House of Paine - A Full Length Bad Boy Novel
Read House of Paine - A Full Length Bad Boy Novel Online
Authors: Kylie Walker
Tags: #romantic suspense
HOUSE OF PAINE
By:
Kylie Walker
Table of Contents
Copyright © 2016 By: Kylie Walker
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Kylie Walker holds exclusive rights to this work. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited.
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The brilliant glare of the sun and the vivid colors of the spring day were offensive to Paige. It was as if there was a conspiracy to show her how the world would go on without him. It made Paige angry. The world shouldn’t still be spinning on its axis while her brother lay in a box that currently perched on the shoulders of his comrades as they carried it towards the freshly dug hole in the ground. Paige thought that everything should be as grey and ugly as her emotions. Funerals should never take place in the spring. The air should at least be cold and damp…or foggy. The singing birds and blooming flowers made her angrier than she already was and as she walked through the churchyard like a silhouette of herself she wished that she was as insubstantial as the shadows. Perhaps then her insides wouldn’t be tangled into painful knots. Her mother clutched onto her hand…looking for support Paige felt too weak to give her as the honor guard designee escorted them to the staging area. He turned and saluted them, and then he saluted the casket as the rest of the honor guard carried it towards them. She despised the casket. It was the symbol of why they were here and because she needed something to focus her angst upon, she chose to focus it on the wooden box that cocooned what was left of her brother.
Greg is gone.
The light he brought to the world had been extinguished forever she thought quietly to herself as the tears gently rolled down her cheeks.
They took their seats in one of the white chairs in the front row…the ones that were reserved for family. She could hear her mother’s soft sobs and she could feel her trembling. Paige sat in silent grief and waited for her brother’s funeral service to begin. She was no stranger to grief. She’d only been ten years old when she lost her father. But the grief was buffered back then by the fact that she not only still had her mother…but she had Greg. This felt different. It was stronger…deeper, more painful. She and her brother were always close but the tragedy of losing their father at such a young age forged an even stronger bond between them…one that couldn’t be broken by anything…not even death. Paige lifted her head and watched as the casket was placed in its place of honor.
Then the chief of police said, “Will everyone please rise for the presentation of colors by the New York Police Department Honor Guard. The singing of the National Anthem will be performed by Officer Hayley Barrett.”
Paige gripped her mother’s hand and helped her to her feet. She glanced at her face. She was almost unrecognizable to her daughter. Greg’s death had aged her beyond her forty-five years. She looked sixty-five today at least. Her face was gray and drawn and no trace of the mother Paige knew lived in her eyes at that moment. Paige had a good idea that part of her mother’s grief was also regret. She had never been as close to either of the kids as their father was. His death, instead of bringing them closer to her had pushed them even further apart emotionally. Nevertheless, a parent should never have to bury their child.
It’s unnatural.
Thoughts were swirling so rapidly through Paige’s head that the sound of the National Anthem was like background noise to her. She barely heard it when they were asked to take a seat. Her mother tugged at her hand and she sat down. As the priest was giving the invocation and then the prayer, Paige let her mind wander into the past.
Paige was in her fourth year of medical school at Princeton. She lived with her mother simply because financially while she was in school, it was easier on them both. Greg was in New York. After graduating from the police academy in New Jersey he had worked patrol for about a year before taking the test for detective. Paige knew that her brother had one goal in mind and that was to bring down some of New York’s most notorious drug lords. That was an obsession that had taken root in his mind as a teenager when they had found out the man their mother married controlled most of New York’s drug traffic.
When Greg was twenty-five he got a job with the NYPD in their Vice squad. Within six months he was working undercover. He didn’t give his sister and his mother any details but he sent Paige a text once a month to let them know he was okay. During that first year, she went to New York three or four times and they would spend the weekend hanging out and just having a good time like they did when they were kids. He seemed happy and as long as she saw him happy and healthy and she got his text each month, her world was okay. It was on her last visit to Greg that the bad feeling crept into her soul and took up residence there. She somehow knew instinctively that things were about to change, dramatically.
She arrived on a Saturday morning like she always did and let herself into his apartment with her key. She was met with a shirtless, sweaty, shaky Greg…cocking his gun.
“What the fuck Greg!”
“Shit! Paige, what are you doing here?”
“What are you talking about? I just talked to you three days ago. I told you I was coming. Put that gun the fuck down, will you?”
