“Not another shop!”
“Czech plates.”
“What? Where?”
“Three o’clock? Or they were before we parked…um, six?”
“Behind us?”
“Yes. Parked. A couple cars down.”
Frank closed his eyes. “You’re talking about the Mini?”
“It’s not a bad guy car?”
“No.” Frank’s stress was even better now! It would have to be a full body portrait, as every inch of his big brother was radiating tension.
“Better safe than sorry.”
Frank suddenly paled. “Get out of the car. I’m going to drive.” The tone of his voice sent chills down Casey’s spine.
“What is it? Are we gonna be in a high speed shootout?”
“No,” Frank said. The first thing he did as he got in the driver’s seat was take Casey’s cell phone and turn it off.
“What are you doing?”
“Just relax.” Frank calmly cut in front of another car and nearly forced them off the road. Traffic was bumper to bumper, but their car seemed to be the only one actually getting anywhere.
“Frank, what is it?”
“It’s Bella,” he said. “Something’s wrong.”
Chapter Seventy-Eight
There were no faceless freaks, no sinister Russians, just regular Parisians walking to and fro on the security video of our apartment. I sighed with disappointment and was about to turn it off when I heard a loud thump from the next bedroom. Another loud thump. And Charlie scratching at Bella’s closed door, whining with her tail down. I shooed her away and knocked hesitantly. “Go the fuck away!” Bella yelled.
“Fuck you too then,” I muttered, and was about to turn around when my phone started ringing. Taking no time to answer Frank’s warning call, I looked to Charlie, who was cowering on the stairs, and then I did something I’d always wanted to do: kicked the door in.
Bella was sitting on the floor in a pool of blood, wearing only a bra and formerly matching panties. It looked like her face was melting off. “I can’t find the right dress for this,” she dejectedly sobbed, and I realized that she’d pulled everything out of the closet.
“This occasion calls for something washable,” I said, and grabbed one of Casey’s shirts from where she’d thrown their clothes on the bed. It was thankfully black, and probably a hand-me-down from Frank to begin with so this wouldn’t be the first time it’d seen blood.
She wailed, “I don’t want to have the baby in that!” and crumpled the rest of the way to the ground, holding her stomach and mopping up some blood with her hair.
“I don’t think that’s something you have to worry about.” I forced it over her head and picked her up, figuring it would be easier on me and quite fitting for her to let her wear it like a straitjacket. It was actually longer than most of the dresses she wore, and naturally her next comment was, “I need shoes.”
I needed Frank. I was nowhere near old enough to deal with this. “They’re in the car.”
“You’re fucking lying.” The tone of her voice made me shift her in my arms so her mouth wasn’t nearly as close to my neck.
“If you’re gonna be a mom you’d better get used to lying.” That seemed to relax her a bit, and I walked carefully down the stairs with all three dogs now at my heels. I slipped my feet into Frank’s extra pair of boots by the front door since I couldn’t exactly put her down anywhere while Kiki was behind me, just waiting for blood to play in.
Thank God I’d gotten the Maserati fixed up so she couldn’t bleed in my Ferrari. I set her in the passenger seat and ran back inside for the keys, taking a moment to breathe and swear and hope that whatever bad feeling Frank had gotten before he called me was really about Bella and not about me passing out and crashing and dying like my parents.
I locked the dogs in the house and hopped in the car, revving the engine more than strictly necessary before backing out. Frank had driven me to this hospital twice, once as a precaution when I pulled a box onto my head while trying to surreptitiously snoop through his stuff, and then again after I passed out following a very stressful Young and the Restless marathon. I’d only been conscious for one of them, but thankfully I remembered that the hospital was just down the street from an amazing bakery I could’ve found by smell alone. Somehow I didn’t have much of an appetite at the moment, though I certainly wouldn’t turn away a well deserved reward for my troubles.
“So…” I started, keeping my eyes on the road instead of looking at her. Bella was making horrible little pained animal noises, and visibly going out of her mind. “What are you gonna name it?”
