Nixon

Chapter 1

Nixon
• • •

Sweat beads at the nape of my neck as I pace back and forth across the familiar room. Being back inside this penthouse makes me anxious. My skin crawls at the many ghosts that linger here. So much shit happened in this place, it's fucking overwhelming.

My heart rate picks up when I hear the elevator arrive. There's only one person that could be because I changed the pin to my penthouse. I also told the front desk that if anyone called or came by asking questions about me, tell them I moved and sold the apartment.

I take a seat on the couch, my elbows on my knees when she pops around the corner. I'm smothered in pain, barely able to breathe through it most of the time. Sometimes being around her eases it just a little, other times her presence makes the pain ten times worse. When I look at her all I see is guilt for what I've done and it fucks with my head.

She gives me a tentative smile as she approaches the couch and takes a seat on the chair across from me. Her blue eyes look me over from head to toe, mentally going over each feature, comparing it to the last time she saw me. I've built muscle back up, my body is finally on its way back to what it was before I got heavy into drugs. It also helps that I'm actually eating now. When you're high all the time you forget to eat, hell half the time you don't even feel hungry.

"How have you been doing?" She asks quietly, her voice shaky with nerves.

My fists clench at the sound of her voice, my eyes dropping to my hands. "I'm okay."

"How did everything go?"

Our eyes meet again, mine scanning over her face. She's gained a few more freckles on her nose since I last saw her. "I fought one of the Correctional Officers and knocked him out the day Seth visited, so I had to do some time in solitary confinement." Solitary confinement was worse than being in a cell with another inmate. Way too quiet, too much time to think about shit.

Her eyes flash with a knowing gleam. "I bet that was hard for you."

It was.

I shrug. "They tried to give me five years but thanks to Mr. Jameson I got sentenced to one year. A month after my sentencing they let me out on probation. I'm fucking stuck with a felony though, there was no way around the possession with intent to distribute charge. The evidence they found in my safe was an amount too large for personal use apparently, they also seized a fucking ton of cash."

She nods, a small smile pulling at the corners of her lips. "I'm glad, Nixon. I hate that you have a felony but a few months is better than five years." The sound of my name on her lips makes me feel too much at one time. "Happy very belated birthday, by the way. November 18th, right?"

I nod, unsure how she even knew my birthday. "Thanks and thank you for talking me into hiring Mr. Jameson back. Spending five years in that place would've sucked." I admit, stalling the conversation out so I don't have to really talk about the shit I need to. The last thing I want to talk about is how I screwed her life up but I know she needs this, probably more than I do.

She tilts her head to the side, eyeing me like she knows exactly what I'm thinking. "Why did you want me to come here alone?"

Fuck, right to the point then.

"Whatever we talk about, it stays between us, right?" I ask warily. The last thing I want after spilling my guts is for her to talk to someone other than me about it.