Chapter 14
Asher
ELLA: You’re sure I didn’t scare you off?
Ismile at my phone, typing back quick.
ME: Not a fucking chance. Gable just needs me tonight. Brother stuff. What are you doing?
I lost rock, paper, scissors for the bed, so I stretch out on the couch, one hand tucked behind my head as I wait for Ella’s response.
ELLA: Trying to write, but I keep thinking about your hands.
I grin.
ME: Are you trying to sext with me, Miss Gibson?
ELLA: Absolutely not. If I’m typing anything sexy, it’s in this damn book.
ELLA: Stop distracting me
My phone starts vibrating in my hand, the name on the screen a welcome one. One I hadn’t realized I needed to see until this very second.
“Hey, Hunter.”
“Hey, kid.” His low, deep voice sounds like home.
Like the first time in years Gable and I had somewhere, and someone, we could go to.
Like stability. Like how I imagine a father would sound.
“Cleo called me. We’re trying to find out who sent the job to you, but as for the girl, she’s clean.
” I close my eyes, relief washing over me despite the new obstacles this creates.
At least I don’t have to kill her; all I need to do now is make sure no one else does.
“What’s going on, kid? Cleo said you sounded off on the phone. ”
What is going on with me? I’ve never let anyone get under my skin the way Ella has, and she isn’t even trying.
“I like her,” I admit, hating how damn high school I sound when I’m a grown-ass man. “She just … appeared, and she isn’t going away, and I don’t want her to. Is there anything you can do about the bounty?”
“If it were from the agency, I’d squash it in a heartbeat, but it isn’t. I’ll do everything I can, but if she hasn’t done anything on paper, it likely means it’s personal.”
Which means money won’t get rid of it. A vendetta digs its claws deep, and the only thing that gets them out is cold, ruthless revenge.
“I think she has the drive,” I say. “I don’t think she knows she does, though. I need to find out for sure, but it might take some time.”
“Do what you have to do. I trust your judgment. How’s your brother?” he asks, and I hear the familiar snap of a lighter. I can imagine him at home, leaning back in his leather desk chair, a glass of whiskey on the desk, cigar in hand.
“Pissed that we’re still here,” I say. “You know Gable.”
His laugh is low. “Hates her, I imagine.”
“With a passion.”
“He’ll just be worried. You’re all he has. If he’s gonna lose you to someone, she has to be worth it.”
She is.
The thought is fleeting, but I still think it, and it almost catches my breath.
“Want me to call him?” Hunter asks. “Tell him to cool off?”
“When has that ever worked?”
Another laugh. “It’s always worth a try. I’m gonna call him anyway, see how he is.”
I take the phone away from my ear and check the date. When I realize what’s tomorrow, I whisper a curse.
“Shit,” I say after returning the phone to my ear.
“Comes around fast,” Hunter says. “Keep an eye on him.”
Once the call ends, I get up, get dressed, and thank the stars for the stores open late. Once I’ve got everything I need and I’m back in the apartment, I lay out chocolate-covered graham crackers and whack marshmallows in the microwave.
It’s almost one AM, but the moment the microwave beeps, the bedroom door opens.
Wordlessly, Gable approaches, and I hand him his plate of s’mores. I pick up mine, we sit beside each other on the couch, and we eat.
It’s a tradition we started when we were kids.
After being separated for almost a year, only keeping in contact with letters and the occasional phone call, we found ourselves with foster families only two streets apart.
One night, Gable crept in through my window with s’mores, and we hid under the covers and ate them, catching up on everything we’d missed in each other’s lives.
We’d talk about the future. About how when we turned eighteen, we’d make sure to never be apart.
We’d be brothers. We’d change our surname so we could have the same one.
We’d get the best apartment in the coldest city we could find.
We’d marry sisters, so then we’d really be related.
Our whole world was about each other, and those nights were the best of my fucking life, because anything felt possible.
As we got older, s’mores nights became about more than just dreams. They were there to fix bad days, to smooth over our past, to distract ourselves from anniversaries like this one.
We don’t talk about that night. Gable never wants to, and I don’t push it. It’s his past to deal with, and while I’m tangled up in it, too, it’s more his pain than mine.
“Hunter call you?” Gable asks finally, licking melted marshmallow off his thumb.
“Yep.”
He nods, then places his empty plate on the coffee table. “Guess I should expect a call too, then.”
He acts aloof, but Hunter is as much a father figure to Gable as he is to me. He’s the only one, apart from each other, who has never let us down.
“Ella’s clean.”
He looks at me. “Seriously?” I nod, and he exhales. “Shit.”
A single word that sums up what could have been the biggest mistake of our lives. Killing someone totally innocent.
“So, what now?” he asks.
I’ve been thinking about that since the call with Hunter. The entire walk to the store, I agonized over what to do about Ella fucking Gibson. She’s in danger, regardless of why, and even if I didn’t care about her, I couldn’t walk away without doing anything.
She’s become our responsibility, whether we like it or not.
“Nothing changes,” I say. “Whoever hired us thinks we’re still trying to kill her, so we have time, which means we focus on the hard drive for now. Once we have it, we should know who wants Ella dead, and Hunter said he’ll try to fix it.”
“And if he can’t?”
“He will.”
“But what if he can’t, Asher?”
Hunter DeLuca doesn’t know how to fail. Once he sets his mind to something, nothing stands in his way, but Gable is right.
There’s always a chance that this is far bigger than even we can deal with.
To bypass the agency with such ease, to offer the kind of money they are, then this might not be simple. Far from it.
I run my tongue across my bottom lip, tasting chocolate and memories.
“Then we take her.”