josslyn

The bartender had been back again, no sign of the beating he’d taken on that Cro-Magnon face as he’d paraded on the other side of the bar. Grey had watched him from the booth he was in with one of his suppliers, amusement tugging at his lips at every scowl. Oh that expression seemed to change with each arrival of a pretty girl but between … it was golden.

Chuckling lightly as Hilly – what kind of name was that for a grown man? – clapped him on the shoulder and poured out the last of the bourbon from the bottle, Grey dragged his attention back. The man had been gabbling on about his wife, his two teenaged daughters and the grey hair they were giving him, for hours. They’d started out in Hilly’s office in the next town over, haggling over the cost of real Egyptian cotton and the weekly laundering of all the dirty linen from the Grey Haven but within half an hour business was over and his intention had been to slip away from the guy and back to the hotel.

His mind drifted away, eyes finding a blonde at the bar but not really seeing her. Destiny had still been in his bed when he’d left that morning, her bump beginning to resemble a mountain under those high thread count sheets. He’d dipped down to kiss her, his hair still damp, the chance of a joint shower slipping away with that pregnancy exhaustion. She’d probably hauled herself up soon after, heading for the newspaper and a day spent wrangling reporters he imagined were anything but well behaved. By now she’d probably be packing up for the day, heading back to the apartment to waddle along the block with Berlioz maybe, or gathering up some fresh clothes, the bits and bobs that weren’t practically moved into his apartment already. Later ….

Grey pulled himself back as another swat of Hilly’s meaty hand came down on his shoulder. The man was offering up that paw as he slid towards the edge of the booth. ”Was a pleasure doin’ business with ya son. I’ll get my girl at the office to type up the new contract and send it over. Send that girl of yours my regards too, pregnancy ain’t easy, I’m tellin’ ya.” He let out a low whistle and chuckled. ”I’m gonna head to the men’s room and then head out to my wife before she starts callin’ the sheriff out to look for me. You get home to yours too.” There was something like a wave and then Hilly – his broad shoulders and pot belly working like a battering ram – parted the crowd to head through to the bathroom at the back.

Teeth raking his lower lip, Grey picked up his phone to check it. Maybe Destiny would’ve messaged him to say she’d gotten to his place already but there was nothing there, no warning. No …

”Hi.” The chirp rose almost musically beside him. A far more slender form slipping into the booth beside him. ”I thought he’d never leave.” Her narrow brown eyes rolled beneath painted lashes.

She hadn’t taken the polite no – or the scowls from grumpy boy at the bar – for an answer. Less than ten minutes later she’d started prattling on about her job and then Grey hadn’t wanted her to leave. A prison officer – a guardian. She hated the job but he’d seen the appeal in it. His hand had dipped into a pocket of his jacket, supposedly digging out his billfold to pay for the bourbon that Hilly had already covered and her third, fourth and fifth espresso martini, but Grey had felt for the cool coil of the wire garrot instead.

That inane chatter had continued into his car – oh that enhanced healing came in handy when you wanted to focus after half a bottle of bourbon, he hoped to hell Hilly’d had the sense to call a cab from the bar – like the teeth gritting shrill call of an oversized bird. Thank the lord Cat hadn’t been at the front desk, the judgment rolling off of her would’ve been as thick as the blonde’s – Shelley, Kelly, he was pretty damn sure it wasn’t Nelly – choking him until he was shoving the woman out the door instead of letting her drape herself over him the minute they were in the elevator. The new guy on the desk would keep his mouth shut, if he didn’t … there was always the glossy garden out back and a future mulching the petunias or whatever the hell had been planted up in the beds out there.

She turned into a leech in the lift, wrapping herself around him, clawing hands pulling his head down until he was all but choking into the patchouli scented heat of her neck. How the hell did the prisoners put up with her – other than the Baywatch redolent looks that screamed anything but Prisoner Cellblock H that was – the scent alone would’ve had them dropping left, front and centre. Maybe without the scent of her battering his sinuses he would’ve smelt the cleaning products in the apartment, attention drawn to the sparkling surfaces, realisation striking viper fast.

