Page 51 of Alfie: Part Two

“I’ll get you all the cannoli you want,” he promised. “Maybe I can get one next time.”

I wasn’t making any promises.

“We’ll see,” I said. “Now, what are we telling Trip and Ellie? I don’t want to drop them off at school and kindergarten tomorrow morning with the slightest worry about their nonna.”

“Yeah, no, fuck that,” Alfie agreed. “They’re asleep now, so maybe we downplay shit tomorrow—she fell or something, but there’s nothing to worry about?”

That would work. Even though they loved Alfie’s parents much more than mine, their attention spans weren’t great if they didn’t sniff out that something might be seriously wrong. For instance, when Trip had asked about my parents the other week, I’d shrugged it off and said they were traveling.

Sooner or later, I’d tell them a child-friendly version of how we weren’t on good terms at the moment, which was an understatement. Some nosy neighbor of mine must’ve spoken to my mother because she’d been calling more often lately. I could only assume she’d found out I was back with Alfie.

It wasn’t on my list of priorities to even send her a text.

CHAPTER 18

Alfie Scott

“So, anyway. Why do you sound like you just woke up?”

“Because I did,” I bitched. “Lemme tell you—waking up to Liam calling ain’t the same as waking up with West next to me.” I walked out of the bathroom and decided I could get dressed later. Sweats worked for now. “West shut off my alarm and thought a love note would make shit okay.”

All right, it was more than okay, but motherfucker, I had to step up my game. He was being way too good to me.

Dad chuckled gruffly, and it sounded like he lit up a smoke in the background.

“So…some improvements, you said?” I asked, heading down the stairs. It felt so weird sleeping in. It was past ten! West had dropped the kids off at school, sent Colby off to a driving instruction thing, brought breakfast to Dad at the hospital, and now he was on his way back with breakfast for us.

“Yeah, two surgeries done, hopped up on painkillers,” Dad replied. “If I don’t smile when she tries to talk, I’d cry like a baby.”

Fuck, it hurt. I was haunted by the photos he’d taken of her injuries. She looked so frail and broken in that hospital bed. And the anger that followed—I didn’t know what to do with it. I couldn’t show West the extent of it, and I definitely couldn’t show the kidsanyof it.

“I told West don’t bother coming down yet,” he went on. “We’re just waiting for the next surgery.”

“Okay, but I wanna see her today.” I picked up Ellie’s hairbrush from the floor and tossed it onto her bed in her room. “Have the police stopped by?”

“Aye, a little while ago,” he answered. “They might be back. She couldn’t give many answers.”

Yeah, I bet.

Once I was in the kitchen, I put on coffee. I’d been warned by Liam last night that they’d set shit in motion hella quick, and yeah, then he’d called in the middle of a sexy-as-fuck dream about West choking me out with his cock. But instead of waking up to turning that dream into reality, I had to get my shit together because Liam and Finn were on their way over.

When life was bad—like now with Mom—I needed two things. Sex that distracted me and dark humor. Now I’d been cockblocked twice in as many days. I was over it.

“But what answerscouldshe give?” I pressed. “Anything about what the attacker looked like?”

“She did mention a mark on the guy’s hand,” he replied.Now we’re talking. “Apparently not a tattoo, but maybe a stamp of some sort.”

“Like from a nightclub?” I trapped the phone between my ear and shoulder, and I grabbed a notepad from the first drawer.

“I don’t know. She couldn’t make out what it was, just that it took up a big portion of the top of his hand. And, uh…” He blew out a heavy breath. “Um, he was about six feet tall—burly, shesaid—and he wore a bandanna or something to cover most of his face. And he had an accent, Russian or Eastern European.”

I jotted it all down and felt a spark of energy. Like we were finally heading somewhere. The accent, the mark—good shit. Anything to narrow things down, unlike six feet tall like half the male population.

“By the way, why are you and West smoking again?” Dad asked.

“One thing at a time, old man,” I replied. I was still busy writing notes. “Did Ma fight back? I tried to teach her how once and where to strike if she was ever attacked.”

“She did.” Something in Dad’s voice grew gentler. “She was mumbling some kind of chant that sounded like IBS first, and?—”

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