by Megyn Ward
“I was her brother—I was the one who should’ve protected her. That was my job. That—”
“Is that why you’re here?” She asks me quietly. Almost reluctantly. “Because of what happened to your sister? Because you think—”
“No.” It’s a question that I’ve been asked more times than I’m comfortable with over the last twenty-four hours. I’m even less comfortable with the fact that until now, I didn’t know how to answer it. I didn’t know what the answer was—why I’m here. Why I can’t seem to make myself walk away from her. “I’m here because I love you, but…” I feel a frown crumple my brow because she deserves the truth. All of it. “I don’t want you to love me, Delilah. It’s not… safe.” I shake my head. “What if something happens? What if when it does happen, I can’t—”
“That’s too bad.” Instead of letting go of me like I expected, my admission tightens her grip. Lights a fierceness in her eyes that makes it nearly impossible to breathe. “Because I’ve spent my entire life believing that I’m pretty much incapable of it and now—wait… you love me?” The way she says it kills me. Like it’s something she never even considered possible. Something she hoped for but never thought she’d actually get to have.
“Yes.” I say it quietly.
“It’s been a long time since someone has said that to me… will you say it again?” She gives me an apologetic smile like she just bumped into me in a coffee shop or on the subway. “I know it’s stupid but I—”
“I love you, Delilah.” Instead of backing away, I double down. Say it again. “I love you and I’m not going anywhere. I’m not leaving. Not without you. Not unless you ask me to.” I feel the weight of it settle in my chest—the certainty that now that I’ve said it out loud, it’s only a matter of time before I lose her.
THIRTY-SIX
Grayson
I TAKE HER BACK TO BED.
Hold her in the dark and listen quietly while she tells me about her grandparents. Funny stories about how her and her grandmother used to dress up in disguises to go grocery shopping or down to Fisherman’s Warf. How her Grandfather bought her brother a pet fish when he was eleven because their mother refused to allow them to have a dog. Every story told me how great they were. How much they loved her. They raised her after her mother and father all but abandoned her and her brother. I’ve met Davino Fiorella, he’s Silver’s father and for all intents and purposes Tob’s father-in-law—and I liked him but I’d be a liar if I didn’t admit that hearing Delilah talk about him didn’t make me want to snatch him up and shake the shit out of him. Mostly because listening to her, I get the feeling that like me, she blames herself for the loss of him. Secretly wonders what it is about herself that makes it impossible for her own parents to love her.
“They died when I was fifteen,” she whispers like her grandparents are still here. Like maybe admitting that their dead might chase them away for good. “She had a stroke in the lobby—we were going Christmas shopping and she just…” She lets it go, probably because the memory of it hurts too much to hold on. “My grandpa went with her to the hospital. I think he knew it was too late. That she was already gone but he didn’t want to let her go.” She lifts my hand from my stomach and turns it so she can slip her fingers between mine. “When he came back, it was late. I was already in bed and he came in and sat on the edge of it and said, we’re gonna be okay, Lilah girl—I love you. I’ll see you in the morning… I think he meant it. I don’t think he meant to leave me but…” She sighs. “He went to bed and that was it. He didn’t wake up.” She reaches for my hand. Lifts it off my stomach to lace her fingers between mine. “He would’ve liked you. They both would’ve.”
Even though I’m not sure if it’s true or not, I choose to believe it because I want it to be. I want to believe that if I’d met her grandparents, they would’ve approved of me.
“Mother came in for the funeral and the reading of the will but that was it. She’s always hated Boston—probably because my father lives here. I stayed until I was seventeen and then I moved to New York… you know the rest.”
Yeah, I know the rest.
I didn’t start working at Level until she was nineteen. By then she was a permanent fixture on the Manhattan club scene. Already wild. Already lost.
“What about Went?” It comes out rough. Accusatory, even though I don’t mean it to. “Where was he?”