Grey pushed her on ahead down the hallway to his ‘work room’. The situation that had started to unravel in Mystic Falls had nudged aside his own spiderweb of necessity. He’d told Destiny it was a dozen, some had counted towards his darach scoreboard, but there were gaps, ones that could come back to bite him now, giving Leah room to slide through. Another ‘guardian’ and he’d have another layer of protection, one that would cover him and hopefully Destiny and Petyr, an invisible wall for that bitch to run into face first. ”Down to the end, darllin’,” Grey drawled, patting the woman on the ass as he peeled her away finally. Not in the bedroom, not wriggling into that inner sanctum that only Destiny had ever been allowed into.

The sharp ’hey, I told you’ dried up in his throat as she shoved the door open anyway, coming to a stop in the doorway with an ‘oh my god’ that had his stomach sinking. Grey stepped up behind her, an invisible hand working its way under his ribs to squeeze at his lungs, his stomach. The apology slipped out of her like it was her fault he was doing this. ”Destiny…” Was it a plea or an apology?

Jesus, would she shut up. He almost shoved power through the hand that rose between him and the blonde. Hadn’t told her he had a girlfriend? He’d barely got a word in from the start, her constant babble drowning out anything but those ringing words – prison officer.

This time the ”hey,” emerged. Grey’s brow furrowed, his gaze cutting back and forth between the blonde and Destiny, her body drowned in his t-shirt, all but that almost obscene bulge of her bump. Just friends? After all that had happened, after Petry, was that what they were back to. ”You’re allowed to stay,” he said quietly, wondering if she even heard him. She was getting dressed already, preparing to slip on a sweater and shoes, clothes to run.

If the blonde – Mellie, that was it, like such Essex airhead, light enough between the ears that she hadn’t had the sense to crawl out of her teenaged years – had any sense she would’ve left instead of hovering there. Grey dragged his hands over his face, wincing at the scent of whatever the hell Mellie had doused herself in on his palms. ”You needed it. You don’t have to … I didn’t …” Intend on bringing another woman into what had rapidly become their bed, like Petyr’s conception had changed the boundaries of his existence, like some sort of magic spell wrought on the place until it was some sort of fairyland instead of the villain’s half abandoned castle.

Of course she bellied back in then, curling possessive hands around him that Grey wanted to tear off. Grey gripped Mellie’s arm, dark brows hitching as he jerked his chin out into the hallway. ”You wanna go wait where I asked you to? Please?” The pleasantry stuck in his throat. He wanted to snatch anything up off of the dresser against the wall and crack her across the head with it. He pulled his hand away, reaching for Destiny whether Mellie was out of the room or not. ”You don’t have to go. You wanna wait for me in bed? This … I won’t be long and we need to talk.” Once the stench of patchouli and blind trust faded from the room. He wanted to throw open the windows, let a blast of air in to wash it out, like it would blow this whole situation away and … shit, there were tears in her eyes. Grey cursed under his breath, his teeth dragging over his lower lip. Fucking Hilly and that bucket of bourbon.

Tagged: DESTINY BACCARI * Word Count: 1500

This wasn’t the first time he’d seen that look on Destiny’s face. Like he’d reached a hand inside of her and torn something apart. Tender ground that had been reseeded after all that had happened with Leah that he’d thought had sprouted again. Somewhere they could tend together that his bitch of a sister couldn’t touch. Shit. And he couldn’t even blame Leah for it this time either. Her foul touch wasn’t anywhere near it. It was his own, dark fingerprints staining all that had they’d purified together. Grey wanted to curl his fingers into his palms and somehow wipe them clean.

He barely moved as the blonde snaked back in, his eyes on Destiny, hers on her shoes like she couldn’t even bring herself to look him in the eye. Did he deserve it? Yeah. Grey dipped his head as Mellie pressed painted lips to his cheek, muscles in his jaw jumping. He wanted to reach up and scrub the touch away, the way he’d once done the blood from Destiny’s skin. Cleaning everything outside the three of them from their skin, like it was the only way to start things afresh.

