by Lake, Keri
Every word sounded okay in my head, but somehow my mouth moved one step behind my head.
'The fuck?
A rush of adrenaline beat through my veins, as thoughts of her naked body danced through my mind, taunting me. I needed one touch of her. One quick fuck to get her out of my system, and I’d be good. I’d never touch her again. Never dream of her sweat-slicked back arching against me, with every thrust up into her.
Goddamn, I was losing my mind over the woman.
Where the hell is she?
With whole lot of concentration, I made my way to the kitchen and, finding it as empty as every other room in the place, floundered haphazardly back to the bedroom. “Mia Luce!”
My brain took the scenic route, making a slow sweep of the bed that turned into the walls spinning before my eyes, and I fell back, the soft mattress catching me. Rolling onto my stomach shot that warm lilac scent straight to my brain, calming my muscles. Filling my mind with thoughts of summer nights, the window cracked, and slow languid movements of her body arching into me while her screams beat against my skull. I wanted to lose myself in those sounds.
My life was a turbulent storm, and she sat in the center of it, in the calm, making me forget the chaos that swirled all around me. I needed that calm, to own it, if only for one night.
Smashing my face into her pillow, I sucked in deep breaths and a quiet growl of possessiveness rumbled in my chest as the world slipped into blackness.
32
Lucy
Call me judgmental, but nothing raised the hairs on a woman’s perfectly waxed body like riding public transportation at night. The man sitting across from me, dressed in rags, with his bones popping through his dark and cracked skin, looked like he hadn’t eaten a meal in days, and I shrank into myself as he eye-fucked me while licking his chops.
During the day, I’d have flipped him the bird, but something about night added a layer of vulnerability to my already-crumbling protective coating. My skin crawled, as he reached between his legs and squirmed against the seat.
As soon as the bus came to a stop I stood up, already dreading the two blocks I’d have to walk to Craig’s house. He didn’t live in as horrible a neighborhood as Jolana, as it was closer to downtown, but that didn’t stop the creepers from crawling out of the woodwork and looking to feed on some unsuspecting woman who was down to her last five bucks. I didn’t even have a cellphone, or a set of keys to slide between my knuckles, as I exited the bus, with the man who’d sat across from me not far behind.
I upped the pace as much as I could in Jase's clunky boots, which thunked the pavement like a physically challenged horse, and tucked my hands into my pockets, aware of every dilapidated house I passed in my periphery. I knew how to throw a punch, but the thought of having to defend myself was exhausting, and the knots weaving inside my stomach told me the skinny guy from the bus could probably take me down. Where a true fighter might’ve gotten a rush from adrenaline, I often found myself fatigued by it.
The thump of his boots trailed after me, getting closer. “Miss!” he called out after me. “Hey, Miss!”
My stomach muscles tightened, and a rush of furious heat flushed my cheeks. How was it that I could survive a break-in at my apartment? A kidnapping. Two men storming into the room, filling the place with bullet holes, and still be hounded by the emaciated motherfucker?
I stopped in my tracks and spun around before he reached me. “Hey,” I said, accosting him in a moment of sheer madness. “I got a question for ya.”
He froze in place, not saying a word, and I marched forward until I was no more than a few feet away from him.
Shrugging, I tucked my hands in my jacket pockets. “I, um … I saw you looking at me on the bus.”
An amused chuckle ended with a nod of his head, and that tongue swept his lips again. “Yeah, I was—”
“I, uh … I’ve never done this before, but … see, I was just diagnosed with a raging and highly resistant strain of the HIV. The doctors give me a week at best. I’m out trolling for, you know, one last hurrah, and just … I don’t know. You wanna hook up?”
“Whoa.” He threw his hands in the air, taking a step back. “I was just asking if you had some change for a coffee.”
“A coffee? It’s almost ten o’clock at night.”
“Sleeping on the street, you know, it gets cold.”
“How the hell did you afford the bus fare?”
