by S. R. Jones
Who has eyes that color? They’re almost silver. God, he’s beautiful. Thick dark hair, olive skin, silvery eyes, and a jaw you could cut glass with. Beautiful, but cold, and dangerous. It rolls off him in waves. He’s not the wealthy businessman you might think on a quick glance.
He’s death in an expensive suit and upmarket watch.
Two more men come into the room with him and he begins to give them orders in a language I don’t understand.
They go out of the room and return a few moments later with some bags and other things, which they take down the hall with them. I throw a glance at Liam, but he’s impassive, and I daren’t ask. I don’t want to know.
These men are going to be dealing with my dead husband’s body. I’m sure of it. They are doing so because I killed him. I’m sitting here judging what’s going on, but I’m the one who took a life today.
I shake again and take a sip of the vodka because I can’t let my body collapse now. We can’t be calling the paramedics with a corpse in the house. It’s not funny at all, but for some reason the thought makes me snort with a half-choked giggle. I hear a soft, deep laugh and look up to see Andrius watching me.
Liam sees it too, I’m sure because he tenses beside me and puts his arm around me.
Andrius takes off his jacket and hangs it over one of our stupidly expensive dining room chairs. The waistcoat he wears over his shirt only serves to accentuate his huge shoulders, and narrow waist and hips. Powerful legs fill out his trousers and as he rolls his shirt sleeves up to reveal thick forearms lined with white scars, I swallow and look away, afraid.
“Hey. Krasava divhyna. Don’t be scared.”
I don’t know what the words in the foreign language mean, but I let myself look at him.
“What did you say? Before don’t be scared.”
“Pretty girl.”
Liam makes this growling noise in the back of his throat and Reece comes forward and places a hand on Liam’s back. “So…Can you clean this up, Andrius?” Reece addresses the Ukrainian. “Everything? We’ll give you the USB drive Nick copied his files onto, it will give you the details of what he was doing, and who for. You can use that however you wish.”
The man says something that sounds like dak in return.
“And what about the other part of the deal?” Liam says. “The part where Abi is safe if she returns home to England.”
“I guarantee her safety,” Andrius says. “As long as she is in Leeds or near Leeds, North Yorkshire, she is on Allyov territory and no one will threaten her.”
“Who is he?” My voice shakes as I ask.
“A Russian businessman with powerful friends and few enemies, at least in our area of operation.”
God. I’m really going to be under the protection of the Russian mob. Somehow this doesn’t make me feel safe.
“Listen.” Andrius lets out a heavy sigh. “I understand this is frightening for you, but joking aside and being serious here. I owe Reece a massive debt. I owe him my life, and because of this when I say to him you are safe. You are safe. No one will bother you. You won’t have anything to do with Allyov, but you are going to be living in the area his family operates, and you will be under my personal protection. Understand?”
I nod my head.
“And mine, and the guys,” Liam adds.
For a moment I think him and Andrius are going to get into a dick swinging contest, but Andrius merely smiles at me. “See? A team of Special Forces Soldiers and a…fixer for the Russians. You couldn’t be safer.”
He looks to Liam with his ghostly gaze and nods once. “You going to take the lady out of here? I doubt she wants to stay for the clean-up. She’ll need to grab anything she needs. Make it clear to her, she was not here today. The doorman you’ll need to take care of, and the two idiots in the foyer. My men and I will take care of the rest.”
“Thank you.” Liam shakes his hand once, and then he takes my arm, leading me out toward the hallway.
“Is there anything you didn’t take the first time you left that you want?” Liam asks me.
I shake my head.
“Good.”
Ethan jogs to catch up with us and Liam turns to him, talking over my head. He’s doing that controlling, protector thing again, but somehow, I don’t mind.
“We need to make sure the doorman won’t talk. The two thugs Nick hired should be a piece of cake. They can be bought off easily, I reckon. Luckily for us, Abi looks so different I doubt anyone else would notice her and think it’s the same Mrs. Madison as they’re used to seeing with long hair and expensive clothes.”
