Unwritten Rules (Filthy Florida Alphas 3)

It, however, is not the ass of a little girl.

Not by a long shot.

Motherfucker.3ToiThe man carries me back into the house like a sack of potatoes. I don’t make a sound or protest. I want to—but I don’t. It’s a learned reflex. There was a time when my father’s beatings were horrible. I was younger then; there was no getting away from them and no leaving. He punched me in the throat, repeatedly bruising the vocal chords and doing damage there. That was ten years ago. I haven’t spoken a word that anyone could hear since.

At first it was because I couldn’t. Now I can, though my voice sounds different and it’s hard to even make a whisper. I’ve kept that to myself, partly because I can’t be sure my father wouldn’t try again to make the damage more permanent, and partly because I’ve learned the quieter I am, the less attention people pay me, and there’s a certain amount of safety in that.

Now as the man carrying me puts me down and I face Marcum and the others, being quiet is easier than ever, because whatever words I might utter are drowned by the fear inside of me. I wring my hands together nervously and look Marcum in the eye.

I see a moment of surprise move across his face, but it quickly fades. Which is a shame, because it’s replaced by an intense look that unnerves me—probably because it is solely focused on me. I’ve seen Marcum in town. He’s even come into the diner while I worked, but I work in the back and he never saw me. I’ve always been more than a little fascinated by him—and a lot scared. He’s larger than life. People tend to talk more around me than normal, because they feel secure in knowing I can never tell their secrets—since I supposedly can’t talk. Yet, hardly anyone talks about Marcum, he gets that much respect—or fear. Still, I’ve seen him and though he has to be older than me—maybe by a lot—there’s something about him that intrigues me. He reminds me of Kris Kristofferson in looks, or maybe even Sam Elliot like he was in the movie Roadhouse. Tall, lanky, but still built, long hair that looks unkempt, but still manages to be sexy. A face that has seen miles, but somehow remains appealing. Lines and scars that tell a story all on their own. There are moments when he smiles or laughs with his men and those lines around his lips and eyes crinkle and I like it… I can’t even say why I like it—but I do.

Right now, however, his face scares me. This entire scene scares me. It feels as if he’s studying me. In my experience when a man looks at you that hard and for that long, good things don’t follow.

“What’s your name?” he asks, and my first instinct is to answer him. I almost feel compelled to do it… but I fight the instinct. His voice is dark and gravelly; it sounds like he smokes six packs a day and has for more years than I’ve been on the Earth. He probably has... I bite my lip, giving myself pain to concentrate on, rather than his intense stare. Silence fills the room. “I asked you a question, sweet thing,” he adds, and again I bite down the urge to answer.

“You can ask the bitch until the cows come home and her answer would be the same. She can’t talk,” my father explains and I can’t stop the hateful look I give him—especially since he’s the reason my voice is the way it is.

“You don’t like him much, do you?” Marcum questions, and too late I notice that his gaze never left my face. He sees the hate I didn’t bother to hide.

“She’s an ungrateful little bitch is what she is!” my father starts. He takes a step toward me, and I can’t stop the automatic reflex to step back, to get away from him. I hate that I do it, but it’s an instinct that has been born over years of abuse. Just because he hasn’t touched me since I got old enough to hit back doesn’t mean my body has forgotten the years before. Years when I was helpless to defend myself.

Marcum’s men grab my father before he can make it to me. I hold my body still, to keep from jumping back anyway.

“Why can’t she talk?” Marcum says, and I can’t help but think it’s not good that I’ve captured his attention. He stands in front of me, his hand drifting up to touch my hair. My breath stalls in my throat. His hand is huge and there are these silver rings on them that have skulls. His hand is also inked along the inside of the palm. When it spreads open I can see a tattoo of a skull with fiery red eyes.