“I’m going to Walmart,” I declare.
“How?” Zinnea asks. “Dolly’s in the repair shop.”
“I’ll walk.” Slowly.
“But it’s so late,” Dexter says, looking at his Apple Watch.
“All the better,” I reply, moving past them, wincing for speaking my thoughts. It’ll only fuel their concern. To them, my nighttime trips to Walmart are a positive step toward freedom. To me, it’s one of the only places I find comfort. The blinding lights. The calm of the few people doing late-night shopping in such a colossal space. The low buzz of noise that blankets the mild sound of people’s voices.
It’s one of the few places on this earth that doesn’t freak me out.
And I need it now more than I’ve felt I’ve needed it in years.
A voice over the speakers tells me I have fifteen minutes to finish my shopping before the store closes. I look down at the basket I’m tugging along. Empty. Coming to a stop at the fruit and veg aisle, I scan the shelves for the mangos, frowning when I see none. Who sells out of mangos? I stop a store worker, a young man with red spikey hair. “Do you have any mangos?” I ask, pointing at the empty space between the pineapples and kiwis.
“No more fresh fruit until tomorrow.” He doesn’t even stop, no doubt keen to finish his shift and go meet his friends.
I pout at his back, claiming my basket and tugging it along to the dairy aisle, dropping some milk into it. Because . . . everyone needs milk.
And chocolate. Everyone needs chocolate. I walk up and down every aisle to get to the candy aisle and stand for a few moments scanning the selection. My skin tingles. I look left. No one. I look right. No one.
My cell rings, but I ignore it, drained of the energy needed to reassure Zinnea, Lawrence, or Dexter that I’m okay. Instead, I text her, knowing she’ll be waiting to go on stage, and she won’t settle until she hears from me.
I’m okay.
I snatch a Hershey Bar, the biggest, and drop it in my basket.
Next, wine.
I trudge on, looking over my shoulder, rolling them as I do. No one.
Another announcement comes over the speakers, telling me I have ten minutes to find my wine and pay. It doesn’t encourage me to rush, my feet heavy as I flip-flop along. My cell rings again. I ignore it. Again.
“I think someone wants to speak to you,” somebody says, and I glance up at a man beside me, who’s grabbing a bottle of expensive-looking Merlot.
“Is it good?” I ask, motioning to his hand.
He smiles. “The best.”
I nod and reach for a bottle, my cell ringing off and immediately sounding again. I sigh, accepting that she won’t settle until she actually speaks to me, my thumb going to answer. I falter placing my wine in my basket, the number on my screen making my heart boom. And I stare. For an age, I just stare at it, delving deep to find the will I need to answer, at the same time wondering what on earth he could want.
Because I can’t figure out if you dislike me. Or want to fuck me.
“I can’t figure that out either, James,” I breathe, and let my thumb fall to the green icon that accepts the call. “Hello.” I don’t say my greeting as a question. He knows I know who it is.
“Beau.”
“James.”
Silence falls, and it’s only broken when the speakers announce it’s my last chance to grab the daily specials. I look at the ceiling, to all the bright, harsh light pouring down on me. It’s a stark contrast to the darkness I’m feeling from down the line.
“Where are you?” he asks, his question flat and without any curiosity. Almost a demand.
“Walmart,” I answer quietly and hesitantly.
“At this time?”
“It’s less . . . chaotic.” Less noisy. Less busy. And it’s light. So very light. “And the risk of having the back of your legs rammed by a cart is reduced.”
Rammed.
I blink my vision clear.
“You don’t like busy?”
“Hate it,” I answer, with no thought for what that might tell him about me. I start to wander toward the checkout, wondering, again, why he’s calling me. Wondering why I’m indulging him.
“Me too,” he whispers, almost to himself.
Except in your bedroom. That was far busier than it should have been. “Why are you calling me, James?” I ask, starting to unload my few things onto the conveyor belt.
