Fix You: Bash and Olivia, Book 2 of 3 (McDaniels Brothers) (2 page)

I lowered myself to my rickety cot and leaned back, letting my lids drift shut. Sleep was slippery here. Every time I closed my eyes, thoughts and memories came rushing in all at once. Thoughts of my childhood in different foster homes, separated from my brothers. Memories of my father, dead on the bathroom floor of our shitty little apartment. Being in a place like this that reeked of desperation and human frailty just brought it all back like it was yesterday, and pretending that I was doing fine in front of Matty was exhausting.

Because whatever I’d told him, I wasn’t okay. My entire life had been ripped out from under me, and my dreams of fighting my way out of Boston were fading fast.

And Olivia. Don’t forget Olivia.

Like I could. Her pleading cornflower-blue eyes were branded into my brain.

“I’ll never see him again.”

That’s what she’d told Andy when they were taking me away. Maybe she’d thought it was a martyr’s move. A bargaining chip. If Andy dropped the charges against me, she and I would be over and that would be a sacrifice that benefited me.

That’s not how I saw it, though.

I saw it as a cop-out. I’d been willing to fight for her, and she’d thrown in the towel on us at the first sign of blood. Matty was right all along. I should’ve kept my eye on the prize, and the prize was and would always be getting the fuck out of Boston. I’d allowed myself to get distracted one time, and look where it got me. Never again. If by some grace of God I made it through this, I was pushing forward with my plans, and I wouldn’t let anything get in my way.

Olivia Beckett was someone else’s problem now.

Chapter Two

Olivia

“Fifteen thousand for all seven pieces.”

I snorted at the man behind the counter, grabbed the black velvet case sitting between us, and turned on trembling legs to make like I was going to walk away.

Total bluff. I wasn’t going anywhere empty-handed. I was desperate and out of options.

“Fine,” he grumbled from behind me. “Sixteen-five, but that’s as high as I’m going to go, so take it or leave it.”

I faced him again and eyed him assessingly. He wet his thin lips and patted down the strands of his greasy comb-over.

“Don’t look at me like that. I gotta make a profit here too, kid. I got a family to feed.”

Probably more like “hookers to pay,” but I let it slide. Heart pounding, I pushed one last time. “Seventeen and we do a deal right now.” I set the case back down and met his gaze head-on.

He mumbled under his breath about being a sucker for a pretty face, but then nodded.

“Seventeen. I’ll do up the paperwork. Be right back.” He barreled through the orange beaded curtains that separated the front of the pawnshop from what he kept referring to as “his office,” which, from what I could see through the “curtains,” was actually a closet that housed a metal folding chair, an honest-to-God typewriter, and a ten-foot-high stack of yellowing
Playboy
magazines.

Whatever. The fact was that I’d been to three other places, two of them being high-end secondhand jewelry retailers in my home town in Connecticut, and Mad Money Max was the only person who’d offered me even close to a fair price on the jewelry I’d brought in. In this time of crisis when literally every penny counted, I wasn’t about to get picky. This was the break I’d been wishing for. Maybe things were finally looking up.

I stared down at the jewelry case full of gold one last time and swallowed the lump in my throat. The class ring my parents had gotten for me, a pair of pearl earrings my grandmother had bought me for my sweet sixteen, the tennis bracelet I’d gotten for graduation…none of it mattered anymore. It was just stuff.

What mattered was getting Bash out of jail. Now, with bail money, and hopefully, forever. I’d watched enough
CSI
to know that a public defender wouldn’t have the time or the energy to fight for Bash the way he deserved so I’d contacted a criminal defense lawyer. Linden Whitcomb, Esquire, was willing to look at the case on short notice, but required a $15,000 retainer just to get the ball rolling, and Mad Money Max was about to give it to me.

I peered down at my cell phone while I waited, and blew out a pent-up breath. One hurdle down. A dozen more to go. If I could get out of here in the next fifteen minutes, I could still get to county lockup in time to catch the tail end of visiting hours. I’d finally get to see Bash.

If he even wants to see you.

