Chapter 16
Gable
“One more time for me.”
I sigh and let my head drop back, groaning at the ceiling. “How many more fucking times do I have to say it?”
I’m cold. I’m tired. I’m hungry. The coffee here tastes like shit. This is what I get for being a good fucking neighbor—interrogations and uncomfortable fucking chairs.
“Indulge me, Mr. Flynn,” Detective Harper says. He’s a little gremlin of a man in a suit two sizes too big and beady eyes I want to poke out.
I lean forward, resting my forearms on the metal table. I don’t have to talk, I know my rights, but I also know that for once in my life I have nothing to hide.
“I couldn’t sleep. Decided to go for a walk. I stepped into the hallway. I heard Ella scream. I shouted for my brother, and I went to help her.”
The absolute fucking truth. The night was weighing on me, and s’mores didn’t fix it, so I wanted to get some fresh air to try and snap myself out of the funk today has me in.
The detective narrows his eyes. “Got there awful quick.”
“Should I have waited until she was dead? Would that make me look less guilty?”
“Are you guilty?” he asks. “Word is you’re not a fan of our Ella.”
Our Ella. And therein lies the problem. Princess Ella is hurt, the little darling of the station, and even though I’m the one who kept her alive, because I didn’t do it the way they wanted me to, I’m the fucking criminal.
“Correct, I don’t like Ella. But what is it you’re suggesting? I hired someone to kill her, then got cold feet and killed him first?” I lean close and lower my voice. “Do you have a brain, Detective Harper?”
Somehow, his beady little eyes narrow further. “You snapped his neck. Not an easy thing to do.”
“Apparently it is.” I slump back.
“Done it before?”
“Nope.” Yep, fifty-six times. It’s just as satisfying as you imagine it would be.
The door flies open, and I expect another appearance from Guy, and I’m right—but he’s not alone.
Hunter steps into the room, looking beyond furious. He points at me, but his eyes are on Detective Harper.
“Is he under arrest?”
The detective blinks. “Um—”
“Answer the fucking question before I shove a lawsuit so far up your ass, you’ll be spitting paperwork!”
Lawsuit. He isn’t even a lawyer, but fuck is he scary when he wants to be.
Detective Harper scowls. “No, he’s not.”
“Gable, let’s go.”
I stand, and I wink at Guy as I pass. “You’re welcome for saving your kid, by the way. I won’t be doing it again anytime soon.”
Guy follows us out. “Is that a threat?”
“Dad,” Ella says, and I see her for the first time since the apartment. She’s beside Asher, her eyes wide, her neck black and blue. I don’t like the woman, but seeing her dangling in the air, that fucker’s hands around her throat, unleashed something feral in me.
Maybe it’s the day. Maybe it’s that as a kid I walked in on my mom in that situation more times than a kid ever should. Whatever it was, it saved Ella’s life, because I’ve never moved or reacted quicker than in those seconds after hearing her scream.
“Are you okay?” she asks me, her voice hoarse.
I tut. “Don’t get soft on me, Gibson. If anyone’s gonna kill you, it’s me.” I grin at her, and she returns the smile. “Can we go? I fucking hate this place.”
Hunter nods. “You come with me. Ella, do you need a place to stay?”
“She’s coming home with me,” Guy barks out, eyeing Hunter like he trusts him as much as he trusts me.
“No way,” she says.
Asher slides his arm around her waist. “Your dad’s right, Ella. You should go home with him, where it’s safe.”
“If I avoid that place now, I’ll never go back,” she insists, looking up at him. “I’m not gonna be chased out of my own house.”
Guy sighs. “Baby—”
“No,” she says, her voice as firm as I imagine it can be. “He was clearly some obsessed stalker working alone, right? And now he’s gone, so … I’m going home.”
I don’t blame her. But I also know what’s coming next.
“Then you can stay with us,” Asher says. “Can’t she, Gable?”
Usually, I’d argue the point, but Guy looks like his head is about to explode, and it’s satisfying to watch. “Whatever. As long as you don’t hog the shower.”
A few days of Ella is worth it to see the fury in her dad’s eyes.
Asher takes Ella in our car, and I go with Hunter.
In the passenger seat of his SUV, we’re quiet.
The sun is rising, but I’m not tired. There’s something about taking a life that invigorates me, like I absorb what they lose.
Closing my eyes, I savor the way my body feels—alert, tingling, alive. Everything that man no longer is.
“You okay, kid?” Hunter asks.
I nod. “Yeah.”
He taps the steering wheel. “You don’t like Ella?”
I chuff. “She’s annoying as shit.”
“And you don’t like sharing Asher’s attention.” He glances at me. “Why don’t you come home for a bit? That house is too fucking big for me all on my own, anyway.”
