Chapter Twelve – Jason
The temperature was a nice, calm seventy degrees with the early afternoon sun shining brightly overhead.
Since it was a weekday, the park wasn’t too busy.
Situated in the center of downtown, it was the only place with trees taller than ten feet and bright green grass.
A big pond sat in the middle of it, surrounded by a paved walkway and numerous benches.
On the far side of the pond was a playground, where a few children were playing while their mothers or babysitters looked on.
Me? I sat on a bench beneath an old oak tree, shaded by the sun, a good twenty feet away from the paved path, even farther away from the pond and its reflective surface. I was leaning back on the wooden bench, waiting for the girl to get here.
And when she did? Frankly, at this point, I didn’t know what would happen, where we’d go from here.
Kieran had been calling since yesterday, and I had to wonder if she knew now who I was. If she didn’t, well, she was in for a rude awakening today.
Laina Hawkins. At first glance, she was just a girl, a girl with dyed hair who liked to wear bright pink contacts that were so clear in their color they were unsettling.
With an appearance like that, you’d think she’d like attention, but the harder you looked, the more you saw it was something else.
I would be a liar if I said I didn’t know who Laina Hawkins was before Tessa called and asked for my help. Though I hadn’t spoken to her in years, I still kept tabs on her and Kieran. I saw the wedding—it was televised to a ridiculous extent. I saw the newscasts about the missing daughter.
Two whole years, and then that missing daughter miraculously returned, a little beaten, a little bruised, a little mutilated.
Tessa wanted my help in dealing with her and Kieran, but I wasn’t stupid.
There was more to this than she told me.
She was hiding something from me. The pieces of this puzzle didn’t fit together as nicely as they should’ve.
I assumed Kieran would hide things from me, too, which was why I wanted to meet with the girl again before answering any of his calls.
First, I’d see what Laina knew about me, if Kieran had told her, and then I’d find out what she knew about the rift between Tessa and Kieran.
When I’d asked her how she’d led Kieran astray, she’d given me a look like I was crazy—a genuine reaction, one that made me wonder if, perhaps, Tessa had lied to me.
I didn’t like being lied to, especially when I had been asked to help. I needed to know the full picture, not just the bits and pieces that suited Tessa.
Even though the temperature was warm, I still wore a thin leather jacket. My arms were up on the bench as I leaned back, and the sleeve of the jacket helped me hide a little something I didn’t plan on using, but the threat of it would hopefully be enough.
Nothing too crazy. Just a switchblade in the palm of my hand. I’d bet anything Laina had come across worse things than that.
That clawed glove I found… now that was something else. A part of me was skeptical she’d ever used it before, but the bigger part of me knew she had, and she’d enjoyed it. A person did not keep something like that nearby just because.
I didn’t know what to make of her, which said something, though I wasn’t sure what.
All this time I’d spent watching her, learning her routine, getting to know her from afar, and I couldn’t peg her.
Kelly had been a slice of her old life, while Lola was new.
The city’s Bloody Queen—you didn’t surround yourself with someone like that without being lured in to the darkness yourself.
Laina was an odd one, that much I knew.
I couldn’t say how long I sat there, waiting, but after a long while, I heard someone approaching from the side.
She took the spot next to me, sitting a good foot away as she deadpanned, “Fancy meeting you here.” She leaned back, her pink and blue hair touching the sleeve of my jacket in the process.
The girl seemed to be totally unaware of the switchblade in my hand, only a few inches away.
“I was starting to think you wouldn’t come,” I told her.
“I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but getting here by myself wasn’t exactly easy.
I had to walk. I don’t have a car—or a license.
” The way she said it made it sound like she didn’t give a shit about either of those things.
I supposed if she had a mini-army of men who would gladly take her anywhere, why would she?
Electing to ignore her comment, I lowered my voice to a whisper, scooted closer to her, and brought my hand down, flicking the switchblade out in the process, “Let’s get down to brass tacks.
You are going to tell me exactly what happened between you, Kieran, and Tessa, and you’re not going to leave out a single detail, no matter how unimportant you think it is.
If you don’t, well, I’ll be forced to use this on you, and I think that’s something we’d both rather avoid.
