14. Lilah
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
lilah
The adrenaline is gone. I know because I can feel every individual point of contact between the rope and my wrists, every nerve ending in my shoulders from the angle they've been held at. When the adrenaline was running, I didn't feel any of it.
Now I feel all of it. I keep my breathing measured and I watch the room.
It's a farmhouse. Old, dusty, unkempt. It’s like it hasn't been properly lived in for years.
I notice a kitchen through a doorway to my left, a front door I can see but not reach, two windows with curtains drawn, and a second door at the back that Marcus came and went through twice since we arrived.
Marcus. That’s his name, he’s the one that hurt Jinx.
He's standing near the front window now, phone in hand, pulling the curtain back at intervals to check the road. He’s monitoring things because Evan’s pacing. I watched Evan do the exact same for two days in Connecticut. He's waiting for something.
These two men have been in this room together for two hours, and I've had nothing to do but watch them, there’s something wrong about them. Not in a crazy way; I know they’re both fucking out of their minds, but it’s wrong in the way they are around each other. They know one another inside out.
"What was the sign for?" I ask, needing to break the silence.
Evan stops pacing, he looks at me and the corner of his mouth moves. "You saw it?"
"I was in the car."
"Then you know what it was for."
"Kai won't come alone."
He holds my gaze. "I'm counting on it."
Fear courses its way through me, making my blood run cold. He wants Kai here. He didn't just take me to hurt me; he took me to use me, to draw Kai in. I start pulling against the restraints again, testing the knot at my left wrist, working the rope against itself.
Evan watches. "Now you're scared."
"Of you? No."
"Don't lie to me."
"I'm scared for him." I meet his eyes. "That's different."
Anger slides into his expression and his jaw tightens. I've said the wrong thing. Not wrong because he'll hurt me, wrong because once again someone else matters more than he does.
That's what breaks him; it always was.
"Lucy loved me," he says, moving to the other side of the room. "Before you." I look at the floor in front of me and say nothing. "She was happy until you started working on her."
"Lucy was afraid of you."
He stops pacing. "Because of you." His voice stays even. "Every time she started to trust me, you were there with your looks and your little comments and your constant..."
"Because you hurt her." I look at him. "She didn't need me to tell her that. She felt it."
Marcus looks up from his phone at that, and Evan takes a breath before continuing, "She needed protecting from herself. From the things you told her."
"Lucy was the smartest person I've ever known," I say. "She didn't need me to tell her anything. She worked it out herself. That's what you couldn't forgive."
He crosses the room and crouches in front of me, I hold his gaze. "She left because of you," he says.
"She left because she finally saw you clearly."
He stands up.
"Evan." Marcus' voice is quiet. "Stop. This isn’t why we’re here."
Evan turns. “Don’t start, Marcus.”
"I'm not starting anything. We have a plan, stick to it."
Evan stares at Marcus. "You've been fucking nagging me since you were twelve."
I look between them and that something that's been bothering me since the alley crystallizes into certainty.
"You're brothers," I say.
Marcus' eyes come to me. They’re flat and careful, whereas Evan smiles. "Half," Marcus says.
"Brothers," Evan says.
The word that settles the whole thing. They’re not employer and employee, or handler and contractor, they’re brothers. Which means Marcus isn’t here for money; he’s here for something entirely different.
I keep watching Marcus. I can't help it now that I know they're brothers.
I look for Evan in him, but I don't see much.
Maybe around the eyes, a little in the shape of his mouth, but that's about it, and Marcus barely looks at me.
He checks his phone, looks through the window, walks into the kitchen and comes back.
Pre-occupied with anything that diverts his attention away from me.
Evan doesn't have that problem; he hasn't stopped watching me.
"Are you always this fucking anal?" Evan asks him.
Marcus glances over. "Just making sure we're clear."
"We are."
Marcus nods and checks the window again anyway. Evan rolls his eyes. "Sit the fuck down, Marcus. You're making me dizzy."
"I'm fine."
"You're annoying."
"Nothing new there."
Evan comes toward me again and Marcus stops moving. Evan grabs my chin and forces my face up. "Still waiting for your biker?" I don't answer and his fingers tighten. "I asked you a question."
"Then ask one worth answering."
The hit comes fast. Pain immediately explodes across my cheek and my head snaps sideways, and a sound escapes me before I can swallow it.
"Jesus, Evan," Marcus groans.
