I was about to join her when Tank beat me to it.
He sat next to her.
He made her smile.
Which just reminded me that all I did was make her cry.
He made her laugh.
I made her scream.
Good. Bad. Did it even matter anymore?
All the choices I’d made that led us up to this point, where I had her where I wanted her, seemed irrelevant as she bit into that donut, as she chatted with him, put her hand on him.
Touched his skin while using her mouth to communicate what I wanted all along.
Her words.
Her mouth.
Her truths.
Before I knew what I was doing, my legs were taking me over to where they sat.
“Hey,” I interrupted, shoving my hands into the pockets of my jeans. I hadn’t had class today; no I’d insisted I could do recon all day along with the babysitting duty she knew nothing about. “You ready?”
Tank eyed me up and down, his green eyes calculating. He wanted to punch me in the dick so bad, but he knew I was his boss; I owned him. So instead, he stood, shook my fucking hand, then gave her a curt nod and simply walked off.
Fuck I loved my job sometimes.
Her face fell right along with the donut; I caught the pastry just in time. “You don’t want any more?”
“What?” Her eyes seemed unfocused, blurry. “Oh.” She looked at her hands. “Sorry, you’re right, that’s such a waste; I could probably salvage the rest for breakfast or a snack mid-day or—”
“Are we not feeding you enough?” I snapped, not meaning to gain the attention of the people next to us, all of them frozen in place, ready to piss their pants at any minute.
I snapped my fingers.
Both couples moved from their booths.
The tinkling of the bell over the door as it opened and closed and the steaming of milk behind the counter were our only musical companions as I stared her down. “So?”
Annie looked away and swallowed. “It’s great. Your house, I guess my house, for now, I didn’t mean it like that. Your parents are extremely generous.”
“They are.”
“But…” She lifted her shoulder. “Sometimes it’s hard not to go backward, to default, you know?”
Oh, I knew. Defaulting was what I did. Emotionally. Physically. Even spiritually. “So you default with your food?”
Her lush lips curved into a smile. “I don’t mean to. I just… I know this sounds dumb, but—” She turned and gazed out the window, a look of wonder on her face. “I have exactly one good memory of my dad before I was fostered out, adopted by a new family. He took me to some local donut shop, and he let me pick out anything I wanted. He apologized for being… mean, and he was, don’t get me wrong.” A shudder traveled through her. “So mean. It was my last happy memory of him as if he was trying to make amends for the yelling, for the fear with Mom and me. The stupid donut gave me hope, and then…” Her hands started to shake as she grabbed a napkin.
“And then…?” I prompted. Almost afraid to know her truth when earlier I would have killed for it, slit throats, taken souls.
“And then,” she continued, “a man walked in with a gun. My dad blocked me. The gun went off. The donut went flying. I hid under the table. Then a hand with a glove on it reached out and grabbed my hair, pulling. I just remember it hurting so bad. I followed him, and he said I was his new daughter. My dad said something like, not this way, and the man let me go. Later that night, though, he came again, this time with more men. He said he would make things right, that I was his now. I had no idea what he was talking about at the time.”
“And now?” I asked. “What about now?”
“A pawn,” she simply said. “In a very dangerous game I didn’t know the rules to. He’s gone now; you made sure of that.” She rubbed her arms where a few pale scars remained. “My bruises are gone. But sometimes, I still felt them lingering. And sometimes… I wish I could still see them to know I survived them.”
I cursed. “I would kill him again for you.”
I tried to keep the rage at bay, remembering the bruises I’d see on her arms last year and the way I lost my shit, killing her adoptive dad without so much as blinking. It’s like he knew I was coming for him too, me and Junior, as we stormed the house with Tank, showing the De Lange associates we’d recruited just how dirty we got when someone threatened our own.
A sad smile played at the corners of her lip, and she said softly, “I know you would.”
“Annie?”
“Yeah?” She finally locked eyes with me.