The rest of her words died a slow death when the contempt on his face only seemed to grow deeper. As if the sight of her was seconds from making him empty his heaving stomach.
“Fine.” She pressed her lips together. “I’ll call.”
She looked down at her trembling thumb, lingering over the glowing buttons of the phone, realizing she didn’t know the number for the FBI. The only number that came to mind was 911. Even 911 seemed appropriate. What she couldn’t decide was whether she’d be dialing those three numbers to save herself from him… or him from her.
Her watery gaze rose back to his.
His deep voice boomed across the room. “Just grab a goddamn box.”
Her eyes widened when he turned his back once more and left the room without another word, nearly dropping the phone when her fingers went numb, along with every other bone in her quivering, aching body.
9
Hours later, Stella’s baby hairs clung to her sweat-soaked forehead. Arms on fire, knees weak, her ankles felt one false move from breaking off. Her legs hadn’t shaken this badly since she’d been forced to sing ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’ in a blue, checkered dress and red slippers during her kindergarten graduation recital. A performance Rocco had mocked the entire way through—even though his rendition of ‘If I Only Had a Brain’ hadn’t been much better—giggling behind his hand, eventually encouraging the rest of their classmates to point and laugh too. Even back then he’d been a loner but a leader. The kid who never wanted to be followed but simply gained his impressionable hangers-on naturally.
Huffing and puffing like she’d just circled the block at top speed, Stella braced her arms on the edge of the moving truck, which was almost half empty. She’d been biting her tongue all evening as she and Rocco moved silently back and forth between the truck and the house like two boats passing in the night, arms always filled with another box of his belongings. She hadn’t dared utter a word of complaint, but as she gazed into that truck and saw they had at least another hour’s work to do—including his king sized ass mattress and bed-frame—she knew her silence was moments from dying a swift death.
She’d swapped her red silk robe for a pair of jeans and a fitted white tank top, which both now clung to her clammy skin, making her yearn for the freedom of the robe once more. She couldn’t breathe. Was she having a heart attack? The thought of Rocco moving in made the suspicion that her heart might be failing her perfectly valid, after all. Even more, than the fact that she’d just spent the last few hours doing more manual labor than she had in her entire life.
She tilted her head back with a sigh when a soft breeze wafted through and cooled the sweat that had accumulated on her scalp; making the ponytail, she’d pulled her hair back into, dance. The previously blue sky above had moved to black hours ago—leaving an inky slate with no stars.
Just like his eyes.
They narrowed at her as he approached the truck. “We’re not done.”
Still leaning, she gasped between words. “Can… we… take a… break?”
“No. You’ve spent your whole life taking a break. That’s over.”
And just like that, two things were over. Stella taking a break, and Stella biting her tongue. “Can we at least talk about—”
“There’s nothing left to talk about. It’s done.”
“So you’ve really just upped and decided, for the both of us, that you’re going to throw your entire life away to move into my home without even consulting—”
“It’s not up for discussion.”
“It’s not too late to haul ass to the airport, Rocco. Take the red eye to Quantico and beg. You can’t throw your life away like this. Blue and I are fine. I’m… I’m fine—”
“You’re not fine!”
She jolted.
He collected himself. “You’ve been selling your body for money… for months. You not fine.”
“I haven’t been selling my body.” Her voice weakened. “I told you in the car. Just normal massages, and my company, that’s it. If they wanted me to throw on some ridiculous schoolgirl outfit in the process, so be it, but I never touched them sexually. They never touched me. You’d be surprised what a lonely man is willing to pay to just have a woman rub his shoulders and stroke his ego for a few hours.”
“And the 30 bands stowed away in your car? That was all thanks to a little shoulder rubbing, huh? A little ego stroking? That’s it?”
