Chapter 6
Declan
“Let me get this straight,” I mutter and pinch the bridge of my nose between my thumb and forefinger. My teeth are clenched so tightly that they might actually crack. “He just… died. Before you even got to the room?” I hear Hayden shift on the leather sofa beside me. “Just… poof… dead?” My head is pulsing with a sharp pain behind my left eye.
“No. I did not say ‘just poof dead’,” Hayden snaps and shoves to his feet, angrily pacing back and forth across our open living room. His shadow appears and disappears in the long rectangles of evening light filtering in from the floor-to-ceiling windows as he stalks around like a caged animal. “I was just down the hall evaluating the situation when this…” He waves his hands in the air, seemingly at a loss for descriptive adjectives.
I blink at him expectantly, but he doesn’t continue. I improvise for him. “Earthquake? Tragic hospital fire? Psychotic nurse with murderous intent?”
He levels me with a dark look and Silas coughs into his fist to hide a chuckle. “You’re not far off,” he admits and drops his whole body back onto the sofa, the leather protesting under his full weight. “Family or something from what I originally overheard the nurses saying. She was visiting and left the room moments before he arrested.”
Silas leans forward from his perch on the arm of the loveseat across from me. “What did she look like? I wasn’t aware of any familial ties that he had. I have been looking into him in great detail for weeks now and there was never any mention of a wife, children, or anything else.” Silas’s voice betrays his emotions. He’s panicking because he thinks that he has missed something. I know from experience just how hard Silas is on himself when it comes to his work.
“They said… cousin? Niece? Yes!” Hayden claps his hands once and props himself up on his elbows. “She was blonde, with a short bob cut.” He gestures around his face with his hands. “She had the most mesmerizing green eyes I have ever seen,” he admits quietly, his voice low.
“Impossible!” Silas nearly shouts and jumps to his feet. “He didn’t have any siblings. He had no family. I’m sure of it.” He’s on the defense now.
I sigh and dig the heels of my palms into my eyes, trying to squash the pressure headache mounting in my skull. “Blonde with green eyes,” I muse under my breath. “I don’t know. Maybe they kept a low profile; off the records. It just doesn’t add up. Maybe it was just a terrible coincidence.”
“You know that I don’t believe in coincidence,” Hayden replies darkly. “You didn’t see her, man. She was… beautiful… She was the picture of grief with the nurses but when she was closer I could tell that she hadn’t spilled a single meaningful tear. Her eyes were… It was like… like…” He’s at a loss for words for a moment. “Determined. Delighted. Dangerous.”
“Like looking in the mirror?” Silas added with a smirk. “I’ve seen your eyes look very similar after a job. The look of a reaper holding a fresh soul. Dark… Devious…” His voice trails off and he looks away.
I chuckle under my breath at the look of both of them looking uncomfortable. I wish they’d get whatever is brewing between them out of their systems so we can all stop tiptoeing around the house. The air is always so thick with this awkward tension. “So not only are we at a loss for who to thank for the completion of this job, but we are also now on the hunt for an angel of death that may or may not be Hayden’s depraved soul mate?”
They both snort and return to their relaxed positions on the sofa. I’m not sure what has been happening the last several months while I’ve been in and out for assignments, but it almost feels like they have gotten into an argument and it has driven a rift between the family that neither of them want to try to mend at this point. It’s pissing me off. My knuckles twitch and I fight the urge to leave them here and disappear into the tunnels for a good fight.
“Angel of death, yes. Soul mate, no,” Hayden finally responds. “It doesn’t matter. It’s done and the mark is dead. Let’s just leave it at that for now.” He levels me with a knowing look. “Wipe that scowl off your face. You are not going to Parkview tonight to beat someone to a bloody pulp. You ruined my fun this morning so now I’m ruining yours.”
“What the fuck are you talking about” I snap, cracking my left knuckles with my right hand.
“I fancy a night out. We all need to decompress from this shitshow of a day. There’s a casino downtown that is having a little party. I heard that there will be some high-stakes games, costumes, and a lot of high rollers.” Hayden raises an eyebrow as he speaks.
“Costumes?” Silas perks up. “It’s the middle of August. Why are they doing costumes?”
“I don’t fucking know?” Hayden retorts. “I’m not personally on the party planning committee for the casino!”
“Shut it, the both of you,” I shout and wave my finger between the two of them. “I’m not in the mood for bickering. You’re fucking grown ass men. Stop acting like six-year-olds.”
They both fall silent and look at their boots, muttering something along the lines of ‘yes dad’. “I’m intrigued. Let’s take the night off and see what this is about. If I can’t go beat someone to a bloody pulp, I might as well get shit-faced. Maybe I’ll get lucky,” I add dryly.
“Do we still have those masks from that job we did in Seoul?” Hayden looks at Silas hopefully.
Silas gives him a single nod and stands, brushing his palms on his pants. “They’re in a storage box in the basement. I’ll go grab them.”
