More than that, I want to get Paisley out of this damn hotel. She reaches the door to her room, and I exit my car, slamming the door shut behind me. She jumps and drops the folder she was carrying. Instead of bending to collect the papers, she whips around, and when her eyes find me, they narrow. It’s not a look I ever want her to give me again because she’s not happy to see me. She’s trying to be intimidating, but the look is about as scary as a kitten puffing up in anger. Adorable. I close the small distance between us and start to collect the papers for her.
“Fuck! Don’t sneak up on someone like that! You’ll give a paranoid girl a heart attack. What the hell are you doing here anyway?” she asks, snatching the papers out of my hand when I straighten.
“Can I come in? I need to talk to you.”
Paisley rolls her eyes in a show of annoyance but opens the hotel room door, leaving it open behind her. This place is ten times worse than the last hotel I ordered her out of. Admittedly, she probably only listened then because coming with me was what she wanted, so I doubt that will work this time.
“I’ve hired a PI to try to help us. He wants to speak with you.”
“You hired a PI to help you. There is no us.” Her voice is hard. Her demeanor is cold.
I take a seat on the bed while she continues to avoid eye contact. This icy front she’s putting on is putting her in danger, and I can’t have that. So, I’m going to sit here until she thaws.
“You’re wrong, Paisley. There’s an us even if you’re trying to fight it. The work from the PI still involves all of us—you, Kai, Teagan, and me. We’re all involved in this. He wants to speak with you. He wants to speak with everyone. He needs to have all the information possible. Those papers you have here in the folder won’t get you anywhere. I already told you, your birth records are sealed. We have to go about this in a way that gets results.”
“I need to do this on my own, Burke. I don’t want to be bought. I need to know I can handle this. This is my past we’re talking about—where I came from, who my parents are. I can admit that maybe I shouldn’t be alone in this hotel, but I don’t want to give up the control on the birth records issue.”
Silently, I celebrate the part where she shows doubt in her decision to stay here, but I ignore it for now. First, I have to convince her that working together on her records doesn’t mean her victory will be taken away if we figure it out together.
“I get that, but this is so much more complicated. Your birth records were sealed for a reason, and some official form for a court order isn’t going to open them up to you. I get that you finding out that information is about a lot more than what’s currently happening around us, but we need to work together. Someone is after all of us, so there’s no reason you should be going this alone. Just because all of us work together doesn’t mean you’re not taking care of yourself. It means we’re being smart.”
“That’s not what working together means. It means you’re doing the work for me. I can’t afford a private investigator that can break rules to get the information or do whatever it is he does to get through the red tape. What working with you really means is sitting around on my ass while your money does the work for me.”
She releases a deep breath and finally sits next to me. We’re only feet apart, I could reach out and touch her, but she feels so much further away.
“Either way, I’m still looking for the same information you are. Your stubbornness is only slowing down the progress we could be making. You’re not going to get the information you want by filling out those papers. If you get on board and help me, we can figure this out together.”
She’s quiet for a long time, and I let her think about what I’ve said. She knows I’m right, but she has to find a way to work it out in her own head.
“I want to contribute.”
“That’s why I’m here. That’s what I’ve been saying, right?”
She shakes her head, and I’m confused on where she’s going with this.
“No. I want to contribute financially. I want to pay money toward the investigator. I’m aware I can’t afford the type of money you and Kai are paying this guy, but I can pitch in. I won’t cooperate any other way. I want to pay one-fourth of his fees. Take it or leave it.”
“Agreed.”
Paisley can’t afford one-fourth of the fees. I know that. I’m not privy to her financial situation, but I think it’s a pretty good guess. She works at the diner, used to live in a shithole of an apartment, and has a single duffel bag of belongings.
I don’t want to accept a dime from her, but if this is what needs to happen to get her on board, then so be it. My PI will gladly produce a fake invoice in exchange for some extra from my end. I hold out my hand for her to shake. She’s hesitant, but she reaches out, sealing our deal in a single gesture. We go over some particulars, and I lie through my teeth about my weekly bill with J. Spencer. It’s not something I’m proud of, but desperate times call for whatever fucking measures I deem necessary.
“We have one more thing to discuss.”
Paisley eyes me skeptically before she smirks. “Oh, yeah? What’s that?”
“Please don’t stay here. It’s not safe for you.”
The playful smirk is gone from her face. I expected that.
“Staying here isn’t my long-term plan. It’s just my right-now plan.”
“Listen, hear me out.” She’s already shaking her head, but I continue on, “Come back and stay at my house. You’ll have your own room and privacy. I won’t bother you. I’ll respect that you being there doesn’t mean we’re together. I need to know you’re safe until all this is resolved. Please, Paisley. I’m going crazy with you staying here.”
She pushes off the bed and paces the room. Good, at least she’s considering it. I lean back on my hands and watch her. I can practically see the wheels turning in her head. She mumbles to herself, trying to work my proposition out in her head.
