Page 22 of Little Death
The man at my feet snivels. Pathetic. If I weren’t desperate, I would have put a bullet in his brain when he first started begging.
“I didn’t say anything! The bitch bumped into me and spilled her drink all over my fucking suit. I swear! That’s all that happened.”
I backhand him with the gun still clutched in my gloved hand. Blood sprays from where it connects with his jaw. Eamon hovers over my shoulder and steps back without a change in his expression as the blood nearly paints his suit trousers. The garage wouldn’t be my preferred location for messy work, but I didn’t have time to move him to a more suitable location. Eamon bought a warehouse somewhere in town for this specific purpose, but it doesn’t matter now.
“Fuck, man. Fuck. I didn’t even do anything.” Tears spill from his watery blue eyes, but unlike my pretty pet’s, these just disgust me.
I press a button on my phone, and crystal-clear security footage plays. She fills the screen, and I’d look away if I could, but my gaze is glued to her. Something horrible squeezes in my chest. Like there’s a massive weight on it. I know it’s her, not only because she’s wearing that short-as-fuck dress that shimmers like starlight, but because I’d gone back through the footage a half dozen times after I woke up and found my bed without her in it. I’d followed her progress throughout the party. Watched our tête-à-tête over and over until Eamon was begging me to stop torturing him with my moonin’.
The man kneeling in front of me is the only one who spoke to her before she did her disappearing act upstairs, and I found her. I’ve already surmised he has nothing to do with her disappearance, but I also didn’t like how he fucking looked at her. Too familiar. Too greedy.
The scene replays on my phone with him manspreading, so she’s forced to turn sideways to slide by him. He’s got a devil mask on, but it’s not hard to read his posturing. Trying to intimidate her. Enjoying the way she squeezes around him and flicks worried glances his way. It’s not until she accidentally spills her drink that his composure breaks.
I wired the house top to bottom before I moved in, so the cameras pick up the way he spits out, “Bitch,” at her retreating figure. If she heard him, she didn’t pay him any mind. Maybe that’s what pissed him off more than the suit she ruined. Either way, I didn’t waste any time tracking him down.
“Please, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean anything by it. I’m sorry. Don’t hurt me.”
I can barely restrain my frown of disgust. I’d put her through much more torment, and even when she’d begged, one look in her eyes had nearly flayed me with the sheer volume of her defiance.
“That mask wasn’t fooling anyone. I’d know who she was even with a bag over her head. You’d have to be an idiot not to recognize her. For fuck’s sake, I’ve only been to a few country club events with her father, but even I’d recognize a body like that on?—”
He was dead the moment he confirmed he knew who she was. The bullet screaming through his brain matter silences the rest of his pitiful pleading. Not soon enough, my skull throbs with a headache from all his crying.
No, we can’t have some simpering gobshite running his mouth.
Eamon scowls. “I told you she was a problem. Feckin’ eejit.”
“She’s not a problem.”
“I hate to break this to you, pal, but you just killed a man because he called her a bitch. If you look it up in the dictionary, that’d be the definition of a problem. If Cian ever found?—”
“Cian won’t find out a feckin’ thing if we both keep our mouths shut. Or do you need more demonstrations about what I’ll do to anyone who can’t?”
Eamon mimes zipping his lips. “What do you want me to do with this?” he asks, tipping his head toward the body.
I flick a glance over it dispassionately, then retrieve a gold pistole from my pocket and flick it in his direction. “Have them clean the library upstairs and the garage and get rid of both bodies.”
Eamon catches the coin in midair with a heavy sigh. “It’s best to forget about her.”
“I know that.”
“You had your fun, but anything more would be?—”
“I grew up in the same world you did. I don’t need you to explain the risks to me.”
Eamon holds his hands in mock surrender, the gold pistol winking from his palm in the overhead lights. “Don’t blame the messenger. Speaking of Cian, he left a message to meet him at the Emerald this afternoon.”
Shite.
* * *
Cian Lynch is a stalwart figure,staring out of the massive wall of windows in my office that overlooks the bustle of the Emerald Isle. The scent of his cigar smoke coils around the room like a snake—thick, gray-blue, and stifling. It clings to my skin, slithers down my throat, and fills my lungs with a trepidation so sharp, I almost forget to breathe. It brings back old memories, as it always does, and my stomach heaves in a violent protest that I swallow down.
Had someone else found her identity? It’s not impossible. A flight from Dublin to New Orleans is only about fourteen hours. All of this flits through my thoughts as I close the door behind me, drawing his attention. He turns, and I keep my face carefully blank, this time without the aid of a mask.
The ice clinks in the crystal tumbler as he lifts it to his lips and drains the remainder, his attention still on the crowds below. A benevolent leader? Not a chance.
“Cian. I wasn’t aware you were coming,” I say, keeping my tone neutral. Controlled. Always controlled. “Would you like a room upstairs? The executive suite should be available for you.”
