Something in the Orange

Chapter Twenty-Six

"Stop you putting roots in my dreamland, my house of stone, your ivy grows and now I'm covered in you"

Ivy - Taylor Swift

The early morning sunlight warms her face as she lets her head rest on the back of her armchair. Her eyes heavy after spending the previous evening watching Miguel, unable to take her eyes off him, watching the slow rise and fall of his chest.

Downing the last of her coffee she leans forward placing it on the small table in front of her before picking her journal back up, her pen gently scratches across the pages as she lets her feelings twist into words, spread across the page in black ink, she pours her soul out, sadness, anger, fear and something she refuses to admit to twist together on the page in front of her.

The sound of the deadbolt unlocking echoing through her apartment as she keeps writing refusing to acknowledge the man who entered. Her body alert to his presence as he moves across the room, sighing at her, before making his way back to the kitchen. The grind of the coffee machine whirring to life, but she keeps scrawling her deepest thoughts across the page.

Placing a coffee down in front of her, he slips in the opposite armchair, bergamot, leather and darkness seeping into her, overwhelming her as she writes the final sentence. Her eyes staring at the words in front of her in her own unique code.

'And somehow I am seventeen again and he holds the key to my absolution and destruction'

Sighing she closes her journal, sliding it between the arm of the chair and her body, steeling herself she looks up meeting Nestor's sorrow filled eyes, regret and redemption scrawled across his features. His body was wrapped in all black. Black suit, black shirt and black shoes, her eyebrow cocks at the look, the past few months had been a mix of the traditional and the biker, but this look was pure wrath under a Galindo banner.

"How's he doing this morning?" Nestor murmurs.

Vee shrugs "no change, Blair got her hands on some blood, she's hopeful that it will boost him since he lost so much"

"How did she –"

"Don't ask" Vee cuts him off.

He softly chuckles as she shakes his head "you got really lucky with her"

"Yeah I did" reaching forward she takes the coffee he set down, taking a sip, no amount of caffeine flooding her veins seemed to be helping with her exhaustion, but she was holding out hope that this would be the magical one.

"What did you find out about our rat problem?" she asks.

"Can you trust me for a second?"

Cocking her eyebrow she takes another sip of her coffee, letting the flavor roll over her tongue "I'm not the one lacking trust"

Sighing he fixes her with a glare "I want you to trust your gut, what do your instincts tell you?"

Vee rolls her eyes.

"I'm serious, I will give you this," he says pulling an envelope from out of his jacket pocket "if you tell me what your gut says."

"Does it matter?"

"Yes"

Groaning, she places her coffee cup on the table "my gut says it's Luis, I have no idea but that's where my mind went to last night when Carlos told us and that's where it stayed last night."

Nestor smirks, handing her the envelope, snatching it out of his hand, she flips it over, opening it "I'm wrong aren't I?"

A vibration fills the room as Nestor winces, reaching into his other jacket pocket, pulling his cell out, glancing down at the caller he quickly ends the call.