Fractured Breaths

by Zoey Derrick

  “Lee Brice?” I ask.

  “Yeah, that’s him. Sorry I don’t listen to that shi… stuff.”

  I roll my eyes and shake my head. “You haven’t seen her since then?”

  “No, sir, and I always work the weekends.”

  “Thank you,” I tell him before I go inside and back to my room.

  Once inside my room, I call out to Liam and he appears in the doorway. He’s changed into a pair of shorts and a t-shirt; his typical sleeping attire. My eyes land on his missing leg and no matter how many times I see it, I can’t help but be reminded of how we met all those years ago. “You feeling alright?” I ask him.

  “Yeah, I’m good, was gonna crawl into bed. Did you catch her?”

  I nod. “It was pointless,” I share. My voice dejected.

  “Wanna talk about it?”

  I give him a humorless laugh. “Not really. I’d like to go home though.”

  “I’ll call the airline.”

  I shake my head. “Go to bed, we can call in the morning.”

  He gives me a smile. “It is morning.”

  My eyes move from him to the windows and sure enough, you can see the sun rising over the mountains to the east. “Well, later, after we get some sleep.”

  “Alright. Anything else?”

  I shake my head. “Good night, Liam.”

  “G’night, lad. He uses the knob of the door to brace himself before he hops forward and closes the door.

  No matter how much I work him, no matter how fast he has to move, Liam is an oak. Solid and stable. If it wasn’t for the fact that I met him in a bar shortly after his accident, I would never know he’d lost his leg. He doesn’t walk with a limp, he doesn’t give the impression he’s incapable of doing anything and I’d be surprised if Cami or any of the other security guys from last night even know.

  I climb into bed, the bed that smells of sex and Livia, and curl myself around the pillow she was laying on before I let the memory of Liam and I meeting fill my mind as I fall asleep.

  Walking into a New York City bar is just what I need right now. The last few weeks have been completely insane. One thing after another has happened that I could have only dreamed about.

  I grab a stool at the bar and pull my baseball cap and sunglasses off my face, setting them down on the bar before the bartender comes over and asks what I want. I point at the guy sitting a few stools down from me. “Whatever he’s having.”

  The bartender looks sad for minute but he pours my drink. It’s a Tuesday night in Manhattan and it’s a quiet, hole in the wall pub across the street from my hotel. It had some Irish name on the outside and it’s tucked between two tourist shops. It seemed like a good place to duck inside for a while and grab a drink.

  The man whose drink I copied raises his glass in a toast when Brian, the bartender hands me my drink. I return the gesture and slam back the drink without actually tasting it. The burn is almost too much and I sputter a little bit. The guy I copied chuckles as he gets up and moves closer to me. I notice then that he’s limping and he looks like he’s in pain.

  He takes a seat on the stool next to me and extends his hand. “Liam,” he smiles, but there is a real pain in his eyes as he does.

  I take his hand. “A Scott in an Irish Pub?” I cock an eyebrow at him and Brian, the bartender, laughs.

  “This fool’s been coming here for years.” They both chuckle over what appears to be an inside joke.

  “Name’s Bryan,” I tell Liam before releasing his hand.

  “Well, that should be easy enough. What brings you to the Big Apple?”

  I point to my glass and Liam’s indicating to Brian, the bartender, the next round is on me. “Business.”

  “Ahh,” Liam exclaims as if that explains everything. “Good business?”

  I nod. “Very good business.”

  “Well, then we have a reason to celebrate,” Liam says as Brian sets down new glasses in front of us and we both grab them, this time clinking them together. “To good business.”

  “Aye.” I smile and this time I don’t down the glass, but rather take a sip of the single malt. “So, why you in here drinking on a Tuesday?”

  “Lost my job,” he states honestly.

  “Ah, shit, I’m sorry. What did you do?” I ask.

  Liam chuckles, “If I tell you, I’ll have to kill you.”

  Something in his voice says he’s serious yet the humor is underlying and Brian laughs. “Federal agent?” I ask.

  Liam smiles, “FBI.”

  “Nice, why’d they let you go?”

  “Lost my leg a few months back.” His answers are short and I can tell he doesn’t want to talk about it anymore.

  “Sorry to hear that, but I hardly see that as grounds for termination.”

  “That, my friend, is the million dollar question. They didn’t like it too much when I said the same thing, but the truth is, I was miserable at a desk job, they gave me the option to stay in that position or leave, I left, so it’s a win-win.”

  “What do you plan to do now?” I follow up before taking another sip of my whiskey.

  “Don’t know. Warm this stool for a while then go from there.”

  The night progressed until we were both completely hammered, but we exchanged numbers before the night was out. The next morning, I called him and offered him a job as my bodyguard. He was reluctant to step into that kind of role, especially considering he still had a long time in rehab to get through. I told him I would pay for his rehab and asked him to move to Nashville with me. Before the year was out, he’d moved in and settled into his role with an ease I wish I could have had with my newfound fame.

  That night in the bar, was fate intervening on a life altering event in both our lives. Liam never talks about his days with the Bureau and, up until Livia, I never bothered to ask.

