by Finn, Emilia
“Yep. I came here for a reason, and that reason was completely nullified today. So now I go home.”
“But what about…” She leans against the doorjamb and draws a deep breath. “That’s it? There’s nothing else keeping you here?”
I shake my head and dump my sweaters on top of the pile. I packed with precision when I left my apartment, but now I toss things in without a single care for where they go. “Nope. I have a company to run. My email inbox is overflowing. My assistant can’t do her job without me there. She can do it for a little while, but it’s been two weeks, Lib. It’s time for me to go home. A wedding between people I don’t know isn’t reason enough to stay here.”
“Right.” Libby wears the jeans and shirt she changed into this morning. The very same jeans I took down and unfolded a week ago. They’re like a second skin and frame her perfect body, and right now, one leg folds over the other in my peripherals as I close the lid on my case and try to zip it up. “I guess it’s done then, huh? You came here for the Bishops. You met them, you reached a kind of agreement, and now you’re done.”
“Right.” I tear the zipper around my case until it’s closed, then I stand and blow through the door and toss it to the bed where she was sitting only a moment ago. “I don’t wanna stay here and play make believe with these guys. Sophia wants to force something that’s not real. She wants a new, powerful ally in Griffin, but she calls it something else. She calls it–”
“Brotherhood?” Lib presses.
“It’s a lie. The guys have it right; blood doesn’t make us family, and she won’t find her ally in me.”
I cross the room and stop at the desk I’ve been using to keep up with my work while away. I tear charger cables from the power sockets in the wall. I fold a Griffin Industries wireless keyboard that weighs a mere fifty grams. It’s the most powerful and intuitive keyboard on the market, so sensitive that it almost reads your thoughts and types them for you. Retailing at only four-hundred and ninety-nine dollars, they come with a lifetime replacement warranty.
Yes, Griffin Industries expects you to pay up to prove your loyalty, but in return, we guarantee a product that will never stop working.
I toss the expensive contraption into my laptop bag, and send the mouse right behind. Libby slowly wanders into the room behind me. Her silence should worry me, but my mind refuses to focus on anything other than a Bishop wedding and women who think bridges can be built so quickly.
“I’m going to have Olly drive me to the airport.”
“No time to waste, huh?”
Libby’s voice trembles, and when I turn, I find her fussing with a shirt I’ve caught in the zipper in my haste. She slowly peels the zip back with care not to ruin my shirt, then she tucks it in and refastens the closure.
“No time to waste. I have meetings to attend on Monday, so…” I shrug and tear my laptop bag closed, then I take my cell out of my pocket and dial. “It’s time to head out,” I say as soon as Olly answers. “Pack up and get ready to leave in an hour.”
“An hour,” he asks, only for the same question to echo from Lib’s mouth.
“An hour?”
“Yeah.” A flash of red catches my eyes. My sweater. The dinosaurs that mean so much to both people in this room. I move across the luxuriously carpeted floor with Olly’s voice pulsing in my ear. He speaks, but he goes ignored as I pick the old material up and hold it in my hand. The last time I owned this sweater, my hand was much smaller. The red was redder, the dinosaurs brighter. The zipper was functional, and the hem wasn’t frayed. This was my most beloved possession besides my pencils.
And now it’s nothing more than worn fabric.
Libby’s breath catches when I bring the sweater up to my face. I draw in a long breath as though to bring back the boy I once was. To trade Theo for Gunner. If my mom and I never went to that club that day, would she still be alive? Would I trade Griffin Industries to be that child again?
I would probably always be broke.
Griffin was borne from desperation and hunger, so if I had never known a life living in alleyways, would I have built my empire?
I bring the sweater away from my face, and when I open my eyes, I catch sight of Libby’s watery eyes watching me. I cross the room in four easy strides, and press the sweater to her chest until she accepts it with a soft sob. She cradles it to her breastbone like she would a child, and drops down onto the edge of my bed to bury her face in her hands.
