Chapter 40 Levi
LEVI
Ileaned forward in the passenger seat, my foot pressed hard to the floor like there was an accelerator there, or like the tilt of my body would somehow make Whip’s car move faster.
“We’re too far away.” Anxious anticipation raced around in my blood, my heart beating too fast. “She’s been there for hours.”
Whip, ever the voice of reason, kept his voice calm and low. “And she’s been with Francine many other times and nothing has happened.”
“Yeah, but her face wasn’t on the creepy wall of death before either,” X said bluntly from the back seat.
I shot X a pointed look.
At least we had hope Violet was still alive.
I was fairly sure Dax’s hope had completely run out.
X cringed and patted his shoulder awkwardly. “Uh, not wall of death. Just a regular old run-of-the-mill Employee of the Month wall. Definitely has no bearing on who Francine the Freak decides to kill that day…”
I sighed heavily.
“What?” X asked. “I’m being comforting.”
“You’re making it worse.”
“I use humor as a coping mechanism, Levi. If you prefer, I could do Whip’s cold and grumpy thing.” He put on his best wise old man voice. “Listen here, sonny. I’ve been doing rescues since before you were born, and I’ll be doing them long after you’re dead. Now pass me my orthopedic sneakers.”
Whip glanced back at X. “When have I ever sounded like that?”
He shrugged. “Or how about I do Levi’s snarly angry prison-man thing?”
“This’ll be fun,” I muttered, willing the car to go faster, not just because I wanted to get to Violet, but because X was making me want to murder something.
He ignored me. His voice turned gruff, apparently in imitation of mine.
“Here’s the plan! Kick in every door, glare at everyone until they wet themselves, and then maybe punch a few walls for dramatic effect.
That’s how we communicate.” He tapped me on the shoulder.
“How’d I do? I think I really committed to the part at the end there. ”
I couldn’t listen to it anymore. I pulled out my phone and jabbed my finger against the screen so hard it hurt.
“I’m calling Fang and War and Hawk and anyone else fucking close enough to do something.
” I stabbed the screen again, anger spearing through me when the stupid thing did nothing. “Fuck! Open, you bastard!”
“Ah yes,” X said like he was David fucking Attenborough.
“Here we see the male of the angry prison-man species, attempting to make a phone call while in full rage mode. As you can see, he is not a very smart animal. If only he knew if he just calmed his tits and unlocked the phone gently, it would allow him to make contact with others of his species.”
I finally got my pin code in correctly and hit call on Fang’s number. I turned around and hissed at X, “If she’s dead—”
“She’s not fucking dead,” X warned in a voice that sent chills down my spine, with eyes suddenly so dark it was like he was possessed.
I was instantly reminded that although he was an idiot ninety-five percent of the time, he was also capable of snapping a man’s neck with no remorse.
And that was something to be respected.
I pressed my lips together and nodded. “She’s not dead.”
He went back to golden retriever mode and grinned like we were just out on a Sunday drive and not speeding toward Saint View on a rescue mission. “Do you think we’ll be able to get Violet back before school pickup? I promised the kids donuts.”
I left Whip to answer that question because Fang’s voice was saying hello in my ear.
“Fang. I need you to go to Clean Sweep and see if Violet or her boss, Francine, are there.”
To Fang’s credit, or maybe to the credit of the friendship that had existed between us for fifteen years, he didn’t question me. He stayed on the phone until a moment later, I heard the roar of his bike, and then the call cut out.
I called War next, then Hawk, then dropped the phone onto the floor at my feet and buried my face in my hands.
Whip’s fingers found the back of my neck and squeezed it. “Just breathe, okay? Fang will call back in a minute.”
But a minute could be too long, when every second felt like it lasted a year, and every tick of the clock could mean the difference between Violet walking away from this alive or us finding her dead and bleeding out somewhere.
I looked over at Whip miserably. “She’s fucking pregnant.”
Whip’s fingers tightened in the tense muscles in the back of my neck. “I know. It’ll be okay.”
But he didn’t know that. Couldn’t promise that by the time we found her she’d still be breathing.
All I could see in my mind was the night we’d found her covered in blood.
I was so fucking scared this time, it would be hers.
My phone rang, and I jumped like it had electrocuted me. I scooped it up from the floor with trembling fingers and answered. “Fang. Tell me you have her.”
Fang’s voice was grim on the other end. “There’s nobody here. The Clean Sweep car is gone too. We sent the prospects over to Violet’s apartment, but nothing there either.”
Whip’s calm voice pierced through the screaming in my head. “Ask him if he can see a roster there anywhere. They might just be at a job. We need to check the obvious first before we jump to the—”
Fang interrupted him. “I heard him. We already checked the roster hanging on the wall, but all the jobs on today have a red cross through them. War is calling around to the owners of the houses that were scheduled, but so far, all of them have said Francine cancelled the jobs.”
