“If I had known—”
“No. I needed to do it. He was going to burn me alive.” I looked at him. “And just so we are clear for next time. I do not need you to do my dirty work because it might be hard on me. This sucked, but I’ll get over it. And I’ll do it again if I have to.”
“Understood.”
As we pulled away from the house, a black sedan pulled up. Liam explained it was Philip’s crew coming to take care of Marcus’ body. Another crew would take care of any questions about his disappearance.
“Do this often?” I asked when he finished explaining it to me.
“When you’re Alpha, you learn the best ways to deal with problems. Stephens more than likely has a similar system in place.”
The thought of Isaac killing someone left me speechless. Isaac came to me for my opinions on how to handle things within the pack, but he’d never once mentioned having to kill anyone. Let alone the cleanup process afterward. He probably thought he was protecting me from the dark underworld of being Alpha. Though, in fairness, I’d never even thought about asking him.
By the time we got back to his house, one of Liam’s couriers had dropped off Ivan and Charles’ phones. We unlocked them and found the app they had mentioned. There were no new messages, which meant, from what they’d said, no one had sent one within the last half hour. I took one and Liam took the other. We’d hold on to them in the hopes the ‘chick’ would send a message.
As if feeling neglected, my phone dinged for the first time in I didn’t know how long. “Isaac,” I muttered as I read the text. He wanted to meet up to talk about my house. “Are we going to check out those addresses they gave us?”
“Not unless you want to. I have some of my guys checking them out.”
“Okay. I’m going to meet Isaac for a drink to figure out my house situation. I’ll be back later?” I felt weird just assuming I could come and go as I pleased. “Maybe I should get a hotel room.”
He closed the distance between us, his hands moving to my hips. “If that would make you more comfortable, then you should. However, I enjoy having you here. You are free to consider this your home until you figure out what you’re going to do.”
His lips tentatively touched mine until I wrapped my arms around his neck and opened to him. After a few moments I broke the kiss and leaned my forehead against his.
“I’ll stay.”
“Good. Go talk to Stephens. I’ll be here when you return.”
As I headed to the stairs, he smacked my ass making me laugh as I jogged up to ‘my room’ to change. Isaac and I had agreed to meet at Mac’s for a burger and a beer while we talked.
He was leaning against the hood of his truck when I pulled into the space next to him. I smiled as I walked toward him.
“It’s only been a day or two, but it feels like I haven’t seen you in years,” he said.
“Yeah, I know.” It hit me then that it had only been a couple of weeks since all this shit started.
The hostess brought us to a table on the patio. It’d be quieter than inside the bar. We placed our order: two rare bacon cheeseburgers, fries, and a pitcher of beer, and then we got the pleasantries out of the way before getting down to the nitty-gritty.
“You want to rebuild my house. That’s why we are here, right?”
“Yeah.”
I waited for the server to place our food in front of us before I responded. “That would be great, but I’m going to pay you.”
“No. There’s no need. We can do it in between jobs. Besides, how are you going to pay me?”
I pursed my lips. “The insurance company will eventually pay me. Liam has a public adjuster helping to get the insurance company to give me a fair deal. And if I need extra—”
“You’ll ask your boyfriend?”
“Fuck you. I was going to say I could get a loan.”
He shook his head. “I’m sorry. That was too far. I just don’t like you staying with him.”
“Why do you hate him so much?”
I took a bite of my burger while I waited for him to answer me. I’d always figured he hated Liam because I did. Now I wasn’t so sure.