Life Of A Prostitute (Ziall Horlik) AU

Chapter 8

Niall's POV

I helped Zayn into my flat and into the guest bedroom I had. He was shivering, but I didn't know if it was out of fear or if it was of being cold. He still had some dried blood on him that didn't get washed off at the hospital, but I was afraid to ask him if he wanted to take a bath or something. I was afraid anything I asked him would sound differently to him. I could already tell he read into things in a darker way than anything even ment. Me offering help, he took it like I was going to arrest him. But I saw he wanted to trust me. I saw he wasn't a hard shell. He was ready to break.

"The bathroom is just down the hall if you want to take a bath or a shower. Are you hungry?" I asked him. He nodded slowly and wrapped his arms around his thin self. He followed me to the kitchen then sat down at the table. I got some sandwich stuff out and started making us both a big sandwich.

"Thank you for doing this. Even if I don't trust you, I appreciate this." Zayn said quietly. All I could do was shrug because I didn't want to make a big deal out of this. I just wanted to help him. It's been that way since the day I saw him in the ally way. Something in his eyes showed me he wanted help, but was afraid to accept it. Zayn took a few small bites of the sandwich the second I put it in front of him. I took a single bite, but had to leave the room because my phone started ringing.

"Niall, how is that case going with the man you found?" My dad asked me like he was a little agitated that I wasn't actually at the station. I had called him last night right when the doctors told me that Zayn looked like he was probably a victim of being jumped for everything he had. I felt angry that someone had done that to Zayn even though I didn't even know him, so I called my dad to maybe help me sort this out. That's the only reason I was able to stay with Zayn all day, but I wasn't supposed to bring him home with me or take him to the flat I had just been to last night that happened to be his.

"I'm still getting information from the victim. He might be suffering from memory loss because of how hard he was hit on the head twice." I lied to my dad. The truth was, I'm an idiot. I knew that Zayn wasn't going to tell me who did this to him. I knew he thought it was his fault because it was most likely him who decided to get placed into that situation. However, he is innocent in the sense he didn't ask to be hurt in the ways he was hurt. The reason I'm an idiot is because I knew Zayn was a criminal himself, yet I pulled a criminal case on him where he's the victim. He's not going to talk about what was done wrong to him because he's smart and knows he'll get caught as well.

"Well talk to him some more and see if he remembers enough to press charges. If not, then we'll have to move on from this case and you'll have to get back on your active duty route tomorrow. I hope this will all work out though. Just keep me posted, but I think that this will be a dead end case anyway. Don't get too invested in him, Niall. If you do, you'll become weak for a crime and that's the first thing that will ever set you back from moving forward with this job." My father told me then hung up the phone. I just stood there and thought of his last words. It was a waste of words on his part though. I was already too invested, but I didn't care. I was helping him and for some reason he was the one person I just couldn't shake from wanting to help.

I went back into the kitchen and found Zayn setting down my sandwich I had left on the table. He blushed and swallowed his mouth full as I saw he had taken a few bites out of my sandwich. I giggled at him and pushed the food to him to continue eating. He did just that, but his big brown eyes stayed looking at me like he was seeing if I really ment it that he could eat my sandwich too.

"If you wanted more you could have made another that I didn't eat off of, you animal." I joked to him. He laughed a real laugh and shrugged to me then continued to eat. I made myself another sandwich but got up to get some water. When I came back that was gone too, so I looked at Zayn and saw he was holding it in his other hand like he was going to take a bite of it. My expression must have been a comical one because he laughed again and gave it back to me. Seeing that he was joking around made me happier than he'll ever know. It showed me that he had a lighter side to his dark persona.