“I’ve been doing it for six months. That’s plenty of time for a girl like me to save 30k—look at me!” She held her arms out before crossing them tight once more. “I might look like a beached whale to a guy like you, who prefers his women looking hungry 24/7, but there are a lot of other men out there who find me pretty damned attractive. And why are you so pressed over whether or not I touched them anyway? Why do you care? It’s not like I scammed the money out of your pockets after all.”
His eyes searched hers. Then, he licked his lips. Eyes narrowing. “Whatever. You did favors. You didn’t do favors… doesn’t matter. They were still using you for your body—”
“So you and they have a lot in common then since you use women for their bodies every day.”
“Like I said, two sides of the same coin. And it ends now. You’re never stepping foot in a place like that, again. Ever.”
Swallowing thickly, he pulled another box from the truck and held it out for her to take. The way his biceps pulsed under its weight told her it was heavy.
She whimpered. “Is Justin on duty today?”
“Nope. He helped me load the truck at my place this morning.”
“So should we call him?” She held out her limp arms. “To come help—”
“Nope.” He dropped the box into her hands before she could finish.
She groaned under its incredible weight, staggering forward when it nearly overpowered her, feeling seconds away from unlatching her arms from her shoulders. She managed to catch her fall, cursing under her breath as she cringed down at the box. The moment she read the word ‘books’ written across the top, she curled her lip at him.
The corner of his mouth kicked up into a smirk as he reached into the truck and grabbed a box labeled ‘pillows’. “And I’ve already told Justin not to answer any of the bullshit damsel-in-distress calls you’ve been making from the bathroom for the last few hours, so you can stop wasting your time on that too.”
She nearly spit fire, finally having the answer as to why Justin—who’d never ignored her—hadn’t been responding to any of her desperate pleas for help while cowering on her toilet, blowing up his phone during her ‘bathroom breaks.’
“Let’s go.” He clicked his tongue and nodded toward the house. “I wanna get this done before eight. Truck’s not going to empty itself.”
She shuffled after him as he led the way toward the house, hardly able to move her aching limbs as she glared at his back.
——
It wasn’t until ten that evening that the truck was finally empty, with most of Rocco’s belongings awaiting him the guesthouse out back. Stella, still gasping, stood at the edge of her dining room with her hands on her hips. She wondered if her labored breathing would ever slow again, the veins in her neck pulsing as she watched Rocco make his way toward the kitchen table. The living room, dining room, and kitchen were open plan. Leaving nearly 2000 square feet of wide-open space, vaulted ceilings, and marble floors. But Rocco still somehow looked too big for the room. Like he could hold his bulky arms out like a bird, and the tips of his fingers would still manage to touch every wall.
The sprawling wraparound kitchen with state-of-the-art stainless steel appliances had white cabinetry with steel accents, white marble countertops, and an island long enough to lie on like a twin sized bed. The island served as the only barrier between the kitchen and the 8-seater table in the dining room.
Rocco took the gray wingback chair at the head of the table and sighed as he plopped down and leaned forward with his elbows on the dark wood. He cl
asped his fingers together when the living room phone began to ring from the side-table, looking up at Stella.
Her legs couldn’t move to answer it, rendered motionless under his unrelenting green orbs. She licked her lips, playing her fingers together as the answering machine beeped and a female voice filtered in and dominated the space.
“Mrs. Armstrong, this is Crescent Hills Collections calling AGAIN…”
His knuckles went white as he tightened his fingers, waiting for the message to finish playing before his deep voice boomed across the room. “Sit down.”
She didn’t move when he kicked the chair next to him out from under the table as Blue kicked and cooed from the booster seat atop the table beside him, where she’d been happily lounging for that entire miserable night. She didn’t even look up at Stella, as she was currently in the process of suffocating Mr. Wiggles with hugs and kisses.
His voice rose, eyebrows pulling. “Now.”
Stella jolted, hesitated, and then crossed her arms tightly, moving towards the table, keeping her eyes on the floor even as her breathing grew so heavy she felt like white smoke might be gusting from her nostrils.
