Not My Heart to Break

by W Winters

  He needs to get off my dick.

  “She was sitting there about…” Walsh pauses and takes in a deep breath, letting time slip by. “About twenty-four hours ago. No,” he’s quick to correct himself, sounding surer with the “no” than anything else I’ve heard from him so far. The chair legs beneath him grate on the concrete floor as he leans forward, resting his clasped hands in front of him. That’s the only bit of him I dare to look at. “No, it’s been almost two days actually since Laura’s been brought in.”

  Forty-eight hours. Two days. A wave of pain hits me from behind my eyes, residual from God knows what and I pinch the bridge of my nose, my eyes closed.

  “I’d like to see her,” I say, trying to be polite and courteous. It’s only a matter of getting out of this fucking room. The second I’m past this stage of questioning, my men will take me to her. They’ll find a way. It doesn’t matter how.

  “A lot’s happened.” Cody’s voice is tight. “She’s had a rough few days, hasn’t she?”

  Sharp pangs of hate stab through me. Lifting my gaze to his, I bite out, “All the more reason I should see her.” My throat tightens and anxiousness claws at the back of it. I don’t like not knowing. It’s the worst feeling in the world, not knowing what’s happened.

  It’s silent for far too long and all I can do is think about her alone in here. In a fucking cell! Why? Because of me.

  My chest pains are deep and brutal, like my rib cage is closing in on itself. Bracing my hand over my chest, I do my best to keep it all down. “I’ll make it right,” I say but my voice cracks and I hate myself. The sound of my words betrays me. I didn’t mean to say them out loud. They weren’t for Walsh. They’re for Laura.

  Everything was always for her.

  How did it get so fucked? How did we get here?

  One breath in, and my back straightens. All the heat suffocating me slowly subsides to the cold darkness that keeps me in control. “I’d like to see Laura.”

  “And I’d like an answer to any of my questions.”

  My lips part, then close again. He can’t play both sides. I thought he’d decided, but maybe this is for show. Maybe there’s someone else on the other side of that mirror and he has to be a fucking prick right now.

  “You haven’t told us anything. You’ve been mute since you were cuffed.” Anger slices through his words. “I don’t think you were trying to rob a bank. No one in here does. You deliberately crashed into the front entrance though, the footage shows that.”

  The rough skin on the pad of my thumb glides over a fresh cut on my other hand. I don’t speak. I don’t look at him.

  “I think you just wanted to see her. Couldn’t wait for visiting hours?” Walsh asks and his tone is so damn condescending.

  My head lifts slowly until I meet him in the eyes. Dark circles lay under his tired icy gaze. Whatever fight he’s forced into his words doesn’t show in his expression in the least. I take him in slowly, calculating what’s going on with him. His intentions, his motives.

  “I want to see Laura and I want to get both of us out of here,” I say, making my demand.

  “I wanted you in here for something other than attempted bank robbery. For the murder of the men who broke into Laura’s place.” He’s casual as he talks, slowly leaning back in his seat.

  “Is that why you’re keeping me in here? To get me to confess?” I practically hiss the words, low and full of venom.

  “You won’t. No man who’d let a woman take the fall—”

  “I didn’t let her do anything!” My fists land on the table, halting him in his place. The pressure of my jaw slamming shut to keep the thoughts at bay is too much. I swear I hear my teeth crack.

  She never should have left me that night. If she’d stayed with me and never gone back to her apartment, none of this would have happened.

  I never should have told her.

  That’s where we went wrong. I told her the ugly truth and she left. She always wanted to leave. Laura’s not the kind of girl who stays, but damn I need her to. I need her back.

