JUSTIN POV
I sat on the private plane that was currently grounded in Boston due to weather and checked my watch for what felt like the millionth time since I woke up.
"I thought the purpose of having our own plane was so that we didn't have to abide by regulations," I muttered to my father in the seat next to me.
"I can't control the weather, son," he replied without lifting his head from his paper. "I've tried though."
"Very funny. Can't you just tell them to go?" I sat back in my chair with a frustrated sigh.
"No, I can't. I want to actually make it back home alive."
"Fine."
I looked outside. The rain was pouring down in buckets. I didn't understand why we couldn't just go up in the air, but the pilot said something about freezing water or some nonsense like that. I didn't really care.
It was currently early Sunday morning, only two days since we left Chicago and luckily, we could get back home early. Or that was the plan at least. On the plane with me were Jeremy, Keegan, Finn, Jaxon, and a whole slew of bodyguards that were always hanging around nowadays. I think my father wanted to start moving them out into the open because things were starting to get dangerous. We could all feel it.
The whole reason that we were in Boston in the first place was to oversee a large arms shipment that was supposed to be delivered to England. Even though Jeremy had hundreds of men working for him, he always made sure that we were there to monitor big jobs. He said that people's fingers got sticky when no one was watching. The shipment went out a day early, leaving us time to get back to Chicago without any problems.
I checked my watch again and noticed that it was seven in Boston, which meant it was six in Chicago. Maddie would be getting up soon for church. I desperately wanted to call her, but I refrained. I would see her soon anyway... if this plane ever got off the fucking ground.
"This is ridiculous." I crossed my arms like a petulant child.
"Shut up and stop whining," Finn groaned across from me, keeping his eyes shut.
"No, I want to go home. I'm pretty sure I could fly this thing." I made a move to get up, but Jeremy pushed me back down.
"You're not going anywhere. We'll move when we can, Justin. What is with you?" He took off his glasses like he was concerned.
"I don't know." I combed a hand through my hair. I had this weird feeling that had been growing ever since I left Maddie. It got stronger as the hours passed; I couldn't explain it.
Benny was supposedly keeping a close eye on her. I still ordered him to stay back, because I knew Maddie wasn't comfortable with the idea of bodyguards yet. Their job was to make sure that she didn't get into anything she wasn't supposed to. I didn't want them poking around in her life or tapping her phone records, and other things like that because I didn't want to cross a line. If she wanted to have a night out with friends, then she was allowed to. Obviously; I couldn't make Maddie do anything if I tried. The OCD in me wanted to control everything about her life down to the second, but that was far from possible with Maddie. As much as I hated to give her space when I felt possible threats near, I understood. But Benny would be watching.
I wasn't her warden, so I tried to keep out of her normal life. She needed some kind of regularity without me breathing down her neck. That's why I didn't do background checks on her school mates or anything intrusive. As long as no one harmed her physically, then I was alright. Benny literally sat outside of Maddie's dorm at night to watch the place.
After I realized that Robert could get access to Maddie by being a sneaky bastard and using her roommates to bring things up, I made Benny track anything he thought was suspicious. The only problem was that there was no possible way to know who Brown had been in contact with. Anyone of those people could have access to Maddie to do his bidding. It frustrated me to the point of near exhaustion that there were so many holes in the dorm's security. It was pathetic. I was tempted to just install a surveillance camera in front of her door. I was still working on how to keep her safe without going overboard.
My main idea right now was to just have her move in with me, but that brought a whole new slew of issues that didn't have anything to do with safety. Those problems were mine.
I had never lived with anyone before-with the exception of my family-and I didn't know how I would feel if she moved in. Were we even ready to move into together? It was a big step, and we had only known each other for a couple of months. These insecurities had been plaguing my brain for a while and only reminded me that I was a feeble human, prone to the downfall of emotions. She was my weakness, and I had admitted that, but I was still trying to convince myself that we were normal. Normal couples moved into together. Normal couples worked out problems together. What made Maddie and me so different?
I was learning to walk the line between giving Maddie freedom and being overprotective. I knew that if I implied a set of rules like I wanted to with her, she was going to hate me for it. My life would be so much easier if she had a curfew and kept Benny at her side at all hours and called me every five minutes and told me who she was meeting...
I sounded more like her father and I didn't want that, so I kept my distance.
I checked my watch again and sighed as it struck seven-thirty. Maddie wouldn't be up for another hour or so in Chicago.
The trip to Boston was a lot worse than when I traveled to Russia. I missed Maddie more this time, and it felt like I wasn't really myself without seeing her. I hated to acknowledge that, because it looked like Finn and Keegan were doing fine.
So what was wrong with me?
I felt guilty for not calling, but when you spend forty-eight hours straight in a gun hangar, you kind of forget what day it is. I made up for it though by playing Maddie the piece I had composed.
