Page 12 of Seduce & Destroy

Grant soon joined us and looked over my shoulder as I played and replayed the tapes. The only movements in the last three days were a black truck carrying in the new cadets, Kenna running to the gate each morning, and hourly guard checks, but none ventured into the brush.

Except one girl. In tight spandex. This morning.

Neenan and I looked up at Kenna at the same time.

“How fresh was the blood found on Tilly?” Neenan approached Kenna, towering over her form as she was seated.

“Uhh, her blood was mixed with fruit juice, but the body couldn’t have been there more than twenty-four hours.” I assessed her. Her shoulders were pushed back, her leather jacket sat atop her relaxed form. Eyes sympathetic. Breaths measured. She was the picture of confidence, but the elevated pitch of her voice as she ran to the door this morning was etched in my mind. “Her body was cooling but not all the way cold yet.”

There wasn’t enough time. Not a speck of blood was on her—no fruit juice.

Grant reached over me to pause the footage. “There.” He rested a finger on the screen. Without lifting his gaze from the screen, he asked, “Was she on the Eastern on Western side of the road?”

“East.” Kenna said.

“Five feet from the fence.” I whispered.

He toggled the arrow buttons skipping a second ahead and a second back. It wasn’t until the fourth comparison that I spotted it. The dark blur. One second it was there and the next second it was gone. A jump cut.

“Enhance it.”

My eyes fell to read the timestamp. 2:34 AM.

The entrance log was verified, and other camera angles confirmed what I feared.

The gates hadn’t moved.

Chapter 4

KENNA

Ididn’t do it.

Eyes bored into my back when I walked into training the following morning. And it was not because I was five minutes early. Laney and Neenan hadn’t accused me of anything last night, but I could see the questions form in their eyes. In silence, they escorted me to my bedroom, each step heavier than the last as they walked me to my coffin, poised to dig my grave any time afterward.

But no one came for me.

No one shanked me in the line for breakfast. Traitor wasn’t screamed in my face, nor a gun drawn. Only whispers permeated the air. And when I caught Grant’s gaze, it was downright lethal, but, like my Mamma always told me, trust can’t be gained through words but through actions.

I wouldn’t plead my innocence, I’d show it

So, when Grant announced the topic of training, I stood calm and collected.

“A special guest joins us today to show you the tactical superiority of knife wielding skills in hand-to-hand combat.”

I inwardly groaned. Knives were slow in defensive scenarios, inefficient, not to mention messy, so I preferred guns to blades. There was no crime scene cleaner on the battlefield, nor a launderette that would take bloodied leather as I’ve come to know.

Conflict was the core of my upbringing. Dad taught me how to combat it while Mama dispensed it. Yet, despite the rough hands my brothers and I were dealt with, our family was a unit, which made this training session child’s play.

The slam of a door snapped me out of my thoughts. Preceding the noise was a woman in a forest green sports bra and matching leggings. Her dirty blonde hair was captured in a high ponytail that swayed as she walked towards the front of the room. My eyes were transfixed on her body.

“Leading the session is Miss Laney.” God, help me. Grant commanded the room, Laney appeared comfortable beside him, if a little nervous as she looked around the stone walls of the basement training room. “While unorthodox for the person you’re paid to protect to teach you defence skills, she is the best on the estate.”

A round of concealed giggles filled the room as the boys looked Laney up and down, I pushed my shoulders back in something like deviance, but Laney didn’t, she cowered. I know I checked her out all the same but not to demean, only to admire! And maybe to indulge. But these boys meant nothing other than offence by their continued scoffs and whispers.

Grant retrieved a gun from his pocket and fired it at the target on the west wall, causing a loud echo to ricochet between each wall and painfully penetrate our ears. “You want her to cut your balls off with a pen knife? It wouldn’t be the first time, in fact, you should be warned, she’d enjoy it so shut the fuck up and listen closely.”

Enjoy it? She looked in my direction briefly then, though her expression gave nothing away.

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