“I don’t know,” he answers candidly, and my hand falters on its way back to the basket.
“Lonely?” I ask.
“Always.”
Air catches in my throat, and it’s beyond me why. Loneliness. It’s a strange thing. You can be surrounded by many people, people who love you and shower you with attention, but still feel incredibly isolated. I’m testament to that. But James? I know nothing about him, apart from his bedroom habits, of course. And that he’s possibly made of glass. “Me too,” I say quietly, wanting him to hear me.
More silence stretches as I move to the other end of the checkout and the lady behind the counter starts scanning my things. “So you called me because you’re lonely?” I ask.
“No, I called you because I need you to paint my office.”
I frown as I tap my card on the reader to pay. “I’m too expensive, apparently.”
“And, apparently, I’m terrible at painting.”
“You tried to do it yourself?” I can’t imagine James painting. I can’t imagine James doing anything other than brooding. And fucking. And there’s part of my problem. I’ve imagined him fucking more than is healthy. I can’t get the image of his strained, incredible body, or his intense face, out of my damn head.
I collect my bag and make my way toward the exit as a five-minute warning to the rest of the shoppers sounds.
“You have five minutes, Beau,” he whispers.
“Five minutes for what?”
“To decide whether you can bring yourself to be in my company again.” He hangs up, and I stare down at my cell, stunned. Five minutes.
I glance around me, as if the empty store can help me. No one can . . . help me. I walk out a little dazed and perch on a wall under a streetlight. The next five minutes feel like the longest of my life, my head overcrowded, leaving no space for me to actually decide whether I will take his offer, and only room to relive the last time I was in his apartment. And I admit to myself for the first time, I wanted to be that woman. Not so much because I want James to fuck me with that kind of ferocity, but because I want to feel as lost as she looked.
Light. Free. Immune to thinking, immune to everything, except for the pleasure.
I startle when my cell rings in my hand, and I stare at the screen for a few seconds before answering. I don’t greet him. He doesn’t greet me. We just breathe down the line at each other.
Lonely?
Always.
“See you Monday,” he finally says.
Then he hangs up again.
The house is quiet when I get home, and I flick on every light as I make my way to the kitchen at the very back of the house. I unpack my few items. Wash my hands as I stare out into the dark yard. Go up to my room, flicking on every light switch I pass. I drop my bag on my bed and wander to Mom’s special bottle of Krug on my nightstand, brushing across the top of the box delicately. “I don’t know what I’m doing, Mom,” I whisper, stripping out of my clothes and leaving them in a pile by my bed.
I go to my bathroom and turn on the shower before putting myself in front of the mirror, forcing my eyes to look at myself. At my arm. At my shoulder.
The scars look especially red today. Angry.
Ugly.
Alive.
I draw a line down the length of my arm to my wrist, my lips twisting, the pain raw. Dead flesh. Dead skin.
A dead soul.
Condensation starts to creep up the mirror, fogging it, until I disappear.
Invisible.
And yet when James Kelly looked at me, I felt seen.
&nbs
p; Completely bared.
9
BEAU
The next morning, the kitchen is silent as I go through the motions of making a morning coffee, Uncle Lawrence and Dexter quiet at the table behind me, no doubt tossing each other worried looks every now and then. I slowly stir half a sugar into my caffeine as I stare out of the window at the sun trying its hardest to push through the dense clouds. The front yard has trees and bushes that place shadows across the front of the house, but the backyard is bathed in natural light from the sun. Warm. Light.
“How was your show last night?” I ask the pane of glass, my tone lacking the interest I hoped to find. I drop the spoon and turn, leaning against the counter and bringing my coffee to my lips. Lawrence’s face is nothing short of insulted. I force a smile around the rim of my cup as Dexter nudges him under the table with his knee.
The eye roll performed by my uncle is award worthy. “Good. It was good.”
“Good,” I mimic, heading out of the kitchen. I feel their eyes follow me until I’m in the hallway.