Even I was slightly shocked when my fingers started to move on the keys a couple of weeks ago. It had been a long time since I played something original and whenever I was home alone, I kept going over this same melody. So I had to write it down. The melody grew into a full-blown song a couple of days ago, and I knew Maddie would love it. I couldn't wait to play it for her live so that I could see her face.
But once again, that would only be when this plane moved its ass.
"So, what's the problem exactly?" I asked rather annoyingly, but I didn't care.
"Okay, you know what? Just because you're in a pissy mood doesn't mean that the rest of us have to suffer," Keegan said, getting angry. "It's raining outside, Justin, and it's cold so the water freezes. Meaning that it's dangerous. I know you understand the laws of science. It's really simple so shut up and sit back because we're not going anywhere." Once he was finished with his rant, he covered himself up with a thick blanket.
"You're such a raging bitch in the mornings," Finn laughed from next to him.
Keegan swung his arm like a sledgehammer and struck Finn dead in the jaw. His neck snapped back, and I could smell the blood from inside Finn's mouth.
"See what you've done?" My father groaned at me. "You've created a war."
"That wasn't me." I shrugged.
Finn was pissed and shoved Keegan hard, but it didn't do much damage. "What the hell, dude?"
"You both need to shut up." Keegan covered himself more with the blanket so that he could sleep.
"Keegan, go in the bedroom." My father pushed him out of the chair.
"I was here first. I don't want to." Keegan got up and cursed like a sailor as he dragged his feet towards the back.
"It's like no one has class anymore." Jeremy went back to his paper.
"Son of a bitch." Finn spit out some blood into a cup. "I'll be right back." He got up and followed Keegan's path.
There was a lot of noise and rumbling from the bedroom, but no one paid any attention to it. Keegan was shouting; Finn was shouting. I heard walls being punched-blah, blah, blah. I just wanted to go home.
I laughed at how childish my morning was.
By the time we were finally able to get off of the ground, it was eight-thirty here, so I knew Maddie was just heading out of the door for church.
The pilot instructed us to turn off our phones, which I felt was unnecessary. I had yet to be convinced that it actually made my flight safer, but I did it for good measure. We took off easily, and even though it was still raining, we were making progress.
Because the weather was so bad, it would take us longer to get back home than usual, but I tried to stay productive.
I sat in a corner of the plane and took out my composition book that I had written some of my pieces in, including Maddie's. I had to hide my revived obsession because if Jeremy knew that I was writing again, he would demand that I play and my brothers would just hound me. I spent the first hour going over and making small corrections to Maddie's piece. I wanted it to be perfect. When that was done, I started a new one that I promised myself would be done by Christmas. I would probably make my mother's year if I wrote her something. It had been years since she'd heard me play. It proved to be extremely difficult since I didn't have a piano and after another hour, I gave up. I could only string together a small melody-pedestrian at best-since I wasn't at Beethoven level and couldn't hear the perfect pitches in my head.
Jaxon came to join me with a deck of cards, wanting me to teach him how to play poker. Finn and Keegan jumped at the opportunity to corrupt the kid even further, and we spent the rest of the trip with our heads bent in card games. I ended up winning about two thousand dollars, so it was a pretty good haul.
By the time the pilot instructed us to get back in our seat belts, I was more than ready to go home. I had never in my life wanted to just return to my penthouse as much as I did now.
"See, it's clear over here." Finn stared out of the window at the nice, but cold, Chicago air as we prepared to land. He looked pretty banged up with an eye that was about to bruise, a fat lip, and a swollen cheek. Keegan didn't look that much better.
"I'm hungry." Jaxon leaned over his seat to check out of the window.
"You're always hungry." Keegan shook his head. "We should get him into football."
"He's not in school," I pointed out.
"So, we could start a league. Better yet, how about rugby?"
"I don't like the sound of that." Jeremy shook his head. "And you know your mother will have a fit."
"Too bad. I already have the idea in my head and Thanksgiving is coming up-we could have a tournament," Keegan shouted. There was a general consensus from the army of bodyguards behind him.
I rolled my eyes at the prospect of Thanksgiving this year. It was always a massive event with family and lots of food of course, but I still didn't know how Maddie and my mother came up with the idea of having the whole thing at my house. I needed to hear that story since I was still attempting to change their minds. There was no way I was letting everyone in my space with their grubby hands and nasty mouths.
I shuddered at the thought.
The plane landed a couple minutes later. We unbuckled and grabbed our stuff before exiting.
Like it was second nature to us, we all turned on our phones. Mine vibrated non-stop in my hand as it came back alive with text messages, calls and e-mails. I would sift through them all later, but I was more focused on seeing if I had anything from Maddie than anything else.
My eyebrows rose when I saw that they were all from my mother. Everyone else had the same look as I did, and our phones didn't stop vibrating as they retrieved all the missed calls.
Jeremy was the first to put his phone to his ear as we waited for our luggage to be unloaded from the cargo bay of the plane.
"What the hell is all of this?" Keegan asked while our father talked to someone, who I assumed to be Pattie.
"I don't know but something must have happened." Finn shrugged.
