“Jesus fuck man, can you not shut up for five seconds?”
When he opens his mouth to speak, Elyse reaches out and covers it before he can get a word out. “Be good and I’ll answer one question; dealer’s choice.” His eyes light up and he mimes zipping his lips as she returns her attention back to me. “Take off your shirt so I can get the bullet out already, will you?”
It takes a little careful maneuvering to accomplish it, but I toss my shirt on the floor and sit back against the headboard. She situates herself on her knees between the two of us, wasting no time setting a towel down and pouring the alcohol over the bloody mess. Sucks for Grave, because his ass will be scrubbing his own sheets clean for this one.
I clench my fist and suck in a harsh breath, but stay rigid out of principle.
“I swear,” she chuckles. “How you guys can get through a single day without measuring dicks is beyond me.”
“Not much of a contest,” I tease through clenched teeth, wincing as she starts digging around to find the bullet fragments.
“You’re right, I’m sure Seth has you both beat.” She smirks before putting a hand on my chest, bracing herself as she adjusts her grip.
“Aaron would kick both of our asses if we stole Seth’s dick to check,” Grave warns, grinning. “I’m in. Want me to go get him?”
I pin him with a look. “What iswrongwith you, man? You’ve got Elyse in your bed and you’re thinking about Seth’s dick? Dude’s practically our brother.”
Grave waggles his eyebrows. “I’m an equal opportunity sort of guy. But nice to know you like the thought of her in my bed too.”
I growl, but it tapers off on a string of curses as the bullet is yanked out of my flesh. “Got it!” she beams, pretending to be oblivious to our conversation, but her small smile gives her away. “Your lucky day; looks like it’s in one piece.”
She pours some more antiseptic on before dabbing the area dry to bandage it, balling up the towel and dumping it in the basket in the corner of the room. Biting her bottom lip, she hesitates, looking uncomfortable.
“Well, if you guys are done shooting each other, I should probably head to bed. Need to be up early and all that,” she awkwardly hedges, going to wash her hands.
When she comes back out, I finally bite the bullet and throw out there, “Or we could finish the movie first. If you’re not too tired, I mean. I’m still pretty keyed up, so I doubt I’ll be falling asleep any time soon.”
I hate the way she looks visibly relieved, like the very thought of anyone wanting her around is so foreign to her that she can’t fathom it. I nudge Grave. “Switch places with me.” This way I can be on the left and have my shoulder against the wall, so when she sits between us, it’ll be easier for all of us to get comfortable.
After we readjust, she hesitantly crawls between us, looking incredibly uncomfortable and out of place. Grave rewinds to before I burst in and as the minutes drag on, the tension starts to dissipate. We fall into a comfortable silence, broken up by yelling at the screen when the main character does something particularly idiotic.
When the movie ends, I pick another at random, not ready for things to end yet. It’s been far too long since I was able to enjoy anything, our livelihood making getting close to anyone impossible. A quick fuck sure, but long term? Hell no.
Yet with Elysium? It’s an actual possibility. I don’t have to hide what I do since she’s caught in the same web now. She may not be in the center of the chaos, and if she wants any hope of leaving when her time is up, she needs to stay as on the fringes of it as possible, but it’s a chance I haven’t had before, no matter how small. I’ve seen that fire in her eyes and I have no doubt that she’s going to be able to keep up with us down the line. She’ll certainly be giving Grave a run for his money, and that’s impressive in its own right.
Her head lolls against my shoulder and I freeze, not sure how to react. She isn’t a hangup that I want to get out of my system; I actuallycare,and that scares the shit out of me. I don’t want to fuck this up, especially since we’re going to be living together for the next few years. I may not have a debt to Julian anymore, but I work for him. I’ve seen and done too much to have any illusions of leaving.
I’m in this life until it gets me killed, and I’m oddly okay with that. I had a shit existence before coming here a decade ago and can’t imagine spending my days punching a time clock, following the same mind numbing routine day in and day out. This is it for me, and I feel like a selfish asshole for wanting to trap her here with me.
She was literally fawning over Grave when I walked in. Stop pining over her like a pathetic sap and wake the fuck up.
Soft snores as she passes out against my arm have me starting to relax. Her blonde hair has fallen into her face and before I can even test out if my bad arm can swipe it away, Grave is there, looking at her with an expression that I’ve never seen on the man in all of the years we’ve lived together. It’s almost heartbreaking.
“I never should have brought her here,” he murmurs, more to himself than me. The times he actually carries on a conversation like a real person are few and far between, making the words that much heavier. “Shouldn’t have let her make a deal with him.”
I hesitate briefly, torn between arguing with him, or agreeing that he’s right. “Then you would have been leaving her in that hellhole. Who knows how long until he would have gone too far, ended up killing her? We both heard the rumors about what happened to Miller’s wife; no wonder Elysium hadn’t tried to run yet. You accepting that trade means he won’t try to hunt her down, happy to let her go and get out of the debt.”
He closes his eyes, glancing at the ceiling. “Julian still took the property with Elyse’s blessing. She’s only here for another fifty grand and I can’t get a good enough read on him to know if he’ll let her stay on as housekeeper after.”
I grind my teeth. “She left that part out when she filled me in after their meeting.” Glaring at her serene face with a mixture of annoyance and respect at sticking it to that bastard the only way she was able to, I point out, “That prick is a real son of a bitch, but even he’s not so suicidal as to try and break in here to take her back with some bullshit claim of us not holding up our side of the bargain. We’ve got a few years before we need to figure out the next step, to convince Julian to let her stay.”
He reaches down to our feet and brings the blanket up, covering her carefully and staring at her like she has all of the answers he never knew he was searching for. “She just-” he sighs, leaning back against the pillows and settling in for the night. “Just felt like she belonged here. Like she was as broken as the rest of us.”
I drag out my long exhale, following his lead to try and get more comfortable without waking her. “I don’t blame ‘ya. I’d have done the same if he’d sent me instead, though I’d have snapped and killed him, information or no.” Out of the corner of my eye, I subtly watch his reaction as I add, “Probably hit close to home too, with the way he wanted to trade off his only kid.”
Logically, I know I’m straddling that fine line that might set him off, but Elyse seems to calm him down in a way like nothing we’ve found before. A brand of specialty Xanax, tailored just for him. I doubt he’ll want to risk waking her up without a good reason, so if there was ever a chance to point it out, it’s now.
“Who the fuck offers up their firstborn as payment for anything?” he snarls, suddenly incensed, but trying to keep his voice down. “Like we’re just things, and not people? How can you pop out a damn baby and the only things you see when you look at it are the dollar signs?”