“What are you doing today?” Lawrence calls.
“I was going to meet Nath for coffee,” I reply, taking the stairs. “But the case he’s working has had a few developments he needs to look into.” Truth be told, I suspect he simply doesn’t want to face me and my probing about the appeal again.
“So what are you going to do?”
Probably be consumed by thoughts of James Kelly. “Chill out,” I call, closing my bedroom door and setting my coffee on the nightstand. “And drive myself insane,” I whisper to myself, moving the details of a thousand apartments I’m not going to buy and collapsing on the bed. Tomorrow is Monday.
I’ll see you on Monday.
Something deep and sensible is telling me that I absolutely shouldn’t see him on Monday. And yet something deeper and more relentless is telling me I should.
But what if you can’t, Beau?
I sink my teeth into my bottom lip and pull up the message from Reg that’s telling me he can’t get my car back to me as soon as he hoped. So it’ll be more cabs in the day and more walking by night. Many of my tools are in my car—tools I haven’t a hope of transporting without a vehicle. Sensibility grabs me for a moment and controls my movements, making me pull up my texts and send a message.
I’m afraid I need to reschedule.
No sooner have I clicked send, my cell rings, and for the first time I wonder why I haven’t saved his number. Not that I need to. I know it by heart; I’ve stared at it so much. I answer, but say nothing, waiting for what James might say instead.
“Why?” is all I get, and although I have a perfectly good reason, I’ll be damned if I can voice it, leaving a long, lingering, expectant silence. “I asked why.”
“I have travel issues,” I say, trying to come across assertive but sounding hesitant instead.
“It’s not an issue.”
“I have equipment issues.”
“It’s not an issue.”
I breathe out, reaching for my temple and massaging. “I have James issues.”
“And finally we have the real issue,” he whispers, and it doesn’t escape my notice that he fails to claim this issue of mine isn’t an issue. Is it an issue? I laugh on the inside. Of course it’s an issue. My body and mind aren’t my own around him. Lonely? Always. It’s like he’s wired into me, making me think things I shouldn’t think. Say things I shouldn’t say.
Do things I shouldn’t do?
“What’s your issue?” he asks.
“That you’re not the kind of man I should be spending time with.”
“You’re probably right,” he replies, honest as can be, no hesitation. I blink my surprise. “But I’ll be at work.”
“And you trust me in your apartment?”
“Shouldn’t I?”
“You don’t know me.”
He inhales loudly, like he’s losing his patience, and releases the air on a sigh I’m supposed to hear. Impatience. It’s rife in him. “Stop reading between the lines, Beau. If transport is an issue, I’ll have you collected. If equipment is an issue, I’ll buy you some more.”
“And if you’re an issue?”
“Then we’ll fix that issue.” He hangs up, and I let my limp arm hit the bed with a thud. I have no idea what I’m doing right now. No idea at all. All I know is that when James is on my mind, nothing else is.
10
JAMES
The heat. It’s tolerated. It’s a fucked-up comfort, because never will I burn alive again. Never will I feel the heat of such a savage inferno.
I stare at the glowing flame swaying hypnotically, my palm hovering over it. I raise it a little. The heat subsides. I lower it again. The heat intensifies. Lower still. Hotter. Lower again. The flame licks my skin.
I hiss and slowly retract my hand, taking my gloves from my desk and pulling them on, my eyes turning to the screens in my office. All are blank, except one with the face of the man I will kill tonight. And another with footage of Beau Hayley. She’s in a supermarket, wandering up and down the aisles, aimless, no direction, no purpose.
Lonely.
I wrestle thoughts of her away with conviction, resetting my attention on the man on the screen next to her. One of The Eagle’s foot soldiers. I slide my knife off my desk and inspect the blade.
“He’ll be at the old scrapyard off the Biscayne Bay docks in an hour,” Goldie says from the doorway.
“Who is he meeting?”
“A dealer from the streets.”
