Butcher & Blackbird: The Ruinous Love Trilogy

SLOANE

You know what I did this morning?

*deep sigh*

I decorated my toaster strudel.

Fascinating. I’m riveted.

Also, toaster strudel? Isn’t that meant for hormonal teenagers who need significant quantities of processed sugar to function in the AM? I thought you were a grown-ass man.

A man who appreciates mass-produced flaky pastry and icing that can be used to spell “WINNER” in vanilla-ish frosting.

I’m 100% positive that I hate you.

And I’m 100% positive you’ll love me one day!

It’s been six months.

Six months since I last saw him. Six months of daily messages. Six months of Rowan telling me about how he’s celebrating his win. Six months of memes and jokes and texts and sometimes calls, just to say hello. And every day, I look forward to it. Every day, it warms me up, lighting places that have always been dark.

And every night when I close my eyes, I still picture him in that sliver of moonlight on the driveway in West Virginia, bent on one knee, like he was about to swear an oath. A knight cloaked in silver and shadow.

‘I think you were going to watch her and then your plan was to kill her,’ he’d said. Francis begged for mercy in the grip of Rowan’s hand. And whatever Rowan said next was just a whisper, but those words unleashed the demon at the heart of him. There was nothing between him and the rage that burned him from the inside. No mask left to hide behind.

“He really beat the shit out of him,” I say to Lark as I glance one final time at our latest text exchange before setting my phone aside. I place a bowl of popcorn between us and pick up Winston to plop the perpetually disgruntled feline on my lap. It’s been six months since I’ve seen Lark, too. In her typical fashion, she was offered a last-minute opportunity to tour with an indie band and seized it, and has been bouncing around from one small town and hipster city venue to the next. And she looks happy for it. Glowing.

“Was it hot?” she asks as she piles her long golden waves into a haphazard bun at the top of her head. Somehow, it always comes out perfectly messy. “Kinda sounds hot.”

“Pretty hot, yeah. Had me worried for a minute, though. I’m used to…controlled. And this was raw. Definitely the antithesis of control.” My gaze falls to the crocheted throw beneath my legs, one that Lark’s aunt made for me the year we left Ashborne Collegiate Institute, when Lark’s family took me in and repaid a debt they never owed. I stick my fingers in the little holes between the looped yarn, and when I look up again Lark is watching me, her clear blue eyes fixed to the contours of my face. “I nearly left him there.”

Lark’s head tilts. “And you feel bad about that?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“I don’t think he would have left me if the situation was reversed.”

“But you didn’t leave.”

I shake my head.

“Why not?”

My chest aches. It does every time I remember the way he called my name like a broken prayer. The defeated slump of his shoulders is a vivid image in my mind, even now. “He seemed so vulnerable, despite what he’d just done. I couldn’t leave him like that.”

Lark’s lip twitches as though she’s holding back a smile. “That’s nice.” She nibbles at the corner of her lower lip and I roll my eyes. “It’s sweet. You stayed. You made another friend.”

“Shut up.”

“Maybe a future boyfriend.”

I bark an incredulous laugh. “No.”

“Maybe a soulmate.”

“You’re my soulmate.”

“Then a best friend. With benefits.”

“Please stop.”

“I can see it now,” Lark says, her eyes sparkling as she sits up straighter, one graceful hand held aloft. She clears her throat. “He can show you the world…” she sings. “Glittering something shiny… ‘I think our love can do anything that we want it to.’”

“You did not just mash up a butchered version of Aladdin with The Notebook. You have the voice of an angel, Lark Montague, but that is atrocious.”

Lark giggles and settles back into the couch as Constantine plays on my TV, a familiar backdrop in our limited roster of comfort movies. We watch for a moment in silence as Keanu traps a spider under a glass. “He could come to my house and catch spiders any day,” she says as she twinkles her fingers toward the screen. “Dark and broody and grumpy? Sign me up.”

“I’m pretty sure you’ve said that every one of the two hundred times we’ve watched this.”

“It’s peak Keanu. You can’t blame me.” Lark sighs and takes a fistful of popcorn from the bowl. “I’m on a dry spell. You’d think there would be some hot musician types on the road but they’re all way too emo. I just want to be tossed around a bit. Manhandled, you know? Call me a dirty little slut and I’m all for it. These cry-into-the-mic types aren’t doing it for me.”

