Dark Secrets(60)

"Vin, you said the hiring and firing is on me," she said pretty loudly and clearly considering her teeth were so clenched it had to be painful. "And he's done here."

"Faith..." Vin tried to reason.

"No," Daniel said, looking at Faith, seeing past the anger that she was wearing like a mask, seeing the hurt beneath it, the betrayal. He put that look there. He gave her another reason to be cold, to be detached, to never want to trust a guy again. And seeing that, yeah, all the fight went out of him. Because he realized there were worse things in life than yet another botched job. Like hurting a strong woman. That shit sucked. "No, it's alright," he said, looking at Faith, hoping his eyes could in some small way show her how sorry he was. But even if he accomplished the task, she wasn't paying attention, too lost in her own head. "I'll go," he said with a nod, taking the key he had to the building and putting it down on the counter.

As he walked out, there was no denying how wrong it felt. Not leaving Lam, not leaving the job he had fought for.

But leaving her.

Leaving her felt more wrong than all the other twisted and shitty things he had ever had to do before. And there was a lot to compare it to.



       
         
       
        

He turned the opposite way outside of Lam, not going to his own apartment, going instead to a fourth floor walk-up in a slightly crummier neighborhood and slamming on the door until the voice inside growled, "Al-the-fuck-right, keep your fucking panties on."

The locks slid and the door pulled open and there was Max in a gray tee and matching thick sweatpants, eyes a bit blurry like he had woken him up.

"Aren't you supposed to be at work?"

"She knows. The job is done," he said and, with that, turned to walk away.

"Whoa whoa whoa, the fuck?" Max exploded. He wasn't one to get angry often, but when he did, he did it big. Daniel didn't even get three feet before Max was somehow in front of him, arm out, finger pointing back to his apartment. "You don't drop a bomb like that and saunter the fuck off. Get in my apartment so we can talk about this. Now," he added when Daniel couldn't force his feet to obey.

Max's apartment was nothing like Daniel's.

It didn't matter that Max had to uproot just about as often as Daniel did. When he got a place, he settled in.

His place was a small one-bedroom, nothing special, no distinct architectural accents. But Max had painted the walls a burnt orange color and he bothered to move in a big, clunky, impossible-to-carry-up-four-flights (which he knew because he had been the one to help Max move in) black leather couch and a recliner to match. There was a coffee table that he had magazines and books scattered on- pointing to his various interests from sports to fishing and even a manual on Spanish which he was always pissed his parents never taught him and he seemed to have no real skill for, even after years of study. The kitchen cabinets were painted a fresh white and Max knew that they had multiple cups, plates, bowls, and various food items. There was even a picture of his mother and sister in a nice frame on an angle beside the sink.

"Drink?" Max asked as he walked over toward the kitchen and grabbed beers out of the fridge.

"Or twenty," Daniel said, taking the recliner and resting his forearms on his legs.

"Alright," Max said, handing him his beer and sitting down on the couch, knocking off the top on the edge of the coffee table. "What the fuck do you mean she knows and the job is over?"

"Rhodes and K came into the bar tonight. They took Faith to the diner. When she came back, she was pissed and she fired me. When I tried to object, she told me she knew."

"That's it?" Max asked, snorting. "Maybe she means she knows that you snore or that you like watching the fucking cooking network on TV."

Daniel snorted, shaking his head. "No, man. She knows. You didn't see her."

"And what was I missing by not seeing her?" 

"Hurt," he said, the word a bitter taste on his tongue. "Betrayal. Anger."

"Ahh," he said, sitting back on the couch, looking at the wall for a minute. "Yeah, that's not good. You were with her last night, right?" he asked. "I called three times."

"Yeah, I was at her place."

"So that's why you looked like you took a shot to the nuts," Max said, smirking.

"It's not like that. I'm not pissed because there's a lid on the fucking cookie jar, Max."

"So you're saying, what? That you have feelings for her?"

Daniel sighed, fighting back the urge to hide the truth to save face. "Something like that," he agreed. "I know it's fucking whack. Especially this soon. But she's something special, man. Never met a woman like her before. She's a fucking battle axe wrapped in velvet."