CORNELIUSI-I shit it was her.I might have forgotten her face but I still could remember those eyes staring down at me encouraging me to take a swing on the ride in the old park in LA that was demolished years ago.“Put your guns down”She bellowed and my finger didn’t stray from the trigger as Lydia held onto my arm urging me to put my Glock back to where I had whipped it from.But I could see it, I could see the fear and surprise in Lydia’s face as we both glared at the man in front of us.My mother.Christ, Sussanne Powers stood between us caught between the spit fire…“What’s he doing here?” I hollered as Joaquin’s eyes strayed to Lydia and the need to blow his brains out screamed in my head with an uproar.Joaquin hand on his damn gun didn’t falter as he looked at the woman who birthed me with the same same questioning eyes.“Please”, Sussanne placed her gun on Joaquin’s lowering it, till the said thing rested on his side.Lydia’s hands hugged my shoulder encouraging me to do th
LYDIA“Lydia so sorry to call unannounced but can I say Metro Chronicles hasn’t been the same without you. We all miss you and I was wondering-““I’m not coming back, Jack. We both know what fired means. That I’m to never step foot in your building?”Jack’s breaths sounded uneasy from the end of the line.“Had to be done unfortunately, you know how business is. People talk, if you continued working here it would only end badly for you”So basically, gaslighting me into thinking me getting fired was my fault and necessary. How had I never seen my ex-boss like this, he was an—asshole.“And why do you want me back now? Isn’t that for business?”The old fart chuckled trying to lure me with that sales man voice that once had me eating at the palm of his hands“Come on, Lydia. I’m offering you a nice deal here. Deals like these never come twice you know”Right, deals that were induced with the fact that my name was now respectable in LA after Connor cleared everything up and threatened to s
CORNELIUSCarlos, the love sick pup had tortured the truth out of me and if it wasn’t for me confessing about his woman, he wouldn’t be as mellow as he was now.I dunked another glass of scotch mentally groaning that if they kissed one more fucking time I would barf.“Are you planning on getting drunk?”Lydia asked a furious brow daunting her olive skin. This double date was bad fucking idea.While Carlos and Henley were busy playing lovebirds, Dia and I were…what was the right term for it, fighting? No, in disagreement, that’s right.She was mad at me for telling Carlos about the whole Henley staying at her place situation and well I was mad because…I could still remember her eyes when I said the word baby. What? After all that shit that had escalated between us was trying to start a family with her that bad?Was trying to finally settle down that bad? Or was she just not ready? For us? For me?“I’m trying to survive”, I said with an obvious smirk pointing my glass towards the coupl
LYDIAAs a couple we were doing great so far. Connor had at least tried to be supportive and if we were going to be serious about this, the first step to take was meeting his family.Even though he viewed me meeting his family as some sort of way courting me, I still appreciated the sentiment. He wanted us to be together for real. Forever and no matter how patient I wanted us to be the truth still lurked and the truth was we loved each other and deserved to be happy.I smiled nervousness eating at my palms as Connor’s aunt walked with me to the kitchen.“I’m glad you settled things. It’s my first time seeing him happy since he lost his mother”I didn’t want to poke my nose into the whole Sussanne issue. Connor was still sour about it and if anything, he hadn’t exactly told his family about the whole Mafioso thing or his other side hustling drug trafficking gig.Victoria Powers must have noted this because she placed her ladle on the kitchen counter eyeing me with curiosity. Fifty or m
CORNELIUSIf this wasn’t hell I didn’t know what was.“Connor pass the bread”, Nicole mocked and I bit my lip with frustration passing the damn bread.I tried to stare at her from across the table but Lydia wouldn’t budge. She had seen me kissing Nicole’s friend and stormed away in silence.Technically I wouldn’t exactly call it kissing, Masha or Tasha or whatever name she went by had basically lunged in my arms faster than I could say stop and as if the universe was against me, Lydia happened to pop up from nowhere.Cain clicked his glass with a damn spoon and I didn’t give two shits about what he wanted to talk about. He stood up, telling everyone thank you for attending and all that gaba gaba but I was too gilded by anxiety to actually listen.I whipped my phone from my pants, pulling up her contact.Can we talk?Her phone buzzed but she didn’t as much as give it a glance.She kissed me.Talk to me.Look at me, for fuck’s sake.She didn’t and I forced myself to pretend that whatever
LYDIAWe arrived in Austin as fast as we could and while I sat with my mother waiting for Connor to bring the coffee, I couldn’t help but feel like somehow this was my fault.It was an accident my mother said but, in my heart, something told me it wasn’t.Sure the old pickup Harrison Hayden had seen better days but I had watched him drive the same truck all my life. It was the same truck he drove me to high school with, the same truck he drove to the market with and never in those countless times had he had an accident or the brakes giving up.But now when Connor and I had enemies lurking all around us, it just happened that my father’s truck had brakes that weren’t working.Impossible.“He’s going to be okay. I know he will”My mother said holding to my hands with a vise grip.She was trying to convince herself by assuring me that Harrison was a fighter and I didn’t know what to say…If my father died, God the thought of his death felt like me getting impaled by a blunt dagger.He wa
CORNELIUSThe old geezer was a handful.I could barely feel my skin as the sun bit my skin like a thousand termites tearing my skin bit by bit.Putting the hoe down, I gulped the rest of the water my eyes on the patio.“You are doing great”, she mouthed and I heaved in response. Her smile was the only thing helping me get through this, otherwise I would have given up weeks ago when her father suggested he needed some work done on his farm.Of course, he had fired all the farm boys and hired me. And necessarily not hired me but manipulated me into working on his farm for weeks now.Harrison Hayden was testing me, trying to make the fine thread of calmness I had maintained snap, trying to make me leave his daughter by overworking me but I would rather continue cleaning up horse shit than admit defeat.Lydia and I were together and pretty soon I would pop the question and then no man be it her father would take her away from me.I was finishing up on the digging. The digging I had done f
LYDIA“She’s so cute”, I cooed like a fan girl in one of Dean Lewis’ concerts.Chubby cheeks, long lashes, Carlos’ midnight black hair, God she looked like an angel and I wanted nothing more than to jump inside my screen and steal the little thing from a distraught Henley’s arms.“Only because you’ve not been with her for a day”“I want one”, I fussed about putting my salad aside.“Motherhood isn’t an easy feat, Dia. I haven’t slept for days”She did look sleep deprived. Like a week sleep deprived.While Carla looked like she had been straight out from a sauna, her mother, Henley looked like she had been sleeping on the streets for weeks with her ginger hair up her head in a mess, eyebags under her eyes and her shirt…well let’s just say motherhood had taken a rather hard toll on her.“Ooh I’m sure I’ll manage it. I mean you did, right? And Veronica is on her way to becoming a mother too so..”“Right, how are things between you and Connor?”Ooh between sex, watching rom coms, him talki