Chapter 43
Forty-Three
A lfie.
‘Promise?’
Her words played over and over. Taunting me. She’d asked me to promise I wasn’t going to hurt her and like a fool I’d done it. She had no idea what I was hiding. Now I was going to have to break that promise, or keep my secret forever.
Here I was, back at the finish line and once again I didn’t deserve her.
My phone rested on my desk next to my laptop, the screen showing me her sweet face, streetlights dappling the night shadows as they passed over her.
Right now I had her muted, but earlier I’d listened as she’d talked to Elliot, making him laugh as she told him about Ryan’s latest novel installment. Now she was quiet, contemplative. I wondered what was in my girl's mind. Her work? Her best friend? Me?
“Alfie?”
I blinked out of my stupor, returning my attention to Angie, her dark eyes watching me from my laptop screen.
“Yes,” I waved a hand at her, “continue.”
“This would be a lot easier if we were in the same room,” she muttered, her fingers skipping over her Ipad.
I didn’t bother to respond, I didn’t need to explain to her why I would be spending more time here.
“You know, I can still come to you,” she said as if the thought hadn’t occurred to me and immediately been dismissed.
“Restricted access, Angie, you know that.”
“To you or your house?”
“Both,” I snapped. Angie was pushing too hard.
Most days, I didn’t know how to quantify what she was to me.
She wasn’t just my assistant, she could run rings around most of my executives.
She wasn’t my girlfriend but she’d been my plus one to more events than I could count.
She wasn’t my friend but she was bound to me anyway.
She was this grey area that I had never figured out what to do with but now, ever since I’d finally told Lo the whole of my history, Angie felt like a weight I wanted to be rid of.
As if she could feel me moving on from the limbo we’d shared for twelve years, she clung on harder, fighting for my attention and becoming snippish when she didn’t get it, like a neglected wife. It needed to stop, but now wasn’t the time to deal with it.
With a clenched jaw she returned her attention to her Ipad. The Dubai build was going to be one of my most impressive projects to date…and I didn’t care. As Angie resumed her run through of our upcoming Dubai trip, I returned my attention to my phone.
My Lo.
She looked tired. I was tempted to ask Ada to make dinner for her but I held back. Lola needed to make her own decisions, even the small ones.
I noticed Angie had gone quiet and I found her watching me. She knew I was watching Lo, I didn’t need to say it. My girl was pulling into the driveway, which was my cue to end the call. “We’ll pick this up tomorrow.”
“We’re barely halfway through!” Angie wasn’t used to this, to me being anything other than obsessed with work. “Is she there?” Her tone was laced with jealousy she had no right to feel.
‘She.’ Angie always referred to her that way, never using her name, as if stating it would make her real. “You can’t hide me from her forever, Alfie.”
“I don’t intend to. She’s joining us on the Dubai trip.”
Angie looked stunned. “Will you tell her about the cameras before then?” I glared at her. She had no right to ask that. “I won’t go along with your game.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Since when do you care about Lola?”
“Since she and I were both violated by Tell men.” Her words turned my stomach, a guilt-heavy anvil weighing in my gut. Angie tucked a dark lock behind her ear, her shoulders slumping under the weight of her own demons. “Good night, Alfie.”
I barely nodded, I was too focused on watching Lola climb out of the car. I heard Angie sigh just before she disconnected the call.
Lo.
I just wanted Lo.
I sighed, rubbing my hands over my face. How did I fix this?
Tell her about the cameras? I would lose her. No question. For good this time.
Don’t tell her? I’d be living a lie.
Without Angie to fill the silence, my father and brother filled it.
They haunted me, not like the ghosts of guilt they used to be, but new smirking creatures, watching me from screens the same way I watch Lo.
They found it funny how alike I was to them now.
A manipulative liar violating those with less power.
I watched her step into the lift, making small talk with Elliot. She was the only person I knew besides Ada that could make that man smile. How could I live without this?
Watching her has become my addiction. I twitched without it, I became short-tempered without it. I needed it. Just in case. Just in case I ever lost her again. This was my safety net.
What sense did it make to tell her? Now, when she finally wanted me back. It would be cruel to hurt her again.
For once, I’d try to be like my father, do away with my conscience. What she didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her.
