Page 28 of The Alpha's Assistant & The Dom Next Door
Once Jenny is tucked in with her shoes off and Flubber in her arms, I go back down to check on my guest. The weight of what I have to ask her tugs at my chest. This isn’t going to be easy, but I won’t feel right until it’sdone.
“How’s she doing?” she asks softly, her sympathy as honest and easy as if we’ve been close foryears.
“Out like a light. She’ll sleep until almost suppertime after all the running around she’s done today.” Chasing Jenny is starting to become a real effort. I’m fit, fast, and tireless, but three-year-olds are gigglingblurs.
I sit back down on the couch, settle back into my seat, and scoop up my mug. “Look, I don’t want to invade your privacy, but I think that we need to talk about what happened with your sistertoday.”
She looks down and away at once, a blush deepening on her cheeks. “I’m sorry. I didn’t ever want you to have to deal with Shayla and herbullshit.”
“Why are you apologizing to me?” I ask, baffled. “Look, I brought it up because I’m concerned for you and your safety. You’re my neighbor, and I’d want to help you even if I didn’t like you or think you’re cute ashell.”
Her eyes widen, and after a moment I realize I probably said a little bit too much, given how long we’ve known each other. Still, it’s true, and at least it gives her some idea of my motives. Okay, they’re not perfect—but they’re honest, and they do involve giving a damn abouther.
“Look, like I said, I don’t mean to embarrass you or get too personal. But I have known people like Shayla before, and they only ever become more bothersome. Are you sure you’re even safe with heraround?”
She sets her mug down a little hard. Her hands are shaking, and tears spill over her eyes. She wipes at them self-consciously. “Wow, my mascara’s really getting a workout today,” shemumbles.
I feel terrible for a moment … until I catch the relief in herexpression.
“I’m sorry,” she says in a shaky voice. “It’s just that you’re the first person to give this much of a damn about me since my parentsdied.”
“Holy shit, I’m sorry. Don’t you have any friends?” Somehow, though, that just makes her look more miserable, and my heart sinks.Think I just put my foot in my mouththere.
“I’d like to have friends,” she admits after a moment, “but I don’t have anypractice.”
“What, why? Shayla?” It has to beShayla.
“She would always drive them away,” comes the soft reply, disgusting me. “I tried to have friends, but if Shayla caught me hanging out with someone she would bully both of us until they avoided me. She wanted all my attention so she could …” She trails off, her voice rising to a squeak before the tears come again and she closes hereyes.
“Have you all to herself. But then she drove you away?” I’m trying to get a grasp on Shayla’s character, like I would suss out an enemy, or a potential betrayer. It was a necessary skill in my old business—always keep one eye out for a knife headed for yourback.
“She wanted me to give up my half of our childhood home so she could keep the whole thing. She drove me here, and then that wasn’t enough so she followed me.” Her chest is heaving distractingly, but the tears in her eyes make the luscious display impossible toenjoy.
“It’s like I said. Is she on cocaine? She reminds me of a person on coke.” She might get curious as to how I know that, but right now, I just don’tcare.
“She might be, I don’t know. She’s so much bolder now that Mom and Dad are gone and she has money.” She sniffles, and then looks up at me suddenly. “Whydoyoucare?”
Her voice isn’t accusing, but rather full of a desperate plea—but it has the same basic effect. The question freezes me in my tracks, not because I’m uncertain of my answer, but because I’m uncertain of how she’ll takeit.
Go gently, I tell myself, draining the rest of my mug beforeanswering.
“It’s exactly like I said. You’re my neighbor, I like you, and I’m attracted to you. But more than that, I want my neighbors to be safe no matter how biased toward or against them Iam.”
“So you ... look after theneighborhood?”
I nod. That’s a good enough way of putting it. “My little girl needs to grow up in a neighborhood where people look after each other. Only way to get people to do that is to lead byexample.”
Her eyes search my face, and then she slowly nods. “It’s been a while since I met anyone like that,” she admits, and I can only give her a sadsmile.
She sips at her cocoa, her gaze going from me to the windows and back again, her lush body drawn up tighter than usual. “I used to spy on the family therapists when they would be talking to my family. I was trying to figure out why Shayla is the way sheis.
“She would drive doctors away just like everyone else, and they could never agree on how to treat her. But they gave a bunch of diagnoses that explained some of herbehavior.
“They kept stressing that none of this excused her being that nasty and selfish. She refused to do anything that would help her cope with her personality disorders. They just became her excuse to be such a selfish, unkindperson.”
My lips twist and I look down. How many sad sons-of-bitches have I known who dove into drugs and stupid behavior while blaming their wartime PTSD, or their addiction, or any of the rest of it for their personal choices? I feel bad for them and what they carry, but most of the time, being sick has never been a get-out-of-responsibility-free card in mybook.
My attitude about that is the only thing that helped me get over Mary’s death and the terrible way she treated me and her own mother in the months before it. Maybe she thought she was doing us a favor by severing ties before her death, but love and loyalty don’t work that way. I kept fighting for her, and she broke my fucking heart—especially when she tried to take our daughter withher.