“Okay. So, what now?” I interrupt. I’m nervous as hell. All jittery and wired, as if I’ve taken a ton of drugs or something.
Reece joins us and strides ahead of us by a few paces. He turns to look over his shoulder, giving me a wink. “We go get Boo, right, Abi? Then your friend Jay.”
I nod, too overwhelmed to argue or know what to do.
“Call Jay from the car, Abi. Tell him to pack a bag,” Liam bosses. “We’ll get you booked on a flight to the U.K as soon as we can.”
“Are you going home, too?” I hold my breath as I wait for his answer.
“I am. For a short while, but then I’ve got another job to start next week.”
His answer is a cold, hard slap around the face. He’s done with me. With us. I can tell from the way he speaks. The way he doesn’t look at me. The set of his jaw. I fucked it up. I ran from him and didn’t trust him, and I fucked it up.
All the way to Jay’s in the car, I’m silent. I have my small bag that I took with me, and Liam says he has the rest of my things with him. I didn’t take much anyway. I don’t want it. I feel sick wondering what is going to happen to me.
I’m scared, so petrified my limbs still shake, and I want so badly to ask Liam to let me stay with him for a while, but my pride won’t let me.
“Abi. It’s going to take a while for you and Jay to get settled.” Ethan turns to look at me. “Until you find somewhere to live, you, Jay, and Boo are welcome to stay with Isla and me. We have the room, and so long as Boo is okay with other dogs, you’ll be fine there.”
I see some of the tension in Liam’s face ease and hate the way he’s so relieved to be rid of the burden of me. Tears prick at my eyes, but I won’t let them come. I bite my cheek hard to stop myself crying and plaster on a smile. “That sounds great, thank you so much.”
“It’s nothing. Isla will like the company. Us guys are away a fair bit with work.”
I nod and wrap my arms around myself as he turns back to look out the front window. Liam stares out the window on his side of the car and I do the same. It’s raining now, and the weather matches my mood. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so depressed. Nick took so much from me, but he didn’t take my hope.
Liam has done that.
I don’t understand where this cold, aloof, uncaring man has come from. He doesn’t give a shit. Whereas before he might have bossed me around, at least he cared. How can he have simply turned all those feelings, and I am sure he had them, off? Even though I fucked up, how can he be so remote?
As I watch the traffic slip by, I let the tears finally fall.
By the time we pull up at Jay’s place, I’m strangely exhausted. My limbs are heavy with fatigue and my heart beats slow and dull in my chest. My eyes are sore, and my mouth is dry. All I want to do is sleep. Forever, if I had my way. But then the door opens, and I see Boo in the arms of some knockout blonde who Reece called and asked to meet us here. My heart swells at the sight of my little boy. My only real family.
I can’t stop myself glancing at Liam to see if he takes the stunner holding Boo in with hungry eyes, but he doesn’t even glance her way. He shoulders by her into the house. She raises her eyebrows at Reece who just shakes his head.
“Your dog is a darling,” she tells me. Her accent is Southern. Her voice honeyed silk. And her long, thick blonde hair brushes cleavage I would kill for.
“You’re
gorgeous,” I blurt out, exhaustion stopping me from monitoring myself.
She laughs. “Thanks darling.”
Reece gives her waist a quick squeeze and kisses her lightly. I wonder if they are together.
She hands me Boo, who licks and snuffles all over my face, bringing me back to life a little with his pure and uncomplicated love for me.
“I better get going. You in town for a few more days?” She asks Reece.
“Nah. Heading back as soon as we can. I’ll look you up next time I’m here, though. And call me if you ever get a Manchester stopover.”
“Sure thing.” She kisses him again and sashays out the door.
I blink up at him when she’s gone. “You should marry her.”
“What?” He laughs.
“She’s…I mean wow. She’s utterly gorgeous.”
