On the surface, it’s easy.
Talking is a distraction, and turning up bleeding on Pidge’s doorstep earns him the right to know the whole truth.
We’ve been friends for long enough. Talking helps me forget the pain and gradually, very gradually, I start to relax when Aerin doesn’t reappear in the doorway. She’s resting properly this time.
“The mafia,” Pidge says slowly, shaking his head.
Light from the single lampshade near his arm casts an eerie glow on his face. “We fought against people like that, you and me.”
“And look where that got us. You think the government or the law gives a shit about men like us? At least with this family, I get to do a little good. I put myself to work and I’m able to sleep at night.”
Pidge rolls his eyes. “You don’t sleep.”
Sighing deeply, I finish the glass of water he gave me halfway through my speech and sigh. “No. I don’t.”
“You have a leak,” Pidge says. “It’s the only explanation. A family as powerful as hers? Safehouses don’t get leaked unless someone wants them to be. Either a leak or someone on the inside wants her dead.”
Someone on the inside wouldn’t go to such extravagant trouble since killing her in the bath would be a lot easier.
Has to be a leak.
With another nod, a final sigh escapes me like a ragged gasp.
“I need your help, Pidge. Those men today? I can’t take all that on by myself.”
“You’re here, aren’t you?” Pidge drags one hand through his shaggy blonde hair and stands. “Sleep. Rest. You’re safe here and so is she. Just don’t die on my fucking couch.” Despite the playful annoyance in his words, he knocks his leg into mine as he walks past. It’s as close to affection as Pidge gets.
War broke both of us. Pidge hides behind his computers and his tech while I throw myself into the criminal underworld just to feel useful. We survive.
Just.
Pidge leaves me with the light on, disappearing deeper into the house.
I should sleep but my mind won’t stop running.
The weak pulls throughout my body don’t deter me as I stand and check the room for any traps, check the locks on the window, and check Aerin’s room to make sure she’s still there.
She sleeps soundly, curled up into a tight ball.
My heart squeezes unexpectedly and remains like that, as if caught in her palm, all the way back to the couch.
She’s alive.
I’m doing a shitty job of protecting her, but she’s alive and that’s all that matters.
At this rate, I’ll be dead before Guido finds out I touched her. He won’t have to kill me because protecting her will do that for me.
Over and over I replay her in the shower.
Her hair dark from the water, her lips flushed and red, her large, perfect breasts glittering from water droplets.
For a moment, I can feel her around my fingers until I touch fingertips and feel nothing but dried blood.
Then all I see is her on the grass with that man on top of her, and rage ignites in my heart. I should have woken up sooner.
Sleep doesn’t come until after I drag myself through a shower and revisit Pidge to get my wound redressed, then I pass out on the couch and remain there, dead to the world, for several hours.
Something wakes me a little after dawn.
