Page 100 of Reaper Flame

Zander rolled up his shirt sleeves. “Where’s Giles?”

“Red’s with him in the office,” Vixen said, her expression turned stony. “We had to put him somewhere before he drained the bar dry and scared away the customers. A sniveling trainwreck was killing our vibe.”

“Do you and Mieko have everything under control here?” Zander asked, looking to them both for confirmation.

“Of course,” she said flippantly. “We’re expecting a late liquor drop. Fuck knows why the guy couldn’t have brought it earlier…”

After my earlier conversation with Mieko, something told me this late delivery was no accident. This could be her plan to get Vixen’s signature on the dotted line. But I had another problem to contend with and had to trust Mieko would handle it.

I followed Zander through to the back and threaded my fingers through his possessively to mark my territory. Gorgeous strippers and shot girls fluttered their eyelashes at him as we passed. Did they really have to make it so goddamn obvious? Zander didn’t notice.

“What do you think Giles wants?” I asked.

“What he always wants,” Zander replied, “to make a scene and my life more difficult.”

Rocky stood outside Zander’s office guarding the door.

“Where’s West?” Rocky frowned, looking behind us. “I thought you’d all come back together.”

“He’s busy.” I shot Rocky a look that hopefully said: ‘busy stashing the body of our only informant in the doomsday bunker under our feet’. “Is he in there?”

Rocky stepped aside for us to pass. “Unfortunately…”

The smell of liquor burned my nostrils as we filed in. Vixen was right. Giles looked like he’d crawled off a sinking boat that got hit by a monsoon. The person in front of us was not the same smartass rich guy I had the displeasure of becoming accustomed to. His pressed designer suits and expensive cologne were long gone; his clothes were stained and looked slept in. Thankfully, the overpowering vodka fumes masked the more offensive odor of something that had crawled under his armpits and died there.

Giles staggered to his feet as soon as he saw me, almost knocking over a desk lamp and chair.

“Candy!” he slurred, squinting at me through his bloodshot eyes. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

“You can stay on that side of the fucking table,” I spat, wanting to keep him as far away as possible. “Why are you here, Giles? You’re not welcome.”

“He says he has information,” Rocky said, grimacing as he steered Giles back to the chair and pushed him roughly back into it. “Sit the fuck down before you break anything else.”

I made a mental note to ensure Rocky sanitized his hands before touching me again.

“I needed to see you after what happened,” Giles said.

“If you came here for sympathy, you’ve come to the wrong fucking place.” I surveyed him in disgust. “You burned our fucking house down, remember?”

“I didn’t mean it!” Giles wailed. He held his head in his hands, mumbling to himself, then looked up with crazy eyes. “The fire! I never knew! I just wanted to… show you…”

“Show us, what?” I pressed. “How to light a can of gasoline? You wanted to destroy something because you couldn’t have it.”

His face crumpled like a wrinkled goblin, making him age ten years. His mouth contorted in physical pain and ugly tears left streaks down his dirty cheeks. Being able to sob like a baby and still make me want to punch him in the face was a rare trait to find in a person. If he thought crying would make me pity him, he was out of his fucking mind.

“I wanted to apol-ap-apolo-apologize.” Giles sniveled loudly, wiping his snotty nose with his grubby shirt. “I didn’t mean—”

“It’s a little too late for that, don’t you think? It’s not us that you need to be asking forgiveness from,” I replied coldly. “Your apology doesn’t change anything. Words are not going to bring them back.”

Giles started babbling to himself and rocking in the chair. “The men he sent… they said they’d checked… I sat and watched when… I didn’t know…”

It’s a good thing West was busy stashing the Blackbird’s body in the bunker. He wouldn’t have been able to contain himself while Giles hosted a pity party. One murder was enough for us to have to cover up for an evening.

“Red said you came here because you had information,” I said. I tapped my foot impatiently. We had to get rid of the Blackbird’s body. If he had nothing useful to say, we needed to throw him back in the gutter where he belonged. “Why don’t you spit it out?”

“Hiram is coming to town,” Giles said. “Tonight.”

Zander, Rocky and I exchanged glances. We couldn’t trust a word Giles said, but what did he have to gain by lying? He wasn’t a good enough actor to fake being this wasted.

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