by T. K. Leigh
Alexander nodded.
She jumped into his arms. “Take me to see her. Please,” she said, her voice soft as she nuzzled against his neck, inhaling his scent.
“Oh, Olivia. Do you have any idea how much I love you? You have to believe that I never meant…”
“I love you, too, Alexander,” she interrupted, pulling out of his embrace and hardening her stare. “I just don’t like you very much right now, and I refuse to be in a relationship with someone who keeps secrets from me. Just take me to the hospital to see my best friend.”
Alexander grabbed her hand and led her down the steps toward the waiting SUV. Within minutes, he pulled up in front of the hospital and Olivia ran out of the car toward the sliding glass doors without even saying good-bye.
“Olivia, wait!” he shouted, jumping out of the car to catch up to her.
“What is it, Alex?” she asked, spinning around, an irritated expression on her face. “I need to go see Kiera.”
“Do you want me to come with you?”
“It’s a free country.” She shrugged. “Do what you want.”
“Where does this leave us?” he asked, his eyes full of hope.
Annoyed, she crossed her arms in front of her body. “In the same place we were the last time you decided to keep secrets from me. I can’t trust you. I can’t spend the rest of my life with someone never knowing if they’re keeping me in the dark on matters that concern me, all in the guise of trying to protect me! I won’t do it!” She spun on her heels, walking through the doors of the large brick building.
Alexander chased after her, not caring that the SUV was parked in a tow-away zone, and found her at the registration desk. “Olivia, please. Tell me how I can fix this and earn back your trust. Whatever it is, I’ll do it.”
She put down the pen after signing in and turned to face him, looking at his disheveled appearance. There were circles underneath his eyes and he had facial hair coming in. His clothes were wrinkled from sitting in his car all night. He looked broken, but she refused to feel guilty. It was all his fault, no matter what his brother had tried to convince her of the day before. “All I want from you is the one thing you refuse to give me. I want to know who I am…who I was. Why are these people trying to take my friends away from me? Why did they kill Mel? What is it they think I know?”
Alexander exhaled loudly and ran his hands through his hair, contemplating what he should do. He was at a crossroads. He tried to put himself in Olivia’s position. How would he feel if he found out that his entire life had been a lie and that the people he had come to trust continued to keep secrets from him?
“You want to know who you are?” He took a step closer and looked in her eyes, their bodies almost touching. “Your name is Olivia Marilyn DeLuca. You were born on October sixteenth almost twenty-nine years ago, and you were the most adorable baby I had ever seen.” He smiled at the memory. “Granted, I was only two the first time I held you, but I knew then that I would do everything in my power to keep you safe.”
He brushed that same errant curl out of her face before continuing, “You were such a pain in the ass when you were a kid, always irritating the piss out of me. We would fight. We would argue. But then we would always apologize to each other because we both knew, deep down, that we couldn’t survive without each other.”
His voice began to tremble with emotion as he continued talking. He brought Olivia’s body flush with his and held her face in his hands. “This is what we do, Olivia. This is who we are. Not much has changed since we were kids. We fight. We piss each other off. But at the end of the day, we realize that no matter how mad and angry we are at each other, there is something much bigger at work here. You can stay angry at me all you want, love, but you know, deep down, that you cannot live without me. You love me just as much as I love you and nothing will ever come between that.” He wiped the tear that had fallen down her cheek and stared into her eyes, searching for an answer.
“I can’t do this right now,” she said quietly, turning away from him and heading down the long corridor to the ICU.
“I’ll wait for you, Olivia. I’ll always wait for you.”
She continued walking, refusing to turn around to face him, knowing that his words were true.
~~~~~~~~~~
“LIBBY!” KIERA WEAKLY CRIED out after she saw her practically run into the hospital room.
Olivia rushed to her side, hugging her friend. She looked awake, but groggy.
“Ouch. Not so hard.”
“I’m sorry.” Tears streamed down Olivia’s face. “I’m just so glad that you’re okay.”
“What happened?” Kiera asked, her voice raspy. “I can’t remember anything.”
She clutched Kiera’s hands in hers, looking down at her frail frame, not wanting to tell her anything, not knowing if she could even say the words. “Don’t worry about any of that right now, Care Bear. You just worry about getting your ass out of this hospital bed, okay?”
“Okay, Libby.” She squeezed Olivia’s hand. “I heard about Melanie…” she quivered, tears welling in her eyes.
“I’m so sorry. It’s all my fault,” Olivia sobbed, looking down.
“Stop it, Libby. Mo said you were going to say that. He doesn’t understand why you’re blaming yourself and neither do I,” she scolded her. “You couldn’t have prevented any of this from happening. Okay?”
Olivia’s chin trembled, wondering if she would ever be able to stop blaming herself for what had happened to Melanie and Kiera. The guilt wore her down. Looking into Kiera’s green eyes, she simply nodded, not wanting to talk about it anymore. Instead, the two girls held each other and mourned the loss of their friend, reminiscing about all the good times they shared.
“Oh, good. You’re here.” Mo said, breaking the moment and carrying a few cups of coffee. “I tried calling your phone and you weren’t answering so I called Alex. I’m assuming you got the message.”
