Finding Ever After (33 page)

           
When I woke up the next morning, my mother’s words, from that day in third
grade, resonated with me. Back then it was just schoolyard bullies, now it was
much bigger than that. Now every choice I made would have harsher consequences
than being sent to the principal’s office or grounded from the TV.

           
I was determined not to hide or run, but I knew that I wasn’t capable of
turning the tables and dishing out that kind of payback, nor did I want to be
capable of it. I sighed with frustration; I was right back where I started last
night, hurt and angry with no way out that I could see.

           
I grabbed my cell phone and saw that not only was it already after nine, but I
had texts from
Vi
and Shane saying they were on their
way over. That was over half an hour ago, which meant they were already here or
would be very soon. I had no doubt that went for Bas as well.

           
I drug myself out of Chris’ big, comfy bed. I almost felt bad that he’d given
it up for me. He probably slept on the couch. I threw a hoodie on over my tank
top, but didn’t bother changing out of my sleep shorts before leaving the
comfort of the quiet bedroom.

           
I groaned thinking that it was too early for me to have to play the voice of
reason to a bunch of amped up alpha males. There would be a lot of arguing. I
just hoped that Bas, Chris and Shane would be on my side. Shane knew better
than anyone, the hell that this could turn into if someone made just one rash
decision.

           
I walked into the kitchen and everyone else was already scattered throughout
the room, sipping from coffee cups and shoveling in various breakfast foods.
There didn’t seem to be much conversation going on, at least nothing serious.
From the looks I got when I walked into the room, I knew that was about to change.
Vi
immediately rushed me and wrapped her arms around
me tightly before I made it any further into the room.

           
She didn’t need to say anything; I felt everything she was trying to tell me.
After she released me, we both grabbed seats around the kitchen table. Danny
and Marcus were also seated at the table with Spade.
Looked
like everyone was going to be in on this.
Bas, Chris and Kyden were
standing around the counter and Ace was digging around in cupboards. Shane was
leaning against the wall just off to the side. At first nobody seemed to want
to be the one to bring up the reason why we were all here, but finally Spade
dove right in, with his usual tactless approach.

           
“So I don’t get why we have to have a meeting to discuss the appropriate course
of action. It’s simple enough to me. I grab my rifle and take the bastard out,
put an end to this.”

           
“I agree. We’ve handled shitheads a lot more dangerous and hard to reach than
this punk.” Ace backed him. I wanted to slam my head down on the
table,
this was going to be fun.

           
“You can’t do that.” I argued.

           
“Why the hell not?
We’re not afraid, and we can do
this without anyone seeing.” Spade countered. “Hell, we’ve done it dozens of
time just on orders, without even knowing the why sometimes. At least this time
it’s with damn good reason.”

           
“This isn’t the same thing, this isn’t some third world country where you’re
gonna
be dropped in and then flown back out. This is
Boston, and it’s illegal.” I pointed out.

           
“So is what he’s doing Princess, and the law isn’t doing a damn thing to stop
it.”

           
“Because they can’t, and you guys can’t do anything either. I won’t let you.” I
told him, meeting his fiery stare with my own.

           
“You
gonna
stop us Princess?”

           
“Knock it off
Ky.
” Chris chimed in.

           
“This isn’t your guys’ fight. This is about me. As much as I appreciate that
you all want to protect me, I will not let any of you sacrifice yourselves, and
that’s exactly what you would be doing if you go after him. No matter how you
guys feel, this is my decision to make. Nobody is killing or dying for me. I
won’t let you put that on me.” They had to listen and understand. I wouldn’t be
able to live with myself if they did that. I didn’t want blood on their hands,
and I didn’t want them to pay for it when they got caught. Not from the cops,
and especially not from my dad.

           
“Fine, so we don’t put a bullet in his skull, we’ll just track him down, wait
until he’s alone, and make him realize how bad of an idea it is for him to come
after you again.” Spade suggested.

           
“I can get behind that.” Danny agreed, and I saw a couple more heads nodding
along with them.

           
“Hey dumbasses, that’s a stupid fucking idea.” Not the most compelling argument
Chris could have made, and it only succeeded in riling the guys up more.