” As I said that last part, I pressed the switchblade against her hip, just beneath her shirt.
To any passersby, it’d look like my arm was around her. My hand and finger covered the switchblade well enough, and what they didn’t cover, her shirt did.
Laina’s expression did not change, not even as I pressed the switchblade against her skin harder—not hard enough to cut her, but hard enough she had to notice the sharp blade prodding at her side.
The girl didn’t even blink. She only gazed up at me with those big, pink eyes and waited, like she was expecting more or something.
When I didn’t say anything else, the corners of her lips tugged into a smile, and she leaned against me and set her left hand on my leg, drawing my attention to the metal fingers there.
“The threat isn’t necessary,” she said, sounding completely level-headed—something I should not have been surprised of.
“But, for future reference, if you want to scare me, you’re going to need a bigger knife.
” Her fingers, even the metal ones, tapped my leg, one at a time. “Remember what I told you at the club?”
Oh, yes, I remembered. This one… she definitely wasn’t normal. I could understand how she’d gotten so deep beneath Tessa’s skin.
“I wasn’t joking when I said I cut them off.
” She lifted her left hand as she bent just the metal ones.
“I didn’t stop there, though. I bruised my own ribs, dislocated my own shoulder, and even cut my face.
” She traced a scar I could barely see on her light skin.
“I did all of that because while I was kidnapped, my kidnapper never touched me. Do you know why I’d do all that to myself? ”
No, but… I could put it together. Like she’d said, it was a story.
“So, Jason,” she purred out my name in an overly-sensual way, something she had no right to do, “when I tell you you’re going to need a bigger blade, I mean it.” A chuckle escaped her. “But if it makes you feel better, sure. You can keep it there.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “You’re… strange.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” She beamed up at me, like I just complimented her. “I’ll tell you everything, but let me ask you something, first: why didn’t you let me talk more when you kidnapped me?”
“Maybe I wanted to see what you were made of, if you were really as resourceful as I assumed you were.” My jaw ground. “Or maybe I wasn’t ready to hear the full truth from you yet.”
“It hasn’t been that long. Now, suddenly, you’re ready?”
“More like prepared. Tessa isn’t telling me everything, and that means she’s hiding something from me. You don’t hide things when you ask for help—not unless you have something to hide. There are only a few things she would dare hide from me, so I need to be sure.”
“And you trust me enough that you’ll believe every word I say?”
“Within reason.”
“One last question before I spill the beans.” Laina breathed in deeply, then sighed.
She turned her eyes toward the pond. “Why do you care so much about Tessa and Kieran? When I mentioned your name to Kieran, he got spooked, and he hasn’t spoken to me since.
He has to know you from before, so who the hell are you, really? ”
So he didn’t tell her. Guess that honor fell to me, then.
“You can’t tell?” I asked her, causing her to whip her head in my direction and once again meet my gaze.
“Can’t tell,” she echoed. “Can’t tell what?”
“I know my hair isn’t the same color it used to be, but I thought, maybe, the eyes would give it away.” I paused before I added, “They both got my eyes, though Kieran’s match mine a little bit more. Tessa’s turned out a bit of a warmer brown than black.”
Finally, the girl got it. Her gaze widened, and she sucked in a hard breath. “Holy shit. You’re… you’re their dad?” I could see her head spinning; she truly did have no idea before now who I was. I bet it was a good thing she was sitting down, otherwise the shock might’ve made her knees give out.
“I am.”
“But you’re…” She studied me hard. “How old are you?”
“Forty-seven. Their mom and I had Tessa when I was only fifteen. Kieran came a few years later.”
“And their mom?”
“She left a long time ago. Up and abandoned all of us like we meant nothing. I did my best to do what I could for them, but in the beginning especially, I was still a kid myself. I worked a lot. They had to rely on each other—so now you know why I give a shit about the fact that Kieran betrayed his sister.”
She had the audacity to laugh at me. “Are you joking? Please. Kieran didn’t betray her.
She gave him an order to get rid of me so she could worm her way into my dad’s life and apparently get the life she always wanted.
As far as I was aware, she wasn’t specific in how to get rid of me.
Your son had a thing for me, so instead of killing me, he kidnapped me and kept me for two years. ”