Liberty Begins (The Liberty Series) (24 page)

Had I betrayed myself?
I wondered. I didn’t think so. I think who I was now was who I was meant to be. But the me from before — the pre-John me — had been fooling herself for a long time. I’d underestimated myself. I was so focused on being alone, on being able to rely just on myself, that I’d tricked myself into believing I could stay like that forever. I froze myself, to save myself the pain — the pain of what I didn’t have, the pain of what I’d thought I couldn’t ever have. I hadn’t thought it was possible for me to love someone like I loved John.

Actually, that’s not true, Liberty,
my inner voice said.
You loved your mother like that. You were just as loyal.
That was true, but what was I thinking? Did I think John was as troubled as my mother? Because if I did, I shouldn’t be here.
He’s not the same,
the voice said, and I knew it was true.
You can trust him. He’s not a lost cause….yet.

What
is
the same is you, and your ability to love someone — your loyalty.

I stood up taller and squared my shoulders at that. I put on the bikini and now even my body looked different to me; it was new territory. I had never thought of it as beautiful or wondrous or magical before, but being with John had unlocked my body’s secrets. Now as I tied on the top and looked at my breasts, my belly, I thought of how John looked at me, how full of love and awe he was. I hugged my smooth skin, thinking of him like that.
Thank you
, I thought, sending my gratitude and love out towards the pool. I was in his debt, even further: he’d help me unlock the power within me to see myself this way.

I had some other things I needed to think about, pressing things: what we were going to do with Ray when and if we found him, who the client actually was, what was going to happen to me and John after we were done. Fear, cold and bubbly, rumbled in my stomach at the thought of
after.
Frankly, it should have been the other things that frightened me, but that fear was pale in comparison to the blinding white fear I had of us going our separate ways.
What am I going to do?
I wondered, and it was like asking a question in an empty, locked room. It made me feel hollow, and there was no one but myself to answer.

The thing was, I already knew the answer. I just couldn’t bear to think about it right now.

Let’s take an hour off from meditations on violence and anticipated heartbreak,
my inner voice suggested, and I couldn’t agree with her more. I was going to drive myself absolutely crazy. I shook my head to clear it from all these thoughts and followed John’s path out into the sunshine.

“Let’s stay up here tonight,” John said, later, while we were watching the sun set from the pool.

I nodded. “We can have dinner with your dad and watch a movie,” I suggested. Ian seemed like he would enjoy some family time. It seemed like he was on his own in the big house a lot.

“Are you sure?” John asked, but he sounded pleased. “You don’t mind?”

“Are you kidding?” I asked, and splashed water at him. “I already told you I love your dad. I’d much rather hang out with him than run around engaging in violent behavior with a bunch of bounty hunters.”

He went underwater and swam over to me. He grabbed me round the waist and then popped up, throwing me over his shoulder. I screamed in delight and he went lower into the water, swimming, dragging me with him. “You don’t want to be my prisoner,” he said.

“For real,” I said, and he smacked my bottom. Hard. “Ouch!” I squealed, and he went under again, taking me with him, and then released me. When we came up he kissed me, suddenly serious now, and stroked my hair.

“I could never hurt you,” he said, tenderly. “I don’t know how anybody ever could.” I leaned up and kissed him then, full on the mouth, and I could feel him getting hard through his swim trunks.

“Oh no,” I said, in as playful a tone as I could manage, and pushed him back. The truth was, I wanted him badly, but there was also a lump in my throat. When he was tender with me like that, it made me feel so safe and protected, I wanted to cry. I was starting to think of it as The Fairytale Effect. I had to avoid that feeling; eventually it would make me weep, throw myself at John’s feet, and beg him to never leave me, bounty hunter or not.

Plus, we couldn’t have sex in the pool while his father was rattling around the house. “Maybe later,” I said, taking his hands, “after your dad’s gone to bed.”

“It’s a date,” John said, leading me out of the pool and into a fluffy towel. “Now, let’s order some pizza.”

“And pick a movie,” I said. I was suddenly, overwhelmingly, ridiculously excited to have such a domestic night with him. We both smiled at each other. He seemed pleased, too, and it warmed my insides. “I’ll go down to the barracks and grab some pajamas and my toothbrush. Do you need anything?”

“Just you,” he said. “And let me guess:
cheese
pizza? Am I right?”

“Consistently,” I said, and kissed him on the nose. I threw my clothes on over my damp bathing suit and headed out through the gate, across the lawn towards my room. It was twilight, again, not yet time for the magic of the lightning bugs, but time for the sky to be changing from pink to purple to the most beautiful color of blue that nature could make. I took in a deep breath, trying to memorize the way the sky looked and the feel of my happy, contented heart.

“Whoa,” said Matthew, as I headed to the door as he was coming out. “You’re practically
skipping
. Not how I expected to find you after this afternoon.”

“I’m making myself live in the moment,” I said to him, wryly. Then I exhaled. “This afternoon sucked,” I admitted. “Is Darius okay — I mean, is he relatively okay?”

“He’s fine,” Matthew said, shaking his head. “He’s in a wheelchair, but he’s just as evil as ever.”

“You seemed really upset before, when I went in there with John. Are you okay?” I asked. I didn’t want him to be in trouble with John. They seemed to be friends, not just coworkers, and I didn’t want Matthew being overprotective of me, too. John clearly had that angle covered.

“I just didn’t want you seeing that,” Matthew said, still shaking his head. He looked up, off into the distance. “I know how John feels about you, and I know he wants you to understand what we do. That’s probably because of your situation with Ray.

