The day at work proved long. An emergency cesarean kept Dr. Cahill in surgery all morning, so I managed her caseload as well as my own. At five o’clock, I headed home for some cuddle time with Alpie, hoping she’d ease my fears.
She snuggled onto my shoulder and shushed me, rubbing her feathered cheek along mine.
“What would I do without you?” I asked.
Alpie fluttered her wings before hopping onto the back of a kitchen chair to preen. “Love-oo.”
I smiled, tears in my eyes, as I caressed her head feathers. “I love you, too, darling girl. Noelle’s taught you right.”
“No-elle. Love-oo,” Alpie called before clicking her tongue against the roof of her beak. “Ca-shoo. Ca-shoo.”
I laughed. I tossed a handful of nuts into Alpie’s cage, ensured she had water and that the latch was locked. Now, an hour later, I’d changed into jeans and a pretty knit top but was too nervous to consider going to the show. I pulled out the ticket and fingered the edge.
No way I’d get to see Murphy, and if I did, what would I say?
As if they were able to read my mind, Noelle texted me right then to let me know she and Maura were already at the Tractor Tavern. The selfie showed them, cheeks pressed together, with margaritas out front. I stared at the picture for many minutes, debating with myself. I should go. I didn’t have to see Murphy. I could hang back, leave as soon as it ended. Better yet, I’d walk out right after he sang “She’s so Bad,” leaving him and his anger where it belonged—in the past.
My chest was tight as I exited my house and into the Uber I’d called. I desperately wanted to see him, be in the same room as him. Hear his voice sing those lyrics—throw my words back at me. Then, finally, then I’d get the closure I needed and more on.
I could do this—I needed to do this. The driver dropped me off out front and I walked slowly toward the entrance. Once again, I thought I heard someone call my name.
I turned, and this time I saw him. About five foot ten, with well-styled salt-and-pepper hair. A large nose and a slight pot belly. Typical middle-aged Westerner. His spectacles made it impossible to see his eyes, but they were brown, a few shades darker than my own. I shoved my way through the door, panic building in my chest. I stumbled up to the table where Noelle and Maura were laughing.
“The band just took the stage so you’re just in time! This is going to be so much fun . . . What’s wrong?” Noelle asked, eyes darting from my face to the swelling crowd.
“Jordan,” I panted.
The people around us quieted and a man’s voice came over the microphone. Aussie accent, baritone. Hayden.
“He’s here?” Maura asked. She narrowed her eyes as she stood on the rungs of her bar chair. “That no-good piece of shit. Where?”
“Outside.” My teeth started to chatter. “I can’t stay here. He’ll know I came to see Murphy. He’ll try to hurt him.” The words stopped, and I sobbed into the napkin Maura handed me.
“What’s done is done,” she said, her voice practical. “He knows you’re here.”
A thick, heavy hand dropped on my shoulder. I wasn’t quite able to stifle the scream as he spun me around to face him.
“Mila, darling. It’s been too long.”
His blunt fingers wrapped around my wrist, and he tugged me toward him. This time, I screamed long and loud, clawing at his fingers, the fright of him being there, touching me, overpowered everything else.
Pandemonium erupted around me, and I didn’t care. I needed Jordan’s fingers off my skin. Away from me.
Maura and Noelle jumped forward just as a man from the next table also stepped in and yanked Jordan off. I ducked out from under Jordan’s arm and darted left, my chest heaving.
“Mila?”
My gaze slammed into Murphy’s. His blue-gray eyes widened, his mouth dropping open in shock. I couldn’t move. Murphy was so close. Anger seeped into his eyes. His lashes lowered, and then the arse the world saw was back, his face and shoulders stiff.
“You’re not getting away again,” Jordan growled, into my ear.
I’d forgotten him. So focused on Murphy, his disgust turning palpable, I’d forgotten to run. Defeat weighted on my back. But then Jordan’s fingers were at my throat, arching my neck back. My eyes pleaded Murphy to understand. This was why I left, but I still love you. I’ll always love you.
