Chapter 9
QUE
Icould hear the twins having fun with Red as I continued to follow Rudy down the hall, picking up the occasional old lady knickknack and picture frame.
Why did old people always have such awful taste in décor? Was it a requirement or something? A starter pack that came with your AARP card?
I flicked a porcelain statue with a tutu while Rudy yanked open a drawer. Guy was convinced something was up with this girl. I was convinced he was just doing what he always did, creating problems where there were none.
It was exactly the reason we spent the last five years behind those bars. Instead of escaping the first chance we got.
I glanced down at the janitor uniform we managed to clip from the old supply closet we found in the basement more than a year ago and then up at the back of Rudy’s head, enjoying the view of his ass muscles clenching beneath the tight material.
I cocked an eyebrow. Fucker was a hard ass in more ways than one.
The last picture frame on a little table outside what appeared to be a bedroom door—a locked bedroom door, if the way Rue-Rue was tugging on it was anything to go by—was one of those old-timey wedding portraits that looked more doom and gloom than my mugshot.
And probably a lot like what the fucker in front of me woulda looked like in his own wedding photos.
Rudy wasn’t the smiling type.
Okay, that was a lie. He did smile. Once. Shortly after Holly said yes to marrying his dumb ass. I even took a photo as proof. Miracles didn’t happen every day. Truth was, there wasn’t much I wouldn’t do to see him smile like that again…
“Yes?” Rudy repeated, like he wasn’t sure he’d heard her right.
“Yes!” Holly nodded, her hands still covering her face the way chicks did when they didn’t want you to see their makeup running.
I didn’t know what my best friend saw in the woman. She was shallow, and not in the endearing way—like yours truly. In the way that told everyone (but the idiot kneeling at her feet apparently) that she was marrying him for his paygrade.
Rudy wouldn’t listen, though. Fucker was “in love.”
I downed the rest of the whiskey in my glass, pulled my phone from a pocket, and snapped a quick photo. Not my fault it happened to be at an unflattering angle that gave Holly a double chin. I was just being a good friend and capturing the memory for ?em.
That had been the last time I saw the bitch. Alive anyway. Though I would be the first to admit seeing her dead eyes stare up at me from that hole we dropped her in was about as cathartic as it got.
I set what I was assuming was Grandma’s wedding photo back on the table and glanced over to Rudy, who was leaning against the closest wall with his face in his palms.
“Fuck!” Maybe I wasn’t the only one reliving ancient history, probably a little more fondly than I should. I rushed over to Rudy, pried his hands back, and realized he had tears in his eyes.
But he wasn’t crying. He was laughing. So hard that he was crying.
This shit must have really been getting to him. Fucker was losing his damn mind, and I had no clue as to what I could do about it.
Angry Rudy was easy. That anger could be fucked right out of him. But Manic Rudy was a-whole-nother level I’d never stumbled across before.
I gently clamped a hand down on his shoulder, while he threw his thick skull back against the wall with a thud and a laugh. “You okay, man?”
He shook his head. “It’s so fucking funny…” he choked out between fits of giggles. The broodiest fucker I’d ever met was… giggling. I think we mighta just stumbled ourselves into an episode of The Twilight Zone.
“What is?” I asked, and he pointed to something hanging on the wall across from us.
I dropped my hand from his shoulder and stepped closer to get a better look, reading the saying on the crocheted doily thing that was pegged down with a couple of nails directly into the sheetrock, “I wanted to make you something, but I ran out of yar—”
Rudy barked out another loud laugh as soon as I was done speaking. “It’s funny… ?cause… ?cause…” He wheezed. “?Cause she couldn’t finish the word…” A cough. “Because she ran out of yarn.”
“Yeah, I got that.” I tipped my head to one side to stare at him while he continued to struggle to breathe. A few more seconds and I found myself feeling lighter and laughing too.
Rudy slid down the wall and plopped onto his ass, his legs spread out in front of him and touching the other side of the hallway. “You get it now?”
I mirrored his posture as I scooted over to face him. “You’re right. It is fucking funny.” At least it was all of a sudden, and I had no clue why.
The commotion had another softer set of footsteps stopping next to us. I followed the bare feet up a pair of leggings to a mop of red hair and then finally a face.
“Hi, Red!” I threw my arms out to the side and accidentally hit my elbow on the little table. “Ow!” I rubbed it a few times before peering up at Nickie again. “You sure are pretty. For a girl.”
I stuck my tongue out at her, and Rudy chuckled into his hand. “You said for a girl.”
Nickie propped her hands on each one of her hips as she looked from me to Rudy. “Did I forget to mention there was a shit-ton of pot in those cookies?”
Rudy laughed, clutched his stomach, and fell onto his side. Staring at me from where he was curled up on the floor. “She gave us pot cookies, Thump—”
“I know,” I giggled.
“I don’t do drugs,” Rudy giggled back.
“Maybe you should start.”