He threw a thumb over his shoulder, as if the bus was still sitting behind him. “Sam lets me ride for free, so long as I don’t mess with the folks on the bus. I wasn’t tryna mess with you. Just wondered if you had some spare change, is all.”
A coffee. Damn. I dug into my pocket and pulled out the five, all I had left after I’d grabbed a bag of chips and water from a gas station earlier, but I handed it to him.
He lifted the cash and nodded, his palms together as if I’d answered a prayer. “You want some company, might wanna head on up to six mile.” Nodding his head, he shoved the money into his mass of ragged clothes. “These streets ain’t no place for a girl to be roaming around at night by herself, though.”
My jaw remained slack as I still tried to process what the hell I was doing. “Thanks. I’m … gonna stop in and see a friend.”
“Bless you. And take care o’ you’re sickness, huh? Keep praying.”
“I’ll do that.” Letting out a sharp exhale, I turned around and headed toward Craig’s, with five less dollars to my name.
* * *
I knocked on the door, counting down five-second intervals between, and alternated with the ringing of the doorbell. When the door finally swung open, I pushed my way past Craig, into the living room, and paced.
“I know what you’re going to say, and believe me, I feel really bad, so before you take me on a ride to Guilt City, hear me out. I’m not getting the fuck out of your house tonight, and I didn’t have a cellphone on me for the last couple weeks, so whatever ass-chiding you have cocked in the back of your throat right now, just cap it, because I’m having a really shitty night.” I took a deep breath. “Okay, go.”
His mouth fish-gaped, as he tucked his hands into the pockets of his robe. “I got nothin’.”
I eyed his terry-cloth robe and fleece clog slippers. “Nice threads. Have you decided to go straight and take up with a herd of leather-clad lady rabbits?”
“Are you answering the ad I placed, or…?”
I broke into a quiet laugh and fell back onto his couch, relieved to be back in the land of the familiar.
“But while we’re on the topic of life changes, where the fuck have you been for the last couple weeks?”
“Craig, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” I rubbed my hands through my hair. “Can I crash here? Just a couple of days. I promise I won’t … give you cramps, or whatever.”
A smile stretched his lips. “I think the phrase you’re looking for, Webster, is cramp my style.”
I waved him on. “You know what I meant. I never asked you … did you hear back from your cop friend?”
“Yes. I left two messages on your voicemail.”
“Didn’t have my phone, remember?”
“They didn’t find a body.”
In my half-exhausted state, having been up most of the crazy ass night, his words almost didn’t register. “Wait … what?” Didn’t find the body? “How could they miss it? It was … well, it was unmissable. You told him it was in the basement, right?”
“Sump pit? Yes. I told him everything you told me. All they found was some vaporizer with drugs in it.” He frowned. “Come to think of it … was it yours? You were acting kind of …” His finger twirled at his ear.
“No, it wasn’t mine,” I said, unamused. “And I’m not crazy. I know what I saw, Craig. I have the freakin’ video!”
“Well, that might’ve helped. Perhaps you should send it in?”
“I can’t.” My beloved camera happened to be in Jase’s car. “Besides, how the hel
l do you just anonymously send a video? I was trespassing, if you’ll recall.”
“They have an anonymous tip line, ya know. Or you could always slip the SD card in the mail.”
I nodded, my body so weak, I couldn’t even process the options he’d just given me. “Are you going to let me stay, or what?”
“Of course. You can stay as long as you need to.”
Which wouldn’t be long at all, if I could help it. I didn’t know if anyone happened to be hot on my trail, and didn’t need to put the only sane friend I had left at risk. “Thanks.” I smiled, curling my legs up into my body. “Any chance you could drive me to my apartment tomorrow? I just gave my last five bucks to a dude I threatened to give HIV to.”
The expression on his face teetered between confusion and repulsion. “Is … is that why you’ve been—?”
“No.”
“In that case, yes. I’ll drive you.”