The click of heels was muted on the thick carpet of the hallway but he still heard the click shut of the work room. If the woman had any sense she’d be back out of there in a minute, the bottles and jars in there an immediate red flag. If. It wouldn’t matter if she did, not unless she went screaming to the sheriff about the weird guy who’d lured her back to his apartment only to find his girlfriend there. Maybe she had enough pride to avoid that. Telling the sad little story about how she’d hit on a guy in a bar and had gone home with him without a fucking clue whose lair she was walking into.

Grey curled his hand around Destiny’s elbow, like he could pull her back in and erase this with a kiss on the forehead. A few minutes was all he needed to make this right, to leave the blonde limp on the floor of the work room, her blood spilling across the tile unchecked while he came back in here and … no. His fingers curled back into his palm like a star fish stranded on hot sand as Destiny stepped back from him. ”Careful. Destiny, sit, please.” Another request falling on deaf ears. He pled his case, asked for the few minutes he needed to … get that woman out of the apartment. There was a roil of disgust in the pit of his stomach, the bourbon trying to boil the way up his throat. What the fuck had he been thinking?

Lines blurring, dissolving, washed away by alcohol and poor judgment like the last couple of months had done a piss poor job of etching their way into his life. The one permanent thing he had, not the hotels, not his life here, not even the curse. Destiny and Petyr, the reasons he’d started to fight harder.

His teeth latched onto his lip, his hands coming up almost in surrender before he curled them both around the back of his neck, holding himself back even if he did still command the space between her and the door. ”You don’t.” Even less question about it now. ”You think you were wrong about us?” He huffed out a breath, just a hint of bitter humour around its edges as he shook his head. ”Every single other time you wanted to talk everything out. You wanted me to open my mouth and explain it all and now you don’t wanna listen.” He’d have asked what had changed but the answer would’ve been everything. They weren’t the people they’d been when Destiny had peeled him up off of the pavement, weren’t even the people they’d been when Leah had laid her hands on Destiny. Petyr’s conception had changed everything and there was no going back.

Upset was bad for the baby wasn’t it? This might not’ve come with the flood of emotions that’d rolled over him the last time, or even the tears that seemed to have come every five minutes since the pregnancy hormones had bitten – happy or sad, joy, fear, defiance all wringing them out but it was stress all the same. He’d encouraged Destiny to find that core of iron within her, had held her after she’d finally beaten Tanner with it, but now he wanted to see it break so it wasn’t used on him.

As she moved, a squirming movement to try and get around him and away, Grey moved with her, his head shaking back and forth slowly. They weren’t going three steps backwards over some stupid bitch in a bar he’d been ready to rid the world of for them. ”You’ve got your neighbour, they can take Berlioz out for his walk. Tomorrow we can get him, bring him here if you’re missing him. It’s not that though, is it?” Berlioz was an excuse, a lie to add on top of those apologies to take the blame on her own shoulders like she’d done something wrong to bring all of this into the apartment.

Blue eyes crinkled at the corners, his hand coming up to squeeze hers even as he frowned down at the hand on his. Grey looked back up, the frown growing, along with his anger towards the blonde and himself. ”You never had to before. I wasn’t expecting you to.” But she thought he’d done this because he’d thought he was free to. One woman out of his bed, the next lined up even while there was a fucking pregnancy pillow still tucked up in the sheets.

The tears started to roll as gripped her hand, not letting go when Destiny tried to push him aside with that grip on his arm. Grey stood his ground, tugging her instead, gently – there was a baby on board after all. ”And you think she belongs here more than you do? Some woman from a bar?” One who was too drunk and desperate to read a single thing about the situation. ”Not with me. If I didn’t want you here I wouldn’t have given you the card. I would’ve kept you out of here like I did all of them. You’re gonna run without a fight this time? That’s not the Destiny I know. You stood and you fought until I pushed you away.” And he wasn’t doing that this time. His other hand was coming up instead, cupping her cheek to brush those tears away. Holding on to them both.

Tagged: DESTINY BACCARI * Word Count: 1108