Thorns Of A Rose (Daredevil)

Chapter 24 - Can't Come Back

Rose.

Rose's eye fluttered open as the early morning sunlight shone through the window. It hadn't completely risen just yet, the sky still red. There was heavy breathing beside her and an arm lazily draped across her waist. He was still in a deep sleep and Rose checked her watch to see it was 5am. Mat's alarm wouldn't go off for another two hours, so Rose carefully and quietly lifted his arm and slid out of the bed.

She grabbed her clothes and quickly pulled them on, keeping her shoes in her hand, but when she turned to leave, she froze as Matt turned over in his sleep onto his back. The sheet only covered his waist leaving his chest exposed. Across the front of his left shoulder was what Rose had only felt the night before, but couldn't see; a cut, one that had been previously quite deep, but now mostly healed. It wasn't the only thing, though. Littered across his sides and his arms were bruises.

She stepped forward, her lips parting as her breath deepened. She exhaled as she turned and looked back out the window towards the red sky and then back to Matt. The only explanation she could think of was that someone had broken into his apartment, planning to rob it, but he was home and they attacked him. However, he wouldn't have lied about that and the cut was older than the one above his eye. She had two choices; wait until he woke up (maybe wake him up herself) and question him about it or she could sneak out and avoid any awkwardness between her and her best friend who she had just slept with.

She left.

Rose went straight to the gym, getting changed into her spare gym clothes she kept in the office and showing in the changing rooms. She then went over to the café to pick up something to eat.

Rose kept thinking about Matt; the bruises, the cuts, the furniture, the staircase, his knowledge about Anatoly, his disappearance the night of the bombings... she shook her head deciding she was being ridiculous. She was reaching, her paranoia and imaginative mind kicking in just because the Mask reminded her of Matt. There was no way Matthew Murdock, the man she had known her entire life, her best friend, her blind best friend who meant more to her than anyone was the Devil of Hells Kitchen... her enemy.

'The guy's like a bat.' Foggy's voice echoed through her mind. Rose hadn't heard what Karen and Foggy had been talking about and there was nothing wrong with her hearing and she was always observant.

Then she thought about the mask itself. It covered his eyes. During daylight he might have been able to see out of it, but it seemed unlikely at night.

She shook her head, "Stop it, you're being absurd." She whispered to herself, turning back to the breakfast she had been served.

A few minutes later Rose glanced up at the TV screen in the cafe. She looked away, but then quickly shot her head back to it, registering who was on screen, almost choking on her waffles.

"What the f... turn that up!" She yelled to the young waitress behind the counter who followed her boss' orders right away.

"I'm not very good at this, out, being in public." Wilson Fisk was saying on the news over a live broadcast. Leland Owlsley stood to his right with James Wesley next to him and Vanessa on Fisk's left. "But I felt the need to speak up for this city that I love with all my heart." Rose resisted the urge to ring Wesley then and there, rage beginning to set in. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing, but warning would have been nice. "No one should have to live in fear." The crowd applauded as Rose's teeth ground together. "In fear of madmen who have no regard for who they injure. In fear of the Devil of Hell's Kitchen, who has inflicted untold pain and suffering. This masked terrorist and psychopaths of his kind... we must show them we will not bow down to their campaign of coercion and intimidation. We must stand up to them. As this man, my dearest friend, Leland Owlsley, a pillar in the financial community, stood up when he was recently assaulted."