She’s there. Manny, too. Scanning left and right, I don’t see Christiano. If he’s inside, he’s in the bathroom and will be out in a minute. I’d rather go in knowing what I’m up against than be surprised. “Hang on a sec,” I say, over my shoulder to Tommy.
“Take your time,” he mumbles, his voice tense.
13
Tommy
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
________
Standing back as Brendan peers through the crisscrossed iron, I’m watching her count the money and all I can see is her flying through it to grab my gun from my hand, disarm me with a surprise attack. I glance over to my BMW, but it’s parked too far up the street. And now that I think about it, I don’t have a gun anymore. Begrudgingly I admit to myself that it’s probably a good thing I don’t.
“Hang on a sec,” Brendan says, as he stares at her.
The voice hissing in my mind says to walk away. I knew when I was sitting at Knockout that I shouldn’t come, and the anger and hatred pulsing through me right now is proof I should have listened. But it’s too late. I’m here now.
There’s a Mexican guy sitting in there with her. Obviously works there. He’s drumming on the counter and that bitch is laughing and talking about something we can’t hear. She looks over to the guy and her eyes fall to the window and she freezes. For a second, I think she recognizes me, but then I realize she’s looking at Brendan, and I’m just being paranoid. But my heart stopped for a second and my instincts to fight went into overdrive. I’m seeing red, watching her smile.
If I was going to walk away, that chance is gone. I’m not going anywhere. I’m seeing this through. My morbid curiosity has me in its clutches. There’s no turning back.
14
Annie
Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing??????
________
“Oh my God,” I gasp under my breath. “I can’t believe it!”
“What?” Manny turns in his chair to see why I’ve gone white. He sees Brendan and flips back around, surprised, but happy. “We told you he’d come.”
I glance to him, then back to Brendan who gives a little wave, just like he did that first night. My whole body flips over in my skin and I drop the money in the register and close the drawer. “Manny, you can go.”
He grins. “Lock the door this time.”
“Funny. Ha ha.” I say, dryly, but inside I’m jumping for joy as I walk out from behind the counter and motion to Brendan to meet me at the front door. He nods, but his eyes are guarded, expression unreadable. Why is he here? I see a shadow move behind him and look closer to see a grown up Tommy walking with him. Confusion sets in. So he’s still friends with Tommy. I didn’t know. Well, I’m sure, like with Mark, I’ve misjudged this friend, too. I unlock the deadbolt in a hurry, and swing the door open, my eyes wide. “Hi.”
Brendan’s standing in front of me and if angel wings sprouted out of his back, I wouldn’t be surprised, that’s how good he looks. I do my best to act normal.
“Hey,” he says, scanning my face like he’s memorizing it.
“Hey.”
Manny scoots by with a nod, trying not to look too happy for me as he reminds me to lock the door. Tommy’s glaring at me, which gives me a jolt to my system. The way he’s looking at me makes the tiny hairs on my body stand up. I give him a small smile and quickly write off his expression as a guy who’s just looking out for his buddy. They obviously talked about what I did. That’s clear.
“Tommy, hi. Good to see you after all these years.” His eyes glitter and he nods, jaw tight. “Come in. I was just counting the register. You guys want a drink or something?” When I look at Brendan, his face has changed; the pleased look is gone. He’s still angry. I can see it in his eyes. I glance from one to the other, excitement replaced by nervousness.
Why are they here?
He brushes past me and our arms touch. The feeling is agony, but I steel myself against it. The fact is I don’t know what they want or what is going to happen. I have a feeling I’m about to get yelled at. Publicly humiliated in front of his friend. Maybe that’s just my past-self clawing at my subconscious, but the fear is growing as I watch them walk to bar stools, mount them like cowboys, and not say a word. If they were cowboys, they’d be the bad guys, wearing black hats.
Get ahold of yourself, Annie. Ride this out.
15
Brendan
If Christiano is still in the bathroom, I’m going to challenge him to a duel.
________
My arm brushes hers as I pass. The sting of need to touch her again fires into me, but it’s eclipsed by the anger that’s back in full force. Anger at her lie. Anger at meeting her ex. Anger at not being able to hate him. Anger at wanting her so badly, despite all of it.
