I grabbed her by both arms and held her tight. “It’s not good, Goober.” I hadn’t called Luna her childhood nickname in fucking years.
“No,” Luna gasped. “You can’t be right.”
I was right. There was no mistaking what I had seen in there. “She’s gone.”
Luna beat my chest. “You should have let me come out here right away! I could have helped her.”
There was no way in hell Luna would have been able to help Bunny if she had shown up twenty minutes earlier. She had been dead for a while. The smell that had hit Frost and me was enough to knock you on your ass. It would have only been a matter of time before the smell seeped into the whole trailer.
Tears streamed down her cheeks, and she fought to get around me. “Let me help her,” she pleaded.
I wrapped her in my arms and pushed her back toward the bikes. Luna might have been a force to reckon with, but I could still hold her back. “There isn’t anything you can do, Goober. She’s gone.”
A sob ripped from her lips, and she buried her face in my shirt.
Pie’s eyes connected with mine. I lightly shook my head and frowned.
It wasn’t fucking good.
Bunny was gone, and we had been right in the middle of the crime scene.
We weren’t going anywhere for a while.
*
Chapter Six
Reva
A knock sounded on the door, and my hand froze mid-air with a half-eaten taco in it.
It was seven-thirty, and no one should be knocking on my door.
Mom and Dad never came without letting me know, and I really didn’t have many friends. At least, not ones who would drop by without a call first.
Another knock came.
I dropped the taco on my plate and set it on the coffee table. I slowly stood, side-stepped to the wall, and crept along it ‘til I was at the front door. There wasn’t any way the person at the door could see me, but I was still sneaking around like the boogie man was out there.
“Reva,” the person called. The voice was male and familiar. Too familiar. “Sunshine.”
I sagged against the wall and took a deep breath. It was only Hero. But what in the hell was he doing here? He had told me earlier that he would see me later and made it sound like later would be while I was still working. I had been a little disappointed when five o’clock had rolled around and Hero hadn’t come back over. Tim had finished up installing the new door around four-thirty and had puttered around ‘til I closed. I moved in front of the door and reached up on my tiptoes to look out the peephole.
Yup, there was Hero standing there in all his handsome glory. “What do you want?” I sounded like one of the munchkins from the Wizard of Oz with my face squished up against the door.
“Let me in, Sunshine,” he called. His voice sounded tired, and there was a heaviness to it.
“Are you okay?” I still had my face pressed up against the door and sounded ridiculous.
“How about you open the door and we can talk face to face.” He tried to chuckle but it was flat and emotionless.
“Why?”
“Reva,” he sighed.
I grunted and pushed away from the door. I guess it did make sense to talk without a door between us. I pulled it open and propped one hand on my hip. “You don’t sound good.”
He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. “I’m doing better than at least one person tonight.”
Just what did that mean? He seemed tired, and his usual air of confidence was gone. “What happened?”
“You think I could come in and not stand on your doorstep?”
I pushed open the door all of the way and motioned for him to come in. His demeanor had piqued my curiosity. “Come on in. I was just sitting down to dinner.”
He walked through the doorway and brushed against me. “Dinner sounds good.”
I hadn’t exactly offered him dinner, but I had made plenty. “Um, why don’t you sit at the counter and I’ll make you a plate.” I nodded to the kitchen, and he headed that way.
I ducked into the living room and grabbed my plate and muted the TV. I didn’t need a rerun of 90210 playing in the background while I tried to concentrate on what the hell had happened to Hero.
“Nice place, Sunshine.” Hero sat on one of the stools at the raised counter.
I walked to the other side into the kitchen and set my plate down. “Thanks. I'm pretty fond of it.” I moved to the fridge. “Did you want something to drink?” I didn’t know how Hero had come to be in my house and sitting in my kitchen, but I figured I should offer him a beverage.
“Beer?”
I nodded. “You are in luck. I happen to have your plain old beer and a couple of the girly ones.”
