Forgiving Lies

6

Rachel

STUPID TEXAS AND stupid allergies.

I’d never had allergies until I moved to Texas. And although I still had yet to determine what exactly it was I was allergic to, whenever it hit, it hit with a vengeance. I couldn’t breathe through my nose, I sounded like a man, my face felt like it was going to break from being so congested, and my eyes were watering so bad it looked like I was constantly crying.

It was sexy.

I threw away the last empty box of Kleenex and went into the bathroom to grab a roll of toilet paper to take back to the couch with me. The front door opened as I was headed out of my bedroom and I saw Kash closing the door behind him. I would’ve sworn I’d locked that when Candice left for camp that morning.

Kash looked up when I entered the living room, and his eyes went wide. “You okay, Rach?”

“Ugh.”

“I’ll take that as a no,” he murmured, and bit back a smile when he saw the roll of toilet paper I was carrying with me. “Do you have the flu?”

I shook my head and flopped down on the couch dramatically. “Whachoo want?”

Walking quickly over to me, he knelt down and put the back of his hand to my forehead. I swatted at it but he held down my hands and tried to decide if I had a fever. “You just have a cold then?”

“Allergies. Stupid mold or cedar or . . . air.”

“Have you taken anything?”

“Nope. Juss woke up. Cantchoo tell?” I waved a hand over my pajama-covered body and wiped my tears away.

He smiled softly and stood up. “You still look beautiful. Let me find you something to take.”

I wanted to have an aww moment, but just then I started in on a string of sneezes.

“Only six sneezes?” Kash called from the kitchen. “Come on, Rach. You’re slacking. Next time go for eight at least.”

I flipped him off and then there was a knock at the door. “Ugh.” That was quickly becoming my favorite word. Rolling to the side, I tried to get my legs on the ground to get off the couch, but I rolled too far and my feet didn’t move fast enough and I landed with a thud on the floor. “Fuck my life.”

Kash barked out a laugh as I sluggishly got to my feet. “Get back on the couch, I’ll get it.”

“No, no. My door. I answer.”

“It’s eight thirty, it’s going to be Mrs. Adams.”

He remembered? “Crap. I forgod it was Thursday.”

“Oh, you forgod, did you?”

I looked up at Kash’s wicked smile and wished I had the energy to punch him. “Shuddup.”

He beat me to the door and opened it as I came up behind him.

“Ra— Oh, you’re a boy. Um . . .” Mrs. Adams stood there wringing her hands. “Uh, well . . . is Rachel here? She needs to help me, my cats are all gone.”

“Hi, Mrs. Adams.” I stepped up and tried to smile.

“Rachel dear! They’re all gone, come quick!”

“Umb, I’m a little sick.”

She shook her head. “The cats, dear.”

I couldn’t close my mouth and I’m pretty sure snot was starting to come out of my nose. Could she not see this?

“I’ll help you, Mrs. Adams,” Kash said with a charming smile.

“Butters won’t respond to a boy.”

Pushing past Kash, I looked at Mrs. Adams. “Well, let’s find them, then.”

“Yes, of course.” She turned and began searching. “Butters!”

“Budders,” I called lamely, and was suddenly being pulled backward. “Kash, stop. She needs help.”

“Go get on the couch. I’m not going to tell you again.” He pushed me back toward my door and gave me a stern look. “I’ll help her today.”

I stood there long enough to see Mrs. Adams look at him like he had three heads and Kash look underneath a bench before I walked back into the kitchen. After searching through the mostly bare medicine cabinet, I grabbed the bottle I was looking for and took a big swig before shuffling back to the couch.

Kash walked in a few minutes later and immediately went to the kitchen. Opening the same cabinet I’d just been in, he looked around before shutting it and looking over the counter at me. “Rach, there’s nothing here you can take. I’ll run to the st—What’s in your hand?”

I lifted up the toilet paper roll.

“Other hand.”

I lifted up the NyQuil.

“It’s eight thirty in the morning. You’re taking NyQuil?”

“Ugh.” That’s sick-talk for Yes, I am, stop bitching at me.

“All right, give me that.” He pried the NyQuil from my hand and bent close. “I’ll go to the store and get something for whenever you wake back up. Is there anything you need or want?”

“Nope.” I rolled to my side and hugged the roll of toilet paper as I curled into a ball. I just wanted to go back to sleep and not have my nose feel like it was about to fall off.

A few moments later Kash was laying my comforter on me and lifting my head up to stuff my pillow beneath it. After a quick kiss to the top of my head, he was gone. He so deserved pancakes tomorrow morning.

Another round of sneezes tore through me. Only five? Fail.

Maybe his pancakes would have to wait until Saturday.

WHEN I WOKE up a few hours later, the apartment was empty, but the coffee table had boxes of Kleenex, cold and allergy medicine, a bottle of water, and a note on it.

Rach,

Had to run to the bar to take inventory. Mason’s running errands, call me if you need anything. The rest is in the kitchen. And if you eat my green ones, I will not take pity on you just because you’re sick.

Kash

Green ones? I walked into the kitchen and laughed out loud. The counter had four cans of chicken noodle soup, eight Gatorade bottles, and three boxes of Sour Patch Kids on it. I put away everything except for one of the boxes and went back to my makeshift bed on the couch. Kash was either the worst . . . or the absolute best at taking care of someone. Either way, I was falling so in love with that man.

