Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
H angman…
The manse was in fine form by the time we reached it. The party hadn’t started, the caterers under direction of Torment were scurrying like ants, and some of the guys were standing around with drinks – they’d skipped the beer like I had and had gone straight for the liquor.
“Oh, no thank you.” Lorelai blushed and waved off the caterer who had held up the bottle of wine to silently ask if she wanted some.
I eyed him and put my lips to Lorelai’s ear and murmured, “Have some now, before the party guests arrive, then carry a glass of champagne. You don’t have to drink from it, but carry one to blend in and keep a motherfucker from pestering you to drink.”
She nodded a bit apprehensively and I kissed her temple and whispered, “Stay with me, I’ve got you.”
She looked up at me and there was a sheen of grateful tears across her luminous silvery eyes. I tucked her under my arm and she leaned into my side and I caught Reaper staring as he usually did when there was something pretty and female nearby.
He was ever stoic, but his eyes gave him away from behind those ever-present round blue lenses… He studied the women we were with as though he found them fascinating creatures, and there was something else in there twisting behind his eyes. What that something was, was anybody’s guess. If anyone knew, it would be Grim, but Grim wasn’t telling.
None of us understood why Grim had taken on the project that was Reaper – we didn’t have to get it. All we had to do was understand that those two were as thick as thieves and in their own world, sometimes speaking their own language that none of us could hear.
Lorelai caught Grim’s eye and he winked at her, then she shyly tucked herself a little harder into my side when she caught Reaper’s eye on her.
He was honestly enough to make any one of us uncomfortable, but I think it was a macho point of silent pride among the guys to put up a front like he didn’t faze any one of us – but I knew better.
He gave every single one of us the fuckin’ creeps at one time or another. Some of us it took a little more some of us a little less, but all of us had felt that cold finger of fear run itself down our spines in his presence at one time or another.
None of us were immune.
It took women a hell of a lot longer than any guy to warm up to the dude. Madisyn seemed the least fazed out of the women that were with the club or hung around us with any regularity.
They had a strange sort of little friendship bond thanks to her art that’d developed into a brotherly/sisterly type of relationship or friendship.
I don’t really think Lore and Reap had fully come to an understanding yet – but that was something they had to work out in their own time and that I couldn’t fix or facilitate unless one or the both of them came to me for that sort of thing.
As of right now, Reap was Reap and doing that thing where he studied everyone in the room like he wondered what they looked like on the inside, while Lorelai remained shy and close to me.
There was a sort of comfortableness to the uncomfortableness of it all – and one that both could seemingly live with for now. That was alright by me.
We hung around talking, went through the main sitting room that’d been turned into a temporary gallery with Min-Syn’s paintings suspended from racks and contraptions that were artfully lit and draped with a black but also somehow shimmery material, making the paint colors pop and lending a magical and ethereal look to the paintings which images depicted Lorelai sitting at a table among some of the graves I recognized from Bonaventure, but seated opposite her, his own cup of tea in his bony hand, sat death itself, face shrouded from view, cowl deep and void of any guess at its features.
A book sat on the table between them, and if you got close enough you could read that poet girl’s name. Lorelai had said the painting was her idea. That she took it from the poem that started Because I could not stop for Death, he kindly stopped for me… the carriage held but just ourselves and immortality…
There were several others in the series. Inspired by poetry mostly, little descriptor podiums in front explaining the process and what poem inspired… in some cases when the poem wasn’t as famous or well known, there was a transcription of it there.
I looked around, thinking to myself that the trap was set, now we just needed the rats to come for the bait – and there wasn’t any bait better for the rich and powerful in and around Savannah than an invitation-only art showing in Savannah’s own King Arthur’s Court – all his Knights in attendance, his Queen on display.
Madisyn indeed looked her best, stunning, body on display in a dress that had to have been chosen by Syn as there wasn’t a hint of modesty in the plunging neckline. He loved to drive a motherfucker crazy with envy, and one look at Madisyn tonight would have struck a chord of jealousy in me were this a year and a day ago, or even six or seven months ago – but that was then and this was now, and as my Sweetpea leaned into my side, I felt nothing but a burning, yearning, ache to be inside of her.
