True North

'Sweet dreams, my little lovely. Thanks for making my entire month!' -Riot

A smile touched my lips, but I put the phone up without answering him. I was confused as hell and dad was right. Something felt off.

When morning came, I went out to the living room to do school work, not wanting to be crammed into my room.

Carla smiled at me, but left me to my schoolwork and Zoom classes silently.

Right after my first morning class, the doorbell rang and Carla let Riot in.

He came in, grinning at me on the couch as he sat down on the other side of me. "Hey you! I brought reinforcements!" he told me, setting a box down on the coffee table before pulling his own laptop out.

"I thought you had to work today?" I asked, confused and a little stressed.

"I did, but I left early. There's something going on at the company and everyone is all hush hush about it and no one is working. It's a bunch of standing around and waiting. So check this out," he grinned, opening his laptop.

"What's happening?" I asked in concern, sitting up.

"Nothing to do with your dad, I'm sure," he shrugged. "It was lower level stuff than him. Just thought Since nothing was getting done and it was all in a holding pattern, I would come see you. Look at this. So, wanna do it? I have my character built already and look at this!" he laughed, opening the box and snapping open a t-shirt before handing it to me. He pulled out the other for himself and I looked over the Hellfire Club t-shirts, then looked at the D&D character creation screen on his laptop.

"Ummm..."

My phone chirped, saving me from having to answer right away.

'Hey kiddo, there's a lot going on here at work. I'm going to be home soon to talk to you about it. I'm on my way.' -dad

I frowned at the message. What was happening? Had he been fired? Was there a hostile takeover of the company?

"True?" Riot prompted. "I said I made a barbarian? Goliath? What do you want to make?"

"Umm... I'm not really sure," I told him softly, feeling flustered. I wanted to call my dad!

"No problem. Want to go get lunch, talk about it? There's a place in the old downtown, a gaming cafe place that has people who do what they call one offs and they can teach us before we dive right in. ... True?" he asked, sounding a little agitated that I wasn't paying attention to him. "Who was that on the phone?"

"Dad."

"What did he say?"

"That he'd talk about it when he got home?"

"It can't be too important then," Riot shrugged. "Come on, let's go get some lunch, I'm starving... True? Hey, calm down, ok?" he called quickly, sitting back down and hugging me to his chest as he rubbed my back. "Easy baby, it's nothing, I'm sure, ok? Everything is fine. It's just business mumbo-jumbo, is all. Probably a new lead shareholder or something, that's all. Calm down. You need some water or..."

The front door slammed open, making me flinch and jerk as I whimpered. Then I stared in wide eyed disbelief as Angel stormed in, followed by Alonso, Jesus and Marcos.

Shaking my head in confusion, I started to sit up, even as Riot jumped up, half dumping me on the floor.

Angel charged Riot savagely, his brother and cousins right behind him as Carla started screaming.

I managed to sit up and scoot back, still staring at Angel in confusion. His head was practically shaved now and he had more tattoos, but the notation was secondary as I scooted further away and whimpered.

Alonso and Marcos were holding Riot down and Angel was punching him over and over again. Riot had been yelling, now he was screaming as Angel kept hammering his fist into Riots face.

Finally, I got my voice.

"No! No, STOP! Please, Angel, STOP! You can't do this! Please don't!"

"FUCK you, Puta!" Angel yelled, turning to me, rage still filling his eyes as he looked me over. "How fucking DARE you tell me to stop! Do you know what he DID to me? Do you even care? Naw, you got your world back and left me behind, didn't you? Fuck you, True! And fuck you more for going back to this piece of shit!" Angel yelled, staggering to his feet. Turning, he spit at me before leaving as I let out a wailing sob of revulsion, fear, heartbreak and bewilderment.

Why? What had just happened?

I looked at Alonso as he gave Riot a final kick, then spit on him. Alonso turned to me with a sneer. "Fuck you, bitch," he hissed. "I hope your cold ass heart stops this fucking time and you god damn die."

"What did I do?" I asked, breaking down into sobs. I didn't understand. "He left ME! He left me and wouldn't return my calls or Rose's or anyones! What did I do?"

Alonso hesitated at the door, his eyes searching my face. He looked back to Riot who was on the floor, bloody and unconscious.

"He didn't fucking tell you?"

"Tell me what?" I asked, heartbroken as I crawled over and tried to push Jesus back.

