by Skye Warren
“He’s not here,” I hedged.
A note of smugness marred the other one’s face. “We know that.”
I affected an amused look, as if I’d thought of something naughty. “Were you watching us?”
Blue Eyes remained impassive. What was his name? Detective Cameron. “We know his schedule.”
“He’s not usually out of the house by now.” I clamped my mouth shut. Could not believe I’d just said that. Even if it was something they could easily find out, I didn’t have to help them.
Shaw’s eyes glittered with triumph at the slip. He knew he could play me now. This Detective Shaw was stockier than the other guy, coarser, and an asshole besides. Like the kind of guy I’d pick at the club if he wasn’t hiding behind a badge. Cameron was leaner, quieter, with those watchful blue eyes. Both dangerous in their own ways.
Detective Cameron leaned forward, just a smidge, but immediately Shaw subsided. So, we had a leader. And it wasn’t the mouthy one either. Interesting.
“Are you aware of what he does for a living?” Cameron asked.
“He owns a restaurant.”
“He does own a restaurant,” he agreed. “It’s a very nice restaurant that he spends a few hours a week on. What does he do the rest of the time?”
“Knitting?” I suggested.
“You think this is funny,” Shaw snapped.
Dick. “No, I don’t think it’s funny that you’re in his house and making accusations.”
“We haven’t made any accusations,” Cameron said. Crystal blue eyes scanned me, cataloging my words, my reactions. I straightened.
“Where does Colin go out at night?” Shaw asked.
“He’s with me.”
“Every night?” he prodded.
“Pretty much. Is this some sort of interrogation technique? Divide and conquer. It won’t work.”
“There’s been an increase in illegal trafficking the last couple of months,” Cameron said, interrupting Shaw’s words. “Shipments at night, that sort of thing.”
“Then Colin’s not your guy.” I let suggestiveness color my next words. “He’s with me all night.”
Shaw opened his mouth, but Cameron cleared his throat.
“Why don’t you leave your cards? I’ll let him know you stopped by.” I gave them my best smile, otherwise known as a baring of teeth. I may not like what Colin did for Philip, but let there be no confusion about whose side I was on. If they came here looking for an in, a mole, thinking because I was new here, I wouldn’t know what was up, then they were shit out of luck.
Shaw sneered, but Cameron stood. I stood myself, aiming for nonchalance but failing miserably as they paraded out the front door to the porch.
The quiet one turned back, a card between his forefingers. “I’ll be around if you ever want to talk.” He glanced past me toward Bailey. “You may not be safe here.”
A shiver wormed through me, and I took the card.
“Nice cat,” I heard just as I slammed the door shut.
What cat?
I glanced back at Bailey, whose fingers were clamped around the tail of a big orange cat. Must’ve slipped in when those idiots had taken forever to leave.
“Shit,” I said.
“Sit,” said Bailey.
Double shit. I stomped around toward Bailey, and the cat darted away. Apparently Bailey had chosen that moment to let go. Of course she’d side with the litter pooper.
I tiptoed into the kitchen where the big cat was licking a sticky spot of syrup on the counter that had escaped my morning cleanup.
“Bad cat,” I said. Which turned out to be stupid, because the cat leaped off the counter—with surprising grace for his size—and ran back into the living room.
“Sit!” cried Bailey as I made a wide dash around her toys to follow the cat up the stairs.
Fifteen minutes later, panting and sneezing, I tumbled the cat out of my arms and onto the front porch.
“This isn’t a shelter,” I told those big, glassy eyes.
I shut the door.
That wasn’t quite true. It was a shelter, but it was full. No vacancies.
I turned around and shrieked. “What are you doing here?”
Shelly pushed off from the wall she’d been leaning against. “You said to go around back.”
“I know. I meant how long have you been there. You could have helped.”
She shuddered. “I don’t do cats.”
I rolled my eyes—and shuddered a bit myself—at her double entendre. “Yeah, well. Neither do I.” I shook my hands free of the imaginary cat hair. “What’s up?”