  Everything slips back into place; my mask, my self-control. All I have to do is get her back. There’s no more bad shit she doesn’t know about. We’ll be fine. I’ll help her. I’ll be her prince who saves her from this hell and she’ll love me again. She can forgive me. She has to. Either that, or I’ll lie. I say I don’t know what she’s talking about. I’ll tell her I must’ve been drunk off my ass to come up with a lie like that. I’ll do whatever I have to in order to get her back. What’s done is done, but now we move forward. There’s no other choice. It’s a slow ease that overcomes my body. I flex my hand before looking back into Walsh’s gaze. It’s going to be all right. I can keep this from happening again. This is the worst of it. I know it is. It can’t get worse than this.

  “I’d like her out of here,” I add, staring him in the eyes, “since we both know she didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “She’s being charged with murder.”

  “Is that what you told them?” I can’t keep the anger down. “You’re really going to hurt her to get to me?”

  His eyes are piercing, his expression merciless. “I don’t want either of you in here,” he barely speaks. It’s nearly impossible for me to hear and his lips don’t move. I almost think I imagined it.

  The next time he speaks, it’s clear and spoken with intention. “You want to see her?”

  The lack of trust separates us. It’ll never be there. Ever.

  “You should really see her,” Cody adds when I don’t answer. The air in the room changes. It’s colder, deadlier.

  “Then take me to her,” I demand, but my power is limited on this side of the interrogation room.

  “I have people to talk to,” he says and rises from his seat as I curse under my breath, hating him and hating all of this. The scratch of metal is searing. A beep precedes the door opening and with his back to me once again he tells me, “This isn’t how I thought things were going to happen.”

  Laura

  Walters shut up real quick the second Bernard came back to the cell. I don’t know anything more than I wasn’t supposed to kill Jean. He didn’t give me that shiv to kill her and that knowledge makes me sick. But what other option did I have?

  With no one here and my imagination running away with itself, I feel like I’m drowning.

  If Marcus put out a hit on me, I’m dead. Maybe I got Jean first, but she gave me the upper hand by telling me. Sitting here all alone and not knowing a damn thing… I’m nothing but haunted and scared.

  This room is larger. Bigger and without a mirror. It still seems like an interrogation room though even if I don’t see any cameras at all. Wrapping my arms around myself, I sit back down in the lone chair, glancing at the small bed on the other side. It’s not like a holding cell, because there’s a solid door with a small window at eye height.

  I don’t know what this room is, but the bed, the lack of cameras, the unknown… it’s fucking terrifying. All I can do is glance from the bed, back to the door, praying whoever comes through it will tell me something, anything, about what’s going on.

  I just want to get out of here. I can’t take it. I don’t like who I’ve become in here.

  How long did it take for me to lose it? To lose the morality Nurse Roth has every day at work.

  I search the walls for an answer to my rhetorical question and then belatedly remember there’s not even a clock in here. Nothing at all to indicate the time. A humorless huff leaves me, and I close my eyes with it. Sleep is so tempting, and the bed is so close.

  I can’t sleep without knowing. There’s a vent on the other side of the room that clicks on and off, keeping the room temperate. It’s gone off six times now. That’s the only way I’ve managed to keep track of time.

  With my arms wrapped around my shoulders, I rock gently, trying to calm myself down. I haven’t gotten my medicine yet. The set of four pills I have to take daily. I have faith, albeit a small bit of faith,
that they’ll provide them once another twenty-four hours have gone by. I can track time that way. I haven’t slept, so I don’t know how close I am to that time frame. Four pills once in the morning. I should be getting them soon, shouldn’t I?

  A shudder runs through my body, followed by a wave of nervous heat. With my eyes closed but my head leaning back, I keep rocking and pray that this will end. Please let this be the worst of it.

  My eyes are too itchy, too worn out to cry anymore. I’m at the lowest low I could possibly be. Please make it stop. When I lick my dry lips, tasting the residue of salt from former tears, a loud beep warns me that God may have heard my prayers.

  Does he find me worthy though? I don’t dare to truly consider the question, because I’m certain the answer is quite firmly no.

  A deep inhale doesn’t settle my racing pulse as the heavy door, this one metal and most likely once a shiny silver, but now worn to a dull gray, opens with a heave and a groan.

