Chapter 10 #2
Tonight, after my family retired to their own wings of the house, I snuck down to the staff quarters to check on Sarah.
It was stupid. I feel like a weak fool for doing it, a weak fool is what father will call me when he finds out.
But as I approached the kitchen I could hear her whimpering cries.
I followed the sounds to the kitchen and found her on her back on the table, Charles’s hand over her mouth.
I knew my brother did these things, but knowing it and seeing it was very different.
She wasn’t fighting him, and I could see her eyes were so empty.
I knew that look. I wore it whenever I took a beating.
Just switched off my brain until it's over.
I don’t know what I was thinking but I ran at him, knocking him to the ground with full force. I had every intention of beating the shit out of him but when I raised my fist, I couldn’t do it. The bastard started to laugh. He threw me off him and I let him.
“You’re pathetic, Alfie,” he sneered at me before looking at Sarah who was fixing her clothes. “Sarah, go up to my room. Kneel on the floor. Don’t even think about getting on my bed.”
I stood up, putting myself between them but the blow came quickly and took my breath away. I hit the floor and forced my muscles to go limp as he stomped on me and hit me. When he was done, he crouched over me. I’m never going to forget his next words. Not ever.
“Unless you’re planning to join in, don’t ever interfere in my games again. I’ll kill you, little brother and no one in this family will bat an eye because you’re weak. You’re worthless and no one will ever want you.”
I feel sick thinking about that threat. It wasn’t idle. The deadness in his eyes told me he meant it.
Elliot, my father’s goon, had interrupted us.
I wondered how long he’d been standing there.
Watching like he always did. “Sir, your father has asked to see you,” he said to Charles.
For a second I thought Charles might argue, but he didn’t.
He gave me another sneer and stalked out.
I’d pulled myself to a stand when Elliot turned back and said in a low voice.
“I’ll keep him busy. Get her out of here. ”
I stared at him in shock. I still don’t know what game he was playing.
He was my father’s paid Pit Bull, and he’d never helped me before.
I didn’t dwell on it though. I told Sarah to get her things and meet me at the service entrance but she argued, said she needed the job, she didn’t have any money. I said I’d figure something out.
Without another word, I ran into my room and scanned it.
I needed something of value. I didn’t have cash.
The room was full of trinkets she could take but all of them belonged to my parents.
Getting her out of here would get me in enough trouble.
I didn’t need to steal from them too. I was panicking when my gaze landed on my violin, safely resting in its case.
It’s cheap for a violin, only worth five grand or so, but I’d bought it with my own money.
I grabbed it and ran. I found her at the service entrance, terrified and trembling. I stuffed the violin into her hands.
“Take this and sell it. Get any other job, just get away from here. Go.” That was all I had time to say.
She left. Disappeared into the night. That was twenty minutes ago and by the approaching footsteps I can hear, I’m guessing Charles has figured out what I’ve done. I can’t say I care that much. It was worth it. Besides, once you’ve taken one beating, each one after that gets easier. In fact, I
The words cut off there and I don’t want to imagine what happened next. If reading it was this hard for me, how much harder had it been for Alfie to live it?
My stomach roiled as I read, turning over with each new page.
I wanted to reach into the pages and pull Alfie away from those hideous people.
I wanted to yell at his mother to love him, to protect him so that he could grow up healthy.
These people were just as responsible for the shrapnel in my chest as Alfie was.
So much more about him made sense now, and yet, I didn’t understand why he thought I would hate him if I learned about his past, so that must mean that there were far more nefarious secrets hidden in these journals.
My body was tired but my mind was suddenly beyond sick of being in the dark.
I grabbed the next journal and poured through it, skimming over the pages as he turned 19, 20, and 21.
Each entry a new tale of debauchery, woman after woman.
Each one a bitter arrow to my heart. Knowing he had a past and reading about it in excruciating detail were two very different things.
I read on until my eyes burned and dawn broke.
I stayed up all night until I was sad and frustrated.
I knew nothing different than what I’d already known, just more pain, more drugs, more women.
I found myself angry with Alfie, angry that he had dumped this in my lap to deal with alone.
I sat in my bed surrounded by his fucked up memories as I made a decision.
I wasn’t going to read another page. I was done with it.
I packed up the books and sent a text to Elliot. The sun was rising when he arrived an hour later. I met him at the door, the chest at my feet.
“I want you to take me to Alfie.”
“Of course,” he answered immediately. We sped through the waking streets of London, from the parts I was familiar with, to the upscale area codes that would never be in my price range.
We finally came to a stop outside of a building so sleek it looked like it was made of glass.
I stepped out of the car, looking up at the chrome lettering. Tell Company LTD. Holy crap.
“Miss?”
“Is he working?” I glanced at Elliot who was grabbing the chest out of the boot, “Maybe I shouldn’t bother him if he’s working.” It was barely 6am. I hadn’t thought about the time. “I didn’t expect him to be at work this early.”
“He’s been here all night, Miss.”
