Chapter Two
Maverick .
Present Day
Tipsy.
That’s how I end up on the third floor of Inferno, watching the new dancer sway her hips while holding onto the bars of her cage for the third Saturday in a row.
Large black wings, lined with gold. Even though her half mask is a moth, she looks like an angel.
The shape of her body reminds me of Raven.
I’m usually on the fourth floor doing depraved things with the women that dance outside of cages.
But that was before Raven.
Who hasn’t shown up to my class unless it’s to drop off her essay on Wednesdays. I don’t know if she thinks I need space from her or she simply needs space from me or she’s giving me a chance to soak up everything she’s given me – and soak up I have.
Jonas still shows up because he needs it for his bachelor’s in political science. But he sits in the back of the class and does nothing more than take notes on his laptop and leaves, never staying behind.
“Let it unravel.”
I watch the same older gentleman as last week stride up to her – pale hair, pale blue eyes, unmasked with an audacious confidence that oozes power and wealth.
I hate him. This man is proud to be seen, doesn’t care if his kinks are on display.
The bartender unlocks the cage and out she goes, her hand in his, and as she moves, I swear, I swear I see the semblance of a tattoo where my Raven has hers. But that couldn’t be right… right?
I go to the cage before her screen is turned off. Chloe Ultor… avenger .
My stomach plunges to my knees as I stare after them, his hand in hers, leading her up the stairs but even behind the mesh in her mask hiding her eyes, I swear she’s watching me.
Her head is turned in my direction and as they disappear behind the ponywall, I feel the silent tug of our soul-string.
My heart begins to stammer in my chest and my legs unwillingly follow.
But I’m four Rusty Nails deep. Not to mention the two I had before arriving.
I could blame it on the alcohol for my stumbling to the stairs. Blame that I confused her for someone else. But I need to see.
I stay in the shadows, the lights overhead bright, purple, white and green.
Some song I heard Raven playing a few times comes on and she vacates Stephen’s lap, goes up to the pole and begins to sway.
A peek of her tattoo – one I traced to primarily with my tongue and my fingertips, mesmerized by the goosebumps that rose in their wake.
But this isn’t her element.
“I’m s-s-ssorry.” She had stuttered with eyes full of tears holding that fucking binder.
The binder that harbored true evil. Syndicate secrets that made me sick to my stomach.
And yet I had devoured every page. All of her scratchy annotations where she had done her own research.
One by one, going back to the pages, her notes, their deaths, researching them myself.
Because she had dared to speak. To me. She had parted her perfect lips, taken a breath, and sputtered her raspy apology.
And as if knowing giving more of an explanation or a deeper apology would hurt her physically.
But her eyes… wide with sorrow, tears, and longing for understanding, silently pleaded with me to love her despite her transgressions.
It was an image I’ll never be able to replace.
And I wanted to – desperately .
But the question remains; what to do with the goddamn ledger? Do I turn it to Detective Arlo and let him and his team handle it? Burn it? Let her unravel? Do I integrate myself in the investigation to keep an eye, make sure any evidence leading to her is redirected?
I’m surprised to see a masked Damon and Jonas watching my dark angel from the bar.
Have they always been here, hiding in plain sight protecting her and I just never saw them in my drunken stupors?
We watch her every move as I slip into the corner, where I’m most likely to stay and be undisturbed, where I can watch as the last sane Prescott roves his hands over what’s mine as one by one, unmasked individuals as audacious as him approach, unbuttoning their suit jackets as they sit around the crescent-shaped velvet sofa, drinks in hand.
He pats her plump bottom and whispers something to her.
I growl and it goes unheard over the music, the woman I’m sure is Raven is swaying her hips to.
The more I watch I can see how nervous she is, how she stays close to the conversation, tilting her ear toward them, her head, and when the song is over, she goes back to him, to his lap.
His hands once more roaming over her body.
My body. The one I owned. It was mine. All mine.
And she leans into it. To his touch. The thought of being replaced sends me into a jealous rage.
I take a step forward but a motion out of the corner of my eye twenty feet away stops me.
My eyes flick to where Jonas is shaking his head at me, one palm raised in a silent STOP and then has his hands raised to his mid-section as to not draw attention .
Gathering information.