  Neither one of us sleep much before we’re on our way to the airport to catch our flight. Leaving the hotel is bittersweet in a way I don’t expect. I don’t even have her number and leaving means the only place she could possibly contact me is now gone.

  “Can you do me a favor?” I ask Liam as we board the plane to head back to Nashville, my home.

  “Always, lad. You know this.”

  “Find her for me.”

  “If that is so important to you, why are we leaving?”

  “Because the only way is if I find her, she won’t come looking for me,” I tell him as we take our seats.

  “You can’t know that.”

  “Ahh, but I can. You didn’t see her resolve last night. She’s protecting herself.”

  “Something that girl has done since she was sixteen years old,” he says morosely.

  “Tell me about it?” I meant to be more demanding of him, but it came out as a question instead.

  He settles in, buckling up and stretching out. “What do you want to know?”

  “Everything.”

  “Aye, but I won’t tell you that, and you know that. But part of what was said last night is true. I found her in a whore house run by Vito Ricci in New York.”

  “So they do exist?”

  “What? The Mafia?” I nod in answer to his question. “They do, unfortunately.” He runs his hand in an absentminded gesture over his knee on the leg he had amputated.

  “So if you won’t spill the details on Livia, tell me about that.”

  “This?” He points to his leg, I nod again and he sighs. “Honestly? It’s still a blur, but it was during a bust on one of Ricci’s joints. We had some bad intel on what was going on at the warehouse we were raiding. We were under the impression it was a drug house and it wasn’t. It was an ammunition holding facility owned by Ricci. So I’ll let you draw your own conclusions on that one. I was lucky all I lost was the lower half quarter of my leg. The Bureau lost four men that day.” He falls silent again.

  “And Ricci?”

  There is an almost evil grin that spreads across Liam’s face. “That warehouse was the key to finishing o
ff the Ricci organization. Over the course of the next three weeks the Bureau, along with the CIA and NYPD managed to take out the rest of the family and the remaining moles they had in place in various organizations. That warehouse held the servers Ricci stored all his information on. It was the holy grail of the organization.” His evil smile turns into a smirk as he’s transported back to that time in his mind.

  “I vaguely remember reading or hearing something about the big takedown,” I tell him.

  “I’m sure you did. Everyone knows about it.”

  “And you played a part in that. That’s pretty epic.” I stroke his ego a little over that one. He just smiles and looks at me.

  “It was, but it was also tragic.”

  “Yeah, it was, but it wasn’t in vain,” I tell him.

  “No, that it was not.”

  We fall silent as the plane slowly fills with passengers before pulling away from the gate and taking off toward Nashville. Meanwhile my mind wanders back to the woman who’s crept her way into my heart. I can’t even begin to imagine all the pain she’s endured in her life, but I’m going to make it my goal to find out and then erase her pain.

  Chapter Eight

  Too late.

  LIVIA

  “Can I help you?” the man behind the registration desk asks me as I approach.

  “Can you call up to the penthouse for me?”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am, but there is no one in the penthouse. They checked out about an hour ago.”

  Fuck. “Were they scheduled to leave this morning?”

  “No, ma’am, they cancelled the rest of their reservation. Is there something else I can help you with?”

  My heart sinks into my stomach. “No, thanks.” I step away from the desk and back toward the doors to leave.

  If only I’d gotten here sooner.

  If only I hadn’t spent an hour pacing my tiny apartment debating on whether or not this was the right thing to do. Debating why I felt so compelled to come back here after the way he treated me last night. It’s still not something I can comprehend because right now, it makes no fucking sense whatsoever.

  Once outside I pull my phone from my back pocket. I don’t carry a purse; they just get in the way. I pull up Ireland’s number. I haven’t used it in months and that’s not her fault. It’s mine. I press the call button and slowly put the phone to my ear.

  “Becca, you alright?”

  “Yes, no…I don’t know.”

  “Talk to me? What’s going on?” she says and I can hear her concern through the phone.

  “I need a favor,” I tell her.

  “Anything.”

  “You seem to be pretty close with Cami now…”

  “Yeah, that’s something we need to talk about.” Her voice is softer, concerned and maybe even a little heartbroken.

  “We will, I promise, I just need some time.”

  “Understood.” Her voice has a softer, defeated tone to it, but she circles back to the reason for my call. “So what about Cami?”

  “She’s Bryan’s agent, right?”

  “No, but her company represents him. Cami delegates.”

  “Can she get in touch with him?” I ask after a beat of awkward silence.

  “Uh…what’s going on, Bee?”

  The nickname brings me back to when we first met back in college. A chore I didn’t want to take on, but I did it. Got myself a useless degree under the name of Becca Carpenter. A name that, if my discussion with Ireland goes south, will no longer matter. When our names were placed on our door, she was listed as Ireland McK and I was listed as Bee Carp. It was dumb, but that’s how it started. I gave her hell for having the name of a country as her first name, and she never stopped calling me Bee. I smile at the memory and wipe a stray tear from my cheek.

  “Nothing,” I finally manage to answer. “I…this is so stupid.”

  She chuckles into the phone. “You slept with him, didn’t you?”

  “What makes you say that?” I snap.