“You’re a fucking piece of work. Do you know that?” She spins on her heels and turns to face me. Here is the anger I’ve been anticipating. I open my mouth to speak, but she cuts me off before I have the first syllable out, “You can’t leave well enough alone. You’re not my fucking white knight. When are you going to stop trying to run in and save me? We’ve already established I’m somehow connected to all this shit from some angle not involving you. So, you can stop feeling responsible for me and let me handle myself.”
“I’m not trying to be your white knight. I’m trying to keep you from getting killed. In the twenty minutes I was waiting in that parking lot, I saw no fewer than three drug deals. I counted seven or eight gang members coming in and out of the room on the far end of the building, and I’m pretty sure the guy working the front desk is running girls. Your staying here will get you killed, and if you get killed, we can’t figure out what is going on. Which one is more important—you getting answers or your pride, Paisley? Don’t think I won’t go as far as renting a room in this place just to make sure you aren’t sold on some black market sex ring.”
Okay, well, maybe that last bit was a bit too much, but I got my point across. She glares at me and then resumes her pacing. There’s more mumbling. She twists the ends of a few pieces of hair around her fingers, letting my words sink in. This has to work. I can’t leave here without her. I’ll give her one more piece of information. While I let her think she has a choice in this, I pull my phone out and thumb through the text messages.
“This is the text I got while waiting for you to get here. Still think you’re safe here?” I hold my phone out to her, and she takes it, reading the short string of messages.
“He’s here?”
“Somewhere out there. I don’t think he’s ever really not close by. He’s been lurking around lately.”
She looks toward the window. The shade is drawn, but she stares, as if she can see through it.
“We’re not together. I won’t be sleeping in your room. This is about us joining forces for the purpose
of figuring out this fucked up game of Clue. It won’t be like the last time I stayed there. I’m my own person, and I can come and go as I please. You don’t have a say in how I live my life, not even if I’m living under your roof. Do we understand each other?”
I nod my head in agreement with everything she’s said in hopes that it’ll get us out of this fleabag motel.
“And I pay rent.”
Seriously? Charging Paisley for living with me is ridiculous. I want her there more than anything, so why the hell would I charge her? Which would probably be reason enough in her mind if she could hear my thoughts. She wants to set boundaries, and this is her way of telling me she’s strictly a roommate.
“Five hundred a month.”
Paisley has the upper hand here, but there’s no way I’m charging her five hundred dollars a month to have her closer to me. I won’t negotiate this.
“I paid cash outright when I bought the place. Problem solved.”
“You are so incredibly frustrating, Burke.” Paisley is stubborn, but I’m a man used to getting my own way. “Let’s just go before I change my mind.” She turns from me and begins to collect her belongings.
Victory.
I won this round, and I’ll win the next.
With Paisley back in my home, it’ll only be a matter of time before I’m back in her heart.
Paisley
I can’t believe I gave in to him.
I shouldn’t have, but he’s right. We are in this together, and those stupid birth record forms wouldn’t have worked. At least this way, we’re working together to get shit done and I’m paying my way. Burke looked like he wanted to explode when I told him I wanted to pay rent. It took all the willpower I had not to laugh in his face. I don’t really care if I pay rent or not. I was just distracting my mouth from telling him how lonely I’d felt, how much I’d missed him in this short amount of time.
Plus, I haven’t felt like this much of a drifter since I was out on the street. All of my possessions fit in one box, which took me all of five minutes to pack. I’ve been living back and forth between Burke’s and hotels for way too long. Everything feels unsettled. When I left the streets, I promised myself I’d never feel that way again, yet here I am.
Burke is quiet on the drive back to his house. He doesn’t even say anything as he grabs my bag for me and leads me to the room I stayed in before. He doesn’t have to show me the way, but I let him. I don’t want to open up a discussion. I have enough to deal with, trying to figure out how I’m going to handle the emotional side of being in the same house as him. I guess the same can be said for him if his silence is an indicator. He doesn’t ask to come in, and I don’t offer before he’s striding in the direction of his own room.
I sit on the bed, not knowing what to do. I’m here, but now what? Before everything happened, I felt like I was starting to belong here, comfortable. Now, I just feel like an outsider. For a girl who’s never had a family or even much in the way of friends, that’s saying a whole lot.
I reach for the cell phone I bought earlier today and mess around with it. It’s a cheap, simple phone, so there aren’t any thrills coming from this time-waster. I don’t even have any contacts, not that I had all that many in my old phone. The few that were in there are gone . . . lost to the era of speed dial and digital phone books.
With a huff, I drop the phone back on the mattress and look around the room. When I agreed to come back, I didn’t think about how awkward this would be. Standing up and putting on my big-girl panties, I decide to go check on Teagan. I can’t spend the foreseeable future locked in here. Besides, I can probably make the dash to her room without running into anybody else pretty easily.
I look like an idiot. I feel like an idiot. I’m creeping through the hallways on tiptoes like a disobedient child out of my room past my bedtime. How did I get here? I hope every day in this house doesn’t feel like a walk of shame; otherwise, I’ll have to renege on my deal.