I quirk a dark brow in his direction because he’s obviously been practicing his ASL.
I gather my courage, finally after three weeks, and stride to the bar to order another drink beside them.
Like before, Damon turns to face the club, inconspicuously, and I stay facing the wall of mirrors and shelved liquor, taking a seat on the stool with a red velvet buttoned cushion.
He holds his classic Old Fashioned, me with my fresh two fingers of Macallan and for almost too long neither of us say anything. Another song plays, low and sultry, the tension thick between us but then, “Have you made your decision?”
“There was a detective literally at my door.” I grumble, the memory of Arlo still makes my stomach churn and my brain pulsate against my temples. I suppose I could blame that on the alcohol as well.
“I see.”
No, he doesn’t see, his attitude is too fucking nonchalant for me.
It was my workplace. I was fucking blindsided not by my girlfriend, not by her partners I was beginning to see as my friends but by some motherfucker I didn’t even know.
Christ I unknowingly got rid of evidence. If anything, that shit was sloppy.
“Do they know or suspect anything else?”
I straighten my back at his bold question. “No.”
Damon sighs. It’s rich and I can feel the sorrow in his voice that matches the feeling in my chest. “It was an honest mistake, one she never meant to make. She didn’t mean for that to happen the way it did and she regrets having dragged you into this.
She’s been a mess without you, our little bird. ”
Our little bird.
Our .
The word bounces between my ears. It feels far away and yet…
it feels right. And that makes me happy.
I take a sip of my drink, hiding the way one elementary word makes me soar.
Even though it shouldn’t. Because my head and my heart are even further at war and the whiskey is in no way helping, when I let it fu rther settle over my tongue, welcoming the accompanying burn. “Which of you was the second shadow?”
No answer.
“Can you promise it won’t happen again?”
The stern “No.” comes from Jonas. “I help her clean up what I can, but I can’t make any promises it will always be perfect.”
“Like the wig in my trash I had to burn?” I chastise. I’m being a fucking asshole and I know it but my anger stems from being kept in the dark for so long.
This time they both face me. Gunmetal first then hazel eyes meet mine.
Damon lifts a heavy shoulder and Jonas fails to hide his smirk, leaving me to believe they think I accept this.
That I’ve betrayed my own morals and ethics, same as them, for her, for them.
For this dysfunctional family that just works. But haven’t I?
“Like the wig in the trash you chose to burn, Maverick.” Jonas says, still scanning the room, one elbow on the bar, looking bored as fuck.
The whiskey in my stomach sours. “How many more?” I slur the question.
“Until it’s done.”
_______
I wake on a couch that isn’t my couch, in a house that isn’t mine, a needle in my arm that’s connected to an IV bag of fluids, the urge to piss but not vomit, and a headache that is minimal, although there.
On the coffee table to my right is a mini bottle of water, two ibuprofen and a note that says,
‘ You should guard your drinks better. The bathroom is the first door on the right. – Jonas .’
Did the little fucker drug me? Better question is, when did the fucker drug me?
I gently tug the IV out of my arm and squeeze my hand, wrapping the cord over the IV stand and make my way to the half bathroom in the grand house, relieve myself, wash my face and find a band aid in a first aid kit under the sink and place it where I’m bleeding.
When I open the door, I’m handed a hot mug of coffee.
“Glad to see you’re up.”
“The kid drugged me.” I gripe, taking the mug, my mood dipping again at how delicious it is. Brewed to annoying perfection.
The prick.
“He just wanted you to see what he was capable of. And it wasn’t a lot. Barely a drop. You were already drunk as a skunk.” A shirtless, comfortable Damon says, taking a sip from his own mug.
“Was not.”
Damon chuckles and shakes his head.
“Where is she?”
“They flew to London with Jonas’ parents this morning for his mother’s birthday since it’s also Thanksgiving break.”
Of course they did. “And you?”
“I have patients to see on campus until midday Tuesday.”
“No family?”
“I’ll be headed to see my father in Stanford on Wednesday and then I’ll catch a red eye on Thursday to see my mother.”
“Where is she?”
“Paris. Jonas and Raven will be meeting me there. Would you like to come with?”
I scrunch my nose, feel my brows furrow. “To meet your parents?”