“He left for college the summer before it happened,” she tells me in a casual, matter-of-fact tone that makes me want to shake the shit out of him too. “He came home for the funeral and decided to stay. He tried but I’ve never been easy to deal with and after my grandparents died I just... he was just a kid, same as me. It’s not his fault.”
I think about her alone. Just a kid and set adrift by the loss of the only people who ever really loved her. I can relate. I was only eight when my parents died but it wasn’t long after that that I met Tob. As soon as I saw him, something in me recognized him for what he was. What he was meant to be to me and I clung to him. We clung to each other, collecting Jase and Logan along the way. We held each other together. Kept each other close. From becoming complete nightmare versions of ourselves. My brothers saved me. We saved each other. I don’t think I ever really understood what that meant until now.
Because no one saved Delilah.
No one really even tried.
What about you?” she asks, probably in hopes of avoiding talking about how her escalating behavior is directly related to the loss of her grandparents. “Where did you go after you left Brighton?”
“The Marines,” I tell her. “I wanted the Navy but when they found out about my finger, they didn’t want me—even with a near perfect aptitude score.” When I say it, her fingers twist between mine, her pinkie skimming along the side of mine. “The Marines were less… selective. Physically, I was near perfect. That coupled with my ASVAB score got me in the door. They agreed to take me on a probationary basis with the understanding that if my missing finger was a hinderance, that I’d be chaptered out—the only catch was that I couldn’t wait. I had to go that day—take it or leave it.”
“A hinderance? That’s stupid.” She sounds angry. Like she’s the one being rejected. “You can barely even tell.”
“Which is how I made it all the way to MEPS without anyone even noticing.” I remember it like it was yesterday. The way it was laid out for me—now or never—like I was being given a gift. Like it was something I should be grateful for. “The Navy is really strict about deformities—”
“Deformi—” She tries to sit up, her tone full of indignation, but I stop her by rolling over. Tucking her under me until I’m stretched out over her, elbows planted in the pillow, on either side of her head. My hips wedged into the juncture of her thighs.
“It’s okay…” I lean heavily on my elbows, brushing my mouth against hers in a soft, almost haphazard kiss that quiets her almost instantly. “If I’d made the Navy, I’d probably still be in…” That’d been the plan. I’d be a SEAL or maybe a Corpsman. I don’t know but I know I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t be with her now. As humiliating as it’d been, as worthless as it’d made me feel, being broken down and judged for what I’ve always considered my scarlet letter—the physical manifestation of my failure and cowardice—I suddenly understand that it was probably the best thing that’d ever happened to me. There’s more. Too much to look at right now. Too much to sort through. Too much to try to understand. I’ll look at it later. I’ll make sense of it but right now, I just want feel.
I just want her.
Delilah.
I reach down and find the hem of my shirt. Gathering it in my fingers, I pull it up slowly, my cock growing thicker, harder, with every inch of her revealed. Pressing against her bare pussy through the front of my sleep pants, I flex my hips, stroking her with my shaft and she moans softly in response. Raises her arms and arches her back, helping me take her shirt off and driving me crazy in the process.
Driving me crazy is
something Delilah excels at.
Giving it an inpatient tug over her head, I toss it aside with a deep, rumbling groan when I feel her stiff, swollen nipples brush against my chest. Her soft, breathless gasp against my neck as her fingers slip across its nape, pushing themselves through my hair.
Urging me closer.
Pulling me under.
I give in, dipping down on another hard flex of my hips as I kiss her again, this one heavy and full of purpose, my tongue sweeping into her mouth on another groan to lick and tangle against hers while she wraps her legs around my hips and lift hers into the press of mine like we’re a couple of kids, hot and desperate for the feel of each other.
I tear my mouth away from hers, nipping and licking my way to her ear. “Delilah…” I whisper it, giving her lobe a punishing little nip with my teeth when she digs her heels into my ass and shamelessly rubs herself against the length of me. Winding me tighter. Pushing me harder. So hard and tight, I can feel a steady pump of pre-cum leaking from the head of my cock, soaking the front of my pants.
