Chapter 12 #3
'Why?' she asks, looking genuinely confused.
'Are you fishing for compliments?' I ask, teasing her a little.
She chuckles. 'Maybe. But genuinely, I don't understand. Surely I'm interchangeable with any other girl. I'm not special.'
I look over at her as we pull into the spot across the street from the graveyard. Now it’s my turn to look incredulous.
'Of course you are,' I say, flabbergasted that she doesn't understand. 'You're— You're everything to us.’
A nasty thought enters my mind and I park the car before I turn back to her.
‘Are we…interchangeable with other guys?' I ask carefully.
'Of course not,' she says, wrinkling her nose. 'But you guys are….'
I give her a look. ‘Special?’
She frowns at me as she gets out of the car.
'Yeah,' she says.
'But we can't think the same thing about you?' I ask as we sneak into the crypt and into the tunnels.
She’s silent as we walk through the underground passages and doesn't answer until we’re at the hotel and going up in the elevator to the penthouse.
'Okay,' she concedes. 'I get it. I don't understand, but I sort of understand. It's weird, isn't it? That you're so important to me and I'm so important to you?'
'Weird,' I echo.
'Come on, we can talk more about the existential relationship stuff over some dinner.'
'Pizza,' I say.
'We can't,' she says, pouting a bit. 'Meeting Sauvage.'
'Oh.' My spirits go down slightly.
'Come on,' she says brightly. 'The food's always good.'
'Yeah,’ I mutter. ‘He makes sure the food's good because he knows that's where your vulnerabilities lie.'
She laughs. 'No, they don't.'
'Daisy,' I say, 'come on. The chocolate torte. The chocolate mousse. I thought you hated wet desserts.'
'Chocolate mousse isn't wet,' she argues. 'It's airy and delicious.'
She checks the time. ‘We’ll be just in time if we go now.’
I follow her, shaking my head and muttering that she's incorrigible.
'If we keep eating like this,' I mutter, 'we're gonna have to start working out the way Mav does. Otherwise, we’re going to be so unhealthy.'
'Speak for yourself,' she says. 'I run five miles a day.'
‘I’ll let the guys know where we’ll be,’ I say with a sigh.
But I’m smiling as I get back in the elevator with her. I have to resist the urge to pick her up and hold her close because, now that her mind is on food, she’ll just wriggle around and bat me away.
On the way downstairs, I get a message from Lu Garrett, reminding me that I told her she could be there when Marcus and Rob got their comeuppance for what they did to Daisy on Halloween.
Although Pete was there too, he has had his nose broken by Blake twice and he’s kept his head down since November.
He doesn’t even hang out with either of them anymore, and, after reviewing the tape from that night, the other two were the only ones who actually touched Daisy.
Pete was just on the periphery, looking like a deer trapped in the headlights, so we’ve decided that whatever we do to him won’t be as bad as what Marcus and Rob get.
I frown at my reflection in the elevator door.
With Marcus the head of the Bandervilles now, revenge on him is going to be difficult.
Plus, he deserves more. A lot more. He deserves what his brother got.
Whether we can pull that off is another thing entirely.
With the cops looking our way, it’s probably best that we try very hard not to kill anyone.
Rob will be easy, though. We’ll start with him, and we’ll do it soon.
But as the elevator begins to rise, I wonder why it has to be soon. Why wait? A plan comes to me quickly and I message Pete. He already knows something is coming and he’s not dumb enough to try to run from it.
Get Rob to Warehouse 15 in an hour. B with him.
The elevator doors open just as I get a reply from Pete.
How? We ain’t friends no more.
Idgaf. Do it.
I message Lu Garrett back, giving her the address and the time. All I get back is a thumbs up.
‘Hey,’ I say to Daisy. ‘I actually need to go take care of something. Are you okay to have dinner with Sauvage by yourself?’
‘Of course,’ she says with a shrug. ‘But what do you need to do?’
‘I just need to fulfil a promise I made that I kinda forgot about. It’s not anything dangerous.’ I grin at her, giving her a lingering kiss. ‘I’ll be back by ten, sweetheart.’
‘Promises are important,’ she nods and gives me a quick hug. ‘See you later.’
I leave the hotel through the tunnels, glad I parked my Jag near to the graveyard instead of in the parking lot under the hotel in case the cops are keeping tabs on me.
I drive to the club and let myself in. It’s eerily quiet as all the construction guys have left for the day.
I look around and can’t help my small smile.
It’s pretty much ready and the bomb was almost worth all the changes we’ve been able to make like upgrading the sound system and the lighting. Even the dance floor lights up now.
The whole ground floor has been reinforced with steel and thick concrete.