Shelly lifted Bailey and gurgled on her belly. “Just checking on the happy couple. You looked kinda freaked out last night.”
For a second I thought she’d meant at night, when I had indeed freaked out. Right in the middle of Colin fucking me. But then I realized she meant after the ballet. Yup, still freaked out. I made a habit of it, apparently.
“Never mind that,” I said. “Did you see who just stopped by for a chat?”
“Rick?” she asked.
“What? No. It was cops.”
“Oh,” she said. “Shit.”
“Sit,” said Bailey.
Shelly met my eyes. Double shit.
“What did they want?” she asked.
“It’s a long story,” I sighed. “So I don’t think I ever told you, but…Colin’s brother is…I’m not sure.”
She raised her eyebrow.
“A criminal,” I said.
She thought for a second, unfazed. “Like, what? A thief?”
“Maybe.”
“A drug dealer.”
“Probably.”
“Worse?” Now she was interested.
“I think yes.”
“And the cops were looking for him?”
“No, they were looking for Colin. Actually they came to talk to me. Because Colin is involved in the whole thing. And that means…”
“Bad shi— stuff,” she finished.
I nodded.
“Do they have anything?” she asked.
“Hell if I know.” I glanced at Bailey as if that absolved me of my swearing sins.
“How bad are we talking?”
“Don’t know that either. Colin was pretty vague. He made it sound like some sort of business. Crime business. What the hell is that? Anyways, Philip looked like the—”
“Wait. Philip? Philip Murphy?”
Oh, no. No no no. The only thing that could possibly make this bad situation worse was if Shelly were involved.
“You know him?” I choked on the words.
“I know him,” she confirmed, her face grim. “I’ve gotta run.”
“What? Now?”
“Yup.” She plopped a fussing Bailey into my arms and vanished out the back door as quickly as she’d appeared.
Well, shit.
I gave myself a tacit pat on the back for keeping that swear to myself. It was hard as hell, but I was learning. It twisted me up inside to want something better, but when I looked at Bailey, I couldn’t help but hope. It would hurt like hell to face my past—to start to heal—but being with Colin almost made it seem possible.
Chapter Two
I decided to tell Colin about the cops. After dinner.
It didn’t take a domestic goddess to realize a man was more amenable on a full stomach. Plus, spazzing out as soon as he got home just reeked of insecurity. However accurate that might have been, I wanted to show him I could deal with this. No problem. Detectives questioning me before snack time? Easy.
So when Colin came through the back door, I just called over my shoulder. “Hey, you. How was your day?” I dropped a spoonful of cookie dough onto the sheet. Look at me, so domestic.
“Not great,” he answered.
I froze, but the lump of dough slid from the spoon and landed on the tray with a plop. Colin was like Shelly. A faker. He said great when he meant fine, and fine when he meant total suckage. Not great was practically
a cry for help.
I turned around. He looked like…Colin. Sturdy, steady. Dependable. Or maybe it’s just that I had depended on him so much that I wanted him to be that way for me.
I walked over to him and reached up to cup his jaw. “What’s wrong?”
“Where’s Bailey?”
“Napping.” I smiled. Physical comfort, I could give.
“We need to talk.”
My smile fell. So much talking today and none of it good.
“Is there something you didn’t tell me about Andrew?” he asked.
Alarm bells clanged. There was a lot I hadn’t told him about Andrew, actually, but I had a feeling I knew exactly which thing he was talking about. The question was, how could he know? “Like what?”
“How long did you and Andrew date?”
Shit. He knew. But how? And perhaps more importantly, how the hell could I get around this? I tried to collect my thoughts, my lies. Lying about this felt more natural than not, but I wasn’t prepared for this direct questioning out of the blue. I wasn’t prepared for all this fucking security to shatter. It was too soon. I’d had just a taste, and it was too fucking soon.
“Colin,” I tried. “Has something happened?”
“Answer the question.”
I felt panic rise in my chest, and I tamped it down. “I’m not going to answer the question until you tell me what is going on. Something had to have happened. You’re acting weird.”