“Thanks, Craig. You’re the best.” I snuggled myself into my coat, where Jase’s scent clung to the fabric and lulled me into a relaxed state. Warmth swallowed me, when Craig pulled a blue and purple afghan up onto my body, and I let out a relaxed sigh. “By the way,” I said on a yawn, “if there happens to be caution tape at my place tomorrow, just ignore it, okay?”
He slowly backed away from me, brows still pinched together. “Are you doing crack? I’m not judging, it’s just … everything would make so much more sense, if you were.”
“No. But if you’ve got some, I’ll take it.”
33
Detective Matt Burke
Detective Burke crouched beside the body, which lay in a pool of blood that’d seeped into the matted, brown shag-carpet of the Lone Pine motel room. The victim’s throat had been slit, and judging by the way his hands had stiffened with rigor mortis while gripping at his neck, he’d been left to bleed out until he died.
The coroner sat across from Burke, examining a second body that appeared to have been shot multiple times. Forensics gathered evidence, while the photographer snapped photos, bouncing around the investigator like a fly he wanted nothing more than to reach out and swat.
Rising up from his squat, Burke crossed over the room to a heavy-set woman, who stood chain-smoking just beyond the perimeter they’d set up outside of the motel room. She must’ve been in her fifties, going by the depth of her crows' feet and her over-dyed blonde hair.
“You said these two claimed to be police officers looking for a missing girl?” he asked.
Her body trembled, the ash of her cigarette flaking to the ground. “Yup. Said they was looking for a young girl who’d gone missing. They described her, and I was pretty damn sure it was the girl I seen comin’ and goin’ from this room.”
“Coming and going?”
“Well, she was with a man.”
“And do you have a name?”
She shook her head. “Paid in cash. We rent the rooms by the hour here. Don’t ask for no names, unless they pay with a credit card.”
“Brilliant. So, can you describe the man who was with her?”
“Well, yeah. He was … young guy. Tall. Real handsome face.” She gestured to her own face, making Burke’s lip twitch. “Big guy. Must’ve been a body builder.”
“A body builder,” he repeated. “And these men, what made you think they were cops? They have a badge? Some identification?”
“Well …” She shook her head, waving a hand in the air. “Look, I gotta daughter. When I hear a girl’s in trouble, I act first and ask questions later.”
Burke glanced back at the macabre inside the motel room. “And yet, we don’t know the condition of the girl at the moment.”
Her hand shot to her hip. “You sayin’ this is my fault?”
“Of course not. The girl, can you give me a brief description?”
The woman shrugged. “Pretty, I guess. A bit small for him.”
“Small for whom?”
“Well, the man.” She took a long drag of the cigarette and blew the smoke out of the corner of her dried lips. “Too dainty-lookin’ for a big guy like that.”
“Right. So sort of pretty and small.” He jotted her comments, mostly in mocking. “Hair color, build?”
“Average build. Dark hair. I didn’t get a good look. They just said they was looking for a young girl, 'bout early-twenties, with long dark hair. She’s the only one I seen here.”
Scrolling through the notes he’d taken earlier, and the ones he’d corroborated with the police who’d first arrived on the scene, he scratched his chin. “You said this was sometime after midnight, correct?”
“Yep. I didn’t see the guy’s car parked out front like usual. I thought he wasn’t home. Thought the room was empty.”
“What kind of car was it?”
Her cheeks puffed, eyes wide. “Well, it was black. Old muscle car. Can’t say what model, but sure was pretty.”
Perfect. No name. No cameras. Nothing. Place must’ve been the only motel in the city that operated like something out of the middle ages. “All right. Thanks.” Burke would have to wait for forensics to give him something more.
As he stood jotting down his notes, a hand gripped his shoulder, and he glanced up to see Anderson jerking his head toward the parking lot, signaling him to follow.
Once across the lot, the two investigators congregated beneath the overhang of the adjacent set of rooms.
Tugging a cigarette from his pocket, Anderson eyed Burke then lit his smoke, inhaling two quick puffs. “We need to keep this under wraps.” His voice had deepened with the captive drag of his cigarette, which he blew to the side. “This gets on the news, this guy will go into hiding, and we won’t find them.”