I blink back the glare from the metal blade reflecting off the spotlights. The Bear’s web of control is about to lose another key player on the drugs front. “They replaced The Snake yet?”
“Not yet. They only just found his body in the river. It’s been two years. MPD aren’t exactly the fastest at finding dead men. Vince Roake was the obvious choice. With him locked up and The Eagle dead, who the fuck knows who’ll move up the ranks.”
“Well, it won’t be the man I’m killing tonight.” I turn and face Goldie. “I need you to collect Beau Hayley tomorrow morning from her home address.”
Her face. I’ve seen various levels of annoyance, but this is something else. My expression dares her to challenge me. But I sometimes forget, Goldie loves a challenge. “You want to fuck her.”
I laugh under my breath. There’s absolutely no humor in it. “Yes, I want to fuck her.” I can’t stop imagining that. Fucking her. Tying her up. Blinding her with something other than her mental pain. It’s screwed up on every level. But then again, I long ago accepted that I’m a whole new level of screwed up.
“More than kill her?” Goldie asks.
I pull up, stalling from slipping my knife into its sleeve. That’s a damn fine question. And the answer, the true answer, is fucking frightening. “No.” I make tracks to my bedroom to collect my Beretta. “You can go home now,” I call, stuffing my balaclava into my back pocket as I go.
11
BEAU
On Monday morning, I call Reg while I’m eating a mango and loading the washing machine to let him know I’ll be there soon to collect some things from Dolly.
With my hair pulled into a low, messy bun and my body appropriately dressed in ripped, paint-splattered jeans and a signature long-sleeved, oversized shirt, I leave the house feeling a puzzling mix of trepidation and anticipation. My hand reaches for my tummy of its own volition, rubbing soothing circles as I dip and weave through the forest that is our front yard.
I make it to the sidewalk with only a few snags on my clothes and come to a screaming halt when I’m confronted by a tall, formidable-looking woman in a masculine suit, her short blonde hair slickly tucked behind her ears. “Miss Hayley,” she says, her British accent strong, stoic as she motions to the Tesla behind her. I know my face must say what I’m thinking, and I’m thinking, who the hell are you?
“I work for Mr. Kelly.”
My eyebrows jump up so fast, I’m surprised they don’t detach from my face a
nd fall to the ground at my feet. “I’m sorry?” I question.
Her impassive face remains blank. “Mr. Kelly instructed me to collect you and deliver you to his home.”
Deliver? What the fuck am I, a parcel? “And how does Mr. Kelly know where I’m to be collected from?” I ask, instinctively looking left and right.
“That I can’t answer.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
A small smile breaks the corners of her bare lips. “Both.” She sweeps her arm out toward the car again. “Shall we?”
I laugh, unable to stop myself. “You want me to get into that car with you when I have no idea who you are?” Did he send a woman because he thought it might make this less fucking weird?
“I work for Mr. Kelly.”
“That’s lovely, but I don’t even know Mr. Kelly.” Or what he fucking does. He could be a mass murderer for all I know.
She eyes me with curiosity, her lips still hovering on the verge of a smile. “No, but you will be getting to know him, yes?”
My shoulders straighten. What is that supposed to mean? I should ask, but, instead, like I’m working on autopilot, or idiocy, I step toward the car. For fuck’s sake, Beau. You’re a cop. This goes against everything I know and believe in. I quickly swallow. No, not a cop. I was a cop, and by casting my badge aside, it seems I’ve also cast aside my sense.
“My name is Goldie,” she says, opening the back door for me. “In case knowing my name makes you feel better about accepting the ride.”
“It doesn’t, but thanks,” I say, settling in the back seat. I’m stupid. Must be. And on that thought, as Goldie rounds the front of the car unfastening her black suit jacket, I send a quick text message to Nath, telling him to report me missing if I don’t contact him by this evening.
The Enigma: Unlawful Men Book 2 Page 7