“This is what’s gonna happen…” His voice echoed through the quiet kitchen as she took the seat next to him. “You’re gonna get a job. You’re gonna get rid of that Range Rover. You’re gonna get rid of every bullshit designer shoe and handbag in your closet. You’re gonna pay down every last bill and loan that keeps that phone ringing off the hook all day and night. Takeout? That’s over. Your hairdresser no longer exists. Learn to do your own goddamn fingernails and toes. I’ll cover the mortgage until you find a job. Then we go 50/50. That way, Blue can stay in the best school zones while you’re pulling yourself together—”
“I—”
“I’m not interested in anything you have to say.”
Stella faltered, stunned.
He jammed the tips of his fingers into his chest. “If I have a question, I’ll ask. Until then, keep your mouth shut.”
Her mouth fell, but no words came.
Even though her mouth was wide open, he apparently accepted that this was as close to ‘keeping her mouth shut’ as Stella Armstrong was going to get.
“How many—” He went silent in mid-sentence when she crossed her legs under the table, and her ankle brushed against his leg.
She gasped as the soft hairs of his calve unexpectedly tickled her skin, stiffening.
The smoothness of her skin on his made his jaw go stiff too.
Their chests swelled.
Rocco shifted, a lump racing down his throat, and moved his leg away with a deep breath. Face tight, he reached toward Blue’s booster chair and slid out a calculator, pen, and paper that Stella hadn’t even noticed he’d set next to it on the table. He picked up the pen, his chest rising a falling rapidly.
“How many credit cards and how much debt on each?” He kept his eyes on the pad with his pen primed against the paper. When Stella didn’t answer, he looked up from under his shadowed brow-bone.
She snapped out of it. “D… uh, Discover, a Chase card, American Express, too many store cards to count.”
“Ballpark.”
She took a deep breath. “15k on the Discover card. Little under 9k with Chase. 50k between both American Expresses and… probably another 50k on the store cards combined—give or take.”
He gaped at her.
She avoided his gaze, opting to stare at Blue instead, who was too busy gurgling contentedly at Rocco to notice her mother’s gaze.
He shook his head, wrote down all the numbers he’d just heard and popped them into the calculator. “124 thousand dollars… in credit card debt… Jesus Christ.” He dropped the pen and buried his face in his hands, elbows on the table. “Stella Armstrong you are… You…” He made claws with his hands; eyes alight. “You…”
“It’s old debt. From before Troy died—”
“Don’t speak.” He held his hands out.
The No Doubt song of the same name immediately began playing in her head, but she had the good sense not to sing it out loud, even if the temptation was killing her.
He reclaimed his pen with a sigh. “Mortgage.”
“Little under a quarter of a million to go.”
“Just had to move into a bigger house when the other one was paid off. I told Troy it was a bad idea.”
“Yeah, you told Troy a lot of things.”
His eyes flew up to hers and caught fire. But hers had already moved to a full alarm blaze, matching every hot spark his green orbs threw at her with a cannonball twice as fierce. Incinerating every blazing shot before they even had a chance to reach her across the table.
He spoke through clenched teeth. “The Range.”
“Paid off.”
“Blue.”
“Between doctors visits, food, diapers, daycare everything in between… a thousand a month?”
The pen tightened in his hand. “Loans.”
“Only 2k in student loans left.”
“Why didn’t Troy just pay off the rest?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t talk to him about money.”
“You just asked him to hand it over.”
“Pretty much.”
“Why not put the 30k towards some of this debt?”
“I wanted a cushion. Emergency fund.”
“Your whole life is an emergency. Does Troy have any residual income coming in?”
“A little, from his book and Netflix royalties. But it fluctuates a lot. Spotty. Barely able to cover half the mortgage most months.”
“What’s your credit score? Negative 500?”
“I don’t know.”
He hissed, cheeks red, going back to the calculator and pad. “Troy gave the old house in Philly to your parents right?”
