Page 9 of PortCity Killers

??F O U R??

By the time I had finished silently sobbing I heard the sticky floorboard in the kitchen. I got up to find Jay’s panicked face as he crept around the island. The relief was clear in his eyes when he saw me.

I nodded to the bar stools where he dutifully sat, a sour expression back on his face.

“Is he your boyfriend?”

I ignored him, pulling open the fridge door. I had gotten into the habit of shopping for both Bryce and myself when I visited the farmer’s market well over a year ago, because the man didn’t know how to boil water and relied way too much on the Chinese takeout next door.

Now, looking in the fridge the pickings were suspiciously similar to the things I would stock when I made those rounds. Yeah, we might not be a couple, but it seemed we sure as hell rubbed off on each other.

I pulled out some veggies, intent on making some sort of stir fry or ramen, anything to get Jaymes to eat. Stress always fucked with his stomach.

While he wasn’t skin and bones anymore, he certainly still ate like someone who was unless you sat him down and all but force fed him.

“Well?”

I looked at him, sliding over the cutting board I’d pulled from a top shelf and a knife from the chopping block. Jaymes looked at me with narrowed eyes as I slid it all over to him with some veggies.

“No. Cut these up.”

“You certainly move around his kitchen like he’s your boyfriend.”

I sighed, pulling a pan from one of the cabinets, “A girl has got to eat, Jaymes. If you spend enough time with a person, you learn their kitchen.”

“So, you’re dating? Fuck buddies?”

“Does it matter?”

“It does to me.”

“Why?” I asked, genuinely curious as to why he was so fucking hell bent on putting a label on us, “It doesn’t have anything to do with you.”

He didn’t say anything after that, just cut up the veggies while I made some rice. I was taking the veggies from him when he asked his next question.

“Is he nice to you at least?” His voice was small, fragile, like if he asked too loud, he could break into a million pieces. I didn’t have to turn around to know his eyes were watering, and I didn’t want him to shut down, so I kept my back to him as I answered him.

“He is.” I stir fried the veggies while the rice bubbled on the back burner. When I had set it to finish cooking, I turned to him, “I know he seems like an ass, but he’s not. Not really. Not to me.”

“A lot of people say that.”

I smiled at him, “Do you think I wouldjustsay that?”

He shrugged, “If you asked me yesterday? I would have said you were lesbian and would never touch a man, and if I’m honest, least of all Bryce theButcher.”

I winced at the reminder of Bryce's reputation. He wasn’t known in wide circles to be a good guy, but they weren’t circles I ran in. When we had started whatever it was we had, he had made sure I never would.

I was the only one in his life that he had, the only one who could possibly be used against him, so he’d made sure to do everything he could to separate himself from me in public.

“Yeah, well, I don’t really know that side of him, Jay. I know it’s there, I just...we don’t talk about his work much.”

It wasn’t a total lie, but I certainly wasn’t going to tell him that Bryce’s old undercover work led him to do a lot of shit he might never have done. It had turned him into the man he was today. His reputation was brutal for a reason, and while I didn’t agree with it, I wasn’t one to stand on a high horse I didn’t own.

“And you’re okay with that?”

I shrugged at him, “I don’t have to like it. We aren’t married, and I’m not worried about where he cashes his paychecks.”

“Does he...pay you?”

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