           
“Well it’s a lot better than sitting back and not doing a damn thing about it
like you assholes want to do. How can you be okay with that?” Ace retorted.
Thankfully Bas stepped in before it digressed into a shouting match.

           
“What he’s trying to say, is that you guys haven’t dealt with anything like
this before. Trust me, we get how pissed off you are. You’re forgetting that
Chris and I were the ones who saw her bruised and bloody and had to watch my
dad stitch her up. If you think I didn’t want to break his neck then, and every
day after, then you’re seriously mistaken, but we know what we’re saying when
we tell you it’s a bad fucking move.”

           
“We won’t get caught. We’ll jump his ass and disappear.” Spade disputed. I just
shook my head and looked around in desperation. One by one I took in their
expressions, hoping they weren’t all that single-minded and reckless. Danny.
Marcus.
Ace.
Kyden.
Spade.
They all had the same determined look. Finally my eyes met Shane’s, and I
silently pleaded with him to do something. He straightened up and spoke to
them.

           
“You might not get caught, but that’s
an awfully big risk you’re willing to take on a maybe’s chances and I don’t
think any of you are fully aware of just how great a risk it would be. Connor
might be a sick fuck, but I have no doubt that he’s smart enough to figure out
who would want to protect her. Kicking his ass is an even worse decision than
killing him. Leaving him alive guarantees he comes after you, but either way if
Connor or my Dad decides to come after you, you’re done, and these guys play by
their own set of rules. It’s not just you they’ll come after if they decide
they really want you to pay. You’ve all got people you care about, and you’ll
be putting targets on their backs as well.”

           
Finally, something that sobered them up.
I saw
hesitation and doubt to creep into their features. They couldn’t ignore his
arguments, like they dismissed the rest. It was obvious though, that none of
them were happy about the facts. Kyden still looked down right murderous, but
this time I could tell it was because he had accepted there wasn’t anything he
could do. I doubted that was a feeling he had often.

           
“So then what, we just let him at her again because nobody can do a damn thing
about it?” Kyden growled.

           
“I didn’t say
nobody
. There are two people in this
room who could do something about it.” I caught on to his meaning right away,
and everyone else was close behind me. “My father and I aren’t on the best of
terms, but he wouldn’t come after me, and he wouldn’t go after her either,” he
looked at me when he spoke next. “There’s no way I’d let you have any part of
this, which is why I’ll be handling it.”
Wait, what? No.

           
That’s not what he was supposed to
say. He was supposed to talk them down and that’s it, not volunteer himself.
How could he possibly think that was any better? I mean I know that I briefly
considered it myself last night, but deep down I had known there was no way I
would be able to go through with it. I meant it when I said I didn’t want to be
responsible for any spilt blood.

           
“The hell you will.” I declared. “When I said I didn’t want anyone going after
him, that
meant you too.”

           
“Too damn bad, little sister. The only way for this to stop is for you to go to
Dad, or me to take him out, and since I know that you won’t go to Dad for
help-”

           
“Because it wouldn’t do any good.
He’s just as much
responsible for this as Connor. No matter what you say.
He.
Does.
Not.
Care.”

           
“I know you believe that, which is why I’ll take care of it.”

           
“No-”

           
“Just stop. This isn’t the first time I’ve had to do something like this, and
it’s never mattered as much as it does now. Like your friend said earlier, at
least this time it would be for something, someone, important, and not just
following orders. I can get to Connor like no one else can and he won’t see me
coming. He got a pass before when he shouldn’t have. I should have ended him a
long time ago and I’m not going to make that mistake again. He’s never going to
touch you again.”

           
“But you’ve got a family. You got out.” I tried to remind him. He turned his
back on all of it to give his wife and daughter a better life, to be a better
man and now because of me he was going to throw himself back into the violence.

           
“And I’ll still be out when it’s done, but it is going to be done. So stay here
until I tell you. If you have to leave I want someone with you at all times and
no one tries to get anywhere near Connor.” He looked around the room to make
sure everyone heard and understood him. The man barking out orders and laying
down the rules was the man my father raised to take over. This was a room full
of egotistical and domineering guys, but not a single one of them questioned
Shane.  He looked back at me. “Stay out of the bars and clubs, and you
really shouldn’t be left without at least two people here.”