I watched her step out of the lift and walk the narrow corridor into the entrance hall. Her arms wrapped around herself as if cold despite the heat in the house.
I watched her face, waiting for the moment she saw them. Her deep blues lit up as she spotted the bleeding hearts, her soft mouth opening into that warm smile. My chest swelled. I’d made her happy. Just for a moment.
She started on the stairs, my finger hovered over the exit button, waiting till the last possible moment before cutting the feed.
Her hand raised to knock on my door and as soon as she turned the handle, I closed the feed and stuffed my phone in my pocket, looking up to find the real thing looking at me like I was worth her time.
Her blue eyes landed on the bleeding hearts littered around my office. They were for me, not her, but she didn’t need to be told that, she knew it already. Finally that gaze landed back on me and she smiled. It took everything not to leap over the table and throw myself at her.
“Hey you,” she breathed, shutting the door behind her.
‘Hey, Lo’. That’s what I meant to say but my tongue got tied. Why did she have to be so fucking pretty? I swallowed, tensing and releasing my jaw.
Get a hold of yourself, Tell. It was hard after being ‘Mr Tell’ for nineteen hours straight to switch back to being ‘Lola’s Alfie’.
She paused, running delicate fingertips over flower petals. “What’s all this in aid of?”
Didn’t she know? My Lo who seemed to know and understand everything before I even understood it myself. Would she understand why I’d done what I’d done? If I confessed, was it possible that…
“It doesn’t matter.” I shook the thought away, I didn’t want to find out if she would understand or not. The risk was too high. “Have you eaten? I’m sure Ada can make something if you’re hungry.”
“I’ll eat when you eat.”
She approached me slowly, rounding my desk. She was careful with me when I was like this, giving me time to adjust to a person being in my space, as if she knew instinctively that I was too lost in memories.
My mind was loud with my father sometimes, as if he was standing over me once again, ready to beat me if I put a toe wrong. The anxiety wriggled in my skin and physical contact made me want to vomit.
But not with Lo.
It was as if her soul was so deeply attuned with mine, she knew what I needed without my words. She went slow when I needed her to go slow, sped up when I needed more, she ebbed with my flow.
She studied my bare forearms where my shirtsleeves were rolled up. She loved seeing me like this. The undone business man. A state that only she got to see me in.
She spared a glance for the paperwork strewn across my desk, her lip curling ever so slightly with distaste. She hated my company, hated what it did to me, and our time together. I understood that.
My instinct was to stiffen as she approached, as it would be with anyone else right now if they tried to touch me. But Lo’s touch was like slipping into a warm bath. It soothed where others stung.
She slid into my lap, her hands so small on my chest. She studied me, like a mother studying her sick child, trying to figure out what the ailment was.
I wondered if she’d still look at me like that in ten years, twenty, fifty? Would she still search my face with such yearning, such intensity.
Not if she knew what I’d done.
If I told her that, this would be the last time she ever looked at me with anything other than hatred. Just the thought of telling her turned my stomach.
“You don’t need to surround yourself with flowers, you know.
If you’re struggling up here,” she brushed a finger over my temple, “and you need me, just say so. I’ll come running.
” She knew what I needed. She always knew.
This was why I couldn’t tell her. This was why I couldn’t risk her leaving me again.
I nodded, I didn’t know what to say. “Talk to me, Alfie.”
And say what? Where did I begin with the madness in my mind? All I wanted was to sink inside her, to wear her as armour for a while but I couldn’t. Because I was wrong. Dirty and wrong. Just like my father. Just like Charles. They watched us, watched me lure this sweet thing in and lie to her.
“Remember when we didn’t need to talk?” I said. “Remember when all that existed was us?”
“I remember when we made each other insane.” So did I. Never had I been so close to being the best and worst version of myself…until now.
“In a way, things were simpler then. We would just fall into bed and fuck and play until the world disappeared. Shit gets complicated when you get morals involved.” Why did I have to care so much? Why couldn’t I just switch it off like the rest of the Tell clan?
“You know, we can still fall into bed and let the world fall away.”
I looked at my girl, my mouth practically watering with the thought of burying myself inside her again. “It’s not healthy to live like that though.”