by W Winters
“I told you, I told you if I could start it over, I would.” His voice is low, but has an edge of anguish.
“You didn’t tell me why though,” I say and lift my head to look him in the eyes, finding my own reflection staring back at me. Crumpled and weak, just how he sees me. “You didn’t tell me it’s because you lied to me every step of the way.”
“There are reasons.”
“There’s no reason good enough.”
“I couldn’t let you go.”
“It’s not your decision to make.” Every response from me turns colder and more absolute. Inside I’m on fire, the blaze of hate destroying everything that made me feel alive with Jase Cross. It rages in my mind, changing the memories, making me feel like they weren’t real.
It was all a lie.
“You wanted me to marry you and weeks ago you fed me one lie after another so I’d do what you want.”
“Bethany,” he pleads with me.
“I told you I loved you and you made me feel like you loved me too.” My brow pinches together as I wipe violently under my eyes. “How could you when you knew it was all a lie?”
“Bethany, don’t. It’s not like that--”
“But it is! That’s exactly what it’s like!”
Placing both of his hands on my shoulder, he tries to console me as if he’s the man who should be doing that. “It’s over with now, it’s better now.”
“I never want to see you again.” As I speak the words, my heart splits in two. I feel it slice cleanly, seemingly fine, then bleeding out in a single beat. “I have to protect myself and you keep hurting me. You won’t stop.” I hate that my bottom lip wobbles. I hate that I believe what I’m saying. I hate that it’s the truth. “If you need me to behave some type of way, you’ll lie to me. You’ll pull strings and make me do what you say.”
My head shakes at the idea, hating what he’s done and wanting to deny it; Jase’s shakes on its own, but for different reasons I imagine, because he knows I’m telling the truth. I’m not the one who’s lied. Feeling my resolve, I push myself up off the floor, ready to leave him. Preparing to piece myself back together and lick my wounds, but he stops me with one statement.
“Marcus has Jenny.” Jase’s voice is low, the words coming from deep in his chest.
Jenny?
“How dare you.” I have no air in my lungs. No will to do anything but slap him. Hard and fast, leaving a red mark and forcing his head to whip to the side. “You don’t get to use her against me. You don’t get to manipulate me with her ever again!” I scream in his face and then clench my teeth together when he grabs my wrists as he pins me to him, restraining my elbows so I can’t hit him, so I can’t move. All I can do is look in his eyes.
“She’s still alive, Bethany,” he whispers and it’s so compelling.
I want nothing more than to believe him. To believe the liar who’s already brought shame to her memory.
“She’s dead.” A fresh flood of tears threatens to fall, but I won’t let him see them. He doesn’t get to be there for me. Not again. I pull away from his grasp, ripping my arm away so I can free myself.
The bright red handprint against his cheek is still there. “She’s alive. We have a video of her with a man after the funeral. After the trunk was discovered.”
“With Marcus?” I can barely remain upright. She’s alive. I’m so cold. A freezing wave flows over my skin. She’s alive.
Hope makes my body tremble.
“A different man. He’s dead, but we have an idea where he’s keeping her.”
“Where who is keeping her?”
“Marcus.”
I’m so confused, so consumed by questions, but one begs to be answered. “How long have you known?”
Silence. The silence is my answer.
“I have never hated you more,” I speak when he doesn’t. Swallowing thickly and feeling a spiked ball form in my throat, I continue. “You saw what that did to me. How could you watch me mourn her death…” I have to stop and breathe in deep.
“Because I love you… I didn’t want to tell you if I couldn’t save her.”
“So you can save her now?” I question him, focused on my sister before realizing what he said.
I love you.
“You’re telling me all this now because we’ve fallen apart.” I speak the unforgiving truth. “Not because you can save her.” And not because you truly love me. I keep that bit to myself.
“I’m trying. We have a plan. I didn’t want to tell you until I knew for sure.”