  “I’ll tell you when,” a voice says softly. The door stays open and a mumbled conversation is blocked by it, as is my view of the person belonging to that voice.

  Seth. Please, God, I think and my lip quivers with a raw mix of hope and fear. I know it’s his voice.

  I’m not in control of my body when the door finally shuts with a resounding click and he becomes my sole focus. My heart cracks and splinters at the sight of him. The space between us vanishes and it’s all my doing. He’s frozen where he is, not moving, not reacting, simply watching me.

  “Oh my God,” I say and I can’t help how both my expression and voice crumple. With a shaky hand over my mouth and the other on his jaw, I ask, “What happened?”

  My gaze roams over his face. His stubble is so long it’s scratchy and I’ve never seen such dark circles resting beneath his eyes before. “Have you even slept?” I ask before he can answer. My thumb brushes along a bruise as I murmur, “What did you do?” I can’t stop touching him or asking him questions without even granting him a moment to answer.

  There’s a cut on his lip and I touch that too, gently, but I imagine it still stings. I have to hold my own hand, snatching it in my other and taking a step back. He looks like he’s been thrown over the edge of a rocky cliff and managed to survive but hasn’t slept in weeks.

  I don’t bother asking about the gunshot. Gripping the edge of his shirt, I pull it up, taking in the stitches and feeling a slight sense of respite at the sight.

  He’s alive. He’s been taken care of, but… “What happened?”

  I’m stricken, taking in every inch of him and not knowing a damn thing.

  His warmth envelops me first. It’s everywhere at once. Every inch of my skin is affected by his embrace. I don’t move, afraid he’ll move in response. It feels so good to be held. It feels like heaven to be safe in his arms. I bury my head in his chest when he shushes me. Shushes me! But still, his voice is the most comforting thing I’ve had in what feels like years.

  My mind rewinds the days, stopping at the moment I saw him drunk and disgraced in his house. I have to close my eyes tight, ignoring the reminder of where that led. I can’t. I can’t not be held by him right now.

  I know somewhere inside of me I hate him. I hate what he’s done. The fact that he helped me mourn… At the thought I have to wipe my eyes and as I raise my arm, Seth creeps backward, but I’m quick to fist his shirt in my hand and shove my body against his. It’s not a conscious move, it’s like everything else that I’ve done since I’ve set foot in this place: it’s an act to survive.

  I know I hate him or at least what he did, but I need him. I selfishly need him right now. Is it possible to love someone, or at least crave to be loved by them while also hating them?

  Simultaneously? I don’t know that it is because it’s only one way for me. Like the teeter-totter of a child’s seesaw, I go from one to the other. Back and forth. But never both at once.

  As my breath shakes and my shoulders press into his hard chest, I only love him right now. It kills me to see him hurt, and the idea of leaving this room without him destroys me.

  At the thought, my eyes widen and I pull my head back so I can look him in the eyes. My hot face feels the instant chill of the air as I search his blue gaze for some sign of what’s happening.

  He still doesn’t speak.

  “Please, say something.”

  “The guard just told me something,” he says and his voice is raw and pained.

  Shattered is what I feel. There is zero doubt that any other word could describe it better. Broken and in disarray, all I can do is wait. His throat tightens when he swallows, his eyes holding nothing but regret in them. I’m fucked. That’s all I can think. They have good evidence on the murder in my apartment or hell, the murder in my cell. Fuck! Fuck! How did this happen? I just want to scream.

  My gaze falls as he tells me, “They told me…” he trails off and doesn’t finish.

  My hand is still wrapped around his shirt.

  Something awful, something dreadful. If I could will myself to release him and back away, I would. But I can’t. I physically can’t. I’d rather be stuck here, a shattered girl unable to hate a man who’s hurt me more than he’ll ever know because I desperately need him to love me right now… yet all he bears for me is more bad news. Something to drag me farther into this hell.

  “They told me you that you killed someone. I’m so fucking sorry, Laura. I don’t know how you could ever forgive me.” My eyes rise slowly to meet his.