“From what I’ve seen, this looks like self-defense. Two men claiming to be cops busted into their room. Shots were fired. Both men appeared to be armed.”
“Then, why didn’t they stick around? Call us themselves? It was the fuckin’ neighboring room that put in a call, that they heard screams and gunshots.”
Ignoring the questions, Burke shook his head. “You can’t keep the news from reporting shit, Anderson.”
“No, but we can keep shit from the news. I’ll have a talk with that witness. I say we keep this low key and let the guy bubble to the surface on his own. You put too much shit out there, you’ll have every fuckin’ Justice League wannabe admitting to the crime.”
Burke pulled his sleeve up and tapped his wrist. “Did you happen to catch that both bodies had the same tattoo? Could be a gang, or a cult. Might be Seven Mile Crew’s new fuckin’ logo, or some shit.”
“All the more reason to keep this low key. If it is a gang, we might have ourselves a little turf war going on.” He flicked his cigarette to the ground, stamping it into the grass. “The most important thing right now, is tracking down that girl.”
34
Jase
A rich, smoky scent invaded my nose and hit the back of my mouth. Squeezing my eyes shut, I buried my face in the pillow, to block out the light beating at my eyelids, and stretched, my hand patting an empty spot on the bed beside me.
Fuck.
Lifting my head brought the disappointing reality into focus, and I let out a sigh, falling into the pillow once more.
“Looking for someone?”
In one quick breath, I reached for my Glock on the nightstand, racked the chamber, and aimed it in the direction of the voice.
Roman sat smoking his cigar in a chair at the foot of the bed, legs crossed, and casually raised his hands in the air. “Easy now.”
“'The fuck are you doing here?”
“Did you think that, after handing off a quarter million dollars, I wouldn’t be checking up on you at some point?”
I lowered the gun, huffing at the intrusion, and sat up in bed, rubbing the lingering hangover out of my temple. “How’d you find me?”
“Nothing escapes my attention.” Roman probably had connections to the Bojanskis. “Have you made any progress on the identity of Pasák?”<
br />
I rubbed my hand back and forth over my skull. “I have someone in mind.”
“Who?”
“Name’s Viktor. Owns Sphinx.”
“Yes, I’m familiar with him. Do you think that someone as crafty as Pasák would have such a belligerent appearance? Viktor fails to hide that he’s a very active member of the underground scene.”
“Did it ever occur to you that Pasák might not be all that smart?” Drawing my legs up, I rested my elbows on my knees. “You’re giving this guy credit for being mysterious and elusive, and he might just be right under your nose.”
“Perhaps.” He puffed the cigar, blowing a thick cloud of smoke into the air. “Were you looking for someone when you woke?”
I cleared my throat, rubbing a hand down my face while trying to ignore the pang of remorse that churned in my stomach for having kicked her out. “No.”
“Really. Because I could’ve sworn I heard you call for a Lucia. Or rather, mia Luce.”
“You probably hear a lot of things you shouldn’t, if you have a habit of sneaking in peoples' bedrooms while they sleep.”
His jaw shifted. “Who is she to you?”
“No longer a distraction, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“How so?”
“I kicked her out.”
“Is that right?”
“She’s not coming back. Trust me.”
His fingers of one hand curled into a fist. “What if I told you that the men you’re after happen to be after her, as well?”
“I’d say it’s not my problem. I gave her a chance, and she walked.” Regardless, I’d be going after her ass, since I’d come to the painful realization that I didn’t like her being gone. I didn't intend to tell him that, though.
“And so, at this point, you have no idea where she is?”
“None.”
If I had to guess, she’d probably gone to visit her friend, or landed back at her apartment. Either way, I didn’t need Roman going after her. She already had enough assholes on her tail, including me just as soon as I got rid of Roman. The woman drove me nuts, especially with her absence, and if anything happened to her, I’d probably end up doing something really fucking stupid.