That’s tempting. I miss the house in Seattle. I miss the rain, and the quiet, and the first bedroom I ever had that didn’t feel tainted with trauma. Hunter’s home is home, but I know Asher won’t leave Ella, and I won’t leave him.
“Then marry one of the endless women you have around.”
He laughs. “Not the marrying type.”
“Me neither.” I stare out the window. “Seems Asher is, though.”
“You think it’s that serious?”
I do. I’ve never seen Asher like this with anyone before. And if it were any other situation, I’d be happy for him.
I shrug. “Either way, he can’t be with her. It would mean being honest, and she’ll run a mile.”
Hunter pulls up outside the apartment just as Ella and Asher enter the lobby. They stand together, their bodies close, and Asher tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear.
“She might surprise you,” Hunter says.
I doubt that.
“More are gonna come for her,” Hunter says. “Her bounty has clearly been picked up by others.”
He’s right. It’s rare that a contract gets handed out to more than one killer, but it happens if the client is desperate enough. Apparently, our excuses to keep Ella alive weren’t sufficient. But we can deal with that tomorrow.
“You coming up to see the place?”
“Your crime scene? No thanks,” he says, focusing ahead, one hand resting on the steering wheel.
He looks no different to the first time I saw him. The day he strolled into a crappy motel room, picked us up, and gave us a future. Fourteen years ago today.
“Thanks for coming, old man.”
“Old? Get the fuck out of my car.”
I grin and get out, and he gives me a wave before driving away.
While Ella and Asher go to her apartment to pick up some clothes, I shower off the smell of cops.
The moment the hot water hits me, so does the exhaustion, a pleasant kind of sleepiness that sweeps over me in waves.
In the quiet of the apartment, I fill Motor’s food bowl, who snoozes on the couch on his back, his legs in the air, not even noticing we’ve been gone.
Once I climb into bed and my head hits the pillow, sleep takes me.
For about five fucking minutes.
“I thought we were sleeping in here?”
I open one eye and glare at Ella in the doorway. She’s in matching flannel pajamas, her hair in a bun. “You can have the couch,” I snap.
“Ew, I’m not sleeping on that. Barnaby called it his wank station.” She climbs onto the bed and sits in the middle, switching on the TV. I put a pillow over my face, so I don’t put it on hers.
“It’s morning. Don’t you have work to do?” I mumble.
“I’ve been up all night and I almost died. It’s sleep time for Ella.” She snuggles into the bed.
“I am not sleeping next to you,” I say.
She shrugs. “Okay. Bye, then.”
I growl and turn over, yanking the covers up to my shoulder. “At least turn off the fucking TV.”
“What are we watching?” Asher asks, and I hear the door close behind him.
Whimpering into the pillow, I remind myself that I love my brother and killing him would probably suck. The bed dips as he gets in it, and Ella is shoved up to my back.
“True crime,” Ella says.
Asher pauses. “You just almost died. You really want to watch this?”
“It’s just until I fall asleep.” I feel her snuggle down and close my eyes, breathing through the urge to finish what the intruder started. It’d be so easy. And so quiet, and peaceful. And I’d be fifty grand richer.
As the commentator on the TV talks about a mysterious murder in Texas five years ago, we all fall quiet. My mind tries to drift off to sleep, but I’m too intrigued by the case, and I look over my shoulder at the television.
“Wasn’t this us?” Asher whispers.
My gaze snaps to Ella, but she’s already fast asleep. She’s curled into Asher’s side, her arm over his stomach, leg over his thighs. How can a person fall asleep that quickly? Freak.
I return my attention to the TV and sit up against the headboard. “I think it was.”
A picture of the victim pops up on the screen and Asher cackles. We high five.
“He’s the screaming jugular,” Asher says quietly, and I slap my hand over my mouth to smother my laugh.
I’d cut the guy’s throat, and he’d screamed at the same time. The noise it made had Asher and I giggling to the point of tears, even as we’d been sprayed with blood.
“Do the impression,” Asher says.
I grin. “It’ll wake up your girlfriend.”
“True.”
We watch the show for a little while, laughing at the wrong turns the police made, the suspects arrested then released. The victim was painted as a family man with strong religious ties to the community. The guy was a fucking arms dealer, and he stole from the wrong client.
Finally, I speak, keeping my voice low. “So, is that what Ella is? Your girlfriend?”
Asher looks at me. With the blinds closed, the only light in the room is the TV, and it reflects the side of his face.
“I don’t know.”
I watch him. “You realize this won’t end well. You can’t tell her the truth.”
He tightens his hold on her. “Maybe I can.”
“Asher,” I say quietly. “You want her to be scared of you?”
He’s quiet for a few minutes, gazing at the TV but clearly not taking anything in. Ella cuddles into him in her sleep and lets out a little sigh.