"Right. So." Alyssa's eyes are definitely welling up, and this fact makes me think of the time Adam sat on the steps outside that tenement block, trying to tell me how let down he felt, how deceived. "This is all your fault, then?" She's looking at Adam, frowning, trying to work him out.
I feel like telling her, I've been trying to do that for seventy years and have still gotten nowhere.
Still slouched with his arms along the settee back, Adam raises his shoulders in a bastardised shrug.
"What? You don't care?"
"Of course I fucking care, little girl." Adam leaps to his feet, and instantly, I'm on high alert.
"Don't you dare 'little girl' me, you murdering scumbag---"
"He's still alive, isn't he?"
"That's debatable." She shoots a little smirk in my direction, and I have to admire her balls.
Standing up to Adam Locke and still taking time out to joke at my expense. That's one of the many reasons I like her. "I'm twenty-five."
"And I'm a century older. Can we just accept I've won this ageist pissing contest and move on?"
"Good God, you two!" I screw my hands into fists and press them against my eyes, trying to block all of this out. The two most important people in my life can't stand each other. Alyssa, my best friend, and Adam, my...whatever he is. I may not love him; I may just want to screw the arse off him then throw him out like a piece of rubbish, but like it or not, he's important. Perhaps it would be better to say influential. Whatever the rights or wrongs of the situation, he's the reason I'm still here today. I just don't know what to call him. I can think of a few things. Mostly four-letter words.
But I have no idea what he actually is to me. "This is not a contest. Alyssa, I know you don't like Adam for what he's done, but, well, he did it, and no one can change that."
"And if it weren't for me, you wouldn't know each other now," Adam pointed out.
"What do you want? A medal?" Alyssa snaps.
"If you'd waited, Nathan might have come round eventually. By choice. And this Will character wouldn't have had to perform the world's most twisted patch-up job on the man you claimed to have loved."
"It's no mere claim," Adam snarls.
"Do you often rip people's throats out to show your love? Thank God Nathan's never done that to me."
"No, darling; it's because you're not his type."
"Adam. For fuck's sake. The pair of you. Just stop it. Stop it. I'm not going to apologise for what Adam's done," I tell Alyssa, then turn to Adam.
"And I certainly won't apologise for anything Alyssa's said tonight. She's got a mind of her own, and if you can't face up to someone calling you on what you did wrong, you've got a long, hard, lonely road ahead of you."
Adam's entire being flinches. It was the word lonely that did it. He's afraid of being cold-shouldered. He can follow me. He knows where I live, after all; I showed him myself. I can move, he can stalk me to the ends of the earth, but it's still in my gift to give him what he wants or to withhold it.
"I still can't believe you fucked this guy,"
Alyssa sneers. "He must have a fucking gold mine up his prostate."
"Are you going to let her speak to me like that?" Adam demands. "Because if you're trying to be fair to both of us, I'm getting a distinct air of favouritism here---"
"Maybe that's because I'm not the bloodthirsty scumbag who nearly killed him. God, no wonder he hid from you for seventy years. Why the hell would anyone want you?"
Adam leaps forward, and I don't even think; I throw myself in between the two of them. One hand on his chest is all it takes for me to stop him.
He glares over my shoulder at a chuckling Alyssa then returns his attention to me.
"She's off limits," I whisper. Cool, calm, and definitely don't fuck with me. "You touch her, I'll tear your throat out myself. Don't think I won't do it. You did it to me---fair's fair. I know just where to hide the body to stop the authorities from coming after me, and to tell you the truth?" I make a c'mere gesture with a flick of my head and lean in to whisper directly in Adam's ear. "The authorities give even less of a damn about vamp- on-vamp crime than they do black-on-black. We're already dead. What would they care if I killed you off properly?" I back off to get a better look at Adam's face. My words have had the desired effect. Perhaps too well; if I'm not mistaken, he actually believes I'd do it. There's fear there and surprise that Sergeant Nathan Stephenson would use his army training and pent-up aggression to do harm. In cold blood. Those three words almost make me laugh, and the feeling of power is arousing. I stand back. I want air between us. And no chance for him to feel exactly how much of an aphrodisiac this new-found power is to me.
"Maybe I should go home---"
"Yeah, maybe you should, little girl," Adam positively snarls, but he speaks in a low voice, almost a whisper, making his words all the more disdainful.
"And when you get rid of this loser," Alyssa continues, "you can let me know it's safe to come back again."
"I'm not going anywhere."
You think? I want to say out loud. Adam, staking his claim yet again. Some things never change. But for now, I just want this conversation over and done with.
"Nathan, I'll just go to use the bathroom before I leave, then I'll slip out---"
"Let me walk you home. I'll get my coat and ---"
"No, no. Stay with your guest. I know how