Well, that blew any ideas that Francine hadn’t planned this all out perfectly. I put Fang on speaker so everyone in the car could hear. “What the fuck do we do now?”
Fang was silent. Whip’s foot lifted on the accelerator, and the car slowed.
I wanted to scream at him to keep going. That we had to get to her.
But none of us knew where the hell to look.
“Hey, Siri? Take us to 1705 Fire Ridge Way,” X called from the back seat, then he swore under his breath.
“Damn, there’s a really good burger bar just down the road.
I hope we have time to stop there on the way home.
Did you know they have the world record for the most barbecued pork ribs consumed in an hour? Says it right here on their web—”
“X!” Whip snapped. “Why the fuck are we going to Fire Ridge Way? We already checked that house. There was nothing there.”
X blinked like that had been a dumb question.
He held up his phone and spoke in his David Attenborough voice again.
“When the male of the species has calm breasts, he can navigate thought quite well. When he is filled with an impeccable sense of humor and model good looks, as well as brains for days, he can make many a deduction.” He dropped his fake accent and picked up his regular one.
“They’re not at Clean Sweep or their cleaning jobs or Violet’s apartment or Francine’s house.
I figured if that house was good enough to lure Nyah in, then she might do the same with Violet.
Where the hell else would she go to murder someone in the middle of the day?
She’s not going to do it out in broad daylight.
What other stomping grounds does she have?
The bluffs are crowded with hikers and families at this time of day.
She wouldn’t be able to lure Violet to the warehouse again, or to the house on Olympic Drive.
The only place Francine has that Violet hasn’t been to is that house on Fire Ridge Way. ”
“The only other house we know of,” Whip muttered.
He was right. Maybe Francine had other places she could go. But we had to check all the obvious places first.
We were only a few streets away from the address, according to the GPS on the dash. Our little green dot moved faster as he put his foot down on the accelerator again.
Whip turned the corner, into the barely familiar street the three of us had checked no more than a week ago. Had we missed something? The place had been spotless, not a speck of dust out of place.
My stomach twisted in knots at the sight of Francine’s car sitting outside the house.
That had definitely not been there the last time we’d visited.
It was in a nicer part of Saint View, where the houses were old but bigger than the shit shacks the government put up as low-income housing.
We were closer to the Providence border than the center of town where the Clean Sweep offices were.
It would take Fang and the others fifteen minutes to get over here.
I wasn’t waiting that long.
Whip drove past the house and parked a few doors down. I yanked on the door handle the second he stopped the car.
X was out just as quick, Whip and Dax a second later.
X led the way back down the street but stopped suddenly well before the house, lifting his arm at a right angle, his fist clenched.
I ran smack into his back. “Ow, Jesus, X! What the hell are you doing?”
“That’s the sign to stop! Haven’t you ever watched a cop show? The SWAT leader puts his hand up like this, and his men all freeze behind him until he says it’s safe to go on.”
“Well, maybe you should have told me that before I practically bowled you over!”
“As your captain, I object to your tone, Soldier!”
I rolled my eyes. “So sorry, Captain Crunch.”
X grinned. “I like that. You can be Sargeant Sassy Pants, and Whip, you can be Drill Sargeant Daddy.” He winked. “But if I hear Levi say, ‘Drill me, Daddy,’ there will be consequences. Dax, you can be…actually, I don’t know you well enough to give you a code name, sorry. You’re just Dax.”
Dax looked completely baffled.
Clearly, he hadn’t been around X long enough to know this was completely typical X behavior, and I suspected his verbal diarrhea was a very real reaction to stress. But he could unpack that with Grayson later.
“Drill Sargeant Daddy—” I shook my head and sighed. “I mean Whip and Dax can cover the rear.”
“That’s what he said.” X sniggered.
I sighed heavily. “And you and I can create a distraction at the front. That work for a plan?”
It was as good as any. I just needed to get in there. If this woman had hurt Violet, she was dead. I’d wring her scrawny neck, twisting it like one of Grayson’s balloon animals if she had so much as touched one hair on Violet’s head.
I blinked at the thought.
X might have had a point about my angry prison-man persona.
Whip and Dax jogged through the neighbor’s yard, and I hoped they didn’t find dogs once they jumped the fence. And the owners were at work or something and not perfecting their tans in their backyards.
X looked at me. “If she watched the whole thing that happened at Paul Jeddersen’s house, she’s going to know my pizza delivery act. That won’t work. Got any other ideas we can use as a distraction?”
I didn’t know and I didn’t care. I couldn’t wait another second to get in that house. The anticipation was killing me.
X trotted up the path after me, and I forced myself not to slam my fist against the door.
Instead I knocked politely, and X raised an eyebrow at me, a silent, “You went in without a plan, so you better come up with something quick,” expression in his eyes.
Knowing he was right, I screwed my face up and called, “Hello? We’d like to talk to you about your car’s extended warranty… ”
I was pretty sure I would be hearing X’s laughter in my nightmares.