CHAPTER 28 FIZ
FIZ
I feel like a total shitdick for not telling Caden what happened with Elodie and Rosco.
It’s eating away at my fractured soul. I tell him everything, literally everything.
But for some reason, some faint, logical part of my brain is telling me it’s not worth what would happen.
And that’s me saying that. The way I see it, Rosco and Elodie shouldn’t have any more run-ins, whatever happened between them shouldn’t rise back to the surface now she’s with Caden.
I’m thinking long term. Rosco is the masked man’s right hand.
I tell Cade that something went down with them two, Cade will do something drastic, like kill him just for speaking to her and making her cry, then what – Drago comes after him?
Makes the Blackwood business crumble? All because of a chick that doesn’t even like him.
Not worth it. I’m doing it for him. For all of us.
It has nothing to do with Elodie asking.
Nothing to do with the desperation that was in her eyes.
The sadness. Nope, it’s the wise thing to do.
Although, spending all day with him while he pries me for information on her makes it so much more difficult to avoid. He knows I’m not telling him the whole truth, and that’s what rips me apart inside. But I’m still holding strong. There’s no point.
Maggie alerts us for dinner, and we head upstairs from the basement. It’s dinner already? Why aren’t Alf and Elodie back yet?
I can tell Caden’s thinking the same thing. He’s had a grimace fixed to his face all day. He must have really needed the space to openly suggest Alf spend the day with her. The kid’s lovesick, caught between a rock and a hard place. It’s hilarious.
As we sit down to eat, Alf marches through the door.
“Oh, good, I’m starving,” he says casually.
Bruiser walks off in the other direction where his dinner’s waiting for him, and Elodie goes to walk straight through to the hallway.
“Uh, excuse me, miss lady,” I call. “Your dinner’s ready.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Get your ass back here,” Alf calls and my eyes fly to Caden, whose face remains impassive as he looks from Alfie to Elodie.
She huffs from the kitchen and turns around. “I’m not hungry. We didn’t eat long ago.”
“We ate hours ago. Come and eat your dinner.”
I stare in silence. He’s not being aggressive, but there’s certainly some tension there between them. Oh, goody.
I mentally rub my hands together as Elodie reluctantly joins us at the table.
“So, how’s your mum?” I say, sounding aloof as excitement bubbles up. I will find out all their drama today.
“She’s good. Better than I thought, actually. She’s back to her normal routine, basically.” Alfie shoves some food in his mouth.
“And you?” I turn my attention across the table to Elodie. “How was your afternoon? What did you think of the almighty Debbie Blackwood?”
Elodie smiles despite herself, her defiant scowl dissolving. “She’s lovely. I had a wonderful day.”
Her gaze slips over to Alf, and I can’t decipher what passes between them, but the air thins out a bit.
“Good, she’s a top tier woman, that one,” I say.
Elodie picks up her fork and pushes around her peas.
“Eat, El,” Alfie says, softer than before. “Please.”
He’s apologising. Did he snap at her? He’s clearly trying to fizzle out the tension.
Elodie looks at him for a moment, then sighs, scooping up some veg and stuffing it into her mouth.
Alfie relaxes beside me.
“So,” Caden says casually, “what did you two get up to?”
Elodie stiffens at that. “Nothing. We just sat in the garden, talking.”
I exchange a sceptic look with Caden.
“That’s all?” he says.
“That’s all,” Alfie says.
Elodie bites her lip.
Oh, this is too good. Something juicy went down. I need to know.
“Did you fuck?” I say outright.
Elodie gasps, Alfie gives me a backhand to the shoulder.
“No! Don’t be ridiculous,” he spits.
“Then what is going on between you two?” Caden says coldly.
Alfie shoves his chair back and abruptly stands. “I’m tired. Goodnight.” He storms away.
I haven’t seen him this uptight in a long time.
Both of us turn our attention to Elodie.
“Well?” Caden demands.
“Well, what?”
“Why is he like that?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Don’t bullshit me. You pissed him off.”
Elodie’s mouth falls open in outrage. “Me? Of course, I get the blame for fucking everything!”
Caden leans back in his chair, fist curling tight on the table.
“Alfie’s got the patience of a saint. He certainly has with you.
You’ve done something to upset him. You don’t know us yet, Elodie,” Caden says, eyes darkening, “but there are some things you certainly should know. You do not want to push Alfie too far.”
She freezes at this, looks at him, then me. “Why? What happens?”
My whole body goes cold. This was not a conversation I thought we’d be having tonight.
I sigh. “We all have bad tempers, I’m sure you know that much by now, princess. But… with Alfie…” I sigh again, not knowing the right words.
Caden hops back in. “He’s a goddamn bomb, alright?
And he hates that he is. So we need to keep him calm.
You know he’s a recovering addict and every day is a battle to stay clean.
” He raises a finger to point at her. “And if you ever… ever push him over the edge, do anything to break his self-control, we’ll have big fucking problems.”
She bites down on her lip. “Nothing happened tonight.”
“Clearly something did,” I say, throwing an arm towards the door Alfie stormed away through.
“No, seriously, nothing happened,” she mutters, cheeks glowing bright red. “I may have overstepped. I flirted a little, and he didn’t like it. That’s all.”
My eyes flash to Caden, who remains stoic, but I catch the tightening of his jaw.
“Shouldn’t come as a surprise,” Caden says, low and threatening. Full of venom. “You’re desperate to jump on his cock.”