  Thump, my heart skitters as Seth attempts to keep his expression schooled, not letting the sorrow take over although it’s so close to doing just that already.

  It takes me a long moment to realize he’s apologizing and that this is about Walters and Jean.

  “It’s about Jean?” I question him, finding a bit of hope. It loosens my grip on him and I’m damn quick to tighten it the moment I’m aware of it. “That look in your eyes and what the guards told you? They know? Who knows? What did they say?” The series of breakneck questions is nothing at all like the initial ones. I rise up, not letting go of him and pulling myself closer to him as his expression morphs to something else entirely.

  “Only the men who need to know, know. Everyone else is convinced its suicide. Or they better be, for their own good. Are you okay?”

  He searches my expression, probably finding a hint of relief.

  “I’m fine. And what about you?” I say and swallow, trying to calm myself. His hand covers my fisted one and I watch as his thumb grazes my skin. “What happened to you?” I whisper.

  “Not here,” he answers in a single breath then looks behind him at the window of the heavy metal door. “Soon though,” he tells me and pulls my hand from his shirt, lifting my knuckles to his lips and kissing them.

  The revolving door of emotions is endless.

  “What else did they tell you?” I find myself crossing my arms over my chest, closer to my heart. If he has eyes and ears in this place, does he know… I try to swallow but it hurts. With everything that’s happened, I forgot for a small moment. I forgot about my heart giving up on me.

  I watch every detail of Seth’s face. I see the confusion in the twitch of his brow. “Are you okay? What else happened?” he bites out, coming closer to me and glancing at the window. “Did anyone do anything at all to you?” The way he asks the question, with the pain so evident, I’ll never be able to look at him and hate him.

  This man would do anything for me. I know he would. I’ve always known that though.

  “No,” I say and ease his worry. “No one did anything.”

  “I never should have…” Seth trails off and shakes his head, then wraps his arms around my waist. He pulls me in closer and I let him. I need it more than anything.

  “You forgive me?” he questions, and his gaze pierces through me. Intense, raw, needy.

  “Yes,” I answer and I don’t even know what for.

  “Good,” he says then breathes in deeply, still holding my hand
to his lips and the warm breath sends a shudder to run down my arm and over my shoulder. He kisses each knuckle again and although I have question after question, I’m quietly waiting for more.

  I get nothing, but at the same time, it’s everything. He holds me for the longest time and it’s the safest I’ve felt in God knows how long. Until he speaks.

  “None of this should have happened,” he tells me and I hear him swallow, my cheek pressed against his chest. “You and I will work. We will be okay, but I need to punish you for running.”

  My arm yanks back in an attempt to rip my hand away, but Seth’s grip is unyielding. So firm it nearly hurts. Seething, I aim to bite back some response that involves the phrase fuck you or maybe you’re out of your damn mind, but the heat and intensity coming off of Seth in waves silences me.

  He means it. He’s dead set on whatever it is he’s concocted in his head. My heart flips and pauses like it does when he’s around. As if the medicine has run its course and I need another dose.

  The whirlwind of what my life is pauses when I look back into Seth’s gaze.

  Did they tell him about my heart? I find myself staring at the small tinted window as if it has answers for me. Did they tell him everything? Or just about Jean?

  He would have said something. He would have. I know he would have brought it up if he knew.

  He goes on about how I run. I can barely focus on his words, because all I can think about is my heart and how Seth will react when he finds out.

  I can only stare into his beautiful eyes, listening to his voice, knowing he’s here in front of me, here to keep me safe. I don’t think they told him. I don’t think he knows. I don’t want him to. I’d rather he not have that to weigh him down like it does me. I hate this, the uncertainty. The pressure. Everything is falling to pieces but I need to be strong for the time I have left.

  “Babygirl, you’re mine. You know that, don’t you?”

  I’m nodding my head before I’m even aware of it.

  “We’re going to be fine, but you need to have your ass blistered red for running.”