Chapter 10 Violet #2
Levi eventually turned to me, his arm around the man. “Violet, I want you to meet Lynx.” He lowered his voice so the entire room wouldn’t hear. “He was my cellmate when I was inside.”
Lynx turned pretty blue eyes in my direction.
I instantly felt like I was being sized up. His gaze ran up and down over my body, but unlike when Levi had done it, there was no warming buzz that started up inside me.
When Lynx did it, I wanted to cross my arms over my chest and sink beneath the table. It wasn’t so much that there was anything sexual in the way he looked at me. More that his gaze made me feel like a living specimen, being studied under a microscope.
His gaze felt calculating and scientific. Like he didn’t see you as a person, but more as a weapon in his arsenal that he was deciding how best to use to his advantage.
He held a hand out to me, and for a long second, I considered not taking it.
But one quick glimpse of Levi’s face and the hopeful expression on it told me I couldn’t.
This man meant something to him, and that alone filled me with fear.
But it wasn’t smart to play my cards too soon, so I stood and took Lynx’s hand, making my grip as firm as possible so he didn’t notice the tremble in it.
“It’s nice to finally put a face to the name.” Lynx’s fingers wrapped around mine, holding on longer than I wanted him to. “I think your letters were all that kept my boy here going in that last year.”
All I could do was offer a stiff smile. I tried to pull my hand away, my heartbeat spiking when, for a second, instead of letting go, Lynx only gripped them tighter.
I was sure he could feel my palm sweating.
Levi squeezed his shoulder to catch his attention. “You’re out! When? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Lynx gave me one long last look before letting go of my hand and turning back to Levi. “Not long after you, actually. They had a busload of new inmates and nowhere to put ’em. A few of us got brought up early for parole to make room.”
Levi shook his head like he’d never heard anything so miraculous. “Unbelievable. That’s so good. You should have called me!”
Lynx laughed. “On what? Not like you left me a number.”
“Could have found me at the clubhouse.”
Lynx frowned. “You said you weren’t going back to them.” His gaze dipped to Levi’s jacket then raised to his face again. “Guess plans change, huh?”
Levi shrugged. “Things are different.”
There was a moment of silence then Lynx elbowed him. “Listen, I should get back to my group, but don’t be a stranger, yeah? I’ll see you around.”
Levi nodded. “I’m working at the tattoo shop.”
Lynx grinned. “Of course you are. I’ll come in for some new ink.”
“See you then.”
Lynx glanced at me and nodded, and then moved back through the room to his table.
I didn’t miss the way his gaze trailed back to me and Levi though. Levi sat back down happily, shaking his head like he couldn’t believe his luck.
I felt sick to my stomach over the fact I was going to burst his bubble.
I probably should have waited until we were in private, but secrets had never done me any favors, and I wasn’t keeping another one from him even for a minute. I twisted my seat so my back was to Lynx and pulled the folder of Toby’s photos from my purse. “Levi. You need to see these.”
He was still grinning and shaking his head in wonder, clearly surprised but thrilled by the fact his old cellmate was out and walking around the streets of Saint View.
I was a whole lot less thrilled about it.
Because I’d recognized Lynx’s face the moment I’d seen him.
He was the same man who appeared in almost all of Toby’s photos. The one lurking in shadows, making deals with strangers, money passing hands in dark corners of Saint View’s seediest locations.
Levi stared at the photographs I’d found in Toby’s room. Dax and Nyah watched on without saying a word, clearly realizing that something was wrong and not wanting to get in the middle of it.
Levi’s smile fell off his handsome face, and I hated I was robbing him of this one small happiness so quickly.
He shifted through the photos. “What are these?”
“I don’t know for sure, honestly. But I found them hidden in Toby’s room.”
Levi’s gaze snapped to mine. “When?”
“Earlier today.”
He swore under his breath and darted a look across the room at Lynx.
“Uh, not to sound na?ve, but why does it matter if Toby had some photos of a guy in a dark street?” Nyah winced at one of the images and stabbed a pretty pink fingernail in its direction.
“I did a cleaning job at that building last week. Place is a hole. I probably passed three drug deals in the process of lugging my mop from Francine’s van.
Not exactly an uncommon occurrence in Saint View, from what I’ve noticed. ”
Levi sighed heavily. “Maybe it’s not connected. But Toby had photo evidence of crimes taking place. Crimes that Lynx is clearly a part of.” He glanced over at him again. “And now Toby is dead.”