“But I just thought he was making a mistake. I couldn’t imagine bringing my wife in with me on a job like this. I didn’t want you to be so upset, see something so horrible. You’re just a kid. An innocent kid.”

“John wants to be honest with me,” I said. “He wants me to know what it is exactly that he does. And then judge him for myself.”

“He’s a brave dude,” Matthew said. “I admire him for it.”

“I admire him, too,” I said, “even though what happened in there was awful.” I shivered. “I don’t know if I can handle that happening with Ray.”

“So tell him, Liberty,” Matthew said. “You tell him what you want. There isn’t anything more important to him than that. I’ve known John a long time, and I’m completely sure that all he wants is what’s best for you.”

I stood there for a moment, taking this in. Something had been bothering me, something I thought he could help me with, but I’d been too afraid to ask.

“Does he ever talk to you about his daughter?” I asked, biting my lip. I figured since we were being honest, I would ask about Catherine. I was hoping Matthew could tell me something I didn’t know, and that something would help me find a way to help John. This was really the thing that mattered the most to him. Maybe once he moved past it, he would be able to start over, to leave this kind of life. I still hadn’t thought of another way to help him deal with it.

“He has,” Matthew said, looking slightly uncomfortable. “He hasn’t talked about her in a long time. I know he still keeps up with his contacts in Mexico, though. They lost her in Cabo.
I think he probably is always going to be looking for her. I know I would be.”

I nodded thoughtfully. “You go on and get your stuff and get back up to the big house,” Matthew said. “Otherwise John is going to come looking for you and I’m going to be in even more trouble than I already am.”

I waved goodbye and went in and got a pair of pink pajamas that John had given me, deeming them decent enough to wear in front of his dad. I also packed workout clothes for tomorrow, my toothbrush and some face wash. I changed out of my wet bikini, put it carefully in a plastic bag and then put on capri leggings and a slouchy, soft tee shirt that John had also given me. Lastly, I grabbed one of the books he’d brought. I hadn’t had any time to read since I’d been here, but in case they wanted to watch a movie I couldn’t get into, I could still sit on the couch with them and not be bored.

I
was
practically skipping on my way back to the house; I hadn’t had a movie night with anyone since Sasha moved away. The idea of doing something so normal, while wearing pajamas and having pizza, with John and his dad was so appealing that it was almost overwhelming. For once, in what seemed like forever, I wasn’t alone. It was the complete opposite of earlier today, and I couldn’t be happier to be on the other side. A glimpse of Darius, bleeding and crying, sprung out from my subconscious.
Don’t think about it,
I thought, biting my lip some more.
There will be a time when you can dwell on it, but not yet.

“There she is,” said Ian when I finally got back. He hugged me. “I’m so excited that we’re going to spend some time together. With none of this interrogation nonsense.” He waved me towards the kitchen. “Let’s go have some dinner and then you can pick a movie, my dear.”

“Oh no — you can pick,” I said, laughing. “I brought a book in case John insisted on watching something with lots of guns and tanks and explosions.”

“John’s not allowed to pick,” Mr. Quinn said, setting two slices of delicious, steaming cheese pizza on a plate for me and pushing it towards me.

“I heard that,” said John, sauntering into the room in low-hanging sweatpants and what looked like one of his old, ripped tee shirts from college. He had showered; his hair was wet and rumpled and wild, his feet were bare. He looked completely comfortable and sexy as hell. Fire shot up between my legs when our eyes connected and I had to look away. We were probably going to have to sit on opposite ends of the couch during the movie so we’d behave.

“Sit,” Ia
n
said, gesturing towards a barstool at the kitchen island. I did as I was told, and took a bite of the pizza. It burned my mouth but it was completely delicious. I had always been an eater, but the crazy workouts we’d been doing were making me a shoveler; I had to slow myself down so I didn’t inhale the entire piece of pizza at once and totally horrify myself and everyone else.

John sat across from me and gave me a smile. “You look nice,” he said to me. I beamed at him. He beamed back and then looked down at his empty plate. “Can I have some?” he asked his dad, hopefully.

“Well, you’re an adult! Help yourself!” Mr. Quinn said, in an exasperated tone. He was looking in the refrigerator for something. John pulled a face at me, obviously because of the preferential treatment I was receiving, and served himself.

Mr. Quinn found what he was looking for — a bottle of white wine — and brought it over to the table. He went to pour me a glass. “Oh, no thank you!” I said. “I’m fine with just water.”

He kept pouring anyway, and then he poured glasses for John and myself.

“I think you might need it,” Mr. Quinn said, taking a sip of his and then looking at me. He lowered his glasses a bit. “I need to talk to you about something.”

My stomach dropped. In my brief experience in the company of these men, I had learned that them
needing
to talk about something was probably a bad sign. I bit my lip and looked across the table at John, who was looking at me softly, like he was sad for me. Suddenly I felt very, very tired.

“Do we have to do this tonight?” John asked, taking another bite of pizza followed by a large sip of wine. “We had our asset’s interview this afternoon ... it’s been a long day.”

“She has a right to know,” Mr. Quinn said, shrugging. “And as you’re about to go out on assignment, I’m afraid we’ve run out of time.”

John nodded almost imperceptibly, giving his assent.

“A right to know what?” I said, flatly, not bothering to lilt my voice in the form of a question. I had some of my wine and kept eating my pizza. The wind had been taken out of my sails, but I was still going to enjoy my dinner while I could.

“Liberty, it’s about your case,” Mr. Quinn said, taking his glasses off and rubbing his eyes. He put them back on and looked at me. “I normally don’t get involved in these matters, but in this case, I
am
involved.”

I shook my head at him, not comprehending.

“Liberty,
I
am the client,” Mr. Quinn said.