"She always worries like this when we don't call," I rationalized, hoping that it was nothing more.
"Yeah, but this is a little overboard." Keegan held up his phone. "How am I supposed to delete all of these?"
"Hit the fucking delete button," Jaxon said like it was obvious. That earned him a slap on the back of the head from Jeremy, who was only barely paying attention to us.
"Ha." Keegan laughed. "That's what you get."
Jaxon nursed the spot at the base of his neck, grumbling. I waited with honed ears, trying to hear what was going on, but I couldn't make anything out over the roar of the plane's engine.
A couple seconds later, Jeremy slammed his phone shut with a hard look on his face. "We need to go."
"Why? What happened?" I asked as we all sped up to follow him towards the cars.
"We just need to get home. There's been an accident." He got in the back of a giant black SUV.
I was the last one in and shut the door with a thud. "What do you mean an accident? Is Ma hurt or something?"
"No," he answered simply.
"I don't like the sound of this." Finn shook his head.
My father didn't say anything else the whole way to the house. We knew not to ask, because he wasn't going to give up information. His face didn't move from its set position and for some reason, I became slightly agitated.
I never got scared anymore, but something about this situation told me that it wasn't going to end well, whatever it was.
We all stayed completely silent, with sharp glances between us, as the seconds slowly turned into minutes.
Pattie was waiting on the front step of the house as the caravan of cars pulled into the driveway. Her arms were crossed, and she looked more solemn than I had seen her in years.
We were out of the car before it even stopped.
"What the hell is going on?" Keegan spouted off at her, almost angry.
"Who was it?" I asked, already knowing the answer.
Her eyes shifted to mine and then down to her feet.
I ripped the front door open and took the stairs three at a time as I charged through the house. I didn't really know what happened, but I swore to God, if Maddie was hurt...
I raced up to the third floor and barged through the door of my room, not caring if I busted the thing off of its hinges.
Maddie was sitting on my bed with a thermometer stuck in her mouth and Olivia and Bridget next to her. A doctor rustled around in his bag while he waited on the thermometer to register Maddie's temperature.
"What the fuck happened?" I asked, out of breath and trying to take in the situation.
"Nothing," Maddie muttered through her thermometer. "Happy to see you too."
She was pale, sickly pale. There was absolutely no color in her face at all. Everyone was dressed in their church clothes. Bridget and Olivia were holding Maddie's hands like she was on her deathbed.
I went to kneel in front of her, pushing the doctor out of the way. "Don't lie to me, Maddie. It looks like you saw a ghost. What the hell happened?"
"Ms. Fell just ingested some unhealthy toxins," the doctor answered.
"What the hell does that mean?" I took the thermometer out of Maddie's moth and checked it. She was running a little high, but it was nothing serious.
I suddenly got very frantic and jittery because no one was talking. I could sense everyone else come in behind me, but I didn't care.
"Will someone please say something?" I almost shouted. "Why do you look like that?"
Maddie held my face in her hands. "Calm down. You'll give yourself a heart attack."
"You need to take these, Miss." The doctor reached over me to hand Maddie a couple of white pills.
"Not right now," she replied, not looking away from me.
"Why is he giving you pills?"
"Did you send me flowers this morning?" Maddie asked, ignoring my question completely.
"No. I sent them yesterday," I said firmly.
"Are you sure you didn't send any?" Bridget asked me in a wishful voice. "If you did, then you need to say something."
"No," I snarled, annoyed by these redundant questions. "Why?"
It was Olivia who gave it away. Out of the corner of my eye I saw her head shift to the left. I took my face from Maddie's hands and followed Olivia's gaze to the windowsill where a pot of small, purple flowers were sitting. They were bell-shaped, and even from here, I could see the tiny thorns on them.
I got off of the floor and went to the window.
There were a lot of protests, but I ignored them until Pattie pulled me away from the flowers.
"You can't touch them, Justin," she said worriedly.
"Why? What are they?"
"They're a flower known as monkshood; well to be honest, they're an herb, but even in small doses, they can be poisonous," the doctor replied.
Things snapped together in my mind in an instant.
Maddie actually looked scared and didn't meet my gaze, taking back her pills from the doctor instead.
"Who sent you those?" I spoke with an eerie calm that was reminiscent of Jeremy; it was even frightening me.
"I don't know." Maddie shrugged.
I went back to the bed and pushed Bridget out of the way so I could sit next to Maddie. "Let me see your eyes," I commanded.
"The doctor already checked me." She raised her head.
I wasn't a physician, but I knew the indications of poison. Maddie's eyes weren't red. That was a good sign. Once toxins hit the eyes, it was over.
"Open your mouth," I said, and she did. There weren't any white spots on her tongue.
"Thankfully, Miss Fell had the foresight to wash her hands. But since she did have some exposure to the plant, she had a bit of a reaction." The doctor tried patting my shoulder, but I thrust him off.
I was so pissed that I couldn't even think properly.
