CHAPTER 11 ELODIE #2
Alfie looks up at me, offers me a kind smile. “Sometimes, holding onto something like that is worse for you. He probably did you a favour by making you stop. You could have driven yourself crazy by now. It’s better for your peace to let it go.”
I won’t tell him, but I already went crazy.
Every minute that I could, I spent it working at the computer, trying to find anything to help me find his murderer.
I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat. I obsessed.
Part of me still does. Part of me still believes there’s someone out there to be caught.
I don’t care if I’m the only one who believes it.
There was a moment, after I discovered I was marrying Caden, where he was staring at me from the foot of the bed, that I contemplated asking him what he thought.
He lost his brother to the same fire, after all.
I knew of the Blackwoods at the time. I had seen that Max Blackwood died on the same day in a warehouse fire because of a faulty explosive.
I wanted to know if the Blackwoods looked into it.
But then everything else happened, Caden assaulted me, his treatment of me has only got worse since then.
I decided I don’t care about Caden or his brother.
It doesn’t matter what they do or don’t know about it, it won’t have anything to do with Lewis.
I’m on my own. I doubt I could talk to Caden about anything like that, anyway.
I turn back to the screen. “I won’t ever feel peace again.”
“Alright, Miss Negative Nellie.”
I huff a laugh despite myself. “You preach peace – you got any?”
There’s a moment of silence. “I try.”
I print off the coordinates and walk over to Alfie. “You ever had to let something go? Even when you thought you couldn’t?”
He gets to his feet, his tall and wide build towering over me. “You have no idea.” His eyes glaze over with a dark memory I’m not sure I want to bring to the surface.
Instead, I tinker with the question that’s been playing on my tongue since we started talking in here. “Hey, Alfie…”
He locks his eyes with mine. “Yes?”
“Do you think it’d be okay to use the computer to continue my search? Now I have access again… and I haven’t got Dad beating on me for doing it…”
“Do you think it’s a good idea? Don’t you think if there were someone to find, you would have found them before?”
I sigh. “I have to try. For Lewis…” I look off to the side. “I have to try.”
I can’t give up on him. I can never give up on him.
I can feel Alfie studying me; he can probably see the silver lining my eyes. The desperate plea there.
I dare to peer up at him.
His comforting smile allows me to take a breath. “If it will make you happy… I don’t think it’d be a problem. But you know what I’m going to say, right?”
I resist the urge to roll my eyes. “As long as I behave.”
“Good girl.” The praise sends a lightning bolt of heat slicing through me. “Show Caden you can be good, and I’m sure he’ll say yes.”
I try not to look too hopeful despite the balloon of hope swelling up inside me. I lift the papers. “Well, those are the coordinates.”
After Drago’s minions drop off the load to these buyers, Drago sends in soldiers to bribe the buyers for more money. It’s brilliant, really, we make double on each transaction. With each click of the mouse, I get a little closer to freedom.
The only downfall is working so close to him.
Albeit indirectly, but he’s still there, on the other side of each job, breathing down my neck in my consciousness.
That imposing body, those thick, overbearing hands.
The man screams power. The most feared masked man on the internet is top of the food chain.
He’s untouchable, untraceable, unstoppable.
We’re lucky, really, that he took a liking to us… well, me, I guess. I’m the reason this whole fucking system works. He liked my brain, among other things. Otherwise, the Valors wouldn’t have come back from that destitution. We’d be on the streets right now, or in prison.
I doubt these men know of my true involvement.
How this business deal really happened. We’re all here today because of me.
Not that I’m chomping at the bit to brag about it.
Hasn’t really worked out that great for me so far.
Especially since Caden’s made it crystal clear how he feels about sluts.
I dread to think what he’d do or say or how he’d treat me if I confirmed anything.
I can’t help but wonder how close Caden is to Drago, his foreboding words clanging around in my memory.
If Drago said the word, would Caden hand me over without even blinking?
The sharp memory of the masked man makes me shiver.
Alfie scratches the back of his head. “Guess your day is done then.”
I shrug. “Back to the bedroom I go.”
I go to walk out the room, but he grabs my wrist and pulls me back.