I huff a laugh and toss a piece of popcorn in the air in a failed attempt to catch it with my mouth. “Don’t talk to me about dry spells. I’m going to need a supercomputer to calculate my days of celibacy at this rate.”

“Or—and hear me out,” Lark says with a slap to my arm when I groan. “You could take a little trip to Boston to visit your Butcher man and see about ending that dry spell. Fill that well, sister.”

“Gross.”

“Fill it up until it’s gushing. Overflowing.”

“You’re disturbing.”

“I bet he would oblige.”

“We’ve literally just been through this. We’re friends.”

“And you could be friends with extra perks. There’s no rule book to say you can’t fuck a friend and still stay friends,” Lark says. I try to ignore her and keep my eyes on the screen even though her gaze weighs like a hot veil against my cheek. When I finally look over, her teasing smile has faded into a knowing one. “But you’re scared.”

I look away again and swallow.

“I get it,” she says. Her hand folds over my wrist and she squeezes until I look at her. Lark’s smile is sunshine, and she’s always ready to share its bright light. “You’re right.”

My brow quirks. “About what?”

“That you’ll probably never meet someone like him again. That he’s probably the only one out there like you. That you could mess it up. Or he could let you down. Or that maybe your friendship could go up in flames. You’re right about all those worries that are circling around in your head. Maybe all of them are true. But maybe it shouldn’t matter, because everyone messes up. We all let each other down once in a while. And sometimes the best things come out of the fire.”

My voice is soft when I tell her a simple truth, “You’ve never let me down.”

“What if I do one day? Do you really think you wouldn’t give me the grace to correct my mistake?”

“Of course I would, Lark. I love you.”

“Then give Rowan a little grace too.”

My conflicted sigh does nothing to cleanse a sudden burst of nerves in my chest. Lark jostles my wrist until I roll my eyes. “Okay, okay. If I have a meeting in Boston, I’ll maybe see if he’s free to hang out.”

“You don’t have to have some excuse. I bet he’d love to see you. Just go. Even if it is just to be friends in person for more than once a year. You miss him, right?”

Christ, I do. I miss his faint accent and his big smile and his ever-present jokes. I miss his teasing and his warmth and how easy it is to just be myself around him, how nice it is to lay the mask aside. I miss the way he makes me feel like I’m not an aberration, but unique.

“Yeah,” I whisper. “I do.”

“Then go,” Lark says as she snuggles herself beneath the blanket and grins at Keanu. “Go and have fun. You can do that more than once annually, you know.”

We fall into silence as I think about it.

And I continue thinking about it.

…For three more months.

And now I stand huddled in the entryway of a department store across the street from 3 In Coach for longer than any sane person probably would, just watching the wait staff and the patrons as the lunch rush tapers off to a quieter hum of activity. In true stalker fashion, I’ve looked up every article about the restaurant since its opening day seven years ago. Every photograph, to the end of the Google search results. Hundreds of reviews. I even found the blueprints from the planning permit submission. I could probably walk the place blindfolded and I’ve never even been inside.

Maybe it’s time to change that.

My bottom lip slides between my teeth as I drive my hands into the pockets of my wool trench and step into the bitter bite of an unseasonably cold spring wind.

Entering the restaurant, I’m greeted by the sound of trendy yet soulless music and a blonde bombshell hostess with a sparkling smile.

“Welcome to 3 In Coach. Do you have a reservation with us today?”

A pang of nerves rolls through my stomach as I glance toward the open expanse of dark wood tables and exposed brick. “No, sorry.”

“No problem. For how many?”

“Just me.”

The woman’s gaze rakes over my hair where it’s laying across my shoulder before meeting my eyes with a chagrined smile, as though she was caught doing something she shouldn’t. “Sure thing. Right this way.”

I follow the hostess into the dining room and before I can request a specific spot, she leads me to a semi-circular booth along the back wall rather than one of the smaller tables in the center of the room. She takes the three unneeded place settings away and starts heading toward the kitchen, but a large group enters so she changes course and greets them instead.

The enormity of how stupid this is starts to seep into my veins like wriggling worms. I’ve let these unfamiliar emotions take over. Things like longing. And loneliness. It’s as though I’ve been thrown into the ocean, drowning in the swell, and suddenly I realize I could have put my feet down all along. I could have stood up and kept my bearings. It was all just my imagination.

