“Here.” He holds a tumbler towards me, and the sweet smell warms me.
Taking it from him, I knock back the ice-cold vodka in one go like it’s an extra-long shot. “Thanks.”
“You came into my house, and you touched my girl. A part of me wants to give you the same treatment as the arseholes who hurt her are going to get,” he says, shooting what’s left of his drink. “That was all the warnings and chances you get. Any more of that shit from you and I won’t stop until you’re horizontal for good.”
We sit in silence for what feels like forever. My mouth dries with every second that ticks by, my pride shrivelling…
“I need to find her.”
“Who?” My eyes flash to his. He knows that there is only one her I need.
Bastard.
He knows what he’s doing, looking down on me.
“If you can’t even say her name, how do you expect to bring her back?” Sitting beside me, he unscrews the bottle in his hand and pours us both another double. “Tell you what, we’re going to sit here until we’ve finished this and you’re blinding drunk. Then you’ll owe me a new sofa, another outstanding bottle of the good stuff, and an apology.”
“An apology?”
“Yeah, to Cassandra. You owe it to me, because I’m not following through on my threats, and you need to give it to her because you hurt her. Physically.”
“I know.” Taking a long sip of my drink, I let that rock sink right to the bottom of my stomach.
“Good,” he says, throwing back his drink. “Another.”
“Don’t you have work?”
“I’ve got it covered.”
“I haven’t been a great partner.”
Laughing as he refills our glasses with a triple, he shakes his head. “Silent partner. Besides, you’re the legal brains. I’m the one who has to do all the hard graft, and I’m telling you–I have it covered. You’ve got better things to worry about.”
“Like getting pissed with my sister’s boyfriend?”
“Like getting abso-fucking-lutely wankered with your mate.” Clinking his glass to mine, he sits back into the seat, wedging the bottle of vodka between us.
I follow suit, and in the quiet of dawn we keep working our way through the bottle. My mind hazes with every measure, and although I hope to hell that the fog brings some kind of calm with it, it doesn’t. It makes her voice louder. Her screams. Cries.
And all the blood. So much fucking blood. Tears.
“Arabella…Belles…”
“Christopher…”
“It’s going to be okay, baby.”
So many tears. So much blood.
Nothing is okay.
“I don’t know where she is.” My worry strangles my voice, breaking it into all the pieces to match my shattered heart. “I don’t know if she’s safe. If she’s hurting. If she’s healing. I don’t know anything, and it’s killing me. I need to know she’s okay.”
“She’ll come back. She always comes back.”
“What if she doesn’t?”
Sitting up straight, he looks me in the eyes. “We bring her back.”