“She’s also an air hostess with a serious boyfriend in Los Angeles who is supposedly going to make her a star, and she won’t want to settle down in Yorkshire with an ex-military man. Trust me.”
I like her a little less now I know she’s cheating on her partner. I’m old fashioned that way, I suppose. My thoughts bring me right back around to Liam and my heart does a stupid flip-flop. I need to get myself under control because he and I aren’t going to be anything going forward. He’s made as much clear. Still, I can’t help but hope he’ll drop by to see Ethan sometimes, which will mean I’ll get to see him.
Later that evening, I’m sitting in a large room in some house the guys made appear as if by magic. Some connection of theirs apparently had a safe house in the area, as you do, and we’re all holed up in it now.
There’s a knock at the bedroom door and my stomach flips. I smooth down my hair, still damp from the shower I had thirty minutes ago, and go open the door.
It’ll probably be Jay. When I swing the door open, my stomach does a full somersault, never mind a flip. Liam is standing there, looking all kinds of hot and rugged.
Why do I react so strongly to him? One glance and I’m melting. I still get those mixed up, torn feelings. Anger at him for being so rough in the way he spoke to me at times. Hurt from the way he’s turned himself closed-off and cold. Despite it all though, there’s that heat, sizzling and snapping between us. He feels it, I know he does because he swallows thickly and glances away.
“We’ve got a flight booked for tomorrow night,” he says, and turns to go.
“You’re unbelievable,” I spit at him, anger stopping me from monitoring what I say.
“Me?” He turns to me. “I’m the unbelievable one, am I? You left me with a note, Abi. You drugged me. You left, and you fucking went back to him.”
“I had to. I can’t believe you’re jealous. I had to go back.”
“I’m not jealous,” he bites off. “I know you have no feelings for him, but it was a fucking stupid thing to do. It shows me you’re in no place to make decisions for yourself, and now you’re going to have to. You put yourself in danger. You put me and my men in danger. You made it so we had to involve a group of people in this I’d rather not be associated with. You did all that when you decided not to trust me and to run away. The same way you might have put Jay in danger by calling him when I asked you not to. You don’t trust me.”
Shit I suddenly get it. Really get it. Liam is used to being in charge. He’s used to being trusted and trusting in return. He thinks he’s closed off from life, from people, but the bond he had—still has—with his men runs deep. It’s given him a template for how things should be, and I messed that up. I ran from him, lied to him. “I get it,” I tell him. “You’re done with me. You don’t want me anymore. I can’t blame you. I’m used up, broken, can’t trust people easily.”
“You’re not…fuck, Abi. You’re not used up, don’t say such things about yourself.”
I notice he doesn’t tell me I’m not broken. His next words kill me.
“But you are a mess. Trust me, it takes one to know one. You need time to get your head together. I need time to get over you.”
He needs to get over me? My heart lifts a little at those words.
“We can’t be anything, Abi. I’m not what you need, and you’re just starting out on your new life as a free woman. You should be happy to be single, to be free. You’ve got Boo, your friend, Jay. And you’ll most likely have a fuck ton of money soon if you sell the apartment.”
I swallow hard and put my heart on the line. I let him in. He has no idea what that means but I never let anyone close. We whispered our confessions to one another. He’s become my friend. My lover. My priest. And my protector. I can’t imagine him being gone from my life. The hole in me, the big, dark gaping nothing I desperately want to fill is a little less scary in his presence.
“I need you,” I whisper as my eyes tear up.
He swallows hard and I see the emotions in his gaze. “No, honey. You don’t. You think you do, but you don’t. What you need is to get strong and recover, and we won’t work if we start from this point.”
He leans in to me and runs his nose up my throat, inhaling as he does. Then he tips my chin up and his lips touch mine once. “I’ve got to go to Indonesia next week. I’ll help you get set up at Ethan’s, then I have to leave. Try to get some rest.”