Someone pulled on Jordan, and I screamed as his fingernails raked across my skin. Murphy’s eyes widened, taking in my struggle, the man behind me—the man who broke us. Somehow I read his lips, heard his voice even over the tumult around us.
“Mila.” Just my name, but it was more than I could handle.
I ran.
My arm was up, and I flung open the door of the closest cab. “Pike Place Market,” I panted. No choice but to get back to my house, get out the suitcase. Tears blurred my vision.
I pulled up my Uber app and set a pickup in the Pike Place Market. Crowded, lots of black cars coming and going. Best chance of losing Jordan was there.
I scuttled from the cab to the new ride, glancing over my shoulder each time. My text app chimed as I slammed the door shut. Noelle.
Are you okay?
I’m in an Uber car. Going back to my place.
No!
I can’t be near Jordan. You saw—he won’t stop. He wouldn’t. Not until I submitted or he killed me. Maybe both. The hurt in Murphy’s eyes. No. I wouldn’t think about that. He could hate me all he wanted, but he wouldn’t break me. Jordan already tried. Almost succeeded.
Noelle responded. Head over to my place. I’ll meet you there.
No, don’t worry about me. I’ll go home. Lock all my doors.
My phone rang. “Hello?”
Loud voices slammed against my eardrums and I winced. “You will not go home by yourself,” Noelle yelled into the phone. She mustn’t realize how loud she was. The volume behind her was insane. “Go back to my condo. I have security at the door. I’ve already called Arnold. He’s expecting you. I’ll be there shortly. One more thing I have to do.”
“Noelle—I can’t. I can’t let Jordan near me again. I can’t get Murphy more involved in this.”
“Considering he kept calling your name, even after security mobbed Jordan, I’d say he’s already involved.”
4
Murphy
Shock still reverberated through me, even all these hours later. Mila. At the venue. The fear in her eyes. Her soul-wrenching scream as that man—the man who’d slipped from six fucking security members—touched her.
That last fleeting peep she’d thrown at me. So much sadness, the pleading with me to understand . . . what? What in bloody hell was I supposed to understand?
I didn’t know, which was why I was edgy, angry, and way too keyed up to sleep.
I wasn’t surprised when Jake knocked on my door not much past dawn and not long after I returned from staking out Mila’s house. “Here to tell me how bad I blew my cues?” I grumbled.
“Considering how much seeing Mila again, seeing her mauled by that arsewipe bothered you, I’d say you did a pretty damn good job.”
“Ben tell you anything? He hadn’t found her when I spoke with him earlier.”
Jake shook his head. “Just what you know—she lives here. In Federal Way, according to her mortgage.”
“She wasn’t there.” I sighed as I collapsed into one of the suite’s chairs. My fingers tunneled through my hair and I pressed the heels of my hands to my gritty eyes. “I waited for hours but she never showed up. What the hell do we pay Ben so much money for?”
“To protect your sorry arse,” Jake said, settling into the chair across from me. “How are you? Really.”
I met his worried gaze. “Knackered. She was so scared, Jake. I can’t . . . what if that bloke hurt her? He’s out there still.”
Jake folded his hands over his stomach. “I talked to one of Mila’s friends, Noelle Markham, while you were trying to find Mila. Noelle said the bloke—Jordan Jones—is Mila’
s step-uncle. And that he’s been stalking her for years.”
The weight on my chest pressed down even harder. “You think that’s true?” I gasped.
“No reason for her to lie.”
“But that means . . .”
“Before you broke up. Why you broke up. That’s what Noelle said.”
He raised his brow. Of course he thought of the lyrics That sweet smile hid an ice-cold heart. You tried to pull me down, to destroy me from the start. After I promised you forever, you cut our time short to be with him—the man of your past. I ain’t never gonna forget you, sweetheart, nor your tears of glass. From our affair, I got a great story to sell, and it’s the only thing from you I’ll ever tell.
