Page 47 of Cruel Debts (Killers of Port Wylde #4)

FORTY-TWO

LIAM

Why the hell had I said those things to her?

Being frustrated with myself was a nice way to focus the blame where it belonged, but it did nothing to assuage the guilt I felt at the words that had come out of my mouth.

Words I knew damn well I didn't mean.

I'd been sitting in the kitchen, staring at her door, which she pointedly slammed in my face three hours ago, for what felt like an eternity.

There had been nothing but silence from her room, which I took to mean she was likely stewing, or sleeping off her anger.

Trinity wouldn't indulge the crying jag most girls would jump right into after being insulted so bluntly.

I winced again.

I never in a thousand years wanted to hurt her.

She meant more to me than my own sister ever did, and yet I put that falsehood out there like that and cut her because I felt off-balance.

Because I didn't like the feelings I refused to process.

Because I felt things I wasn't ready to feel for her, things I didn't want to feel, and no matter how much I fought against them, I couldn't stop them.

I couldn't will them away, so I did the only thing I could think to make myself feel better, which was denying them to the one person at the source of their origin.

And it only hurt me in return twice as much as it must've hurt her.

Asher came home an hour later, and found me there, still staring at her door like some pining teenager with his first love.

"You okay over there, Sentry?"

Oh, so we were back to code names? He must've really been mad about the argument earlier. Considering it was over Trinity, I don't blame him.

"Yes, , I'm fine," I lied, knowing damn well I most definitely wasn't.

"Cool." His form threw shadows over my lap as he marched around the kitchen in search of food. "Do we not have anything to eat here that doesn't require an actual chef to make?"

"Chef?" Hawke slipped through the front door, gingerly taking his jacket off, careful not to drop any of the blood dripping from it on the floor. "Are you hungry? I could cook." His gaze flitted to Trinity's door, and he frowned. "She still in her room?"

"She's been in there pretty much the whole time you've been gone," I admitted, letting my gaze finally fall to the floor. On the counter beside me, my phone started to go off, but I ignored it, clearly uninterested in anyone or anything outside wallowing in my own regret right now.

"Your phone's going off," Asher supplied unhelpfully, as if I couldn't see and hear it right next to me.

"Yeah, I know, just leave it," I mumbled, my gaze now back on the door.

Maybe I should go in and apologize. Maybe I should just man up and stop playing this game with myself.

Maybe I should do what she said and get out there on the street and deal with this shit so she could go somewhere people would treat her better than we did.

Than I did.

I owed it to her and her brother to ensure that she could live the rest of her life in peace.

The ringing continued, and I hit the ignore button without even looking at the damn screen, too engrossed in my trainwreck of thoughts to bother.

The kitchen got crowded the second Hawke joined us in here, apron in hand, and a wicked grin on his lips. "Someone should go ask Tee-Bird if she wants something, too. I'll cook for everyone."

"Feeling charitable?" I eyed his hands, still coated in tiny dried flecks of someone else's blood. "Maybe wash your hands first, you animal."

His gaze dropped to his palms, and he swore. "Shit, yeah, you're right." His apron landed on my head as he rushed off to the sink and turned on the water, drowning out whatever Asher was busy saying to me.

Again, my phone went off, and okay, so maybe I was pissy, but if someone was trying that hard to get to me, I supposed I could answer it, but then the ringing stopped. And then it was no longer a problem, so I ignored it.

Just like I tried to ignore my feelings for Trinity McCoy.

Hawke got halfway through pulling steaks from the fridge, when his eyes finally fell on my phone on the counter, right next to his cutting board. "Hey, twat waffle. You gonna check those missed calls?"

Who cared about some missed calls? "If you're so damn curious, you check them." He knew the password. If it was important, if it pertained to a client or a contract, then he'd need to know as well. And if it was a telemarketer, let him sit through their bullshit messages.

"Smile for the camera, you ugly fuck," he said cheerfully, holding the face recognition up to my profile.

I scowled, and the phone unlocked with ease, just going further to prove how irritating life was for me on a regular basis.

If even my phone thought my resting bitch face was standard operating procedure, then clearly I needed a vacation from this shit?—

"It's Trinity's number."

Why would Trinity be calling me from the next room? "Are you sure?"

"Unless you saved someone else as 'the bratty McCoy', then yeah, I'm pretty sure."

He clicked on the voicemail icon and set the phone down on the counter, putting it on speaker for us to hear as a group just in time for Asher to pull out a bottle of beer and pop the cap.

I didn't miss the way Hawke's eyes cut to the offending drink, and then rolled. He made it perfectly clear what he thought about alcohol, and usually, we didn't drink it around him.

Asher must be more affected by what I'd said to him than I thought.

The first voicemail was short and very weird. It was nothing but panting, raspy breaths, someone clearly running, and the sound of someone shouting in the distance.

"What the fuck?" Asher frowned, leaning in over the phone like he expected to see footage of a video with the weird audio.

"Maybe it's an old one," I muttered, "I don't check them as often as I should."

We skipped to the next one, and the second Trinity's voice came on the recording, I knew something was very, very wrong.

"Oh my god, Liam, dammit, I know you're mad at me, but pick up the phone! I'm—I fucked up, I—they're following me, I—haaa, fuck, I really should have done more cardio—Liam, please—shit?—"

Silence.