“You’re sure she’s alive?” Jenny. My sister’s face plays in my mind and I have to cover my own. Please, God. Let her be alive.
“As of two weeks ago, yes.”
Two weeks. Two weeks is so long. Too long. Please, God.
“Will you save her for me?” I beg him, looking up at him and praying for him to do just that. Even if he doesn’t love me. Even if he lies to me a million times more until the day I can see her again. “I’ll do anything,” I confess and my voice cracks.
“I’m doing my best. It’s the first time we’ve ever tracked anything that has to do with Marcus.”
I have never felt more at his mercy and more alone than in this moment. I don’t know what to believe or what to do. It’s too much.
“I’m breaking, Jase. I can feel myself slowly breaking down and I can’t stop it. Don’t take advantage of me. Don’t do this to me. I’m not okay.”
“I’m not taking advantage of you.”
“Then don’t say you love me if you really don’t. It’s not fair. Because I do love you. I hate you right now and we’re not okay, but I love you.” I don’t know how I’m even able to speak, since the sudden rush of emotions are warring with each other at the back of my throat.
Jase struggles to hide his as well. “I don’t love you, is that what you want to hear?”
“Don’t do that. Don’t use what we used to have.” My finger raises as I yell at him, my voice cracking. He loves me.
Heaving in a breath with the intensity growing in his eyes his own voice trembles as he says, “Whether you believe it or not, I love you and you’re staying here.”
With an exhale and then another, a calmer one, his expression softens as he waits for me. He’s waiting for me to say it again and I know he is. “Everything I’ve done is for you. I love you, cailín tine.”
“I don’t want you to call me that right now.” I stop him with the statement, not knowing what to believe. Adrenaline is coursing through my body. Fight or flight taking over. He won’t let me leave and he’s the only one left to fight. “Of everything I learned today, the only thing that I can focus on right now is that my sister is still alive.”
“I know. And I’m here for you.” He tries again to appeal to the side of me that’s still holding on to hope for us. I’m ashamed to admit that side still exists.
“How could you watch me cry for her and accept her death when you knew she was alive? I can’t even stomach the thought.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Do you expect to say you’re sorry and I simply forgive you?” I throw his own words back in his face. “Words are meaningless.”
“You can’t leave me when we fight.” He says the words like they’re a truth that’s undeniable. Like nothing else matters.
“Lying to me isn’t the same as fighting. And what you lied about… I’m not okay.” Pulling away from him, I feel the chill in the air. “Nothing about this is okay.”
My legs feel weak when I stand and he tries to right me, but I do it myself.
“I’m going to the guest room.” I give him my final words. The only ones I have for him in this moment. “Don’t lock me in and don’t trap me. But leave me the hell alone for right now.”
Loneliness is a horrible companion, but it’s the one I need right now. I think about messaging Laura, but I’m still pissed at her. Instead, I sit on the bed and look out of the window. Just to think. Just to break down again. All
alone.
Does he know the nightmares he’s given me? The hate I feel for myself knowing I’d said goodbye to my sister, even though I still felt her presence. I knew I shouldn’t have, that it was too soon.
Shame is what comes for me when the loneliness no longer matters.
I don’t hear the door open and I don’t hear Seth walk in until he speaks from across the room. “Are you all right?”
Lifting my head from my folded arms, I glance over my shoulder. I’m certain I look like a wreck, with my knees pulled into my chest so I’m merely a ball of limbs staring out a window.
“What do you think?” I ask him.
“I know you hate me--”
“I don’t hate you.”
“Well, I know you’re mad at me, and I’m sorry.”
“Okay.” The petty answer leaves me instantly. I’ll be damned if I’m simply going to forgive him in this moment.
The bed dips and I turn back to Seth, warning him to get the hell out. “I’d like to be alone.”
“Just one thing.” Although it’s a statement, he says it like it’s a question.
With a nod, I agree to hear him out.
