Kristen Ashley - The Promise

So I pushed, “Did he have a choice?”

She remained silent.

“Natalia, did he have a choice?”

“I never thought Davey would hit me.”

I went still at her words and the way she said them. All but my head, which I lifted, my eyes flying to Benny, who was still watching me.

I could tell by her voice that she was hurt, probably not physically, but emotionally.

Nat didn’t show a lot of emotion. She was Ninette times a thousand. The only thing she wanted was whatever she wanted and nothing dragging on that. That didn’t mean she didn’t have emotion. It just meant she’d learned a long time ago not to show it.

I felt for my sister. This was her consequence for being selfish and stupid, but I knew she loved Davey in her way. And being Nat, tied up in herself and only that, it would take a miracle to get her to see beyond that and to her part in this fucked-up scenario.

I had to force my lips to move when I said, “Nat, honey, please, please, listen. Cat and Art have cleaned up. They’ve been sober for a long time. They’ve been workin’ with a marriage counselor to get strong before they make a baby. I have Benny and I’m happy. He’s good to me and he’s good for me. I learned not to look for Dad, and Cat learned not to act like Mom. We’re both happy. Now you need to learn from that. Sort yourself out. This is not okay what you’ve been doin’ to Davey. And this is really not okay, what happened with Davey last night.”

“No matter what you say, Frankie, there’s no excuse for your man hittin’ you.”

“Is there one for a man’s woman hittin’ him?” I shot back.

She didn’t reply.

“Okay, I know you know the answer to that is a big fat no. So now, tell me this: Is it okay for a man’s wife to keep fuckin’ around on him?” I asked.

“This is you givin’ me shit, Frankie,” she returned.

“This is shit you need, Nat,” I replied.

“No, ’cause see, I got his fuckin’ mother up in my shit and Ninette’s up in her shit and the phone won’t stop fuckin’ ringin’. I gotta work tonight and I don’t need more hassle. You’re hassle. So you’re wrong. I don’t need your shit because my life is pretty fuckin’ shit right now and I’m not lettin’ you make it more.”

I opened my mouth to speak, but the dead I got over the phone couldn’t be anything other than her hanging up on me.

Still, I called, “Nat?” But I got nothing.

I closed my eyes, took the phone from my ear, and saw the call had ended.

I looked back at Benny. “She hung up on me.”

“The wrong answer to say is ‘good,’ but that’s the only one I got, babe.”

“I don’t know what to do next,” I told him.

“Nothin’,” he told me. “You tried. You gave her good wisdom, Francesca. The shit you said was right on the money. She didn’t listen. You did what you could do, but she wants to wallow in her shit. The hard part starts for you now ’cause you gotta let her.”

“Ninette is livin’ with her and that’s not gonna make anything better,” I reminded him.

“Another consequence. She let her ma in, she deals.”

“Maybe I should call Ma and—”

Benny interrupted me, clipping out, “Do not even think about it.”

I shut my mouth. Apparently, Ninette was where Benny drew the line at my family “slicin’ into me.”

“Come here,” he ordered.

“I need a donut.”

“Right. Get you one. Get me one. Then get your ass over here.”

I was standing in the kitchen in my heels, something I’d been doing awhile so I needed a break. This was the only reason I didn’t give him lip. Instead, I grabbed the baker’s box and walked into the living room.

Ben took the box from me, tossed it on the coffee table, and Gus honed in on it immediately. Fortunately, he was too tiny and klutzy to jump up and get a donut (or the whole box). Unfortunately, he didn’t give up. I didn’t want him to hurt himself so I leaned over Benny’s legs to grab hold of him.

I got my hands on Gus just as Ben got his hands on me. I pulled Gus to my chest. Benny pulled my ass onto his lap.

Gus licked my jaw, then threw himself at Benny.

Ben took hold of the dog in one arm, kept hold of his woman in the other, and caught my eyes.

“Chrissy and Eva are okay. Your little sister doesn’t have a ridiculous name, icing on the cake. Your other sister is a whackjob, no surprise. So, with Eva bein’ called Eva, you’re not battin’ five hundred in this mess. I’m thinking seven fifty. Not bad.”

I lifted a hand to scratch Gus’s booty and settled further in Benny’s lap, noting, “Eva being Eva is definitely a silver lining.”