I knew about then I was in too deep, and there was no going back whatsoever. That like it as not, Lorelai was stuck with me. I was just one lucky son of a bitch that she seemed desperate to stay with me.
“Doors!” Synister called and I felt Lorelai take a deep breath at my side.
She knew, as we all did, that this was our last-ditch effort. Our hail Mary pass at catching the son of a bitch – because we’d come up empty on every other angle we’d pursued.
Her daddy had been involved, but we didn’t tell her that. Her mom knew. It had been the final straw. The thing that’d made her pack up and walk away – but she’d practically begged us to keep Lorelai in the dark.
It had barely taken any threat at all from Grim and Reaper to get the sloppy SOB to spill his guts. He’d owed some motherfuckers some big money – was facing ruin from cutting corners on a project or two. Projects that’d belonged to some very dangerous people.
I kept my girl in the dark on as much of it as I possibly could – not because I thought she was weak, but to honor her mother’s request and hers… she had told me that while part of her wanted to know everything, the rest of her knew just how that might be a bad idea and honestly? I could respect that.
We’d had a lot of talks like that, me and her. About club business being club business and how it wasn’t any of hers – not because I didn’t trust her. I did. Implicitly. No, the main reason we kept our women out of it was plausible deniability. She couldn’t be forced to talk about what she didn’t know by law enforcement or anyone else. It was a safety measure, a security blanket if you will…
Still, I felt like I knew too much about this whole situation and before this was all over, I worried that my Lorelai would too. I worried she would be heartbroken. Angry with me or her mother for keeping her in the dark… it was certainly anxiety inducing, but not as anxiety inducing as the “what if” of what if we never caught him?
We knew certain key players in the charade – we knew who daddy had pissed off, and how. We knew why Lorelai had been targeted, and the why on that – and it made me sick. Sick and fucking angry…
Partially because it was precisely the kind of fucked-up shit that we got up to when we were all in boarding school together. When we were a bunch of dumbass teens with cruel intentions pissed off at our parents and the fucking world with no place to direct that energy other than downhill where the shit always tended to roll.
Some of us felt guilty about some of the shit we did. I was one of them, secretly, deep down inside… and some of us would take the secret of that guilt to the fucking grave. Some of us still didn’t give a fuck what kind of havoc we’d wreaked back then.
Hell, Tor still engaged in fucked-up head games. He enjoyed fucking with people and psychological warfare. Lived for mind fucking people just for the pure hell of it.
I felt like I’d outgrown a lot of that shit, and while I couldn’t make up for a lot of the shit I’d done and had no desire to make up for other shit I’d gotten up to… there were a few things that I felt I should probably in some way atone for.
…and here was Lorelai. With the fucked-up situation surrounding her, drowning in lies and reaching for a truth, or at the very least justice.
It was like the universe had handed me an opportunity in atoning for some of my past shit by helping her. Not only handed it to me, but gift wrapped in shiny paper with a big red fucking bow.
Guests started to arrive and Lorelai stayed close to me, except for the odd occasion she needed to use the restroom, or that I did. In the event that I needed to leave her side for any reason, I left her in the care of one of my brothers.
Lainey stayed close by, and as I’d advised, Lorelai kept a drink in hand though I don’t think she ever actually sipped or drank any of the liquid in her glass at all. I couldn’t blame her. It was something we would have to work on – but not right now. Right now, we had bigger fish to fry…
“I have to piss,” I muttered unhappily as I scanned the crowd for a brother to leave Lorelai with.
“I’m here,” Reaper said from behind us and Lorelai startled vaguely.
“You alright with that?” I asked her.
She nodded, a bit pale and I raised my eyebrows to check with her one more time. She met my eyes and gave me a single nod, her face etched with lines of bravery and determination.
I gave Reaper a silent warning look and he nodded, standing beside Lore, and saying, “Try to smile and act like we’re having enough of a conversation that I don’t actually have to talk to anyone else?”
She smiled and nodded and said back, “That’s very interesting, please tell me more.”
“Fuck,” Reaper muttered. “I was hoping you would do most of the talking,” he said dismayed and Lorelai laughed like he’d told her a funny joke as I strode away and made my way to the bathroom off the hall. There was a line forming which was annoying.
