Page 64 of Green Flag
I started to leave, approaching those trying to filter out through the door. I’d been petrified of coming to the prison; I didn’t need to interact with any actual criminals.
“You got that little red number on?” he shouted. “With the bow?” He wolf-whistled. “Or the cute little cotton ones from when you were younger?”
Pedro snarled at him in Spanish. Over my shoulder, he’d become a different man. Angry and aggressive, trying to throw himself over the table at the guy whom I didn’t even look at.
But his words weren’t shocked. Weren’t questioning.
“Why would you fucking say that to her? You’ll never get another look—”
He’d shown him.
The tears fell and Pedro could do nothing but stare at the floor in shame, restrained by the guard.
And I didn’t know if what I had for him had been love or if my love wasn’t as strong as I’d once believed. But it wasn’t strong enough to withstand a truth like that.
14
Chapter 14
Everly
Pedro hadn’t even glanced at me in the pit box. He’d simply continued his conversation with Luca, who had been laughing along until his eyes flickered to mine.
But Pedro had seen me. He’d liked the picture of me in the Ciclati uniform. He’d messaged me. He’d received my messages and he knew I worked here.
But as Luca was dragged away to the cameras, I didn’t cower. When I looked over my shoulder, Livie gave me a soft, concerned smile, and when I shook my head, she went into action. I could see her walk to the back of the room and talk into her radio. With her and Luca behind me, I still felt safe.
With them, I would be able to rationalise, to stay intact, to breathe.
“You got my message then,” I told him, crossing my arms and trying not to glare at Pedro. But he was looking straight past me to the cameras. We were just out of eyeshot by the door.
At home last week, I’d managed to sneak onto Dad’s emails in his office while he was out.
Frustrated, I’d decided I had to be looking in the wrong place.
The whole time, I hadn’t considered Livie to be involved at all.
But when I’d looked at their latest email… I’d realised maybe I could be wrong. Very wrong.
Because she explained a shipment route from Helsinki to Dubai to Lisbon.
Which made a total of zero sense.
A five-thousand-kilometre detour?
Then, when I looked at the full manifest sent by the travel team, something had been offloaded in Dubai two weeks ago —same weight, same crate ID, new batch numbers.
We didn’t work in Dubai.
What made absolutely no sense was that Ciclati was a Portuguese brand. Head office was in Lisbon. The bikes were built in Lisbon.
So what the fuck was happening in Dubai? In a moment of weakness and confusion, I’d messaged him.
“I blocked you after, but yes, I saw your message.”
Prick.
“You should have heard me out.”