His words hung in the stillness between us.
I didn’t know about the others, but it suddenly felt like Lynx’s gaze was burning a hole in my back. I didn’t dare turn around.
“What do we do?” Nyah echoed the questions rattling around in my head.
Levi tucked the papers back into the folder and handed them back to me. “Nothing for right now. We’re in a restaurant full of people, and I need time to think.”
I put the photos back in my purse and tried to be level-headed.
I hated that this was hurting him. “We don’t know for sure Lynx had anything to do with Toby’s death.
Even if he is doing something shady in these photos, he didn’t necessarily know someone was watching him.
” I bit my lip, knowing that coincidences in a situation like this were probably rare.
And that where there was smoke, there was probably fire. “Should I have not shown you?”
Levi shook his head and met my gaze again. “Of course you should have. I don’t want secrets between us.”
His voice was so strong and firm I was instantly reassured I’d done the right thing. But my heart ached for him anyway. He’d been so excited by the idea of having his friend back, and I’d just thrown a bucket of cold water on it by accusing him of having something to do with Toby’s death.
I could see that same idea playing over in Levi’s head as we ordered our meals, and again when our food came.
He was quiet, staring into space, not participating in the stilted conversation Dax, Nyah, and I tried to maintain.
The whole thing felt awkward and weird, but I forced myself to make idle chitchat since we couldn’t just leave mid-meal.
Dax and Nyah carried the conversation, but the tension was getting to me.
I wasn’t even sure he was looking in my direction, but I could feel Lynx’s presence looming over me.
All my brain could think about was if he had something to do with Toby’s murder, then he was the man whose heart I needed to stop.
He was the man who’d taken my best friend and who needed to be put in the ground.
I had no solid proof, nothing but circumstantial evidence that would have been laughed out of a court, and yet my brain screamed there was something off about this man. That he knew me even though I didn’t know him. That his polite words hid a snake coiled within.
I pushed back from the table, even though the waitress had just put a steaming plate of juicy steak in front of me. “Excuse me, please. Bathroom.”
I threaded my way through the room, my footsteps faster and faster, Lynx’s sharp-eyed gaze following me until it was all I could feel.
Anxiety wrapped itself around my chest, forcing breathless gasps, my brain screaming I couldn’t just sit there and eat steak in the same room as the man who could be responsible for Toby’s death.
I’d thought this whole thing had been about me. The things I’d seen. The things I’d done. The men I knew.
What if I was right, but it wasn’t Levi, Whip, and X who were the problem? What if it had been Toby who’d set this entire thing in motion by sticking his camera lens where it didn’t belong? What if it was him who’d dragged me in, and me who’d dragged in the others?
My brain was a whirlwind of thoughts and theories, none of them quite fitting, but unable to think clearly enough to dismiss any of them either.
I slammed my way into the bathroom, finding it a blissfully empty space to have a mental breakdown.
I gripped the bathroom sink, hunching my shoulders, heaving in shuddering breaths, panic seizing my body.
The door opened.
I snapped my head up, a sudden realization that I was alone and if Lynx followed me in here, I’d be trapped.
But it was Levi’s green eyes that met mine.
Relief flooded me as he locked the door and stood behind me, wrapping his arms around me.
I couldn’t stop my brain shouting of dangers lurking just outside the door. “What if—”
His hand lifted from where it was tight against my chest and shoulders to press a finger against my lips. “I know. I know all the what-ifs. They’re running on a screaming loop inside my head too.”
But my heart rate wouldn’t slow. My breaths wouldn’t calm.
I forced his fingers away. “All this shit happened after you got out of jail. If Lynx got out not long after…It feels like all the pieces are there, but I just can’t work out how they fit together.
Dickson was there that night. He was in prison with you too.
” I shook my head. “I don’t understand. I thought this was all about me, but what if it’s not? What if it’s Toby? What if it’s you?”
“What if it’s all of us?”
“I can’t keep doing this,” I said miserably.
“The stress is too much. The constant not knowing. The constant edge of fear that never goes away. All I wanted for tonight was to go on a date like a normal couple and not worry about any of this shit, but it follows us everywhere. When is it going to stop?”
My chest heaved, trying to suck in breaths that it couldn’t seem to hold.