My stomach roiled and I reached into my jeans pocket and pulled out the roll of Tums that had become my best friend over the past few days. I popped two in my mouth and chewed the chalky rounds while I scrolled through the text messages waiting for me.

One was from my mom telling me she’d call me tomorrow, one was from my bestie Cara asking me how my spring break was, but it was the last one that made my blood boil.
Andy
. I squeezed my eyes closed and held my thumb over the delete button, but paused. What if he’d come to his senses and was offering to drop the charges against Bash? It was unlikely, but if there was even a 1 percent chance…

The second I opened the message, I realized my mistake. Text scrolled by, reading “Fun Times in Cell Block C.” Then, the sound of fists thudding against flesh came blasting out of the tiny speaker as a video of two men in the middle of what looked to be a prison cafeteria filled the screen. The brutal fight between them lasted less than ten seconds, culminating in one of the guys pounding the other’s head in with a chair until his skull caved in.

I stared, unblinking at the screen, my brain frantically trying to process what I’d seen. Was one of those people Bash? My stomach heaving, I ran to the corner of the store and lost my Tums lunch in Mad Money Max’s garbage can.

By the time I was on empty, I’d mentally replayed the scene in my mind. Once I got past the initial shock, I realized neither of the men was Bash. One of them was older, maybe in his early thirties, and the other was wiry and lean, not muscular like Bash. I knuckled the tears from my cheeks and focused on taking slow, even breaths. He was okay. No one had crushed his skull in with a chair.

This time. But Andy’s taunting message had teeth. Who knew how long Bash would be safe behind bars? And how would I live with myself if something happened to him?

“I just have a few things for you to sign.”

“Add these to it, too,” I said, yanking the trio of silver Tiffany bracelets from my wrist. They weren’t even mine. Echo had let me borrow them a few weeks back and I’d forgotten to return them. I was pretty sure she’d been egging Andy on with this whole “filing charges against Bash” situation in hopes that she and Andy would wind up being a couple. They’d already slept together behind my back when Andy and I were still together, and as far as I was concerned, they were a perfect pair.

I slapped the bracelets onto the countertop with a
clink
. “I’ll take whatever you’ll give me for them.”

***

Two hours later, I stood next to my car in the jail parking lot crunching on the last of my Tums and staring at the double doors, waiting for Bash to walk through them. Apparently, he’d had a second bail hearing that afternoon, but when I called the station, I was told that it hadn’t gone any better than the first one.

Luckily, I’d managed to set up a meeting with the booking officer, give him my statement, and pay the four thousand to secure Bash’s release before they closed for the day. It cut deep into the money I’d managed to wrangle from Max, and now I was a couple thousand short for the lawyer’s retainer. I’d have to hit the bank the next day and empty out my savings account. Worst-case scenario, I’d trade in my car. Whatever it took. I made a mental note to keep a few hundred dollars aside to get him a decent suit to wear in case this went to trial.

Assuming again, of course, that he’d even talk to me. A chill swept over me in spite of the relatively mild temperature.

I’d missed visiting hours by ten minutes, so there hadn’t been a chance to go and discuss my plans with him or make sure he even wanted me around anymore after everything that had happened. The truth was, it didn’t matter. I couldn’t stomach the thought of him being in jail for another night. There was no question I was taking a huge gamble, but it was a gamble I would have taken a thousand times.

A moment later, the doors swung open and Bash stepped out into the fading evening light. I swallowed the knot wedged in my throat and waited for him to notice me. He was buckling a watch onto his wrist and scanning the opposite end of the parking lot. His laser-blue gaze flickered past me for a second before snapping back again to settle on my face, and my world tilted. God, he looked so pale and tired, but he was a beautiful as ever.

He walked toward me slowly, a riot of emotions passing over his face. I attempted a smile, but I could feel my lips trembling.

“Hey,” I finally managed.
Because apparently that’s what you say to someone who just spent three days in jail for you.

Hey.

I chewed at my cheek as he slowed to a stop a few feet from where I stood.

“I thought Matty was the one who…” He closed his mouth, and his jaw tensed. “Listen, I don’t need any favors from you. I’m sure the last thing you want is to get saddled with a felon. Plus, if your boyfriend sees you here, he’ll prob—”

“He’s not my boyfriend.”