Elodie’s face screws up. “Yeah, anyone’s but fucking yours!” She jumps to her feet. “You don’t have to worry about it, anyway, Alfie made it quite clear he doesn’t like me. It won’t be happening again.”
I can almost taste the bitterness of rejection in her words, see the shame in her blue eyes.
She goes to walk off, and I grab her arm as she passes. “Anyone but him, aye? Does that mean I have a chance?”
“Urgh!” She yanks her arm out of my grip and kicks me in the thigh. It’s a brutal blow and sends pain shooting up to my stomach, but I can’t help the chuckle rumbling from me.
“No,” she yells at me, “I’d sell my soul to the devil himself before I went anywhere near you.”
Caden rises to his feet slowly. “You already have, princess.”
Her eyes grow wide and I see the tears fill them. “Fuck you. You’re worse than the devil.”
She runs towards the door.
“Sure am,” he calls after her, “and I’ll rip your fucking soul to shreds!” But she’s already gone.
He drops back down. I rub my thigh vigorously. “She’s a warrior, that one.”
Caden rubs his eyes roughly. “God, she is exhausting.”
“I like her.” I stare at the door where she scrambled. “I really fucking like her.”
***
The house has been quiet since then. Alfie still follows Elodie about, but there’s a stiffness between them now.
He trains her without a smile, she eats without a single word.
It’s been awful. She hasn’t even bitten back at any of my inappropriate comments, and when I’ve grabbed or smacked her ass in passing, she just ignores me. How rude.
Caden’s as tightly wound as possible, wrapped in barbed wire so sharp you can barely go near him without getting pricked.
I can understand it, everything around him is out of his control, he cannot get a handle on this girl.
He can’t leash her. And that’s not something Caden’s used to.
I definitely can’t tell him about Rosco.
We’ve got four days left until The Hunt, and he’s running on less than a hair trigger now.
I will not be responsible for snapping it.
But it doesn’t mean it’s not tearing me the fuck up inside keeping it from him.
Anyway, I can finally get away from this suffocating environment. We’ve got a good distraction today, I’m the lucky sod Cade’s taking on this extra excursion with, by order of Drago. Accompanied by Sarge and Bob, who are currently in the backseats.
It’s an in-and-out job. Some fuckers robbed one of his properties, a shitload of gold stolen, and we’re the suckers who get to go get it back, for a cut of that hefty gold, of course.
Caden’s been extra quiet these past few days, and I’ve tried to get him to talk about it on several occasions, but he’s locked himself up in that head of his and whacked a big old KEEP OUT sign on it.
But we’ve got a bit of a drive ahead of us, so I’m trying again.
“Do you think Elodie’s old man will come to the wedding?”
Caden shrugs, switching the music to some Iron Maiden. “Hope the fuck not.”
Blunt. Annoying.
“Surely not, right, if he hates her so much. I’m surprised he bothered to show up to the dinner.”
“Probably nosey enough to see if I’d broken her, or she’d broken me.”
I chuckle. “Both are equally likely.”
He lets out a quiet grunt.
My patience snaps. “Come on, Cade, talk to me, brother.”
“About what?” He flashes me a frown.
“Whatever bullshit is up there turning you into this reserved, mute weirdo.”
He licks his teeth, then bites his lip.
I wait impatiently.
“I’m finding it very hard to adjust to this whole relationship shit,” he says finally. “It’s confusing and it’s tiring.”
“Okay,” I say, dragging it out, urging him to go on.
He huffs, raking his fingers through his hair. “I’m seriously debating letting her go.”
My jaw drops. “What? Why the fuck would you do that?”
He shakes his head. “She doesn’t want to be here, Fiz, she’ll never want to be here. Sure, I can keep her here, it’ll be easy, but what life is that? What’s the point? To have someone by your side every day you know full well doesn’t want to be there? That shit’ll wear you down eventually.”
He’s feeling rejected. He’s feeling unwanted. He’s feeling.
Holy shit. My emotionally unavailable best friend is catching feelings.
I shake it off. “Once you win the bet, you’ll wear her down. You got that irresistible charm when you want to, Cade, you haven’t exactly shown her that yet.”
Caden sighs. “Because she’s a fucking brat.”
I chuckle. “While that may be true, she’s got spunk. She’s got intelligence, she’s got beauty, she’s got potential. Why don’t you step out of that little egotistical superior box and try to get to know her?”
“Because there is order in this world. There’s a hierarchy and there’s respect. She ranks low, and as for respect…” He shakes his head. “Girl doesn’t know the meaning of the word. She’s so not what I want. What I need.”
“Oh, Cadie.” I reach over and slap him on the shoulder.
“I think she’s exactly what you need.” He glances over at me again and I see the bewilderment in his eyes.
Bless him. “I’ll tell you when you’re older.
” I wink at him, and he rolls his eyes. “For now, just focus on winning the bet and tying her to your life forever. Let her in, Cade. Trust me. It’ll pay off. ”
He grunts, and I let his shoulder go. The guy has the emotional intelligence of a slug and it’s adorable. He’s feeling all the feels and he’s scared. Murdering some people today is exactly what he needs. He can exorcise some of the pent-up frustration in a healthy way.
We pull up to the location a while later and we load up, both of us conjuring our no-nonsense-all-business demeanour that always gets my dick hard.
Caden leads the way to the house, and once we’re inside, my stomach falls. Shit. Well… the more the merrier, right? What could go wrong?