Chapter 41 #2
“Fucking try, I dare you,” I growl up close and personal. “Do you even know what I do to pigs like you?”
“I’ve seen him. It isn’t pretty,” Orion muses. “Remember Bob?”
His eyes narrow. “You wanna confess to a murder, boy?”
“I want you to understand … she’s not alone.” I pull out a knife and hold it under his throat. “And I will die for my woman.”
“I admire your tenacity,” he says. “You’d make a fine cop.”
I spit in his face. “The fuck I do. I fucking hate you.”
He stares at me like he’s not impressed or afraid. “You’re in love with her, aren’t you?”
My eyes widen, and I blink a couple of times. “How did you—” I push the knife further into his skin. “Fuck that, it doesn’t matter. You messed with the wrong fuckers. Release her, or I will kill you.”
“Then you won’t get your way, regardless,” he quips.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Orion says.
“If you kill me, you will pull the entire police corps after you.” I don’t like the fucking smirk that’s slowly forming on his face. “So go ahead and try. See where it leads.”
My eye begins to twitch. “Listen here, motherfucker, you know damn well she doesn’t deserve what you did to her.”
“She did that to herself,” he retorts. “Killers don’t get a pass.”
“Then maybe you should’ve taken them down and arrested them, Mr. Justice,” Orion says.
“Trust me, I’m working on it,” he says. “If I’m not being threatened with murder.” He eyes us up and down. “Is she really worth throwing away your life for?”
Blood rolls down his neck as I growl, “I would fucking die for her if she wanted me to.”
“Noble, but foolish,” he replies with a kind of darkness in his voice I haven’t heard before. “Especially considering you were already a hair’s breadth away from being locked up yourself.”
My eyes widen. “What?”
PING.
The doors to the elevator open. Luckily, no one steps out, or I would’ve had to kill them too for witnessing a crime.
Atreus smiles. “Oh … she didn’t tell you? She traded herself for your safety.”
The knife clatters to the floor as my entire body begins to shiver.
“She did what?” Orion mutters.
“She was adamant about protecting you two from the consequences of your very poor choices.” His eyes glimmer. “Seeing as I know you two are involved in all of the murders.”
When I take a step back, Orion grabs his throat and forces him back against the elevator.
“She is a goddess, and we should be thankful she graces us with her presence. And you? You … you take her existence for granted.”
Orion squeezes his veins so tightly that Atreus begins to struggle, and he attempts to fight him off, to no avail. Orion is much stronger than he looks, especially when he hasn’t been drunk in a while.
“You took her from us,” he hisses. “You need to pay for that.”
“You. Won’t. Kill. Me,” he grits.
Orion squeezes even harder as Atreus slowly loses his strength. “You think I can’t do it? You underestimate my need to get back to her.”
“She. Wants. Me. Too.”
As he nearly loses consciousness, Orion releases him from his grip.
“What are you doing? We need to kill him,” I say, picking up my knife.
Atreus coughs and heaves, rubbing his throat. “Because he knows that if he kills me, she’ll never forgive him.”
“She will once she realizes it’ll bring her the freedom she craves,” I say.
“You’ve fallen in love with her,” he says, tilting his head. “You think you’re the only one she’s wrapped around her finger?”
Orion frowns. “You’re saying you love her?”
“I’m saying she managed to crawl under our skin. For better or worse.”
Holy shit. She really has made him fall.
How could a cop like him ever be good enough for a killer woman like her?
He ruined her, destroyed every good thing we had.
“You’re the worst thing that ever happened to her,” I grit.
“Then why did she leave all those lipstick stains on the bodies, hmm?” he says, going up against me.
I meet his gaze with an equally deadly one. “Because she wants people to know her revenge is executed.”
“Because she wanted me to find her.”
Orion and I glance at each other.
“No, that wouldn’t make any sense,” Orion mutters. “Why you?”
“His connections,” I mutter. “All of the evidence in his office. She needed it to find those guys.”
It’s all beginning to click.
The bodies she left lingering around. Her anger at me trying to help her dispose of them. The lipstick. Stalking a cop.
Fuck. He’s right.
“You realize it now, don’t you? She used you two like she used me,” he says. “We are nothing but toys to be discarded once she’s done.”
“No,” Orion says, shaking his head. “I refuse to believe that.”
“Truth is hard to accept when it’s right in front of you, isn’t it?” he says. “But she fooled us all.”
“You’re in love with her too,” I mutter.
This is insane.
A cop.
Fallen for the killer he was supposed to find.
He looks me up and down with disdain.
And he has the audacity to judge us?
I grimace. “You’re no better than us.”
“I’m trying to do the right thing,” he replies.
I grab him by the shirt and lift him up. “Listen to me, you asshole, if you love her as much as we do, you’d free her from jail. Now.”
“Can’t do that, and you know it.”
Grinding my teeth, I say, “Give me one good reason.”
“You think the people of Crescent Vale will accept that?” he rebukes. “There’s been a murder spree across the city, people are scared and they need someone to blame.”
Orion pulls a face like he smells shit, and I don’t blame him. “That’s your reason?”
“She’s a murderer.”
“And? Those fuckers she’s hunting are murderers too. Arrest them.”
“We’re working on it,” he yells.
“Then take one of them instead of her!” I yell back.
“What the fuck did you hope to do here?” he says. “You really wanna kill a cop now?”
“I fucking might,” I retort, still clutching my knife.
“Wait, wait, hold on. Let’s not kill anyone here,” Orion says, rubbing his forehead. “This is a mess, and she’s going to be so upset with us for fighting among ourselves.”
“Fine. You love her? You help her,” I bark at him.
He narrows his eyes. “You think I’m going to abandon my duty?”
I close the gap between us. “She. Needs. You.”
Our foreheads are in contact, but I don’t give a single shit, because he needs to get it through his thick head that he needs to pick a fucking side and stick with it.
“I tried. She refuses to talk,” he says.
“Not. Hard. Enough.”
“Guys …” Orion mumbles. “This is not going to help her.”
“He’s right, you know. You hit an agent of the law.”
“You should be glad that’s all I did to you, after what you did to her,” I growl.
He raises a brow. “Are you done?”
My nostrils flare, and I’m this close to pummeling him into the elevator and sending him to the moon.
I shove him away, and he straightens his jacket.
“You two should be happy you’re still allowed to roam free.”
“Fuck you,” I spit, pointing my knife at him. “You’re lucky you’re still alive.”
“Likewise,” he retorts.
Orion stands between us. “Enough.”
“Are you on his side now?” I balk.
“No. I’m on her side. And she wouldn’t want us to kill each other.”
I suck in a breath. He’s right. Even though I don’t understand, she likes him enough to keep him around. If I killed him now, it would only make her hate me, and that’s the last thing I want.
I lower my knife and sigh out loud. “If you’ve fallen for her… help her.”
I put my trust in Sunny.
She chose him.
For a reason.
It has to work.
Atreus stares me down. “Get out.”
“Find the last one on her list,” I say. “Bring him to her.”
He blinks a couple of times and licks his lips. “Leave, before I arrest you both.”
But there’s something about the way he looks at me that makes me pause. An inkling of resistance disappearing.
Maybe … just maybe …
Orion grabs my coat and drags me with him. “C’mon, let’s get out of here, before shit hits the fan for real. He got the message. Now let’s go.”