Page 4 of The Hitman
Hushed voices stop me at the edge of the hall. I glance around the room, finding no one but Leo and a woman I don’t recognize, standing in front of the indoor koi pond. I retreat to the shadows, watching them stare down at a one-of-a kind Italian vase—make that, abroken,one-of-a kind vase.
“Shit,” Leo mutters.
“Shit, indeed,” she echoes, bringing a tiny grin to his face. Something I haven’t seen since before I brought him to the penthouse.
The woman, who I assume is Miss Finley, lowers to her knees in a gray pencil skirt and simple silk blouse, which accentuates her curvy figure. Her light brown hair curtains her face as she gathers the largest pieces of glass into a pile.
“I have some glue in my room,” Leo suggests.
She sits back on her heels and dusts her hands together, but it’s her answering smile which stops me from interrupting. “That’s a great idea, but I don’t think we have the time to fix it before someone notices.”
He rubs his chin with the pensiveness of a grown man, not the eight-year-old he is. “Yeah, you’re probably right. My uncle is pretty uptight.”
I scoff silently.
I amnotuptight.
“Don’t worry. I’ll tell him it was my fault,” she assures him, but he winces, not relieved in the slightest.
“He’s gonna besoomad.”
“You’re right about that.” I discreetly tuck the gun in my belt at my back and emerge from the shadows. Their heads swivel myway as I point to the soccer ball I’ve told him countless times not to kick in the house. “Have you no respect for my things, Leo?”
“I’m sorry.” His bright blue eyes, so much like Isa’s, widen. He’s chewing the inside of his lip the way she used to when we’d get in trouble at his age too, and I lose myself to frustration. “I jumped when she walked in and?—”
I lift a hand, silencing his excuses. “Go get the broom and get this cleaned up.”
Intense silence fills the room before he mutters a dejected, “Yes, sir.”
A pair of round, green eyes blink up at me once he leaves. “You don’t have to be so harsh, you know. It was an accident.”
I arch a brow at her. “That vase was worth more than half a million dollars.”
She swipes a finger along one of the larger pieces, revealing a dark smudge at the tip. “And given the layers of dust it’s collected, you must be heartbroken.”
An inkling of guilt presses in on me. I can almost feel Isa’s hand at the back of my head, smacking me for talking to Leo like that. He’s been through hell, and I’m dragging him into a life he didn’t choose. The least I could do was not embarrass him in front of company.
“You’re right,” I say, because maybe I’m not mad at him. Maybe I’m just mad at everything else. “I don’t give a fuck about that vase, and I owe Leo an apology.”
Callie’s mouth pops open, then shuts, as if I’ve caught her off guard.
“Right. Very well then,” she says, matter of fact.
She’s still kneeling as her curious gaze travels up my body in a way I shouldn’t find attractive.
“Do you need help getting up?”
“Oh! No, thank you.” She laughs nervously before rising to her feet. After adjusting a pair of red heels as crimson as herpouty lips, she offers me her hand. “Callie Finley. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mister…”
I take her hand, soft and small in my calloused one. “Jaxon Knight.”
“Ah, so you’re the mysterious J. Knight.” She gives me another once over, cheekier this time. “You don’t look like a serial killer to me. Though I suppose historically, most of them are handsome.”
“Like me, you mean?”
More nervous laughter escapes her, and the blush spreading up her neck demands my attention. “Okay, I walked right into that one.”
There’s an airiness about her, a playful spark that’s as inviting as her subtle rose scent. She smiles in a way that suggests her twenty-eight years have been spared from life’s worst heartaches.