We have shit to take care of, and we don’t have a lot of time.
“Boss?” Olly’s voice finally breaks through. “You there?”
“Yeah. I’ll call Annaliese and have her book flights now. You have the car, so drive me to the airport, then you can continue up and drive the rest of the way home.”
“Yes sir. Anything else you need before we leave town?”
“Nothing.”
The Bishops. The Frankston girl. It’s all been resolved.
It doesn’t feel resolved, but I’m not going to stay here and execute people just because. The very thing that has consumed my every thought for so long has simply been… nullified.
“There’s nothing left to do. It’s time to go back to work. Get your shit ready, I wanna head out.”
“Sir. Do you wanna know what I found out about Jericho?”
My heart gives a heavy bump that I swear must be audible, because Libby’s head comes up and her eyes – one still swollen – latch onto mine.
My answer should be no. I should pretend this town and the people in it don’t exist, but a habit I’ve held onto for so long is hard to break. “Sure, what did you find out?”
I can almost hear the way he shrugs his shoulders. “I didn’t get much. I figure it’s a password for something. A safe word. Something that doesn’t mean anything to anyone but them. When did you hear it? In what context?”
“Someone said it to someone else,” I murmur. “To calm that other person.”
“Mm.” Olly moves around the room right next to mine and takes my orders literally. He’s packing his things. “Right, that’s kinda where I’m at too. It’s a private word, a safe word. But I don’t think it’s important to us.”
“So basically, you learned nothing?”
He chuckles. “Affirmative. I tried, boss. I really did. But all I’ve got are assumptions. I’ll keep looking. I have feelers out, so…”
“Okay.” I frown when Lib buries her face in the sweater a second time. I don’t understand her mood; she was smiling only minutes ago. She was high on adrenaline after our meet, but now it’s as though she hardly has the strength to sit up tall. “I have to go. Pack up, meet me at Libby’s apartment in an hour.”
“Yes sir.” He hangs up without another word, and makes Libby jump when his heavy fist thuds against the wall that joins our rooms.
“An hour.” Lib wrings my sweater between her hands and holds on so tight that her knuckles turn white. “You’re packing up and leaving in an hour, and that’s all there is to say about that?”
“There’s nothing else to say. There’s just…” I lift my hands and suffer from my first ever bout of… What next? I’ve spent my whole existence fighting for the next thing. To help my mom make ends meet. To help myself survive in the streets with nothing but a pencil and brains. To build a business, to run it and make it thrive, then to learn everything there is to learn about the Bishop brothers until I was certain I would take them out.
But now there’s nothing.
“I don’t know what else to do here, Libby. There’s literally nothing left. If I stay, I might forget my promise to walk away. If I see them in the street, I might forget the white flag I tossed down on the way out of their building.”
“But…”
I stop in front of her when her shoulders bounce and she refuses to show me her eyes. Her back is bowed, her shoulders tight. Kneeling down, I hate the way my heart races at the thought of her hurting. “What’s the matter?”
“You won’t even consid
er staying?”
Her request confuses me and brings my brows tight. “Why would I stay? What’s here for me?”
Dirty green eyes – dirty, like the rainforest on a stormy day – come up to flicker between mine. They sparkle with hurt. With pain. With deceit. “What’s here?” she questions on a whisper. “You want to know what could possibly keep you here?”
She breaks eye contact when I nod, and lets her head drop with a gentle side-to-side shake.
“Libby?” I bring my hand under her chin. “I don’t know how to solve riddles like these. Say what you want to say.”
“It’s me.” Her words are a whisper and a snap in one, delivered in hurt and anger. “I’m here. I thought you’d come back for me.”
“You?” Instead of crouching, I drop to my knees and cup her hips.