Greg looked at the gun in his hand like he just realized it was there. Paige was suddenly feeling sick. His hair was greasy and long and he had at least three days growth of hair on his face. He looked like he’d lost twenty pounds since the last time she saw him and along with the shaking and sweating, his pupils were as large as saucers, taking up nearly his entire iris and making his usually pretty eyes look scary.
“Sorry,” he mumbled and went over to the desk in the corner of the room. He sat the gun down and ran a trembling hand through his matted hair.
“Greg? What’s going on?”
She saw his shoulders rise and fall. He was taking a deep breath before he turned around to face her. “Nothing is going on. I was startled, that’s all; Stop being so fucking paranoid. I’m a cop…I own a gun.”
“Yeah, I know. Usually seeing you takes care of that…but you look like shit, Greg. Are you sick?”
“No, I’m just tired. I’m not sleeping well.”
“You’re skinny. Are you eating?”
“I eat. Jeez Paige what’s with the fucking inquisition?”
“I just want to know you’re okay. Look at yourself.”
She looked around the apartment. All of the blinds were drawn but even in the semi-dark she could see that the place was a pig-sty and it had a funny smell.
“Look at this place. What’s going on Greg?”
He looked around the room with a confused look on his face like he had no idea what she was talking about before saying, “I work a lot. I don’t have much time for housekeeping. Let’s go out. Let’s go have a drink.”
“Greg it’s ten a.m.”
“So now you’re the fucking drink police too? That medical school bullshit is going to your head.”
“Greg…”
“You know what Paige? It’s just been a fucked up week, okay? I’ve had a bad week, I’m taking the weekend off and I’d like to relax and not have to explain myself to anyone, let alone my little sister. Maybe we could do this another time.”
“You want me to go?”
“Yeah, I think that would be best. I’m sorry; I just need to get some sleep before I have to go back out there. I need to be alert….”
“Go ahead and sleep. I won’t bother you. I’ll clean up while you…”
“No! No, Paige. You’re not my housekeeper. Please…just go home. I’m fine.”
“You don’t look fine.”
“That’s not what the ladies say,” he said with a grin and a wink. He was trying to pacify her…make her feel better so she would leave. That bad feeling was telling her not to go. If she didn’t know better she might think he was on drugs. He looked like a junkie that was just about to go out looking for a fix. Greg would never use drugs though. He hated them and anyone involved with them. But she had to ask…
“Greg…are you taking something?”
“Taking something?” he said, like he didn’t understand the question.
“Are you using drugs?”
“Fuck Paige! No! I’m a fucking undercover cop.”
“You’re human…you’re around them all the time…”
“Go home, Paige.”
“Greg…”
“No! Go home. I’m fine and I’m not a fucking junkie, okay? Go home and worry about your own life. Mine is fine.”
Nothing about her brother was fine that day. When he was a kid his room was so clean you could have literally eaten off the floors. He always had that kind of obsessive compulsive component to his personality that made him do just about everything with a sort of military precision. He would have never lived in the sty that his apartment had become. He also took a lot of care with his appearance. His dark hair was always styled, his face cleanly shaved unless he happened to be wearing a goatee and then he kept that neatly trimmed. He was always clean…always well-dressed. Everything she had seen that day was contrary to what she knew about her brother. That person was not Greg…she wasn’t going to leave him until she had some answers.
“Let’s just go get something to eat…then if you still want me to go home, I will.” She had to find out what was going on or she’d go back to Jersey and worry herself to death. Greg’s face visibly softened.
“Okay, give me a minute to clean up.”
She forced a smile at him and he disappeared into the bedroom. While he was gone, she’d cleaned up his living room as much as she could. She was on her way to do the kitchen when he came out. He had put on an NYU hat and washed his face. He had on a long-sleeved t-shirt and a pair of jeans…but most notably, he wasn’t shaking. He wasn’t sweating and his whole persona seemed to change. She hated herself for it, but she had to wonder if he’d taken something else while he was in the room…something to take the edge off.
He grabbed her up into a bear hug and said, “I’m really sorry about my attitude. It was a long week and I am wiped out…but I’m always happy to see you. Let’s go eat.”
They went to a nearby diner and although Greg ordered a big breakfast, he didn’t eat much of it. He seemed to be constantly looking around the room, over his shoulder and towards the door. He jumped every time someone dropped so much as a spoon. He went out of his way for the rest of that day to prove to his sister that he was okay but she could see that he was visibly nervous or worried about something.