Chapter 26 Maeve
MAEVE
I winced at the sight of my reflection in the mirror in Bram’s bathroom. It had been a week since we’d gotten home from Romania, and while most of the purple had faded, there were still big yellow splotches where my skin was still trying to heal.
“You’re beautiful,” Poe said, kissing me on the head as he walked past me to pee.
Naked, of course,
This was how it was with us now: we all slept together in a rotation of beds that had no rhyme or reason, we ate our meals together, and the Butchers didn’t think twice about peeing in front of me even though I still wasn’t there yet.
A little mystery never hurt anyone, and since they’d seen every inch of my body from pretty much every angle — I had the sore pussy to prove it — the bathroom was kind of my last stand.
“Bailey is going to freak,” I said, leaning in for a closer look.
She’d been pressing for a visit since I’d gotten home, but I hadn’t dared invite her over when my face had been as swollen as a basketball and as purple as a plum.
I’d been able to beg off with not-untrue claims of exhaustion, but finally she’d told me she would be at the loft the next day and I could either call the cops when she climbed the fence or make plans to let me in.
It was something we had in common — not taking no for an answer — so I couldn’t be mad.
“Maybe at first,” Poe said, finishing up and flushing the toilet. “But she’ll get over it once she sees for herself that you’re okay.”
He patted my ass, bare under Bram’s T-shirt (or was it Remy’s?).
I sighed and pulled on leggings, then went to the kitchen to put the pastries I’d made the night before on a serving plate.
It had taken me a couple days to settle into unemployment, but I’d slowly found my way back to the kitchen, not because the Butchers expected me to cook for them but because it was still my comfort mechanism.
For the first time in a long time, I cooked by whim, making whatever sounded good to me that day.
It had been the best way to get my appetite back, and I’d made a vat of homemade spaghetti sauce and crusty roasted garlic bread, simmering pots of soup, two batches of cookies (oatmeal chocolate chip and buttery snickerdoodles), and the flakey raspberry custard pastries — Bailey’s favorite — I’d made for her visit.
I’d just poured some orange juice into a glass pitcher when the intercom buzzed.
I let Bailey in and headed downstairs to meet her at the door.
She was pulling off her coat and scarf when she caught sight of me on the stairs.
She froze, then burst into tears.
“What’s wrong?” Then I remembered my face. I touched a hand to my cheeks. I guess it was worse than I thought.
She threw her arms around me as she stepped off the stairs. “What did he do to you?”
“I’m fine, I promise.” I hugged her back. “I’m a bit beat up but getting better every day.”
She pulled back to look at me. “Jesus, Maeve, no wonder you didn’t want me to come over.”
“It’s not that I didn’t want you to come over,” I said. “I just didn’t want to worry you.”
“I’ve been worried about you for the last year and a half. But definitely don’t go home for a bit. David and Charlotte will lose their shit.”
“Don’t I know it.” I wouldn’t in a million years do that to my parents.
She sniffled. “Also, there’s a cat outside. He seems friendly.”
“He’s a stray,” I said, bending to pick up the bag of cat food I’d had Poe grab at the store. “And he absolutely hates Bram.”
The cat had taken to visiting, rubbing against Poe, Remy, and me, but he hissed like a demon when he saw Bram.
“If you feed him he’ll never leave,” Bailey said.
“I know, but it’s cold, and he’s hungry.” I opened the door. “Give me a sec.”
The cat, a gray and white puffball with matted fur and a giant attitude, was waiting for me on the old loading dock.
“Good morning,” I said, dropping my hand.
He came over and rubbed against me, purring so loud I was surprised Bailey couldn’t hear him from inside.
I poured food into the bowl I’d copped from the kitchen. “Stay warm, mister man.”
He was busy chowing down when I went back inside.
“Come on,” I told Bailey. “I made those pastries you like.”
“The raspberry ones?”
“Those are the ones.”
She followed me up the stairs into the living room. On the other side of the loft’s big windows, Blackwell Falls was nestled into a bed of snow like a picturesque village in a snow globe.
Ray came over to greet Bailey, his tongue lolling out of his mouth, a big goofy smile on his face.
“Hi, Ray,” Bailey cooed, bending over to smoosh his face. “How are you, boy?”
“He’s happy to see you,” I said from the kitchen.
“You’re a good boy, aren’t you Ray?” She straightened and took in the living room. “You still have your tree up.”
“I figured we could use the cheer. Coffee?”
“Please.” She looked around. “Where are the guys?”
“Remy’s down the hall in the gym. Bram and Poe are working.”
“Working huh? What does ‘working’ entail?”
A couple months earlier I might have put her off. Back then, I didn’t think it mattered whether Bailey approved of the Butchers. Now I knew they were in my life to stay — at least I hoped so — and I wanted Bailey to know them at least a little.
I handed her a cup of coffee. “I don’t know the details, but I do know they keep the drug trade and other… unsavory things from being a problem in town.”
“Did you just use the word ‘unsavory’?”
I laughed. “I guess I did.”
“Wow.” She took a sip of her coffee.
“I guess I’ve been hanging around Remy too much,” I said. “He’s a big reader.”
“Really? I wouldn’t have expected that.”
“Why? Because he has tattoos and wears leather?”
She thought about it, which was something I appreciated about Bailey. She wasn’t afraid to question her own preconceived notions, wasn’t afraid to cop to it when she’d been wrong about something.
“I guess so,” she admitted. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be,” I said. “I was as surprised as you when I first moved in here.”
She picked up one of the pastries and put it on a plate. “Thanks for this, seriously. But should you be baking and stuff? You look pretty beat up, Maeve.”
Her tone had turned serious, and I knew this was what she’d wanted to talk about all along.
“You should see the other guy,” I joked.
She didn’t crack a smile. “This isn’t funny.”
“I know.” I rubbed at a smudge on the island’s marble countertop. “I’m just coping however I can.”
“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked.
“Not really.”
“Can you… can you give me the short version of what happened?”
This was hard for her. There had never been a time in my life when she hadn’t known everything.
I took a deep breath. “Ethan Todd kidnapped me and took me to Romania. He kept me in an old dungeon under an abandoned castle, then hunted me until the Butchers found me.”
“Oh my god…”
She asked me some more questions, but there wasn’t a ton to say: it had been terrifying and lonely and I’d wondered if I was going to die there. I told her that Ethan Todd had gotten away, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell her that I’d killed Anton or that Poe had killed Nick.
I wasn’t in denial. I knew it had happened. I just couldn’t afford to dwell on the details.
“Don’t you think you should see someone?” Bailey asked, her pastry forgotten.
“Are you suggesting therapy?” It seemed almost funny to think that a therapist could fix the mess of my life from the comfort of an office.
My life now was concrete and violence, savagery and death.
And love. There was that too.
But the other stuff couldn’t be fixed by someone who didn’t know what it was like to be in it.
“Maybe,” she said. “Or… a doctor at least?”
I could tell that she already thought it was insane that I hadn’t enlisted the help of at least one of those two professionals.
“I’m fine.” I didn’t know how true it was, if someday all the psychic damage I’d suffered would manifest as some kind of epic breakdown, but right now I needed to focus on getting justice for June. “Let’s talk about you. How’s work?”