Tony Mierro is sitting on Damien's sofa holding a clump of human hair.
He is sitting on the sofa holding a clump of human hair.
Vik's hand against my back makes me jump out of my own skin.
"Jones, get in here," Damien orders.
Tony glares at me, hand squeezing around - that.
"Hi," I say.
Damien looks at my outfit - denim overalls, flowery shirt, muddy doc martin boots - and lets his lip turn down. It's not like I usually dress up for him, just jeans and a t-shirt, but I do try and dress down the crazy every Friday.
Not that this outfit is particularly out there, but okay, noted: Damien doesn't like the unusual outfits.
"Is she-"
"You don't talk," Damien grunts, pointing at Tony, who opens his mouth. "Ever."
Vik stands next to me like a bodyguard, arms crossed over his chest and everything. I lean into him as Damien and Tony begin quietly arguing with each other.
"What's with the hair?" I whisper.
"I have no idea," he answers just as quietly, accent as thick as ever.
Well. That makes it worse.
"So," Damien says, looking at each of us individually. Only the four of us are in the room. There are no young boys, no scared staff, not even a remnant or scuff mark on the neatly polished floor. "We have a problem."
"It isn't a-" Tony begins.
"Ever."
Tony's eyes blow wide. He goes red in the face, and even as I expect him to explode, he remains relatively calm. He doesn't shout back or argue, at least.
That's how I know it's bad.
"It's a problem because I say it's a problem," Damien grits. "The dead man who isn't dead is a problem. Should we try and work out why he's still breathing?"
Tony says nothing.
"And where have you been?"
My heart stops. He's looking at me. They're all looking at me.
Round, beady eyes.
"Me?"
Damien rolls his tongue over his teeth without opening his mouth. It looks like a snake behind his lips, pressed together so tightly so that it doesn't escape. I swallow my nerves. This is Damien. Scary, big bad wolf, Damien - who thinks I'm funny and likes having me around. Nothing to worry about. Definitely not.
"You. Where were you?"
"The... farmers... market?"
He doesn't look amused today, though.
"Don't make me ask a third time."
This time I don't swallow my nerves; I just swallow.
"I was-"
"Does this matter?" Tony asks abruptly.
The electricity in the room wraps around my throat. All air left must whoosh out under the door door, because suddenly, my breath is gone.
All I can do is watch as Damien pulls out that ever familiar gun and aims it at his brothers chest.
I can taste the metal in my mouth all over again. It floods my senses like water.
I can smell my own fear from that night in the air, and I realise, once again, that I don't know Damien Mierro at all. That he's completely unpredictable, completely untrustworthy, and doesn't give a fuck about anyone - not even his own brother.
All he is is a pissed off man with a gun.
"It matters to me," he sneers.
Tony blinks up at him.
"I was at the allotment. With friends," I answer quickly.
"Which friends?"
"Maddie, Matt and Noah."
"Laurier?"
He's still pointing the gun at Tony despite looking at me.
"Yes," I answer quietly.
And then I can breathe. His attention is once again off me and onto Tony. The gun disappears and the room fills with oxygen once more. Noah's name seems to relax him.
I make a mental note to ask Noah the true specifics of what happened between him and Damien Mierro, and to thank him for possibly saving my life.
If only Madelaine knew about all of this.
Damien paces.
Scratches the back of his neck.
"So what's the plan now?"
"What plan?" Tony forces out. They both share that trait - the angry speaking-through-gritted-teeth thing. Happens a lot when they share a room.
"James Hartley," Damien practically growls. "He's awake. He's remembering small details about his life. Pretty soon, I think he's going to remember being lured into an abandoned building and being beaten to within an inch of his life. I think he'll remember the guy who dug out his own grave, won't he? Wouldn't you?" Silence. "So. Smart boy. What's your fucking plan?"
"Your girlfriend is my plan."
"What?" Damien, Vik and I echo each other.
"You were with me all night, weren't you, princess?"
Not once.
Not one single time did he ever call me that.
Not in Fiction, not before or after we made out, not in the text messages, not in the few phone calls we shared. The word doesn't even sound right in his stupid rough boy London accent.
If Damien see's the bobbing of my throat he doesn't comment on it.
"Yes," I say. "I was with you all night."
Tony's grin is feral.
Nobody ever called me princess. Not until Kaiden decided it was the perfect nickname to piss me off.
•─────⋅☾ ☽⋅─────•
The street is desolate.
I don't expect him to be there. I don't even know why I'm walking that way.
Vik almost lost a tooth when I told him I'd be walking home. That he should drive around the block and pretend. He won't lie to Damien, I know that, but I at least have to check.
It's been hours. He's definitely not there anymore.
And I know Damien will call or message to ask why I walked. It's a fifteen minute drive to my house from here - God knows how long the walk would take me, especially in these shoes. They're heavy.
He's gone, and I have to walk home alone, freezing, in these stupid clunky shoes.
A strong breeze lifts a bit of the fog.
Kaiden's car is exactly where it was three and a half hours ago.
My relief isn't even measurable.
I strain my neck checking that there isn't a Range Rover in sight before I speed over to the car and hear the doors unlock. The handle is freezing cold, almost frosty. The windows have fogged up a bit.
Kaiden is half lying in the drivers seat with a book in hand. Something about music.
"You waited?" I ask. My voice sounds a little shaky.
"Didn't I tell you I would?"
"I didn't take you for a man of his word."
"Evidently. You just walked down the street in a t-shirt thinking I'd gone home."
I take a deep breath as I sink into the seat.
