Page 18 of Sleeper

“Yeah, I guess so. Nothing else made sense as to why you all haven’t cut him out yet.”

“No, brother. Neither of us trust that fucker, but he has a place in the game just like the rest of us do. Greasy little shits like your dad trust him, and Monty trusts us. It’s a vicious cycle of dog eat dog. We keep him around because we’re his alpha. We say when he pisses and what tree he can do it on.”

“Huh. I guess I never really thought of it that way, Prez,” I admitted, closing the door most of the way, so as not to wake Vera.

“Yeah, we might be old, but we’re not dumb shits, Sleeper.”

“Never said you were.” I massaged the back of my neck as I walked down the hallway.

“Has she talked yet?” Ghoul wasn’t asking if Vera had audibly spoken, he wanted to know if she had given up any useful information.

“Nah.” I lied, knowing if I told him she’d lied about her identity none of my brothers would hesitate to take her to our slaughter room to get answers. We’d all done stupid shit when we were scared, so I didn’t blame her for not arguing with us when we called her by her best friend’s name.

“Damn. I want you to earn her trust. Get close to her. Tin Man told me about the way she looked at you. If she’ll talk to any of us, it’s you.”

“How did she look at me?” I racked my brain trying to recall her eyeing me or staring, but the only thing I remembered was her sadness.

“Don’t be coy, Tony.”

“I’m not, boss. I swear I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Okay,” he drew out the word, “whatever you need to tell yourself, Sleep. Get what we need from her. That’s what I want your focus on.”

Watching a fucking hot woman shouldn’t be a problem and for the most part it wasn’t. Although, if she crossed Belle’s path wearing that locket it would be. I asked Lina and Mrs. Slayton if she could stay with them longer until I got some shit figured out and took the per diem job on our floor. Everything civilian wise was in order, it was our club shit that was a shitstorm. This was all preventable if I hadn’t blindly underestimated Willie. Of course, he would find the guns, he was the one who taught me to hide shit in the floorboards. I was in such a rush when I was relocating our guns that I’d forgotten that little nugget until now.

“What are you doing fucking calling the iron Gods in here?” Vera said in a sleepy voice, rubbing her eyes with her balled up hand.

“What? No. What it the hell are you talking about?” I slid my phone in my pocket.

“This music, if that’s what you want to call it.”

“Oh, shit. Sorry,” I apologized, strolling the rest of the way into the living room and turned the volume knob down. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“You didn’t. Your phone did.”

“Oh,” I simply said, quickly going through my parts of the conversation in my head. Was there anything she shouldn’t have heard? “How long have you been awake?”

“Long enough to agree with you,” she said and then she lifted her shoulders in an awkward half shrug.

“About?” I left it open-ended. If this was her way of getting information from me, it wasn’t working.

“I don’t trust Monty either. Willie will sell anything and anyone out. Yeah,” she nodded. “That about sums it up.”

“You’re honest. I like that about you,” I absentmindedly thought aloud, wishing I hadn’t as soon as I did. Her cheeks flushed under the fading bruise and my head whipped away from hers. She didn’t answer. Every time I saw her bruised up face, I was pissed all over again. She thought she was the failure, but in reality, it was me. If I had handled the situation before there was one, her friend might still be breathing, and I might hate Willie a little less. The latter wasn’t true, he’d been pushing me toward the edge of hating him my entire life. If this hadn’t been the root of my hatred, he would have done something equally as shitty I was certain. What got me the most was if Belle’s timeline was correct, Willie must’ve beaten the ever-loving hell out of Vera for her to still be bruised nearly a month later.

16

SLEEPER

“Does it hurt?” I forced from my lips, when her fingertips lightly ran over her cheek, and she winced.

“Eh. I can’t say that it feels good, but it is what it is. Complaining won’t magically make it heal faster.”

“I’m sorry.” I reached for her out of instinct and pulled her against my body.

“For hugging me?” she probed with a squeak, and I took a step backward.

“Heh, no. I mean, maybe. I didn’t intend to, but it’s who I am.”

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