"That piece of shit and his boys jumped Angel when he left here that day... Pumped him full of drugs, put a fake ID on him, stuffed enough coke balloons up his ass to send him to jail for the rest of his life then dropped him off at the fucking border. The fake ID was for a wanted man and a tip was called in. They found Angel passed out in a bus station, the drugs where they were told they would be and he's been in jail down there this whole time. He just got out, just got back and here you are... all tucked in with that piece of shit, living your best fucking life. He tried to call you and your dad and all he got were messages from you both to stay the fuck away."

"No! No no no! No, it wasn't me! I tried to call him! I tried to call him so many times and his phone was cut off! He changed his number!" I wailed, my fingertips going numb.

Alonso looked me over again, then looked at Jesus and Marcos as they pulled Riot up to drag outside. I was assuming to put into a vehicle.

"Don't! Please don't," I begged Alonso, shaking my head.

"Angel!" Alonso called.

"What?" Angel demanded from far away.

"Come here a minute."

"I don't want to see that bitch!"

"Just come here."

Angel came in a few seconds later and sneered at me as I gripped the couch and tried harder than I'd ever tried in my life not to pass out.

"Don't," I begged Angel. "Don't hurt him anymore. Don't... do whatever you're going to do to him!"

"You fucking called me back in here so she could beg for his fucking life?" Angel snarled at Alonso.

"No, man, just listen. She said she didn't know and I don't think she did. Remember I told you that I never got your messages? I think he fucked with all of our phones somehow, made it so you couldn't contact anyone. Not just us, but her and her dad too."

"So fucking what? She's still here fucking him in her perfect fucking world!"

"No! No... no..." I panted, trying to hold on to something tangible. "I didn't... I wouldn't... It wasn't... Please... you can't kill him!"

"I will do WHATEVER THE FUCK I WANT TO HIM!" Angel screamed, dropping down to get right in my face.

"No," I whispered again, shaking my head. "No, you can't! Please! Please, Angel!"

"SHUT UP! Stop begging me for that piece of shits life!" Angel cried, tears welling up behind his rage now.

"No! No, yours! Your life!" I managed, moving to clutch his wrist. "If you... if you kill him, they will take you again... please don't!"

"Angel!" Alonso scolded, moving to pull me off the floor and lay me on the couch. "It's you she's worried about, not him! If you kill him, you go to jail!"

Angel's face contorted as he looked away, then he shook his head. "No. No, I tried to call her! I tried to call her from every single phone I could get my hands on and she wouldn't answer! All the emails told me to fuck off!"

I shook my head again, but couldn't speak as I looked at Riot. Riot who was in tech support and had access to phones and the network of everyone who worked for dad's company.

"Fucking cops!" Marcos hissed under his breath as sirens came screaming up to the house.

"My room," I mumbled to Angel. "Hide. My room."

"Go!" Alonso hissed at Angel. "Hurry up!"

"Fuck that," Angel growled, then dropped down on his knees next to me and took hold of my face in his hands. "You swear it, True? You didn't know and you... weren't fucking him?"

My lips were numb and my vision swimming, but I managed to shake my head as I clutched Angel's wrists. They were holding me too tightly, but I didn't care.

They were holding me.

"...don't care what she saw, I am telling you, I want to press charges against the man you took to the hospital!"

Dad's words made no sense. And why was he so far away when I could feel the safety that only came from being close to him?

Opening my eyes, I managed to turn away from the warm, white fabric in my vision before throwing up.

"She's awake," a male voice called, one I didn't recognize. "Sit her up so we can talk to her."

"It doesn't work like that," dad snapped. "How about you uncuff that man so he can help her? I TOLD you, he is not the bad guy here!"

"Sir, he just got out of prison, came straight here and put a man in the hospital. There are witnesses to the assault."

"And I told you, I don't fucking care what the witness says! She has no idea what was really happening! She's a brand new maid and she has no idea what's going on here! If you aren't going to let him go, then let me go help her!"

"Sir, we need you to stay seated for now. Until we get this all straightened out, all I know about you is that you assaulted an unarmed, unconscious man."