The phone cycled to the next and final voicemail, and we stared at each other, worry and confusion creeping in.

"I don't know what's about to happen, Liam, but I'm being followed. I—fuck, I snuck out, okay, to make you mad. It was stupid. I'm at the club—or I was. There's something going on, and they're following me—shit, shit shit shit?—"

The phone fell away from her, the audio distorted as I heard Trinity on the other end, screaming and shouting at someone who clearly meant her harm.

Words here and there got through as she fought her assailants, and I stayed riveted to the seat as Asher busted her door in, swearing at what he found inside.

"The Gunners—they're going to find you—let me go!---you'll regret this—don't you dare fucking touch me you creep!" More fighting, and then a moan that sounded like Trinity in pain, followed by a much more subdued "Help me, Liam, I'm sorry?—"

And then someone else clearly picked up the phone, because the voice that echoed over the line wasn't a language I was fluent in. But the second he switched to English, I placed the accent.

"Don't waste your time."

Russian. Just like the assholes we were investigating for the trafficking ring.

My heart sank through my stomach, and suddenly, all the eyes were on me.

Asher leaned across the counter and damn near strangled me by my collar. We were so close, I could feel flecks of spit flying from his mouth as he snapped his teeth and snarled at me.

"What the fuck did you do, you prick?"

Our third was too busy rushing around to pay us any attention. It was like someone had cut Hawke's head off and pulled a rip cord out of his back, sending him careening into chaos. I'd never seen him so stressed in the years since we joined the Guild. Talk about unnerving.

I glanced over at Trinity's room and sighed, a cold sweat trickling down my spine, breaking out on my brow. "I?—"

I couldn't tell him what I'd said. I'd never again be able to face him—or her.

"I might've said a few things I shouldn't."

That was as close to the truth as I was going to get. There were no details needed. The fact that I'd screwed up was enough.

Not for Hawke, though. He stopped on a dime like a dog at the end of his leash and scowled.

"What the hell do you mean you said something you shouldn't?" He leaned in now, right beside Asher, and now there were two rabid dogs in my face. "What exactly did you say, Liam?"

"Use your words, jackass," Asher growled, his eyes narrowed damn near to slits. "And make it fast."

"Now isn't the time to split hairs, you guys?—"

I no sooner made the excuse than I found my face being slammed into the marble countertop, quite possibly breaking my nose. It was hard to tell. Blood ran like a faucet, and it was tender to the touch, but I was afraid to shift it, for fear that it was actually broken.

"You broke my nose, you prick!" I swung on him, but from my position, it was futile. I missed by a mile, and ended up just making my own ears ring. With a swear, I bit the bullet and touched the side of my nose, and my eyes watered. "Sonofabitch, Asher, what the fuck?"

"What. The fuck. Did you say to her?" His words were punctuated by a finger in my chest, and at the cost of being more injured, I made a bad decision and lied again.

"It's not important." It was very important. I was just a pussy.

Wham!

My face met the counter again, and if my nose wasn't broken before, now it was really broken.

I sniffed, and all I could feel was pain. Blood ran down the back of my throat, down the front of my face, and stained my white shirt red. It dripped onto the counter between us, leaving a nice little puddle as Hawke watched with his arms crossed and a leering smirk on his lips.

"Fuck," I mumbled, "okay, shit, stop abusing me." I tried to look cross-eyed at my nose, but the damage made me queasy. "If I tell you, will someone snap my nose back into place?"

Asher quirked a brow, but Hawke huffed something that sounded a lot like not like you deserve it, but whatever. Taking the risk, I sighed.

This wasn't going to go well at all.

"Fix my nose first."

Hawke blinked at me. "No."

"Yes." If they found out what I said first, they'd break my nose a third time for shits and giggles. If they fixed my nose, they'd be more reluctant to shatter the remaining cartilage in my nasal passages, for fear they'd have to redo their work. "Nose first, then the words."

"Fine, you man baby." Asher leaned forward and grinned gleefully as he gripped my nose in one hand and the back of my head in the other. With the precision of a surgeon and the rage of a man betrayed, he snapped my nose back into place.

I jumped back with a yowl the second he let me go. "You could have been gentler!"

"You could be less of an asshole, but here we are. What did you say to her?"

I stared at the floor and held my hand under my still-bleeding nose. "I told her she was just a job."

It was enough of the truth that they didn't need to know more.

I could have easily copped out and told them that I told her she was changing them. But they would have known that wasn't the worst of it. It was better to give them something serious and walk away with the full rage instead of their suspicion and more broken body parts.

Hawke was first to respond, surprisingly. His hands gripped the edge of the counter, and I could practically hear his teeth grinding in his mouth as he stared me down with lethal intent in his eyes.

"You—of all the low things—I swear to god I'll kill you, Liam, just you wait?—"

Asher held him back, and not soon enough, because he might have actually killed me had he gotten close enough to put his hands around my neck.

"Not now, Hawke," Asher muttered, his eyes pinning me with a malicious glare. "You can kill him when we get her back."

"We don't even know where the fuck she?—"

"We start at the club," Asher declared, his eyes hard. "And we go from there."