           
That was that. Shane made the decision, obviously before he even showed up this
morning, and he laid out how it would go. There wasn’t anything I could do to
talk him out of it. Part of me was relieved, because as much as I hated to
admit it, Shane could do this. He could take care of Connor like it was nothing,
but how was me letting him do it any different from me doing it myself? I knew
it would take him a little bit of time to set things up, I just had to hope I
could beg and plead and talk him out of it before it was too late to take
anything back.

           
He was willing to live with taking a life,
lbut
I
wasn’t willing to let him. No matter what he had done for my father in the
past, that’s exactly what it was, his past. Izzy and Lucy were his present and
future and they deserved the Shane who had turned his life around. They
deserved better than a killer. He knew it and I knew it, and I wasn’t sure what
would happen to him if he went through with it, because there was no way that
taking a life wouldn’t change him again.

           
Shane’s words played in my head over and over again. He said there was another
way. It wasn’t the first time Shane had tried to tell me I was wrong about my
dad, and I didn’t believe him any more now than I did the first time he tried,
but I did wonder if maybe I should. If I went to my dad could it really change
anything? Could I save Shane from what he was planning to do and save myself at
the same time by giving my father the chance to prove me wrong? What happened
though if he didn’t, what happened if he proved Shane wrong? Where would that
leave me? If I went to him and he handed me over to Connor, what then?

           
The following two weeks were some of the longest in my life. If I thought I was
being coddled and crowded before, now I was straight up being smothered. I
wasn’t allowed to drive myself to and from work. I couldn’t even hide out in
Chris’ room without someone knocking to check in on me every five minutes, as
if Connor might have
ninjad
up the side of the house,
in the window and abducted me without them hearing anything.

           
I was fine with taking precautions and being safe, but they were taking
overprotective to a whole new level and I was suffocating. On top of that I
still hadn’t talked Shane out of operation
hitman
,
and Kyden was tipping the scale of craziness in my life. He was the worst about
hovering and denying me time to
myself
, but as
obnoxious as it was, he was also being unusually pleasant and that’s what made
me the craziest.

           
He didn‘t balk when I made him sit through hours of chick flicks, which to be
honest I did just to see how far I could push him. Let’s just say that now he
is very familiar with the works of Nicholas Sparks. He didn’t complain once,
which had to be difficult for him.

           
I was also sure that he was responsible for the stock of peanut butter M&Ms
in the house. I even found a package of Nutter Butters sitting on the counter
and strawberry milk in the fridge. He shook his head and sighed, but didn’t say
a word when he watched me devour them. He could have his healthy, sludge
protein shake. Give me the sugar. I guess that‘s why he has the chiseled abs
and mine are slightly less chiseled and a little more . . . soft. I was
definitely in favor of his diet as he had a habit of walking around the house
shirtless. While I didn’t want things to get any more complicated than they
already were, I had no problem looking, and I looked a lot.

           
I probably should have demanded that he remain fully clothed in my presence,
but I knew if I did, I would end up looking at his smug grin instead. No way
was I admitting that seeing his bare chest made me want to lick those abs. Oh
man, I really was losing it if I was thinking about licking any part of him,
but that’s what happens when you spend so much time cooped up with someone so
attractive. You start forgetting all the reasons why your body parts shouldn‘t
ever go anywhere near their body parts.

           
Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you looked at it, he had the
most flexible work schedule of all the guys. He was able to rearrange most of
his music lessons, or have them at the house, which meant he was my designated
babysitter most days. The few times he did have his students over to the house
I sat quietly and listened to them. Two of them were teenage boys and one was a
middle aged woman. He was a really good teacher; patient and funny. It was
another side of him that surprised me.

           
I was still undecided on whether or not spending so much time with him was good
or bad. My stance shifted daily if not hourly. I couldn’t decide whether it was
harder to be his friend when he was being an arrogant, self-centered prick, or
when he was so sweet and charming that I wanted to wrap myself around him and
get lost in his embrace. Both made it difficult and neither left me with
feelings that were strictly friendly.