I should just leave. This is dumb. Dumb and so stalkery. Not in a sexy stalker way either. More like a weird, creepy serial killer stalker way, which tracks. So I need to take off, before—

“Hey, my name is Jenna and I’ll be your server this afternoon. Can I get you something to drink?”

I sit back, pretending like I wasn’t just edging my way to the end of the booth, and glance up at Jenna. She’s even more stunning than the hostess, her face lit with a genuine, broad smile and her thick auburn hair pulled back in a perfect ponytail.

Why am I doing this to myself?

“Alcohol…” I say.

Jenna beams, sensing my anxiety. It’s something that’s always worked in my favor. A woman like Jenna, who unfolds the cocktail menu and suggests a few of her favorite drinks, would never suspect I’d be capable of murdering anyone.

All she sees is a nervous data scientist, weirded out by the beautiful, friendly, outgoing woman who’s just ordered me a frozen cucumber margarita which she insists is her favorite. It’s true, I am nervous and weirded out, not only by the drink option I apparently just ordered, but by this whole scenario of being an intruder in a space that feels too sacred to bend to my obsessions.

Maybe I need to big myself up. Positive thoughts, remember my strengths and all that shit. Because just as much as I might appear quiet and spooked on the outside, I am also a serial killer who enjoys vivisection and a bit of cartography.

And I also enjoy an annual murder competition.

And I might be increasingly attracted to another serial killer and now I’m not so sure if maybe Lark was right last year, that I’m losing my shit.

I try to latch on to the rational thoughts that are still swimming in the anxiety soup of my head like drowning flies. Rowan might not even be here today. Okay that’s a lie, I hacked into the restaurant schedule and he’d marked himself down for lunch service. So what if he’s here? Rowan is in the kitchen. If I got up to leave right now, he wouldn’t even know I was ever here. 

I shuffle from the edge of the cushion to the middle of the booth where I’m sheltered by the high and curving backrest. It takes a minute to focus enough to actually read the menu, even though it’s short and well-structured, but by the time Jenna returns with my bright green drink, I’m ready to order.

And then stew in silence.

And drink in silence.

And eat in more silence.

I take out my burner phone and contemplate texting Rowan, but I end up putting it away when the pressure only makes me more antsy. I opt for a pen and my notebook instead, and flip to a new sheet of paper.

I pour my focus into translating the image in my mind into ink. The whole universe can collapse into a single page. Distractions ease, and my thoughts follow the lines of black ink, ideas and conversations existing in strokes of darkness rendered by my hand. Even when Jenna brings the charred Brussels sprouts and coconut curry soup, I barely notice, oblivious to the world around me.

At least, I am until the door opens and a boisterous group of seven enters the restaurant. I look up to lock eyes with a man I’ve never seen, but one whose features are unmistakably familiar.

Dark hair. Full lips slanted in a smirk. Tattoos that climb the side of his neck from beneath his collar. His arm is draped over the shoulders of a tiny brunette woman, the rings on his tattooed knuckles glinting beneath her perfect waves. He’s tall and powerfully built. Even with his leather jacket and thick sweater I can tell he’s basically a wall of muscle. And with those dark, predatory eyes that sharpen like a blade set to cut me, I know he’s trouble.

Big fucking trouble by the name of Lachlan Kane.

I break my gaze away as Jenna returns to my table with my dessert, a fig phyllo Napoleon. “I’m so sorry, but can I get a box for this and the bill please? Something’s come up and I have to get going.”

Jenna’s smile doesn’t falter. “Of course, it’s no problem. I’ll be right back.”

“Thanks.”

When my gaze returns to Lachlan, his attention is on a long table in the center of the room where his friends are finding their places, some already seated, others chatting as they take off their coats. But the second I pull my jacket closer across the seat to slide it on, his eyes snap back to mine, amusement coloring their dark hues with the kind of light that sets me on edge.

I drop my focus to my sketch and force myself not to look up as I shrug my jacket over my shoulders and fasten the buttons with a slight tremor in my fingers. Jenna arrives with the boxed dessert and I give her more than enough cash to cover the bill before she heads toward Lachlan’s table to gather drink orders. When I hear an Irish accent among the voices, I seize the opportunity to bolt, but not before tearing the drawing of a raven free from the notebook. Some part of me just wants to leave a little piece of myself behind, to exist in a place that means something to Rowan, if only for a moment. Maybe Jenna will throw it away. Or maybe she’ll pin it up somewhere in the kitchen. Maybe it will remain here long after I’ve found a hole to crawl inside to die.

