by Tia Lewis
“You’re dodging the question,” Tess said, biting the end of a fry, chewing and swallowing. She picked up a can of soda and opened it before taking a swallow.
“Can’t you just admit that maybe, just maybe, you want to tell me something?” she went on, placing the can back down on the carpet. “I’ve told you about my life…”
“I never asked for that!” I snapped. “At no point did I ask you for any of that!” Now I was getting pissed. I didn’t owe her shit!
“Don’t you yell at me! You asked for it the night that you rescued me! That was when you asked for it!”
“I saw a fine pair of legs and some hot pussy in a skimpy red dress. That was all.”
“I don’t believe that! I believe that you felt something more. All I’m asking is for you to open up to me! Do you realize that’s the only thing that we argue about?”
I didn’t respond.
Tess growled and launched her tub of Chinese food at the wall. Fries and pieces of fish cakes splattered everywhere. Soy sauce, breadcrumbs, and fish stuck to the wall, slowly dripping down to the floor.
“I’m tired of your back and forth shit! One minute you’re caring, flirtatious and funny and the next minute you’re cold as ice! Make a bloody decision!” Tess jumped to her feet. “And to say you only saw a fine pair of legs and some pussy like that’s all I mean to you? Really? After everything that we have been through? Who the fuck do you think you are!” I could see that I had fucked up with my comment, but I didn’t know how to stop this train wreck from getting further out of control.
“I’m not going to let you bloody talk to me like I’m some piece of shit! If you think I’m intimidated by you, then you got another thing coming.”
She clenched her fists and looked down at me. She was wearing her shirt, panties, and nothing else. She paced back and forth before getting back in my face again.
“Why are you so bloody complicated! We get along so well, but when I try for even an inch of something real with you, you treat me like I’m meaningless! Why are you trying to pretend that you’re the biggest, and baddest arsehole that’s ever existed? I mean, you tickled me earlier!” She threw her arms up in frustration. “I know it sounds trivial, but don’t you get where I’m coming from?”
I had polished my nerves to a professional edge over the past years of my life. I had to in order to do my job. But something snapped in me when Tess kept shouting. The piercing screams to my ears in this cramped motel room were more than I could bear. Before I knew it, I was on my feet, standing over her with gritted teeth.
“Answer me, Liam!”
“Stop screaming!”
“Then bloody answer me!”
“Where the fuck would you be without me!” I was now inches away from her face and cornering her against the wall. “Where the fuck would you be If I hadn’t saved your ass in that alley!” I was about to fucking lose it.
“Get the fuck out of my face!” Tess rose up on her toes in an attempt to bring herself up to my level.
“You’d be dead or in Zharkov’s fucking bed. That’s where you’d be! I’ve killed for you, I’ve fought for you, and all I want to do is eat my goddamned food in peace without listening to you scream in my goddamned ear!” I turned and shouted. “You knew I was fucked up, but you decided to stay!”
“That’s beside the point, and you know what? How do I know you’re not working for Zharkov and the Russians? What if all of this is a setup and you’re manipulating me and acting like you care when you’re just going to send me back to him?”
“Work for Zharkov? Are you calling me a rat?”
“You won’t open up to me, Liam! So how in bloody hell am I supposed to know what’s really going on? I don’t want to play this guessing game anymore!”
“Don’t you fucking call me a rat,” I warned. “I’ll never go against the Bianchi’s. Family and loyalty to the death and I’ll take that to my grave. Even if they fucked me over, they’re still the only family I know.”
“You could just be saying that. How do I know you’re not a rat? Huh? How do I really know that Liam? Because honestly, I don’t know shit about you!” Tess had lost her fucking mind.
I was so fucking done.
“Are you trying to get a bullet to your head? Call me a rat again.” I felt the animal inside rattling its cage.
“I told you to get the fuck out of my face!” She refused to stop screaming. I admired her fire, but this bitch was taking shit way too far.
I towered over here as she unsuccessfully tried to push me away.
“After everything I’ve done for you, this is how you repay me?”
“What about the key and message on the piece of paper. What’s that about?”
“You went through my shit?”
“Yes! You know why? Because I can’t trust you! You won’t let me in! Now I told you to get out of my face! Back the fuck up!”
I turned back to her and punched a hole in the wall above her head. She flinched, but she didn’t back down. “I’m tired of this shit! You’ve had every chance to go to the police or get the fuck away from me, but you decided to stay. Yes, I’ve claimed you as mine but never once did I force you to stay with me. Did I? Did I!”
“No!”
“Then stop trying to change me into a man that I’m not! Stop going on and on about the past like it fucking matters!”
“Fuck you!” She screamed and her eyes burned with fiery hatred. “Punching a hole in the wall doesn’t scare me! You’re nothing but a heartless and emotionless thug! Is that who you are? Just a bloody thug like the rest of them!”
“I’m a killer, Tess!” I growled. “That’s who I am and this all I know how to do! I have to kill to save both of us! I don’t have time for emotional shit when I’m a hitman!”
“I don’t accept that!”
