28. Cal Walker
I helped Iris clean up the kitchen, feeling more than a little put out that Ryan hadn’t accepted my offer to help him with the service.
He was right. I did have other shit that I should be doing. Ryker’s orders were burning fresh in my inbox, and I really should be spending the day trying to hunt down that man who had been causing all the problems.
However, I didn’t want to. I wanted to spend time with Ryan. I didn’t mind helping him with his job if it meant we got to be together.
Apparently, the feeling wasn’t mutual. Naomi had told me to back off and listen to him if he told me he needed space, and I knew she was right, but… it was hard .
Drying off the last of the dishes, I sighed, and Iris patted my arm gently. I turned to look at her, and she gave me a knowing smile.
“There, there, dear. He’ll come around. Ryan always takes some convincing to walk the path less traveled despite the fact that he is… rather extraordinary. He’s stubborn. Just like his father.”
“My sister said I shouldn’t force myself on him,” I complained, untying the totally boss apron that Iris let me borrow.
Iris chuckled. “While I agree that force is likely not the way to my son’s heart, persistence will be necessary, dearie. Don’t give up. We have been waiting for you for a long time. He will just need some convincing.”
I cocked my head to the side, confused. That wasn’t the first time she had said something like that. I ran my hand over the small lump in my pocket that housed the weird little pouch she had given me when I first met her.
“What do you mean by that?” I asked, but she just gave me a strange smile and floated toward the door.
“My son loves lilies. The flower. If you ever find yourself in a position where you need his forgiveness, consider a nice bouquet.”
And then, she was gone.
Ryan had said I needed to be out of the house before he came back downstairs. He didn’t say anything about being away from the house.
Parking my G-Wagon down the street, I texted Vox, asking him to come help me wire up some monitors in the vehicle.
If I couldn’t help Ryan with the service, then I might as well get some recon done, but I still wanted to be able to keep an eye on my ginger snap while we worked.
Vox arrived and got to work installing some baby monitors that he repurposed for my creepy stalking purposes. I could switch them to rearview and GPS monitors if and when I ever got Ryan’s sexy ass in my car. Until he admitted that we were together, I didn’t want him to know about the live feeds I had installed in his house. I had a feeling he would be mad about it and make me take them down.
In my defense, I had installed them for more serious reasons than watching him jerk it in the shower, though that was obviously a huge bonus. Ryker’s not-so-subtle threat made me nervous, and I wanted to be able to have eyes on him at all times. That way, if anything went down, I could show up to save his ginger ass.
While Vox installed my monitors, I climbed into the front seat with my laptop. I yelped in surprise as something sharp dug into my thigh. Vox cocked an eyebrow at me in question, and I fished the weird pouch Iris had given me out of my pocket. The nail in it had stabbed me in the leg, and I frowned.
Fuck.
Hopefully, I wouldn’t need a damn tetanus shot after this…
I stuffed the pouch in my cup holder before settling into the driver’s seat and firing up my computer.
Ryan’s street slowly filled with cars as people arrived for the funeral, and I watched all the people dressed in black formal attire show up with grim expressions on their faces.
Everyone was so somber but… put together? It felt very clinical. I tried to imagine how I would feel if I showed up at Cass or Naomi’s funeral and shuddered.
I wouldn’t be feeling somber , that’s for fucking sure. I would be losing my fucking mind. How all these people who were coming to grieve a loved one seemed so put together and calm was beyond me.
I supposed everyone was different.
As people filed into Ryan’s house, I got to work digging into the encrypted digital package Damian had sent me.
From what I could gather, we were looking for Ronan Carter. He was a man on a fucking mission. It was clear he was a professional, and based on how easily he had been covering his tracks, it was obvious he was ex-police, at the very least.
The other man, Logan Sutton, didn’t seem to have any police background at all, but he was smart and… creative with his kills. Logan also seemed to be nearly as good with black hat hacking as Vox was, which was going to make my job difficult. It was extremely tough to track hackers. They rarely left a paper trail.
I stared down at Logan’s headshot. Vox had pulled it from the About page on his tattoo shop’s website. He was giving California surfer with a side of serial killer. His dark blond hair curled out of a backwards ball cap and his pretty eyes were blank and void of light. He was hot as fuck. Like a ten out of ten, and also… vaguely familiar. It took me a minute, but I realized after a moment that I’d seen him before.
I’d been sent by Damian to guard some judge who lived in a big fancy house; however, by the time I got there, the dude was already dead. I saw Logan leaving the scene but hadn’t known at the time that he’d been the killer, so I let him go.
Huh.
This whole thing screamed ‘revenge mission.’ They had started with small potatoes, targeting pedophiles.
My gut churned as I realized they were hunting the same types of douchebags I did in my spare time. That fact alone made me hate the fact that I had been assigned to this mission. I didn’t want to kill these guys. I wanted to help them. However, it became clear why Damian wanted them gone as I scrolled deeper into their file.
What I couldn’t figure out was how they were sourcing their targets. If I could work that out, I could likely determine who their next target was going to be, then intercept them and take them out before they could execute.
Vox finished up with my monitors, and I glanced up with a grin, flipping to the viewing room so I could watch my man in action.
He was in a suit, looking absolutely fucking delicious in formal attire. However, the tie he was wearing would look way hotter around his wrists than his neck, in my opinion…
I watched as he mingled with the attendees. It was an open casket, and I frowned as I saw a strange shadow following him around the room as he checked in with guests.
His back was stiff, and he seemed more uptight than usual, and he kept brushing off the strange shadow that no one else seemed able to see.
“What do you think that is?” I asked Vox, pointing to the dark spot on the monitor. He frowned and fiddled with the wiring in an attempt to correct the screen.
“I don’t know, man. I don’t think it’s the hardware. It’s almost like he’s interacting with it or something…” I said when none of Vox’s tinkering made a difference.
Vox leaned back, his brow creased as we watched the odd phenomenon. The more I watched, the more frantic Ryan seemed to become.
He was rushing (in his controlled Ryan way) to do what I would have assumed were several people’s jobs. He was greeting guests, showing them the way through the house while also doing his best to mingle in the viewing room. At one point, he hurried out to the garage to get the hearse ready, and I tongued my lip ring anxiously.
Didn’t he have anyone to help him? Why was he doing all this by himself? Where was Theo?
Ryan told me he didn’t want my help… but it was starting to get hard to watch. The final straw was when a woman grabbed him by the arm, and his entire body locked up with anxiety.
The strange shadow next to him seemed to flicker violently while this woman was clearly berating him… What was this lady’s fucking problem?
I told myself it was nothing. Ryan could handle it. He did this every day… he didn’t need my help.
However, I lost it when the lady pointed a finger in his face, and it became clear that she was straight-up yelling at him.
I would fucking kill her.
“I’m going in.” I snarled, and Vox gave me an amused look, shaking his head.
“What!?” I asked, and he just shrugged, the corner of his mouth quirking up.
“Whatever. Stay here. I’ll be back in a bit,” I ordered, hopping out of the wagon. I would just make sure he was ok and tell whoever that bitch was to back the fuck off… politely, of course.
Yeah. I would politely let her know that there was room for two in that pretty coffin if she touched my man again.