Page 1 of Hero: Claimed

1.

Brinley

I’m safe, Brin. That’s all her note says. I flip over the postcard to trace the wordsThornbriar,Kentucky. I’ve traced them so many times over the past seven years that parts of the shiny ink have worn away and the corners have crinkled and rounded to the point that the pressed paper is starting to separate.

Miss you, Han, I think for the hundredth time today. And I still have a hundred more to think it before the night is over. I know because it’s the same every night, only tonight it’s worse because it’s my birthday and I’m sitting in my crappy apartment with only the cockroaches to keep me company. I push my glasses back up the bridge of my nose and sigh. Not because the glasses have a loose screw in the arm to keep them from fitting properly, either

Hannah knew how bad it felt to be abandoned. Her mom was the first to leave. Not taking her daughter from this hell but leaving her to deal with it. My mom took her in, cared for her as her own. Then just like Hannah’s mom, my mom took my father’s verbal, emotional and physical abuse one too many times and she took off, too. Never looking back. Never bothering to take Hannah and me with her. She just left us to him like we meant nothing. I know we didn’t mean nothing to her, it just wasn’t safe. She didn’t have money to care for us.

But then, seven years ago tonight, on my sixteenth birthday, after surprising me with a Hostess cupcake with a candle lit on it, I made a wish, blew out the flame, and Hannah and I laughed and talked until we passed out. When I woke up, she was gone, too. No note. Her clothing and a few mementoes were gone from her room. And three weeks later, I got this postcard.

I stand from the badly worn sofa, the fiber fill peeking through the scratchy, threadbare fabric, and walk over to look out the window. All the lights of the city lit up so brightly this time of night makes the city almost palatable. Houston has beauty for some during the day. But that’s not the Houston I live in. In my Houston, we’re only equal at night. With the lights. The lights don’t discriminate. They don’t characterize you as poor or trash or a slut, which of the three, I’m not.

“Happy Birthday, Brin,” I say, because there’s no one else to say it. Because of my dad and his associations, there aren’t any friends who would have me or whom I could keep safe from the stink of this life. Because they lead the same life as him.

Strangely, a pounding comes from my door, startling me, tearing my mind away from the contemplation of the city below. Who would be pounding on my door at this time of night? Maybe a junkie at the wrong apartment?

“Come on, fat ass. Open up. I ain’t got all night.” And that’s when I know exactly who’s pounding on my door. The junkie part wasn’t wrong, though. I walk over to the door, unhook the chain-lock, twist the first deadbolt, twist the second deadbolt, and finally flip the lock on the handle itself. A girl can’t be too careful in this neighborhood. Not that I own any possessions worth protecting, aside from me. But I’m my most prized possession.

Before I have the door more than cracked open, my dad pushes inside. A large hairy man whose head appears to be attached directly to his collar without that pesky neck getting in the way follows behind him. The way I know he’s hairy is because he’s wearing a cut, showing his allegiance to The Devil’s Riot—a nasty MC, the kind of nasty that gives MCs world over a bad name—without a shirt underneath. Although he’s so hairy, at first glance, people probably think he’s wearing a sweater.Stark contrast to my father whose sallow skin pocked with open sores, gaunt complexion and wrinkles make him appear fifteen to twenty years older than he actually is. Thinner than I’ve ever seen him. The tattoo of the bullet hole on his face sags so much it looks more like a fried egg now.

I close my eyes to collect myself. He’s a horrible man, no doubt, but he’s still my dad and I struggle seeing him looking so sicky and strung-outwhen he used to be strong and so handsome, despite being an asshole.Since my sister ran away, he’s all I have left and even though it might make things easier for me to escape this life if he wasn’t around anymore, the thought of being totally alone scares the hell out of me.

Beneath that cut and sweater, the Riot guy has bigger tits than me. And his beer belly looks like he breached the walls of a brewery rather than enjoying pints with his brothers. I know, I’m one to talk, but at the very least I try to take care of myself. Shower, wear makeup when I leave the house, try to find clothing to complement my figure. I mean, not tonight. I wasn’t expecting company and it’s well after ten o’clock at night, so I’m in what I’m always in, a thin pale pink tank top with spaghetti straps and a pair of gray cotton shorts with notches cut out at the corner of both thighs. And pockets. Because everything is better with pockets. Perfect sleeping attire.

It’s unusual for my dad to remember my birthday, so surprise doesn’t begin to cover my reaction to him showing up tonight. “Hey, Dad,” I greet him. “You remembered my birthday?”

“Fuck, it’s your birthday?” he asks, though not really asking, sort of just thinking out loud. And totally shattering that brief thought that my father might actually give even a tiny shit about me to show up tonight. “You’re what? Twenty-three, twenty-four?”

“Twenty-two,” I answer drolly.

He looks me up and down, and not in the way a father should never look at his daughter, assessing me. Predatorially. Creepy. “Good thing I showed up then. Wouldn’t be much use to me in a year or two.”

“Don’t like old cunt,” the hairy Riot says to my dad.

What the hell is going on? I narrow my eyes at my dad. “What the hell is going on?”

“She’s a big girl, you left that part out. Not paying top dollar for a cunt with thighs as big as mine.”

As if! My thighs are not as big as—what? It just hit me what the man said. “Paying top dollar?” I ask stupidly, because in the back of my brain, I know exactly what he’s talking about.

“Now, come on, Crush. We made a deal. You can’t go back on your deal,” my dad whines atCrush.

“You didn’t tell me she’s fat.”

“I called her fat ass when we got here,” says my dad, defending himself.

“There’s fat ass and there’sfat ass. Not a huge market for bitches her size. It’ll take us longer to unload her—fuck man. Lucky I don’t shoot your ass for bringing me defective product.”

Ouch!I’m notthatbig. Geesh—wait, I don’t want him to want me. Yeah, I’m totally that big, guy. Move along. Let’s pretend we never met.

“And at her size,” my dad goes on, “means that not many men have had her. Fat ass means tight pussy. You gotta want tight pussy.”

I should try to get away, to run. But no, I remain standing, cemented to the spot in my apartment, shaking, understanding what I’ve heard, yet not understanding it at all.

“Right,” the guy says. “I’ll forgive the debt and front you for more smack, but you owe me for the new shit. She only pays off your last debt. Best slowdown that using unless you got more daughters.”

“I got one more daughter,” Dad offers.But he doesn’t have another daughter to offer up because Hannah left. She got out and only I have an idea of where she might be. I can’t believe the lengths he’d go to score another hit.

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