“For fuck’s sake! I know what I am! I’m the man in the fucking shadows, do you get it? I’m the man who people run away from. I’m the man with the gun, razor wire… I’m the… fuck! I’m The Animal! A hitman, through and through and when I’m done there’s nothing but blood!”
I turned to leave the motel, chuckling softly to myself: You can’t win with this girl. I turned back to her and laughed before I said words that I would soon regret.
“You know what? Fuck this shit,” I chuckled while shaking my head. “I don’t wanna burst your bubble Tess, but we’ve just met.”
“I know that!”
“Well, then you should know you’re nothing special to me. You hear me? You’re just another whore. Another wet hole to fuck.”
I could hear Kevin scream in my head: Take it back, brother! You don’t mean it! I knew my brother was right, but when the fury takes you over, right and wrong don’t come into play. I wanted to wound her, hurt her as deeply as she’d just hurt me.
“Fuck you, Liam!” Her eyes started to water, and she rubbed her face. “So, that’s how you really feel? The truth is finally out, and here I thought you were one of the guys—one of the few —who understood the difference between calling a woman a whore during sex and not in real life. But apparently not. Maybe you’re right; maybe I don’t know you at all. Maybe I would have been better off with Zharkov living in bloody hell than falling in love with you!”
“You don’t know me?” I couldn’t believe her fucking nerve. “That’s because nobody knows me! I’m not a man that anyone should know! If you know me, it’s because I’m coming after you to do a job and that means that I will be the last thing that you know!”
She finally backed down and walked over to a nearby chair and sat down. Her arms were folded, and she crossed her legs as she stared out the window.
I paced back and forth as I regained my composure. “You know what? Maybe everybody will better off if I was dead. Then at least I wouldn’t have to carry this fucking dark cloud with me every single day, and I could finally join my brother. Death is what I deserved especially when I killed…”
I stopped short. I was g
etting carried away in my anger, and I refused to go there. Not right now.
“What are you talking about?” Shit. Now Tess’s interest was piqued. I could see that mentioning my past was like dangling candy in front of a baby.
“Forget it.” I threw my hands in the air. “Just forget it.”
“See! That’s exactly what I’m talking about, Liam!” Her voice cracked, and she wiped her eyes again. The whites of her eyes were red and bloodshot. “I’ve been used, abused, tricked, and raped…”
“I know that!” I stood by the door, watching her, at a complete loss as to what to do.
“Then understand that not knowing a single bloody thing about the man who saved me, the man I’m beginning to fall for hurts worst of all! But you know what?”
“Tess…”
She leaned forward in her chair and pointed at me. “You’ll never find a bloody damsel in distress in me! I’m a survivor not a victim, and I refuse to let some detached arsehole make me feel like shit!”
“Tess…”
“Go fuck yourself!”
Her tears flowed freely now. Tess brought her hands to her face, but the tears just pushed between her fingers and covered the backs of her hands. She sobbed, keeled over and rested her face on her knees. It was sad to see her hunched over like that, sobs wracking her body as she cried.
Her body trembled, and I felt the urge to go to her, to comfort her in some way. But I didn’t know what to do, and I had no clue how to comfort her. I stood there for two or three minutes watching her, and then I couldn’t handle it anymore. She just kept crying, the tears showed no sign of stopping. I felt like she was drowning and I was miles and miles away, unable to get to her. I felt something warm and potent in my chest, and I couldn’t allow that. I had to cut that weak shit out before it caused me any more grief than it already had.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, I pulled on my boots. Then I picked up the suitcase and headed for the door.
“I’ll be back soon. I need to clear my head,” I announced, feeling dizzy as I walked away from her and into the night.
Go back, brother!
You can’t just leave her there!
You can’t just abandon her like that!
“Fuck!” I roared into the sky as I walked through the fading sunlight to the pay phone near the road. I didn’t know if Tess and I would last or if we would even get through this. Could we fight our way out of the Hell that we’d had fallen into? I didn’t know what the future held or if we would even reconcile after this argument. I tried to become the man that I had once been, the tough man, the uncaring man, but Tess…
She had changed me. For better or worse, she had changed me.
And if I knew one thing for sure it was this.
There was no going back.
Chapter Twenty-Six
We just argued, I thought as I stood in the pay phone booth. I wasn’t the sensitive type, that was for sure, but after saving Tess from the Russians and getting into this hot mess, I had to admit things were changing for me. But I needed to concentrate. But she’s back in the motel room, and we just argued. My mind wouldn’t let it go, and that right there told me that I cared more than I was willing to admit. It wasn’t Kevin’s voice this time. It was me who was the voice of reason.
I should go back!
“No,” I muttered, out loud.
Now was the time for business, and I wouldn’t let my emotions get in the way of it. But Tess Britton was different than the others―Tess was special. She had hammered into my cold black ribcage and taken a peek at my heart. With her long blond hair and her sexy petite body, she had broken through to something.
I shook my head, shaking the thoughts away.
Focus, Liam!
Cars drove by as I made my way to the phone booth trailing my suitcase behind me. I opened the door and saw somebody had scribbled: ‘Lacey sux any1! The booth smelt like piss and the floor was sticky with it. On the notice board were several advertisements for homeless shelters and drug abuse hotlines.