“Sylvia.” She was shivering, her hand between her legs as if that could stop Sylvia from leaking out of her in a puddle. But she was alarmingly calm.
“What if it’s a boy?”
Bella punched me in the head and I nearly careened into another car. So much for calm. “It’s not a fucking boy!”
Like she would even know. She’d refused to see a doctor, and Casey, the only person who might’ve been able to talk her into it, would never stand up to her long enough to accomplish the task. Instead the two of them had been living in some sort of fantasy world where babies came from storks, playing house in my house, while Frank and I were waiting around for Malkolm to show up so we could go out and kill some people.
I switched on the stereo, and promptly switched it back off again when Casey’s horrific CD started blaring. She growled, “Turn that back on.” There was no point in telling someone who punched me in the head that their choice of music was likely to give me a migraine. Especially not when her version of childbirth was threatening to give me nightmares the rest of my life.
Twenty minutes of sheer torture later, I pulled up behind an ambulance, my head beginning to pound and Bella’s face so pale she looked blue. “Baby time!” I said with a forced enthusiasm, and had just lifted her out of the car when two orderlies came rushing out with a stretcher. I handed her over, and since she seemed barely conscious I figured it was perfectly safe to tell them, “I think she, uh, lost the baby,” at which point young Sylvia took full demonic possession of her mother. Bella started flailing about on the stretcher, kicking and screaming and apparently deciding retirement really wasn’t her thing but killing orderlies certainly was. I took a step back with my hands raised in surrender as several more orderlies came to help haul her and their fallen comrades away.
“And they say homosexuality’s unnatural,” I muttered to myself, wiping my dirty hands on my dirtier pants. I’d finally resumed wearing blue jeans after years of bloodstain-hiding black clothing, and even gotten Frank to branch out into color, and here I was again, looking unprofessional.
Chapter Seventy-Nine
If they’d given Bella a fucking cigarette like she’d fucking asked, there’d be no need for fucking restraints. “Zo you won’t ert yourselv,” the stupid nurse had claimed. Bella knew better. She’d slashed the bitch in the face with her fingernails. If anyone was protected by those restraints, it was that smug French cunt.
Her arms hurt. Her whole body hurt. Why couldn't they just stop the bleeding and leave it alone? Leave him alone. She didn't want a boy. She had five brothers. Dangerous to have boys first. Dangerous to have girls at all. They never wanted a girl. That's where all their problems began. But Bella did. She wanted a little baby girl. She wanted Sylvia with her little Chloé booties. A pink Versace onesie. A tutu.
She felt like she was trembling but she was perfectly still from the drugs they gave her. Painfully still. She pulled at the straps and screamed, “Let me fucking go!” only she didn't scream she couldn't scream. She thought of Casey's painting and started to cry; no one could hear her. Casey couldn't hear her. He wouldn't hear her. He'd be broken and they'd side with him. All of them. She had nothing left after Silva and they'd all side with him and he wouldn't want her anymore because she killed his son. It should've been his daughter. It was never going to be either and Bella should've known that. They never let h
er have what she wanted. And now she wanted Casey. More than anything she wanted Casey. And twenty fucking packs of cigarettes.
“You look radiant.”
She turned her head and there he was like he heard her thoughts, knew that she wanted him and so he came. She shivered and stammered, “Fffucck yourself,” tears sliding down her face.
“That's my girl,” he said with a giant fucking smile. His girl. And he couldn't lie.
Her face crumpled and she sobbed, “I'm sorry.” She should’ve taken those pills. Then Casey would never have to know. Or his mum. Maggie had been so sweet, sending her little presents in the post just like Vincent. Candy and vitamins, and photographs of Casey when he was just born, three times bigger than their baby who died.
“It’s fine, Bella. That one was obviously a dud.” Only Casey would say something like that in a time like this and she laughed, nearly hysterical. “Besides, we wanted a girl.”
