Page 3 of Butcher & Blackbird
“Better that than the authorities making something up for you. Trust me.” Rowan’s gaze shifts to the corpse and back again, his head tilting as he regards me. He jerks a nod once in Albert’s direction. “He must have been really acting the maggot.Get it?”
There’s a long pause, the silence between us punctuated by the hum of insect wings.
“No. I don’t.”
Rowan waves a hand. “Irish saying, meaning he was up to mischief. But it was a pretty clever joke, given the circumstances,” he says, his chest puffed with pride as he hooks a thumb toward the corpse. “Begs the question, though—how’d you wind up in the cage while he’s dead with your blade out there? Did you knife him through the bars?”
I glance down at my formerly white shirt and the dirty boot print that hides beneath the splash of blood. “I guess you could say it was a moment of bad timing.”
“Hmm,” Rowan says with a sage nod. “I might have had one or two of those myself in the past.”
“You mean you’ve been locked in a cage with a dead body and a little infantry of orzo pastas marching your way?”
Rowan looks down across the space around us and frowns. “No. Can’t say that I have.”
“Didn’t think so,” I mutter with a weary sigh. I dust off my hands on my grimy denim shorts and take a final step back as I cock a hip. I’m starting to become annoyed at this interloper who seems to be doing nothing more than delaying my slow death by starvation. I’m pretty sure he’s a bit nuts and I don’t get the impression he’s that keen on actually letting me out of here.
Might as well just get on with it.
“Well…?”
“They’re making decent progress, the little orzos,” Rowan says, more to himself than to me as his gaze remains trapped on the trail of tiny white worms heading my way. When his eyes lift from the floor, they meet mine with an eager smile. “Want to get lunch?”
I level this stranger with a flat glare as I motion to my bloody, boot-printed shirt. “Unless you want to send us both to jail immediately…no…?”
“Right,” he says with a frown before striding toward Albert’s corpse. He rifles through the pockets, coming up empty. When he looks up to the bloated neck, he lets out a little sound of triumph, pulling my blade free before he yanks on a silver chain, the links snapping with the swift assault of his strong grip. He turns his smile toward me as he rises, his fingers unfurling around the key that rests in his palm.
“Have a shower. I’ll find you some clothes. Then we’ll burn the house down.”
Rowan unlocks the door and extends a hand into the shadows of my cage.
“Come on, Blackbird. I’m in the mood for barbecue. What do you say?”
2
FUN AND GAMES
ROWAN
The Orb Weaver.
I’m sitting across the table from the fuckingOrb Weaver.
And she’s fuckingbeautiful.
Raven hair. Warm hazel eyes. A spread of freckles over her cheeks and a little nose that’s turned a bit red. She clears her throat and takes a long sip of her beer and then frowns, her eyes trained on her glass as she pushes it away.
“You’re sick,” I say.
Sloane’s eyes meet mine with a wary glance before her attention shifts to the diner. Her sharp gaze lands on one table of patrons for only a moment before it floats to the next. Sloane is a nervous one.
Probably justified, all things considered.
“Three days in that hell-hole was bound to take a toll. Thank fuck I had water in there.” She reaches for the napkin dispenser and pulls a tissue free to blow her nose. Her gaze finds mine again but doesn’t stay on me for long. “Thanks for letting me out.”
I shrug and sip my beer, and I watch in silence as her gaze flicks away to a server who exits the kitchen with another table’s order. Sloane asked for a booth midway down the window, pointing to the exact one she wanted when the hostess led us into the room. Now I get why. It’s equidistant between the front entrance, the emergency exit by the bathrooms, and the kitchen.
Is she always this flighty, or has her time in Albert’s cage got her spooked? Or is it me?
