Page 83 of Devious Gambit

“Three people?” Gretta shouted. “He killed three people?”

“Bang, bang, bang. And one of them was an art thief who stole Cody Harrington’s family’s Klimt. And that, my friends, was the real reason Jace a-hole Luxon wore me down until I broke, so I could drill my daddy about a damn stupid painting.” I screwed my face up in horror. “I can’t believe I just called a Klimt stupid. Poor Klimt. I must be losing my mind.”

I glanced at their horrified faces. “You two look like those clowns at the fairground with your mouths open like that.”

“Wow!” Gretta was the first to pull herself out of the shock. “We so need to get you drunk more often.”

I added, “Once he got what he needed to pass on to his highness, he discarded me.”

Lise screwed her face. “What an asshole! Don’t worry, Rhys, now you’ve had plenty of experience we can get you back on that horse in no time.”

“I want to be alone for a while,” I told them. Even though, Mr. Ed slashed my insides to shreds, I still failed to believe anyone could compare to him. However, I’d like to be proven wrong.

“You’re always alone!” Lise argued. “For as long as I’ve known you, Rhys, you hid away in your bedroom, preferring the company of fictional characters to real people.”

“I’ve just proved my point why the characters in books make better companions,” I argued.

“Yeah, but that’s not living, Rhys. It’s barely breathing,” Lise quickly sobered up when she uttered those words.

“Barely breathing,” I mumbled.

“Emotional and physical pain is part of being a human and you can’t spend your entire life running away from it. I’ll tell you right now, Rhysals, one day it’ll catch you up and deal you the worst hand there is. So you may as well experience it all why you’re young and can bounce back easily.”

I don’t think I’d ever been more captivated by the common language than at that moment when Lise spoke. Booze was only half to blame, the rest was me rapt by every word.

“You’re right,” I admitted.

“I know,” Lise laughed. “Go figure.”

“It is a shame, though,” Gretta said, munching on more cheese and crackers, “that we don’t have a spy anymore to find out who those other two rapists are.”

Lise agreed. “Yeah, we need someone on the inside of their stupid little jock cult.”

“Fancy dating Cody?” Gretta suggested.

“No, thank you,” I bit.

“What about Ridge or Josh or one of the others?”

“No, no, no,” I shouted. “Why don’t you, Gretta? You’re single and pretty, why don’t you get yourself a well-hung jock and play dumb for a bit so you can find out what’s going on.”

“I’m too well-known in the women’s rights and Worm and Mug circles,” she stated. “They’d smell a rat a mile away.”

“Maybe not,” I argued. “Not if you play the game well.”

“Says the expert,” Lise stated, winking in pride at me.

“One way or another,” Gretta began, “we’ve got to get to the bottom of it all because the police don’t seem to be making progress.”

“And if we can prevent another rape then it’ll be worth it.” A haunting darkness appeared behind Lise’s big blue eyes that made me shudder. It was as if she slipped into another realm, at that moment, maybe where she was a vigilante murderess killing her way through rapists. I still picked her as the main suspect for suffocating Liam Greene while he slept in hospital. Not that I’d share my view, because I’m glad he’s dead. At times of weakness, I could still smell the revolting body odor dripping off him when he shoved his ugly cock in my mouth.

Unconsciously, I rubbed my left temple where he smacked me when I bit down on his cock. Yeah, I’m definitely glad he’s dead. One day when the truth is out, I will personally thank the person who put that pillow over Greene’s face. Maybe that person was sitting there in mineral bath with me or maybe they’re residing in the Vault, pretending to grieve the loss of a fellow frat boy. Either way, the job wasn’t complete.

Two down.

Two to go.

THIRTY TWO

---