I give them both a devious grin, knowing the exact job they’re referring to. We had infiltrated an entire mob scene in Korea wearing black-on-black suits and sporting white masks with card suits on the front. “Let’s get dressed, gentlemen, we have a casino to raid.”
They smile back before disappearing down the hall to get ready. “Doors open and dice start rolling at nine!” Hayden calls over his shoulder. I hear the distinct click of his door locking a moment later.
Gambling is not my drug of choice. I’d much rather use my fists to let my inner demons out to play, but it’s not always feasible. Especially right now because I’ve got some gnarly bruises on the left side of my body that are still healing from my time in the ring last week. I glance down at the watch on my left wrist and sigh loudly. It is already seven-thirty and I have no idea where my black dress shirt even is. Fuck me for even agreeing to this.
I make my way to my room and take my time in the shower, the hot water turning my skin a deep shade of scarlet as I stand under the spray and let my mind wander through all the details of the day. The job, the woman, my brothers, the retaliation if whoever hired us finds out that it wasn’t us that killed the mark. My mind is buzzing, and my headache is starting to teeter towards a migraine. Maybe going out is not the best idea.
I shut off the water and rake my fingers through my hair, sending droplets of water splattering onto the wall behind me. Not bothering with a towel, I step onto the cool tiled floor and look toward my reflection. The steam from the shower thoroughly fogged up my mirrors, so I bypass trying to fix my hair and step into the cool air of my bedroom. On my bed lies two full-face masks. One is a black spandex ski mask, and the other is white plastic with a solid red diamond painted over the right eye hole. I trace my fingertips gently along the edge of the white mask, reminiscing about the last time I saw it. At least it isn’t covered in blood spatter anymore.
“I can’t find my black shirt! Did we lea-” Hayden barrels through my door with a bare chest and his black trousers unbuttoned. “Why the fuck are you naked?!” he bellows and throws his arm over his eyes.
I roll my eyes at his theatrics. We’ve been living together since we were teenagers, and we have all seen each other naked more times than we can count. “Why am I naked? In my own room? Just after I’ve gotten out of the shower?” I level him with a glare, which he doesn’t see because he’s still hiding behind his forearm. His black suit jacket is hanging limply in his other hand.
“Why didn’t you lock the damn door?” he nearly shouts.
“Why would I lock the door to my own bedroom when I’m showering in my own private bathroom?” I also nearly shout back at him. He is most definitely on my ‘punch first, ask questions later’ list tonight.
“Just put some pants on or something!” He waves his hand in the general direction of my cock and scrunches his eyes shut. I quirk an eyebrow at him and pull on a pair of dark blue boxers. “Are you decent?” he asks after a moment.
“No,” I mutter wryly. “But my dick has been put away so you can open your eyes.” He shoots me a middle finger before leveling me with his dark eyes. He narrows in on my purple and green bruises but doesn’t comment other than to raise an eyebrow. Judgmental bastard. He gets to kill people to keep his monsters happy, but I can’t have a bit of bloody fun every now and again?
“I can’t find my black shirt. Do you remember what happened in Seoul?”
“I remember everything that happened in Seoul,” I respond darkly and pull on my own pair of black trousers. Well, almost everything. I also can’t seem to remember what happened to that particular item.
Silas appears behind Hayden a moment later looking very sharp in his black-tie attire. A white dress shirt crisp and clean under the layers of black. His eyebrows shoot to his hairline as he takes in both of our half-naked appearances. “The shirts were too disgusting to save. I burned them when you two were packing up the weapons. You’ll have to go with white tonight,” he adds and tosses two white dress shirts at us.
“That’s right! I remember now!” Hayden grins and his eyes take on this faraway expression. “We took the jackets off because it was so fucking hot in the warehouse. I remember I was covered in grime from coming in through the sewer tunnel and I couldn’t take the heat and the smell at the same time.”
“It was only hot in the warehouse because you set the fucking place on fire before we were all the way inside.” Silas laughs, his eyes sparkling with the memory.
“It was an accident,” I chuckle slightly and finish putting on my layers of dress clothes. “One of his warning shots got too close to a few cylinders of gas.”
“Anyway.” Hayden finishes buttoning his shirt and slips on his black jacket. “That was a fun trip. Now I remember getting rid of those shirts as quickly as we possibly could. White it is then.”
I grab the masks off my bed and start making my way to the front door. Looking over my shoulder, I see Silas watching Hayden discreetly as Hayden pulls on the black ski mask followed by a white mask with a red heart painted over the left eye. Silas catches my eye and hastily pulls on his black mask. His white mask with a black spade over the right eye hangs limply in his hand as he follows us to the car. “Where exactly are we headed?” I ask Hayden as the engine of my Dodge charger purrs to life.
Hayden climbs into the back. Silas slips into the passenger seat and finally hooks his mask into place. “The Black Crown Casino on Marshall Ave.”