He licked his lips when they became parched.
He could still feel the foreign sensation that had soothed him while he made her breakfast the following morning, and the all too familiar sensation that had wrecked him when he’d realized she was gone.
Slamming his eyes shut, he covered his forehead with his hand, stunned that it was damp.
A long silence fell in, and he knew it wasn’t just Latika giving him the eye at that point but both of them.
He refused to give either of them the satisfaction of seeing the sweat collecting on his forehead, or even a passing glance.
Then a soft, whispered, “Happy Fourth of July, everybody.”
And her scent faded.
His heart fell to his feet.
“Happy Fourth of July, sweetness,” Latika said. “Have a good night.”
Gage clenched his fists and sucked in a breath, turning toward Veda, whispering, “Happy Fourth of Jul—”
But she was already gone, hurrying out of the automatic glass doors of the entryway with her arms cradled tight around her body.
Gage jolted. He almost followed her, but something stopped him from moving forward. He pushed his hands in his pockets as he appreciated her backside. It looked as soft in her blue scrubs as it’d felt under his greedy fingers the night she’d let him have her.
Their first and only time.
His breathing came faster, harder.
He faced Latika.
Her knowing eyes studied him over the rims of her glasses, lips puckered.
Gage held up a hand. “Don’t—”
“Mmmmmhmmmmm.”
—
Tonight was the night.
Tonight, on the Fourth of July, in the middle of Shadow Rock Hotel’s rooftop nightclub, with fireworks lighting up the sky and house music blasting, Veda Vandyke was finally going to kill Todd Lockwood.
No distractions. No excuses. No exceptions.
It was a 21+ club, so Coco wouldn’t be there to screw everything up with her doe eyes and saccharine smiles, and Gage was nowhere to be seen either. With those two out of the picture, Veda’s sanity had made a swift rebound, one step closer to getting what she came for.
To silencing the demons in her heart. To being free from the emotional cage she’d been locked in for years. To the next animal she’d put to rest.
One step closer to her number two.
But for now, as she waggled her body to the pounding music that shook the floors, she remained focused on her number one.
The bitter tang of vodka still warmed her tongue from the sole drink she’d consumed.
Just one.
Just enough to take the edge off, loosening her up so she could pull the trigger, but not so much alcohol that she’d be too intoxicated to pull it off.
In the middle of the dance floor, scantily clad bodies gyrated all around her. The echo of talking and laughter joined and blended in with the music. Spotlights flew, but they were no match for the colorful fireworks exploding in the starry sky above.
Veda threw her head back and let her eyes flutter shut as the vodka warmed her veins. She breathed in the scent of the ocean, which seemed to be present in every corner of Shadow Rock Island.
Her head fell and she looked down at her body, whirling to the beat of the music. The silver mini dress she wore sparkled under the pyrotechnics and zooming strobe lights. Her muscled thighs contracted as she swayed.
In her right hand, hanging from the tips of her American flag manicured nails, was the vial she hadn’t yet been able to utilize.
But that would all change tonight. That would all change in seconds because, right in front of her, completely unaware of her presence, Todd Lockwood also moved along with the music, his back turned to her. His right arm was locked around the neck of a lithe blonde woman, grinding his crotch into her ass.
In his left hand, hanging at his side, was the red cocktail he’d been nursing all night.
A week earlier, at Dante’s Bar, she’d noticed Todd never sat his drink down or let it leave his hand. That was still true tonight, but as Veda watched him burying his nose in the blonde woman’s hair, presumably whispering demeaning things in her ear, her eyes were riveted to the plastic glass hanging from his fingers.
A glass he hadn’t let go of, but had taken his eyes off.
Veda felt like the explosions in the starry sky had relocated to her heart as she popped the top off the vial in her trembling fingers, eyes locked to Todd’s glass.
Just as she stepped forward, fingers itching to empty that vial into his exposed drink, something froze her in mid-step.
She didn’t know why, but her eyes shot up to the gothic staircase at the far corner of the rooftop. They climbed the winding rails and each step that glowed with white lights. Her eyes ran the railing all the way to the upper level, where only the VIPs were allowed to stand. Shadow Rock’s elite all lined that railing, observing the minions partying below.
When Veda’s eyes landed on Gage, leaning against that railing in a black T-shirt, black leather jacket, and dark washed jeans, Veda understood.
She understood why some unknown force had stolen her focus, forcing her eyes up that staircase.
She understood because it had become impossible to deny.
Whenever she and Gage Blackwater shared a room, even when they weren’t speaking, even when they were actively avoiding each other, something always pulled her eyes to him.
Always.
Tonight was apparently no exception, and Veda cursed under her breath when the sight of him made her jolt and nearly drop the vial. She looked down to make sure it was still safe, damning her body as it went into overdrive, her heart pounding like she’d taken a hit of one of the many drugs that had been passed around the saturated party all night.
Her eyes flew back up to the railing, and she held her breath when she found Gage looking right back at her.
