Page 3 of Deadly Little Sparrow

I bite back a moan and use the back of my hand to wipe the blood off my lips. It’s useless, of course. More blood simply takes its place, pouring from my nose like an endless waterfall.

Travis crawls carefully off the pool table, casting nervous glances in my direction like he thinks if he moves slowly enough I won’t be able to see him. I fight the urge to roll my eyes at the moron. I’m not a fucking T. rex. I can see just fine, and right now what I see is the one person in this bar who might know anything about the phantom who blew out of here before I managed to shake off my shock, leaving me without so much as a name to track him down with.

I grit my teeth and make a dangerous, rumbling sound deep in my throat as I take a menacing step towards him. Travis puts both hands up defensively, shrinking into himself like a turtle without a shell. I grab the front of his shirt, not giving a single damn about smearing the front of it with the blood drying on my hands.

“Who was that?” I demand.

“How the fuck should I know? He came in here and started swinging. He’s fucking unhinged,” he babbles.

I grip his shirt tighter and give him a sharp shake, watching with satisfaction as his head rattles back and forth and he screws his eyes closed in a fearful wince.

“He wanted something.” I’m assuming, anyway. I couldn’t hear a damn word either of them said before shit jumped off. “What was he asking about before he attacked you?”

“I don’t know,” he whimpers again. “I have no fucking clue.”

“The Sleepless Reapers,” Taylor answers. And here I thought he was the stupid one out of the two brothers. Maybe it’s his turn to use their shared brain cell for a change.

“What about them?” I narrow my eyes at Taylor, keeping my hold on Travis in case I need to give either of them a little incentive to cooperate. Sparrow didn’t strike me as the biker type, and he doesn’t exactly fit the profile of the type of meek, helpless boys that crew likes to victimize.

“Just where they hang out. That was it, I swear.”

I huff and finally let go of Travis, giving him a hard shove for good measure as I release my hold on him. He stumbles and catches himself on the edge of the pool table. I spin on my heel, adjusting my suit jacket with a quick shrug and then rebuttoning it.

“Sorry about the mess, Sid. Send me a bill for any damages,” I call out, the crowd parting around me like the Red Sea as I stride out of the bar without a backward glance.

I look one way down the dark sidewalk and then the other. I don’t expect to find Sparrow waiting out here for me. He may be ballsy, but he doesn’t strike me as stupid. The fact that there’s no way of telling which direction he ran itches under my skin though. For all I know, he got in his car and hopped on the first freeway exit he passed, hightailing it out of this city without a second thought.

My throat vibrates with a frustrated sound.

Nothing I can do about it now, unless I want to start canvassing the city, knocking on every door until someone can give me something to go on. That option is more appealing than it has any right to be, but right now, I need to deal with my nose.

I pull my key fob out of my pocket and unlock my car. Sliding into the driver’s seat, I thank god for how easy it is to clean blood off leather. The flow has slowed, but it hasn’t stopped completely, and I can’t be fucked to clean it off my hands or clothes right now. My body is on autopilot, heading towards the familiar apartment near the center of town, and my mind is somewhere else entirely. Or, more accurately, on someone else entirely.

Pretty little Sparrow.

Angry little bird.

I’ve always been a sucker for that feral kind of beauty, more thorn than rose. But who are you? And where did you go? I glance at every pedestrian I pass and into every car, searching for him fruitlessly until I finally pull into the underground parking garage.

I could make it from the garage to the top floor penthouse with my eyes closed. I absently drag my tongue along my lips, the coppery flavor of blood making me wince as I raise my hand to rap at the door. My nose throbs and an exhilarating, electric feeling courses through my veins as I listen to the padding footsteps on the other side of the door. Did Sparrow knock something loose inside my brain with that elbow to my nose? Or is there another reason that I suddenly feel like all the switches have been thrown into the On position. Nothing is numb, and I can’t remember the last time I could say that.

The door swings open and it occurs to me too late that I never bothered to check the time or make a call to see if Enzo was still awake… or alone. The most feared man in the city, Lorenzo ice-in-his-veins Moretti stands in the doorway wearing a pair of red pajama pants with little Dalmatians all over them and nothing else. Out of his expensive suits, he’s a surprisingly slim man, all wiry muscles and dark body hair. There’s a deep scar over his left shoulder where he caught a stray bullet years ago.

I snort, inadvertently causing a fresh cascade of blood from my nose. “Cute,” I taunt.

He narrows his eyes at me in a dangerous way that would have most men pissing themselves.

“What the fuck happened to you?” he asks instead of responding to my teasing comment about his puppy pants.

“You’re not going to believe this, but you know Declan Fitzpatrick? Well, I bumped into him and he was wearing pajamas with kittens all over them…”

Enzo growls, but steps aside to let me into his apartment. He shakes his head as I step past him, careful not to touch anything with my bloody hands.

“With the way you can’t seem to stop running your mouth, I’m surprised you don’t get your nose broken more often, honestly,” he mutters, following me straight to the bathroom where he’s patched me up more times than I can count over the years.

I chuckle, leaving him to flip the light on as I plop my ass down on the closed toilet seat.

“I can afford to run my mouth. Who would be stupid enough to break the nose of Lorenzo Moretti’s right-hand man?” I shrug off my jacket and take the damp cloth he hands me to clean myself up with.

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