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“Should I hide the razors?” he half joked, testing me.
“Ass,” I muttered, smacking his arm.
“There’s my good girl,” he mockingly called me what my father usually did.
I was the good girl. Now, I was damaged goods, yet that still had to be better than being Mel.
Right?
NINE
“And above all these put on love, which binds everything
together in perfect harmony.”
—Colossians 3:14
LIAM
She’d played me.
She didn’t want a divorce, I knew she didn’t.
I wanted to be pissed at her. I wasn’t over the last five months, and yet as hard as I tried, I couldn’t muster the energy to keep fighting. I’d fucked it out of my system…and that was what she’d wanted. It had been two days and I couldn’t be around her without wanting to bury myself inside of her. We didn’t speak to each other; all we did was look over every last sale in the five months that we’d been away. Neither of us was surprised that we were bleeding money, but that didn’t mean we were going to accept it. There was so much work to do, and on top of that, Avian was the anvil hanging over our heads waiting to crush us.
Walking into our room, I stopped. To my knowledge she had only ever come in here to bathe and change before leaving. She spent her nights barely sleeping in the corner of Ethan’s room. There were more than a few times that I wanted to pick her up and take her to bed. But instead, I settled for sitting across from her. Now she sat in the center of our bed, with Ethan in the space between her legs. She looked so relaxed in her shorts and silk top while reading through what looked to be work related files.
Hearing me enter, she glanced up and stared at me. Taking off my jacket, tie, and shoes, I walked over to my side of the bed and leaned over to kiss Ethan on the head. He smacked my face with his little hands as if to say, “Leave me alone so I can concentrate.” He was trying to put the square peg into the circular slot. Moving his hand, I tried to help him place the square into the square slot. He stared at it for a moment and then at me. Frowning, he took the square and once again tried to fit it in the circle.
“He’s a hardhead. I wonder where it comes from?” Mel muttered softly.
I smirked, as I glanced up at her. “Both of us? Which means we’re screwed when he gets older.”
“I’m never letting him grow up then,” she replied as a small smile played on her lips.
I think my father used to say that about me.
We fell into silence for a moment, and I fought the urge to pull them both to me and just sleep. It had been a long day.
Should I say something? I didn’t want to fight. Not in front of Ethan at least.
“Coraline gave me a very long list of interviews for tomorrow,” she said to me as she handed me a piece of paper.
“Dear God.” Who weren’t we talking to? “Did they send a list of questions?”
She nodded. “They did, but it’s bullsh—”
Pausing, she stared down at Ethan who looked up at her. “They did, but it’s just a front. They’re not going to stick to it.”
Grinning, I bit back my comment as she glared at me. No cursing. Got it.
“What’s our story then?” I asked her as I ran my hand over Ethan’s feather-soft hair. I wasn’t sure if we would’ve been able to have this conversation if he wasn’t here. He kept us both calm and highly entertained.
“You knew the entire time where I was and stayed in jail to protect our family. I can’t talk about the investigation in any great detail for national security reasons, but I’ll go on about how terrible I felt and how scared I was…something along those lines. I’ve also called President Colemen to make sure our story is backed up.”
I waited for the anger. Surprisingly, it didn’t come. “Okay.”
“Okay?” she asked, as she me wearily.
“It’s your story, Mel. You planned it, and I trust that it will work.” Because nine times out of ten, it did.
“We also have business to discuss,” I said as I lay back, and reached for the file at my bedside table.
“Go on.”
“Before I do, I need you to be a hundred percent honest with me, Melody,” I replied sitting up. Her jaw tightened and she stared at me like she knew what I was going to ask. “The demand for cocaine is rising again, and so far…” I hesitated, unsure of how to approach this topic. I hated how tentative things were between us lately.
“Just say it, Liam.”
“What happened to you…will it affect this, our work? If so, I can take over.”
“I’m glad you asked, so I can say this once and for all,” she frowned, “I’m not an addict. I’m not impaired. I went through a rough withdrawal. It hurt, and I have no interest in going through it again.”
“Most people don’t have that choice,” I whispered.
“Well, I’m not like most people,” she snapped at me. “If they cared about anyone or anything, I mean if they truly cared as much as I do, they would stop. It’s not yours, mine, or anyone else’s fault that they don’t. I don’t feel any sympathy towards them. We supply, and whatever happens after it leaves our facility is not on our hands. Have I answered your question?”
Ethan burped loudly and I was never more thankful for it because it was like ice water being poured over me…calming my desire to jump her. There was something about her that just turned me on.
“Fine,” I replied, trying to keep my cool as I handed her the file I’d just been looking over. “Roy, I believe his name is, has been cutting the product to make a small profit. Nothing major, but it bothers me.”
“Declan and I will speak to him. Apparently we were not clear enough last time we saw him.”
“No, we will.”
Her eyes cut into me. “Why ask me to be honest if you don’t believe me?”
“I believe you. I’ve just spent five months away from you, I don’t want any unnecessary distance until—”
“Until you’re sure I won’t disappear again.”
Why must she always cut me off? “Your disappearance was my fault, you staying away is all on you. I don’t want distance until I’m comfortable that we both won’t make the same mistake again.”
“You blame my disappearance on yourself?” she asked me slowly.
I really didn’t want to talk about this. “433K, our company in Colorado, is going to bring in at least four hundred million this year. We had lines going three hours long. I say we lobby for more states to legalize marijuana. But for now, I want to set up at least four 433K shops in every time zone selling medical marijuana so when it is legalized, we already have a foothold in the area.” If we played our cards right, we could control both the legal and illegal markets. It would also help with publicity.
“We can’t,” she said.
What the fuck? “Why the fucking hell not?”
Her hands snapped to Ethan’s ears as he yawned widely and his head bobbed back and forth as he started to drift. It was only 9:00 p.m., but I guessed that that was well past his bedtime.
“The public is going to be paying close attention to us for the next few weeks. Plus, the moment we start moving into that territory, many others will follow. So I say yes to your plan, but do it completely under the radar.” She lifted Ethan up and he hugged him onto her and he laid his head on her shoulder as his eyes began to close.
