by Nicole Fox
The house was so quiet that it was oppressive. She couldn’t seem to feel properly, her mind reeling. Suddenly a wave of nausea descended over her, crashing hard against her center. The shattered bits of her heart seemed to click against each other, lighting up the silence with the sound of her chest collapsing in on itself.
The man who had been living in her home, the man who had slept in her bed, and the man who had brought her such immeasurable pleasure, was a gang member and murderer. Feeling cold, then hot, she felt unsafe in her own home for the first time in her entire life. Unable to think of anything else to do, Francesca picked up her phone and called the first person she could think of.
“Francesca, darling, it’s very early. Is this important?” her mother’s too-calm voice said, obviously unhappy that Francesca had woken her.
“I — ” Tears bubbled to the surface of her eyes, cutting off her air for a second. “He lied to me, I — ” It was impossible; the whole world had fallen away and left her bereft and empty. How had her mother not felt the end of the world happen?
“Francesca, I need to you take a deep breath and tell me what is wrong, okay?” Her mother sounded more awake now, as though Francesca’s panic was caffeine to her bloodstream. “Breathe, Kitten.”
Taking a deep breath in, Francesca noticed the world stopped leaning to one side long enough for her to get the words out. “Logan. He’s not who I thought he is, Mother.”
# # #
Logan
After Logan woke and headed downstairs, he was shocked to find a very silent Francesca and Diane at the kitchen table. Both held identical mugs filled with coffee they didn’t drink and identical expressions of calm that had his head reeling. Something bad had happened.
More than anything, Logan wanted to protect Francesca from whatever it was that had put that expression on her face, but he was pretty sure there was nothing he could do. A sick, cold feeling welled up in him as he stared at their too-calm faces.
Tears welled in Francesca’s eyes as she watched him walk down the stairs, her whole body quivering with something like fear or rage. Her whole body seemed to move away from him as he entered the room. Her emerald eyes lost their sparkle and looked flat and lifeless. And those cupid’s bow lips that always had a wicked little smile for him were turned down and unmoved by his presence.
Logan felt hot, then cold, his head spinning as he froze in place. As much as he wanted to go to her and comfort her, he was pretty sure that he was the source of her pain. So he did nothing at all.
“You were on the news this morning, Logan Pendergrass,” Diane said without any preamble. “We saw your pretty face all over the national news.”
Logan hung his head, feeling like he’d just been punched in the gut. Swallowing, he tried to get his bearing back in a world that was reeling. “Okay. My name is Logan Pendergrass, and I was once mixed up in some…unsavory stuff.”
Diane shook her head, setting her mug down on the table with enough force to spill the coffee over the edge of it. She didn’t seem to notice, but Francesca did. She stared at the spill, looking like she might cry over it. “I knew that already, boy. I had someone pull up your record. But it features a few stolen property charges and some reckless driving tickets. It didn’t say a fucking thing about murder.”
Logan opened his mouth, but paused when Francesca picked up her head. “You checked Logan’s background?”
“Yes,” Diane said, dismissively, waving a hand at her daughter. “But the murder rap was too new to show up properly, wasn’t it, Logan? Who were you running from?”
He cleared his throat painfully, staring down the Savoy matron with fiery eyes. “Zook,” he said, the name bringing up all sorts of angry thoughts he fought to keep under control. “He — I watched him kill Snake Eyes. But he wasn’t planning on taking the fall for it. He set me up. So I ran. It was all he wanted; he hasn’t sent any pursuit here, which just means he wanted my turf. So, he has it, and I was supposed to disappear; I have a buddy in California that promised to get me out of the country if I ever needed it.”
There was silence in the room, and Logan crossed his arms over his chest, standing in a defensive position unconsciously. “I left with the intention of sailing straight through as quickly as possible, but I got held up by a lady who offered me more money that I’d ever had at one time.” Sighing through his nose, he met Diane’ eyes with his own, both of them unflinching. “But then I spent some time with you daughter and ended up caring for her deeply. I should have left before I hurt you, Francesca. I — I’m sorry.”
Diane was watching him with eyes burning with anger, but as he spoke, her demeanor shifted, changing from anger to something more thoughtful. Staring at him for a long time, Diane seemed to be searching every inch of his soul for something that Logan was pretty sure she wouldn’t find. After his life of crime, he was pretty sure he didn’t have a soul anymore. Never in his life had he ever regretted those decisions that lead him to become a criminal until right this very second.
Seeing Francesca’s distraught face, he wanted to take every second of it back.
Finally, after an eternity of silence, Diane finally turned to her daughter, her expression much softer than Logan had ever seen it. “Francesca, darling, I need you to call up that slimy Quentin Maloney man to give our Logan ‘Jones’ a believable background story. We need to make him as reputable looking as possible for tonight, and take great pains that all of his tattoos are covered.”
