Page 107 of Savage Daddies

I smile on the inside. Already, the plan is coming together. Red is the color of blood—funny, considering that heaps of it has already been spilled this week.

Suddenly, dread sinks my stomach. Red isn’t like black—it makes you stand in the crowd, for good or for worse. If this plan fails, there’s no hiding, and then what? My cheeks turn the same dark red as the dress, and I become the laughingstock of the century?

“Smile, Zoe,” says one of the makeup artists. She’s called Sarah and always scrapes her hair back into a butterfly clip. With a makeup brush, she dusts setting powder across my forehead and examines her work in the mirror while the guy—Lenon—decides how to style my hair.

“Down,” I say, even though I don’t really have a say in the matter.

Felix usually butts in and decides himself, but he doesn’t today. Must be too busy getting his own face painted—sometimes, I think he wears more makeup than me.

“Hmm.” Lenon runs strands of hair through his fingertips, tilting his head in debate. “Yes, with red I think that will look good. Bring out a feminine side, which is what we want with such a bold color.”

Need I be reminded.

Tiredness wells under my eyes. I examine my reflection. Last night, I slept better, but it was with one eye open. It’s been two days since we saved Fiona from the staged suicide, and I haven’t left the house since.

Felix still assumes that Fiona is dead, strung up in the middle of nowhere decaying in the sun. Every time I walk past him, I stick my tongue to the roof of my mouth in case I burst and yell in his face. It’s tempting. He thinks she’s dead, and he moves through life just the same as before. I don’t think he suspects that anybody knows anything, but yesterday evening when the news played on ABC, he sat forward in his chair like he was curious to see if her body had been found.

If he discovers that she’s alive, he’ll try again.

Which is why I feel ready to throw up today. I don’t how I’m gonna keep down all of these wines—already, my stomach is unsettled.

We headed to Wrangler’s house after saving Fiona so we could get her cleaned up. While the others were doing that, Bullwhip got out his phone and showed me images he’d taken from Felix’s office. My eyes weren’t ready to read the words laid out in front of me. Alibis. Descriptions of how he killed and tidied up all of the mess. Bullwhip told me that there were hundreds of invoices. Most had been paid off, but the clients that failed to pay were shot.

“He gave them twenty-four hours to pay up,” explained Bullwhip. “Otherwise—” He cut an imaginary line across his neck to signal death.

I asked why the short time frame, and Bullwhip took one look at me and said, “If there’s one thing that man loves more than money, it’s murder.”

That did it for me, and I spent that night back at Felix’s reciting the plan constructed by me and the boys to take him down.

Nobody else can do it.

Only me.

Felix might not trust me, but hedoesneed me on his side for the cameras. He said it himself—me entertaining other men is turning him into a laughingstock, so he needs me to do my job, smile and link arms to prove there’s nobody else.

“How are things with you and your father?” asks Sarah.

Things have been sticky in the media ever since I confronted Father. The comments were wild. A certain “Sara” went viral for questioning why the media left out important details, like me saying Felix was gonna kill Fiona, and the part where Father very kindly admitted he wanted sons not daughters. None of that was mentioned, not inanyof the stories, and backlash spread like the plague in response to Sara’s very “woke” comment, because Felix “would kill himself before he killed others.”

Blah, blah, blah.

“Yeah,” Lenon adds to the conversation. “I was gonna ask—did you come to an understanding?”

“I can’t believe you’re still hanging around with those nobodies,ugh. They tried to rape you, Zoe.Rape.Want me to spell it out for you?” Sarah rolls her eyes. “They disgust me. I’m all for a little secret affair if nobody gets hurt, but this one needs shutting down now. This has all been made very public, and you’ve upset Felix a lot.”

Just not in the way you think.

I seal my lips as they continue, and wait for them to quit gossiping.

“I can’t believe one of them assaulted that dealer. Disgraceful.” Lenon runs a piece of my hair through the curling wand. “Also, it’s disrespectful. Poor Paul hasn’t even been dead a week yet, and already chaos is breaking loose in his casino.”

“I know, right?” Sarah curls her head around me. “Also, Zoe? Your literature teacher? Seriously? I know he’s a hottie, so do what you want, I guess, but you should’ve been more careful.”

I snap my neck around to face Sarah—not in the mirror. In real life. “What?”

“You didn’t see the interview?”

“With who?”

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