Page 40 of Love & Vendettas

“Hey, I have an idea.”

“What?”

“Why don’t you, Trina, Alicia, and I take an impromptu weekend getaway. An extended weekend. Maybe leave Thursday afternoon and return Monday morning. Take off Friday and Monday and return to work Tuesday.”

“I don’t know.”

“Come on. You never use any vacation time, and I know that Trina is out of school for the summer,” I express, referencing her best friend, who is a high school history teacher.

My best friend, Alicia, owns a hair salon, so she can get away whenever she’d like. My sister is the VP of sales at her telecommunications company.

“I’ve already been working from home for the last couple of days and haven’t been to the office.”

“So. You’ve still been working. You deserve it.”

“I work from home three to four days a week, though.”

“And? Your vacation is due to you. You can’t excuse that away by saying that you never go into the office.”

She inhales deeply. “Where would we go?”

“I was thinking somewhere quick. Maybe Miami?”

“Party for the weekend?”

“Exactly,” I answer in a sing-song tone.

A small smile begins to form on my sister’s lips.

“I like that idea, Bayleigh.”

“Good. Call Trina, and I’ll call Alicia.”

What I don’t say is that I’ll call Zaire first. I don’t want to rub in her face that she doesn’t have a man to call. At least, I hope that she doesn’t.

I hope that he’s now an extinct species, thanks to my baby.

19 – ZAIRE – THE HOVEL

“What do you plan on doing to him?” Parker asks solemnly.

He’s standing beside me with a wide-legged stance, his arms folded over his chest, as he stares blankly at the man before us.

Kenny’s arms are chained above his head to two iron bolts protruding from the wall. The lashes across his ribs and back are starting to heal, and I’ve got half a mind to pour salt or alcohol into them.

“I don’t think he’s learned his lesson yet,” I spit.

Kenny glares at me from swollen, puffy eye sockets. He doesn’t even look like the same man that he once was. All he’s been fed the last several days have been slices of bread and cups of room-temperature water. The lack of nourishment has been just enough to keep him alive, but minimal enough that he’s starting to look gaunt with the rapid weight loss.

Stepping forward, I grip his chin in my hand, and he pulls it away from me.

“Yeah, he still hasn’t learned his lesson. The arrogant fuck is just as dumb as he was before. That tells me that he’ll go back and do the same thing if given half a chance.”

“Then why don’t you just finish him off? It’ll be easier just to put a bullet in his brain and make sure he doesn’t repeat the same mistakes.”

“He doesn’t deserve to get off that easily, Parker. He needs to suffer the same way that he made Riley and all the other women suffer,” I disagree.

“Fuck you,” Kenny manages to utter through his broken jaw, though it doesn’t quite sound that way.

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