He turns and goes. The fucker simply walks away after I put my heart on the line leaving me feeling stupid and small.
Well screw him. I’ve been through hell. Hell. Instead of being with me, comforting me, Liam can turn around and walk away. It makes me realize he’s not who I thought he was.
Another knock and the door has me swinging it wide to give Liam a piece of my mind, but it’s Jay. He comes in and walks me to the bed, where he pulls the covers back and pushes me under the sheets before climbing after me and wrapping me in his arms.
I lie and let sleep steal over me, the exhaustion dragging me under despite all I’ve been through. My last thoughts are how much I wish Jay’s arms belonged to another. To a rough Yorkshireman who somehow stole my heart.
****
I watch the child ride around the ring on the horse he wouldn’t even stroke two weeks ago with a smile on my face. The sun is beating down but there’s an autumnal chill in the air. It won’t be long now until the nights start to draw in.
It’s been months since I went through utter hell. I’m stronger. Better.
A lot of which I put down to my therapist, Jayne. She’s helped me come to terms with everything. Of course, I can’t tell her it all. I daren’t tell her I killed my abusive husband. Patient client privilege might be a thing, but I am not sure how robust a thing it is. Nick’s body was never found, but a warning was. A severed finger. The authorities think the mob killed him.
The scary Andrius has called on me twice to give me this and other information, and he terrifies me. Only the fact I live so close to Ethan and Isla and now have four dogs including two big Rottweilers helps make me feel safe.
I love Isla. She’s become like a sister to me in a short space of time. A true friend. She’s gorgeous, too. So pretty. She and Ethan often have barbecues and invite Luka, Cara, and Reece. They also invite Liam, but he never attends. I don’t know if he’s staying away because of me, or simply too busy. Either way it hurts.
I wish it didn’t, wish I didn’t care, but despite getting myself together, at night, in the cold and dark, I still yearn for him. My body burns for him no matter what my rational mind tries to tell it.
I have told Isla I still miss Liam. No one else. Whilst Isla has become a good friend, I’m a little wary of Cara. She’s colder, and full of opinions about things I know nothing about. She makes me feel stupid.
Jay doesn’t live here anymore, as he’s at art school in London, but he comes up most weekends and stays over during the many holidays they seem to get.
The child on the horse in the ring breaks into a beaming smile and my heart lifts. Her instructor, Vicky, leans in to say something with a big grin of her own. This is my life now. Doing something good for others. I di
d get a lot of money, and decided to follow Liam’s advice, turn something bad into something good.
I’ve extended the remit of the stables, and now on two days a week, one being a Sunday, we host underprivileged children. It means I pretty much work seven days a week, but it doesn’t feel like work and I love it. In fact, I think it’s this, having a purpose in life that’s saved me the most.
One of the dogs comes to stand beside me, panting. She’s a brilliant alarm, barking in her deep, growly way at night if anyone comes to the door of the house, but totally chilled with all the kids arriving at the center. Of course, I have actual alarms too. State of the art things, not the sort most people have. Fitted by Ethan, and wired up to some sort of command center run by a private company. If the alarm is triggered and not turned off then they will send someone out, Isla also told me it will alert the guys too and she and Ethan are mere minutes away by car.
It seems that Liam might be done with me, but the guys aren’t. They’ve made me their side-project and have done all they can to help me feel safe.
A small car pulls up and I turn to see it is Cara. I brace myself. It’s not that I don’t like her, it’s simply that I find her a little bit scary.
She climbs out, long red hair buffeted by the breeze, and then starts fiddling about with something in the back of the car. The next moment, she’s hauling her new son up into her arms. He’s cute, but he’s a baby. All babies are cute, and they’re all similar. I prefer them when they get to be toddlers and you see their little personalities start to come through.
She reaches me and passes me the bundle. “He’s not stopped whining and grumbling all day,” she says with a grin. Then she rummages in her bag and holds a couple of big chocolate bars aloft. “I brought snacks,” she says.
