Together We Lie

Chapter Twenty Eight

Ahuffofwarm air fluttered across my face, followed by a wet nose pressing into my cheek. Scrunching my eyes tight, I rolled away from the big fluff trying to ruin my sleep. Two big paws sunk into the mattress, followed by a loud bark right in my ear.

Groaning, and with my eyes still shut, I reached out for my phone, patting along the top of the bedside table in search of the device and coming up blank.

Another loud bark came from the large Newfoundland standing by my bed, demanding I get up and feed him.

“Okay, okay, you big mutt!” I moaned, dragging my aching ass out of bed at the sound of the worst kind of alarm clock known to man, as the big puppy had no concept of time. Did it matter that I got home at five-thirty this morning? No, Rocky was on a schedule and wanted his breakfast at seven a.m, come hail, rain or shine.

I fumbled through the scattered clothes strewn across my bedroom floor, pulling on a large black hoodie to cover my almost naked body. After a long night, I got into bed in my underwear, too exhausted and sore to throw anything else on.

Any other day, I would have gone to feed Rocky in my bra and shorts and then returned to bed. I wasn’t ashamed of my body, and the scars that scattered my flesh weren’t anything Alex hadn’t seen before. The big blue-purple bruise running along my ribs and the finger marks around my neck, however, were something I’d rather he not know about.

I pulled the hood up over my head and tightened the toggles, drawing it closer to my face. Glancing down to the carpet by the bedside table, I saw my phone face down on the floor. I must have dropped in when I got into bed.

Pain pulsed across my ribs as I bent down to collect it, clenching my teeth and breathing hard through my nose. I wanted to bring that asshole Philip back to life just to kill him all over again.

Pocketing my phone, I tiptoed along the corridor, slowly making our way to the kitchen with Rocky’s gigantic paws clattering excitedly back and forth at the prospect of food.

“If you were up, why couldn’t you feed Rocky?” I asked the tattoo-covered man leaning against the worktop, scrolling through his phone.

“Call it punishment for coming home five hours after you were meant to and not checking in once you were home,” Alex replied, his back still to me and eyes locked on his screen.

“Since when are you the boss?” I murmured, sidling up beside him and hip bumping him out of the way of the cupboard.

Sometimes things didn’t go to plan and a job may take slightly longer than anticipated and he knew that. Maybe not five hours longer than expected, but it wasn’t my fault the target decided to stay longer at the Gentleman’s Club, feeling up the female waitresses.

I braced myself before pulling open the door and reached in for the almost full twenty-kilo bag of dry dog food. Bending over, I winced and released a painful groan as I pulled the bag toward me.

“And that…” he said, taking the bag out of my hands and starting to fill the dog bowl, “is for trying to hide your injury from me.”

“Sadist,” I muttered, moving to drag myself up on the barstool and wait for Alex to inevitably check me over. I could never hide things from him. It was like his sixth sense, one I wished he didn’t have right about now.

With Rocky happily guzzling down his food, he moved his attention to me and untied the drawstrings to pull back the hood to expose my neck. He tutted and moved to lift the sweatshirt to display my torso, sucking air through his teeth at the sight of my new war paint.

“Does it hurt?”

I huffed out a breath as he started poking and prodding around my ribs. I shook my head. “It looks worse than it is,” I said through gritted teeth, trying to keep the pain from showing on my face.

It did hurt like a bitch, and my ego hurt just as much. Alex’s fingers trailed up to my neck, causing unwelcome goosebumps to ripple across my body. His face remained clinical and ignored how I held my breath while he examined my bruises.

“Stevie, you’re black and blue. What the fuck? I thought the job was a mugging gone wrong!”

“It was!” I exclaimed in a rush. “At least I didn’t need to stage it. The bastard didn’t fight fair. He was wearing steel toe capped boots and got in one good kick.” I gestured toward the area Alex was back to examining and worked hard to keep my eyes from betraying the real reason why I got hurt.

“What made you think he’d fight fair? He’s scum.” With one finger, he pushed at my ribcage, and I slapped his hand away with a hiss. “You know I’m going to have to report this back to Will?”

“Ah, fuck’s sake, Alex!” I scowled, moving away from his jabbing fingers and pulled the jumper back down to cover the bruise. “No need to tell him anything. I’m fine.”

I didn’t need that pain in my ass calling me to his office to lecture me again. If he was so worried about how I handled my assignments, he should bloody well do them himself.

Alex clucked his tongue again, then picked up his phone, but I caught his wrist before he could walk away from me.

“Alex, keep this to yourself. Please,” I begged quietly. His expressive eyes lowered, hiding the worry and unease that filled their depths as he turned to the freezer to pull out an ice pack.

“You’re lucky you walked away with only bruised ribs and not a fracture. One more kick, and it would have broken, Stevie.” He sighed, coming back and placing the ice block against my side. He replaced his hand with mine, indicating I should keep pressure on it as he went to make our coffee. “Give me the rundown on what happened last night, then,” he said, starting to froth the milk on the coffee machine located in the corner of the kitchen.

Rocky came by and stood at my side, leaning into me for a scratch behind his ears as I waited for the liquid gold to kick-start my morning. I closed my eyes and replayed the moment Phillip became my dad. A shudder of shame coursed down my back, along with regret that would appear when I told Alex as much.