I knock on her door, and she hollers for me to come in. Emotions flood me. Joy when I think about each and every fun moment we had together. Sadness when I recall the screams of terror from her the day we were held prisoner. And shame for leaving her at the hospital. I close the door behind me but only inch into the room. Teagan was pretty out of it last time I was in here, and I’m not even sure she remembers I came in to see her. She lifts the covers in a signal for me to get my ass over there. I crawl into bed beside her, and we’re quiet for a few long seconds. It’s a comfortable reunion, and I blink back my tears.
“Are you back?”
“I guess so. Back in the house at least. We’ve come to a mutual decision to work this out together.” My voice is soft, partially because of how quiet it is in here and also because I’m scared of what Teagan will have to say about me walking away from her brother.
“You’re scared.”
“Aren’t you?”
Teagan locks her fingers through mine and hugs our interlocked hands to her chest. “Yes, I am, but the way you mean isn’t what I’m talking about, and you know it.”
In an effort to avoid this conversation, I bite my tongue and hold back any response.
“We were taken right from this very house, and it’s far from over. I’m scared about that every day, but I’m talking about how you’re handling the aftermath with Burke.”
I try to tell her she’s wrong and that I’m not scared of Burke. The words won’t come.
“He cares about you. I’m pretty sure you care about him, too. You can let this tear you guys apart, or you can let it make you stronger. The choice is up to you.”
“The day we were taken from here, I was so wrapped up in an emotional bubble. I was lost in my feelings for Burke, and then everything changed. One second, I was a swooning girl in his bed, and the next, I was a girl who wasn’t certain about anything. If I forget what that felt like and go back to being blinded by my feelings for Burke, I’m afraid I won’t be able to bounce back next time. I’m afraid I’ll get hurt. The type of hurt there’s no coming back from. I’m afraid of having my heart broken.”
“Don’t let the bad people win. Don’t let them take this away from you.”
I look up at her face, and her pain is evident. The anger she feels about what happened to her and the fear concerning what’ll happen next are there, too. Something tells me the advice she’s giving isn’t only for me. In a different way, she’s also struggling with not letting the bad people defeat us emotionally. Each of us needs to find a way to take back our lives. We may not ever be exactly the same, but we can’t let them control our future. Each of us needs to build a better, stronger version of who we were before all this started. I need to focus on that, and then once I get there, I’ll worry about what it means for Burke and me.
“Paisley, quit letting your fear control your heart. Your reasoning is pathetic.”
She smiles, and we laugh.
“Tell me how you really feel.”
“Quit being a pussy, and go use yours to tell my brother you’re sorry for being a brat.”
My mood lightens with her brash words, and our conversation turns to lighter things until my eyes get heavy.
Burke
I check on Teagan, and both she and Paisley are sound asleep in Teagan’s bed. I’m fucking jealous of my little sister. How pathetic is that? Seeing Paisley relaxed enough to sleep is good though. She didn’t say anything, but I know it’s not something she’s been getting much of recently. I leave them there and head back to my room, which is too cold and lonely without Paisley in it.
I pull out my sketchbook. Paisley’s sexy curves jump from the page under my fingers. I get lost in them—the dips and curves and shadows of who she is. I stay there until the sound of a door closing pulls me away. I assume it’s Paisley returning to her own room. Like a chump, I wait until I’m certain she’s made it back before I go check on Teagan. I haven’t seen her for most of the day, and I want to be sure she doesn’t need anything and has been taking
her medication.
I expect her to be sleeping when I walk in, but she’s awake and struggling to sit up.
“Are you going to just stand there, or are you going to help me?”
Her words don’t have any bite to them, but I still find myself rushing to help her. I swear, I hear her mutter the word sucker under her breath as I pile more pillows behind her.
“It’s late for you to be up and awake.”
“Stop worrying. I’ve been in bed all day long. All I did was watch movies and sleep. I need my medication, and that’ll knock me back out anyway.”
I’ll never stop worrying about her, but I keep that to myself. I grab the bottle from the nightstand and pour out two pills before handing them to her with a glass of water.
See? Still worrying.
“I see Paisley’s agreed to come back and stay here.”
“Yeah.” That’s about as much as I want to discuss on that topic.
“Yeah? That’s all you have to say?”
“What’s there to say? She’s here. Discussion over.”
Teagan shifts but then flinches and wraps an arm around her ribs. “Discussion definitely not over, you idiot. Discussion just started. I like her, Burke. She’s a good girl, and she’s good for you. How are you going to fix it?”
“I’m not. We have bigger things to worry about first.”
I came in here to check on my sister, not to get a lecture from her. I guess I should’ve expected it.
“You’re not? Really? What the hell is wrong with you?”
“She’s here. Maybe that’s enough for me. Maybe things will happen naturally as the chaos quiets. I don’t want to push her, Teagan. If she leaves, then she’ll be in danger. I’d rather her be safe and not with me before anything else.”
Teagan glares at me like she’s ready to pop me upside the head.
If looks could kill.
“You’re not the man who sits around and waits for things to fall in your lap. Be you. Go after what you want. You may be out of your depth here, but you’ve never been one to let a challenge cripple you. Make a move. Show her. Ease her fears. Act. Be you. Otherwise, you probably don’t deserve her.”
Vengeance in Bloom (The Love Unauthorized Series Book 2) Page 7