“Sylvia.” How could she be dead if Bella knew what she looked like? She could see her. She was wearing couture.
“That's fucking right. Sylvia.” He sat on the edge of the bed and leaned down to kiss her forehead. “Those are some very fashionable straps you're wearing.”
The straps were hideous, uglier than his hat. She had bracelets of bruises from them and she couldn't fucking move. “They think I’m dangerous.”
“Well, doctors are pretty smart. They go to school for a really long time. And you did single-handedly take out half the staff.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out the knife she'd thrown at his head when they got into this mess, determinedly sawing away her unfashionable straps. Casey took her lipstick out of her purse, turning up the tube like an expert. “Here,” he said as he pressed it to her lips. “This should stop you from biting someone at least.”
“No, it won’t,” she and Frankie said at the same time. Bella hadn't even noticed him in the corner of the room. Frankie looked terrified. He was so awful at this sort of thing. Little Vincent was there too. He was covered in blood. Her blood. Or the baby's. “Where are my shoes?” she asked. He shook his head and moved closer to Frank.
“Blot.” Casey held out his sleeve and she pressed it to her lips. His hands smelled faintly of mixed perfumes, and of cigarettes. His fake Rolex was loose on his wrist.
She remembered that first morning, when he held out his watch to her and she refused to even look at it. Refused to acknowledge him. He'd said it was a funny story. “Tell me about your watch.”
“Gideon's watch. He used to have one, a real one, but when his parents cut him off for marrying his first wife, he sold it to buy books. Like six months later, his wife, Elise, bought this one off a street hustler, thinking it was real. She spent more on it than he'd gotten for the other one. He didn't have the heart to tell her. He always said she was a terrible judge of people, that she would've made the absolute worst lawyer, but it was slow and because of that he was never late, so he kept it. He thought I should have it since I'm late all the time, not that it's really helped.”
“You told me it was fast.”
He smiled and shrugged. “It wasn't fast. I just couldn't wait to see you again. Now scoot over.” He lay down beside her and took out fashion magazines from his bag. It was falling apart. His sketchbook could have fallen out. She'd have to get him a better bag but he hadn't brought any men's magazines to look at. There were pages missing from the magazines he did bring. She started breathing heavily, anxious and angry the doctor's would've taken them from her like they took her baby but she realized it had to be Casey. The perfume was on his hands. He must've torn out the pages that might upset her, edited them right out as if they never existed. It was better this way. Better just to smile, and not think of it at all.
Chapter Eighty
While Casey had been nervously pacing the waiting room like an expectant father, Frank had prepared himself for the worst. There was nothing he could've said that would have made the situation bearable, no words of sympathy he could have given to ease Casey's pain. With the amount of blood covering Vincent there was little doubt that the child had perished, but whether or not it would take Bella's life along with it remained to be seen. It should have been a relief when the doctor had finally come, approaching Frank as if he were the father and hesitantly explaining that yes, Bella was alive, but they'd had to restrain her and place a guard on her room for fear that she would cause harm to herself and more harm to others, and could not be trusted near the maternity ward for what they felt were obvious reasons.
He had momentarily forgotten Casey, and had the doctor against the wall, lifted off the ground by the lapels of his obscenely clinical white coat, imagining Bella institutionalized as he had been, driven mad by her loss and even madder by her care. Then Casey had intervened, using Vincent to draw Frank away from the scene while he took charge, smoothing down the doctor's coat to placate him before the authorities were called. And Casey had remained levelheaded through all of it, as though he hadn't heard what the doctor had told them: that his unborn son was dead. Casey had not even flinched. He apologized for the inconvenience of having to hospitalize upwards of a dozen employees, but not as if Bella's attack on the staff had been in any way unwarranted. He had the doctor smiling, nodding in agreement with what he had to say, when Casey demanded to see her immediately.
Frank remembered how Silva had gone to Bella's side after she was hurt, how he joked with her and got her to laugh even as she fought back tears, meanwhile Frank stood by helplessly, incapable of pretending that everything was all right or ever would be again. Silva comforted him as soon as Bella was asleep, and then he had walked to his room and shut the door, and when he emerged five hours later he was a weak old man.