“Yeah.”
“They still don’t work?”
It was her turn to bare her teeth. “They’re retired.”
“Retired. So I can safely assume they’re living off a pension plan or 401k or something?”
She paused, voice falling. “No.”
“So who takes care of their bills and essentials?”
“I do. They’re my parents. Troy upgraded their lives just like he did mine. Just like he did his own parents. He always took care of them. Am I supposed to pull the rug out from under them too?”
“How much?”
She sighed. “Food, water, electric, cable… comes out to about $1000 a month.”
“So a second mortgage.” His jaw clenched and rolled as he nodded toward the staircase. “Big house. Lotta empty rooms.”
Her eyes exploded. “I love my parents but god, no. I can’t. You can’t. I’m a carbon copy of my mother. Imagine living with two of me. Is that really the choice you wanna make?”
He considered her words for all of two seconds before going back to his pad. “They’re getting downgraded right alongside you then. We’ll look into government programs. See what we can get. I’ll cover whatever’s left while you look for work. Then, 50/50.”
“It’s a lot, Rocco. How on Earth will you cover all this if you just quit your job?” Stella whispered. “I know you’re smart with money, but you can’t have that much squirreled away on a 90k salary—”
“I thought I asked you not to speak?”
Her eyes fell, playing her fingers together under the table, comforted only by the sound of Blue’s blubbering across the table. As the weight of the night came down on her shoulders with the force of ten mountains, she clenched her hands into fists, sniffling when her nose was suddenly wet. She felt his gaze on the top of her head but didn’t look back up.
“How much money do you have hidden in the house?”
“None, I kept it all in the car.” She took a moment. “Rocco, did you… did you tell DJ? About me working at the parlor?”
“She doesn’t need to know.”
She exhaled, slamming her eyes closed.
He made a disgusted noise once more and tossed the
calculator away from him as if it had suddenly become contagious.
“I can’t even do this right now. I honestly I can’t even look at you.” The legs of his chair disagreed with the floor when he stood to his feet.
Chin in her chest, Stella gave a soft nod. Through the corner of her eye, she saw Rocco lean over and kiss Blue’s forehead, which made the baby’s legs kick wildly.
“Night, Blue.”
Stella felt his eyes on her once more. She felt them linger.
Then, he was gone. His boots stomped across the marble floors as he made his way to the sliding doors that led to the expansive backyard where all of the unpacked belongings that had been meant for Quantico were now littered all over her guesthouse instead. Waiting to be reassembled in the home he’d never wanted or asked for.
Stella couldn’t help herself. “I thought you never wanted to see me again?”
He paused with his hand on the sliding door. “I didn’t.” He cocked his head toward his shoulder, eyes lowered. “You obviously can’t even scratch your own ass without proper supervision… but I’m not doing it for you. I’m doing it for Troy.” His voice lowered. “For Blue.”
10
The following morning, the pop of Eggo Waffles leaping out of the toaster joined in with the rumble of the coffee machine and the soft chirps of birds outside.
Stella froze from where she had Blue’s bare foot in her mouth—one of the few things in the world that could pull a giggle from her baby girl’s lips—while leaning down in front of her high chair. The fragrant scent of toasted blueberry waffles filled the kitchen as she gave Blue’s wiggling toes one last playful blow.
“Should we go give Uncle Rocco some breakfast?” Stella made her way back to the toaster and added the golden waffles that had just popped to the stack she’d already piled onto the plate beside it. The scrambled eggs and bacon she’d woken up early to whip up steamed from the plate as well. She raised her eyebrows as she looked over her shoulder and locked eyes with Blue across the kitchen, receiving nothing but gurgles in response to her question. She placed the plate on top of a silver serving tray, complete with the glass of orange juice, jar of syrup, and packets of butter. “You think he’ll like my cooking, babe?”
Forbidden (War Book 1) Page 9
