Page 32 of King of Depravity

“Can I help you?” he looks up at me with a startled expression. I know I’m being difficult.

“Where’s Chloe?”

“Went home two hours ago, sick. Won’t be back for a few days, buddy, you’ll have to have another girl serve you drinks.”

“She’s sick?” I ask. She was fine like six hours ago. What did she come down with so quickly? A fever? Stomach bug?

“Yeah, man, she’s sick.” He gives me a skeptical up-and-down glare. But I’m out the door before he can ask me any questions.

I stop at a late-night Thai place and grab a takeout container of a noodle soup in chicken broth before I hop a cab to her house.

The place is dark, and for a moment I consider just heading up the fire escape, but the soup will do better if I enter through the front door.

So I raise my hand and knock.

Nothing happens.

I stand there for a good thirty seconds before I knock again…louder.

“Who is it?” a sleepy woman’s voice calls from the other side of the door.

“Killian,” I bark. “I came to see Chloe.”

I hear the lock unclick but when the door opens, I realize the chain is still on the door. Daff is standing, peering through the two-inch crack. “If you came to apologize, you should come back in the morning.”

“Apologize?” I ask, now thoroughly confused. “What are you talking about?”

“I saw what you did to her face,” Daffodil straightens her shoulders. “I’m not letting you in.”

“Her face?” My gut twists. “What’s wrong with her face?”

“Like you don’t know,” she sniffs.

“Open this door, or I will break the chain,” I grit out. Daffodil gasps but shuts the door in my face, clicking the lock into place.

I pound again. “Open the fucking door.”

The lock clicks again, and it opens with the chain still in place. Chloe stands on the other side of the door, her face turned to the side. “Don’t scare Daffodil, she’s just trying to protect me.”

“Protect you?”

Then she looks at me, her face swollen and my vision blurs with rage as I drop the soup. “Who did that to you?”

“It-it wasn’t you?” Daffodil asks from behind Chloe, her voice shaking with her surprise.

“Why would you think it was me?” I grunt, my hand coming to the knob. “Unlock this door, Chloe.”

“Killian,” she whispers. “It’s been a long night and I’m not sure it’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“I’m in over my head, here. Your family, their business. You. It’s…” Her lips begin to tremble.

I reach through the crack in the door, touching her hand on the jam. “I’m your monster, sweetheart. Let me in so I can protect you.”

She hesitates for another second and then she closes the door, and I hear the slide of the chain. I pick up the dropped soup and push the door open and then step in, locking it behind me, letting out a breath of relieved air.

Daffodil stands behind Chloe, looking at me with worried eyes. “You think I would do this?”

---