“Good assumption,” she replied sarcastically, wiping her tears.
He raised his eyebrow at her, silently questioning if everything was all right.
She knew that she would have to tell him what was going on, but she wasn’t ready yet. “Well, I’ll give you two some privacy.” She got up from her chair. “I’ll be back in a little bit to check on you. Okay, Care Bear?”
Kiera smiled weakly at her. “You got it.”
Olivia turned to leave.
“Oh, and Libby?”
“Yes?” she replied, facing Kiera.
“Whatever stick crawled up your ass these past few weeks, please remove it.”
Olivia stared at her friend in shock. “What are you talking about?”
“You. Being a bitch to us and everyone around you, including Alexander,” she said, her voice raised. She glanced at Mo as he clutched her hand. Her expression immediately softened when she met his eyes. “This whole incident made me realize how much I appreciate what I have in my life, including the people in it.” She met Olivia’s gaze. “I love you, Libby. You know that. But you’ve got to stop shutting people out just because they fuck up and make a mistake.”
Olivia looked down, feeling guilty that she had treated her friends so poorly. But, at the same time, she was the reason that Kiera had been hurt and that Melanie was dead. She could put a stop to everything if Alexander would just come clean to her, but he refused. “It’s not as simple as that, Kiera.” She exhaled.
“Well, humor me then.” She smirked. “I’ve got nothing on my busy schedule today, except healing from a few bullet wounds.” Her voice was heavy with sarcasm. Olivia was happy that the attack didn’t seem to diminish Kiera’s spirit all that much.
She retreated back into the hospital room, pulling up a chair next to Mo. “Well, I guess you both should probably hear this.” She proceeded to tell Mo and Kiera about her dad being alive and running into him at MacFadden’s. Then she told them about the letter that Carol had found in Kiera’s house. She struggled to fight back the tears as
she told them about Lucas killing Melanie to try to get Olivia to remember whatever it was they wanted her to.
“I know he’s still keeping information from me, and the reason he’s doing it is to protect me. He says that if I remember, he could lose me.”
“Do you really blame him, Libby? Look what’s happened to poor Mel. And me!” Kiera screeched. “I can’t believe you’re really going to stay angry at him for keeping you safe…” She trailed off, wishing she had someone looking out for her when she was attacked.
“Do you have any idea who’s behind everything? Maybe that will help,” Mo said calmly.
Olivia took a deep breath. “I don’t see how. Nobody knows who is pulling the strings here. Carol and Alexander have apparently worked tirelessly trying to figure it all out, but no one has a clue. The only person they know of is this Mark Kiddish guy, but he’s just a hired goon. Even then, there’s no hard evidence that he’s actually involved. At least not enough that the police can open an investigation into him. Regardless, if he’s out of the picture, they’ll just replace him with someone new. It won’t end until they have what they want. And what they want is me…my memories. I’m the best shot at saving my friends, but only if I can remember. Alexander knows that so he’s keeping my past from me. He knows what they want and he won’t tell me.”
“Wait a sec,” Kiera said. “What about your dad? Can’t you talk to him about it?”
“Carol is worried about me doing that. She said that his identity has been kept a secret for a reason and until they can figure it out, it’s best that I stay as far away from him as possible so that he doesn’t get hurt…or worse. I have no way of getting in touch with him anyway.”
“Don’t do anything stupid, Livvy,” Mo said. “Don’t think about that letter…”
“How can I not think about that letter?!” she shrieked, standing up and glaring down at her two friends. “It pretty much said that I’m the reason my friends are being targeted!” She took a deep breath before continuing, “Right now, I’m the best shot at keeping everyone safe, but the only way I can do that is by figuring out what these guys are after. And the only person who can help me with that is Alexander. His refusal to tell me what I need is putting my friends’ lives in jeopardy.”
Olivia spun on her heels and stormed out of the room, not wanting to listen to her friends try to talk any sense into her. She knew she sounded irrational, but she refused to admit that Alexander was doing the right thing by keeping her past from her.
CHAPTER THIRTY
COME CLEAN
AS OLIVIA WALKED THROUGH the front door of MacFadden's and up to the second floor several weeks later, she was unsure of whether she would have enough inner strength to get through that night. Waves of emotion rushed over her when she saw the swarms of people there for Melanie’s memorial celebration. Huge photos of the chipper blonde adorned all the walls, people scribbling their good-byes on them through their tear-soaked eyes.
Feeling a lump form in her throat, Olivia dashed to the bar, desperately wanting to forget about everything that had happened…or at least down a few drinks to try to numb the pain that was starting to take over. After gulping back the amber liquid, she began to relax.
“Is this seat taken?”
Olivia stilled at the voice. She sighed and turned to face Alexander. “No. Have a seat.”
He flagged down a bartender and placed his drink order, Olivia signaling for another drink, as well.
“Carol said that she saw you down at the station earlier.” He attempted to make small talk.
“Yeah. They had more questions about Lucas and his brother, Dylan, if that really is his brother.”
