Page 92 of Barre Fight
“Justin?” Ivy was looking up at him as though she was waiting for him to answer a question he hadn’t heard.
“Yeah?” he replied vaguely.
Ivy gestured at Miss Mary, who was eyeing him curiously again, brow furrowed.
“Do you want to have dinner with me on your way back to Sydney? They’ve moved most of us into a hotel in Hartley and their dinner menu isn’t half bad.”
Justin shook his head. “No,” he said firmly. “I’ve got some old business to take care of.”
And without explaining further, he set off down the street towards the heart of town.
Ivy caught up with Justin after offering Miss Mary a hasty thanks and an even hastier goodbye. By the time she reached him, he was ten meters away, his long legs eating up stretches of deserted footpath.
“Where are we going?” she asked, when she arrived at his side, grateful once again that she’d ditched her heels. The heat of the fires had cracked the concrete, and the ground was uneven beneath the soles of her sandals.
“We’re going to find Kavanaugh,” he said.
Ivy’s stomach lurched, even though, on some level, she’d known exactly where Justin was going. She’d known when Kieran Kavanaugh had ridden away on his bike, and Justin had stared after him with a fierce, protective expression on his face, that this was coming. But she wasn’t about to let Justin confront his childhood bully alone. Not when he’d frozen at the sight of Kieran’s face. Not when the last time he’d been reminded of how Kyle had treated him, he’d gotten into a fistfight.
“What are you going to do?” she asked warily.
“That kid wants to take ballet lessons, and I’m going to make sure his piece of shit father can’t stop him,” Justin all but growled.
It sounded like a fistfight was not entirely out of the question.
“Wait a second,” she said, skirting the line between walking and jogging to keep up with him. He didn’t stop walking. “Justin, wait!”
He just kept going, and Ivy had a sudden flashback to one of their first days working together, when they weren’t working together at all, when she was following him around ANB doing everything she could to get answers and information out of him. She sped her feet up and skittered around him, placing her body in front of his and holding her hands out so he couldn’t step around her. She knew full well that if he wanted to, he could lift her off her feet and move her body out of his way, and make it look graceful. Thankfully, he didn’t. Instead, he stopped abruptly, putting his hands on her waist to steady himself.
“What are you going to do?” she repeated.
He cast his eyes around over her head, and she watched them sweep across the street, looking at everything but her.
“Hey,” she said, putting her hands over hers and holding them against her. “Take a breath. We’re not going in there without a plan.”
He looked at her then, his cheeks flushed again, and his eyes met hers. “We?”
“Yes, we. I’m going with you. And we’re not going in there without a plan—and punching him is not a plan.”
“I don’t want to punch him, I just—” he objected, but at the look on her face, he didn’t bother to finish the sentence. “Fine. I want to punch him. I’ve wanted to punch him for two decades, and frankly he deserves a lot worse than that.”
“What he deserves is nothing. Not your time, not yourenergy, not some stupid impulsive decision that’s only going to endanger your career. Again.”
Justin blew out a breath, looking unconvinced.
“Whatyoudeserve is to move on. To make a beautiful life for yourself that doesn’t include him because you’ve healed from what happened, and you can come home and see your family and Miss Mary and not give him any more time or energy or power than he deserves. Which is none. So you are not going to punch him and I am not letting you take another step down this street until we have a plan. Okay?”
Justin looked down at her, eyes blazing, and she held his gaze. She wasn’t going to let him do something he’d regret. She was going to go with him and made sure he got what he deserved.
She slipped her fingers between his and squeezed tight, holding their hands together and against her body. “Okay?” she repeated.
“Okay,” he conceded. “Let’s make a plan.”
“What do you want?”
“I want to make sure he doesn’t ruin that kid’s life like he ruined mine. I want to make him apologize for what he did to me. I want to make sure everyone knows what he did so that he has to leave town and can’t ever come home again.” He was breathing hard again. “You should threaten to expose him if he doesn’t let the kid do it.”
“What?” Ivy asked, confused. “Journalism’s not for punishing your enemies. And even if there were an exposé to be written here, it wouldn’t be ethical for me to write it. Not when I’m… not when we’re together.”