“Girly ones?” he laughed.
I opened the fridge and grabbed my rather large selection of beer. It was a lot for one person, but after all, I did live in the land of beer and cheese. “I think this one is appley, this one has a bit of a lemon flavor.” I held up one with a badger on it. “I picked up this one at the gas station the other day. You can’t go wrong with a grumpy looking badger, right?”
Hero chuckled, and it didn’t sound as flat or forced as it had before. “I’ll go for the grumpy badger.”
“Excellent choice, though I don’t know what it tastes like.” I set the beer in front of him and left one of the lemony ones out for me. Then I pushed the others back in the fridge and turned to the stove where I had left all the fixings for the tacos. “I hope tacos are okay.” I glanced over my shoulder at Hero and watched him take a long drink of his beer.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Tacos are always okay in my world, Sunshine.”
Well, I had to agree with him. “Well, good.” I would have found something else for him to eat if he had told me he hated tacos, but then I also would have contemplated kicking him out because only psychos didn’t like tacos in some way, shape, or form.
He quietly drank his beer while I made a plate and set it in front of him. He grabbed my plate and slid it in front of the empty stool next to him. “Sit with me, Sunshine.”
The man really needed to stop calling me that. Mostly because whenever he said it, I would do whatever he wanted me to. I grabbed my beer and sat down on the stool next to him. “Hi,” I mumbled.
He chuckled and leaned back. “Hi, Sunshine.” He took a pull from his beer and looked at the label. “Grumpy badger beer isn’t half bad.”
I grabbed a stray piece of shredded cheese and popped it in my mouth. “Good to know.”
“Sorry I didn’t drop back into the shop. Some stuff came up with the club, and then, I was busy the rest of the day.”
I shrugged as if I hadn’t minded that he didn’t come back over. “It’s okay. I was pretty busy today.” I had been. Sort of.
“You catch the news tonight?”
I tipped my head to the side. That was kind of an odd question. “Uh, no. I tend not to watch the news lately. Too much bad in the world.”
“That’s life,” Hero replied grimly.
“I suppose,” I agreed. “Though, I guess I don’t want to hear about it all of the time. I know what’s going on in the world but I try not to focus on the negative.”
Hero nodded and took another drink.
“What’s wrong, Hero?” I asked. “Did something happen today?” I didn’t know if he would actually tell me, but it seemed like he wanted to. I was done beating around the bush with small talk and odd questions.
He picked at the label on his beer and peeled off a section of it. “Got a call from one of the guys this morning. One of the girls who works at the club hadn’t been in for the past two days. Luna was worried about her and wanted to run out to her house and make sure she was okay.”
“That sounds like a good idea.” I had no idea who Luna was, but I would have wanted to do the same thing.
Hero nodded. “Yeah, it was. I headed out with two other guys from the club and Luna. We got to her t
railer, and no one answered the door. All of the doors were unlocked, and the power was cut on the place.”
Uh oh. Uh. Oh.
Now I wished I had watched the news because I had an uneasy feeling that what Hero was about to tell me made it on the broadcast.
He finished peeling the label off the bottle and tossed it on the counter. “She was dead.” He tipped the beer to his lips and drained the rest of it in a few swallows. He set it on the counter and sighed.
“Oh, my God, Hero. I’m so sorry.” I couldn’t even imagine what it would be like to find someone who was dead.
He shook his head. “I didn’t even know her, Sunshine. Don’t feel sorry for me. Feel sorry for Luna who was worried about her.”
I looked down at my food. I wasn’t hungry anymore. “What was her name?”
“She went by Bunny, but her real name was Shannon Waters.” He stood, walked over to the fridge, and grabbed another beer. “It was bad, Reva. Whoever hurt her was fucking brutal.”
Chills ran through my body. “Do they know who did it?”