Anger at being put in this position and not knowing how to break out of it.
Mark said to fight for her. How the fuck am I supposed to do that?
She walks behind the bar, chewing her lip. “Can I get you something?” Her voice is shaky.
I glance to Tommy, if only to stop staring at her. “Lagavulin?” He nods, his eyes hard. I can’t remember the last time he said something. As soon as she turns her back to get the bottle, I cut my eyes to him to tell him to cut it out. He glares from her to me and when he sees my expression, he struggles and shifts his body on the stool, trying to relax. I’ve seen loyalty, but this is fucking ridiculous. It’s not like she cheated on me. I’m the one that ended it and while I would have liked it to have not been THE NEXT DAY she got back together with her ex, I can’t blame anyone but myself.
Tommy’s shoulder shifts as he cracks his neck.
She flashes a tenuous smile to me as she pours into three glasses. “I need one for myself,” she laughs, the sound strained and nervous.
“How’ve you been?” I mutter, feeling lame.
She glances my way, and stops pouring. “Okay. You?”
“Great,” I lie. “Really great.” She nods and starts pouring again, her eyes locked on the glass for focus. This is nuts. What are we doing?
She glances to both of us, lays the bottle on the counter, and hands Tommy a glass. He drinks without waiting for a toast. She and I both follow his lead, looking at each other awkwardly. Suddenly, I wish he wasn’t here. I want to talk about everything. I need to–
“What do you think of the patio?” she asks, flicking her eyes to it as she shifts her weight on her feet. Tommy and I both look.
“It’s good,” Tommy manages, which draws Annie’s smile his way.
“Yeah? Thank you, Tommy. Brendan, it was your idea, do you like how it turned out?”
I nod, relieved to have something neutral to focus on. “It looks great. Really great. I brought these for you.” I put the plans on the counter in between us, and slide them over. “I guess you don’t need them anymore, though.”
“That’s okay,” she offers, quickly. “I can keep them as a souvenir.”
I smile, loving that she said that; that we think alike. I stare, transfixed, aching for her as she pulls a lock of hair behind her ear and smiles up at me from underneath her eyelashes. Fuck. It’s like she glows.
Tommy and I both watch as she walks out from behind the bar, saying, “I’m sorry. I forgot to lock the door. Hang on.” She smiles apologetically, and jogs over. “It’s not like he’d come back a second time, but…better to be safe than sorry.”
Tommy leans his elbows on the counter, brings his glass to his lips and downs it. He holds the glass in both hands, his fingers tight. I glance over to him, surprised that he sucked that down so fast. It was a five-finger pour. The corners of my eyes tighten as I take in his face. He looks like he’s about to fight. Being a man, I know the look all too well. He’s got that look. I scan his body and it’s tight. If he were a rattlesnake, we’d hear the warning rattle.
Annie senses something, too. She’s walking back to us from the door, but she’s moving carefully glancing from him to me. We exchange a look.
> “Tommy? You alright?” I ask, slowly.
Annie watches him put the glass down, and freezes, staring at his hand, her face turning white as her mouth falls open. “It was you!”
16
Annie
My Job: fill empty glasses.
Habit: to look at said empty glasses
Heart: exploded into shattering bits as I look and see the ring.
________
I’m frozen, no more than three feet away from him. My eyes fly up to meet his, which are now tiny slits of evil.
With an eerily calm, low voice, he asks, “What’s me, Annie?” He’s poised and ready to pounce.
Brendan’s on the seat next to him, which is essentially behind Tommy from where I’m standing. “Annie, what’s wrong?”
My eyes flit to the register to where I’ve left my phone. I lick my lips, not moving.
Tommy sees me looking and knows exactly what I’m thinking.
I make a break for my phone to call 911, yelling, “Brendan, grab him! He’s the gunman!” but Tommy lunges for me and grabs me in a chokehold, turning to face us to Brendan who’s stunned and didn’t have time to react. Brendan jumps off the chair, his arms out in front of him as he squares off, ready to fight. “Tommy! Let her go!”