And she felt it. Whatever it was that stained his eyes as his gaze locked on hers from above. It entered her and tied her insides in knots. Even from the dance floor, she saw the muscle in his jaw roll. He didn’t acknowledge her outside of that intense stare, but he didn’t have to.
Veda waited for him to look away, because she knew she wouldn’t be able to.
He didn’t.
When the act of dancing and tolerating the butterflies fluttering to life in her stomach became impossible to do all at once, Veda moved into a simple two-step. She probably looked ridiculous, two-stepping on a dance floor full of people going all-out, busting the most sexual and complicated moves they could think up, arms high in the sky as they celebrated their nation’s birthday, but Veda simply couldn’t do both.
When Gage was looking at her like that, she couldn’t do anything but stop, stare, allow her body to react, and wait for the chaos to pass. Kind of like a charley horse. She felt the unbearable ache coming, knew it would be terrible, but there was nothing she could do to stop it. It was completely out of her control. All she could do was lie on the floor and wait for it to be over.
And all she could do right then was endure the fire Gage sent ablaze inside her until he finally looked away, or it slowly extinguished on its own.
His eyebrow hitched. What felt like a lifetime passed with his eyes latched to hers. He twirled a glass in his hands; whatever shot of amber liquid sitting inside it swiveled. The firecrackers blazing through the sky lit up his face, and Veda couldn’t decide if he looked angry, annoyed, turned on, or all three.
But she couldn’t look away.
She hadn’t even realized that she’d stopped dancing completely—not even a two-step—until a woman came up next to Gage and locked her slender arms around his.
The air left Veda’s lungs. The butterflies in her stomach died a rapid death, plummeting to her silver high-heeled feet. Her arms and shoulders collapsed. The vial tapped against her thigh.
She recognized the red-haired woman whispering in Gage’s ear.
His bride-to-be.
Veda cursed under her breath at the feeling shooting through her. Was she that much an idiot? That big a simp? Had she really allowed a taken man to derail her focus so much that she’d nearly let him ruin her plan with just one smoldering look?
Her heated eyes fell back on Todd, drink still at his side, nose still buried in the blonde’s hair, still oblivious to the fate that awaited him.
She looked up one last time. Gage and his fiancée were no longer there. Her eyes searched the staircase and the dance floor, but they were nowhere in sight.
Good.
Now that Gage’s eyes were no longer ripping through her, she breathed easier, her objective crystal clear once more. She stepped forward, close enough that the wind made her curls brush against the back of Todd’s light pink button-down shirt. He didn’t notice her nearness, since nearness was a certainty on an overcrowded dance floor like that one. To him, she was just another club-goer having the time of her life, probably too inebriated to realize she was brushing against a complete stranger.
But Veda wasn’t inebriated.
She was crystal clear as she brought the vial from her side and let it linger over the rim of his drink. When she tipped it just enough to empty its contents inside. And as she dropped the vial to the ground and stepped back, checking her surroundings to make sure she hadn’t been seen.
She hadn’t.
She watched Todd’s drink obsessively, waiting for him to take the first swallow.
One swallow would be all it took.
The poison would enter his veins and hang out quietly for hours. He wouldn’t even realize anything was wrong. Then, gradually, he’d begin to feel off balance. Uneven. Lethargic. Veda knew this was his fifth cocktail of the night, so he’d likely narrow the nauseating feeling down to intoxication. One drink too many. He wouldn’t feel panicked at something being out of the ordinary, and therefore wouldn’t be moved to visit the emergency room. By the time the venom began weakening his immune system, he would probably be fast asleep. And by the time the coroner did a screening, all traces of the toxin would have already left his system.
A small smile bloomed on Veda’s face as she anticipated his first swallow. She raised her hands over her head and began grinding to the music, with more feeling that time. She swiveled her hips and circled Todd, wanting to see his face. She wanted to witness him taking the chug that would end his life slowly.
Just like he’d slowly ended her.
Neither he nor the blonde noticed her as she danced up beside them. They were too entrenched in what some would call ‘dancing’ and what others would call ‘fucking with their clothes on’ to be aware of anyone else.
The blonde swiveled around to face Todd, her long hair flying as she held his jaw, never missing a beat in her gyrating hips.
“Buy me a drink!” Veda read the blonde’s lips. “I’m thirsty!”
With a smirk, eyes smarmy, Todd lifted the glass from his side, offering it to the blonde.
The gasp that ripped through Veda’s chest was loud enough to overpower both the pounding music and the crackling fireworks.
The blonde had barely wrapped her fingers around the glass Todd offered before Veda reached out and slapped it from his hand.
Todd jolted and the blonde screamed as the cup went flying, red liquid soaring high into the sky. It joined the firecrackers that were coincidentally the same fire-red hue before spraying back down on them like a rainstorm, staining Todd’s pink shirt and the blonde’s white dress.
“Oh my fucking God!”
“What the fuck!” Todd and the blonde both screamed, holding their hands out at their sides as the sticky red liquid drenched their skin, destroyed their clothes, and dripped down from their hair.
Their horrified eyes flew to Veda at the same time.
Veda’s sputtered, shoulders by her ears, hands clamped into fists at her cheeks, and her own eyes filled with shock as she tried to think up something—anything—to say.