“You read the news?” He dropped his iPad into my hand and headed into the suite’s dining area where a coffee pot was set up in the corner. The pot rumbled to life.
“What news?”
“You don’t have some sheila here, do you?” He waited for my negation before continuing. “Okay, good. Read it.”
I bit back the angry retort and did as he asked. “States Mila was attacked last night at the Tractor Tavern. Nothing we didn’t already know.”
“Confirms the arsewipe is, indeed, Jordan Jones, stepbrother to one Rosemary Jones. Mila’s mum.”
Pouring a steaming cuppa, I slammed it back, shuddering as the liquid burned the roof of my mouth and all down my throat. “The hell, Jake?” I set the iPad down on the table and met his gaze. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“To find this lady. Noelle.”
“Why should we do that?”
“Because . . .” Hell if I knew why.
“You can’t break down the woman’s door, demanding answers. Anyway, you and I have a plane home to Sydney to catch.”
“Then why bother me with this?” I asked.
“You said Mila left her mum’s house before you first started dating, right? She didn’t ever want to go there, even when she was between places to stay.”
I nodded. I refilled my coffee cup and sipped more cautiously. My mouth hurt, but I needed the caffeine. The awareness of why Jake was bringing this up was slow to dawn, but when it did, all the breath left my lungs and nausea rooted deep in my stomach. “Bloody hell. Mila left the house because this stalker, her step-uncle, used to live with her.”
Jake pulled up the article again. He pointed at the artist’s rendering of the man next to an old snapshot, which was next to a grainy photo taken last night. Mila’s back bowed away from Jordan, her fingernails gouged into his hand where it was clamped around her neck. She was in profile, but even the small amount of her face showed soul-deep fear.
“Seems like this might be the man who threatened our mum—what was it, the message he’d left? He keeps what’s his?”
I paused, thinking back to that night. A large man, masked, armed with a bush knife, strode up to my mum on the street out front of her house during her evening walk with her dog, Shimzie. He’d told her next time he came back, it wouldn’t be to leave a message. Shimzie barked his head off enough for neighbors to step outside, concerned about the racket. When the bloke stepped forward to stuff a paper in Mum’s hand, good ole Shimzie bit his ankle with those tiny Pekinese teeth. The message was direct but odd. I keep what’s mine.
Jake, the police, and I had puzzled over those words. If he planned to steal from my mum, how could he claim the items were his? He didn’t take anything, and Mum was firm in her stance not to make a bigger fuss out of the situation. But now . . . what if the bloke meant Mila? Chewing my lip, I considered the news story.
“I can’t go home,” I said. The need to protect Mila shocked me even as it overpowered my good sense and the reasons I shouldn’t care—mainly that she’d dumped me. “I have to go see this Noelle woman. Find Mila. Talk to her.”
A deep furrow built between Jake’s eyebrows. “You think seeing her is a good idea?”
No. Seeing Mila again was a terrible idea. I wasn’t ready for it—would never be ready.
She broke my bloody heart. Then, when I found out she was preggo with some other man’s baby, she shredded it so small, I still didn’t have all the pieces. I shrugged.
“You planning to be your typical charming self? How much further do you plan to blacken your image and that of the band, Ets?”
“She’ll deserve anything I say. And I don’t have to explain myself to you,” I said, shoving him out of the way as I headed toward the bedroom. A quick shower and then I was off to find answers.
Fifteen minutes later, I was dressed. I shoved my wallet into my back pocket and headed back to the living room. Stopping short, I gaped at the sight of my mum.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
She rose from the couch, her gray curls bouncing around her face. Her cheeks were the same soft pink as usual, but her eyes were red-rimmed, and her mouth pinched tight.
“Nice to see you, too, son. Lovely greeting.”
I wrapped my arm around her shoulders, pulling her into a tight hug. “I’m chuffed to see you. Course I am. But . . . you hate to fly.”
She’d never come to any of our concerts because of it. The fear was deep, instilled in her as a teen when she’d hit turbulence over the Pacific Ocean coming back from her one trip abroad to Japan. No matter how much Jake and I coaxed her, we never got her near an airport again.