As soon as the sheet is torn free, I’m out of the booth.

I make it halfway to the door with hurried steps before a single word stops me dead.

“Blackbird.”

The voice carries across the restaurant and I’m pretty sure everyone is now staring at me.

I whisper a curse, taking a deep breath that fills to the bottom of my lungs in a futile attempt to rid my cheeks of a crimson flame. When I make a slow pivot on my heel, my eyes track to Lachlan first, whose smirk is nothing short of diabolical.

And then my gaze collides with Rowan’s.

The sleeves of his chef coat are rolled to his elbows, a few flecks of orange dotting the otherwise pristine white fabric. The stains are the same color as my soup, and for some reason that makes the blush smolder even hotter in my cheeks. His black, baggy pants are impossibly sexy and adorable at the same time. But it’s his expression that grips my throat in a vise. It’s full of shock and confusion and excitement and something hot, something that burns me up from the inside. The combination shortcircuits my brain until all that comes out of my mouth is a single, squeaked word. “Hey.”

Rowan almost smiles.

…Almost.

“Meg,” he barks, shifting his attention to the front door as he gestures toward me. “What the fuck?”

Meg the Hostess freezes in place, the color draining from her face as though her blood has been sucked out with a straw. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry, Chef. I meant to come tell you but got sidetracked.”

Rowan’s glare shifts to the exact booth where I was just sitting and then to Jenna who closes in on it with a spray bottle and a rag. The sheet of paper I left behind sits like a damning piece of evidence on the table, stark and obvious against the glossy black surface.

“Do not touch that fucking table,” Rowan snaps.

Jenna’s eyes widen as they shift between us, her lips folding between her teeth to clamp down around a smile as she turns on her heel and heads for the bar. Rowan watches her for a moment, his frown deepening when she tosses a grin over her shoulder.

His gaze lands on that fucking drawing.

And then it fixes on me.

“Sloane…” he says, taking a few cautious steps closer as though trying not to provoke a wild animal. “What are you doing here?”

Dying an agonizingly slow death of mortification, clearly. “Umm… eating?”

Rowan’s navy eyes glimmer, a fleeting spark igniting in their depths. “In Boston, Blackbird. What are you doing in Boston?”

“I…I’m here for work. Meeting. A work meeting. Not like, here in the restaurant, obviously. In town. City. Boston city.” Dear God, make me stop. I am burning hot, my wool jacket trapping my body heat and amplifying it until I’m positive my blood has turned to lava. Sweat itches between my shoulder blades and I try not to fidget, opting to back up a step toward the door rather than shedding my jacket to scratch my skin off.

Rowan’s gaze flicks down to my feet and he halts his campaign to inch forward, a crease forming between his brows in a thoughtful frown. “Stay,” he says, his voice low and quiet. “We can sit at the booth.”

A nervous laugh bursts past my lips, its color darkened by my self-deprecating thoughts. The last place in the world I want to go is back to that booth where I left a drawing like some shy, pathetic middle schooler, confused and lovesick over her first crush.

So I do whatever any pathetic middle schooler would do. I take another step backward toward the door and lie my face off. “I’ve gotta get going, actually. But it was great seeing you.”

I flash Rowan an apologetic smile before turning to stride toward the exit only to be stopped short by Lachlan, who’s standing as a sentry between me and my escape. He raises a glass of whiskey to his lips and takes a sip around a devilish grin. I was so caught up in seeing Rowan and battling with my emotions that I didn’t even notice him receive his drink, or rise from the table, or block my access to the door.

Shit.

“Well, well,” Lachlan says through his shit-eating grin. “Fuck. Off.”

Rowan growls behind me. “Lachlan—”

“If it isn’t the elusive Sloane Sutherland,” Lachlan continues, swirling the ice in his glass. “I was beginning to think you were a figment of my brother’s overactive imagination.”

“Sit down, Lachlan,” Rowan grits out. I glance over my shoulder to where he stands rigid a short distance behind me, his hands folded into tight fists.

“Whatever you say, little brother.”

Lachlan raises his glass in a mock toast before sauntering off in the direction of my booth.