“I spoke to Andrew today.”
“You did what?” Jesus Christ. Colin and Andrew together. This was a cluster fuck of the first order. Fuck, fuck, fuck. “Why would you do that? What did he say?”
“We had to find out if he was going to pursue this.”
I tensed. “What did he say?”
“He said he was sorry.” He paused. “He acted like I was going to hurt him before I even threatened him. Why would he think that, Allie?”
The room blurred. “Because…you’re a mean son of a bitch?” I hoped repeating his own words back to him would distract him. At least enough so I could breathe again. Actually the whole not breathing thing was good. Kind of dimmed the panic of the whole Colin and Andrew thing when I thought I might pass out.
“I don’t think that’s why,” he said, so far away.
“I don’t…” My voice faded, and so did I. I wasn’t sure how I’d finish that thought anyway. I don’t know why Andrew does anything. I don’t want to think about that. Don’t make me tell you. Don’t hurt me.
I was nothing good or special. I had never deserved this knight-in-shining-armor treatment. I knew it, and now Colin would too. I felt his touch on my arms, warm and sure. The next thing I knew, I was sitting down on the couch with Colin beside me.
The stillness in the room belied the way my world was crashing down around me. I hadn’t wanted this moment to come, but it had. Of course it had.
The sound of my breathing roared in my ears. Colin’s warmth seeped into my skin, but not deep enough. I wasn’t stalling. I was bracing myself.
“If I tell you,” I said, “you have to promise me something. You can’t hurt him.”
“Fuck no,” Colin said.
“I’m serious. I can’t…I can’t deal with that too. You have to promise. And you can’t ask anyone else to hurt him either. Swear it to me.”
He looked down, and I heard him swallow. I knew he wouldn’t want to. I thought maybe he’d refuse and just go beat Andrew up anyway, knowing that if I feared it, it would probably be deserved in his eyes.
“Please.” I put my hand on his arm. “Please.”
He looked up. “Okay. I promise.”
Thank God.
“I didn’t exactly tell you the truth.” What a way to start. God, I really deserved what was coming to me.
I turned to face him and pulled my leg up underneath me. Might as well be comfortable for this. There would be few enough comforts left afterward.
I told him everything. Or really I’m not sure what I told him, so lost was I in my story, my shame.
* * * *
Andrew and I were best friends. It wasn’t Shelly I called to chat about nothing for hours as I painted my nails or lay on my bed, but Andrew. And it wasn’t his buddies he confided in about the nights his father had drunk too much, but me.
His father was away, had been for days, leaving Andrew without any way to contact him and no food. As usual. We hung out in his basement and ordered a pizza from the money my dad had left me. There was a movie playing on the TV, but neither of us were interested.
“Allie,” he said. “I’ve got to get out of here.”
“Okay. Let’s go,” I said.
“No. I mean, out of here. This whole city. The fucking country, maybe.”
It wasn’t the first time he’d expressed discontent. More than anyone, I knew what he risked, what he tolerated to stay in this shithole of a house, but there was an edge in his voice tonight. And that bottle of rum we’d jacked from his dad’s stash had run awfully low.
“Where would you go?”
“Anywhere,” he said. “Maybe I’ll join the army.”
I snickered. “You wouldn’t last two seconds. You don’t follow orders well.”
He laughed, a hollow sound. “You’re probably right.” He looked over at me. “Come with me. We’ll find someplace to go. Anywhere’s gotta be better than here.”
I shifted on the couch. That was true enough for him, but not for me. I wasn’t sure I loved my dad, that guy who stopped in with his semi between long-distance routes every couple of months, but it was comfortable.
“Come on,” he said. His eyes turned stormy. “Do you want me to stay here? You think I deserve this?”
“What? No. Of course not.”
“Are you sure?” he said in a singsong voice. “I might deserve it. Maybe I should tell you what he did, and then you can decide.”
