Chasing Redemption (Book 2 of Chasing Series)

Twenty-nine | Old Times

I wasn't quite sure how I'd kept my job at Cash's bar. The last shift I had here blurred into nothing, a memory that I wasn't sure even happened. Snippets of shifts here came together into one, until I began to wonder what day it had been.

"Hey."

Beckett stands to my left, cleaning the area around the beer on tap. He's watching me curiously, almost like he isn't sure who I am.

He probably doesn't anymore.

"Hmm?"

"You're spaced out," he observes. "What's on your mind?"

I studied him for a moment, all floppy hair and bright smile. I wondered why I couldn't have fallen for a guy like him; a guy who is considerate and respectful. Someone who doesn't have a dark history to capture me and drag me under. Life would have been so much easier.

But I'd never appreciated easy. My history showed as much.

"Nothing," I lie, glancing away from him.

The kitchen had just opened, preparing the grill for the day before patrons begin arriving in half an hour.

I couldn't tell Beckett the truth about what was really on my mind. Not without unravelling a whole stream of secrets.

"How have you been since—since Brax's return?"

The sentence catches me off guard and I feel my heart drop in my chest. When I look at Beckett, I see he's just as concerned with what he's said too.

"I was mad at Sof," he begins. "I thought maybe she'd known the whole time and at first, I didn't believe that she hadn't been aware that he was still alive. We fought about it but she's adamant she didn't know."

"She didn't," I nod. "I could tell by the look her face when he—when he came back."

I swallow, staring at the clock opposite the bar. I will it to tick faster so that we can begin our shift and have less time to chat. I loved Beckett, but I didn't want to have this conversation.

"I feel terrible that I didn't believe her," he says, clenching his jaw. "I've never had issues trusting her but that's what she thinks now."

"Give it some time," I say. "Try to show her that you do trust her. That you know she's telling the truth."

I wonder if I'll ever be able to trust anyone again. If I could give my entire being to someone and not feel like they were going to crush it. The idea terrified me.

"I haven't seen him yet. I've been avoiding Sof's house," Beckett continues. "I can't imagine how you must feel because I don't think I've been angrier in my entire life."

"It's not even the anger that matters to me now," I whisper, staring ahead. "It's the hurt. It's the distrust in him and the betrayal I feel. He thinks he was protecting me but he clearly didn't know me at all if he thought for a second that I—"

A lump forms in my throat and I taste the tears before I feel them.

"That I would be okay without him after—after just losing Casey. He should have known that."

"I'm sorry, Rhea. Maybe I shouldn't have brought this—"

"The worst part is that I don't need him now. I learnt how to begin living without him and suddenly he's decided to come back. He's a selfish—"

A glass falls from the bar, clattering to the floor as it breaks into a thousand pieces. I hadn't even realised I'd been holding it.

The staff from the kitchen look up towards us. Cash opens the door to his office peering out.

"Everything alright?" he asks.

Beckett replies for me before Cash disappears back inside the room.

"I'm sorry," Beckett says again.

"It's not your fault. I should have just said I didn't want to talk about it instead of going off on the same tangent I have with myself everyday."

"Did you want to talk about something else? How is it being back with Davina?"

I laugh, shaking my head as the tears dry. "Next question."

I didn't know how I felt working for Davina anymore. I didn't know where I stood with the world of law and justice. I was constantly stuck in the underworld, pulled in by ethically and immorally wrong people that stood against what she stood for. I'd battled with this demon before, but now it seemed to be back in full force.

I knew more than she did, just like I had before. How could I ever look her in the eye without spewing everything I'd heard?

I felt like a fraud. I was a fraud. I was the cheater in a fake, perfect marriage. I played poker and won, but knew the person's hand. I wasn't honest.

"Rhea?"

I look towards Beckett as he watches me intently. "Are you sure you're okay to be back working here?"

"If anything, Beckett, this is the only place in the entire world that feels normal to me. The one place I had before all this mess that has stayed constant. I need this job more than it needs me."

Understanding passes across his face as he nods, throwing a tea towel over his shoulder. "It won't always be like this," he says. "It will get better."

"I hope so," I whisper.

I wondered if that were true. If one day I'd look back and this would all be a distant memory, like working a past shift that I couldn't remember now.

He puts a hand on my shoulder, squeezing gently. "You've always got me. You've always got Sof."

I smiled at him absently, lost in my thoughts again.

You've always got Sof.

I wasn't so sure that would be true once I imprisoned Brax. I didn't know where she'd stand with me when I tore her family apart once again. I hoped she'd understand that I was doing it to protect her.

I watch as Cash unlocks the front door and people begin to trickle in. Eventually I get lost I'm my work and don't have to worry about the ever-present thoughts that run rampant in my brain.

I didn't have much longer before I'd change the Patridge family's life once again, so I hold onto the mundane job that I have and I cling to the normalcy for a little longer.