Trailing the tip of my tongue down the soft slope of her throat, I lick and graze my way across her collarbone. Along the swell of her breast to circle and tease the hard, swollen tip of it for a moment before I pull it into my mouth for a slow, hard suck while I reach between us to wrap my hand around the top of her thigh. Drawing the pad of my thumb up the seam of her slick, swollen slit and she gasps, her knees falling wide, hips rolling and moving under the pressure of my thumb when it skims over the engorged bundle of nerves at its top.
“Gray…” She moans my name, arching into the heat and pressure of my mouth, the swirl of my thumb, circling and sweeping over her, again and again, until she’s shaking, fighting off the orgasm baring down on her. “Inside me… hurry… please…”
She barely has it out before I’m moving, the soft mewling hum caught in the back of her throat when she says it, enough to snap the last of my self-control.
Reaching down to jerk my pants over my hips barely low enough to free my cock, I stroke myself into her on a hard, deep thrust that slams her knees into the sidewalls of my chest and tightens the wrap of her legs around my hips. Digs her heels into my ass on another low shuddering moan.
“Christ…” I fall over her again, catching myself on my outstretched arm, holding myself up so I don’t crush her while my hips pump and work between her thighs, my other hand pressed between us, fingers stroking and teasing her clit until her entire body is humming.
“Gray…” She moans my name again. Reaches for me and I lower myself over her further so I can kiss her, claiming her mouth with deep, languid sweeps of my tongue while she comes on my cock, the clench and pull of her pussy so tight I can feel the answering heat of it gripped around the base of my spine, so intense it nearly blinds me, a second before I’m letting go and coming with her.
THIRTY-SEVEN
Grayson
I’M AWAKE WHEN THE TEXT COMES IN.
I look at the antique clock on the nightstand— it’s 4 AM. Knowing it has to be one of my brothers, that no one else would text me at such an ungodly hour, I reach for my phone.
Jase: Call me.
Easing myself out of bed, I find my pants and pull them on.
“Where’re you going?” Delilah murmurs softly, eyes still closed, a slight frown marring her near perfect features.
“Told you...” Giving the drawstring a hasty tie while I lean down to drop a kiss on her mouth. “I’m not going anywhere. Go back to sleep.”
The frown smooths away from her brow a brief moment before she drops into sleep again.
As soon as she’s settled, I cross the room quietly and slip out through the door. Down the hall and into the large, open area that houses the living and dining area. As soon as I’m sure I’m far enough away, I call Jase.
“Mike the drug-dealing bartender is dead,” Jase says, not bothering with pleasantries. “My guy found him in his apartment a few hours ago—looks like a suicide.”
“Suicide?” As soon as I say it, the back of my neck goes tight. “When?”
Jase sighs. “He’s not too fresh—my guys says it looks like about a day or so but it’s hard to tell because all the windows were closed and A/C was off.”
June in New York.
A closed-up apartment.
Time of death would be hard to nail with little more than a visual to go on.
“Ketamine?” I ask, my tone short and clipped because Mike was our best chance of linking Delilah’s ex to her attempted kidnapping and without him, there’s pretty much nothing else to go on.
“There were drugs all over the apartment—coke. Some heroin. Ketamine—all packaged for resale. There’s more…” He says it like he doesn’t want to say it. Like he knows that whatever he says next will likely push me over the edge. “There were pictures of her—a lot of pictures. Like a crazy stalker amount. More than a few of them look like they knew each other… intimately.”
“Jesus Christ, Jase—intimately?” I huff out a rough laugh. “Quit being so fucking delicate and just say whatever it is you’re trying to say.” Even as I call him out for treading so lightly, I understand what he’s doing. I know he’s doing it because for all our differences, we’re brothers. He’s trying to help me but right now, I don’t feel helped. I feel managed. Manipulated and I hate it.
“Okay,” says in a short, clipped tone that I recognize. It’s the tone he reverts to when he removes himself from his emotions. “There was a video cued up on his laptop—porn. Of Delilah. My guy says it looked like he’d been watching it when he—”
“They’re fake.” I grind the words through my teeth. “The pictures. The video. All of it. Whatever your guy thinks he saw, it’s fake.”
