Page 40 of Sinful Seduction
“I’ll come with you.” Cato pushes off the wall, shyly looking anywhere but our way. “Is it okay if I stay at yours tonight?”
“Sure. Anytime?—”
“He’s coming with us.” Minka grabs my baby brother’s shirt and tows him into the hall. “He can sleep on any couch. Doesn’t have to be the one in the apartment.”
She was asleep before we left the hospital, and too tired to fuss over the fact that I carried her into the house my father once owned. The mansion on the hills, with too many bathrooms and too manybedrooms, where Timothy Malone the Second conducted business occasionally and killed women… probably.
No doubt.
She slept, even as I carried her up the stairs, and slept some more when I laid her on a king-sized bed in the middle of a bedroom larger than our apartment. She snored when I pulled her shoes off and painstakingly unlaced the corset crushing her ribs, and she released a sweet sigh when I removed the tight boning and allowed her, finally, to expand her lungs and breathe normally for the first time in almost twelve hours.
Twelve fucking hours, though they felt like a hundred.
And now, a new day has begun. But still, she sleeps, comfortable in an air-conditioned home amongst lavish gardens and near a lush waterfall that leaves the air feeling cooler than that down in the valley Copeland City sits within.
Privilege sucks for those who don’t have it. And sometimes, I wish I were a better man. That I could give these things up, since I only have them because my last name is Malone. But I’m not, and I won’t. And for right now, I’m thankful for the fortune my father and grandfather amassed. Even knowinghowthey earned that money isn’t enough to make me regret the comfort and safety my wife slumbers within today.
Sunlight hits the side of the house, but unlike our apartment downtown, the brick exterior doesn’t absorb the heat, and the windows don’t allow the glaring rays to burn through. Timothy Malone the Second poured money into this place, double-glazing every sheet of glass, and applying a special film that reflects the light instead of eating it. So as I sit up in bed, the single sheet falling to my lap and sweatnotmaking that filthy slurping sound in response to my movement, I glance left and find Minka asleep on her belly, her long hair draped haphazardly over the side of her face. The lengths tickling the tops of her shoulders, and the ends flittering in the breeze of her exhales.
Her lips are swollen and puckered forward, her lashes long and delicate, kissing her cheeks.
She’s so fucking pretty it makes my teeth ache. This woman, this goddess, is so damn sure she’s broken. Weird.Like I didn’t listen to her discussion with my brother last night.She thinks she’s the lesser of us, like I’m some kind of saint for tolerating her and her quirks, when, all along, I exist in a state of terror, wondering if someone else might step in and offer her more. Something different. Something tempting and just a little too good not to, at the very least, make her stop and consider.
Careful not to disturb her sleep, I lean closer and lay a gentle kiss onthe ball of her shoulder, then I move away again, determined to let her rest as long as her body demands it.
Pushing the sheet away, I turn and set my feet on the floor, and standing with an achy grunt vibrating from the base of my throat, I snag my phone from the pile of my jeans and shirt tossed haphazardly on a chair beside two others. A small coffee table. A television mounted on the wall.
This is not just a bedroom. It’s a suite, big enough to be self-contained, so if a man doesn’t want to visit the rest of the house, he doesn’thaveto.
Fixing the waistband of my shorts and heading into the hall, I walk without looking where I’m going and swipe my phone unlocked instead. I have texts from Fletch. Texts from Tim. Texts from Detective Drake Banks. Emails sit in my inbox, some from my lieutenant, and another from Nicki giving me an update I never technically asked for: Steve is still doing okay, and Molly is doing better.
I turn at the top of the stairs, not needing to pee, despite just waking up. Which means I’m dehydrated, too. But I tap on Fletch’s name and bring the phone to my ear, knowing he’ll be awake already, and moving down the stairs—one flight, then another, and then a third—I turn right and head toward the kitchen.
Fletch answers after just one ring. “Hey.”
“Hey. Moo doing okay this morning?”
He hums in the back of his throat, sipping something cool and painting a mental image of him sitting in Tim’s garden, maybe. Relaxing in the shade while his daughter explores. “She slept in bed with me last night. Held my hand for eight straight hours.”
Frowning, I slow my steps and come to an almost stop before the kitchen. “She’snotdoing okay?”
“Tired. Anxious. She saw a little girl in distress yesterday, so it makes sense that it would stick with her, even if the girl is okay.” He sips again and reminds me that I’m thirsty, so I continue walking, enter the kitchen, and find myself caught up in Cato’s stare. His long, trim body bowed over the counter, his elbows on the stone, and his ass parked on a tall stool. But most surprising of all is the ink littered along his ribs, the beginnings of a design I had no clue he’d started.
Ravens. So many fucking ravens. And a tall, dark, dead tree that shadows his tan flesh and leaves me with a sense of dread tickling my stomach.
“I pulled Ben’s record this morning,” Fletch continues. “Lots of petty crime. Shoplifting. Car theft. Fighting in public, that sort of shit.”
“Not surprised, I guess.” I walk slower, past the fridge and around the dusty countertop that hasn’t been cleaned in a good long while, and though Cato watches me warily, drinking a soda and finger-combing two-inch black locks off his forehead, he remains still and silent, even as I come around and tilt my head to the side. The tree is not yet finished, but the intricate details have been mapped out. The extensive root system down below, and the equally extensive branches spreading from the top. But this tree is void of life. Void of leaves. Void of anything green orpretty. “Tim’s place is only ten minutes from the Waterfalls,” I murmur, wanting—but stopping myself—from tracing my baby brother’s new ink with the tip of my finger. Because fuck me, some of the branches are not branches at all. Some of them are words, and it’s only now, fifteen years after I finished high school, that I regret not paying attention when they taught us Latin. “You wanna come to the house and bring Ben’s files? Yesterday kicked my ass, and we’ve done fuck all for this kid’s murder.”
“I mean… we found a bunch out about his girlfriend,” he counters. “And that she likes a bad boy, probably because her daddy was the same. We can surmise they were in love, in that desperate, completely obsessive way only a couple of teenagers from opposite sides of the tracks could be in love. We still have Clay’s statement that he heard footsteps and a car fleeing the scene, so even if we’re looking for just one killer, we’re for sure looking for more than one witness. Witnesses tend to yap eventually, especially when they split up.” He settles back in his chair, the metallic creak of iron grumbling under his weight. “That’s notfuck all, considering we only had a half-day yesterday, and ended up at the hospital four separate times.”
“Come over. Bring Moo, if you wanna. She and Penny can hang here all day in the cool.”
“You don’t mind?”
I scoff. “You could move them in here and I wouldn’t mind.” I circle away from my brother and head back to the fridge to get that damn water before I forget. Then, slamming the door, I come around and twist the cap off the bottle. “I gotta take care of some stuff here first, and Minka’s still asleep. But come over and we can try to figure this shit out.”
“Yeah. Okay.” He exhales a heavy, grunting breath—pushing up from his chair—and starts across whatever space he’s in. The back patio, maybe, where the previous owners created a space for entertaining, but let it grow wild in the last couple of years. “You wanna go see Uncle Archer’s house, Moo? They still have that piano in the front room if you wanna play.”