“Touch that fucking table and I will rip your goddamn hands off and use them to wipe my ass until the day I die,” Rowan snarls.

Lachlan stops, turning slowly to give his brother a devious grin before he shrugs and starts back to his own table, passing close enough to the seething chef to clap him once on the shoulder and whisper something in his ear. Rowan’s eyes darken, but they never leave mine. Even when my gaze darts around, every time it lands on him, he’s there, waiting.

“Sloane—”

A blast of animated conversation enters the restaurant on the cool draft from the open door.

“Rowan! You’re done for the day?”

I turn to watch a gorgeous blonde woman enter the restaurant with two equally beautiful friends close on her heels, both of whom are engaged in an animated conversation full of laughter and confidence. The blonde strides straight for Rowan. She never wavers on the stilettos that accentuate her bare, tanned legs, her skin glowing as though she’s just returned from some expensive spa vacation. She tosses Rowan a wide grin, oblivious to the tension she’s just shattered in the room, the shards of it cutting me to the core.

“Hi, Anna,” he says. Those two words seem full of resignation as the woman wraps an arm around his shoulder in a hug he doesn’t return, though she doesn’t seem to notice. When she lets him go, she turns, spotting me for the first time.

“Oh I’m sorry, I just kind of barged in, didn’t I?” She offers me what seems like a genuinely apologetic smile. I can tell she’s trying to assess whether I’m a disgruntled customer, or maybe a food critic, or a vendor here to supply meat or vegetables, not that I look like the gardening type.

No, Anna. I’m clearly here to die of embarrassment.

“Anna, this is Sloane.” Rowan pauses as though considering how he should elaborate on how he knows me, but nothing comes. “Sloane, this is my friend Anna.”

“Hey, nice to meet you,” she says, her expert smile transforming from apologetic to welcoming. “Are you going to join us?”

My throat is raw. My voice comes out a gravelly rasp, grating compared to Anna’s smooth, bright tone. “No, but thanks for the offer. I’ve gotta get going.”

“Sloane—”

“Nice seeing you, Rowan. Thank you for lunch, it was lovely,” I say, rattling the box of fig Napoleon that I have the urge to throw into the nearest flaming dumpster where the rest of my life belongs.

I meet Rowan’s gaze for only a moment, and I regret it as soon as I do. The resignation that was in his voice moments ago has found its way to his eyes, swirling with desperation and dismay. It’s a terrible combination that turns the ache in my heart to a sharp, piercing pain.

I give him a final, fleeting smile, not waiting to see what effect it might have. The urge to run is so strong that I have to think about each hurried step I take to the door. There’s probably not much dignity left for me to salvage, but at least I can force myself to walk.

So that’s what I do. I walk away. Out the front door. Down the street. Not knowing where I’m going. Not remembering when I throw away the box of dessert. Not aware of when the first, hot tear of embarrassment falls across my cheek.

I keep going, all the way to Castle Island, where I stop at the shore and look out across the dark water. And I stay there for a long time. Long enough that the walk back to the hotel seems like an endless trudge, like all my energy has been spent.

As soon as I walk through the door, I fire up my laptop long enough to rebook my flights to the earliest departure the next morning, then I slide into bed and fall into a restless sleep.

Can we talk?

I’m just getting on the plane. Maybe when I get home?

Yeah of course, just let me know. Safe travels.

Hey, you make it home okay the other day?

Yeah, sorry. Just been chaotic. Work is full-on. I’m in meetings all day but I’ll text you when I can.

I’m sorry, my week got a bit out of control.

And I’m sorry for just showing up to your restaurant and not contacting you first. That was weird of me.

Each one of the past ten days since I got back from Boston has passed in a haze, and every time my phone has chimed with a message, my heart has rioted with a burst of nerves. I’ve been working myself up to get to this moment, but as I press send on my most recent message and place my burner phone face down on my lap, I’m already wondering if I should try to recall the text before Rowan has a chance to read it. I’m still staring at my carpet, wading through the depths of indecision when the phone buzzes on my lap.

It wasn’t weird. I wish I’d known you were there. I wish you’d stayed.

I turn the phone off and set it on the coffee table, then drop my head into my palms and hope that they can absorb me into another world.

One where I don’t have to feel anything.

Because revenge is easy.

But everything else is hard.