She swallowed hard against my shoulder, clutching me with her fingertips. “It was awful. Worse than I imagined. But I had to tell you in person what I know.”
I settled her onto the cushion next to me on the couch and took her shaking hand in mine. “You’re scaring me, Mum.”
She brushed her hair back off her forehead, her pale blue eyes settling on my face. “I’m sorry, Murphy. What I did at the time, I did as Mila asked me.”
I stiffened, yanking my hand from her grip. My stomach spun, dipped, all the while aching with the knowledge I wouldn’t like what came next. “What . . .” No other words came.
“I knew there was more to Mila’s leaving than you told me!” Jake crowed.
“Doesn’t matter if there is,” I snapped. I narrowed my eyes and willed the words to be true. “I’m totally over her.”
Jake raised his brow again, calling me on my shit. He’d known, more than Hayden, how much Mila meant to me, and he’d been the one to suggest I go talk to her in Perth—for my sanity. I hadn’t, and Jake dealt with the fallout from my misery this past year.
“So no worries that I’ve set up to have drinks with her later tonight then. Ben found her and we talked. Be good to catch up.”
Both my hands were in his shirt as I shoved him against the wall. “You don’t touch her. Ever.”
Jake shoved me back, his boot catching on the edge of the fancy carpet, causing him to stumble.
I stalked away, trying to ignore the growl building in my throat. Jake couldn’t put his hands on her curves. Her soft white breasts with those luscious pink nipples. The slight curve of her belly. The firm give of her bum.
“Stay away from her,” I snarled.
“You can’t have it both ways, mate. You walk around like an angry, wounded bear and, all the while, collect more women than a sheik has in a harem.” I saw Mum flinch at those words. Can’t say I’ve been winning any son-of-the-year awards with my shoddy behavior.
“One of the perks of being famous,” I gritted out, my jaw locked down solid. I was seconds away from swinging at my brother. Bad as the shit got with the band these last few months, I’d never come to blows with Jake. He meant too much to me. But now, my ears filled with a loud, vicious ring. The same sound I’d fought off when Hayden came back from his jaunt to Seattle a few months ago so bummed out and lovesick over a piece of arse—who turned out to be the love of his life. Yeah, no wonder Briar was wary of me, and Hayden considered me the excrement on his shoe. I’d tried hard to destroy their relationship from the get-go.
Stupid of me to foist my issues with Mila onto Hayden’s relatio
nship with Briar. Stupid and wrong.
Jake shook his head, eyes filled with disgust but also sorrow. “This is your chance to fix it. Forgive Mila for her mistake and let the past go. Especially if she left because of a stalker. That’s serious. And mental.”
“Mila didn’t make a mistake,” I bellowed, so many of my emotions spilling over. “She told me she couldn’t see me anymore. Left me that note.” I still had it. It was in my wallet. I pulled it out sometimes to remind myself why I was so fucking angry with her. I love you, Murphy, I always will, but there’s a man from my past. I need to sort things with him if I can ever truly be with you properly. “She said if I came round, she’d leave. Which she did anyway. Ran away, got pregnant with some other man’s bub. She wasn’t supposed to ever. Come. Back.”
“So are you angry she showed up here or are you angry you still love her?” Jake snapped back.
I tugged at the piercing in my eyebrow. The one I got when Mila chickened out and wouldn’t do her second hole at the top of her other ear. We’d had matching loops put in and for some stupid shit reason, I’d never been willing to take mine out.
“You’ve cracked a fruity, Murphy.” Mum’s face paled to chalk-white, her mouth pulled into a tight pucker. “This should never have gone so far.”
Bloody hell. Why couldn’t Mila have stayed buried in my past, nothing more than the genesis for the song that bought me my fame?
“There are things you need to know,” she said, a tremble building in her voice. “That you should have known then. That I wanted to tell you but I was asked not to share.”
Seattle Sound Series, The Collection: Books One to Five Page 55