Francesca looked up at her mother, her mouth agape. Logan didn’t notice as he was giving Diane a very similar expression. Suddenly, Logan realized what had happened; Diane saw past all of his bad-guy posturing and down to the core of him.
She knew he was falling hard for Francesca, and not a thing in the world could stop it.
Wincing, Logan realized that she was going to milk that for all it was worth. And in the next second, he realized he didn’t care at all, just so long as it meant he could steal a little more time with Francesca.
That was all that mattered.
Chapter Sixteen
Francesca
Lucky for everyone involved, Quentin Maloney was free that morning, and was willing to make the thirty-mile hike out to Francesca’s home in the desert. Francesca didn’t really know how to feel about any of it, the flurry of emotions just under her skin made her feel like she was lost at sea.
Feeling empty and listless, she called the only person in the world that could make her feel better and could keep a secret: Nikki. Her best friend would show up to help, no questions asked.
Nikki flew in the door without even knocking after only about ten minutes, looking like she’d just poured herself out of bed, into some shoes, and come right over. She had a little leftover makeup from the night before, and her pretty, super-long hair was up in the messiest of messy buns. She still managed to look cute as hell though, with made Francesca a little jealous. But she instantly felt better with her BFF by her side.
All in an instant, she realized she completely forgiven her best buddy for any error she may have made with Davis. It was all water under the bridge, and Nikki would always be her best friend, no matter what.
It took the whole rest of the thirty minutes they had remaining to catch Nikki up on the news of the morning. She took it better than expected and was the shoulder Francesca needed more than anything to cry on. Logan smartly made himself scarce and even Diane found somewhere else to be. Francesca told Nikki everything, her speech only interrupted a few times by Diane yelling at the TV remotes for not working how hers worked at home.
She was ready to face the world by the time Quentin arrived. It was a good thing, too, because Quentin came with a world of bad news.
“I feel for yah, girly,” Quentin said, pilfering a cup of coffee and a plate of snacks off of the table. He’d managed to drain two pots of coffee, a whole plate of cookies, and a floral arrangement made out of flower-shaped pieces of fruit, and he still looked around for more to stuff into hi
s ugly maw. “Unfortunately, I can no longer help you.”
Francesca never liked Quentin; he was a slime ball and worked with circles of people she wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole, but sometimes, a celebutante needed a slimy man like him to keep the dirt from getting on her own Dior pumps. “What do you mean you can no longer help us?” Diane asked, slamming her hands down onto the table.
“I gotta work on the right side of the law for a bit; have some law men watching me a little too tightly right now. So I’m 100% clean as soap until the vultures find a different corpse to circle,” Quentin said, picking his yellowed teeth with his fingers. “So, as much as I want to, I can’t get your young man a new social security number or passport or anything. I can’t even refer yah to someone else without making some problems for my friends, yah see? And probably problems for you all, too.”
Francesca couldn’t seem to keep her head above water long enough to catch all of his words. Everything seemed to blur in and out of focus. Why were they doing this? Logan had to tell the police everything. They shouldn’t be covering this up. She didn’t even care about the half a million dollars or Davis or anything else anymore. Forget pride. No, this was far more important.
But she couldn’t seem to formulate a proper argument, so she kept her mouth shut, letting the others speak instead. She was too tired to argue with anyone, anyway. So while Logan, Nikki, Diane, and Quentin argued over their next step, Francesca just walked away from the table and found a quiet corner of the TV room to be alone.
How had everything gone so completely wrong so quickly?
# # #
Logan
“I don’t think you understand what you’re saying, Francesca,” Logan said, trying to keep his voice even. He was careful not to interrupt her when she spoke; she got enough of that from her mother without getting it from him, too. But it was incredibly difficult to keep himself in check when she was spouting nonsense.
Nikki was watching the two of them with curious eyes, but she didn’t interject. Thankfully, Quentin and Diane had already left, finally bringing a modicum of peace back to the white house in the desert.
“Then explain it to me,” she whispered, her face a map of anger and strain. “Please.”
“I can’t go to jail; police won’t take my word. They won’t trust me. I’ve seen it before. It’s why it’s so easy to set one of us up if you want his place. They don’t care which one of us actually did it. They just want someone to serve the time. In jail, I won’t be able to do anything.” Logan sat back in the chair, crossing his arms over his chest to keep from taking Francesca’s hands. “If I don’t find evidence for what Zook has done, I can’t go to the police.”
“But if you go back to Boston, Zook could kill you.” Francesca was clutching a bunch of tissues like a lifeline, her eyes clear of tears. She just seemed to be holding them just in case. Either that or she desperately needed something to hold onto.
“But if I go back, maybe I can clear my name and clean things up instead of hiding. I’ve never been good at hiding, and maybe if I do the right thing, then I can get my life back.”
Francesca’s head snapped up, her emerald eyes searching his own. “What do you mean the right thing? The right thing would be to go to the police and tell them — ” She was nearly hysterical, ready to start screaming. He was close to that point, too, and he fought to keep his head on.