“It’s him,” I gasp to Brendan, my voice cracking under the pressure of his grip. “It’s him!”
“Fuck! This wasn’t how this was supposed to go! I knew I shouldn’t have come here! FUCK!” Tommy yells, filled with rage. We know that sound well. His yelling sounds exactly like the gunman. “Brendan, back off or I’ll break her fucking neck!”
Brendan’s eyes cut from Tommy to me and he steps back. He’s got the same look he had the night of the shooting, when he was so angry he couldn’t get the money out of the register for me and keep me safe. “No fucking way! How is it you?” Brendan spits, his anger taking root with nowhere to go.
I feel the choke tighten, my air channel leaving me. I know now is the time. I’m about to die. He will kill me. There’s no doubting it. If I don’t wake up, I will die. It’s time to stop being the victim.
I bring my elbow hard into Tommy’s ribs. He yells out, and tightens the choke. But I’ve freed my arm enough to flash it back in another hard elbow-strike. In the split second of his reaction, I make a claw with my fingers, shoot my arm in the air, twist my body, and pluck down hard at his grip, snapping his arm down by using all of my weight as I push into him to use his own force to throw him off balance. He’s pulling at me. He expects me to pull back. So when I fall into him, he falls backward. I duck my body and jump out of what’s left of his grip, planting myself in front of him in my fight stance
“What the fuck!” he growls.
With my hands up like I’m scared, like I don’t want to fight, I cry out, “Please don’t hurt me!”
He’s thrown off long enough for me to slice up his middle with a groin-kick, the Krav Maga Handshake. He yelps and doubles over in pain. I hammer-fist the back of his head and he crumbles to the ground as Brendan rushes forward and start railing on Tommy, punching him until he’s unconscious.
We’re both panting, staring at Tommy’s bloodied face and Brendan asks, his chest heaving, “How did you know?”
“His ring!” I gasp. Brendan looks at Tommy’s hand, confused. “Didn’t I tell you the gunman had a silver bull ring?”
“No, you didn’t. I can’t believe I didn’t see it.” Brendan looks at me, still in shock. He pulls me to him and crushes me against his chest. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry, Annie.”
“It was all my fault! I shouldn’t have lied to you!”
He pulls back and searches my eyes, his hand pushing my hair back to make sure my neck isn’t bruised. “Fuck, he bruised you. I’m going to fucking kill him!” He releases me and kicks Tommy in the gut. I grab Brendan and yank him back as hard as I can. It’s like trying to stop a train that’s gone off its tracks. He shakes me off and keeps kicking the unconscious body.
Not knowing what else to do, I scream, as loud and shrill and terrified as someone in a horror movie. Brendan freezes and looks at me, dazed and wild-eyed. “He deserves to die!” he mumbles. “He tried to kill us!”
I run in front of him. “Stop! You can’t kill him! I know you want to. I know what he did. But you can’t! I can’t lose you again! You’d go to jail. Do you hear me? You’d go to jail forever!”
Brendan blinks, his sanity fighting to return. He gasps and takes me into his arms as I whisper, “I can’t lose you again. I just can’t!”
His voice is strained and guttural. “You won’t. I’m not going anywhere. I love you, Annie! I love you so much.”
I sob into his chest, “I love you, too! I’ve always loved you, Brendan!”
A groan from the floor pulls our attention and we look to see Tommy trying to open his puffy, bloody eyes.
“Call the police. I’ll watch him,” Brendan urges me, yanking his phone from his pocket and handing it to me.
I dial quickly. “I’m glad he bruised me. It’s proof it was self-defense. And they have the blood DNA from that night to prove it was him.”
“Good,” Brendan says, staring at what used to be his friend.
“911, what’s your emergency?”
17
Brendan
Me: stunned.
Annie: shaking.
Tommy: in handcuffs, moaning as he’s carted off.
________
We give an abbreviated statement and agree to come down for an in-depth one in the morning. I hold Annie, my arm protectively around her little super-hero body as she and I watch them leave. She leans her head on me, her arms wrapped around her chest, her shaking body falling quiet as I stroke her arm. As soon as we’re alone, we face each other. I’m staring into her eyes, stroking her cheek. “You are amazing, Annie. You knocked him off you.”
