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  Copyright © 2014 Max Henry

  Published by Max Henry

  Smashwords Edition

  All rights reserved. No part of this ebook may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Max Henry is in no way affiliated with any brands, songs, musicians, or artists mentioned in this book.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you are reading this ebook and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it to the seller and purchase your own copy.

  Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  Published: May 2014, by Max Henry [email protected]

  Edited by: Max Henry

  Cover Design: Rebecca Berto of Berto Designs

  Formatting by: Max Effect

  One

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  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Pistol swiped the unwanted tear from his eye, and punched the steering wheel. Pain seared through his knuckles, and sent jolts of agony into his forearm. He hit the unrelenting, steel centre again, and again … and again. Fuck it. He’d been that close to having her, to capturing her for himself. But she’d spooked on the home straight, and now he looked a ruined horse in the eye, deciding whether he should spend the time nurturing what he had into something worthwhile, or putting the damn thing out its misery, right there and then.

  He eyed her workplace one last time before slotting the shifter into gear, and high-tailing it from the car park. The whole thing was his ma’s fault. If the fucking woman hadn’t decided to step foot in the country, he wouldn’t have a brain that ticked through ways to kill her like a damn microfiche. Speaking of the wench … she flew in that morning. Surely, the mole had already begun to sniff him out. If that was indeed the case, she’d be on him in no time.

  At least then he’d be able to find out what it was the skank wanted with him. Why was she here? What did he have that she needed so desperately? Like hell she would turn up for a damn reunion after all this time. She hadn’t cared for her kids when they were in her care, so why the fuck would she start now? No, the bitch would be after something from him—he only had to try and figure out what.

  Pistol tapped an impatient rhythm at a red-light while he mulled the situation over. He couldn’t see her changing after all this time. Sure, they probably forced her into some Kumbaya therapy circle in prison, but the woman was fucking born with a chip off her shoulder. The bloody Pope would have a hard time getting her to confess her sins.

  Even if by some miracle his mother did want closure, there’d be no chance for an amicable parting of ways after the send-off Cutie had given him. He should be mad at Steph for giving up on him, for stubbornly refusing to see things from his point of view, but instead he hated his mother more. The cow had ruined his life right from the day he came screaming into this unforgiving world. No way would he take it easy on her now. Dearest Mam had to pay.

  He had at least eight hours until he needed to be setting up for work. Eight hours to play. Eight hours may as well have been eight years for what he could do to her in that time. Providing he could locate his mother with minimal trouble that was. The city was a big place, and his knowledge on her travel plans minimal. Unfortunately, he’d been too blinded with rage to think about squeezing the details from Richard before he shut the fucker up for good.

  He propped his phone against the dash display, and dialed through to Derek. If anyone would be able to help him speed this along, it was the man who had agreed to guarantor the woman’s visit. The old guy would know where his mother had chosen to stay, and if he had his smarts about him, probably new to expect the call from Pistol as well. The trill of the dial tone pierced the low rumble of the engine as he pulled away from the green light. He cruised along the main road in no great hurry until he knew his correct destination. Derek finally answered; his voice tired, and hoarse.

  “Late night, old man?”

  “Pete. Lovely to hear from you, too.” Pistol chuckled at the droll reply. No doubt that wife of Derek’s had been chewing his asshole out all night about how much dosh she needed for some fucking shopping spree. “What do you need from me today?”

  “Agh, don’t be like that.”

  “Pete, you never call me unless you need something.”

  “You know where the old lady’s stayin’, then?”

  Silence hung thick over the line. “You know I can’t tell you that.”

  “Aww, come on—”

  “—but if you happened to stop by in an hour, I may happen to be out, and the front door may happen to be accidentally left unlocked.”

  A smirk spread from ear to ear. Nice move, old man. “I may pop by on the off chance. Be a pity to miss you.”

  Derek sighed. “Speaking of missing, have you heard from Richard lately?”

  He steeled at the question. Last he knew Derek and his youngest son weren’t on speaking terms any more. To say he hadn’t expected the question so soon would be a lie. “Sorry, old mate. You know we ‘aven’t been talkin’ since our fall-out.”

  “Yeah, I know. Just checking.”

  Pistol had been mates with Richard since right after Derek took him on. They’d been the troublesome-duo—spending shared nights in custody more times than he could count on one hand. Thick as thieves they were, right up until Richard slept with the girl Pistol was dating at the time. The ensuing fall-out had been of epic proportions, and exactly what you get when two hot-heads harboured so much angst toward the other. Derek had been around to peel them apart on more than one occasion, and he’d copped a couple of fists for his troubles, too. But, apparently leaving a blood-stain in the cream carpet of his parent’s home had been the last chance for Richard. The guy had been pushing at their patience for some time, and truthfully, the fall-out probably gave Derek the reason he needed to make the split.

