Page 49 of Spiteful Heart

Look at me, being all logical and shit. I should get hopped up on drugs and anesthesia more often.

My eyebrows furrowed, and I asked, “How did you know where to find me?” But, wait. It wasn’t Sylvester. It was Harvey. “Is Harvey okay? And where are the others?” I wanted to see my other men, my other boyfriends, and make sure they were okay with my own eyes. Same with Harvey.

The things Sylvester had suspected about Harvey… even I had, towards the end there, when he’d told me he’d had a date but didn’t. I think we both owed the man an apology—and I didn’t say that lightly. Me and apologies didn’t mix too well, kind of like water and oil. It’d probably sound awkward as hell coming from me, but I shouldn’t have let Sylvester’s doubts about him get to me.

“Harvey is fine, and the others are, too,” Sylvester said. “They all wanted to be here, but I sent them home to try to get some sleep. It’s been a long two days. You were in and out of it constantly after your surgery.”

Damn. Two days? Fuck me. Not literally of course, becauseow.

“I’ll give them a call soon, tell them you woke up,” he went on, giving me a gentle smile. “For the first time ever—and I mean ever—I’m thankful we had Harvey.” His smile faded. “Don’t you ever tell him I said that.”

“I won’t,” I said, probably a lie, but it was one neither of us chose to address. “But how did he know where to find me?” The more I thought about it, the more it didn’t make sense. I was pretty sure he’d told me Sylvester had sent him, which meant Sylvester had known… but how?

“You’ll probably get pissed at this, but I don’t care,” he stated matter-of-factly. “That necklace I gave you had a tracker in it.”

I tried to yank my hand away from his, but he didn’t let me. His grip on my hand was strong as steel. “Asshole,” I whispered. Here I’d thought that necklace was a peace offering, a symbol of his apology for hiding the existence of the serial killer from me. Guess I’d been too stupid to realize there had to be more to it. A man like Sylvester didn’t apologize.

“Hey, that necklace is the only reason you’re here now, Lola. Without it, you might be dead, or still trapped in that basement, at the hands of fucking Tony Torio—”

“Knives,” I corrected him. “At the knives of fucking Tony Torio. He didn’t have hands. I cut them off, remember?” I shook my head as I thought back. Tony had guys helping him. Someone had fished him from the river and helped him enact his vengeance upon me. Sending me Tina’s head, giving me that tape—hell, even recording that tape. He had to have help with all of it. Your options were limited when you had knives for hands.

Hmm. Wonder how he pissed and took shits…

I glared at Sylvester. “I am mad at you, but given that your stupid necklace helped out—a little—I’ll overlook your betrayal, for now.”

“Betrayal?” he echoed, narrowing his stare at me. “It wasn’t a betrayal, Lola. I didn’t trust that you’d stay out of trouble, and look at you: I was right. You should be thanking me.”

Rolling my eyes, I muttered, “Fuck off.” I didn’t really mean it, though, and I think we both knew that, because neither of us could keep a straight face after that. I let out a chuckle, while Sylvester grinned.

“Do I have to talk to the doctor or the police?” I asked, not really wanting to do either. I wanted to get out of this damned hospital and get home as quickly as I could; being here any longer than I had to would be like torture. Me and hospitals didn’t mix well, for obvious reasons. The only times I’d be in a place like this was when my parents had to pay doctors under the table to perform certain procedures on me.

And then that big one… the procedure to end all procedures. Sterilization. It’s ironic; my parents were the kind of people who’d want their bloodline passed down from generation to generation, but they’d anticipated it’d be Aiden doing the passing. Well, now that Aiden was dead, so were the Hardings. Our side of the family, at least.

“No, the doctor’s handled, and I dealt with the police,” Sylvester said. “There will be no investigation into this, so we can put all of this behind us and finally move on.” Never before had I heard a better sentence.

Put it all behind us. That’s exactly what I wanted to do right about now.

Sylvester stood up, slow to release my hand. “I guess I should call the others and let them know you’re awake. They’ll want to see you.” He reached into his pocket, pulling out his phone. “Unless you want to rest more before the mob gets here?”

“No,” I said. “Call them. But—wait. Call Harvey, too. I want to see him.” I paused, taking in the frown that had grown on his lips. “And when you do call him, I want you to apologize to him for your behavior. And, yes, I will be asking him when he gets here if you did, so don’t try to get out of it.”

He scoffed at me, but relented in the end. “Fine, fine. But I’m also getting you some food and water. You need to eat a little something.”

I couldn’t argue with him there. I’d hardly been able to eat the day that I’d gone to meet my mysterious serial killer, and if it’d really been days since then… I had to force something down. Hopefully I wouldn’t just throw it right back up. Guess we’d wait and see.

As Sylvester left the room, I thought back. Everything had happened so fast, and yet, at the same time, it felt like it had ended too soon. Not soon enough for all the girls who’d lost their lives at the hands of crazy Tony, but on my end, it almost felt too easy. I lifted up my hands, eyes dropping to my wrists. Bruises sat in rings around them, from the tight chains.

Tony had been just another man before, totally unremarkable and not worthy of anyone’s notice. Because of that, he’d decided to take more from me than he should’ve, and as a result, I’d gone out of my way to make his end—or what I’dthoughtwas his end—as painful as humanly possible. He never would’ve ended up as a knife-handed freak if I wouldn’t have killed him… but I wouldn’t have killed him if he hadn’t been another disgusting male.

What were the odds that someone had seen him floating along that night? What were the odds someone had decided to dive into the big, wide river and lug him out? The odds had to be astronomical, so much so that it had to be damn near impossible.

But someonehadhelped him. Someone had fished him out, and because I didn’t like the odds of something next to impossible, I figured they had to be watching us already. Watching me. Whoever it was had been watching me so closely, they’d seen me cut off Tony’s hands, seen my guys toss him into the river, as forgotten as any other corpse that we had to dispose of.

Who could it have been? And why?

Those two questions danced in my head for a long time, until Sylvester came back with a tray of food and a small paper cup filled with water. Easy to eat food, nothing that required too much chewing or hard swallowing. Mashed potatoes, peas, Jell-O. You know, stereotypical hospital food.

What were the odds that the person who’d saved Tony’s life had been one of the ones helping him out? What were the odds that person was dead now? I’d say pretty good, but that was before I knew just how easy next to impossible feats were. Next to impossible still meant it was possible.

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