From the moment Frank had that bad feeling, he had known that this would be what destroyed Casey. He watched him with Bella as he'd watched Silva, and he followed Casey out of her room once she was asleep, nodding blankly when Casey asked whether he was okay. Case had set his hand on Frank's shoulder in an almost paternal way, as if to practice the fatherhood that had been stolen from him. The calm finally burst in a rush of tears, and Casey raced down the hall to be out of Bella's earshot when he broke down sobbing.
Holding him there as he wept felt worse than getting shot. He could feel everything that Casey was slipping away from him, and Frank desperately clutched Vincent’s hand, powerless to stop it. He hadn't been able to protect Casey from the world, or to protect Bella from herself. He couldn't protect Vincent at all.
There suddenly came the sound of some preposterous, inappropriately bubbly pop song, and Casey pulled out his phone, glancing at it briefly and taking a deep breath. "It's mom. She's probably in the lobby." He sighed and closed his eyes, keeping his chin up as he wiped away his tears, fanning himself until he no longer looked flushed. Frank had never considered that Casey would've put on a brave face for his mother's sake, but he realized that it must've always been that way, and how hard it must have been for them, for her, to arrive at the point where she would accept Frank without question.
“It would kill her to see me like this,” he said with a smile, and Frank found himself nearly smiling back. Casey had deemed him someone who could handle seeing him cry.
“You're all right,” Frank said, intending for it to be a question but it was a statement of certainty.
Casey nodded, then laughed. “You look so freaked out, tough guy.” He scruffed up Frank's hair as if he'd been the one sobbing in Casey's arms only moments before. “I'm gonna go get her. Will you stay here? Watch Bella for me?”
Frank nodded and he stared after Casey as he walked down the hall, feeling as though something should have changed in the kid, would have changed in anyone else, but seeing no signs of it. He was vaguely aware of Vincent pulling away from him, and only realized how hard he was holding his hand when Vincent finally had enough and brought his heel down on Frank’s foot in retaliation.
Vincent rubbed his hand when they pulled apart, giving a wounded pout th
ough it could not possibly hurt as badly as Frank's newly healed bones being crushed under Frank's own boots. “You want to sit down?”
“Oui,” Frank said, and they sat together with their backs against the wall outside of Bella’s room. They did not hold hands. “You did a good job, V.”
“I thought she was gonna die,” he said, wisely not pretending that Frank was thanking him for re-breaking his foot. “She bled all over her car.”
“At least it wasn’t your car.”
“No kidding. I would’ve made her walk if my car was the only one available.”
He hoped Vincent was joking. It was doubtful.
“Are you okay?”
Once again they were not discussing Frank’s foot. “He seems…upbeat.”
“It’s his gooey marshmallow center.”
“Hungry?”
V shrugged. “I’m not sure if I’ll ever eat again after seeing that.”
Frank gave him some cash for the vending machine. Like Casey, V was back to himself in no time. He even brought some ice, which he was kind enough to let Frank use. But only after it had melted a bit on his sore hand.
Chapter Eighty-One
With love in her heart and an excuse for her disobedience on the tip of her tongue, Sophie Durrant skipped from the metro station to Vincent Sullivan’s apartment. She knew she was supposed to stay away, although she didn’t know why and she didn’t care. Sophie hadn’t seen her beloved in so long, she just couldn’t wait another minute.
She clutched the perfumed love letter to her chest and rang the bell, nervously hoping that no one was home. Especially not Vincent’s dour roommate. She waved to the security camera and rang again just in case, then typed in the code. It didn’t unlock.
Sophie pursed her lips and tried it again. She felt thwarted and suspected that Frank had something to do with this. He was so possessive of Vincent…and strangely affectionate. It drove her mad!
Les Recidivists (Chance Assassin Book 2) Page 40