Selfishly I didn’t want to know. It was easier to pretend his dad was an ass. The ordinary kind. I didn’t want to see the remembered pain in the eyes of the boy I loved, not when I’d be helpless against it.
“Stop it,” I said. “Just stop.”
“Maybe I should show you,” he went on. There was a strange glint in his eye, and I couldn’t tell if he was teasing me or was angry with me. Maybe both. “Then you would have all the facts. What do you say?”
“Please stop. I’m sorry.”
That only made him angrier. “You’re sorry,” he spat. “I don’t want your fucking sorries.”
He crawled over me on the sofa, and I shrank back into the thin cushions until the springs pushed into my back. I was afraid of him, afraid he’d yell at me, or afraid he’d say something mean. So when he tilted my head up and pinched my chin hard, I was more surprised than anything.
“What the hell are you doing?” I asked, pushing his hand away. But he still crouched over me.
“First, he was drunk.” Andrew glanced at the empty bottle of alcohol. “Done that. Then he started yelling, you know, that I’d never be anything but a loser, that sort of thing.”
A funny feeling tickled my nose. “Oh, Andrew. Fuck him.”
“Yes,” he said. “That’s pretty much what happened.”
And he smiled. Something had happened. The man-boy hovering above me wasn’t Andrew, my friend, the person I loved and trusted. He’d been replaced by an echo of his father, sick and sadistic.
It wasn’t exactly the same, he said. Because I was a girl, it would hurt less. That’s what he told me anyway, but with my wrists in his hand and my body forced open, it hurt a whole hell of a lot. And then it was over, but the pain never stopped.
Chapter Three
My heart thudded, in that moment long past but never forgotten, and here in the present. Colin pulled me closer. I wouldn’t have thought I’d like to be touched right then, but it calmed me.
“I said no, but he didn’t listen. It…happened anyway.”
“He raped you,” Colin said in a flat tone.
&n
bsp; “No,” I said. “It wasn’t like that. We were friends.”
Colin just looked at me.
Tears blurred his image. “We were best friends. I…loved him.”
Colin’s arm tightened around me.
“Why didn’t he stop?” I whispered. It wasn’t a rhetorical question. I’d been searching for that answer, desperate to understand, ever since it’d happened. Maybe Colin would know.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
I understood why Andrew got so angry when I’d asked that. I didn’t want to hear that. It wasn’t an answer to the question. What did “I’m sorry” really mean, anyway? I’m sorry this happened to you, but I’m glad it wasn’t me. I’m sorry you’re broken, but life goes on. It wasn’t anything good or anything helpful; it was just pity. Fucking pity.
I took a deep breath. “After that, he drove me home. I just sat there. I didn’t know what to say. I should have screamed or cried or something, but I couldn’t. Why couldn’t I cry then, but I can’t stop crying now? He was my friend, but I hate him. So much. You don’t understand how much I hate him.”
“I think I do,” Colin said. He was squeezing me almost to the point where I couldn’t breathe. I doubted he even realized it, but I wanted more. There’s a certain magic to being held. No one could hurt me there.
“I heard he left town right after that. I didn’t see him again.” Not until a week ago, when he showed up at my apartment.
“Why didn’t you call the cops?” Colin asked. His voice was even, without the judging lilt I’d expected, but I didn’t want to talk about that. There was enough bitterness in the room to choke on without adding more.
I shook my head and tried to blot the tears out of my eyes. “It wasn’t really…”
“Rape? Yes. It was.”
“I know,” I whispered. “I know, but I just… It’s better if I don’t think about it like that. I know I never should have gone out with him or let him kiss me. I should have fought harder. I should have—”
“No.” I winced at his raised voice, and he lowered it. “God, is that what you think?”
“I don’t know. I’m sorry.” Christ, now I was doing it. “I just…I don’t want him to know Bailey. I know that fathers”—I practically choked on the word—“have rights and that Bailey deserves a father, but he isn’t…he’s not…” My voice broke, and I bit into my lip hard to stem the tears. I also clutched Colin’s hand a little too hard, but I couldn’t seem to let go.