Chapter Eighteen
T he next few days were nothing short of idyllic.
Long hikes through the woods. Sitting on the dock and slipping their feet into the freezing lake.
Dumping a puzzle onto the table and both quietly working on matching the pieces together.
Sometimes they sat in comfortable silence, and sometimes they had in-depth conversations.
Lowen never felt such peace in her life. She could happily live the rest of her life at the cabin. Trying different recipes. Writing up the story of her life and turning it into a romance novel, because who doesn’t like a happy ending? She’d gotten hers by simply not marrying a murderous asshole.
“Evren,” she said one night as they sat in the den. “I know Jeremiah said I could use his credit card for things I needed, but there’s something I want that I don’t really need . But I would like to have.”
“What is it?”
“A laptop.”
“Okay.”
“Okay as in thanks for telling me, or okay as in Jeremiah won’t care if I buy it?”
“We can go right now and buy one. Laptops aren’t a frivolous purchase. They’re a tool for everyday life.”
Excitement coursed through her. “What if I told you I wanted to write a book?”
“Go for it.”
“You don’t think that’s silly?”
“No,” he replied. “Not at all. We can go into town tomorrow and buy you one.”
She searched his face to see if there was mockery or subterfuge, but saw only honesty reflecting back. Happiness crashed over her, knowing deep within her soul that this was the life she deserved.
****
J eremiah punched in the code to the basement and entered Saxon’s playroom, otherwise known as the “torture chamber.” Heavy metal screeched through the speakers, so loud it threatened to rupture his eardrums. How his brother liked listening to this fucking noise was beyond his ken.
Saxon designed his workroom himself, building the benches and shelves to his specifications.
Stocking it with all sorts of items that would cause injury—ordinary tools like screwdrivers and wrenches, blow torches.
Saws, electric and hand. Hammers. Scissors.
Knives of all shapes and sizes. He even had all types of sexual apparatuses.
Jeremiah didn’t even want to speculate how Sax used dildoes to extract information from his so-called visitors.
A man hung upside down by his ankles. Blood stained his naked body, mixing with sweat and other bodily fluids to run in diluted ribbons down his skin.
Jeremiah felt nothing toward the poor schmuck hanging like a hide of beef.
If he turned out to be the mole, not even his family would be able to identify him.
Picking up the remote, he turned down the volume, and before he could turn around, a knife flew by his head to bury in the wall next to him.
“What the fuck?” Jeremiah snapped, spinning around.
“Woopsie,” Saxon said and shrugged.
“You could’ve killed me.”
“I knew it was you.”
“No, you didn’t,” Jeremiah argued. It was already a long fucking day. “Have you discovered anything?”
“This is Del Sangro,” Saxon said. Then he bent and turned his head to address the man upside down.
“This is my brother, Del, your boss.” He quickly righted himself.
“Del here is a bartender, but guess who moonlights as a security man? This dude. And guess who signs his paychecks? None other than Scias Mailliard. Apparently, Mailliard has some warehouses outside Vegas, up on Interstate 95, that are filled with all kinds of construction machines. So, naturally I had an ah-ha moment.”
He fell silent, and Jeremiah waited, completely patient with his youngest brother.
All the inflictions Saxon endured when he was younger had taken their toll.
Sax needed things an ordinary human would faint and vomit at, and Jeremiah worked hard to make sure his brother’s empty emotions were channeled into something productive.
He’d do anything to help Sax, but he was afraid there wasn’t anything that could help him reach a sense of normalcy.
“And?”
“Well, Del here has the personality of a narcoleptic sloth, but that makes him the perfect spy. Nobody expects the wallflower to be anyone important.”
Jeremiah shook his head. “There’s no way this man knows the inner workings of my business.”
“I agree,” Saxon said. “Our mole knows too many intimate things about us. It has to be closer in-house, but I needed to dot my i’s and cross my t’s .
So, I started off with some light fileting and worked my way up.
If anything would make a man squeal like a stuck pig, it’s having his balls crushed by a ball crusher. ”
Jeremiah winced. “Does it really crush balls?”
“Yep,” he replied, pointing. “It’s over there on that table labeled ‘ball crusher’ if you want to try it out. Obviously, on Del here, not yourself. Long story short, I am confident he isn’t our mole.”
“He’s not moving. Is he still alive?”
Saxon bent again to check. “Shit. When did he die?”
Jeremiah pinched the bridge of his nose. Fuck. The last thing he needed to deal with was an accidental dead body.
“So, he wasn’t our mole.”
“No,” Saxon said morosely. “But if there’s one of him, there’re more. I just gotta find them. Sorry for crushing your balls, Del. RIP.”
“I’ll take care of Mr. Sangro for you,” Jeremiah informed. “But, you gotta be careful with the next guy, Sax.”
“They’re all too fragile,” he said, staring at the dead man. “I want someone I can play with who’ll last.”
“Look at me, Saxon,” Jeremiah ordered. “I need you to stay focused. The only way we stay safe is if we find out who is betraying us. Okay?”
“Okay. I won’t let you down, brother.”
Jeremiah nodded. “I know you won’t. I appreciate how hard you’ve been working.”
Saxon ran his hands over his face, into his hair. “How? Why?”
“Words, Sax.”
Taking a deep breath, Saxon closed his eyes to center himself. “I’ll find it one day.”
“Find what?” Jeremiah asked.
“The perfect person.”
Jeremiah shook his head. “Okay. Well, let’s focus on the present, and the person hell-bent on ending us. Yeah?”
Saxon nodded. “Yeah.”