"What the hell is going on?" Keegan sighed. "Now we're getting deadly flowers?"
"Olivia got some too, but she didn't touch them." Maddie pulled away from me.
"I wasn't even home; I was staying at Finn's, but they were there when I went to drop my stuff off," Olivia said.
"What happened?" I asked Maddie. It was like it was only the two of us in the room. I could give a fuck about everyone else, so they didn't even register in my brain.
"Well, you sent me some flowers the night before... and those were waiting for me when I was heading out of the door for church this morning, so I assumed they were from you as well. I... I don't know who sent them, but I called Pattie when I read what they were online. The problem was that I had already touched them."
"She just had a small reaction," Pattie said from behind me.
"After she woke up-" Bridget began.
"Woke up?" I interrupted.
"Oh, I had a small fainting-thing, but the doctor said that was from the plants," Maddie said quickly.
I looked down to Maddie's left hand. It had a bunch of small red splotches on it that looked like a minor rash.
I was so furious that I couldn't talk. I had to get out, or I was going to blow something up.
I got off the bed and patted myself down for cigarettes. I didn't find any, so I made a move for the door.
"Where are you going?" Maddie jumped up and ran in front of me. "Justin, look at me. You can't go starting a war over me."
I realized that my body was shaking when the earth kind of looked like it was vibrating underneath me.
"You're turning purple again," she said. "Just calm down."
"Someone tried to kill you," I muttered through painfully clenched teeth.
"They weren't trying to kill me."
"Bullshit." I ripped myself from her grasp. "Someone sent you poisonous flowers."
"Okay, let's all just think rationally," Jeremy said, stepping in.
"I don't want to think rationally!" I shouted. "Someone tried to poison her!"
Did no one else understand that?
"Doctor, if you please." Keegan nearly pushed the stunned man out of the door, locking it behind him when he left.
"We don't know who sent them at all?" Jaxon picked up a letter that was near the flowers.
I had a lot of things going through my head right now, but they were irrationally based thoughts. That being said, I didn't need anyone to tell me how to handle this.
Without saying a word, I unlocked the door and stomped out of the room. I heard soft feet from behind me, but I was in no mood to talk to Maddie. I might say something I would regret later.
"Justin, where are you going?" She asked when I reached the bottom step.
I stopped without turning around. "To handle this."
"What does that mean?" I felt her hand on my back.
"I... I don't know."
"Just sit here and cool off. You're going to get hurt if you do something rash."
I turned around and felt my face crinkle in disbelief. "Are you serious? You were almost poisoned and you don't feel the least bit angry?"
"No. Well, yes, but what am I going to do about it?"
My anger subsided for a second as I looked at the ghostliness of Maddie's skin. She had always been sort of pale but nothing like this. It was as if she had no blood in her body at all.
"Nothing." I ran my hand through my hair. "That's my job." I left her standing on the stairs and rushed towards the garage.
I took the Saleen because, let's be honest; there was no faster car in my arsenal.
I didn't know what everyone else was planning on doing about all of this, but that didn't matter. Maddie, my Maddie, was harmed. I didn't know by whom, and I wasn't thinking straight enough to go through the possibilities at the moment. I only knew of a couple of people who were capable of this. But first, before I started pointing fingers, I had to get some answers.
I screeched to a halt in front of Maddie's dorm so fast that the wheels sounded like an eagle's cry, and I saw black rubber marks behind the car when I got out and slammed the door.
I made my way into the building and threw a couple hundreds at the guy sitting there. He was protesting like a little bitch and followed me into the lobby.
"Dude, you can't go up there," the guy said. He was new and didn't know me, but I wasn't planning on entertaining his stupid remarks.
"Just take the money and let me be," I warned him.
"You look really pissed. Are you going to kill someone?"
"Yes." I got in the elevator and the doors thankfully closed on his ugly face.
I rode up to Maddie's floor, and my senses began to tingle from the prospect of the hunt. I was going to get my answers, even if I had to do this myself. Someone would be punished for hurting Maddie.
There was a more logical part of my brain that cursed me for being this way. I didn't even kiss Maddie goodbye, nor did I let myself receive a welcome home kiss, for that matter. I was so angry that everything else was blocked out and when I got like this, it was hard to turn myself off. There was something in my head that was screaming at me to breathe and take things slow because I could get in a lot of trouble for some of the things I was planning. But my dominant side, the scary side, was stronger.
The doors opened, and I walked with a purpose towards Maddie's room. I didn't have a key, but I didn't need one since I wasn't planning on going in just yet. If I had my way, I would lock everyone in this building and interrogate them until I got some answers.
There were two things troubling me here.
First, someone easily got into not only this room, but Olivia's as well, to deliver the plants. Olivia lived in a regular apartment with no security, but Maddie at least had someone watching the front, right? Which was bullshit because if I could deliver flowers, then so could anyone else.
The person who sent them knew about my flower messages, meaning that we were being watched. Someone had been keeping tabs on me, and I wasn't having it.