Nothing came.
“What the fuck was that?” the blonde wailed, shooting daggers with her eyes, her slim, milky arms still held high at her sides. She surveyed her white dress, appearing on the verge of tears. “Oh my God, this is a two-thousand-dollar dress!”
Todd’s anger gleamed in the hot slits of his eyes, but as he glowered at Veda, visibly on the verge of his own rant, those eyes suddenly widened.
Veda saw it. Recognition.
Todd bared his teeth and reached out to her in a flash, taking Veda’s arm in a fierce hold, yanking her forward. “You crazy bitch.”
The hair on the back of Veda’s neck stood on end as his blue eyes burned into hers. Her blood went ice-cold when he tightened his fingers around her forearm to the point of pain.
“Are you going to come for me, bitch?”
Veda swallowed back the bile climbing up her throat over and over, praying that he finished before she was unable to control it anymore. The slapping of their skin filled the air, joining the cackles of his friends as his moans turned to grunts.
He clapped his hand around her forearm as the heat of his seed filled her, scalding her untouched walls. He tightened his hold so fiercely Veda worried he might split her arm in two, just like he’d split her center.
“Let go of me.” Veda showed her own teeth, tears stinging her eyes, filling them to the brim and spilling down her cheeks as she attempted to yank her arm from his grasp. But he was too strong, the 23 on his wrist flexing as he tightened his hold, entrenching her in that ugly place, shooting her back to that dark night. A scream split her throat as she thrashed, trying to reclaim her arm. “Let go of me!”
When Todd suddenly released her, Veda’s vision had already been blinded by her tears. She cupped her throbbing arm, blinking them away, her chest heaving in shock.
As the tears spilled down her cheeks and her vision cleared, she realized Todd hadn’t released her at all.
A massive hand locked around his neck, face beet-red as the air was stolen from his lungs, Todd’s stunned blue eyes searched Gage’s face just as he tightened his grip.
“Don’t you ever put your fucking hands on her again,” Gage seethed. “Have you lost your goddamn mind?”
Veda covered her thundering heart with her hand. Then she and the blonde both reached for Gage, whose face had gone so tight and crimson with fury that Veda barely recognized him.
“Gage, stop!” The blonde tried to put herself between Gage and Todd.
Gage didn’t even notice her, squeezing his fingers around Todd’s neck even more, tensing until his friend wheezed.
Veda came to her toes, clapping a hand on Gage’s bicep, flexed so tightly she wondered if the boulder under her trembling fingers was going to rip right through his leather jacket.
The moment her fingers brushed his arm, something cracked in Gage that hadn’t cracked with the blonde. He snapped his head toward her, meeting her eyes.
Veda’s stomach tightened at what she saw. A nudity, a sightlessness, an expression so vacant of anything but blind fury she felt like she was looking at a different person.
“I’m okay,” she whispered, hearing the out-of-control vibration of her own stunned voice, feeling the tears that had dried and stiffened her cheeks. “Gage, it’s okay.”
Gage didn’t relent, still clasping Todd’s neck so tightly it prompted Todd to grab the lapels of his leather jacket. He tugged, silently begging for release. Still, even as he struggled, Todd didn’t retaliate physically.
Holding Veda’s eyes, his entire body shaking, Gage released Todd, shoving at his neck until he went flying into the oblivious crowd still dancing around them.
Veda sucked in her first breath in minutes, as if she were the one who’d been choking. Her wet eyes grew larger, following Gage as he straightened, yanking at the flaps of his jacket, fixing it on his broad shoulders. He suddenly seemed ten times tal
ler, ten times wider, ten times more threatening than he ever had before.
Veda found herself stumbling backward, away from him, covering her mouth with both hands. Her wide eyes searched his just as his fiancée came up next to him, her blue eyes exploding with concern. The woman grabbed his arm, shaking him, but it took another moment for Gage to break his gaze from Veda and look down at her. She reached up and caressed his jaw with one hand, whispering.
Whatever words she spoke made the muscle that still pulsated under Gage’s jaw relax. He held her frantic eyes for a moment before lifting his own eyes to the crowd.
Veda understood.
He was worried someone had seen him. Noticed his outburst.
Veda watched his fiancée whisper more, saw Gage visibly relax with each word she said, returning him to the man they all knew.
Seeing him brought back to his true self by someone who wasn’t her, however, made Veda move away faster. Away from his fiancée’s delicate hand, still clutching his jaw. Away from his eyes, calming rapidly under whatever soothing words she was saying.
Veda turned her back on the sight and elbowed her way through the crowd, moving as fast as she could until she found herself at the exit, throwing it open and racing toward the elevators at the end of the hall, desperate to be on the building’s first level.
Desperate to get her feet on the ground.
Desperate for escape.
7
Gage hadn’t smoked in years. Not since he’d watched his late grandfather breathe his last strangled, squawking, rasp-fueled breath, his charred lungs struggling even as they gave out.
But tonight.
Oh, tonight.
Quiver (Revenge Book 1) Page 10
