Chapter 3
She’s about to lie.
I’m not sure if she knows it, but I do. She’s tucked the tiny corner of her mouth between her teeth. It’s her tell.
“Put it down.” She presses her hands against the countertop of the narrow island separating the kitchen from the living room and tries to glare at me.
She’s trying to intimidate me. Cute.
It’s a failed attempt. She’s as clueless as I am about how this loaded gun found its way into her apartment. It’s not that she couldn’t purchase a gun, but not this one.
“Where did you get this?”
She reaches beneath her glasses to rub her eyes. A heavy sigh escapes her.
“I didn’t get it anywhere. My brother mentioned having left something here, maybe that’s it.”
“Maybe this is it?” My eyes might actually fall out of my skull and roll across the floor; this woman exasperates me to no end.
“It doesn’t make sense, though.” She turns her back on me and goes to where she dropped her purse by the door as she continues. “He needed my key to come back here to get something he left, and I sure as hell would have noticed that thing when I made my coffee this morning, so it wasn’t that.”
I watch her tap on her phone, then put it to her ear.
“I mean, a loaded gun. Seriously.” She shakes her head and walks several more steps to the bookcase in the corner of the room.
Obviously, she’d like for me not to hear this conversation, but that’s not going to happen. Taking the weapon with me, I cross the small living area.
It’s a cozy set up with a television set crammed between several bookcases. A long coffee table, topped with two jarred candles on a quilted runner sits between the television and the couch, which is pushed against the half wall dividing the living room from the kitchen.
“Keith. Call me back as soon as you get this. I found something I’m sure belongs to you.” She ends the call after leaving the message then taps on her phone again, leaving the same message for her other brother, Joey.
When she turns back around, she jumps, not having heard me approaching her.
“Your brothers generally walk around with these types of guns?” I question her.
“It’s just a gun, right?”
Just a gun. My teeth are going to break if my jaw tenses anymore.
“No. It’s not just a gun. This is a Glock 18.” I turn the weapon and point to the telling marker. “This tab behind the rear sight is a selector switch.”
She does her best to keep her expression bland, like nothing I’m telling her is provoking in any way.
“It’s a fully automatic weapon. This magazine only holds eleven bullets, but there are mags that hold up to thirty-three.” I tighten my grip. “It’s an illegal gun. Where would your brothers have gotten it?”
“Who said they have anything to do with this?” She breezes past me as though she’s bored with this subject and would like to move on to something new.
“You did.” I point out. “You said they probably left it behind. Do they normally leave fully automated illegal weapons in your kitchen?”
I knew those little pricks were trouble the first time I saw them.
Aside from the fact they carry themselves like low level street thugs, they show up at all hours of the day or night banging on Maxine’s door.
There’s been numerous complaints to the landlord about it.
If he wasn’t such a lazy piece of shit, he’d probably get around to evicting her over it.
“It’s really none of your business.” She puts her hand out to me, palm up. “Just give that to me and you can go.”
“Who do your brothers work for?”
“I don’t get involved in their jobs.” She drops her hand back to her side. “I’m sure you’re used to doing whatever you want whenever you want, but you should go. I’m inside my apartment, thank you for your help, but I think you should leave.”
“Why?” I take a small step in her direction.
Does she realize she keeps chewing on the inside of her bottom lip? She’s doing her best to keep her expression neutral, but she has too many tells for it to work.
“Because I just got home from work. I’m tired. I’m hungry. And all I want to do is rot on the couch the rest of the night.”
The couch she mentions looks as beat up as the rest of this neighborhood. The cushions are flat and there are several thin tears in one armrest. Probably where the demon cat exercises her claws.
“Seems an easy thing then; simply tell me where your brothers might have gotten this, and I’ll leave you to your night of entertainment.”
“I don’t know. I don’t ask them questions.”
“You don’t ask them questions you don’t want the answers to.” I amend. “Because if you knew what they were up to, maybe you’d have a harder time letting them use you the way they do.”
Her eyes go wide as anger pours into them.
“You should go.” She jerks her head toward the door.
“What’s wrong? Did I hit a nerve?” It shouldn’t be so enjoyable to piss a woman off, but this one isn’t like other women.
Her cheeks flush, barely enough to add a brush stroke of pink. And her lips, those full fucking lips that I can’t help but acknowledge would look amazing wrapped around my dick, swell from dragging her teeth across them.
It’s a sight, her temper. A beautiful, sexy, arousing sight, and I’m not regretting having a front seat.
“They’re my brothers. They don’t use me. They count on me. They depend on me. You should understand that. You have an entire criminal empire at your disposal when you need help. They have me.” She thrusts her hand out again. “Now give me the fucking gun and leave my apartment.”
I stare at her a moment, letting the silence build between us. It’s a little surprising her glasses haven’t steamed up from all the anger she’s vented.
A soft mewling breaks the stalemate as her cat, an older looking thing with blotches of brown splattered across an otherwise black coat, prances from the bedroom. When she goes ignored, she howls, walking between Max’s feet and rubbing against her ankle.
“I think the cat needs something,” I say casually.
Her nostrils flare. “Give it to me and go.”
This time there’s a touch of exhaustion. Either from our conversation or her day. She’d been asleep in the hallway when I’d found her. Completely knocked out, with her mouth slightly open.
She’s had a long day, and the soft grumbling of her stomach underlines the fact she’s hungry. A night of rest is what she needs. And I have a meeting to get to all the way across town. No time to get to the bottom of this with her right now.
“Fine.” I tuck the Glock into the back of my jeans, pulling my jacket down over it.
“You’re not taking it.” She steps in front of me when I turn to the door.
“You want me to go, I’m going.”
“You can’t take it.” She presses her back against the door, spreading her arms out like she is some sort of formidable blockade.
“I can.” I step closer until I’m fully in her space.
She has to tilt her head back to keep her defiant stare aimed at me. A lock of her shoulder-length roasted chestnut hair clings to her cheek. Unable to resist, I trail the tip of my middle finger across her cheekbone, capturing the errant hair, and tuck it behind her ear.
“And I am.”
“You’re a real prick, do you know that?” She grabs the door handle, as though it can stop me.
“It’s been brought to my attention a few times, yes.” I lean closer, inhaling the sweet scent of her. Like cotton candy and coffee.
“You have no right to take it.”
“Why do you protect them? If they’ve stolen it from someone, they’ve put you in danger by leaving it here. If they’ve been trying to sell these on their own, they’ve put you in danger by bringing it to your apartment. Whatever the scenario, this thing being here is dangerous for you.”
Her throat works as she swallows, trying to think of something snarky to shoot back at me.
The woman is all spice and firecrackers, and I can’t deny it intrigues me.
The librarian thing never really did it for me before, but with her thick-rimmed glasses and her business casual fashion, she’s making me rethink it.
She raises her chin, growing even more defiant. Her eyes narrow at me, and her body stiffens. She should be rolling into battle with the fierceness flashing in her gaze.
“They’re my brothers.” There’s something there, buried in her words. The way she says it,…like it’s a defense or maybe a confession. I’m not sure. And I don’t think she is, either.
“Not very good ones.” I retort and reach under her arm to yank her hand off the handle.
My shoulder brushes against her as I jerk the door open, shoving her away from it in the process. I pause long enough to be sure she didn’t stumble before pulling it open completely.
“Lev. Seriously, don’t take it. They might need it.” She grabs the door and is out in the hallway with me as I head to the stairs.
As I turn down to the first step, I stop and make eye contact with her. She needs to understand I’m not bluffing. I’m not fucking around here.
“If they want it back, they can come get it.”