I was standing next to a guy in a nice, tailored suit. I didn’t know him. Had never seen him before. He was a clean-cut yuppie-looking son of a bitch, but the watch on his wrist was expensive as he checked it, waiting for his turn to step into the bathroom and do his thing.
“Only problem with holding one of these types of functions in a home – never enough bathrooms,” I griped.
He chuckled and tilted his head, saying, “Name of the game when you’re rubbing elbows with the ultra-rich.”
“I suppose,” I said with a smirk. “You make it sound like you’re not one of the elites.” I looked around, trying to gauge in what capacity he might be here. He was certainly dressed the part, but he was talking like he wasn’t the one holding the reins. Still, if he was just the staff? Well, insert a low whistle here…
“I’m not,” he said with a bit of a shrug. “If I had to hazard a guess, you aren’t either.”
“Oh?” I asked smoothly. “Why would you say that?”
The door opened to the restroom and a gent stepped out and, with a polite nod, went past us. Dude looked past me at whoever had walked up on my six and said, “Ladies first.”
I glanced and Lainey smiled brightly and said, “Thank you!” before giving me a polite nod and slipping past both me and the mystery man and closing the door.
“Mm.” He gave his head a little shake and looked after Lainey like she was a prime cut of meat. “I was saying?” he asked.
I chuckled, on cue, just another red-blooded American male – locker room style, like he hadn’t just disrespected one of my brother’s girls by looking at her the way he just had and I kept a lid on things. “You were just about to tell me what gave me away as not being one of the rich fucks wandering through this house,” I reminded him.
He laughed mirthlessly. “I would say you’re on my level. A foot soldier,” he said, raking me with his gaze. “You carry yourself like prior military.”
“Guilty,” I said. He nodded.
“I thought so…” the conversation turned to the typical bullshit – what branch? How many tours? MOS, that type of shit.
Turns out he was Army at one point, and he was here with the Mancini family – protection detail.
Interesting.
Lainey came out of the restroom and said, “Thank you again, so much!”
“Of course,” he said, taking her hand and kissing the back while she blushed furiously. He let her go and went into the pisser, closing the door and Lainey’s face dropped – customer service and polite smile vanishing in an instant. She made significant eye contact with me and then looked across the room. I followed her eye to my Lorelai, standing by Reaper who was trying to pry her hand open around the shattered champagne flute in it. Blood dripped down her arm and her eyes were both wide and haunted. Terrified and far away with that thousand-yard stare that had become so familiar for me.
I looked from Lore to Lainey, from Lainey to Lore and as I looked back to Lainey realized Lainey stared fixedly at the bathroom door where my new friend had just disappeared into.
A calm settled over me. The kind of calm where all sound just dropped, ceased to exist, and I went into that place deep inside myself where nothing lived. Where it was quiet and still in a way that for anyone on the outside meant trouble.
My target had just been locked.
“Get me any one of the boys and then go see to Lorelai,” I ordered her. She didn’t hesitate, just gave me a crisp nod and off she went, beelining to Lorelai to turn her away and lead her into the kitchen jerking her head in my direction at Reaper.
Reaper made eye contact with me and started moving in my direction through the crowd, like a shark gliding through the currents. The vibe suddenly changing around him, people subtly moving out of his way without knowing the reason why or that they even did it.
I saw Grim catch Reap moving with purpose this way and he broke off from the knot of people he’d been standing with and made his way this way. Reaper got to me and I said, “The dick in the shitter. Keep him busy.”
Reaper nodded just in time for the door lock to sound as it was thrown back and we both got our game faces on in the nick of time, just before the door opened.
“…Army he was telling me,” I said and the man of the hour stepped out.
“Oh yeah?” Reaper smiled and it was an infectious thing.
I smiled back and said, “Yeah. Speak of the devil – sorry, man. I didn’t get your name, but I’d like you to meet Sam here.”
“Hey, Sam. Cal, Cal Pierce,” the man said and stuck out his hand to shake Reaper’s. “You on protection detail too?”
Reaper’s smile grew. “Absolutely,” he said. “We’re all just living that body guard life…”
I stepped into the bathroom and threw the lock, bracing my hands on the edges of the pedestal sink as my body both sagged with relief and tensed with a fiery and incendiary rage .
Game, set, match, motherfucker… I thought venomously at my reflection. Taking a moment to get it together and myself under control.