47 Seven
I sat in the car with the engine running and watched the ocean murder itself against the rocks.
I'd gotten rid of the limo last night and swapped it for an SUV.
No matter how hard I tried not to think about her, she was there—lodged deep into the forefront of my brain. And that damn kiss… My mouth still burned from the contact even though it lasted less than two seconds.
You're beautiful.
Fuck.
Men were not supposed to be beautiful.
Men were supposed to be rough.
Yet, she saw something in me no one ever did, and that made all those stupid emotions scream inside me. My body was like a goddamned volcano about to erupt. If I were to stay with her in one place, I wasn't sure I'd be able to control myself.
And the…loss of control was the most terrifying feeling ever.
Like the ocean outside my windshield. Completely unknown and ready to swallow you up.
I checked my burner once more, registering all the missed calls from her that have been slowly creeping up into double digits.
It was shitty of me to leave her hanging, but I needed to figure out what was happening in my head.
This was a lonely stretch of the PCH somewhere between Malibu and Ventura. The sky was the color of granite, and the clouds were thick and angry. The spray hit the breakwater in white eruptions, the wind caught it, and everything past the windshield was a shifting sheet of water.
I'd parked in the same spot I always used when I needed to think. Not that thinking ever helped. Besides, it didn't happen often. But sometimes you had to go through the motions—pretend you could get ahead of whatever was coming, pretend you were more than the sum of your code and your orders.
I looked at my gloved hands on the wheel. They were steady, but there was a current underneath, some pulse I couldn't shut off.
On the passenger seat, lay that same manila envelope—unopened—that Father had given me. I'd been carrying it around like it was something precious, which wasn't far from the truth.
It seemed that it'd been forever since he handed it to me. So why hadn't I worked up the nerve to look inside?
I took off my gloves, reached over, picked it up, and thumbed the flap. My skin prickled where it touched the edge.
Part of me didn't want to know.
Another part of me did.
I rested the envelope on my lap. In the silence, you could hear the air between the waves, that slow, sucking pause before the next breaker. There was a comfort in it, maybe because it was predictable. Maybe because it didn't care about anything except gravity.
I set the envelope back on the seat and traced the lines of the tattoo on my chest over my jacket.
I was eighteen when I'd had it done. The wings were the only real memory of the past I'd been living in before Father found me. I had no parents, no birthday, no name. Just a number and an old burn scar and, for some reason, the vague recollection of an angel figurine.
A sound broke through the rumble of the ocean—my earpiece, buzzing a second before Viper's voice crashed in.
"Seven, you alive?"
"Why wouldn't I be? You can't wait to get rid of me?"
"That's a new one?"
"What are you talking about?"
"For once, you speak like a real human and not like a machine."
I waited a heartbeat before replying because he was right. I answered his questions with one of my own, which was not my typical behavior. "So?"
"You wanna tell me why you're still off the grid? Your last ping was five hours ago."
"Had things to do."
"Like thinking about the client you shouldn't be thinking about?"
Viper was always like this. Constant noise and assumption. But this time his assumption wasn't far from the truth. He'd seen all the street footage of us during the karaoke night. I ignored his bait.
"When are you getting me the goods?" he asked.
I ran my tongue across the back of my teeth. "Haven't made it back to the safe house yet."
"So where the hell are you?"
"Been tracking the target. He's been holed up in his penthouse since the club incident. I suspect wife kicked him out."
"That's expected," Viper mused. "Unless of course, she's a twisted bitch like her hubby."
"I doubt it. You said it yourself you never found any evidence she knew. Plus her reaction on scene confirms it. And even if she suspected him, her family would most likely force her to distance herself from him. This is not the kind of scandal the blood-blooded elites want to be involved in."
I stared out at the water, the way the foam streaked the sand in crooked lines.
"Well, if you want this to be over as quickly as possible and before the target retaliates, better get me that footage, boss." I could hear him typing. A low, constant chatter, like his brain couldn't stand the idea of idle time. "I've already done all my prep. In talks with a few media contacts."
"Copy."
"And you still have a tail."
"I know. That's why I'm careful. Don't want to lead them to her."
"Understandable."
"What's the situation with Kimmy's mother and her insurance company?"
"I'm closing in. We should be able to put a lid on this bullshit soon."
"Good."
"I've got your back, boss."
"Later."
"Hey," Viper called right before I went offline.
"What's up?"
"Don't use the names, dumbass."
I had a comeback with an unsavory name for him right on the tip of my tongue. Instead, I hung up. He was right. I'd gotten sloppy.
The car was quiet again, except for the hum of the engine and the ocean's roar.
I put my hand on the envelope and thought about its contents. Real name. Birth date. Maybe a picture of a family I didn't remember, or didn't want to. Maybe a police report. Maybe just another test, another way to see if I'd follow orders.
Or maybe it was empty. And I had a full reign of what I wanted my life to be.