“No, I want to stop talking about cantaloupe and start talking about your troubles.”
Shit.
“Okay,” I said, still cutting. Then I was silent.
So was Luke, for a moment, then he broke the silence.
“Ava,” his voice held a warning.
My mind raced for an excuse for another delay and it found none.
Fuckity, f**k, f**k, f**k.
Time to get it over with.
“Um… well. You know my friend Sissy?” I asked, eyes on the melon.
“Yeah.”
“She’s married to Dominic Vincetti.”
“I worked that part out,” he told me.
“Now, they’re kind of separated.”
Silence.
“She’s going to file for divorce.”
More silence.
“She’s up in Wyoming, staying with her Mom.”
I looked at the cantaloupe and realized I had cut far too much for just myself. Oh well, at least Sandra wouldn’t have to worry about cutting up the cantaloupe next time she was there. I put down the knife, picked up a chunk of melon and popped it into my mouth.
“Are you done?” Luke asked, my eyes slid sideways to look at him and I swallowed.
“Um… yeah.”
“That’s it? Your trouble is that Sissy’s filing for divorce?”
I grabbed another chunk and put it into my mouth while I turned to him and leaned my hip against the counter. “She’s my best friend. Her troubles are my troubles.”
Luke stared at me for a beat then said, “So why were you there last night?”
“She needed something and asked me to get it for her.”
“She needed something out of Vincetti’s nightstand?”
Hell and damnation.
I looked down at the melon and back at Luke. “I cut too much melon just for me. You sure you don’t want any?” I stalled again.
He shook his head, totally seeing through me, but took a chunk and put it in his mouth. I found watching him chew was weirdly fascinating and decided I was not a dork, I was a freak.
Once he swallowed, he said (his voice kinda scary), “Ava, I’m not gonna tell you again not to lie.”
Crap.
I took another chunk of melon and chewed while glaring at him. “You know,” I told him, again trying to stall. “This is really none of your business.”
“It became my business when you and I were caught in a hail of gunfire.”
Hmm.
In all fairness, he was kind of right, though I wasn’t about to tell him that nor was I going to give in. I didn’t ask him to be there.
I nabbed another chunk of melon and chewed it angrily, now seriously glaring at him. “I didn’t ask you to be there,” I pointed out. “You weren’t even supposed to be there.”
“Okay, then it became my business when you walked into the offices yesterday.”
“No it didn’t.”
“Yes, it did.”
“No. It didn’t.”
He took another chunk of melon and threw it in his mouth calmly then his eyes came back to me and I noticed he was totally oblivious to my glare.
“I don’t need your help,” I told him, switching subjects and still delaying.
“Right,” he said.
“I don’t.”
“Maybe you would have had the presence of mind to get out of the line of fire last night, maybe you wouldn’t. With the way you freaked out afterward, I doubt you would have. The way I figure it, you owe me double.”
I blinked with confusion. “Double?” I asked. “I owe you double for what?”
“Saving your ass last night and not telling me you have a situation.”
I shook my head, not following. “Excuse me?”
“You’re standing here, right now, because of me. And yesterday, I told you if I found out you had trouble, you’d pay. You’re paying.”
I was not getting a good feeling about this.
“I don’t… I don’t even know what to say. That’s just crazy,” I told him.
“Nope, it isn’t. Last November a friend of mine did something brave but stupid to save someone she cared about. She got a bullet to the chest and another one to the belly for her troubles.”
Yikes.
I sucked in breath at his announcement and the way he shared it. He looked angry and his body was tense and I knew this event affected him in a profound way (as it would anyone).
I stared at him but he wasn’t finished talking. “I saw her on the floor, bleeding while her man tried to staunch the flow with a f**king bath towel. Before she went down, she shot a man in the head, killing him. She’s got to live with two kinds of scars now. The kind you can see and the kind you can’t.”
Ho-ly crap.
“Luke,” I had lost my glare and my anger and my voice went soft.
Luke didn’t feel like responding to my soft voice. He came closer and it took a lot of effort, because his intensity was freaking me out, but I stayed where I was even when I saw his eyes were shining with anger.
“I’m not playing this f**king game with you, Ava. You told me last night you wanted to know why I cuffed you. So now I’ll tell you. You’re playin’ with fire and I’m not about to stand around and watch you get burned. Before Jules got shot, there was Roxie, another friend of mine’s woman who was stalked by her ex, beaten, abducted right from his f**kin’ house while he was out runnin’, and taken on a crazed, zigzag ride through three states. We found her cuffed to the sink in a sleazy motel. Before Roxie there was Jet, whose Dad got some poker debt and his loan shark tried to use Jet to force payment. She caught the attention of a f**kwad and ended up kidnapped and nearly raped. Before Jet there was –”
“Okay, I get it,” I broke in quietly.
Jeez.
I was freaked out and he hadn’t even gotten to the car bombs yet. Boy and I thought all the men I had met were ass**les.
“Tell me right now what you and Sissy are up to,” he demanded, moving back but only slightly.
I gave in. I might as well, he wasn’t going to let it go, that was easy enough to read. And anyway, I knew this extent of sharing was taking some effort for him, what with being a tough guy, macho man and all. I didn’t like that he was angry and struggling with unhappy memories and I further didn’t like that I was the cause of it. It made me feel crap.
“I don’t want Sissy to come back here,” I blurted and Luke’s body went still, likely preparing for what I would say next. “Dom’s good at sweet-talking her back to him and he’s a total jerk and no good for her. I won’t get into it but trust me, he’s seriously no good for her. While she’s gone, I promised to get the goods on Dom, find some evidence to use so the divorce would go well for her.”