Hero shook his head. “No fucking clue. They, of course, questioned us up and down since we found her, but they know we didn’t hurt her. We all have fucking alibis and no reason to kill her.”
I rubbed my hands up and down my arms. A woman had been brutally murdered, and they didn’t know who had done it. There was a murderer somewhere in our small town. “So what are they doing?”
Hero sat back down next to me. “They spent all day talking to us. When they finally realized we had nothing to do with her murder, they talked mostly to Luna and the rest of the girls at the club. Luna swears up and down she has no idea who would have wanted to kill Bunny. I guess she was seeing a couple of guys but none of them were serious.”
“Jesus, Hero. That is crazy.” Things like that never happened in Rockton. We were a small town that didn’t really have many things happen that were newsworthy. “There's a murderer somewhere out there.”
Hero opened his beer. “Yeah, Sunshine. Shit is fucking crazy out there.”
“Do you think…” I didn’t want to say it out loud. I didn’t want to know if he thought whoever who had killed Bunny was going to kill again.
Hero read my mind. “I don’t know. It seems like whoever killed her knew her, but the problem is they don’t know who it was.” He finally picked up one of his tacos and took a bite. “Haven’t eaten all fucking day,” he mumbled. He chowed down the three tacos I had made him and finished his second beer. “Got any more?”
I grabbed his empty plate and made two more for him. I still had one and a half on my plate that I hadn’t touched since he walked in the door.
“You gotta eat, Sunshine.” He nodded to my plate.
He was right, but I wasn’t hungry. I managed to eat half of the taco, and it just tasted like sawdust going down. I drank my beer slowly while Hero finished his fourth and fifth tacos.
“You wanna watch a movie?” I asked when he finished.
“You’re not trying to push me out the door?”
I shrugged and grabbed his empty plate. “Should I?”
“I’d rather you not.”
I laughed and dropped the plates into the sink. “You can pick a movie out while I clean this up.”
“Another beer?” he asked.
I glanced over my shoulder at him. “If you drink another one, I’m not going to let you leave until you sober up.”
“That a promise?” he chuckled.
“Try me,” I dared. I wasn’t going to let Hero take off on his motorcycle after drinking three beers. He would have to walk home or sleep it off on the couch. I’m sure he was capable of driving, but I heard too often about drunk driving and accidents. I didn’t want to be partially responsible if something were to happen to Hero.
He opened the fridge and grabbed two more beers. “I’ll get the movie fired up.” He sauntered toward the living room and popped the top on one of the beers.
Well, I guess that settled that.
I put away the leftover tacos and fixings and turned on the dishwasher.
Hero was sitting in the middle of the couch with his feet kicked up on the coffee table. “You got shit taste in movies, Sunshine.”
I sat down next to him, careful not to actually touch him, and sighed. I’m sure I did according to his standards. I loved a good love story drama or a good documentary. On opposite ends of the spectrum, but it was what I liked.
“I like what I like.” I didn’t know what else to tell him. It wasn’t the first time I had been told I had shitty taste in movies. “Put on Netflix.” I grabbed a different remote from the end table, hit the Netflix button, and handed it to him. “I’m sure there are plenty of beat ‘em up and smash ‘em movies on there.”
He grunted and grabbed the remote. “Thank God,” he muttered under his breath.
The man who had been on my mind far too much seemed more relaxed. Not so wound up like he had been when I had first opened the front door. It was so easy to read Hero. He may play some things close to his chest, but it was always clear what kind of mood he was in.
He settled on some action movie that wasn’t going to hold my attention, but I figured he had a pretty stressful day and I could sit through a movie I wasn’t a fan of. He reached across the couch, turned off the light, and settled back next to me, this time closer than he had been before. Our shoulders touched, and I tried to fight the urge to lean into him.
Fifteen minutes into the movie, my eyes were becoming heavy and my resolve to not cuddle into him was almost gone.
“I have to confess,” I said through a yawn. “I’m pretty tired.”
