47. Talon
forty-seven
Talon
I had come to expect the unexpected when in regards to my brother’s life and his girl. For example, I certainly had not expected for him to lead me into their backyard and show me the coop he had built and filled with thirty laying hens. If someone had asked me if I would ever see my punk ass little brother tending to chickens and educating me on things like bumble foot, I would have laughed in their faces. Yet here we were, standing in the middle of a covered chicken run, while he introduced me to Cluck Norris. Yeah. Apparently, they named all of them.
And yet, even preparing myself for the unexpected, I still was not ready when Birdie flung open the door to the chicken run, stomped up to me and slapped me with so much force my face flew to the side.
“You absolute son of a bitch!”
Milo, ever the loyal brother, immediately jumped to Birdie’s side and inspected the hand she now held tucked to her heaving chest. “Baby,” he cajoled, tugging at her hand. “What is it, what happened?”
“Nothing!” she snapped, shooting daggers at me. I held my cheek in confusion, taken aback by the sheer force the woman had put into the slap. “Nothing except for what I said. Your brother is an absolute son of a bitch. You !” she shouted at me, pointing her finger with menace. “You are an asshole!”
“I know!” I shouted back, feeling the need to say something, even if it meant agreeing with her. “I know. But what did I do this time?”
Milo held her still but still Birdie lunged. “How could you use Cara against her like that? She trusted you!”
The gut punch was worse than her slap. I fell back a step, one of the chickens— Hennifer Lawrence? Rotisserie Cullen? Who the hell knows?—squawked as they narrowly dodged my boots, a fuss of clucks and feathers floating up around me. So, she really hadn’t told Birdie about Cara. It didn’t matter because she had told her now, and the brunette was spitting mad.
“I don’t…I just…” Words wouldn’t form in my mouth the way they were supposed to, guilt and shame tying my tongue.
“It doesn’t matter.” She stood straight now, balling her fists at her sides. She’d gone eerily calm, her gaze shooting through me like a laser. “Because you’re going to apologize.”
“She doesn’t want to see me.” A pathetic excuse.
“I don’t give a shit. You are going to grovel and you are going to plead and you are going to apologize. Because I’m with your brother and if you don’t make up for how you hurt my best. Fucking. Friend. ” She punctuated each word with a sharp jab to my chest. “Then I will make your life a living hell. Do you understand me? Until the day you’re in your grave, I will torment you for how you have hurt her.”
Milo’s chest shook with laughter he barely held at bay before putting up a hand like a white flag. “I’d listen to her, man. These women are fierce about each other. If I remember correctly, Misely gave me a very similar threat when I first started hanging around Bird.”
I gaped between the two of them, at a loss. I wanted to apologize. I’d wanted to apologize the moment the words left my mouth. But more than that, I’d wanted to keep her safe. If I went to her now, I’d be putting her at risk, again . Especially now that a decision had been made. I hadn’t told Milo yet, but I’d accepted the offer to at least have a conversation with the detective overseeing Milo’s case against Kyle.
Leo’s safety was the priority, above all else. If we couldn’t come to an agreement ensuring that he and his family would be okay in all of this, the deal would be scrapped and I’d have to figure something else out. And after receiving yet another call from Kyle warning me that I was running out of time, I felt like I was covered in fire ants. There was no way that he still had eyes on Leo, but if something didn’t give soon, Kenna would take them back home. Right back into the waiting clutches of Kyle.
“You gotta apologize, brother,” Milo said, softer. “You’ll never forgive yourself if you don’t.”
Grinding my teeth together, I ran a hand through my hair. “What am I even supposed to say to her?”
Birdie, who had not softened in the slightest, pulled her lips into an evil smirk. “I don’t know, and I don’t care, but I’d hurry. It sounded like she had company when I spoke to her. Of the male variety.”
It was two in the morning when my plane touched down in Chicago. I’d paid an inordinate amount for all the baggage I brought back with me—both mine and everything Misely left—and struggled to get it all loaded into a cab once I’d landed.
The plan had been made hastily and was poorly thought through—I’d show up at her apartment and beg her to forgive me. That was it. That was the plan. It seemed simple enough until I was standing in the dreary cold of Chicago, waiting for someone to open the door to her apartment building because I was too much of a pussy to ring her buzzer.
Finally, a custodian emerged from around a hall corner, his mop bucket rolling along with him. Banging on the door, I prayed he noticed me over whatever he had playing on his headphones. When he finally did, he cocked an eyebrow, uncovering one ear and poking his head out the door without fully opening it.
“You lost or somethin?”
My first instinct was to say something insulting, letting my aggravation and anxiety reveal itself. Instead, I forced back my retort and gave a self-deprecating chuckle instead.
“Not exactly. This is my girl’s place, she lives upstairs. We just got back from a trip. I came down to get the rest of our bags but forgot the keys and I think she might already be asleep.”
The man eyed me and then the bags. “Who’s your lady?”
“Misely Fisher, in 4D.”
His eyebrows shot up in recognition before he schooled his features again. “Didn’t realize that one had settled down. She gets so many… visitors .”
I had to reign in the rage, gritting my teeth. Despite my burning jealousy, it only served to piss me off that this fucking nobody had the audacity to judge her. Technically she was a single woman, she could have as many visitors as she wanted. Before me anyway. Not anymore. “And that’s all they are. Visitors. Look, can you let me in or not? I don’t want to wake her up, but I will. And then I’ll get her landlord’s number and let your boss know you’re making inappropriate comments about the tenants.”
All a bluff. I’d rather beat him into the pavement than report him to management.
He must have recognized that because his cheeks lost some color and he stepped back, pushing the glass door open further to let me through with the six billion rolling bags. Now that I was in though, there was any point in maintaining my total restraint. Grabbing the asshole by the front of his shirt, I slammed his back against the wall behind him.
“If I ever hear you so much as whisper another word about Misely, I’ll make you swallow your teeth. Got it?”
His nod was frantic and panicked, but I didn’t let myself enjoy it. Forcefully I released him, grabbing the bags and jabbing my finger into the elevator’s Up button. It took several moments to get all of the bags into the cab of the elevator with the dickhead janitor holding an arm across the door sensor to keep it from sliding shut, but eventually I made it up to her floor.
Just like when she’d shut me out at Milo’s, my fist hovered over the door, nerves keeping me from following through with the knock. Taking a breath, I let myself remember the soft smile Misely wore the last morning we woke up together before reaching Oregon, let myself envision waking up to that every morning. Steeling my spine, I lifting my fist again, ready to find out one way or another if that would be something she’d want, when I was stopped mid-knock by the sound of Misely’s raised voice on the other side.