Page 59 of Honey Bee Hearts

Colt runs a hand through his hair. “We figure it out when that time comes.”

“Fuck,” I draw out, looking down at where Trent holds the guy in a chokehold. “Kill him.”

Trent jerks without hesitation and the guy’s neck snaps. He immediately slumps.

“Fuck!” I snarl, punching the wall. My knuckles split and leave a little bit of blood behind. “We’re fucked!”

“We knew this could happen,” Colt points out. “We were playin’ with fire working with two gangs.”

“What do we do now?” Gunnar asks, a hand pressed to his forehead. For a second, I’m reminded that Gunnar has remained relatively clean throughout this. He has to for Callie, and wealways make sure he doesn’t do any of the dirty work, but now here he is, looking down at another dead body. Fuck.

“They’re gonna send someone else,” Colt says. He sighs. “We need to get rid of this guy before morning. Fable can’t suspect anything.”

“Fuck,” I snarl, hitting the wall. “Call Mel. Make sure he knows to watch Fable’s door, so she doesn’t come back out while we’re handling business.”

“It’s time to start finding a way out,” Gunnar growls. “Like I told you a long time ago.”

“That doesn’t help right now,” I spit. Because there’s no way out. Not once you start. We all know that. Gunnar still hopes, though.

“And what do we do with him?” Trent asks, kicking the guy as he stands to his feet.

Colt eyes the man with disdain. “Strip him and throw him to the pigs. They’ll finish the job before morning since they haven’t eaten in a few days. Just make sure none of you assholes take Fable down there tomorrow in case they aren’t done.”

I hold my head in my hands and take a seat on the nearest crate. My head is really starting to hurt. My eye feels like it’s swelling up. There’s gonna be no way to hide it tomorrow. I’m gonna have to avoid her.

“Motherfuckers,” I growl through the pain. “Those motherfuckers.”

Chapter 33

Fable

Idecide on my space cowgirl outfit on Monday, a way to start the day off right. It’s all chrome again, just like my jacket, but this material is a shinier cotton version I got at the craft store in town. My fringe skirt is dotted with little stars that glow in the dark. My new black jacket I sewed has painstakingly hand painted stars across it. Every bit of me looks like the night sky. I’d have completed the look with a space helmet, but I couldn’t find anything to make it out of, so instead, I have a little jetpack on my back I made from a two-liter soda bottle and some paint. When I show up at the garage in the getup, Trent looks up from where he works on Rhett’s truck and blinks.

“What are you supposed to be?” he asks as he leans over the side of the truck.

“A space cowgirl,” I reply with a smile as I lean down to pick up Sly. He’s heavy in my arms, the fattest raccoon I think I’ve ever seen, but he’s adorable. His little hands tap at my pockets, searching for food. I give him a strawberry from the new basket of them that showed up this morning on my porch. “You like it?”

He shrugs. “It’s. . . nice. There a lot of cowgirls in space these days?”

“I don’t know,” I answer honestly. “I just thought it would be fun to be a cosmic cowgirl for a day. Whatcha working on?”

“Rhett needs a tune up, so I’m changing the spark plugs out. Boring work,” he says as if he expects me to wanna leave after that declaration.

“I had to teach myself how to work on stuff, so this is just as interesting to me. I used to change my own oil and even did the spark plugs once. Learned on Youtube,” I say, taking a seat in the chair. An apple sits on the side table as if it’d been waiting for me, the same exact kind of apple that’s been showing up in my cabin for at least a week now. I glance at it and tilt my head, before looking back at Trent.

“Your dad didn’t teach you?” he asks as he focuses on his task.

“Didn’t have one.” When he looks up at me, I shrug. “My mom was a druggie. She didn’t exactly know who donated their sperm when she got pregnant.”

“They make tests for that now,” he points out.

“Yeah. . . but I don’t wanna know.” I sigh. “If I could just wipe my past out of existence, I’d prefer to do that.”

He straightens and looks at me. “I get that.”

I lean forward and brace myself on my knees. “Rhett said y’all are technically brothers.”

He studies me, seemingly weighing what he should tell me. “Adopted, yeah.”

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