“He left a note.”
The back of my neck goes tight again.
“In it, he claims that he and Delilah have been in a relationship for over a year now and that she broke it off because she decided to marry Vanderhoff. When she told him, he began stalking her, sending flowers and gifts to her at the Hawthorn in New York,” Jase tells me in that same rote, distance tone. “When those failed to win her back, he set the fire at Level and attempted to kidnap her out of desperation.”
“What are you saying?” I take a rough swipe at my face in an attempt to scrub away some of the frustration that’s settled into my bones. “That not only is Mike the guy who’s been stalking her and tried to kidnap her, that when he failed, he went home, wrote out a confession, jerked off and then shot himself?”
“That’s what the evidence suggests.”
“I don’t give a shit what the evidence suggests—” I spit at him. “The evidence is lying.”
“Okay…” He doesn’t argue with me. Doesn’t try to convince me. “Then who do you think it is? Who do you think has the reach and connections to hang this kind of frame because I’ve gotta tell you, it’s pretty solid—NYPD came through and they’re eating it up with a spoon.”
“The cops?” It’s a stupid thing to say. Of course the cops are involved. Mike is dead for fuck’s sake. That’s not something I can ask my brother to keep under this hat.
“Yup.” He sounds tired. Resigned. “And they want to talk to Delilah. Talking about having BPD pick her up and—”
“You told them where she is?” It comes out sounding like an accusation. Like he had a choice.
“Fuck you,” Jase growls back without any real heat. “I didn’t have to tell them shit—TMZ told them.” He sighs again, probably trying to temper his tone. “Look—they’re going to find a way to get her in an interview room, how doesn’t really matter, so I suggest you have your alternative theory ironed out before they do.”
“It’s Vanderhoff,” I say, pacing the length of the dining room table like a caged animal. “It has to be.”
As soon as I hung up with Jase, I knocked on Went’s door and told him what was going on. What my brother’s fixer found in Mike’s apartment. As soon as I explained what was going on, he c
alled Conner.
It’s barely 6 AM but here we all are, right back where we were last night—no closer to finding the man who’s stalking Delilah.
“Why?”
I look up to find Conner watching me.
“What?”
“Why does it have to be him?” He gives me a shrug. “Because he’s a rich prick and you don’t like him?”
Yes.
Instead of saying it out loud, I shake my head. Force myself to look at it objectively.
“You said whoever this guy is, that he’s either rich or smart—possibly both, right?” I stop pacing and spread my arms in a there you go type of gesture. “Well, Mike is neither of those things—he’s a fucking bartender and small-time drug dealer. He doesn’t have the resources to pull this shit off.” Dropping my arms, I shake my head. “Besides, I saw this guy—that guy didn’t just go home and kill himself. No way.”” I tell them, remembering the way he stood at the top of the block and watched me. Even with half a city block between us, I could feel it. Anger and malice, rolling off of him in waves. “I mean, I don’t know what his IQ score is, but Vanderhoff has money.”
“Lot of people have money. Lots of people are smart,” Con counters, playing Devil’s Advocate. “I have money and I’m smart.”
“Okay—fine.” I lift my hand, holding up a finger. “He proposed to her and she said no.” I flick up another finger. “She broke it off with him and she told me Friday night that he wasn’t taking it very well. That he has a hard time hearing the word no.” I flick up another finger. “He wasn’t on the guest list for Friday night, but he was there anyway. He—”
“If he wasn’t on the guest list then how’d he get in?” Went asks, his tone laced with accusation that instantly sets me on edge because he knows that I run club security and if Vanderhoff is our guy, that means what happened to Delilah is ultimately my fault.
“He wasn’t on the guest list but he—” I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. Start over because the last thing I want to do is throw hands with Delilah’s older brother. “Liz Cramer added him even though Delilah asked her not to—I guess the two of them have been screwing around behind her back for a while now.”
