Flawed Beauty (16 page)

“Hey, Nelson,” she said politely.

Sucking on a toothpick, which was a
constant in his mouth, he said, “My, my, my. You are looking so fine tonight,
little Tater-skin.”

Tate cringed at Nelson’s nickname
for her. It seemed vulgar somehow. And so the tone for her evening was set.
Sadly, the best the night ever got was cringing at Tater-skin. The bar was
filled with mostly young college students who only wanted to get drunk, be
loud, and fight. Because of the young crowd, her tips were minimal, but her
work was doubled. She ran from table to table for most of the night, not even
getting a chance to help Thor behind the bar during shift. This mattered as
whatever wasn’t done during shift, had to be done after.

Tate was surprised at how many
people were still in the bar at Last Call on a Tuesday night. She was tired,
cranky, and only wanted them gone. She went behind the bar and began washing
glasses. The crowd had thinned considerably by the time she was done. Glancing
at her watch, she groaned when she saw it was nearly three o’clock. She had to
be up at seven for school. She began moving quickly around the
bar,
policing the tables and lifting the chairs up so the
floors could be swept once everyone had left.

In her haste, she knocked two wine
glasses off a table. The crashing of the glass onto the floor caused those left
in the bar to applaud loudly.
Why wouldn’t they just go home?
she
fumed.

She picked up the biggest pieces of
broken glass and placed them on her tray along with the rest of the glasses
from the table. Irritated at her own clumsiness, she made her way to the bar to
drop off the glasses and collect a broom and dustpan. Lost in her musing, it
took her a moment to notice the man lounging with his back leaning nonchalantly
against the bar, and his ankles crossed. Her steps faltered, her breath caught
in her throat, and blood began to thunder in her ears.

“Nick?” she asked in a straggled
whisper.

Her hands began to tremble and the
tray she held slipped from her suddenly uncoordinated fingers. The crash of the
glasses on the floor brought her back to her senses. Oh, my God.
It couldn’t be… not after all these years.
Nick Tracey, the
boy who’d taken a horrendous situation and made it worse. He was older, of
course, but still had the same sandy-brown hair and cruel, brown eyes. He was
casually dressed in a black polo shirt and khakis. She’d not laid eyes on him
since he was sixteen, but she’d never forget his face. He smiled a cruel,
knowing smile and sauntered over to her.

“Hello,
Patanga
…
or are you still going by Tate?” he asked with mocking consideration. “Here,
let me help you.”

Her hands trembled and her breathing
was ragged. She batted his hands away.

“I’ve got it,” she muttered.

Her brain couldn’t seem to
kick-start into gear. Her heart pounded with the implications of Nick being
here. What if
Jace
found out about her past before
she had a chance to tell him…? And Nick would certainly tell him if given the
opportunity – especially if he thought it would hurt her. Because her hands
were shaking and she couldn’t regain her concentration, it wasn’t until Nick
reached down with a napkin that she realized she’d cut her hand and blood was
streaming onto the floor. Her stomach roiled at the sight of her blood. She
flinched at his touch.

“Don’t touch me,” she said and tried
to jump back, but as she was on her haunches, it only succeeded in landing her
on her rump.

Thor was at her side immediately.
“Is there a problem here?” he asked, glaring at Nick.

Nick raised his hands, palms up. “No
problem here. I was just helping and she cut her hand. It looks pretty bad,
don’t you think?”

Tate glanced down for the first
time, noticing the slash, which started at pad of her forefinger and ran
diagonally across her palm. Blood was gushing and streaming to the floor. Her
stomach became queasy at the sight of her own blood, and she swallowed and
closed her eyes briefly. 

“It really does look bad, Tate. How
about you let me take you to the ER?”

When she started to shake her head,
Thor rose. “You’re going and that’s final. So get yourself together and I’ll
get the workman’s comp forms from
Zek
. You need to
get this taken care of. Besides, the Doc would never forgive me if I didn’t
take care of you.”

As Thor rose, Nick offered casually,
“I’ll be happy to take her.”

“No,” Tate said more sharply than
she intended, causing both men to look at her.

“No, it’s okay. I’ve got her,” Thor
answered.

As Thor moved swiftly away leaving
Tate sitting on the floor, Nick came back down on his haunches.
“So, a doctor, huh?
Well, good for you, Tate. You’ve really
hit the jackpot here, huh? Better than all those other losers you spread your
legs for.”

She flinched when he reached out a
hand to rub one of her blonde curls, which had escaped its band.

“So beautiful,” he muttered almost
to himself.

“Have you put out for
him
?”
He gave a harsh bark of laughter at her expression. “Well, good for him, bravo,
I say. I wonder… does he know?”

She blanched at his words.

“Oh, I see,” he said with a twisted
grin. “It was really good seeing you, Tate. I’ll stop by when we have more time
to… chat,” he said with a menacing promise in his voice.

Thor and
Zek
came from the office and wrapped her hand in a bar towel before shuffling her
off into Thor’s SUV. She glanced back to see Nick waggle his fingers at her
from the bare parking lot. How had he found her? Had Alan told him? No, she’d
bet her last dollar Alan wouldn’t have told him.

The emergency room was packed. Thor
sat beside her and leaned forward with his forearms resting on his thighs.

“Thor, you don’t have to stay with
me.”

Suppressing a yawn, he turned his
head towards her. “I know, sweetheart.” Leaning back in his seat, he asked,
“How’s Markus doing these days?”

“Toby said he was scheduled for
another surgery soon,” she replied.

“It’s a shame. A man spends his life
protecting his country and gets shot breaking up a bar fight – never to walk
again; a real damned shame.”

“Yes, it is,” she murmured.

