Page 57 of Hunted Obsession

That is where he’s wrong—so fucking wrong.

“Find out how to cancel the hit,” I state.

“Sell and trade?” he asks. “You know that’s going to cost a pretty penny.”

And that is when it hits me.

“How much to buy?”

“Theron,” he warns.

“How. Much. To. Buy. Lucille?” I demand, enunciating every fucking word.

Vaughn reluctantly takes out his phone. I watch as he scrolls through it for a moment, then clears his throat. “A million.”

A million dollars to buy Lucille. Then I’d own her—forever. “Put in the purchase order.”

He shakes his head. “The kill offer is more than that, and three hitmen have already taken the job.”

“Two million. Offer it.”

He whistles, and then I watch as his fingers move across his screen. I hear a sound on his phone, almost like a single bell, and then his gaze finds mine. “We’ll see if it’s accepted. You got the cash?”

“I never spend money, unlike some of the others,” I say.

Vaughn chuckles, because he does spend money. He invests as well, but he does not want for anything. The life of luxury is one that he always wanted, and he’s not about to live any other way.

“Do I want to know how you are on that site?” I ask.

I watch him for a moment. He clears his throat, then rocks back on his heels. His eyes find mine, and he holds my gaze for a moment. I can tell he doesn’t want to admit how he knows about this.

“I have taken odd jobs.”

“Vaughn?”

He shrugs a shoulder. “I don’t do it often, but I have done a few over the years. It is a good way to make a quick return, and I always invest it in something.”

Leaning forward, I whisper as if anyone else could hear me. “You’re a fucking hit man?” I ask.

“Pays the bills, brother.”

He’s right. It does pay the bills. “I’m wondering why you kept it a secret?” I ask. “Maybe we all need bills to be paid.”

“I would never, not fucking ever, put the only people in this world I love in a situation like this. It’s fucked up.”

That’s when I figure it out. It hits me, almost like when I realized all those years ago that I loved Lucille, that I cared abouther too much, and I knew that not only would I hurt her, but that she would make me lose control.

“You do it because you like it, but also because you need it.”

“It keeps the monster at bay,” he rasps.

I wrap my fingers around his shoulder and jerk it slightly. “You do whatever you need to do, but we’re going to eliminate the man who created the monster. We are all going to fucking be able to breathe easy knowing he’s dead.”

Vaughn doesn’t respond to me, and I don’t give him the opportunity to, either. Instead, I leave him alone in his apartment. He’ll do the deal for me, but we don’t need to discuss the monster or anything else he does on his own time.

And I won’t tell anyone because it’s not my fucking place.

Instead of going back to the Willow Club, which is what I should be doing, I head back upstairs to the safe house. I can’t leave Lucille again without being inside of her.

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