The first door I knocked on was Janice's. She was the only person who had delivered something to Maddie, so I went with her.
I kept banging on the door until someone answered. A scrawny guy in boxers finally came to the door, wiping his eyes. "What do you want?" he asked sleepily.
I shoved myself into the room. "Janice, wake up," I shouted, pushing some books off of her desk for noise.
"Hey, who the hell do you think you are?" the guy demanded, getting in my face.
I easily tossed him in the chair next to me without a word.
Janice rolled over, and I was thankful that I didn't have to throw her any clothes.
"Who are you?" she asked without lifting her head from the pillow.
"Did you put any flowers in front of Maddie's door this morning?"
"What?"
I repeated my question slowly like I was talking to a child, but her answer was still the same.
"I have no idea what you're talking about." Janice sat up drowsily. "I didn't give her anything else after that CD."
"Are you sure? Did you see anyone suspicious this morning, drop anything off? Did you hear anything?" I stressed.
"No, no, and no. Go away." She lay back down. "No one gives Maddie anything but you."
That was the second problem. Someone knew about my gifts and was turning them into a sick game. They intentionally sent Maddie something that would harm her under the guise of a nonthreatening present.
"If you think of anything, you call me." I wrote my number on a piece of paper. "Maddie won't be staying here anymore," I said as I walked out of the door.
"Why? Where is she going?" Janice shot up in bed.
"None of your business; just make sure no one is dropping by her room." I slammed the door behind me and got back in the elevator.
I was in the Saleen a couple of minutes later. The roar of the engine seemed to mirror the anger that was still flowing out of my body. I sat there in my rumbling car for a minute while I thought. There were two options of who sent those flowers. Well, I guess there were more, but my mind had only a couple faces at the forefront.
First, was one of the Antis'. Felix, in particular, or maybe Kennedy. They were both insane enough to try something so devious, so underhanded, and so deadly. I wouldn't put it past Aro to put them up to it but for some reason, I didn't want to believe that it was them. It just didn't feel right. They would have made a bigger scene and would have left a definite calling card. They liked their evilness known.
I pulled into traffic and didn't bother following laws as I made a hard right towards the police department.
It was illogical to even consider that Robert Brown was involved in any of this. He was a cop, for Christ's sake, but I was more than willing to put everything on the line and accuse him. It had his handwriting all over it. In many ways, he was like me; sneaky, smart, a challenger. He knew what he was doing, and if I were to take a guess, I would say that Brown sent those flowers, knowing that they were poisonous, just to get a rise out of me. Well, he was going to get the reaction he wanted.
I was gripping the steering wheel so hard that my hands were throbbing slightly in pain. My pulse was pounding in my ears. I hadn't been this mad in a long time, and I didn't see it getting better any time soon.
The back of my car lifted off of the ground as I stomped on the brakes in the parking lot near the police department. I didn't feel like dealing with the security of the place, so I stayed in the lot across the street.
I slammed the door shut and started off at a brisk pace towards the doors but someone grabbed my elbow, stopping me.
Finn spun me around. "Justin, what are you thinking?"
"What the hell are you doing here?" I ripped my arm from his grasp.
"I came to bring you back home. Maddie is very upset right now, and she doesn't want you to get into trouble."
"Well, that's not my problem. Go home."
"Not without you."
"Why are you so calm about all of this?" I pulled at my hair. "Someone tried to poison them. You should be going out of your mind."
"That's why Dad doesn't let you take over anything. You run on too many emotions. You have to think, Justin. What do you plan on doing?"
"Something," I answered stupidly, leaving him outside as I went to open the glass door of the building.
The main, downtown office was huge. The department employed over thirteen thousand officers for the city of Chicago, and most of them were located right here in this building. The Organized Crime Division was on the sixth floor, and I was on a mission. I was planning to blast though the building until I got to Brown.
But first, I had to go through security.
"Name?" the guard in front of a metal detector asked gruffly.
"Justin Bieber," I said, pulling out my ID and not caring if they knew me or not.
The guard, of course, gave me a skeptical look as he took my ID and reviewed it.
"Do you have a problem?" I was getting impatient.
"Who are you here to see?"
"The commissioner," I lied. "Do you want me to call him?"
He eyed me up and down before ushering me through the metal detector. I left my gun in the car because if I had brought it, I would have used it.
I dealt with a few more stupid questions before the guard finally let me go, and I stepped into an empty elevator. Just as the doors began to close, Finn dashed in and hit the sixth floor button.
"I'm just as pissed as you are," he said.
I didn't reply.
"Maybe it's not as bad because Olivia didn't get hurt, but I'm sorry about Maddie. She's really worried about you."
"Why are you here?" I asked without turning to him.
"I figured it was only a matter of time before you showed up to take on Brown."
"So you're making sure I don't do anything stupid?"
"I'm here because Maddie asked me to come."
"And?"
"And... because I want some answers."