“No shit,” Hero laughed. He looped his arm around my shoulders and pressed me into his side. “Sleep, Sunshine.”
It was too appealing of an invitation to turn down. I stifled another yawn and settled into him. We were like two pieces of a puzzle that aligned perfectly.
My eyes finally fluttered closed, and I completely stopped fighting sleep.
Hero had snuggled me next to him, so obviously he was okay with me falling asleep cuddled under his arm.
Who was I to argue with what he wanted?
I fell asleep to the sounds of a car chase on the TV and slept like a baby tucked into Hero. Not how I expected my night to end, but I wasn’t going to complain about that at all.
*
Hero
I gathered her to my side, laid down fully on the couch, and cradled her in front of me.
It had been a shit day, but this was the only ending I was willing to accept. I had only come over to tell Reva I was sorry about not showing up this afternoon, but as soon as I had seen her, I had wanted to be next to her and tell her everything that had happened.
She cuddled into me and sighed in her sleep.
Yeah. Today was shitty, but ending a shitty day with Reva in my arms was all I needed to make it better.
The movie played, but I stopped watching it.
Watching Reva peacefully sleep was more entertaining.
I fell asleep, my breathing matching hers, and slept like a damn baby.
*
Chapter Seven
Reva
The bacon sizzled in the pan, and I sipped my coffee.
See, this was normal.
Totally normal.
I did this at least two times a week.
I set my coffee down and grabbed a fork.
“Morning.”
I closed my eyes. That was not part of my normal. Crawling out from under Hero’s arms was not normal. It had felt nice waking up with his warm body pressed against mine, but have I mentioned that it was not normal?
I opened my eyes and looked over my shoulder. “Uh, hey?”
Hero stood there, his shirt rumbled, his hair disheveled, and a sexy smirk on his lips. “Coffee?”
I nodded to the coffee pot. “Cups are in the cabinet above.” I turned back to my bacon and tried to tell myself this was all normal.
“You slee
p okay?” he asked.
I felt him moving around the kitchen, but I didn’t turn away from the stove. “Uh, yeah?”
“Even early in the morning, you’ve got that cute awkward shit going on.” He filled his cup with coffee and then he was next to me. He leaned against the counter, his body facing me, and sipped from his cup.
“Mmhmm.” If only I could stop the awkward and throw a little sass his way. Hell, I’d like to just sound a little intelligent.
“What’s going on in your mind, Sunshine?” he asked.
Good Lord, there was a lot going on in there. The biggest thing rattling around in my head was wanting to know just what in the hell was happening. I didn’t think even Hero knew. “Not a whole lot.” I grabbed the plate I had draped a couple of paper towels on and started laying the fried bacon on it. “Hungry?”
I wasn’t making anything fancy. Bacon sandwiches were a morning favorite of mine. I guess I just liked B Sandwiches without the LT.
He looked down at the plate of bacon. “You got some eggs to go with that?”
I shook my head. “Nope.” I moved to the fridge and pulled out the jar of mayo. “Got some of this,” I held up the mayo, “and bread.”
Hero quirked his eyebrow. “I’m gonna trust you on this one, Sunshine.”
“Does that mean you want one?”
He nodded. “Fire one up for me.”
I laughed and set the mayo next to the bacon. “Well, it’s not exactly gourmet, but it’ll fill ya up.”
“Can’t ask for much more than that.” Hero laughed.
I popped two slices of bread into the toaster and grabbed a butter knife from the drawer. “So,” I drawled, “what happens today?”
I had about a minute until I could slather the toast with mayo. Might as well fill the void with some awkward conversation.
“Not a fucking clue. I plan to go check on Luna later, make sure she’s okay. I’m assuming the news broke to everyone who works at Sultry Knights so it would probably be best for me to make an appearance to make sure things are okay there.”
Passing the Torch (Devil's Knights 2nd Generation Book 1) Page 5