She smiles under tired eyes. “It was nothin’.”
I chuckle. “Uh-huh. Nothin’ short of incredible.”
“Then we make a good team,” she offers, her eyebrows twisting up in a cute way.
I smile, but it fades away quickly. “Look.”
“Yes?”
“I know Christiano’s a good guy, and he said he loves you,” Her eyes round slightly, and she opens her mouth to speak, but I barrel through, “but I don’t think he’s the one for you. I think I am. I think I’m the one for you.”
She gives a few confused blinks as her pretty face melts into a smile. “I think you are, too. You really think that, Brendan?”
With my heart on the outside of my chest, I nod. “I do. And if you need time to find out, that’s fine. But you have to leave him. It’s got to be just us.” I take her face in my hands and my voice deepens. “I love you. I haven’t been able to sleep, to laugh, to do anything worth anything. Without you, I don’t want to live. I need you. I’m sorry for reacting the way I did. And when I saw you tonight, before we found out about Tommy, I knew there was no way I was going to let you go. I knew it! You have to leave him.”
She’s smiling up at me. “That’s a pretty easy thing to say yes to, because he’s back in Italy. I told him I love you and couldn’t be with him.”
“What?! He didn’t stay?”
She shakes her head. “No. How did you know he was here?”
“Wait, let me get this right. When did he leave San Francisco?”
“He only stayed one night.”
“He hasn’t been here with you these past weeks?”
She looks at me like she wishes I’d known that, that I hadn’t been tortured, and shakes her head again. “No. And you should know, we didn’t... do anything.”
A tidal wave of relief hits me. I laugh! Grabbing her, I kiss her hard. She responds to my kiss, sliding her hands up the back of my neck to pull me closer as she stands on her tiptoes.
She tastes exactly like happiness.
18
Annie
Six Months Later.
Reading: Fire Nectar 2 o
n the couch in the penthouse.
Wearing: red bra. red panties. red garter belt. beige fishnets. red stilettos.
________
The sound of the key turning in the lock pulls up my head and I look to the hallway, waiting to see my boyfriend get home from work. Brendan walks in, holding his jacket. He takes one look at me and freezes. “Whoa. What do we have here?”
I throw a leg straight in the air and point my toe. “I’m going to church.”
He laughs and tosses his jacket on the ground. I toss my Kindle to the side and he’s on me in no time flat. I squeal as he pins me down on the rug. “Now that I’m taking Krav, too, you can’t fight.”
“I could try! I just don’t want to!” I laugh as he tickles me. “Stop it! Oh my God! Stop!”
His eyes go hungry with need. I gasp as he pins my arms and lunges for my neck. He doesn’t know I was just reading a vampire story and this is exactly what I want right now; a good neck gnawing. I moan as he takes my tender skin between his teeth and chews on me, giving me a sensual massage with his mouth. My hips rise up with desire. He maneuvers my legs easily so I can slip them around him as he grinds into me, licking my neck and breathing heat onto my skin.
He moves my panties to the side to slip one of his thick fingers deep inside me. I moan and crane up, crushing my chest into him. He lies on top of me as he fingers me, taking my mouth in his as our tongues lash about. “I can’t get close enough to you,” he groans, unzipping his pants and pulling his engorged cock out.
“I know! Hurry!”
Brendan’s dark blue eyes lock on mine as he pulls my panties over more, snaps my garter belt, and plunges himself into my pussy, yelling out as he goes in as deep as he can. I cry out and fight against him for the fun of it. He growls and pins me down harder, ripping into me again and again. His pulsing lights up every nerve ending. We rock our hips faster and faster until he pulls at my hands and freezes, taking control so he can slow down and drive me to insanity. I pant, waiting, aching so badly that my heartbeat is throbbing deep in the walls of my pussy. He stares into my eyes, fierce and possessive, and thrusts into me slowly, so slowly I want to scream for him to go faster. He knows I want it harder. He knows I can’t take this. He wants me to beg. “You don’t like it slow?” His eyes challenge me.
Hearts Series Bundle: Books 1-6 Page 44