A small grin creased my lips. "I guess some of us aren't as holy as they appear to be."
"Just because I don't make big dramatic scenes, doesn't mean I'm not upset."
I didn't really have time to say anything else because the elevator doors opened, and I was back in hunting mode.
Since it was Sunday, the rooms were almost vacant; only ten officers were around. They were sitting on their asses, watching a football game.
I made my way through the maze of emptied desks and down a window-filled hallway where the offices of higher up deputies lined both sides. Finn was traipsing behind me easily as we went to the last door on the right.
I didn't even bother knocking.
Brown was leaning back in his chair, his feet propped up the desk with a pen in his mouth. He was typing something on the computer. I thought about throwing the damn thing out the window; he was going to listen to me.
I decided to get right into it and slammed my hands on his desk. "You son of a bitch. What the hell did you do?"
He didn't move but raised an eyebrow. "And to what do I owe the pleasure?"
"You sent Maddie those flowers, didn't you?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about." He leaned back further. "Am I supposed to know what that means?"
"Don't play games with me, Brown. I understand that we're never going to like each other, but you put Maddie in danger."
The left side of his lips lifted in a small smirk. "I take it someone tried to hurt her."
I didn't even realize what I was doing as my arm reached over the desk, and I hit Brown dead in the mouth with my fist. He spun around, so that his feet fell, but he shook off the blow.
Finn was there to pull me back. "Justin, what the fuck is wrong with you?"
"If you ever come near her again, I'll put your lights out." I shrugged Finn off and straightened myself out.
"Is that a threat, Mr. Bieber?" Brown stood up and wiped a drop of blood from his lip.
"Yes," I answered.
"Boss, what the hell?" A bunch of guys ran into the room, not noticing me, and surveyed the damage. It consisted of a toppled-over chair, a bunch of papers on the floor and a bleeding officer.
"Nothing, I just had a run in with an old friend."
I was suddenly the most interesting thing in the room and before I knew it, I had three guns staring me in the face.
"Come to turn yourself in, Bieber?" a fat deputy wheezed.
"Don't flatter yourself. I wanted to straighten some things out." I'd calmed down but my main focus was on Brown, even though there were pistols honed in on my head.
"I could have you arrested for assaulting a police officer." Brown stuffed his hands in his pockets smugly and walked around the desk. "But what would that do? You'd be out in two minutes tops."
"Put me in jail if you want; I don't give a fuck. But if you come within five steps of Maddie ever again, I won't hesitate to kill you. You had no right to get her involved in all of this."
"I had every right the first time you spotted her across some bar and decided to take her home." Brown finally grew some balls and started shouting. "How long do you think she's going to stick around, Justin?"
"As long as I keep her safe from scum like you." I moved forward. "Don't even think about looking into her life. I will have people watching you."
"Her father is a fucking cop," he laughed. "She has boundaries."
"First of all, I would appreciate it if you ordered your trash to get their guns off of me and second, I don't care what you think; Maddie isn't going anywhere."
"I've never seen you act like this before. What's changed?"
"Nothing. I'm still the same badass you met all those years ago who put a bullet through Flick's leg. You remember that? When you fucked up and put your men in danger."
"That wasn't my fault," he growled.
"The judge said it was. I bet you took a big hit over here among the big wigs," I snickered.
"That was years ago. The fact of the matter is you put her in a dangerous situation, and now you're blaming me. I've never touched the girl."
"You wouldn't have to touch her if you're sending her cryptic flowers and fucking CDs through her roommates."
"Not my problem. I have no idea what you're talking about with flowers, and she had the right to know about what you do. Were you ever going to tell her?"
"I was getting around to it. That wasn't your job." I pointed at him accusingly and was seriously about to blow my lid in a minute if he didn't shut up.
"You need to learn that you're not invincible, and you've put an innocent girl in danger because of who you are."
"Justin, let's go." Finn started to pull me out of the door.
"I'll keep a look out for any danger," Brown joked with me.
"Oh, fuck you!" I was fighting to get back to him, but Finn had a tight hold and dragged me out of the room, slamming me against the opposite wall.
"Justin, calm the fuck down. He could have had us both arrested," he whispered. "You could have gotten yourself in big trouble."
"Yeah. And where were you the whole time I was handing him his ass? You could have said something." I pushed him off of me.
"Sometimes, you can learn a lot more by just shutting up." He held up a folded piece of paper in my face. I made a grab for it, but he stuffed it in his pocket.
"What's that?"
"I'll tell you when we're out of here. I bet the commissioner is on his way down, and he'll ask questions." Finn pushed me down the hall towards the elevators.
We left the building, and I still had enough energy to want another fight. Finn had to drag me past the security guard we had encountered coming in because I was going to tell him off for just looking at me funny. We headed toward Finn's Mercedes. I plucked a cigarette out of my pocket and lit it just as we reached his car.
I nodded to the paper he had in his hands. "What's that?" I let out a long puff of smoke that I had been holding in to calm my nerves.
