My Valentine

Chapter 1

The bar reeks of stale beer and broken dreams, the kind of smell that sticks to your skin like regret. I’m wiping down the counter, my hands moving in circles, as if I can scrub away the years. “Valerie!” my boss snaps from the back, his voice slicing through the twang of country music. “Get your ass to the other side and serve the gentleman over there! I’m watching your dumbass!” I flinch but nod, my feet already carrying me across the sticky floor. At twenty-four, I’m used to the yelling. It’s just noise now, like the wind rattling the loose shutters of my life. My name’s Valerie, and if you’re guessing my life’s been a mess, you’re dead right.

I was born in downtown Kentucky, where the air was thick with bourbon and bruises. At twelve, I ran from my alcoholic parents, their fists as heavy as their empty promises. My little brother, Tommy, wasn’t so lucky. He was only eight when their rage took him, his small body too fragile to survive. That day’s a shard of glass in my heart, too sharp to touch. After I fled, the system swallowed me whole. Foster care. Four families by eighteen, each one spitting me out with the same verdict: “A lost cause, just like your folks.” At sixteen, my parents tracked me down—not for love, but for money, probably to fuel their next blackout. I stood there, shaking, as they loomed over me, their eyes hollow and mean. That was the day I broke. No one wanted me—not my blood, not my fosters. So I ran again, this time to Wyoming, where the sky felt big enough to hold all my hurt. For two months, I slept in alleys, counting down to my eighteenth birthday. Freedom, I thought. No more chains.

Three days before I turned eighteen, on September 15th, everything changed. I met Eric outside a diner, his New York accent sharp and smooth, like a blade wrapped in velvet. He was twenty-two, with eyes that promised safety and a smile that felt like home. I was seventeen, starving, my clothes threadbare. He bought me a burger, gave me his jacket, and said I didn’t have to sleep on the street anymore. To me, he was perfect. No one had ever looked at me like I was worth saving. Eric took me in, clothed me, fed me, and got me a job waitressing at his friend’s restaurant. For the first time, I felt like I belonged. But seven months in, the cracks started showing. He’d come home late, his breath heavy with liquor or something sharper. One night, at 3:00 a.m., I couldn’t hold it in.

“Eric, where were you?” I asked, my voice small but steady.

He exploded. “You lazy piece of s**t!” he yelled, his face twisting. “I’m busting my ass, and you’re just leeching off me, living rent-free!” I tried to argue, to say I was working too, but his hand cracked across my face. The sting was sharp, but the shock floored me. Then came the belt, lashing my skin, splitting my lip, bruising my knees. For twenty minutes, he didn’t stop. I curled up on the cold floor, crying, my body a map of pain. Then, as if a switch flipped, he dropped the belt, his face crumpling. He ran to the bathroom, sobbing louder than I was. “I’m sorry, Val,” he said through the door I’d locked myself behind. “I don’t know what came over me.” I was young, naive. I thought his tears meant love. Ten minutes later, I came out. We made up. But that was just the beginning.

For two years, I wore long sleeves, even in Wyoming’s brutal heat, sweat soaking through to hide the bruises blooming on my arms, ribs, thighs. Eric’s apologies followed every blow, each one laced with promises he’d never keep. I stayed because I didn’t know where else to go. He’d saved me once, hadn’t he? Maybe this was love. At twenty, my world shifted again. One evening, Eric burst through the door, pale and frantic. “Pack your bag, Val. We’re leaving. Now.”

“What’s going on?” I asked, my heart racing.

His hand cracked across my cheek. “Just do it!” he shouted. I packed, hands shaking, and followed him to the car. As we sped through the night, he finally spoke. “I got into trouble. Drugs. A deal with the Aspires. They’re coming for me, Val. We gotta run.” The Aspires—Wyoming’s most notorious mobsters, their name a curse whispered in dark corners. We holed up in a filthy motel, the walls sweating, the air sour. For two days, Eric paced, jumping at every noise, his eyes wild. On the third day, his phone rang. He stepped outside, and when he returned, his face was different—determined, almost relieved. “Pack up,” he said. “A friend sent money. I can pay them off.”

The building was a rotting husk, its rusted walls reeking of oil and decay. Eric led me inside, his grip too tight. The air darkened as we walked, a single bulb revealing a group of men—twenty, maybe more—clustered in the shadows. A bloodied young man lay lifeless on the floor, a warning. Eric stopped short, and I hid behind him, my heart hammering. One man stood out, a jagged scar running from his left eye to his jaw. Eric called him Spin. He was their leader, his presence thick as smoke. “How you plannin’ to settle your debt, Eric?” Spin asked, his voice low and dangerous.

Before Eric could answer, a giant reeking of blood and sweat struck him from behind. Eric crumpled, his mouth bleeding. I screamed, then clapped a hand over my mouth, but Spin’s eyes locked onto me. “I’m sorry, Spin,” Eric gasped, spitting blood. “I don’t have your money.” Another punch landed, and as the next blow loomed, he blurted, “But I have something else! Take her—my girlfriend. She’s yours to clear my debt.”

The words hit like a freight train. My head spun, my legs froze, blood draining from them. Spin shoved a 421MI gun into Eric’s mouth. “What’s so special about her?” he growled, his eyes sliding to me. He nodded to his men. “Get her.” I couldn’t move as they grabbed me, dragging me to Spin. His hands pressed into me, testing me like livestock. I screamed, and his palm cracked across my face. The world went black.

When I came to, the air still smelled of rust and fear, my cheek burning. Eric was gone. The Aspires were gone. I was alone, sprawled on the cold concrete, aching but alive. Now, at twenty-four, I’m slinging drinks in a bar that smells like my past, serving men who look like Eric, like Spin, like my father. The bruises have faded, but the scars—the ones you can’t see—linger. Every night, as I wipe down this counter, I tell myself one thing: I’m not done yet. I’m still running, in my own way, and I’m not giving up.