“Yes. It’s like we’re children again, and now you’re running out and leaving me standing at the top of the stairs. It doesn’t even cross your mind to stay with me. You’ve always been the guy to run alone, to forget me and move on with your life like I don’t matter. You stared into my eyes on the way out of the club, and you’re doing the same thing again. You’ll pat my ass and drop me off at my apartment, then you’ll just…” She flicks her hand toward the door, then brings that same hand up to swipe an errant tear from the top of her unharmed cheek. “Leave.”
“Libby…” I cup her luscious hips in both of my hands, and though she tries to deny me with a shake of her head, I scoop her forward until she comes off the bed and ends up sitting in my lap the way she did last night. “Hey.” I use my nose to turn her face. To bring her eyes back to me. “I didn’t say I was leaving without you.”
“You…” Her gaze widens. “What?”
“I told Olly to meet us at your apartment in an hour; isn’t that enough time for you to pack your stuff?” I cast a glance around my room. “I told him an hour, and I’m finished here in ten. That means you get five times more time than I did, to collect your girly trinkets and every pair of tight jeans you can find.”
“Gunner… I–”
“You’re coming with me, right?” I stare into her eyes. “You said you wanted to come with me when I was eleven. You said you wanted nothing else except for me to come back to get you. You said you loved that boy, and dreamt of him for twenty years. Were they just words?”
Her lips quiver as she shakes her head.
“Are you going to bow out now when I’m right here in front of you? I’m giving you time to pack your bags. I’m asking you to come with me.”
“I can’t just…” Her heart races with panic – fear of losing me? Or losing them? “I worked so hard for my station. I worked for so long. I love my squad, Gunner. I love those guys, because after you were gone, I had no family. I was all alone until I wasn’t. Now they’re my family. I can’t just pack a bag and disappear on them.”
It didn’t occur to me that she wouldn’t come. It didn’t even present in my mind as an option.
“So you’re…” My stomach drops when fresh tears spill over her cheeks. “You’re not going to come? You’ll stay here, even knowing I’m alive? All of those nights you cried can be fixed, but you won’t…”
“Why do you expect me to leave?” she asks. “Why must I give up my life? You could come here.”
“Uh…” My breath catches. It’s almost like she slammed a fist into my solar plexus. “Because of Griffin. Because I built that man up from the ground. People need me, Lib. They need their jobs, the world needs our tech. I can’t just stop turning up.”
“And people need me here.” Her jaw wobbles, but she still brings a hand up and swipes a thumb along my cheek. “I built me up from the ground. I made my name a little less tarnished. I earned respect. I created a family. The people in this town need the police, and the little girls in this town need me to show them they can do anything the boys can do.”
“What are you… you’re saying no?” My heart breaks. It aches in my chest and gives a final thud when a fresh tear slides over her cheek. “You’re choosing them over me.”
She shakes her head. “You’re choosing Theo over me. Don’t you see how unfair that is? You expect me to make the move. You expect me to make the sacrifices.”
“But…” Winded, I sit back onto my ass, but I bring her with me so she remains in my lap and her hands rest on my shoulders. “I already made my sacrifices. I lived in an alleyway and sold pictures of the one and only person on this planet I had left to love. I said goodbye to you thousands of times.” I take her hand and press the palm to my chest. “Those were my sacrifices, Lib. A man can’t be expected to say goodbye to you again.”
She drops her gaze and closes her hand to scrunch my shirt under white knuckles. “I’m sorry, Gunner.”
I thought being rejected by the Bishop brothers was bad. I went into that office so fucking mad at them, so willing to tear them apart and move on with my life, but when they presented their united front and spoke of brotherhood, despite my stubbornness and willing myself not to get attached, I still felt the sting when we walked out and no one came running to call us back.
But I had Libby. With her by my side, I can take anything.
But this… while she sits in my lap and willingly says no to being together, this hurts so much more than anything any Bishop has ever done to me.
Like in a dream state, I stare at her back when she leaves with my red sweater. She keeps it like a token. A memory. I close the door when she refuses to give me her eyes or change her mind.