And yeah, I ate the green ones. I’d have to remember to hide the other two boxes before he came over again.

Kash

“CHICKEN NOODLE SOUP and Gatorade?” Mason laughed and opened the door to the police department. “She said she had allergies, not the flu.”

“Well shit, I don’t know! She really looked like she didn’t feel good, so I just got her everything I could think of.”

“You’re so whipped and you’re not even screwing her.”

I shook my head and tried not to punch him. “Shut up, Mase.”

We walked in silence the rest of the way to the conference room and both stopped when we got in the room. What the hell was our chief from Tampa Bay doing here?

He didn’t look at or acknowledge us in any way during our three-hour meeting on Camden, possible leads, and some new courses of action. The millions of reasons he could have been there in Texas ran through my mind the entire time, and to be honest, at the end of the meeting I couldn’t remember the actual details of it. I wasn’t sure what Mason thought of his being there, but from the fact that his face was drained of color, I figured it was the same as me. Chief wouldn’t have been there for good news.

“Gentlemen,” he said by way of greeting once the room was finally cleared out, “sounds like you’re doing your jobs well. Had a meeting with Detective Ryder before everyone was called in and we went over some things.”

“You’re checking up on us? Are you kidding me?” Mason looked annoyed but relieved that that was all he was there for. “When have we ever not done everything and more than what was asked of us at our jobs?”

Chief raised one graying eyebrow. “You’re right. You do do more. Surely you haven’t forgotten about what you did to get the police-brutality charge brought against you, right, Gates?”

Mason shut his mouth.

“And I’m not checking up on you to make sure you’re doing well. If I didn’t think you two were some of the best I’ve ever worked with, I wouldn’t have given you this opportunity after what went down last month. I would have just suspended you before sending you to a desk.”

Fuck . . . Mason was about to make us desk bitches.

“The charge was dropped, by the way; you’re welcome.”

“Thanks, Chief,” Mason mumbled.

“No disrespect, sir, but why are you here?” I hurried to finish before he could get mad. “I mean, your being here kind of scared the shit out of us. The only reason I could come up with for it is that bad shit went down back home. So is everything okay?”

He took his time sitting back down in one of the chairs and straightening out his tie. “Things are great for you, gentlemen. My wife and I are here visiting family in Houston and I got the call yesterday morning that the guys hired to take the two of you out are now in prison awaiting trial for first-degree murder.”

“That—” I looked over at Mason and straightened up a bit. “That’s good. So we’re not hiding anymore?”

“No, but for the duration of this case, you will continue to stay where you are, working where you are, and doing what you’ve been doing. If you want to tell your family where you’re at, that’s up to you.”

“Understood,” Mason answered when I got quiet.

“You boys work tonight?”

“No, sir.”

“Let’s go grab a beer and talk about this case and what’s going to happen when you come back to Tampa Bay. I’m not exactly in a rush to get back to my wife’s family,” he said as his eyes widened in dread.

“MASE, WE NEED to talk about this.”

“About what?”

“About not being in hiding.”

He nodded his head and lifted one hand from the steering wheel to run it over his face. “I don’t think we should tell our families where we are.”

“Agreed. And I don’t think we should tell the girls who we are yet.”

“What? Why?”

“Same reason we don’t want to tell our families where we are. We need to keep them safe. As soon as we tell them who we are, we’ll have to tell them about our lives . . . at least back in Florida. They’re going to know why we’re here even if they don’t know about the case. Their knowing anything is dangerous.”

“It makes sense, but are you going to be able to stay away from her?”

I rolled my eyes. “It’s not like you’ve been staying away from Candice.”

“It’s different, and you know it.”

“I’m not going to put Rachel in danger, and we need to be in agreement with this. So do you agree or not?”

“Yeah, whatever. I agree, Mr. Chicken Noodle.”

“Fuck off.” As soon as he pulled into an empty space, I was out of the truck and walking to the girls’ apartment. The door was locked, and after knocking quietly and getting no response, I wasted no time at all picking the lock and letting myself in.

A smile tugged at my lips as I took in Rachel wrapped up in the comforter like a burrito, Kleenex everywhere, a half-empty Gatorade bottle on the floor next to the couch, and an empty box of Sour Patch Kids on the table next to the cold and allergy medicine. I brushed the back of my hand against her forehead, making sure she hadn’t gotten a fever since I’d left her, and she rolled toward me on a groan.

“Rach, wake up,” I whispered close to her ear, and let my fingers trail down her cheek.

She grumbled again as her eyes slowly cracked open. “Time is it?”

“Almost five. You hungry?”

Shaking her head, she closed her eyes again.

Laughing softly, I kissed her forehead and spoke against it. “It’s probably because you ate the green ones when I told you not to.”

Her body went rigid for all of three seconds before she began burrowing herself deeper into the comforter and away from me.

My next laugh was louder. “Take some more medicine, and go take a hot shower; the steam will help. I’ll make you soup for when you get out.”

As soon as she was vertical and headed toward her room, I ran back to my apartment to rid myself of my badge and gun before going back to take care of her. Mason raised an eyebrow and mentioned something about lying to her for longer than necessary, but I ignored it. Lying for now meant keeping her safe. And that’s what mattered most.