Alex placed my coffee on the counter. I looked into the cup and back at him, seeing him hide a smug smile behind his mug. He had been attempting different coffee art with the milk ever since I had shown him how to create the standard Rosetta every barista seems to do. Today, staring back at me were three individual roses, stems and thorns included.

“Show off.” I brought the hot liquid to my lips, savouring the smooth rich flavour as Alex replied to someone on his phone, before quickly placing it face down on the counter.

“So?” he prompted, leaning both hands on the edge of the breakfast bar. I sighed, readying myself to start going over what happened last night. Rearranging the ice pack, I leaned back in my chair, placed my bare feet on the kick bar and took a deep calming breath.

Last night’s target; twenty-two-year-old Phillip Walker, the son of Senator Walker, was a predator, surrounded by rumours and whispers of a reputation of physical abuse and rape. He was a low-life, riding on his father’s coattails, thinking he was indestructible, and now Daddy couldn’t cover up for his twisted son’s extracurricular activities. He had been a liability. So what do desperate men with deep pockets and no morals do? They come to me.

“He started fighting back like a pussy. He clearly hadn’t been up against a chick who was sober enough to fight back, but as I said, fucking steel toe-capped-” Alex’s phone interrupted me. I was riled up with having to recount the last six hours that resulted in my failure, the pain in my side that increasing, and I was functioning on roughly two hours of sleep. Now his bloody phone wouldn’t stop vibrating, and I wanted to get this over with so I could go back to bed. I had a private matter to attend to tonight.

“Jesus Christ, Alex, who the fuck is texting you this much at this time in the morning?” I huffed, leaning over and snatching the phone out of his hand, only to get an eyeful of a pair of tits on the screen. “Who the hell is that?” I asked, zooming in and out of the picture, focusing on a tattoo inked on the mounds of the faceless breasts. “Are those paw prints on the top of her boobs? That’s so early two-thousand.” I shook my head with a laugh, handing back the phone.

“Hey!” Alex said, tilting his head and looking back at the very large, very fake naked breasts filling the phone. “Chrystal also has a nipple ring. And the way she moans when I play with it with my tongue…”

“Okay, enough.” I shoved his arm to bring his attention back to me as he laughed. “Somehow, I got on the ground. He kicked me once, hard, and then I put a bullet right through his carotid. Dead.”

Alex sat strumming his fingers on his chin, thinking about what I had told him. “Well, if you can’t recall how you ended up on your back and giving the target access to cause damage, maybe we should change up your training programme.”

I exhaled and dropped my gaze.

“Stevie?” Alex reached out and sat his hand on top of mine. “What aren’t you telling me?”

I pulled my hand away from his and hung my head as I said, “I saw him.”

“Who?”

“My dad.”

“What? When?... Where?” he asked, his voice hard and angry. I swallowed and shook my head.

“He wasn’t there. He was here,” I said and tapped the side of my head with two fingers. Then I released a hollow chortle at how fucking stupid that sounded. Alex’s face darkened as a frown marred his brow. “I could hear his laugh. I could see his piercing blue eyes as he choked me. It was him instead of Phillip, and I froze. I fucking froze, Alex, like I was the scared little girl who he used to beat.”

Alex was by my side in an instant, pulling me against his chest as he rocked us back and forth soothingly. I let myself be lulled by his movements, staring at the stainless-steel backsplash behind the cooker, and barely blinked. I sat up, forcing Alex to release me from his hold, and cleared my throat.

“I’m going to kill him,” I stated, no inflection in my voice, as if I’d just told Alex the weather. He slowly circled the breakfast bar until he was back to his original position and pursed his lips.

“Why?”

“What do you mean, why?” I barked. Alex removed his glasses and rubbed at his eyes.

“I mean, why now, Stevie? You’ve never said you wanted to take him out, even when Will offered to have someone do it for you. You always wanted him left alone.” He paused, repositioning his glasses and holding his mug up to his lips but never took a drink. “Is this all for Jake?” When I remained silent, Alex snarled and slammed his mug down in frustration, the brown liquid splashing across the worktop.

“Fuck’s sake, Stevie,” he shouted. “You have fallen for him, haven’t you?”

I stared at my best friend, my mouth parted as I searched for words.

“You have. Just admit it, Stevie,” he demanded, then continued to speak without letting me respond. “You must have if you’re willing to kill your own flesh and blood for him.”

“It’s not for him,” I said quietly, as that was partially the truth. But as soon as those words left my lips, I knew that they held more weight than I realised.

With more strength in my voice, I looked straight into Alex’s eyes. “It’s for me and only me. I can’t watch my back thinking he could come for me - or worse, for Chris. I can’t have Will wasting resources on him, keeping tabs on whatever he is doing twenty-four-seven. And yeah, I can’t do anything to Jake on his behalf. He might be my flesh and blood, but he sure as shit isn’t my dad. He never was. He didn’t raise me, I did. He didn’t care for me, I did. He didn’t make me who I am today, I fucking did,” I said, prodding a finger into my chest as I checked off my list.

“Let me do it,” Alex requested, his demeanour softening slightly as he grabbed a cloth from the sink and began cleaning his mess.

“No,” I replied shortly.

“Stevie–”

“No, Alex. I’m doing this. I need to do this, and if you try to take this from me, I will never forgive you.”

Alex didn’t look up, but I caught the small nod of agreement as I carefully slipped from the barstool. I turned back and said, “Philip’s phone, wallet, and keys are in my jacket pocket. Make sure you destroy them.” And then I left him alone in the kitchen.