Chapter 22 Malice
MALICE
It’s been a few days since the engagement party, and we haven’t heard much at all from Willow.
It’s got all of us on edge, wanting to know she’s safe and find out if her grandma came down on her for what happened at the party, but it’s not like we can just march in there and find out.
We have to be cautious so we don’t get her in trouble, but waiting around has never been something I’m good at. It makes me feel like I’ve got ants under my skin, and it’s fucking impossible to relax.
I hate this. This distance from her. This feeling of not having her close.
The wedding is in less than a week, which means a big red countdown clock is ticking over our heads.
And in the meantime, we still have X breathing down our damn necks, giving us job after motherfucking job.
We can’t say no or tell her to go fuck herself, because she could easily send me back to prison or take out her anger on Willow, and neither of those are an acceptable possibility.
So we have to keep playing her damn errand boys while we search for some kind of leverage to get her off all of our backs.
Today’s little ‘errand’ was a mostly routine job, but Vic got hurt in the escape. It’s not too bad, but he definitely needs to be patched up.
Ransom is in a pissy mood too, stomping into the warehouse and slamming the door as soon as we get home.
“This fucking sucks,” he snaps. “We’re going to be Olivia’s bitches forever. Until we slip up and one of her stupid fucking jobs kills us.”
He’s been more on edge than usual lately, and I know it’s because he blames himself for the shit that went down with Troy at the party.
“She’s not gonna kill us,” I grunt back, steering Vic to the couch and sitting him down.
“It’s fine, Malice,” my twin says, sounding worn thin.
“Shut the fuck up,” I tell him, but there’s not much heat in it. “You need to get stitched up.”
I push his sleeve up so I can see the gash on his arm, then make quick work of threading a needle so I can do the few stitches he needs.
Vic grits his teeth. There’s barely any expression on his face as I work, although he looks a bit annoyed that my stitches aren’t as precise as his would’ve been.
“Did you hear anything else from Willow?” I ask him. The last update we got was that she’d gotten into the safe, but that there was nothing useful there. So now she has to keep searching the house, trying to find some other place where Olivia would keep her incriminating shit.
“No,” Vic murmurs. “Nothing so far.”
Ransom paces the living room, then stops and kicks at the coffee table, nudging it out of place by a few inches. Vic gives him a look, but Ransom doesn’t seem like he gives a shit.
“So that’s it then,” he says. “Time’s up. We need to start prepping for plan C.”
Plan C is the last resort. The one where we all just get the fuck out of here with Willow, even if it means Olivia hunts us forever.
I clench my jaw and glance up at Vic, sharing a look with him. Neither of us really wanted it to come to this, but when he nods, I know Ransom is right.
We’re basically out of time.
“Fuck.” I let out a sharp breath, sitting back on my heels. “Guess we don’t have another choice.”
“We knew it could come to this,” Vic agrees. “We’ll have to put a few things in motion before we can go. And we’ll need to find a way to talk to Willow without alerting her grandmother or Troy. We need as much of a head start as we can get.”
Ransom opens his mouth to say something, but he’s cut off by a knock at the warehouse door.
We all exchange glances, instantly on alert. None of us would put it past Olivia to send someone out here to ‘deal’ with us, so we move as a unit for the door, ready for a fight if it comes to that.
But when Ransom swings the door open, it’s not a threat standing outside.
It’s Willow.
“What are you doing here?” Ransom asks. “Are you supposed to be here?”
“What’s wrong?” I demand. “What happened?”
“Let her come inside,” Vic interjects.
We all move back so Willow can come in, and as she steps inside, worry turns my stomach into a rock. I should be glad to see her in our space again, back at the warehouse where she belongs, but given the shit that’s gone down recently, it’s not as simple as that.
“Nothing is wrong,” Willow assures us, offering up a little smile, but it doesn’t look right. “I’m okay. It’s okay.”
“Then what are you doing here?” Vic questions, and I can practically see him trying to work out the puzzle in his mind.
“Olivia said I could have one night to myself, away from her place or my apartment,” Willow explains. “I think it was supposed to be a nice gesture, since the wedding is coming up so soon and she still thinks I’m going to go along with it.”
Ransom frowns. “I don’t think she expected you to come here though, right? And she’ll know. The tracker will show her right where you went.”
Willow nods. “I know. But she already knows where you live, so it’s not like I’m giving her any information she doesn’t already have. And… this is the only place I wanted to go.”
Fucking hell. This woman.
Reaching out, I pull her into my arms, needing to have her close after all those days apart. Her scent tickles my nose, and I breathe her in, closing my eyes and letting it settle the irritation that’s been right there on the surface since the party.
Then Willow gasps, and I pull back, looking down at her. “What?”
“You’re bleeding,” she says softly, running her fingers over my arms like she’s checking for where I’m hurt.
Shit. I forgot I was covered in some of Vic’s blood.
“It’s not mine,” I tell her, jerking my chin at him. “It’s his.”
