—Rich—with his tatted arms and charming smile. He kept his hair a bit long, and he used to like the way I gripped the strands when he fucked me. This place, his voice, everything combined to drag me back into memories. How fucked up was I that I wanted him to do it again?

  He slid around the corner, his smooth face twisted into a scowl, and I wanted to peek out of my hiding spot. I wanted to feel his rough hand on the back of my neck as he dragged me down on the ground. Gravel pressed into kneecaps could make desire sweeter, and I’d learned that lesson at his hands. Maybe what I didn’t need was a sloppy kiss tinged with alcoholic breath, but a fuck that punished me as well as praised me.

  “Bitch, where are you?” he asked while he searched under crates and into cardboard boxes just a few steps from where I hid. A silver glint caught my eye, drawing my focus to his blade. Tony wanted to cause pain tonight, and knowing that he’d probably kill me was the only thing that saved me from my downward spiral into darker needs.

  “Oh no,” I moaned, and rushed from my hiding spot to a vacant building further away from Tony. I must have pissed him off good; he never moved more than a few blocks from his perch. I knew what that meant: Tony got dangerous when he was angry. I’d seen the prostitutes he’d left sliced up for not doing a good enough job or cutting off his money. One renegade, a girl without a pimp who worked for herself, lasted three nights under his blade. I still had nightmares about that time.

  The large alleyways were interlocked in the center of Industrial Town Chicago, which made it hard for me to sneak past him. Until he went back toward his area, I couldn’t move far. The large, vacant buildings here didn’t hide sound well; it was why Tony liked working them. A puddle of water to my right smelled of stagnant piss. I slid around it, trying my best not to track the smell with me.

  “Don’t run from me. You’re only making it worse for yourself.”

  I pressed my body against the wall behind me and steadied my breathing, hoping the club noise and pepper spray in his eyes had shielded my escape.

  “Dammit,” I mouthed.

  “Don’t make me come find you. If I have to come find you, I’ll leave you in pieces when I’m finished.”

  Maybe that’s what I deserved: a filthy death for a filthy whore. No one would miss me; I’d learned that long ago. I gulped as my heart raced and sweat trickled down between my breasts. My cheeks ached, and it took me a minute to realize I was smiling. Like a maniac, I smiled while a drug dealer hunted me, threatened to chop me into pieces, and toss me away. I smiled.

  So fucked up.

  A gunshot cracked.

  I didn’t care about Tony as I turned.

  “Fuck it. Enemy territory. Bitch is good as dead anyway,” Tony mumbled to himself. His voice filtered through the haze, but I didn’t comprehend his words.

  In the dim light of the abandoned warehouse, a man stood in the doorway, his hair falling in blond disarray around his ears. A rough goatee accentuated his firm mouth. Time slowed and morphed. I heard nothing. Blood splattered the wall as his victim slid down, a red hole between his eyes. The blond watched him without emotion before he turned the gun toward me.

  I froze. My heart thumped, and the sound ricocheted through my head. My blood ran hot and then turned ice-cold as he stepped toward me, his heavy boots thudding on the ground. He didn’t appear to be one of the normal thugs from around here, one of the everyday drug dealers perpetrating petty crimes. No, he wore his violence with ease. Didn’t even look back at the man he’d killed. Instead, he kept coming toward me. His jeans made no sound, and the black leather of his vest sent off warnings in my head, the cut familiar. I knew that snake patch anywhere.

  Diamond Eater.

  He belonged to the Diamond Eaters Motorcycle Club, a one percenter. Out of the frying pan, into the fire.

  “You shoot up?” he asked.

  I swallowed, not sure what the right answer was in this circumstance but not able to lie as I looked into his eyes, either.

  “No.” I shook my head to punctuate my answer. His gaze slid over my arms and I crossed them over my chest, a chill racing up my spine. “I used to,” I added.

  “Too bad. May have made you forget.”

  He pressed his gun to my forehead, right between my eyes. Not shying away from him, standing my ground, I wanted him to look into my eyes while he took my life. Needed him to see who he was taking. My parents told me I would die in these streets one day. My obituary would probably read “Here lies the asshole we told would die if she didn’t get off the smack.” Not entirely accurate, but real.

  “If you’re going t
o shoot me, do it already. I’ve had a bad night, and life isn’t looking too good anyway,” I told him.

  “You’ve got heart,” he said. “I’ll give you that. If you don’t shoot up, what you come out here for?”

  “Something.”

  “Not an answer for the man holding a gun to your head.”

  I took a deep breath.

  “Something dangerous,” I whispered. I wasn’t sure if it was regret or longing in my voice. Regret that I’d found it at the end of a gun. Or longing that I could finally be free of the pain, if he’d just pull the fucking trigger. Hell, I’d like to think it was a bit of both.

  Studying me for a moment, his gaze burrowed deep into my soul, where emotions swirled and unanswered questions screamed for answers. Into that part of me I didn’t like to admit I had, and yet I fed with meaningless sex and pain. Anything to feel good. Anything to feel alive again, like when I chased that high.

  I dropped my gaze, angry he’d made that side rise closer to the surface.

  “Get up and let’s go.” He pulled the gun from my face and stepped back.

  I blinked, uncertain what to do, afraid of what he had on his mind. Run! I stumbled to my feet, but I wasn’t fast enough. The Diamond Eater twisted his fist into my hair, yanking me back.

  “I don’t repeat myself.”

  Turning me toward him, he hauled me against his chest. Softness pressed into hard. Fear into determination.

  “Where are we going?!” I screamed.

  My captor gave no answer, just held me against him, crushing me so my exhale locked in my lungs, trapped. I forced it out as he wrapped one arm around my waist and pinned my hips to his. His control was absolute, powerful, and unbreakable. Being this close to him made it easier to study his features. His eyes were brilliant emerald, his gaze burning me wherever it touched: my chocolate eyes, the slender slope of my nose. A flush rose under my pale skin. Then my mouth was on fire, and I parted my lips, sucking in air to cool the blaze. It only fanned it further.