I wondered when the all-nighters had started. He had never done that when we were together.
“Then maybe I shouldn't interrupt him.” I was suddenly uncertain of whether this was a good idea or not.
“His orders are that, where you’re concerned, he is to be contacted immediately, day or night.”
“But—”
“Day or night, Miss. Besides, I’ve already told him you’re coming. If I don’t take you up there, there’ll be hell to pay.”
“He’ll come and blow my house down, you mean.”
“No, Miss,” he chuckled. “He’ll be upset with himself and I don’t need him punishing himself more than he already is.” He headed for the building, leaving me to follow him.
Elliot used a key card and code to get inside, and a bored-looking security guard sitting behind the desk gave us a disinterested nod as we passed.
It was eerily quiet, like being in a shopping centre after hours.
I imagined this place at 9am, bustling. I hated the thought of Alfie spending all night here by himself.
We entered the lift and, twenty six floors later, we stepped off.
He led me down a glass-walled hall and several turns later, we arrived at a clouded glass office.
A familiar scent hit my nose, a perfume it took me a moment to place.
“Is Angie here?”
“He sent her home when he found out you were coming.”
That was a relief. I pictured them together, working late, her sitting way too close to him.
I smiled to myself. It embarrassed me that I used to compare myself to her and think she suited him so much better than I did.
On paper, she did, but in reality, she was just more of the materialistic narcissism that already engulfed him.
I didn’t bother to knock and simply opened the door and strode in. Alfie was at the head of a glass boardroom table. Behind him were stands holding blueprints and schematics, the table was scattered with more of the same.
“Lola,” his silken voice stole my attention back to him.
He eyed the chest Elliot had just set on the floor before stepping out and closing the door behind him.
It must be strange for him to see me and his memories together.
In our past life, he’d gone to great lengths to keep them hidden and now, here they were, lying there for the world to see. “That was quick.”
“I haven’t read all of them but I got the gist.” I noticed then that at the table, each chair had a folder, notes, a mug and a glass of water. “You aren’t working alone?”
“My team has gone for an early breakfast. They will be back in a while. Riley is with them. I’m sure he’d like to see you.”
“I didn’t come here to see Riley.” I wondered how to phrase this best. “Alfie, thank you for giving your journals to me, I know how much of a huge step that was for you. I’ve read enough of them to understand you, I think.”
“No, you haven’t,” he said, his gaze dark. “If you’d read enough of them, you wouldn’t be standing here. At least, not alone.”
“Okay, see, that right there is why I’m giving them back.
Everything that I’m reading, the women, your family…
it all helps me understand you better, but that big secret, the big thing that you are so certain will make me despise you.
I don’t want to read that here. I want you to look me in the eye and tell me to my face. ”
“Why?”
“Because it’s not fair to leave me to deal with it alone.
” I folded my arms over my chest, wishing I’d put a coat on or something.
Standing here in my dress and heels I felt more vulnerable than I liked.
“Maybe I have questions, maybe I need comfort when I’m reading these awful things, but instead of offering those, you just dump and run.
You don’t even tell me which entry to read so I’m just reading page after page of heinous shit that I can’t talk to anyone about. ”
“I thought you wanted to know everything.” He frowned.
“I do, but Alfie, how would you like to sit and read book after book about me being beaten on and abused and hooking up with other people and you can’t do anything about it or tell anyone.”
“I thought I was doing the right thing.” He looked so confused. I sighed. I felt for him, I really did. He was trying so hard.
“The gesture was right but this big secret, the one I don’t know yet, that needs to be a conversation.
Not a hushed secret your past self whispers to me that I have to deal with on my own.
” Silence fell over us. His gaze ran over my scantily clad body and I shivered.
The tequila had long since worn off and no longer warmed me.
“Are you sure you want to do this? You can’t unhear what I tell you.” His words frightened me. I steeled my nerves. I had to know.
“I can take it.”
“I don’t think I can take seeing the look on your face when you find out what I’ve done.” He looked like a man resigned to his fate. “Can I tell you in the dark? With the lights turned off?” This was his compromise. Slowly, I nodded.
“Yes.”
“Fine. But not here.” He stood, a stoic determination on his face. His gaze darkened as he uttered a word I’d heard from his lips a thousand times. “Come.”
I followed him out of the room, Elliot following after us carrying the chest. We exited a different way, and ten minutes later I found myself in a private area of an underground car park. Elliot put the chest in the boot and left us to it with a nod to Alfie.
Alfie opened the passenger door of the sleek vehicle. With a deep breath, I got in. Instantly, his scent enveloped me. The hair on the back of my arms rose up. I was so fucked. I calmed myself, carefully moving my mask into place as I had practiced so many times.
Alfie slid in beside me and navigated us out onto the empty city streets. I’d forgotten how attractive it was watching Alfie drive.
“So, where are we going?” I asked, shaking myself out of my dangerous thoughts.
“My house.” A small smile lifted his lips at my shocked expression. “You’re going to hate it.”