He wants to ask what happened, I can feel it. I can feel his eyes on the ruddy red of my cheeks, on the puffiness of my skin, on the wrinkles I'm sure I gained in that last hour.
But he doesn't ask, and I'm grateful.
Instead he starts the car and drives far, far away from the Mierro house.
I don't even realise when we're going at first, but then we turn onto the familiar fancy ultra-rich street. His house. His big, bare walled mansion with the thousand entry passwords and the dying aloe vera.
"Your house feels cold."
"We're not even inside yet," he scoffs.
The door to the garage opens. We pull inside.
"Maybe it matches your cold personality," I mumble.
His eyes flare but he holds his tongue.
I follow him into the house - which is as bachelor pad empty as it was the last time I was here - and collapse onto the sofa, wishing that he'd leave a throw or blanket lying around somewhere. Not even one decorative pillow, seriously?
"Hey, the aloe has been drying up!"
"Are we going to talk about Damien at all?"
"I don't know, are you going to buy a painting any time soon?"
He shakes his head, forehead creases appearing.
"What?"
"Bleh," I moan.
"Do you realise that you were on the verge of suicide about four hours ago, and now you're just- fine. What the fuck happened?"
My fingers interlace at my lap. I squeeze.
"I don't want to talk about it."
This very obviously pains him.
"Just the highlights?"
"It wasn't a football match," I huff.
He folds his arms across his chest.
"Do I look like the kind of guy who watches football?"
"You look like the kind of guy who has enough money to decorate." My words are mumbled, but he still licks his teeth under his lips and narrows his eyes.
"Chelsea."
"Kaiden."
He throws his arms into the air before storming off in the direction of the kitchen. It feels a bit like winning, though I'm not sure either of us were necessarily serious.
In fact, considering a week or two ago we couldn't go five minutes without breaking into an argument, this is definitely good progress.
"You're going to tell me."
There goes the progress.
"Excuse me?"
"You go into his fucking mansion for three hours," that's rich, the emphasis on mansion, considering the couch I'm sitting on right now probably costs more than two months of my salary, but alright. I let that one slide. "Say nothing about what happened, what he said, what's up with the whole Hartley situation - and now you're in a weirdly positive mood. Is that it, princess? Did he officially name you his heir?"
"His heir to what, cocaine?" I retort. My feet are up on the couch, posture still relaxed. This argument stuff is run of the mill.
"Maybe you'll inherit the twins," he shrugs.
"And what would little old plain me do with two burly men like that, huh?"
His eyes flash.
"Stand up." His voice is deeper.
"No," I say.
His throat bobs as he swallows. His eyes look black as coal.
"You scared?" He coos.
Something changes in my body. The way his shoulders are squared off, the way he's slowly gotten closer to me, towering over my small frame curled on the sofa, the way this argument has felt different from all the others - like something between us has changed.
I don't hate him. Not at all.
He's annoying and arrogant and completely impossible to work with, yes. But the way he's looking at me right now...
My legs close.
I'm worried he'll sense this change in me, that he'll laugh when he realises this angry facade he's forcing out right now is actually turning me on.
"No," I croak. It's been at least a minute since I spoke.
Fucking hell. Should I have seen this coming?
It's been a long time since I've spent alone time with a man. Maybe a small, tiny, inconsequential crush forming was inevitable.
"You look scared."
"You look tall."
Great. Good one, Chelsea.
His eyebrow raises, but he doesn't comment.
"You look like you're trying to disappear into my couch."
"You look..."
"What?" He mocks, head tilting.
Hot, right now, actually.
And despite doing my best not to think about it, I find the only thought in my brain to stop thinking about this very small, seriously minuscule sexual attraction, is the only thing I haven't been able to wrap my head around all afternoon.
"I think Tony knows about us. Us Meeting! Us - being around each other."
That towering composure drops (which means he was definitely doing it on purpose. I'll read into that later.) He deflates before my very eyes.
"Tony was there?"
"Yes," I sigh. "Holding... It doesn't matter. He called me princess."
Kaiden drops onto the couch next to me.
"He called you princess?"
"Yes, and - I don't know. It felt like it was a dig at you."
"He doesn't know me."
"Well, he's never called me that before."
He goes silent.
Huh.
At least I killed the one sided sexual chemistry.
"Maybe he just... fancies you."
"Tony hates me," I mumble. "He avoids me at all costs. He tried to lunge for me a few weeks ago."
"He seemed to like you enough when he asked you out?"
"Yes, and then his brother metaphorically pissed all over me like a dog."
"Thank you for the imagery." His face is back to the careful neutral that it usually is. His voice is normal again. I miss the angry dark tones, the black eyes. I wish I hadn't brought up the Mierro's at all.
Pull yourself together.
Positive thoughts, positive affirmations.
"How would he have even heard me call you that? It's not like I do it all the time."
"You weren't there. It was meant as a threat, I just know it." That smirk he had. Of course it was a threat. An I know something you don't know threat. He's only keeping it to himself for blackmail; and, oh goody, what a thing to look forward to. "You believe me, right?"
"Of course I do," he says. "I'm just hoping you're wrong."
"Me too."
A comfortable silence stretches between us. It's probably getting late. The sun has been set for quite a while, and I've not been home all day. Cecelia is probably having a wedding meltdown right about now, and I'm sure our mother has probably blown up my phone.
But then, out of nowhere, "Are you hungry?"
"What?"
"I'm going to order something. Chinese, maybe? Thai?"
"Thai," I say.
Kaiden stands up and goes to order Thai food.
I curl back into the sofa and rest my head on one of the arms, looking at the unused fireplace and the newly potted aloe vera above it, slowly coming back to life.
I guess Cecilia can wait.