I lift my head, and Evan looks over his shoulder. "What?"
Marcus' jaw is tight, but whatever he was about to say disappears. "Nothing." He turns toward the window, and I stare at the back of his head.
Evan turns back to me. But I'm not looking at him anymore. I'm focused on his brother. Because Marcus Webb might be willing to help Evan find me, he might be willing to help him take me, but he doesn't like watching him hurt me, and right now, that's the first useful thing I've got.
"What did he tell you about Lucy?" I ask.
Evan’s face hardens. "Don't."
"Did he tell you she was tied to a chair?"
"Lilah." It’s a warning.
"Did he tell you I was right beside her?"
"Shut up." His hand connects with my face, open-palmed, hard enough to send my head sideways and fill my eyes with water. I hold the tears back through sheer refusal.
I look at Marcus. "Did he tell you he made me watch?"
Marcus looks at Evan, Evan stares back, but nothing is said. When Evan turns back to me, it isn't just his palm that connects with my face. I keep my eyes open. I make myself stay present even while my body is screaming the opposite.
To distract myself, I think of Kai. His hands at the small of my back last night.
The feeling of warmth as I woke up inside the circle of his arm.
His voice, low and certain. I'm staying, Lilah.
I hold on to that even as the pain laces through my body as Evan unleashes his anger on me, anywhere and everywhere he can.
I'm on the floor, bloody and beaten, and there’s a ringing in my ears that hasn't stopped.
I just lie here, taking stock of my body: my wrists are still bound, the rope is looser on the left from all the pulling but not enough, my ankles are tied to the chair legs, my shoulder is hurting from the impact of being dragged and pushed, and my lip is busted, I can taste the blood dripping from it.
I close my eyes for a moment, centering myself like every time before.
Kai's voice on the phone, low and steady and immediate.
I'm here. His arm around me this morning before either of us had said anything, just the weight of him, certain and unhurried.
His name from my lips for the first time, the resulting shift in his expression.
I stay in that for a moment longer, and then I open my eyes.
Marcus hasn't moved, he was standing at the window throughout Evan’s assault on me, with his back to me, and now he's looking at the floor. Evan is nowhere to be seen.
I groan as I try to sit up but it’s no use; I’m in too much pain to get up. Marcus finally moves and sits on the edge of the table a few feet away. Not close. He doesn't look at me.
"He saved you," I say quietly. I’ve been thinking about it for a long time. Their relationship makes no sense, surely, you’d see how awful your brother is and put a stop to it, but Marcus hasn’t. His eyes narrow, but he doesn’t speak. I say it again, louder this time. "He saved you."
Marcus' eyes snap to mine. "You don't know what you're talking about."
"Don't I?"
"No."
"Then why are you still here?"
His jaw tightens. "You don't know anything about me."
"I know you're not like him."
"You don't know him either."
A laugh slips out of me. "I watched him murder my sister.
" Marcus looks away, but not before I see the flash of guilt in them.
"He saved you from something," I say. "Maybe it was from your dad, or even your mom, I don't know.
But whatever happened, you've spent your whole life paying him back for it. "
"Shut up," he growls at me.
"Am I wrong?"
"I said shut the fuck up."
But he doesn't look at me and he doesn't answer the question.
"Lucy used to defend him too," I say, pain lacing my chest at her name. God, I miss her so much.
His eyes come straight back to mine. "Don't talk about her."
"Why? Because Evan told you who she was?"
"I know who she was."
"No." My throat tightens, but I don't look away. "You know who he told you she was."
His face changes, it’s only a slight change, but I see it, so, I keep going. "Did he tell you she was tied to a chair, defenseless, when he killed her?"
“Shut up,” he grunts.
I don’t stop. "Ask him why he tied me to the chair beside her, ask him what he did to us for two fucking days, and ask him how Lucy died."
Marcus looks toward the back door.
"No. Look at me." His eyes come back to mine. "Ask him."
"You need to stop."
"Why?"
"Because you don't know what you're talking about."
"I was there, Marcus." His jaw clenches. "I watched my sister die. You didn't."
"He told me what happened."
"Of course he did."
His eyes are filled with anger, and I think a little sorrow. "You think you know everything about him."
"I know he put a knife in Lucy while she was tied to a fucking chair."
He flinches at my words. "Stop."
"Ask him if I'm lying,” I goad and he pushes to his feet. "Ask him," I repeat.
He walks to the window and stares outside.