“He lied to you, he does that,” Seth tells me easily, like there’s nothing wrong at all with it. “He made mistakes he’s not used to. He decided to do things he shouldn’t have.” There’s a rhythm to his voice that’s calming. I fall for it, listening to every word he says. “He’s not the only person I’ve ever met that lies to make other people feel better.”
“He could say he’s sorry,” I counter as if a simple “sorry” would make much of a difference. Then I remember… he did. He said he was sorry. I don’t remember for which part. Maybe all of it. He was right though, words are meaningless.
“He’s not. He’d do it again if he had to.” I’d be pissed off if Seth wasn’t so matter of fact and if I wasn’t so convinced already that what he’s saying is the absolute truth.
“Then why should I ever trust him again?” That’s really what it comes down to. I don’t know that I can believe him or trust him ever again.
“Because he’s trying to be a better man… for you. He’s done all of this, for you.”
I try to respond, to disagree. But I can’t. Intention matters and behind all of this, he wanted to keep me safe. He tells me one last thing as he makes his way out.
“You know he loves you.” Seth sounds so sure of it. “Just love him back.” With that he shuts the door, not waiting for a response.
Jase
“I’d say she’s pissed,” I comment in the dark night as I shut my car door. I fucking hate that I’m not there now, just in case she wants to talk or yell… even if she wants to hit me again.
“I’d say she has a right to be.” Glaring at Seth’s profile, I note that he doesn’t look back at me until he adds, “She loves you, though.” When his eyes reach mine, I look ahead instead.
He changes the subject to ask, “You ready for this?”
It’s bitter cold as the clear, glassy surface of the puddle beneath my boot is shattered. I don’t hesitate to take another step and another. Moving quickly through the harsh wind to the warehouse.
“No one’s ever ready for this shit.”
“I don’t like not knowing what to expect,” Seth comments, and it’s only then that I notice how tense he seems.
“Whatever happens in there, we’ll figure it out,” I assure him. “Follow my lead.”
“I’m not sure I’m the best at that, Boss.”
“You’ve always been the best.”
“Not at following… I like lists and control and knowing what to do. If you’re telling me that you don’t know, I’m telling you I might not follow.”
There’s always been direction. Always been a sense of right and wrong and a certain way to do things. Recently though, everything has been like walking through fog.
“Whatever you do,” I finally answer him, “don’t point your gun at me. Aim it at the prick who brought us here.”
With a huff of a laugh he tells me, “I’ll try to remember that.”
Pushing open the double doors, I feel every muscle in my body coil, ready to act. Bright light greets us instantly, blinding me momentarily. It only makes the adrenaline in my blood pump harder and faster.
“We’ve been waiting for you.” Officer Cody Walsh’s voice reverberates in the large empty space. Blood rushes in my ears as I take in the man who’s been like a dog with a bone ever since he arrived in town.
There’s no back room or secret entrances in the empty warehouse. The ceilings have to be twenty feet high and the room itself is vacant, all 1200 square feet of it. With the exception of a steel shelf on the back wall and several stacks of old metal chairs behind Officer Walsh and another man I’ve never seen before, there’s nothing here. Nowhere for anyone else to hide. That doesn’t mean there aren’t cameras.
“Good to see you again, Officer,” I speak and other than my voice, the only sounds are the large fans spinning above us as we walk to them, slowly closing the distance. Seth stays back slightly, letting me lead the way.
Officer Walsh is in jeans and a black leather jacket, nothing like his typical attire, save the expression on his face.
“Undercover tonight?” Seth mutters beneath his breath, although it’s a joke – there’s a serious hint of a smirk there - and I share a quick glance with him. All of the FBI cases we could find on Walsh are sealed, except for one case. The one that has information on Marcus as well. His files were squeaky clean, with numerous medals and honors, referrals. But not a damn thing about undercover work. Anyone could spot him as a cop. He’d die in a week out here if he pulled that shit.