Gus threw himself on the couch, then plopped side-first into a toss pillow and started cleaning himself. Benny wrapped both arms around me and drew me nearer.

“You gonna call your dad?” he asked.

“And say what? You’re a douchebag?” I asked back.

Ben smiled.

I shook my head and gave him the real answer, “No. I have nothing to say to him, and even if I did, he’s less prone to listen to me than Nat was. Doesn’t matter anyway. Chrissy’s a fighter. If he doesn’t do right by Eva financially, she’ll see he does.”

His arms gave me a squeeze. “That’s my Frankie.”

I had no reply because I was his Frankie, and anyway, I was enjoying his words and his arm squeeze enough it took all my attention.

“So, you’re done dealin’ with your whackjob family?” he asked.

I grinned. “I’m done dealin’ with my whackjob family…” I paused, then finished on a warning he already knew, “Today.”

That got another smile from Benny, before, “Right. Next up, choices: watch the game or make out on the couch, then watch the game.”

No choice, really.

I got closer, wrapping my arms around his shoulders. “Make out on the couch, then watch the game.”

His eyes dropped to my mouth and he muttered, “I like the way you think.”

It was my turn to smile.

Ben slid a hand up in my hair and pulled my mouth to his.

Then he twisted and moved so my back was to the couch, he was on me, and his tongue was in my mouth.

I heard my phone start ringing.

Neither of us broke the kiss. We both ignored it.

Some time later, after making out and then watching the game, I went into the kitchen to make my man and myself a sandwich for lunch.

Before doing this, I checked my voicemail.

When I did, I learned the joyous news that my sister was having a baby.

Fucking finally.

I brought our sandwiches into the living room and enjoyed Ben’s grin when I hauled out seven bags of chips, along with some beers and a jar of pickles. Then I called Cat to celebrate and give her the lowdown on the whackjobs in our family. I then told her I was done, she wasn’t wading in, and from here on out, they had to sort their own shit.

Her response:

“Fucking finally.”

The next morning, Benny’s phone ringing woke me and I knew it woke him when I heard him mutter, “Fuck.”

This made me smile as I was prone to smile any day I woke up next to Benny, even if he woke cursing. I felt his heat go from my back where he was spooning me. I turned with him, opening my eyes, and saw him reaching toward the nightstand to get his phone.

He got up on a forearm on the bed, put the phone to his ear, and greeted with a “Benny.”

He listened for a few seconds before he twisted his neck, his eyes coming to me, and my stomach clutched at the look in them. Then he pulled himself up to rest his back against the headboard, took the phone from his ear, hit a button on the screen, and a very attractive deep male voice came from it.

“…investigating,” the voice said. “I understand from our former clients you have copies of what they’ve uncovered and it’s their understanding it would be safer for you to pass that on to us. I’d like to ask you to go to a restaurant called Frank’s on Main Street in Brownsburg sometime today. A man named Herb will be there. You can give him the flash drives. I’ve got a man en route to Brownsburg. He’ll meet up with Herb and get the drives. We’ll take it from there.”

The voice quit talking and Ben said toward the phone, “Bud, no offense, but I do not know you. You’re a voice on the phone callin’ early on a Sunday with no warning. So I’m not givin’ anythin’ to some random guy at a restaurant.”

“I was told that you’ve been informed our services were engaged,” the voice replied.

Oh my God.

Was this the Nightingale guy?

My eyes flew to Benny and I saw his were on his phone.

“Listen,” he said. “Again, I do not know you so I’m not sayin’ dick about anything.”

“You can look us up on the Internet,” the voice replied. “Like I said, I’m Lee Nightingale. I own Nightingale Investigations. The man I’m sending is Luke Stark. He’ll be there this afternoon. We want the drives prior to his arrival so we can sort through them and set him on task without delay.”

“If you do what you do for a living and you know what’s goin’ down with this and you had your woman on the inside, would you take a phone call from a guy you don’t know and do what he tells you to do?”

There was a moment’s hesitation, then, “I see your point. Look us up on the Internet. You got an email address, give it to me. I’ll send you one and it’ll have our domain in the address.”

“Not sure that makes me feel better,” Benny stated, not knowing anything about email or that it would be quite the task to register and use a domain name just to pull one over on an unsuspecting, protective, Italian hot guy first thing on a Sunday morning.