I pushed past the squeeze of pain that came with the knowledge that he thought I would even talk to Andy again, never mind get back together with him, and focused on trying to figure out what he needed from me right then. “I’m so sorry about this all. Just let me take you home, okay? We don’t even have to talk.” I curled my fingers into fists to keep from touching him. Reaching out to feel the warmth of his skin to make sure he was real and alive.

“My apartment isn’t far. I can hoof it.” His tone was chilly, and his words rained on me like little needles of sleet.

He started toward the sidewalk, and I stood, frozen in place. I’d known there was a good chance this would happen. That he would be so angry that I’d ruined his life, he’d never want to see my face again. What I hadn’t been expecting was exactly how much it would hurt. I reached blindly for my car door handle and jerked it open, hoping like hell I’d make it in before I started sobbing.

“You know what pissed me off the most?”

I whirled around as my heart skittered. He was two feet in front of me again, eyebrows drawn together in fury, but I didn’t care. Because he was still there. He hadn’t walked away from me yet. I wet my lips and shook my head, not trusting myself to speak.

“Not the part where I got cuffed and dragged into a police car in front of my brother. Not the part where that asshole stood there and laughed in my face.” His breath was coming fast now. “It was you.” He jabbed his index finger toward me. “You standing there telling him that you’d never see me again if that’s what he wanted you to do. I’m such a dumb fuck to think that you’d stick in after such a short time, but I don’t know. I thought we had something. I thought you felt it too.…”

He held up both hands and stepped back.

“I just had to get that off my chest. Thanks for bailing me out. I’ll pay you back in June as soon as I get paid for the Spada fight. You can go now. Your conscience is clear.”

He turned to leave again, but this time I didn’t freeze. I launched myself at him, flinging my arms around his neck and burying my face in the crook of his neck.

“I didn’t come here to clear my conscience, Bash. I came here because I do feel it too. Everything you said. And yes, partly because I want to fix this mess.” He pulled back, but I held tight. “But even if I wasn’t responsible, I’d be here for you. The thought of you being in a cell makes me want to find Andy and cut his balls off. The only reason I said what I did was because I wanted to protect you. The way you protected me. You have to believe that.”

He pulled away and peered down at my tear-streaked face. “You didn’t come to see me, I didn’t hear from you. Hell, I didn’t know if I’d ever hear from you again,” he said, his voice all rasp. “I don’t mean to be a dick. I know it couldn’t have been easy to get the money and I appreciate it.”

The guilt swelled again, making my chest ache. “Believe me, I wanted to come, but the most important thing to me was getting you out of there as quickly as possible, and it took some doing. I’m so sorry for putting you through that.” I touched his face, wishing I could wipe the worry away. Rolling onto my tiptoes, I planted a kiss on the corner of his lips but he stepped back.

“Look, Liv, my head’s ten kinds of fucked up right now. Up until twenty minutes ago, I didn’t know whether I’d be in there another hour or another year.”

His tone wasn’t as cold anymore, but he sounded weary. Wrung out, which was almost worse.

“For three days, I thought you’d turned your back on me, and now you’re here. My entire future is a question mark, and everything I’ve worked for my whole life is on the line.” He reached for my hand and gave it a squeeze. “I care about you, but I can’t do this with you. Not right now. I have to keep my head in the game and focus on doing everything I can to get through this mess with as little damage as possible. I think it’s better if we…”

I nodded, but my heart was breaking. “Sure. Yeah, I totally get it.”

I had to be strong, because the last thing he needed was to be worried about comforting me right now. I’d suck it up and be grateful he didn’t hate my guts after all the trouble I’d caused him. As much as he swore up and down that his punching Andy wasn’t my fault, the fact remained that it was my own poor judgment that got me in that situation in the first place. I should have walked away from him the first time he screamed in my face and pushed me, and I didn’t.

I’d been lucky, and came through it okay, but Bash had paid a very dear price. Time for me to be as honorable as he had been the night he’d rescued me at the bar, and set my feelings aside, personal consequences be damned.

“Still, let me drive you home, all right? I’m here anyway, and I’m going right by your apartment.”