Page 56 of Hidden Ties

After going to a party one of her coworkers had thrown when she first got hired, it had not only been her first party experience but also the last. She was already regretting heading in that direction, but it was the only place she knew to go.

Making a right on the next street, she adjusted her rearview mirror just to be sure he wasn’t following her. She did technically have his keys in her pocket, but a girl had to be certain.

Positive she couldn’t possibly be followed, Valerie turned into the neighborhood, hoping her memory was correct. When she spotted the vomit-green door, she pulled into the driveway, still not able to forget the first time she had seen the hideous color.

Valerie adored color, but when men tried to do absolutely anything with color, they always picked the worst fucking shades. Heaven forbid they ever asked a woman’s opinion before they did anything. It was actually her biggest gripe with Apple.

Hey, Apple, have you ever actually seen the color pink?

Turning her car off, she exited it and walked right up to the door, knocking loudly. She thought she might’ve gotten unlucky and that he wasn’t home, when the door flung open.

“Valerie?”

“Hey, Lyle.” She wasted no time letting herself in. “I need you to get in contact with someone for me.”

“Wait a second.” Lyle still had his headset on and Xbox controller in his hand, clearly taken off guard. “I thought you were in prison?”

“No, not yet. I’m out on bail at the moment,” she clarified, trying to get this going. “So, can you help me out or not?”

“Okay, sure,” he finally agreed with the shake of his head. “How can I help?”

“Where’s your gaming PC?”

Scratching the back of his head, he tried to laugh it off. “I don’t have one at the moment. I just have an Xbox.”

What a noob.Rolling her eyes in disgust, she held out her hand out for the Xbox controller, finding it sticky.

Ew.

She looked around at this bachelor pad; it was totally different than the bachelor pad Sal had.Dammit,maybe he wasn’t only the best of the bunch by made men standards, but men in general.

Valerie sat down on his couch in front of his TV, planning to burn the clothes she was wearing later. Moving the controller sticks with her thumbs, she quickly wrote Justice a message through Xbox, telling him it was urgent and to contact her on this account ASAP. Hoping it would make it to Justice’s PC account, she hitSend.

“What do we do now?” Lyle asked.

Valerie set the dirty controller down, being sure to rub the stickiness off on her pants. “Now, we wait.”

“Okay.” Taking an awkward seat next to her, Lyle finally took off his headset. “So, what do you want to do until then?”

“I want you to stay on that side of the couch”—she made herself clear at seeing the hopeful possibilities swirling in his mind—“and order me a pizza.”

TWENTY-ONE

RELEASE THE KRAKEN

Having eaten the whole pie by herself, Valerie sat back on the couch full as she watched Lyle gun down someone in Fortnite.

“Ha-ha, you bitch!” Lyle screamed into the headset to a probably fourteen-year-old kid. “That’s right; go cry to your mommy.”

Having seen enough, Valerie just shook her head, then went into his kitchen for a drink. While Lyle’s taste in video games sucked, he at least had good taste in drinks when she pulled a cold blue Powerade from his fridge.

Valerie quenched her thirst; she hadn’t had one of these bad boys in days. She wondered when Justice would finally reach out. If he didn’t get a hold of her soon, she was about to take her chances and go on the run to Texas to find him in person.

About to seriously give up when she heard Lyle yelling at a girl player to go back in the kitchen and make him a sandwich, a knock could be heard on the door.

Peeking her head back into the living room, she gave Lyle a look of death. “Who is that?”

Lyle stopped playing a moment to look at her then shrugged. “I don’t know.”