Our boots smack off the cement floor as my eyes adjust to the fluorescent lighting and we get closer to the two of them.
The other man is younger. Maybe in his thirties, or late twenties. In dark gray sweats and a long-sleeve black Henley, he would come off as relaxed if he didn’t keep looking between Cody Walsh and the two of us.
“I don’t think we’ve met,” I address the other man, and the moment he opens his mouth to greet me, Officer Walsh whips up his gun to the side of the man’s head and fires.
The racing of my heart isn’t quite as fast as I am to pull my gun from its holster. With both hands on the steel in my hands, I stare at Walsh pointing the barrel at the unsuspecting man beside him. If Walsh sees my gun and Seth’s aimed at him, he doesn’t react, he only watches the man to his left. The dead man falls to his knees, his eyes dead and vacant with a rough bullet hole leaking blood down his face. Walsh continues to focus on him until finally, the man falls face-first onto the floor with a dull thud.
“I was wondering when you were going to get here so I could kill him,” Walsh admits, his eyes watching the bright red blood pool around the nameless man’s face.
Our pistols are still on him and he only seems to notice now.
“I wouldn’t if I were you. If I don’t make it back to the office and pull the tapes out of the mail room, all the evidence will be dispersed.”
Seth’s gaze sears into me. I can hear the soles of his shoes scrape against the ground as he shuffles his feet although his gun is still up.
Keeping myself calm, I lower the gun and shrug as if I’m unaffected. “I didn’t take you for a man who liked the dramatic.”
Officer Walsh is a man who’s strictly by the book. That’s everything we found on him. Clean record and a man who believes in black and white with no grays in between. This… this is to throw us off. It can’t be his normal.
“I didn’t take you for a man who liked being late.”
“You killed him because we were late?” Seth questions. He lets a hint of humor ease into his tone, but his gun still sits at his side.
It’s only then that Officer Walsh takes his gaze from me and focuses on Seth.
“No. I shot him because I don’t need him and he knows too much.”
“Good to know that’s how you do business.�
� Seth’s criticism is rewarded with a tilt of Walsh’s head.
“What’s his name?” I question.
“It doesn’t matter.” Walsh looks between the two of us, making me second-guess his plan of action.
“It does to us,” Seth speaks for me, and I don’t mind in the least, since the same words were going to come out of my mouth. I want to know everything about the dead man lying on the floor. What he did, who he worked for, and most importantly: why he was standing beside Walsh in the first place?
“Joey Esposito.”
“Anything else we should know about him?” Seth asks and Walsh simply stares at him. I didn’t come here for a pissing contest.
“What do you want?” I speak loud and clearly, breaking up whatever’s starting between the two of them.
“To share two things with you. Both of them are pieces of information I think you’ll find valuable,” he says and then nudges the leg of the dead man on the floor. It’s a dull prod with no emotion behind it, just enough to be noticed. “He worked for Romano.”
Just hearing the name Romano raises the small hairs on the back of my neck. I feel my eyes narrow but other than that, I keep my composure. Seth does the same. Remaining still, unmoving. Unbothered.
That’s more like him.
“I’ll hand over the whereabouts of Romano freely. I’d prefer for you…” he pauses to glance at Seth before adding, “the two of you, to know that I’m willing to negotiate.”
“Handing something over for free isn’t a part of negotiations. Negotiations require something in return.” Seth corrects him and I have to fight the grin that plays at my lips.
The irritation in Walsh’s demeanor is something I didn’t know I’d enjoy so much. Maybe because it’s obvious he wanted the upper hand by killing this poor fuck the second we got here. Maybe it’s because Seth isn’t making it easy for Walsh. Either way, I make a mental note to tell him I like his style when he’s not following.
Before Walsh can respond, I comment, “How’d you get the information regarding Romano’s whereabouts? Esposito just gave it to you? Or did he think you had a deal?” I let the implication hang in the air, that his deals aren’t to be trusted as I take a step forward.