           
I was also concerned that I was becoming deranged because there were moments
when I was so content around him that I was almost happy about my situation and
the amount of time I got with him. I reveled in the fact that he hadn’t gone
out once during the week. In fact, none of the guys had gone out or done any
partying since our temporary cohabitation began. 

           
Even though my emotions were all over the place with Kyden, I hadn’t wavered
from my decision not to go there. Every time I was in the same room with him I
got those damn flutters in my stomach and my heart rate picked up, but I didn’t
give in. That night at the concert I told myself it wouldn’t be easy and it
wasn’t. My heart wanted to do its own thing, despite what my head told it.
Still I didn’t do anything other than look, and appreciate and okay maybe a
little fantasizing, but that’s it. Even in the moments when I was tempted the
most.

           
Last night was one of those moments. I was curled up on the sofa watching
episodes of Supernatural with Kyden when he grabbed my feet, pulled them into
his lap and gave me the most amazing foot rub. I tried not to look at him and
give away just how affected I was by his touch, but I couldn’t help myself.
Only when I did look over at him and our eyes met, I got the impression that he
was struggling as much as I was with what he wanted. He had this look on his
face, the same one he’d had a few other times when I thought he was going to
kiss me. I was sure that if I just made the decision for the both of us and
crashed my lips into his, he would welcome it, but I didn’t. Then the moment
passed, but the feeling it created inside of me didn’t.

           
He was a drug that I was having a hard time resisting. Nothing made me forget
where it would end if I gave in. The only hope I had of keeping him in my life
was to resist. The moment I gave would not only be the moment I lost respect
for myself, but it would also be the moment I lost him period. Even all of his
mood swings and man whoring couldn’t make me want that. I was clearly a glutton
for punishment or masochist to want to keep going through it.

           
When it came down to it, he was there for me when it really mattered and that
friendship meant more to me than any number of kisses ever could. Even if I was
sure they would be world rocking, heart stopping, leave you panting for more
kisses. I’d had plenty of time to let my imagination run wild and when it came
to his lips and what I thought they would feel like pressed to mine, my
imagination had been working overtime.

           
Like right now, he was standing across from me in the kitchen, in a pair of
athletic shorts and a sleeveless shirt, sweaty from the run he just finished,
chugging an ice cold bottle of water and how I wished for a moment to be that
water bottle.

           
Uhnn
.
I silently groaned in frustration and shook
my head it to clear it.

           
“Problem Princess?” He raised an eyebrow and gave me a smirk that told me he
didn’t need to be a mind reader to figure out the direction my thoughts were
heading in. I didn’t give him the satisfaction of a response. I just picked up
my glass of water and left the room.

           
Marcus, Ace and Spade were in the living room playing Xbox, taunting and
swearing into their headsets as they blasted through their opponents. Even
quiet, shy Marcus had a competitive, foul mouthed side that I only ever saw
come out when he had a controller in hand.

           
“There’s my girl. Get over here Rainbow.” I set my glass on the coffee table
and plopped down on the couch between Spade and Ace. “Here, take the
controller.” Spade tried to hand it off to me.

           
“What? No. I can’t play.” I protested, but it did me little good.

           
“Yes you can, I’m
gonna
teach you.” He grinned like
he thought it was the best idea he’d ever had. Somehow I found myself holding
the controller and attempting to follow his instructions, but I was having a
hard time figuring out the different commands, and kept accidentally tossing
grenades instead of shooting. At one point I called in an air strike when I
simply meant to change weapons.

           
Without Marcus and Ace sticking close to cover me while I got the hang of it, I
would have been dead several times over. Although, I don’t think Ace was real
thrilled when I accidentally shot him because I panicked thinking he was
someone from the other side trying to sneak up on me. However, when the voices
of the other players on our team came over the headsets with all kinds of
comments on my intelligence for shooting my own teammate, and all the other
mistakes I had made, Ace didn’t hesitate to lay into them. In fact all three
guys started yelling through their
mics
in my
defense. It was kind of sweet. The words that came out of their mouths were
completely inappropriate, but still sweet none the less.