  Pistol on the other hand, had barely made it twelve months before mutual dealings had brought them back together. He hadn’t exactly reconciled with Richard—more come to an understanding surrounding the benefits each gave the other when it came to petty crime. Brains, and brawn. They went together like opposite sides of the coin.

  “What’s got ya askin’? He been a bit quiet?” Of course he would dig a little further. He needed to find out exactly how much Derek knew.

  “Yeah. His mother’s a bit worried, but I keep telling her he’ll be fine. You know how the jack-ass was; never one to keep in regular contact with her. He’s probably off on some week long bender somewhere.”

  It was only the wife who kept in touch with their disappointment of a son, then. “Aye, more than likely. I’ll let ya know if I hear anythin’.”

  “Cheers, Pete
. I didn’t think you two had spoken since he did you over, but I’m kind of at the desperate end of seeking information.”

  “I understand, old mate. I might see you in an hour, eh?”

  Derek chuffed. “Might not, either.”

  Pistol disconnected, and edged the needle on the speedo higher. The thought of having the information he needed to finally come face-to-face with his mother thrilled him. Years, he’d dreamt of what he would say, what he would do. He was plagued by macabre fantasies; always ending in a scene that played out a lot like a horror movie.

  Only trouble he would have now, is choosing which fantasy he’d run with.

  Steph buried her face in her hands, and groaned. The morning had promptly skidded from bad to worse. Pete was the least of her worries when she’d knocked a full cup of coffee over her desk—and keyboard.

  “Marcus?” She stood to look over the partition between her, and the IT guy.

  His head popped up to greet her. “Yeah?”

  “Help,” she squeaked.

  He rose to full height, and circumvented the low walls to her cubicle. “What’s the issue?” His eyes fell on the mess over her desk as she pathetically tried to cup the remnants running out from the overflowing keys with her hands. “Oh.”

  “Yeah, oh.”

  He grinned, and the cutest dimples appeared. “Easily fixed. Unplug it, and I’ll get you a new one.”

  “Thanks.” Steph smiled.

  Marcus was a good looking guy in a Gothic kind of way, and up to a few weeks ago she would have said not her type, but Pete had changed that, hadn’t he? She watched Marcus head for the store-room; the wallet chain on his low-slung, black jeans rattled as he walked. Eye-balling another man still felt like infidelity. She thought back to the discussion that morning, and cringed. Nothing definitive had been said, but she got the impression from the tyre marks Pete left in the car-park that he thought she had chosen to walk away from him. Truth was, she had simply needed out of the situation. Being so close to him was always such a distraction, and deciding whether his extra-curricular activities with his mother were a deal-breaker was one decision she wanted a clear head for.

  Work however, proved to be equally as distracting. In the short time she’d been in the office, she had found herself staring into the white void between two pixelated numbers on more than one occasion. Her head still screamed at her to run, to leave him behind, and think of her safety first. But her heart kept on arguing the point that he hadn’t actually hurt her. All she was doing was laying presumptions about what could happen given his history. Who was to say anything would happen?

  Steph leant across to snatch a couple of tissues from the box beside her phone, and lined them along the base of the keyboard before wiping her hands off. She hitched up her dress, pushed the chair out, and knelt down to crawl under the desk. With her neck craned to the side like a magpie eyeballing its next feed, she sussed out which wire was the keyboard, and unplugged it from the tower. The space under her desk was narrow—barely enough for her to fit her legs comfortably—and it required her to back out blindly on her knees into the open space of her cubicle to get up. Her heels slammed into something hard—something that moved.

  “Shit, sorry,” Marcus muttered as he moved aside.

  His gravelly tone caressed her in all the wrong places. Or the right ones, if she wanted to see him like that. Not that she did. Do I?

  Marcus was one of the first people she’d noticed at the new office given he was kind of hard to miss with his tall, dark appearance. But until now, they’d never had much reason to talk. And she hadn’t realized until a moment ago how deep, and reverberating the timbre of his voice was. Steph straightened as a shiver slid off the base of her spine, and picked up the old keyboard. Her brain was locked at the point of impact with his legs, and she didn’t think twice about the coffee that still sat in the recesses of the hardware. The warm liquid sloshed over the edge, and down the skirt of her white dress.

  “Fuck.”

  Marcus chuckled. “Really not your day, huh?” He handed her a wad of paper towels he’d brought back with him, and she blotted at the stained fabric.

  “Not in the slightest.”

  Steph took a step back to let him under the desk as she continued to curse at the lack-lustre job the towels did of removing the fast-spreading smudge. He halved his tall frame, and got down on all fours before her. The grey shirt he wore rode up his back as he crawled into the narrow space, and she caught a glimpse of a tattoo that curled around his hip, and up his back. Figures. Of course a guy with ear plugs would have tattoos as well. He backed out, and rose up with a silly grin plastered on his face—dimples and all.

  “Try not to ruin this one too, huh?”

  She gave him a mock salute, and narrowed her eyes on him. “Yes, Sir.”

