“Can’t keep you clean, you know.”
He watched her and he could see it working behind her eyes he just didn’t know what it was. He felt his body was tense. He was preparing to do what he had to do. Stay still and let her walk out of his life or go after her if she tried.
“So, as you do this business, someone finds out and asks questions, you’re paying me fifty thousand dollars to cover for you,” she said.
He pulled in breath.
Then he gave her what she needed and what he needed to give her.
“Your money is in my safe upstairs in the bedroom. Part of the reason I had to sit a game is to make sure I covered you as well as my business. Right now, you take the diamonds, I go get you the money, you pack your shit, you go and I let you. I can see what I’m doin’ don’t sit well with you. You’ve already had that kinda shit in your life, too much, kept yourself clean, I’m gettin’ you dirty. This is your chance to stay clean. Take it and go.”
She held his gaze and asked, “How is this getting me dirty?”
“Lexie, it comes down to it, I’ll be askin’ you to lie to cops.”
“Ty, it comes down to it, I’ll be lying to dirty cops and everyone knows a double negative is a positive.”
At her words, Walker felt his lungs seize, so bad, he couldn’t breathe or speak.
He battled for oxygen as he watched her look around the kitchen, over her shoulder, taking in her surroundings.
Then she whispered, “Life interrupted.”
“What?” he asked quietly.
Her eyes came back to him.
“You were what? Thirty years old? Thirty-one? You had a job. A house. Friends. And just because you’re a half-black man who won a poker game, they took all that away for five years? Then when you get out, they follow you for days and show up at your door on a Sunday morning just to give you shit?”
The air came back into his lungs and it did this because her voice was getting louder and shriller. She was working herself up.
She was not getting pissed.
She just was pissed.
For him.
“Baby –” he started.
She leaned toward him and her eyes narrowed. “That is not cool, Ty. That is not cool.” Then she slapped her hand hard on the counter of the island and shouted, “I do not believe this shit!”
Oh fuck. She was off.
He moved toward her but she stepped back, lifting up a hand.
“No,” she shook her head, “head’s up, you don’t know this about me yet but when I get mad, it’s good to keep a distance and I’m… fucking… mad. I mean, what the fuck?”
She yelled this still backing up as he advanced thinking she was wrong. She got mad the other night. He’d learned then distance was good when Lexie went off. He just wasn’t going to give it to her now because then, she was pissed at him, now she was pissed for him.
Then she suddenly stopped retreating and planted her hands on her hips. “All * doesn’t have chains, Ty. This Misty bitch was a bitch. We’re not all like that. I assure you. Okay,” she threw out a hand then planted it right back on her hip, “we can be pains in the asses. I’ll grant that. But lying about your whereabouts? And doing it in order to steal five years of your life?” She shook her head, her voice loud, sharp, seriously fucking pissed. “Unh-unh.” She shook her head. “No way.”
He approached cautiously, got close and sifted his hands into her hair at either side of her head, holding it back and resting his forearms lightly on her shoulders, he dipped his head close.
“Babe, get a handle on it,” he whispered.
“That’s why you don’t trust me,” she returned, not whispering, hands still on her hips, body held tight.
“Uh… yeah,” he confirmed.
She nodded, the movement jerky, taking his hands with it. “Right. I can see that.”
He felt his mouth twitch.
“Lexie –”
“We’re not all like that, Ty.”
He pressed the pads of his fingers into her scalp and murmured, “All right, babe, now –”
“And I’m going to prove it to you and I’m going to prove it to you by not going. You need someone to take your back during this business, that’s me. I’m not going. I’m staying right here and giving you what you need.”
He felt his gut clench at the same time that thing pierced through the left side of his chest.
“All right,” he whispered through a pain that was exquisite.
She stared into his eyes and kept her hands on her hips. He stared into hers and watched the wet start to form.