We did a test the other day and the basement might as well be a mile away.
No sound makes it down there unless the door is open.
And we’ve made sure that the whole sublevel is basically a bomb shelter.
Daisy will be safe as a bug in a rug down there whether she’s in the lab, or asleep in our bed.
I go through the basement and use the keypad to exit into the tunnels. I checked the tide times on the way here, so I know the passages to the warehouse district will be clear for the next three hours or so. More than enough time to get in, watch, and get out.
I get to the concrete steps that lead up, where I took Daisy up to the street after the bomb in the club. My heart hammers in my chest and I try not to think about it, knowing that I’ll probably have a nightmare tonight if I let my head linger on the memories of that day.
In the derelict warehouse above, I find that the Garretts have already arrived. There are four guys I’ve never met before, but I’ve seen one or two around. They’re loitering by the wall, like they’re just here to kill time. Lu Garrett is amongst them.
‘Novelle,’ she says by way of greeting. ‘Cousins, Novelle. Novelle, cousins.’
We all nod to each other, and she checks her watch.
‘Five minutes late,’ she mutters and then gives me a narrow-eyed look. ‘Hope you haven’t wasted our time.’
My phone buzzes and I check it quickly. Daisy has a meeting with Detective Anders tomorrow. I quickly message Robert Burrows, my lawyer, directly, to ask him to meet her there before I glance up at Lu.
‘Pete and Rob will be here. Be happy,’ I tell her, putting my phone away. ‘This way, you get to actually participate. You’re welcome.’
She snorts. ‘You mean take all the risk. Whatever. Daisybear is worth it.’
We hear a car engine and the Garretts take their places just inside the door while I stay in plain view.
It rolls open and Pete enters first. When he sees me, a look of resignation passes over his face, but his steps don’t falter. I begrudgingly give him a tiny iota of respect for not being a coward. The Garretts wait until they’re both inside and the door slams shut behind them.
‘What the fuck!’ Rob shouts as he’s taken in a sure grip by two of Lu’s cousins and his arms are wrenched behind his back.
Pete doesn’t say a word and doesn’t struggle.
‘Shade. What is this?’ Rob snarls.
I step forward. ‘This is your punishment for what you tried to do to Daisy in the game room on Halloween.
‘What? I didn’t do shit! It was all Marcus!’
‘Shut the fuck up, Rob!’ I growl. ‘We saw the tape. We know what you did. Did you really think there wouldn’t be hell to pay?’
‘What-What are you going to do?’ he stammers, finally looking scared.
‘Me?’ I ask innocently? ‘Nothing. It’s the Garretts you need to worry about. They’ll be… well, I don’t know either actually.’ I give him a thumbs up. ‘It’s gonna be a surprise for the both of us.’
‘First things first,’ Lu says, casually sliding on some brass knuckles that look like they were made specifically for her small hands. ‘You’re Pete, right?’
Pete nods jerkily.
‘Great! I’m told that you’ve already suffered a little and you were kind of just there. Now, you may not have hurt my friend, but you didn’t help her either, so you’ll be getting a beating today.’
Her right hook is swift and it’s clearly not the first time she’s handled her own dirty work.
Pete yowls as his head snaps to the side and then she hits him again in the stomach.
He doubles over with a groan, and she lifts his head up by his hair.
‘These are my two cousins. They’ll be finishing up and then abandoning you in the woods later.
They might leave you a compass since you haven’t tried to resist.’
The two guys holding Pete drag him to the wall and begin pummeling the shit out of him.
Lu turns to Rob who’s still struggling in the other two’s grips.
‘Fuck you!’ he snarls at her. ‘Do you know who my father is?’
‘I do, actually,’ she chirps. ‘Hi. My name is Lu Garrett. Your dear old dad does a lot of side business with my PopPop. He’s pretty pissed that you’ve made an enemy of us, so, as long as we don’t accidently kill you today, I don’t think he’s gonna care, Robert.
In fact, he only asked respectfully that we don’t disfigure your face or fuck up your junk so bad that you can’t make an heir. ’
Her eyes move over him and clearly find him wanting. ‘You not being able to procreate doesn’t seem like a bad thing, though. We’ll see.’
She claps her hands together and gives a little jump. ‘Ever been waterboarded?’
The vision of Rob’s eyes popping out of his head while Lu Garrett bounces on her tippy toes like a demented pixie is one of the most satisfying in my life to date.
I check my watch.
‘Aw, I gotta go,’ I say a little sadly. ‘Meeting Daisy after dinner.’
‘Say hi for me!’ Lu sings.
I nod and leave the warehouse, a small smile playing on my lips. Two down. One more to go.