I’m brought into his body, my eyeline only reaches the top of his chest. The heat emanating from him sends shivers down my spine. I’ve never been this close to a man without him doing something filthy seconds later.
But all Alfie does is bring a crooked finger under my chin and tilts it up to meet his gaze. I wonder if he can feel the tremor in it as he holds my face up to him.
There’s a shimmer in his eyes, something hungry but hesitant. I don’t know how he does it, perhaps it’s just his sheer kindness, but he completely disarms me, like he’s the safest person in the world.
“I was thinking,” he says, his deep voice quiet and gravelly, “have dinner with us tonight. As much as I’ve enjoyed having you all to myself and no headaches from the other two, it’s important you get along with everyone.
This is your home now, it’s only right you build a relationship with those who live in it.
One of whom you’re actually supposed to be marrying. ”
The idea makes bile rise in my throat. “I don’t want to be around either of them.”
His other hand comes up and brushes some hair out of my face.
He’s done a good job with that, too. Each bath time he’s given me some fancy conditioner to work out the matted knots still entangled there.
He hasn’t washed it himself since that first time, but he sat and brushed through it after each wash.
It was terrifyingly intimate but wasn’t so hard to endure.
As a result, my hair’s nearly back to how it used to be months ago.
It’s enlivening, the way he touches me. The way he treats me like I’m some delicate thing, even though I have the resilience of a cockroach. I curl my hands at my sides to keep from touching him back.
“I’ll be there. I won’t let anything happen. Nothing will anyway. Dinner is a peaceful event. It’s just food. And you’ve done well in that area. You’re ready for a proper meal now.”
I drop my eyes. “Why couldn’t it have been you I marry?”
He chuckles, his breath blowing in my face. It’s hot and minty. Homely. “You do not want to marry me, El, trust me. I’m just doing a job.”
I peer up at him. “So, all this.” I gesture to his hands holding me. “Is just a job? It’s all fake?”
“I won’t lie and say you’re not enticing as hell, but yes. It’s just a job. My responsibility to take care of you. You’re not my fiancé. We don’t know each other.”
I push away from him, head hung in humiliation. I jumped the gun too fast. Stupid me, so desperate for some affection. Something I’ve never had the pleasure of experiencing in all my twenty-one years.
“El,” he says as I turn my back on him.
I carry on walking and he trots behind me. “I’ll be at dinner. Just… leave me alone.”
I’m surprised he lets me go, his presence behind me fading as I rush to the bedroom.
What a fucking joke I am. How starved of human contact am I?
I don’t know that man, but he gives me a couple of meals, some brushes through my hair, and some biscuits and I’m all over him like a fly on shit.
I’m no better than those four-legged brutes downstairs.
I fall onto the floor and let my body sink into the carpeted wood.
I still need to complete several transactions to make the money I need to get the fuck out of here.
Now with this new job, I can add my official cut to that amount.
I’ve never had an official cut of anything, Dad never gave me a penny, that’s why I did what I did on the dark web.
When my dad blew all our money, I kept this account secret.
I came up with the Drago partnership in order to make more money for myself.
I never planned to stay and work for him.
Or my father. I just want enough money to get the hell out of here.
My target’s a hundred grand. A hundred grand to get me on a plane, halfway across the world and away from all these creeps and monsters.
With this new job, plus the extra tiny fraction I’m stealing from the others, it won’t take me long.
When this deal was made, I said to myself this was the plan. These people are so stinking rich they won’t notice a grand – or five – missing from their cuts. I bet they don’t even check their accounts. They won’t miss it.
I’m so close. Every job I do, I’ll get closer. But these jobs don’t come in every day. I have to have patience. Which seems almost impossible now. On my first day here, I was fondled by two out of three guys. If I stay here longer than absolutely necessary, what the fuck will they do to me?
If they let me walk out the door tonight, I’d take the money I have and run with it.
But that won’t happen. I’m a prisoner here as much as at my dad’s house.
So, I need to make the best of it. Maybe I could even behave a little and keep them off my back.
As long as they don’t fucking molest me again.
Dinner should be fun.