I tried to keep Tess out of my head, but it was difficult. I knew that she was back there, crying, and I knew that it was because I had called her a whore. Why the fuck did I have to say that?
She had been kidnapped. It wasn’t her fault.
But still, I had said it.
I sighed, reached into my pocket and pulled out some change that I put into the machine. The coins clattered into the mechanism reminding me of coin machines at the arcade. I picked up the receiver and closed my eyes. I couldn’t remember my Fixer’s number because all I could think about was Tess.
I had to focus and leave all of the emotional shit for later.
But focusing was easier said than done.
I couldn’t help but picture Tess in the chair, hunched over, tears pouring down her cheeks. And to acknowledge the fact that I had caused those tears made it worse. I thought that I had hardened my heart to things like this. But when I pictured Tess―my woman―I felt a pang in my chest that I had not felt since Kevin died and I never thought I would feel that way again. I found myself gripping the receiver so hard it creaked with the strain.
“Just think, goddamn it,” I muttered to myself.
But my mind ran on and on, like a dog who’s spotted a bone and wouldn’t give up until it finally took a bite out of it. I envisioned Tess throwing on a jacket and fleeing the motel room, maybe bumping into the old cat-loving couple from earlier, wiping at her wet cheeks and shouting, “Fuck you, Liam!” I saw her stumble down the road, into traffic—and my sick mind went on and on until I saw her blood spattered on the road, croaking in desperate breaths.
I shuddered.
Think, think!
I tried to tell myself that I had only known this woman for a few days, that it was madness to care this much, and that I was letting myself become soft. But that did little to soothe my anxiety. When you’re shut off from everybody in your life, it takes some damned good prying to get you to open up. Whether she knew it or not, Tess had succeeded in getting me to open up, if only just a little bit. I was open to caring about her. It terrified me more than any man ever had. Killing was nothing compared to this powerful emotion: this puncturing feeling that had tangled me within its web and refused to let me go.
I closed my eyes and listened to the hum of the traffic, and the squawking of a flock of birds as they darted through the dark sky. I listened to the footsteps of a pedestrian who walked past the phone booth, feet kicking up dust and stones. I listened and focused on nothing but the sounds around me, and I searched the depths of my mind for the Fixer’s number.
After about five minutes―during which time I must’ve looked like a crazy homeless man, or a meditating Buddhist, or even like a hardened hitman trying to push away his woman and remember a goddamned phone number―something clicked in my mind. I remembered dialing the number before, and the memory of the motion of my fingers across the buttons drifted into my mind.
“Yes!” I murmured and dialed the number.
Across the street, a black crow landed and stood at the edge of the road as though it wanted to cross. How did the crow cross the road…? I looked into the crow’s eyes, and it looked back at me, tilting its head. We’re the same, surrounded by death, the crow appeared to be saying. I couldn’t deny it.
“Hello!” a bubbly Texan woman sang out after five or so rings. “Thank you so much for calling Pirate Mini-Golf Adventure Land Supreme! How may I help you?”
“Yes, I’d like to book a stage party, please. A party of eleven with the Meat Special platter and eleven wristbands for the amusement rides.” It all came back to me now.
“Absolutely, sir, one moment please!” The woman pretended to type, all for the charade. There was no mini-golf, there was no Meat Special platter, and there were no amusement rides. There was just the Fixer’s employee sitting in a storage shed somewhere, waiting for calls. “And what is your address? It is just for our records.”
“It’s the Wanderer’s Pillow
.…” I gave her the address.
“Excellent! And do you require any extras?”
“Clothes, tools, delivery service.”
“Great!”
“One more thing,” I said, reaching into my jean’s pocket and pulling out the white piece of paper from Mrs. McGreevy’s painting. “I would like to book the scavenger hunt, too.”
“What a fantastic choice, sir.”
I read her the message on the paper.
“Thank you for that information. One moment please.”
I listened to the awful elevator music, leaned against the phone booth and waited.
“Sir? Are you still there?”
“Yes,” I grunted.
“One moment please.”
More elevator music.
“Thank you for your patience. We sincerely apologize for the wait, and we appreciate you as our valued…”
“Speak,” I cut her off impatiently.
“Very well. I was unable to find information on the letters and numbers you gave us. However, the address is not in Boston, sir. It’s in the United Kingdom. London to be exact.”
“London?”
“Yes. 429 Finchley Road is located in Hampstead London England. The address is to a warehouse building…”
I hanged up.
Warehouse? I shook my head. I set the receiver down and picked up the suitcase, before leaving the phone booth. I thought about going back to the motel room, but the Fixer worked fast. He’d be here any minute. And the thought of seeing Tess again terrifies you, doesn’t it, brother? Is it because you’re angry, or because you’re ashamed? It’s because you know what you did was wrong.
I ignored Kevin’s voice and walked to the edge of the parking lot, set the suitcase down, and shoved my hands in my pockets. The black crow waddled down the street so it was level with me and stared at me again, its eyes blinking and squawking the entire time. It flapped its wings and ascended into the sky, which had nearly darkened to night while I was in the phone booth.