"I slapped him and BARELY! Do you know what he's been doing?!? He's had a live feed into my house! He's been watching my little girl! Intercepting her calls and emails, manipulating her! And me too! He intercepted emails meant for me and calls as well! He used his fathers position at my company to have her boyfriend unduly arrested and sent away, then moved in on her! Spying on her and controlling everything she saw and did! If some man did that to your daughter, or had you sent to prison in another country so he could get hands on your wife, what would you do? THAT'S what all this is about! He's had the codes to my house, all the live feeds in every single room, he knows every single move she makes! I didn't even realize it until today at work when the other IT specialists noticed something was up and he took off! Now damnit, let me go so I can help my daughter! Or let him go so he can help her!"

I could only groan weakly as I was shifted and cleaned up by unfamiliar hands.

Turning again, I looked at Rose and wondered what was happening.

"Hey kiddo," dad called softly, stroking my hair back as I turned to his voice.

I was back in the hospital.

"You're just fine, ok? Everything is going to be just fine."

"What happened?" I asked softly, squeezing Rose's hand as she took hold of mine.

"A lot, I guess. It seems John and some of his friends ran Angel off the road after he left here the last time you saw him. Went at him with tire irons, then injected him so full of heroin he almost OD'd. John's friend drove Angel all the way down to Texas and left him with his cousin who took him over the border. They... planted drugs on him and a fake ID. The ID of a very wanted man, then called in a tip. Angel was picked up and put in prison. John... was already interning at my company with his dad and he used his access to filter the calls and emails we got. All of us. Used Angel's phone to send some 'goodbye' texts, then destroyed it. Then he went after you. That's what was happening at the company. His dad was arrested first, it was all done with his logins, then we realized it was John. He'd taken off, though, and came straight there to the house. I guess... I guess he had some plan in the works to get you out of the house. Take off with you. He'd been watching you, True... all the time. Constantly. Everywhere you went. The setup in his room... he had monitors up for your room and two more for the rest of the house. Another for your phone and laptop cameras. That's... that's how he knew all the codes to get in and what was happening. Like the day he showed me the footage of Colin. It didn't strike me as odd that he knew our passwords and took me straight to the camera feed, I was so focused on WHAT he was showing me... not how. I knew something was off, though... I'm sorry, True. I failed you again!"

"No! No, you didn't. I made my own choices, remember? I never felt right either, something felt off to me too and I guess I know what it was," I sighed, my head pounding.

"The place he had, True," Rose shook her head in worry.

"Rose! None of that now," dad scolded quickly.

"What?" I asked warily.

"Nothing," dad told me firmly, giving Rose a warning look.

I let it go, knowing Rose would tell me everything later. "Where's Angel?"

"He's being held at the moment," dad told me, blushing. "He's... a bit more colorful than the last time we spoke," he told me primply. "And I don't just mean the new tattoos. He has... quite a mouth and... a lot of anger."

"You would too if..." Rose began.

I waved her off quickly, rolling to my side to hug dad around the waist and hide my face against him. My head was throbbing and my thoughts scrambled as I tried to sort it all out. Tried to decide how I felt.

"Is Riot ok?" I asked softly.

"He's in a room here eating through a straw," dad told me darkly. "He's part of why Angel isn't here. He has a restraining order against him and his whole family. His folks do, anyway. Your head hurting, kiddo?"

"Mmm."

"I'll call in the nurse, let them know you're awake and they'll get you something. Do you think... you think you feel up to giving a statement? I'm supposed to call the officer when you wake up."

"The very HOT officer," Rose smirked, speaking low.

Rose was very right. The officer who came in with his partner was very attractive. Enough so that dad actually blushed more than once as he answered questions and Rose flirted outrageously. The officer took it all in stride, like he was used to it and I was guessing he was.

By the time I was done with my statement, which I was still completely confused about, the doctor had come and gone and the nurse had removed my IV.

"Where's my phone?" I asked, still feeling numb as dad helped me into his car.

"Home, I guess," he answered softly. "Things were such a mess, everything happened so quickly."

I immediately looked at Rose and she rolled her eyes as she suppressed a smile.

"I've been in touch with him, he knows everything going on," she told me. "He hasn't really answered back much, but Alonso has. He says he's... a bit different than he was over a year ago when you saw him last. A lot angrier and more... violent and volatile. He's out of jail on bail for right now, but Riot and his family are pressing charges."

"I already got him a lawyer," dad told me quickly as he pulled onto the highway. "This isn't something she needs to be worrying about right now, Rose!"

"Daddy, look at her! It's ALL she's thinking about! I'm just easing her mind, is all."

"Can we go to his house?" I asked dad softly.

