Page 25 of Spiteful Heart

It took me a while, but eventually I said, “Yeah, yeah, I promise you and all that shit.” When he released my hands, I looked to Maddox, who hadn’t moved an inch, still seething on the couch, his dark eyes staring at nothing in particular. “Why’s he so pissed? Doesn’t wanna see daddy after all this time?”

Maddox shook his head once, growling out the words, “Don’t fucking call him that.” He turned that pissed off stare to me, although he divided his attention between Sylvester and me. “Why the fuck would I want to go see the man who abandoned us when shit was going down? And tell me why the fuck you think he’ll be of any help right now, when more shit is going down, when he couldn’t even stick around before?” He let out an angry chuckle.

“I already told you, I don’t know if he’ll help. I don’t know if he’ll know anything, but he might. No one knows this city better than our father,” Sylvester said.

“No one who’s alive now, anyway” was what Maddox chose to say, referencing people who were no longer with us. Probably the DeLucas. Old Carl, who I had a hand in poisoning. Oopsie. Still not very happy about being used like that.

Sylvester said, “If there’s even a small chance that our father knows something, it’s worth it. We need to find this serial killer and put him to rest for good.” He sighed, bringing that stare to me once more. “Just don’t go anywhere alone when we’re gone. If I come back and you’re his next victim… I swear to fucking God, I will find a way to bring you back from the dead and kill you again myself.”

That got me to laugh. “As if you would ever hurt me, Sylvie.”

His jaw ground, and I knew using the nickname had instantly angered him, but I didn’t care. It took him a long time to say, “No, but just keep that in mind. Do not step foot outside this house without Viper or Mike with you. That’s an order.”

If things were normal, I would’ve told him off for trying to give me an order, but with everything as it was, nothing was normal. Normal had passed us by and was now a tiny fleck in the rearview mirror, a distant memory none of us could picture quite clearly. I knew he was just trying to drill it into me, to make me realize just how much my safety meant to him. I knew it was only because he cared.

That was the only reason I said, “Yes, sir.” If it was another day, if everything was different, I would’ve given him two little birdies and told him to fuck right off.

But things weren’t different, and they definitely weren’t normal. Everything had been thrown to shit lately. This was what we had to deal with, for now at least, and I wasn’t the praying sort, but I prayed them going to see their father would yield something. Some clue, at least.

Not for the first time, we were blind, trapped in the dark, grasping at nothing but straws.

I spent the rest of the day with Maddox and Sylvester, but I couldn’t stop my mind from working, the wheels in my head from turning. They’d both be gone Friday… and Friday was the day Harvey had his little date before his time tailing Newton.

Hmm. I could work with that. One way or another, we’d find out if Harvey was involved.

Chapter Six – Viper

I wasn’t there to send off Sylvester and Maddox. They left before dawn, and watching Harvey had thrown my sleeping schedule to the shits, along with my brother’s. They were going to see their father, apparently, hoping that he’d have something to tell them. Some new information that would help us find the serial killer stalking the streets of our city and put a bullet into his head once and for all.

There was nothing on the Newton front. Nothing at all. Nothing other than a businessman who was pissed at having to close down his club while he had the whole thing cleaned up. It had taken days before the Gilded Rose could re-open, and that was a lot of business lost, I’d assume.

I didn’t know. I wasn’t a businessman. I was more of a hitman than anything else. The brawn, not the brains. I was a guard, a stalker, a shadow. I was whatever was needed, and I would remain that way for the rest of my life.

Mike had watched Harvey all night, and with nothing to report, things were definitely going slow. So, yes, I hoped Sylvester and Maddox were able to find something out. Anything. Any little clue.

Mike and I had an app that followed the tracker we’d put on Harvey’s car, so even if we weren’t with him, we could see where his car was. He parked his car in a parking garage downtown when he was sleeping, so a hood and some careful avoidance of the camera system of the garage had been all that we’d needed to get it done. As far I knew, Harvey was none the wiser.

Neither was Lola. She knew we were watching Harvey, having figured it out on her own, but she didn’t know about the tracker. I think, if she would’ve discovered that, she wouldn’t have let it go so easily.

Lola really did like Harvey. Don’t ask me why, because I sure as hell didn’t know. The guy was all right, I guess, but he was strange. Socially inept, perhaps the most fumbling person I’d ever met. Add the fact that he’d worked for the Bloody Princess before, and it just didn’t make sense. So, in that way, I understood why Sylvester suspected him so much.

I was in my room, changing, having just worked out and showered, when Lola came to me. I was getting ready to take my brother’s place in watching Harvey, so when I turned and saw Lola leaning against the door frame to my room, something nagged at me. Maybe it was the twinkle in those beautiful baby blues, or maybe it was the way the right corner of her mouth curled upward in a mischievous smirk.

Or maybe that was just Lola being Lola.

“I have a favor to ask you,” Lola said, pushing into my room, walking with an added sway to her hips. “It’s one you’re not going to like, but I don’t care.” She wore tight black leggings that had the look of leather, even though they weren’t, a low-cut pink top clinging to her chest. The shiny, diamond-encrusted skull Sylvester had bought her hung around her neck. Her blond hair was a bit messy, its waves uneven and unkempt, but that was Lola’s signature look.

A sexy, hot mess.

A part of me knew I would never be able to deny whatever it was she wanted me to do, even if it wasn’t something good. I just barely resisted my urge to touch her, saying, “What it is, then?” She was never one to beat around the bush, so her reluctance to speak I took to mean was pretty bad.

“Harvey has a date tonight,” Lola said. She closed the distance between us, drawing a hand down my chest and fixing any stray wrinkles in my shirt. “A movie and then dinner before he’s supposed to be on Newton duty. There’s only one movie theater downtown.”

I said nothing, because I didn’t catch on to what she was trying to say, not yet.

“I want to go with you,” she said. “I want to watch Harvey with you today. And then, later, I want us to come home.”

I didn’t know what to say. Lola wanted to come with me and watch Harvey, but then she wanted us to leave him be before my brother was ready to take my place? That meant no one would be watching him.

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