Page 59 of Clubs

“At least I was smart enough to bring him out here.” Emory gestured around the yard.

And for that, I did have to give him credit. It was better he killed him out here than in there. A crime scene in the elements was easier to cover up than one inside a home.

“Yeah, except for the fact that mine and Declan’s DNA is all over the inside of that place.” I pointed to the old Victorian. “Jesus Christ. Why dd you do this?”

“Why do you think?” Suddenly, his eyes were venomous, his voice just as lethal. “What he did to Ria. You’re not stupid, right? You put two and two together. What? Am I the bad guy here for killing a murderous, raping, piece of shit?”

Slowly, my stomach dropped. “He…”

“Maybe,” Declan said, voice hardly more than a murmur. “She wouldn’t talk about it. But I smelled something on her, and when she was getting in the car, she was in a skirt, and I saw more of her than I wanted to.” Still, his voice was hardly audible, and he simply stared at the mauled carcass on the grass. “Probably something she should talk to you about anyway. But, yeah, it looks like that was what happened.”

As sick as that made me, I didn’t have time to process it. Right now, we needed to fix this. Or do our best to.

But, if I was being honest, that wasn’t where my head went. I was more concerned with why Emory did this for Ria. He hadn’t needed to. But he did. Why?

“This your first time?” I asked him.

“First time doing what?” Emory asked.

“Killing someone.”

A sound that almost resembled a laugh. “You would be the person to ask that.”

“Was it, or wasn’t it?”

“It was,” he said. “Why?”

Emory had faced a lot of hardship in his life. Maybe not the same as mine, but hardships all the same. And this was what had sent him over the edge? Someone beating and raping his friend? Friend, being the operative word in that sentence.

Something I could pick apart later, I supposed.

“Alright.” Massaging my forehead, looking between the body on the ground and the house, I debated where to start. “Alright. Do you need a minute to collect yourself, baby?”

Declan glanced up, then dropped back onto his ass, looking unusually green. “Just… Just give me five.”

“Well, you might want to take your five over there.” I pointed to the tree line. “Because, Emory, you got a knife on you?”

He lifted a pocket knife from his jeans. “Like this?”

“No, not like that.” Rubbing my eyes, I exhaled deeply. “We need Ria. Go grab her.”

“You really think she should see this?” Emory asked.

“I think she should’ve been the one to fucking kill him,” I snapped. “But you took that from her. Because you think she’s such a sensitive little flower that doesn’t know how to take care of herself. I assure you, she does. But that doesn’t matter right now. I need her for the spells. So go get her.”

He tightened his jaw at that, but he disappeared.

“Why don’t I want to see this?” Declan asked.

“Given the fact that you seem to be a little squeamish today, you don’t want to see how gory this is going to get.”

Even from here, I could hear his stomach gurgle. “How gory is it going to get?”

“Well, I’ll burn his body. But we need his hand first.”

Blinking hard a few times, Declan lifted a hand over his mouth. “What do you mean ‘you need his hand?’”

“I mean, your job is going be going through the house and sniffing out our scents. Then we’re gonna wipe all the surfaces that we touched, which is a lot. And then, I’m gonna go through with Davey’s amputated hand and put his fingerprints on everything. So that it doesn’t look like it was staged.”

---