"I think they're tracking Aro." He handed me the paper, which was a phone transcript between Aro and Demetri. It was a bunch of stuff that didn't make any sense, but you never know; it could be important.
"Why the hell do I care about this?"
"We have to cut ties with the Anthis'."
I rolled my eyes in annoyance, "Great, so now we know that they have all of us on their radar. That's so helpful."
"I mean it, Justin. We have to tell Dad that they aren't worth it. You have to bring it up to him. We can't be in business with them."
"This has nothing to do with Maddie or the situation that just went on in there."
"It does if you think about the fact that Robert is trying to take us all down like a totem pole."
I calmed down for a second to think about what my logical brother was saying.
The totem pole was a scam used in the crime world since the beginning of time. It boiled down to one family, working with the police to destroy another. The main tactic was to take out the weakest link from all angles; in this case, Maddie. The Anthis' were working with that piece of shit Brown to hurt our family. Little by little, Maddie would be scared into giving up information. She would be threatened and now that I looked at the situation from the outside, it all made perfect sense.
"Son of a fucking bitch." I kicked one of Finn's tires.
"You have to warn her."
"I'm going to handle it." I stubbed my cigarette out on the pavement and sulked off towards my car, almost ripping the door off.
I pulled out my phone to text Maddie.
Where are you?-J
I waited for her reply, which came twenty seconds later.
At your place. Where are you?-M
Don't leave.-J
I backed out of the parking space and sped off towards my penthouse.
So much had happened today that I couldn't really even remember back to when I woke up this morning. I was still mad as hell, but I realized that I needed to calm down so that I could talk with Maddie about all of this. Her safety was my main concern, and it was about to drive me insane.
To be perfectly honest, Robert was completely right. I put Maddie in this situation, but I had already come to terms with that fact. Now that she was here, she wasn't leaving, and I was going to make sure that she stayed protected.
I pulled into my parking garage and got out of the car, nearly running towards the elevators and anxiously waiting to jump inside. One finally arrived, and I tapped my foot as I went up. I held the "door closed" button so no one would disrupt my travel.
Maddie was going to raise all hell when I implemented these new rules I was thinking about, but she had no choice in the matter. I was going to do anything I had to in order to keep her danger-free. If that meant locking her up, then so be it.
The elevator doors opened. I strode across the foyer and slid my key in the door.
"Maddie, are you in here?" I shouted through the house.
I heard feet running down the stairs. She was dressed like she was sleeping. There was a little color back in her face, so I was relieved that she seemed better. "I hope you didn't do anything stupid."
"No, I just stopped off at the police department." I said casually as I went into the kitchen.
She followed me. "Why the hell would you do that?"
"Because I was getting to the bottom of things."
I was stunned at the amount of food that was spread out on the counter and stove. There were pastas, cookies, a whole chicken and what looked like a pot roast.
I looked at Maddie skeptically. "Was my mother over?"
"No, I cook when I'm nervous. I made all that stuff at her house and brought it over." She hung her head.
I sighed, realizing how much of a dick I had been. I didn't mean to ever take my anger out on her back at the house, and to be honest, I don't really remember what happened after I found out all this shit.
I didn't really know what to say to make up for it.
"You could start by giving me a kiss." Maddie walked up to me where I was resting against the counter. "I've missed you and all I wanted was a kiss, but you ran out of the door so fast..."
I swallowed her words with my lips, meshing our bodies together and pressing her into me with as much force as I could without hurting her.
My tongue had a mind of its own as it swept the inside of her mouth. Her hands took hold in my hair. I had forgotten how incredible this was, and it seemed that my anger had subsided temporarily while Maddie's taste invaded my mouth.
The wet noises of kissing filled my ears for upwards of ten minutes and my lungs were screaming for air, but I wasn't moving.
All too soon, it seemed that Maddie had had enough and pulled back.
"That's all I wanted." She breathed a laugh. "Are you hungry?"
"Very," I answered.
She fixed me a plate of God-knows-what, but it all looked incredibly amazing. I sat down at the table that I had used only once before to eat while Maddie played with some ice in her glass across from me.
"How was Boston?" she asked.
"Fine. Everything's good. How are you feeling?"
"Okay. I have to take some pills for a week, but it's nothing permanent."
"I still can't believe someone did that," I sighed, taking a bite of chicken.
"Did you find out who it was?"
"I have a sneaking suspicion but of course, I didn't get anything concrete."
"Did you think you would?"
"No."
"Then why did you run out of there like that? She answered her own question before I could. "You just wanted to start a fight."
"I was pissed, okay? I had some things to get off of my chest, and I didn't want them to come out to you."
"That's what I'm here for, Justin. I want you to talk to me so that you don't go running off and causing trouble."
"Well, I'm sorry, but I just can't sit back while someone tries to kill you."
"I understand that but-"
"No, you don't understand it, Maddie," I stressed. "Things are about to get very dirty, and I'm trying to keep you safe. It would be much appreciated if you would cooperate."