Alexander nodded, proceeding with caution now that Olivia was finally talking to him. Over the past few weeks, things had been awkward between them. She continued to live at her old brownstone on Commonwealth Avenue, but would let him in anytime he appeared at her door. She rebuked every attempt he made to help her see why he was refusing to tell her what those guys were after. Instead, they would sit on the couch together in silence, Olivia glaring at him, hoping that he would finally crack and come clean.
“How many times are they going to have you go down to answer more questions? I’ll talk to Carol and have them come to your house. You shouldn’t have to be inconvenienced.”
Olivia took a sip of her fresh drink and turned to face him, noticing how gaunt he looked. It was obvious that he hadn’t been sleeping well. Guilt overwhelmed her conscience for causing the painful appearance that he exuded. She felt the same way. She hated life without Alexander and she wanted nothing more than to go back to the way things were before, although she knew that too much had happened for that to be possible. “I don’t mind,” she said.
“Have they found anything?”
She shook her head in resignation. “No. They haven’t been able to uncover any evidence linking Melanie’s death to anyone other than Lucas, no matter what I’ve told them happened in the boathouse.”
“They’ve questioned me regarding what I know about Mark Kiddish, but that’s been a dead end, too. As far as they’re concerned, his name change to Donovan O’Laughlin was reasonable after his father’s disappearance, and he runs a legitimate consulting business with strong ties to the community. Without any actual proof that this guy is behind it, there’s not much that can be done.”
“They told me the same thing. The phone call was traced to Lucas’ cell so they couldn’t find anything there. And the asshole has refused to answer any questions, other than insisting that he was working alone. He’s definitely playing the deranged psycho rather well. So, based on his answers and the fact that they’ve found nothing on his supposed brother, Dylan, it’s not looking like this will lead back to anyone other than him.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, shifting nervously on his barstool. “How’s Kiera doing?”
“Better. She still has no memory of what happened that night, and neither Mo nor I really want to be the one to tell her.” She glanced at him and he gave her a knowing look before she returned her attention to the drink in front of her. “It’s almost like her brain is trying to protect her from remembering what she probably endured those twelve hours. She’s starting to perk up a bit and she doesn’t appear to be in too much pain anymore. I was just there with her before I had Agent Marshall drive me here.”
“Thanks for that…for having her drive you.”
Olivia turned her head and gave him an icy stare before softening her expression, almost pleading with him to finally tell her the reason why he wants her to have constant protection…to tell her what those men are after.
“You need to understand where I’m coming from here, Olivia.” He answered the question that was written plain as day on her face.
She sighed. “I get it, Alex. I really do. I understand your reasons, and so do the police. Unfortunately, they're on your side here. But I don’t want to be left in the dark. I don’t want you keeping all this information, holding it over me, saying that it’s too dangerous for me to even know about my own past. Let me make those decisions.” Olivia got up from her barstool, needing to distance herself from him before she broke down and jumped back into his arms.
“That house in Newport!” he shouted, getting her attention. She turned around to face him, her eyes narrowed as she crossed her arms defensively in front of her body. He lowered his voice. “The one you had me stop at when we were there for the marathon.”
She glared at him. “What about it, Alex?” she hissed.
He ran his hands through his hair, looking rather vulnerable. “We used to go there a fair bit when we were kids. Your mom would take us up there from time to time. There was such a huge yard, and we would run all over playing hide-and-seek.”
“Why did we go there, Alex? Who lived there?” she asked, not sure if she really wanted to know.
He took a deep breath. “Your grandparents live there.”
Olivia let out a small cry. “Live?” Her lo
wer lip trembled. “As in present tense?”
“Yes,” he answered quietly. “Harris House. Your mother’s maiden name was Harris.” He hoped that maybe if he started to slowly feed her information about her past, she would forget about wanting to know what Mark Kiddish was after.
As she took in what he was saying, a hurt look spread across her face. She seethed with anger when she realized that he was keeping so much information from her. She had a family that she didn’t even know about, but he knew. She spun on her heels, needing to get up on stage to start their performance.
“Olivia, love!” Alexander cried out. “I’m sorry. I should have told you sooner.”
She refused to turn around, instead walking onto the stage, sitting down at the piano.
“Hey, Livvy,” Mo greeted her as he strapped on his guitar. “Everything okay?” He nodded to where Alexander was standing, imploring her with his eyes.
She laughed. “You know what, Mo? I have no idea how to even answer that question anymore.”
“Neither do I,” he said before turning and stepping up to the microphone. “Good evening, friends. We’d like to start by thanking everyone for being here tonight to celebrate the life of Melanie Erica Brooks, beloved daughter and friend to all of you.” Mo took a deep breath before continuing, “Mel’s parents asked us to play a memorial for her here tonight, and a few people are going to get up and talk about her. After that, they’re going to open the upstairs for everyone and we’ll play our normal set. It’s what Mel would have wanted…”
Mo was starting to crack. Olivia looked at the crowd that had gathered to pay their respects. She immediately felt the need to be the strong one that night. Many of her work friends were gathered in the audience, huddling together, shedding tears as they thought about the bubbly girl who sat at the front desk of the wellness center nearly every day. Her eyes continued scanning the room, finding Tyler standing in the corner, Alexander and Carol comforting and supporting him.
