MIO FIORE

BROKEN FRAME

The landline started ringing and I tossed my toast onto the plate leaning over and grabbing it, "Hello?"

“H-Hey Krystal, it's Daxton. I want to talk to you about business. Do you want to meet up for dinner?"

***

“Here." I looked up as Daxton gave me some ice wrapped in a towel and smiled, "Thank you."

Daxton lowered himself onto the ground next to me, "Sorry."

"Why are you apologizing?" I asked as he logged into his laptop. Thank god he had most of the files, or else we would really be screwed. And I was also lucky that I saved and sent most of my emails he would have copies of ninety percent of the work.

"I should have dropped you off last night." I gave Daxton a look before shaking my head and leaning against my couch, "Please, it wasn't your fault I got mugged."

"I should have walked you down," he said almost frustrated and I let it drop. He was here to talk about work, not about how we could have prevented me from getting mugged and losing all my work which could cost us so much.

Besides, it was already done, it didn't matter now, it was best to move on and find a way to finish all our projects on time. I didn't like being late, my pride was in my punctuality.

“Sorry for making you drive all the way here." when he suggested we meet up at a restaurant, I wasn't exactly sure how we could cover a lot of work there, better here, and also I couldn't drive because I had no car.

“No that's fine. I liked the drive. Is...anyone home?" he asked looking around.

"Nah," I took over his laptop logging into my emails to download all the work.

"In this big house by yourself?"

"Aiden is out, he'll be back soon," I said

“Oh, oh right yes of course." Daxton nodded clearing his throat. I opened the PDF files breathing a sigh of relief when the most updated version was there, okay. That was good. I didn't have my work in progress but I had my most recent one.

I emailed it to myself so I had a copy at home I could work at.

I flinched when I felt something on my face, pushing the hair to the side, and looked at Daxton, "Sorry I just wanted to see how bad it looked,”

"Uh," I leaned back a bit, "It’ll heal," sure it looked like a baseball hit me, with the way it bruised, but I'll just leave my hair down even though that was annoying and people wouldn't stare, much. I did have a few meetings penciled in, but I couldn't remember when.

My planner was in that bag. No, no Krystal, don't think about it and make yourself have a panic attack, you can figure this out, between Joe and Emilia you can find out when all your meetings are. But that just meant more work for me, and I didn't want to backtrack.

"Here, put the ice back on," he grabbed the ice from the table and held it up to my face,

"Uh, thanks," I said as I reached for it and I scooted over trying to get a bit more space between us. Why was he so close?

I looked up as the door opened and I could hear voices again and my eyes flickered to the clock, it was only eleven, they were back incredibly early. Aiden walked in his grey eyes meeting mine, "Did you move the GPS out of my car?"

What.

I stared at him, "No?"

"Are you sure?" he asked.

“Positive." I didn't even touch his car, why would I have anything to do with his car anyway, apart from paying for it with my money. He nodded turning around walking into the closet and I shook my head going back to my work when I heard something fall and break.

"What the hell," I muttered throwing the ice package onto the desk, "Excuse me," I told Daxton, I lifted myself off the ground. What the hell was he breaking now?

The closet room had a lot of things from my childhood that no longer had a place in my house, I didn't need him breaking anything valuable.

"Aiden get your fat arse out of there," I muttered switching on the light, it might help if he had the light on, "What the hell did you break?"

I looked inside my eyes flashing bright lights till they settled, god my head hurt, and I saw his hunched silhouette on the ground picking something up. Yep, he definitely broke something.

He turned around as I neared him, "It's just some stupid picture."

“What picture?" I tried pushing his giant body out of the way so I could see but he barely budged, "Your GPS wouldn't be in here, why would I touch your damn GPS?”

"I don't know, so I don't know where to drive since you're like a warden." Aiden muttered behind him.

I scoffed bending down over him trying to grab the photo frame, "Give it to me."

“Go away, why are you so annoying. go back to your boyfriend," he muttered holding the frame above me.

“He isn't my boyfriend and give me the f*****g photo frame," I snapped recognizing the frame. Aiden froze making me look down at him, and it wasn't the close distance that was making me feel all hot, it was the throbbing head and my anger building up.

“Did you just swear at me?" he asked.

"The frame Aiden, now"

He handed it over in a second and I stood up looking down at the broken glass and frowned, it was ruined. I wiped the dust off the glass seeing the photo below that nearly made me smile. I forgot I even had this photo.

I pulled away the broken glass looking at the clearer photo underneath, "You're going to cut yourself."

My eyes flickered up to the grey ones and I frowned, "I don’t care, Now get out of here."

“What?" Aiden asked.

“Your GPS isn't in this room, go search somewhere else and stop going through my s**t!"

“Whoa, are you ok-”

“Aiden get out!" I yelled.

He waited a second before hastily shoving past me muttering something like crazy b***h under his breath, which I probably was.

I waited till he left and heard the front door slamming and knelt at the box he was rummaging through. Why was he touching this?

He knows that his GPS wouldn't be in here, god this is why I hated him. He did s**t like this is to piss me off, and breaking a photo frame, real mature Aiden.

I opened the torn wooden lip looking at the other things that were dear to me, hidden in this box, and pulled out a small statue from the lot. And my heart broke seeing it broken.