I finish packing in a daze, I call Olly again before he leaves to go to Libby’s apartment, and ninety minutes after that, I sit on a plush leather seat inside an eight-passenger private jet with Griffin Industries painted on the side in big, bold letters.
Four of the seats face each other with a small table between. Like a conference space, a space I’ve conducted business in a million times in the past. And four of them belong to a bench seat.
I sit back in one of the bucket seats and rest the side of my face against the window, but as my flight crew move about and prepare for takeoff, Lara, a stewardess I’ve met many times in the past, sashays by the bench seat and draws my eyes.
She wears a tight skirt and a push-up bra that almost has her assets touching her chin. She’s young – twenty-five or so – fit, beautiful, and flirty, which is precisely how we’ve ended up together on that bench seat in the past.
She holds no allure anymore. She has green eyes and light brown hair. Bright red lipstick draws every man’s eyes to her lips, and as though she’s set out guideposts, those eyes always then lower over her breasts and hips.
But I do none of that. I turn away and stare out the window in desperate hope that a car will come screeching onto the tarmac at any moment. I hope and pray that Libby will come bounding out of her car with her packed bags and a vow to never let go again.
But my daze continues as Lara serves me a beer, then as she sits in her seat and buckles in. The doors are closed and locked – and Libby isn’t here.
The engines begin to roar – and still, Libby isn’t here.
My captain’s voice crackles over the speakers as he announces takeoff and arrival time – and yet… no Libby.
My heart literally aches as we start moving forward on the tarmac, and when we take off and my stomach drops the way it does every single time I fly, I firm my lips, stare out the window, and watch the world get smaller and smaller as we climb.
I had her. I lost her.
I had her again.
But now she chooses them over me.
* * *
“Mr. Griffin?”
Annaliese’s soft voice brings my eyes away from the report I’ve yet to absorb, despite staring for a whole hour. Her voice comes from the phone on my desk, so I reach out and grab it.
“Yeah?”
“Sir, the police are here. They’d like to speak with you for just a moment.” She lowers her voice, “I asked for a warrant, but the female officer tore me up
and said she’d bring me in for questioning if I don’t cooperate.”
My heart races, and my smile creeps up. “I’m coming.” I toss my phone down and jump up from my chair.
I’ve never in my life been so happy to hear that there’s a mouthy female cop in my building. I’ve never not insisted on that warrant. But here she goes again, a pair of sexy legs making me act out of character as I sprint the length of my office and tear open the double doors.
My staff are surprised by my actions. Not once in the whole time Griffin Industries has been operational have I been so dramatic – or welcoming of the cops – so when the doors slam open, and I wear a grin that would rival that of Pennywise, they stop working and look up with wide eyes.
The phones continue to ring. The four women who sit behind a long reception desk look up and study me as though I’m wearing a dress and a wig, and Annaliese, who sits at her desk just by my door, gulps when my eyes stop on the stocky policewoman and my heart gives a final splat.
“Mr. Griffin?”
This isn’t Libby. It’s not fucking Libby!
“Hi, my name is Detective Trinke, and my colleague, Detective James. We’d like a moment to speak with you about a business venture you recently absolved.”
I think I have a genuine case of whiplash. My body aches, my stomach hurts, my neck hurts, and my eyes itch. My whole fucking being rejects this bitch who steps through my office door and takes a seat across from my desk.
Annaliese apologizes with her eyes. We have a system for this, a protocol that hasn’t failed yet, but my hopes that Libby had followed me made me act rashly. And now I have two cops in my office, one of whom is a woman, but not the one I want.
My top lip curls back with disgust as I’m reminded once again that I fucking loathe cops. There isn’t a single one whose name isn’t Libby that I like, and it’s lucky that I was already in love with Libby long before I knew of her vocation.
I turn away from Annaliese and close the doors once more. Stalking across my office, I take my seat and go back to the guy I was before my two-week hiatus so recently.