           
After a few more rounds my skills improved and I was actually starting to enjoy
myself. I still wasn’t even close to level of anyone else playing, but at least
I wasn’t killing teammates and blowing up things that didn’t need blowing up.
Once Spade felt confident that I had the basics down, he tried to hand the
mic
off to me as well. Up to that point he had kept it on
and done all the trash talking, but apparently it was a vital part of the game
that the guys insisted I experience. He had it attached to my head before I
could really object or stop him.

           
“I don’t know what to say.” I whispered.

           
“Just say whatever you want, first thing that pops into your head.” Spade
instructed, and then the guys proceeded to give me more examples, none of which
I could ever bring myself to repeat about someone’s mother, nationality or
sexual preferences.

           
“I can’t say those things, that’s really mean and messed up.” I argued. “
Oooh
nice shot.” I spoke into the
mic
.
Even though the guy wasn’t on my team, he took Marcus out just like that, and
none of us saw him. There was some chuckling from guys on the other team when
Ace scolded me for commending the guys who shot Marcus.

           
“Princess, what were they thinking giving you a
mic
?”
I glanced to the right to see Kyden standing in the hall outside the bathroom
in nothing but a towel, still dripping from the shower.
Holy
freakin
nearly naked man Batman
. He was going to be the
death of me. I was pretty sure my heart stopped. Didn’t matter how many times I
saw that physique, it was a beautiful sight every time, and I couldn’t pull my
eyes away from it.

           
Hard planes, defined muscles, sprawling ink, the fine trail of hair that
disappeared beneath the towel and the ‘V,’ oh that ‘V.’ Something about it on a
guy makes a girl shudder every time, or at least me. I was so caught up in
gawking that it was no surprise when I was taken out by a knife without even
getting a shot off. I knew I was
pathetic,
no need to
point it out, but that didn’t stop the three guys sitting around me from
letting me hear it. Thankfully they waited until after Kyden had winked and
then disappeared behind his bedroom door with a grin on his face.

           
“Damn girl, I thought we were going to have to restrain you to keep you from
going over there and licking all the water off him like he was a fucking oasis
in the middle of the desert.” Spade teased, and the other two snickered right
along with him.

           
I just groaned, set the controller aside and buried my face in my hands.
“Someone should probably just put me out of my misery.” I whined, finally
looking up to face their amused expressions.

           
“Nah don’t worry about,
ain’t
the first time we’ve
seen that look, and honestly you’re the only one who’s ever held out.” Ace
tried to assure me, but it really didn’t do much good. I felt like I was
seconds away from crumbling, pride and morals be damned. I needed something to
take my mind off naked Kyden just a couple doors down from me, more shooting
and blowing stuff up would have to suffice.

           
The guys, thankfully, didn’t give me any more crap about him and were happy to
continue instilling me with battle skills and trash talking. That part I never
really got the hang of, it’s just too mean, even if it is just part of the
game. That doesn’t mean I didn’t manage to get myself in a little bit of
trouble with the
mic
and guys from the opposing side
though.

           
NightShade
: I’ve played with Spade before and I don’t
remember his voice sounding like a hot chick.

           
SpadeBringer
(me): He’s teaching me how to play. This
is my first time.

           
KillSwitch
: I’ll to teach you how to play.

           
NightShade
: So you’re obviously not Spade, what’s
your name?

           
SpadeBringer
: Jaxyn.

           
NightShade
: That’s hot. You’ve got a hot voice too
Jaxyn.

           
SpadeBringer
:
Ummmm
thanks.
I think.

           
KillSwitch
: Is Spade your boyfriend Jaxyn?

           
SpadeBringer
: No, he’s just a friend.

           
KillSwitch
: Do you have a boyfriend?

           
SpadeBringer
: Uh no. I don’t.

           
NightShade
: I’ll be your boyfriend. I bet you’re
smoking. Anyone else know this girl? Is she smoking?

           
XAcesX
(Ace): Yeah she is. (He grinned and winked at
me.)