Trapped (Caged #2)(42)

“That’s your second helping,” she reminded me.

“Oh yeah. Well, I was really hungry.”

Tria crossed her arms over her chest, leaned back in her chair, and glared at me. It was pretty obvious that I wasn’t going to be getting out of this, so I rolled my eyes and started talking.

“It wasn’t a big deal,” I lied. “I had been clean for about a month when Ryan tracked me down. He wasn’t supposed to tell anyone where I was, but he told Amanda, and she told the whole f*cking family. I swear she thinks by getting into their good graces she’s going to get some huge f*cking inheritance or something.”

“So what happened?”

“It’s pretty straightforward,” I said. “Ryan brought Dad here. I took one look at him, punched Ryan, and walked out. That was the end of it. I didn’t even find out until later that Amanda was involved.”

“Your father came here?”

“Just that once,” I said.

“You didn’t talk to him?”

“Nope.”

“Liam!” Tria raised both hands up into the air and then brought them down hard on the table. “He wanted to talk to you! Why else would he have come here?”

“Don’t, Tria,” I warned. “Just don’t.”

I got up and walked out of the kitchen before I got so pissed off, I would end up running out. Grabbing my smokes off the nightstand, I crawled out onto the fire escape.

“What’s up, crazy bitch?”

Krazy Katie had about nine empty dental floss containers lying around her feet and had constructed a pretty intricate spider web out of the floss itself. There was a huge, tangled mess of white string all over the fire escape, which pretty much made it a fire hazard.

Gotta love the irony.

She didn’t say anything to me, but she kept glancing over at me with a weird little smile.

“You are very loud, you know,” Krazy Katie said as I finished my smoke and started to climb back through the window.

I narrowed my eyes at her, but she didn’t look over at me. She seemed completely entranced by the bit of dental twine wrapped around her fingers. She tied it into a loop and started to play Cat’s Cradle.

“You get off on listening?” I asked with a smirk, but I didn’t get any more words out of her. I climbed the rest of the way back through the window and found Tria sitting on the couch with a big glass of apple juice.

“I’m going with you,” she said definitively. “I’m not going to argue about it, and I have no idea what I’m going to wear, but I’m going. I’ll go in f*cking sweats if that’s what I have to do, but I am going!”

I rolled my eyes and was about to start the whole “oh no you aren’t” argument over again when someone started tapping at the door.

“Who the hell is that?” I muttered as I went to open it. As soon as the door swung to the side, I wished I had just stayed on the fire escape. “What the f*ck?”

“Good evening, Liam,” Michael said smoothly. He looked around me to smile at Tria. “Hello, Miss Lynn. It’s a pleasure to see you again.”

“Hello, Michael,” Tria replied. “Please, come in.”

“Seriously?” I asked. As I turned around to look at her, Michael stepped to the side and entered the apartment. Behind him was an older guy with white hair down to his shoulders and a big bag over his arm.

“Pardon my manners,” Michael said as I closed the door. “This is Carter. He’s going to get you measured for your tux, and then we’ll work on some designs for Tria’s dress.”

“My…my what?” Tria stuttered.

“Your dress for the wedding,” Michael said with a cool smile. “Ryan said Liam was concerned he would need a new tuxedo, and it occurred to me that we could kill two birds with one stone, so to speak. Carter is a fabulous procurer of wonderful items from Italy and Paris. He’ll find just the thing for you, I’m sure.”

“Michael, are you out of your mind?” I glared at him.

“You said you were going to attend the wedding, correct?”

“Yeah,” I admitted.

“And I assume you are still a man of your word, regardless of the sins of the past?” He eyed me pointedly. “I’m fairly certain that was a trait instilled in you by your father and grandfather.”

I took a long breath but gave him a single nod.

“Then you will need a tuxedo.”

“This has nothing to do with Tria,” I said to him as I took a step closer.

“Hold your arm out to the side, please,” the white-haired gentleman said. He took my wrist and guided my hand away from my body as he pulled out a tape measure and started taking measurements.

I ignored him but let him do his job. One thing that was definitely true was my need for a tux, and since Michael would be paying for the rest of the wedding anyway, I didn’t think the price of a tux was going to amount to even a drop in that budget bucket.

“Of course it does,” Michael replied as he smiled at her again. “We’ll want her dressed appropriately, and considering your income level, you know you can’t accommodate.”

“My income level is none of your f*cking business!”

“Liam,” Tria said as she stood from the couch and walked over. “We were just trying to figure out how I was going to get something to wear.”