“Francesca, please. This is my life we’re talking about here. We can’t just — ”
Standing up, Francesca nearly knocked her kitchen chair over. Nikki’s eyes narrowed as she watched the two of them in careful silence. Logan couldn’t blame her. But he wanted to defuse this situation and move onto a planning stage, but Francesca seemed to refuse to take a deep breath.
Her beautiful, terrified body was hyperventilating, and he couldn’t do anything.
“You’re wrong!” she was screaming. “You need to go to the police. You can’t leave them chasing you; it’ll be even worse if they catch you on the run!”
“I’m already on the run,” Logan snapped, finally losing his temper. Why wouldn’t she listen to him? “No matter what I do now, I’m screwed unless I find some evidence to defend myself with, as soon as possible. And that means finding Zook and figuring out why he did this to me.”
Francesca’s tiny fists beat against his chest. It barely even hurt, but it hurt more than she would hit him. “You’re wrong, goddammit, listen to yourself!”
“Francesca! Logan! Please stop.” Nikki finally cut in, her voice ragged and unhappy. “This is literally getting us nowhere. How about instead of jumping in feet first, we make a damn plan?”
Francesca turned to her friend, her body quivering like a rabbit’s. She took a deep breath, then another with her eyes locked on Nikki’s. Once again, Logan was blown away by the depth of their friendship. All Francesca needed was Nikk by her side and she could handle anything. Even if that thing was the man she’d been sleeping with wanted by the police for a murder he didn’t commit.
It made Logan want to punch Davis in his stupid face all the more. “Look at what he almost ruined; one of the best relationships I’ve ever seen between two people.” Logan wished he had someone back home that he could trust so completely.
Nikki rubbed her hands over Francesca’s arms as though she were warming her up. “See? Deep breaths. Now, Logan. You can’t go just running back home without a plan. And Francesca, you can’t just send him to the police without a plan.” Nikki looked back and forth between them for a long moment, her nose crinkling as she thought it through. Suddenly, her face lit up and she snapped her fingers at Francesca. “That private investigator your mom has on speed dial for her boyfriends, you think he might have contacts on the east coast?”
Francesca sniffed exaggeratedly, her chest heaving with the depths of her breaths. “Maybe. I could ask. Why?”
Nikki smiled at her friend, obviously happy that she was starting to calm down. Logan was pretty happy about it, too, to be honest. “Now, here’s my idea…”
Chapter Seventeen
Francesca
Nikki was like the piece of wood that saved Kate Winslet in the movie Titanic. She was Francesca’s Superman, her knight in shining armor. Nothing was too big for Nikki to tackle, and nothing in the world could change that. And Francesca was more glad for that now than she ever had been in her whole life.
Taking a deep breath, Francesca released her frightened, crazy anger. She breathed in Nikki’s calming words, feeding off of her calm tone. And she managed to finally chill out long enough to really listen to what her friend was proposing.
“So here’s the plan,” Nikki said, starting to write down ideas on a piece of paper. “We contact your mom’s private investigator and figure out if he has any friends on the east coast. We track down some people who can sniff around the murder without raising too much suspicion, and we find a way to clear Logan’s name. Does anyone else have any ideas that they would like to share?”
Logan pondered the question for a moment, his perfect eyebrows furrowing. “I don’t care how we do it, but I want Zook to pay for what he’s done,” he answered, finally, his voice filled with a kind of determination that Francesca had never heard in him before. “If this investigator thing doesn’t work out, I will have to head back home and fix this. I never should have left in the first place. I can’t go back in time, but I will do whatever I have to make sure that Zook pays and I get my people back.”
Francesca wanted to argue with him. “But, if you hadn’t come out here, we never would have met.” That thought bounced around inside of her skull like a pinball, blocking out the sound of Logan’s and Nikki’s voices. A pain started in her chest, spreading out until every inch of her body seemed to hurt.
So instead of pretending to listen, Francesca got up from her chair and walked away. She left the dining room, dragging her feet through the hallway and the living room. She found herself in the kitchen, and began brewing a pot of coffee without eve
n thinking about it. It was cathartic, watching as the earthy, bitter liquid spilled out of the machine, as the scent of freshly ground beans filled the whole house.
Francesca stared out of the kitchen window, watching as the sun continued to rise in the sky. This day had felt so long already that Francesca was sure it must be at least dusk, but it wasn’t even noon.
“You okay?”
Francesca turned around at the sound of Nikki’s voice. “Yes,” she answered. But her hands shook as she took the carafe out of her machine and tried to pour herself some coffee into her favorite mug.
Nikki ended up taking the cup and the carafe away from her before she broke something. She poured the coffee herself, mixing in a little cream and some sugar, just the way Francesca liked her coffee before handing it to her. Then Nikk poured herself a mugful, too. “I’m sorry this happened to you, Francesca.”