"What are you going to do? Lock me up?"
I shrugged. "Yeah, I guess. And Benny's going to be closer, and I want you to call me every hour."
"Are you serious?"
"Oh. And you're not staying in your dorm anymore. You're staying here."
"Yes, sir." She saluted. "By the way, I'm pretty sure this falls under kidnapping." She pushed herself up from the table. "Are you going to ban me from classes too?"
"We'll see," I answered in all truthfulness. "If it comes to that."
"This is unbelievable. I can't sit at home all day just because you're scared."
"I'm not scared, but you have to see the danger you're in."
"Of course I do. I can't even walk out of my dorm without feeling Benny behind me, but I'm not going to stop living my life."
"So you want me to worry at all hours of the day?"
"No, that's my father's problem." Maddie huffed. "I don't want to stay here all the time."
"It doesn't really matter what you want. We can go get your stuff tomorrow."
"Go to hell, Justin." She stomped up the stairs like a child.
I guess that might classify as our first fight.
The rest of the day, Maddie didn't say one word to me, and I was too stubborn to fall first. She had to see that I was trying to protect her and I got that I was going a little overboard, but she just better be glad that I hadn't installed a tracking chip in her tooth or something crazy like that.
We avoided each other like the plague and couldn't even sit in the same room together without it being heavy with tension. Whenever I tried to explain something to her, she would shut me down and complain that I was being stupid or over controlling. I didn't even bother trying to reason with her because it was pointless. The one thing that she did need to realize was that her safety was my main concern.
By the time the sun set, Maddie was in full bitch mode and trashing my apartment... on purpose.
I had to follow behind her with a broom as she chomped loudly on chips, spilling the crumbs everywhere. I was insanely pissed. Whenever I asked her to stop-well, more like shouted at her-she would just look at me and continue, saying, "It's going to get a lot worse if I stay here all the time".
Maddie pulled a blanket out of my bedroom when it was time for bed. "I'm sleeping on the couch."
"I don't care." I turned off the lights downstairs and left her to do whatever. This wasn't what I had in mind for my homecoming but if she wanted to act like I child, then I was going to treat her like one.
I climbed into bed that night, still pissed, but acting like I didn't care.
I tossed and turned for about five hours. It was like I used to sleep, with my eyes shut, but my brain going crazy. I couldn't sleep so I gave up after a while.
I was going to keep her safe, even if she didn't like the plans I implemented. I wasn't letting her dictate things anymore because it was obvious that her way wasn't keeping her out of danger.
Maddie was just going to have to accept the changes that were coming her way.
Maybe I should call Jeremy and see how he managed things so well...
By four in the morning, I was fed up with all of this and trudged downstairs where Maddie was messily taking up one of the sectionals in my family room.
I quickly picked her up and grabbed her blanket.
"Let me go," she mumbled.
"No, you're staying with me."
"I don't want to stay with you. I hate you." I maneuvered through the furniture. Even in her sleep she fought me.
"You don't. You're just mad at me."
"Same thing. Let me go back to my sofa." Maddie began to struggle in my arms, but I held her tightly.
"We're going to bed." I climbed back up the stairs towards my room, and she stopped fighting me, snuggling into my chest
I made it to my room and laid Maddie on the bed in her normal spot. When I climbed over her to settle into my space, I saw that she was wide-awake and scowling.
"What?" I asked innocently.
"I hate you," she repeated.
"You could never hate me," I replied with a chuckle.
"This isn't funny, Justin."
"I just don't see why you can't understand where I'm coming from."
"Because you think that your way is the only way." She propped herself up on her elbow. "You could have asked me if I wanted to be kidnapped."
"And you would have fought me on it, so I just skipped over that part."
"You're such a dick." She lay back down and rolled away from me.
I sighed and mimicked her movements so that I was flush against her body. "Maddie, you have to agree with me that things are very dangerous and you're in no way equipped to handle them." I moved her shirt over and kissed the sliver of her shoulder that was now revealed to me.
"I do agree, but you can't lock me up. I have a life, you know."
"Just let me do what I do best. I'm not trying to keep you locked up. Well, I am, but it's for good reason." I slid my hand under her shirt and then brushed it over the skin of her hips, molding myself closer to her.
I heard her gulp. "I can't call you every hour. I have better things to do than check in so much, and Benny can't actually sit with me in class."
"Yes, he can. That's what I pay him for." I moved her hair and kissed the exposed part of her neck.
She was still trying to fight me but tilted back so that I could have more access. "I need to have some space."
"I gave it to you and that obviously didn't work. So we're doing things my way now." I let my intentions known as I pressed my now hard cock into the soft flesh of her ass.
"Justin, we need to talk about this. Stop trying to sex me up," she breathed softly.
"Then talk. I'm listening." I kissed behind her ear and let my hand roam over her stomach. I continued down until I was under her panties, stroking her most intimate area with gentle touches.
Needless to say, we didn't get much talking done that night.