Thor sat with her for an hour, but
it was late, and after begging him for fifteen minutes, he finally agreed to go
home.

“Are you sure you’ll be okay?” Thor
asked her.

“I’m fine, the bleeding has slowed.
I’ll call a taxi when I’m done. There’s no reason why both of us have to sit
here all night. Please go. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Well, if you’re sure…”

Left alone, Tate let out a trembling
breath and let her head fall back against the wall with her eyes shut tight.
The pain in her hand had nothing on the anguish in her heart. Her stomach
flopped as she thought about Nick Tracey. She’d been fourteen when he’d raped
her and sent out that revolting video. And she’d been branded by it as much as
if he’d take a red-hot poker and carved his initials on her forehead.
666
would have been more appropriate
, Tate thought.

As she’d never seen the video – had
never wanted to see it – she never knew what actually happened, just what her
mind had imagined. But everyone else had watched it from beginning to end.
Every football player, every baseball player, guys from every group of the
school had hit on her with the express purpose of doing whatever Nick had done.
It had been humiliating and degrading. She moved to a different school to get
away from her newfound notoriety. But it’d not taken long for the video to
follow her there, too. The only thing Nick had suffered was being suspended for
the rest of the school year for emailing the video, and this had further
infuriated him. He blamed her for the suspension. So in retaliation, he told
everyone how she’d come to live with them in the first place. How her own
father had tried to sell her to the highest bidder. She hated him so much. And
now he was here.

It wasn’t until she’d already been
placed with several different families that Alan and Beth had seen the video
and known what’d actually happened – understood what Nick had done to her. She’d
been placed into more foster homes than she could remember, and, until she
moved in with Toby and Markus, had not lived in the same house for longer than
a matter of months. Once a new foster family got wind of her past, either the
other foster kids hit on her or the school would call to complain about her
alleged activities, and off she’d be.

At first, when guy after guy had hit
on her, or touched her inappropriately in the school halls, or made rude
comments, she’d just ignored them and bowed her head in shame. But eventually
she’d decided if she was going to be branded a
whore,
she might as well live up to the name. She’d gone out with whoever asked and
had lain beneath them as they’d pounded into her while holding her down. She’d
had sex in cars, bleachers, parent’s beds, pool chaises, boats, and even once
on the Ferris-Wheel. And none of it had meant anything to her. She’d closed her
eyes during each time and seen Nick Tracey looming over her holding her down…
and she’d cry each and every time.

So lost in her thoughts, she jumped
when she felt a cool hand touch her cheek. “Tate?”

She looked into the concerned
brilliant blue eyes of Dr.
Jace
Staton
as he squatted in front of her, dressed in scrubs and a white coat. He looked
so odd to her. She was used to seeing
Jace
the
rocker, not
Jace
the doctor. But here he was, his
hair brushed back and away from his face in a professional manner. He was
clean-shaven and seemed to wear a different persona here. But he was still
beautiful.

Taking a shaky breath, she wiped at
the tears she’d previously been unaware of.

“Hey,” she murmured.

“What’s wrong, honey?”

His use of the endearment made her
want to cry harder. Nick was going to once again destroy her life, she just
knew it.

Clearing her throat, she lifted her
injured hand. “I cut my hand on a piece of glass at work.”

He stared intently into her face
before gently taking her hand within his.

“Let me see.” With soft fingers, he
unwrapped the bar towel from her injury and looked at it thoroughly. The jagged
edges had started to pucker and were vividly white compared to the intense
redness surrounding it. He was so gentle and her heart seemed to stop beating.
She was going to miss him so much.

“Well, I think you’ll live, but you
will need stitches,” he said with a grin as he wiped a stray tear from her
cheek with the back of his fingers. “You should have let me know you were here.
I’d have squeezed you in,” he admonished.

He helped her stand and guided her
into an exam room. After he’d pulled the curtain closed around them, he pulled
her to him all too briefly to offer her comfort, and kissed her. She needed him
so much and before she was ready, he set her aside and began working on her
hand.

It was nearly six a.m. when she was
stitched and set to go.

Glancing at his thin gold watch,
Jace
said, “If you can wait around for another hour, I can
take you home. In my expert opinion, you need to be in bed… with constant
medical supervision,” he said suggestively.

She reached up with her uninjured
hand and wiped at the tiredness under his eyes.

“I’ll call a taxi. You need your
rest.”

“I’ll sleep better if you are
wrapped around me. What do you say?” he said with a wicked gleam in his eye.

Not knowing what the future might
hold, she nodded her agreement. “I’ll be down in the cafeteria, okay?”

He pressed a hard kiss to her mouth
before dashing off.

”Well, hi little princess. Your
dress is so sweet. Are you here all alone?”

“Of course not.
My mommy and daddy are buying me a
pretzel.”

“Do you like pretzels?”

“Not as much as ice cream.”

“Would you like an ice cream?”

With her eyes dancing, she said,
“Yes.”

“Well come with me and I’ll get you
one. But we have to be quiet. I wouldn’t want to make your parents angry. Can
you be quiet?”

“Oh yes, very quiet.”

“Okay, well let’s go then.”

The dark-haired stranger reached out
a hand and the little girl in the tulip-shaped tutu placed her small hand into
it. She looked up into the face of the man and realized who he was… her father.

Tate woke with a gasp and sat
upright.
Jace
was standing in the doorway to the
bedroom lounging against the doorjamb, cradling a cup of coffee between his
palms, watching her as she slept. He was dressed in a pair of silky, navy-blue
pajama bottoms which hung deliciously low on his hips. The chiseled outline of
his stomach and torso were even more defined. Tate couldn’t believe that this
beautiful man had made love to her for an hour just this morning. That he
actually seemed to care about her wellbeing.