"Kiddo, that's not really a good idea right now," dad told me sadly. "I've also been in touch with Alonso and... Angel isn't really talking to anyone very much. They try and he just walks away and locks himself in his room or in his garage. Or he leaves on a borrowed bike. His is gone. He's going through a lot and he probably needs some space."

That made me think of something else, then. "Riot knows where his bike is. He has my helmet in his garage up in a box, I saw it. You should probably let the police know that... I wasn't thinking about it when they took my statement. ... Dad... this is all just so much! I was letting him back in! Not as more than a friend, but... it hurts. It hurts so badly! And now Angel is back and I should be glad he didn't just write me off, but he thought I turned my back on him? And he's so angry and he said horrible things to me!"

"No anger or hate is stronger than that borne of love, sweetheart. His anger is as big as it is because of how much he loved you... loves you. All of that pain had to go somewhere and unfortunately, he turned it into anger. He still loves you though, sweetheart. You should have seen the way he was holding you, looking at you after you passed out. After how long you made yourself hold on just so that he would know how you felt. Alonso told me everything and I saw him when he was holding you. He loves you so much, True... If I were smarter, I wouldn't tell you all of this. I would let you let go of him and move on because... no. I don't really like him. He's nice enough, but... I feel like he's not good enough for you. Not at all. Not because he's poor or his race, you know I don't care about that, but because... probably because no one will ever be good enough for you in my eyes. Also because I'm afraid for you... The way you look at him, the way you gave him your heart so completely. He could shatter you! He's done it once, even if he didn't mean to, and I'm afraid he'll do it again. His temper, his lifestyle, something. I don't want him to hurt you and... even more... I don't want to lose you to him. That's my biggest fear and I know it's selfish..."

I lunged up and hugged him from behind, squeezing as hard as I could. "You're never getting rid of me, dad, not ever! No one will ever come between us!"

He smiled sadly and held on with one hand as he drove us home.

I felt horrible, but the first thing I did was get Alonso's number from Rose and text him, then hurried into the shower.

I said nothing at all to dad as I came out, just hugged him as tight as I could, then slipped out the back door like I was going down to look at the lake.

I circled around quickly, then walked up the street until Alonso pulled up on his bike. He said nothing, just handed me a helmet and helped me get on back before turning around right there and going back across town.

Their house didn't look the same, really. There were no bikes in the drive, no parts or tools. The garage door was closed.

Alonso led me up the stairs and let me in through the kitchen. I stayed quiet as he led me behind Abuela, who didn't turn away from her cooking. Even she seemed more subdued and sad.

Alonso took me down to the garage and eased the door open.

Angel was there, but he was sitting and facing the door, lost in thought.

"Angel?" Alonso called softly, putting a hand on my shoulder before I could run to Angel.

Angel didn't move, didn't twitch. He kept staring through the door.

"Angel!"

He still didn't move.

Alonso waved me to stay, then moved closer slowly, calling Angel's name again and again.

Finally, he touched his shoulder and Angel jumped up with a snarl, spinning and grabbing Alonso by the throat as he drew back his other hand in a fist.

He didn't hit him, but he didn't immediately let him go either. He finally eased his hold, still looking pissed. "I told you to leave me the fuck alone!" Angel hissed in his brother's face.

Alonso cut his eyes over at me and Angel's gaze followed.

I didn't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't the resolved sadness. "You should not be here, True," he told me, his voice trying and failing to be soft. "You need to move on. Leave me in your fucking rearview."

"I don't want to," I told him, moving closer slowly.

He stepped back quickly, shaking his head. "It ain't about what you want, is it? I'm fucking telling you. I'm no good for you and I refuse to bring you down. And you... you let him back in. You let that... snake... you let him..."

"I didn't let him do anything. He was trying to be friends with me again, I knew he'd never be more. Not ever. My heart was gone and not mine to give anyone else. And I wouldn't have anyway... I didn't trust him and I didn't like him, he was just... manipulating me and... I had no one else. I was lonely and sad and broken. I thought you left me, hated me because I was too different. I was hurting! You don't get to be upset at me, Angel! I was heartbroken over you and I thought about you and pined after you every single day! I cried myself to sleep and made myself sick over you! I had no way to know what was happening, we were tricked and deceived! ALL I knew was that you left that day and texted me that you never wanted to see me again, then ghosted me! I had no way to know any different at all!"