  Sir. Oh, god. Now was not the time to have visions of Pete in rather compromising positions.

  “You okay?” Marcus asked. “You looked like you left us for a bit there.”

  “Yeah, I did.” She giggled. “You so don’t want to know where to.”

  He hesitated at the edge of her desk with a curious furrow in his brow. She binned the soggy towels, and looked over to him, unsure of the reason why he still stood there. Had she forgotten something? Her finger tapped the space bar, and the cursor moved across the screen.

  “Seems fine,” she affirmed in case he’d wanted to check it all worked.

  His Adams apple bobbed, and he ducked his head to his chest. “Cool.”

  Steph looked down at her ruined dress once more, and when she lifted her gaze again to crack a lame joke about her co-ordination, he was gone. His faux hawk disappeared below the level of the partition as she looked to his desk. Probably for the best too, considering she had no place worrying what a broody Goth IT man was thinking about her. My God, are you that vain? Her main focus should be on what she would do about a tattooed troublemaker called Pete, not what she would do if she was offered an inter-office relationship. She closed her eyes, and drew a deep breath. One thing at a time.

  Her mind ran through the conversation with Pete for the six-millionth time that morning. Why did she feel compelled to fix things with Pete? What made it so impossible to walk away, and cut her losses? They weren’t bloody married.They weren’t even what you could class as a regular couple. They’d never been on a date, let alone done anything by the book. You can’t walk away because you’ve fallen for the guy. Had she, though? Or was the strange attraction toward him, and all his vices simply lust? After all, she’d never truly loved Dave, so what did she have to compare this all to?

  If only she had a girlfriend to talk this over with. But thanks to Cass’s little stunt, that was a no-go. And like hell she would talk to her mother about it. Who else was there? If she spoke to Ben again, he’d want to know who the guy was, and she wasn’t ready to explain that one yet. Oh, you know the crim Derek helps out? Yeah, him. She could foresee that going down like a bucket of sick. The only person who already knew who the mystery man in her life was, was Ivan. Here you go again, leading him on. Honestly, what did she think he’d make of it if she asked him over again? Although, Ivan said himself that they were simply good friends. Friends, yeah. Why should she let paranoia get the most of her? She needed someone to talk to, and he had always been a good listener. Maybe if she went to his place it wouldn’t seem like she inferred anything by inviting him over.

  Steph dug her phone from her bag, and opened the last message thread to Ivan. She glanced at the text she’d sent him last night to assure all was well with Pete, and frowned. All was most indeed not well.

  Hey douche. Got time for a visitor tonight?

  She dropped the phone in a clear space on the desk, and picked up the sheets of paper now tainted a lovely mocha colour. Steph opened the relevant documents on the desktop, and got to work replacing the ruined files. As the last of them re-printed, her phone vibrated with a reply.

  Only if it’s my favourite, green-haire
d lady.

  Steph smiled.

  As if it would be anything but ;)

  One short message, and already Ivan had her more relaxed, more at ease. Wasn’t that what she’d thought Pete did for her? The emotions were the same, but yet, so different. Ivan made her feel comfortable in her everyday state; as the Steph who’d finished her Accounting Degree, and got herself a sensible, safe job. Yet Pete made her feel comfortable in her nocturnal state; being the Steph she wished she could be without hesitation. The Steph she repressed for being ‘strange’.

  Who was she really? Daytime Steph? Or night-time Steph? Could she be both? Did they work together? Or would she find herself out of a job, and out of friends if people knew the truth?

  Her phone skittered over the desk.

  See you for dinner?

  She sighed, and her thumb hovered over the screen. Was it a mistake to see Ivan about this? Or was Pete the mistake she needed to try and forget? Her heart ached trying to work it all out.

  Sure.

  No matter what she did, she knew she could never forget Pete.

  Not when she could still feel how his hand gripped her throat the first night they met.

  Pistol edged the door to Derek’s suburban mansion open, and stepped into the plush entranceway. Wood paneled doors opened off on each side of him, and the wide staircase loomed ahead, flanked by two ostentatious plants that stood in decorative urns. He peered in each doorway, finding empty chairs, and magazines which rested in a strategically placed pile on the side table. Nothing stirred. Seemed the old man was right about nobody being home. He ducked left, and walked into Derek’s home office. The computer screen lit up the darkly decorated space, and a note was stuck to the desktop.

  He trailed a finger over the oak as he rounded the desk, and plucked the slip of paper from the leather insert.

  Look to the printer. I think I left something behind.

  Pistol grabbed the crisp white sheet from the tray with unchecked excitement, and glanced over the details. What do ya know.His mother was staying at a two-star motel mere kilometres from his place. The wench is casing you out. He folded the sheet, and stuffed it in the pocket of his waistcoat. He hadn’t even asked Derek if the reverse were true; if his mother knew where he lived. Looked like the race was on to get to her first.