Page 6 of Tears of Gold

“Will you move into the main house with me while we are here? My wife should be in my bedroom, not in a guest room.”

I shake my head as I scramble from the mattress, helping him to sit up. “No. I’ll stay here. It’s for the best right now. I’m still here for you, but I don’t want to be sleeping down the hall from your wicked grandmother.”

He stills, pensive beneath the bruises. “And I don’t want to sleep without you at all. I’ll move out here.”

I go to shake my head, but he cuts off my words with a fleeting caress of his lips against mine. “Together.”

I smile against his mouth, my tongue tasting the metallic tang of fresh blood which must still be leaking through. “Forever.”

* * *

I’m not going to lie. I didn’t sleep and neither did Eli. We both lay there in the darkness, both ensnared in our own tangled thoughts.

When daylight begins to creep through the curtains, I roll over and lift up onto my elbows; my ribs and bruised flesh aches with a dull spreading pain at my sudden movement. “Shall we stop pretending to sleep now and go find some breakfast?”

One of his eyebrows lifts and he shifts his attention from the ceiling and down onto my face. “For a woman as skinny as you, you seem to be constantly talking about food.”

I mull over his words for a moment as I stretch under the duvet, my toes pointing, my muscles aching. “I am hungry. Maybe it’s because I’m not maintaining my vital nicotine intake.”

He snorts a little and then winces as his ribs obviously cause him pain. “Possibly.”

“Listen, I know today is going to be shit, but I think we need to get your injuries checked.”

He just groans and lifts an arm to cover his face. “No. Don’t fuss.”

“Eli, it’s not fussing. It’s called caring.”

I sit up and pull his arm back down before dropping my focus to assess his bare torso. The bruising is bad. More than bad.

I want to slice Aiden’s dick off with a carving knife. Okay, I’ve wanted to do that for years but now I want to cut it off and then make him eat it like a hotdog. He’s ruined my Eli. I know the bruises will fade, but their memory will linger between us, unspoken, but never truly evaporating.

He rolls slightly to get up, masking any pain he is experiencing. I can only imagine he is cussing like a bitch on the inside. “Okay, Faith. Stop faffing and let's have a tactical discussion before we get into the main house.”

“A tactical discussion? Is this a battlefield?”

He arches one wry eyebrow—I can only imagine that must hurt, too. I don’t really know how it’s possible to look so handsome when your skin is the colour of an aubergine, but he’s managing to pull it off. With sleep smudged eyes, bed hair and bruises I wish I could erase with my touch, he is still astonishingly breath-taking. From the corner of my eye I can see my own reflection and all I see is ink. “This is Bowsley, everything is a battle,” he says, unaware of my internal musings.

“Eli.” I sigh and switch myself back into our conversation. “Your brother has just died. I don’t think these are normal circumstances.”

His face freezes. Those lips I normally love to kiss when they aren’t swollen and covered in scabs, crimp into a straight line. “I know he did.” His voice echoes with a shattering emptiness. “But a couple of days ago my mother, or grandmother, whoever it might have been, tried to sabotage us, again, by inviting your useless father to my birthday dinner.”

With a sigh I shift closer and slip my arms carefully and gently around him, staring into his eyes. “How are you?” I meet his gaze only to find a tortured fear in their depths.

Before I can search the depths of emotions in his eyes, he drops his head to my shoulder, his breath fanning along my skin, rippling a flush of goosebumps across the exposed surface of my ink. “It’s unreal. I can’t think about it.”

I nod. Dan was like this when Al died, and Dan had warning; he knew it was coming, knew it was imminent, despite not wanting it to happen.

Peter is just gone.

There one minute with his sardonic smile.

Gone the next.

I don’t know what to say. So instead of saying anything at all, I plant a gentle kiss on his shoulder. He leans into me, the warmth of our skin touching filling the place words leave empty.

“I don’t want them to hurt you again, Faith.” He picks up my fingers, staring at the diamonds and gold. “Peter wouldn’t want it, either. He liked you. The night of my dinner when you ran; I hate to admit it, but I stood there frozen. For a long moment, I couldn’t move, couldn’t even think. The second you turned and walked away with that look in your eyes, I thought we were done for good. It was Peter who came up and handed me the keys to his car. He said, 'What are you waiting for, prodigal son? Go get her'.”

A resonating crack splits his words.