Not seeming at all soothed by that, she glances at Vic, seeing the stitched up wound that he’s got covered in gauze now.
It’s nothing big, but her eyes still go wide.
Ransom got dinged a little too, although his wasn’t enough to need stitches, and as she sees the blood seeping from the cut on his arm, she presses a hand to her mouth.
“Oh my god. What happened to you all?”
The three of us exchange glances, silent communication passing between us. We promised her we wouldn’t hide things from her anymore, but this feels different. She has enough on her fucking plate already, without this adding to it.
But she must be getting better at reading us, because she looks at each of us in turn and then frowns.
“Stop it,” she says. “Don’t try to figure out how much you can hide from me. Just tell me what happened.”
Ransom sighs, dragging a hand over his face. “It’s not as bad as it looks. We just got a couple scratches from a job.”
“A job from Olivia,” Vic adds, as if that’s not pretty clear by now.
Willow’s eyes widen, and she gasps softly, looking horrified. “What happened?” she demands. “What did she have you do?”
“Just some stupid shit,” I tell her. “Breaking and entering. It should have been easy, but there were some… complications.”
“What kind of complications?”
I glance at Vic, and he nods before taking over. “The security system wasn’t as easy to disable as it should have been,” he explains. “Namely because the facility had dogs. She neglected to mention that.”
Grief and anger war in Willow’s eyes for a second, and she swallows hard. “I can’t believe she’s doing this to you. I mean, I can, but… is it always like this? Are all the jobs this dangerous?”
Ransom shrugs a shoulder. “Not always. Sometimes it’s routine shit. Busywork. The problem is she’s running us into the fucking ground. We barely get a day or two to breathe between these jobs.”
“She’s running you ragged,” Willow murmurs, almost to herself.
“Yeah,” I agree. “She’s fucking with us because she knows she can, but it’s not a big deal.”
“How is it not a big deal?” Her head whips up, her voice rising. “She’s putting you in life-threatening situations over and over again, and there’s nothing we can do to stop her!”
“It’s not a big deal,” I say again, keeping my voice even.
“It really isn’t,” Vic agrees. “We hate working for her, but it’s to keep you safe. And anything is worth that.”
“Yeah. We’d do a hell of a lot worse to make sure you were alright,” Ransom chimes in.
Worry is still churning in Willow’s soft brown eyes, and I hate Olivia fucking Stanton just a little more for putting us all in this position.
Willow glances around at the three of us, drawing her bottom lip between her teeth.
Tears well up in her eyes for a moment, a look of intense pain flashing across her face.
Then it seems like something settles inside her, and some of the tension drains from her shoulders. She draws in a deep breath and nods.
“I know you would,” she whispers.
“Anyway, it doesn’t really matter now.” I pin her with a look, returning to the subject my brothers and I were discussing before she arrived. “We’re out of time. So we’ve gotta run.”
Her mouth falls open. “What?”
“The wedding is supposed to be happening in just a few days. We need to get out of here. We should run now. Head out of the city. Maybe we’ll be able to get enough of a head start to evade whoever Olivia sends after us.”
“No!” Willow says sharply. She shakes her head. “No. It’s too soon to give up. I can still get the evidence we need to blackmail her, and that’ll be better than her hunting us. You know I’m right. I just need a little more time.”
I frown at her, narrowing my eyes. “How much more time do you want?”
“Until the wedding.” She sees me open my mouth to object and puts her hand on my chest, continuing quickly.
“I’ll be over at Olivia’s house a lot in the days leading up to the ceremony.
That will give me more chances to search the rooms I haven’t gotten to yet.
And I heard her snapping at a maid about how her bedroom is only supposed to be cleaned by certain staff members, so I think she might keep something important up there. Please, Malice. Let me try.”
“And if you can’t find it?” I grit out, wrapping an arm around her and pulling her tight against my body.
“Then we’ll go.” Her hand is still pressed to my chest, trapped between our bodies.
“We’ll set up a meeting point, and I’ll find you there.
It will be easier for me to slip away that day anyway, in the chaos of everything, with caterers and florists and last minute fires for my grandma to deal with. ”
“That does make some sense,” Ransom murmurs grudgingly. “The more distracted Olivia is when we run, the better.”
Willow nods. “Exactly.”
I still don’t fucking like it. All I want is to throw her over my shoulder like a fucking caveman, toss her in the back seat of the car, and get the hell out of here right now. But I know her argument has some logic to it, and I hate that even more.
“Solnyshka…”
I shake my head, but Willow fists her hand in my shirt, tilting her head up to meet my gaze. Her small body is molded to mine, and I can feel the thrum of her heartbeat in her chest.
“We can figure out the details later,” she says. “I only have this one night away from my place, and that’s not what I came here for.”
Her tongue darts out to wet her full, pink lips, and before I can ask her what she did come here for, she shows me, rising up onto her tiptoes and crushing her mouth to mine.