  “Becca, come on, I know you. But I also know that if you slept with him, you wouldn’t want to call him again, unless…” she trails off, “Unless you’re actually falling for him.”

  “Good god, no, nothing like that…”

  “Yup, okay, fine, be that way.”

  “What way?”

  She laughs, “It’s okay to have feelings for someone, you know?”

  “Can Cami help me or not?” I ask, redirecting the subject from Bryan and me to why I need her to contact Cami.

  She laughs and I can picture her shaking her head. “It’s gonna cost you.”

  “What?” I smile into the phone. This is our little game.

  “Dinner?”

  “I told-”

  “I’ll make chili,” she interjects.

  “Dude,” I laugh, “It’s a bazillion degrees outside. I don’t want chili.”

  “Liar.” She has a point. Ireland’s chili, no matter the temperature, is amazing.

  “When?”

  “Tonight?”

  I sigh, “I can’t, I have to work.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “Will you call Cami before then and if she gives you a way to contact him, will you call me?”

  “Of course I will, but I’ll still hold you to dinner.”

  “Alright. I’m off Tuesday. Can it at least wait until then?”

  “Sure. I’ll let you know what I hear back from Cami, alright?”

  “Thank you, Vy, you’re the best.”

  “Uh huh, remember that,” she laughs. “Everything else alright?”

  I sigh into the phone and lean against my car. “Yeah, I’m good.”

  “Promise?” she counters.

  “Pinky.” I smile.

  “Good, I’ll call you a little later.”

  “Thanks, Vy.”

  “Anytime.”

  We hang up and I climb into my car and turn on the A/C but I don’t pull out of the parking lot. A part of me wonders if the guy at the desk was just pulling my leg. I call the hotel for good measure and someone, a female, answers the phone. “Biltmore Hotel, this is Angie, how can I help you?”

  “Bryan Hayes, please,” I say into the phone.

  “What room?”

  “The penthouse.”

  I hear some computer keys clicking before she answers me, “I’m sorry, ma’am, Mr. Hayes check out this morning. Is there anything else I can do for you?” My heart sinks into my stomach as I hang up the phone.

  I’m such an idiot.

  Chapter Nine

  Do or Die.

  LIVIA

  “I haven’t been completely honest with you.” I finally manage to get the words out to my best friend. It’s only taken three glasses of wine to get to this point. We spent the better part of an hour discussing Ireland’s latest news. Between the baby coming, where she ran off to, why she ran off and most importantly, her father is alive, but he’s not the man she originally thought he was. The whole thing is so convoluted and fucked up that it would take an entire book to tell the story.

  Now, it’s my turn.

  It’s been over a week since I went back to the hotel in search of Bryan, and in that time I haven’t heard anything from him. Cami was all too willing to hand over his number to Ireland, but it was for Ireland’s use only. Not that Cami doesn’t like me or trust me, it’s a celebrity thing and while I bought it for a little while, it pissed me off after that. Ireland, being the best friend she is, dutifully passed my number along to Bryan, but alas, I haven’t heard a peep.

  “About what?” Ireland interrupts my musings about Bryan’s lack of phone calls.

  I wring my hands and debate on where to start.

  “Whatever it is, Becca, you can tell me. You know this.”

  I start to pace her living room. She invited me over for dinner and while Dyson was with us to eat, he’s left us alone so we can talk. “I know, but this…” I pull a deep breath into my lungs, hold it for a moment then let it out. “This
isn’t just me copying your homework.”

  She sits up a little straighter and I continue to pace the room. “Are you in trouble?”

  I stop and look at her. She’s always been the intuitive one. “Not really,” I hesitate, “Well, not that I know of. That’s part of why I wanted to get in touch with Bryan. Liam and I, we…we have a history.”

  She cocks her head to the side. Her vibrant red curls fall over her shoulders, her eyes grow concerned. “What kind of history?”

  “Uh...he used to be an undercover FBI agent.”

  She straightens and raises an eyebrow. “What exactly did you do to come in contact with a…Becca?”

  “Oh god, this is harder than I thought it would be. I don’t know if I can do this, Vy.”

  “Becca, I…”

  I cut her off. “My name isn’t Becca.”

  “What do you mean?” She’s clearly shocked, judging by her tone, but she’s not pissed off.

  “That’s probably not the best place to start,” I mutter.

  “Then why don’t you start from the beginning,” she offers.

  “That makes this a really long story.”

  She sits back, getting comfortable on the couch, and I notice as she leans back that her baby bump is more pronounced. “I’ve got all night,” she encourages

  “When I was a little girl, my mother was killed. But you already know that part. The part you don’t know is that my father was a cop with the NYPD.”

  “You never told me that.”

  “I know. There’s a lot of this story I haven’t told you. Call it embarrassment or whatever, I just…” I pause and stop pacing. “My father being a cop isn’t exactly something I’m proud of. You would think, as his daughter, I would be honored by him serving, especially because he was a 9/11 responder.”

  “Oh, Bec-” She stops herself.

  “Livia, my real name is Livia.”

  A smile spreads across Ireland’s face. “That’s a beautiful name.”