Chapter 29
The underground garage reeked of oil and metal, with fresh coffee layered over the top.
The first intrigued me, while the second propelled me.
Ray’s luxury garage was filled with cars I’d love to dig into, adult toy haven.
The bright lights were warm, not fluorescent, and when I asked him why, Ray gave me a withered look.
“Fluorescent lighting is unforgivable, Chief. Warm light for this skin only.” He carved a line down his sharp jaw.
The scar, which cut over his eye, was pale pink. It amused me how it only enhanced his looks. Seeing him peacock again brought a strange warmth to my stomach. He gained even more attention wherever we went, much to Jonah’s and Lyra’s displeasure.
“Are we going to do this or not?” Jonah dragged his boot off the coffee table with a growl.
I rubbed my hands, searching for which car Lyra would most likely choose.
She always went for speed over muscle, and when she emerged from a sleek white Porsche, I grinned to myself.
Her matching slate gray tracksuit hugged her body, and she blew a breath to dislodge a strand of hair that eluded her messy bun.
The languid tip of her lips made my heart clench and settle in my chest, though.
We could breathe for the first time since… maybe ever. No secrets to weigh down our lungs or nights disturbed by waiting for someone to slit our throats.
“I want the rainbow controller.” Lyra slid in next to Jonah and turned on the giant television screen that lowered from the ceiling.
Ray crossed the room, pulling out a stack of restaurant pamphlets and lining them up. “Winner gets first choice. Loser has to pay for dinner.”
My forehead furrowed, and I waved a hand at the array of cars in front of us.
“I thought we were having a race today?”
I’d wanted a do-over from the time we’d raced with Lyra. Preferably with me in the driver’s seat, Lyra in the passenger seat, and both of us together in the back seat, when I won.
“We are. Mario Kart.” Jonah held up a well-worn controller.
“Games?”
“Yes, Chief.” Lyra patted the spot next to her. “Don’t be a downer. I’m craving Thai, so you better believe I’ll be kicking your asses.”
“What a coincidence,” Ray said as he sprawled on the floor. “I’m also in the mood for Thai. Let’s form an alliance.”
Jonah whipped his head up with a growl. “You told me you wanted Indian, you liar. Is this because I made you cry last time when I beat you on mirror mode?”
I took my seat as Ray spluttered. “I was half out of it on painkillers and you cheated.”
“I’ve never played before,” I said.
Lyra reached over to lay her hand on mine.
She ran me through each button and gave me the briefest of instructions, which I didn’t listen to, distracted by her lowered lashes and lingering touch.
Maybe this day would end the way I wanted it to after all.
I settled back on the couch, widening my legs while we chose our characters.
“Don’t trust Jonah,” Ray complained, tossing his hair. “He always chooses Bowser and somehow wins.”
He’d had to trim the dark locks after the blast because of singed edges, but this shorter style matched his healed scar. It made the debonair dangerous.
“You’re just bitter because I’m better at this than you,” Jonah replied.
I rolled my eyes, a knee-jerk reaction, but a smile tugged at my lips and softened it.
After everything we’d been through, we were sitting here playing video games, and that felt like something I’d never had a taste of before.
Surrounded by people who cared for each other.
I would kill for each of them. That was a big step toward caring for me.
“Careful. Didn’t I say I was feeling lucky?” Lyra tossed an elbow into Jonah’s side.
“I’m going to destroy you all,” I added, voice dangerously calm.
Ray tossed back a look, with flattened lips. “Easy, Chief. When you say it, put some inflection in your words. Otherwise, it just sounds like you’re a serial killer.”
I opened my mouth, and Lyra pinched my hip.
“Don’t answer that.”
I wasn’t used to this. The downtime, the relaxing and being able to focus on Lyra without wondering who might use her against me. After a lifetime of living on the edge, it would take a long time to find out who I was without The Unseen.
“About that alliance.” I nudged Lyra with my thigh.
“No teams.” Jonah wagged his finger at us, a serious look washing his features into stone.
The first race started with me squealing my tires at the start line.
Somehow, I found a shortcut and beat Lyra and Ray, who went full rampage mode.
Jonah still came in number one. Ray’s bottom lip pressed out, and I smothered a laugh as he launched into an argument about how Jonah had to be cheating.
“Enough. Let’s play,” I interrupted him.
“You’re having fun, aren’t you?” Lyra whispered to me, conspiratorial. “What do you say, Thai?”
I winked, and before I knew it, the afternoon disappeared.
Jonah won every round, and even though I actually tried, I still couldn’t replicate my beginner’s luck.
He decided dinner would be Thai, much to Lyra’s delight.
Ray abandoned his controller and was straddling Jonah, digging his fingers into the bigger man’s armpits.
Jonah’s hands spanned Ray’s back, easy and affectionate.
“You’re a cheater.”
“Just admit you’re a sore loser who doesn’t have my talent.”
Ray reared back. “I demand a rematch.”
Jonah let out a laugh, and Ray, with a look of utter fury on his face, shut him up the only way the man knew how, with a kiss.
Jonah didn’t seem to mind too much, tilting his head and deepening the passionate lip lock.
What they had didn’t hold a label. It was like the group of us.
Affection abounded. And if they were busy with each other… it meant more time with Lyra and me.
I had learned to share. But I always craved her alone. I pulled Lyra into my arms, intent on kissing her until she agreed to forget dinner and skip straight to dessert. Her sweet pussy. But her phone vibrated in her pocket, and she pulled it out with a wordless grimace of apology.
“Hi, darling.”
I stiffened for a moment. Who was Lyra calling darling? I’d already reached my limit of sharing her with two other men. She waved me down with a flick of her wrist before she turned the speaker on.
“I hope you didn’t start playing Mario Kart without us? I’m feeling murderous as fuck, and only a race with Peach is going to solve it.” Adelaide’s voice filtered through.
“What happened?” Lyra asked.
“Just got a tip-off that one of your missing council members has been making inquiries around the city. Seems like someone has a grudge and decided to do something about it.”
Heat bubbled in my stomach, and my mouth watered. Maybe I wouldn’t have to get used to relaxing after all.
“Do we have a location?” I interrupted.
“Ah, my favorite interrogator. I was hoping you’d be around. How much can I pay you to come out of retirement? The job you did for me last week scared everyone shitless, even my own guys. Everyone is talking about the guy with dead eyes, precise hands, and malevolent energy.”
My chest puffed up. “I could be persuaded.”
I’d stepped in to help Adelaide get answers out of one of her men, who turned rat for a growing sector of rebels.
It was bound to happen. If you were at the top, there was always someone waiting to pull you down and take your place.
Only an idiot leader would get complacent and think they were untouchable.
“You’ve given up your role in the police force, so we need to put pressure on the guy who took your place. Make sure he knows who runs Greenich Bay. Maybe after we deal with The Unseen, we can talk about terms.”
I cracked my knuckles, letting out a favorable grunt. I’d handed in my notice at the Greenich Bay Police Force and planned on retiring Chief Goldman for good. Mingling exhausted me, and feigning concern for justice depleted my acting abilities.
Tearing people’s nails off for information? That was a breeze.
“What information do you have about them?” Lyra asked.
“The name is Ashlynn, and I’ll send through the footage I have and the location. She seems pretty content to hole up and get resources, so I wouldn’t rush down there tonight. You guys deserve a night off. But if you play Mario Kart without me again, I won’t forgive you.”
Ashlynn? I exchanged a look with Lyra. She’d held out a long time, but I knew she’d come after us eventually.
“No way.” Jonah tore himself away from Ray. “Logan cheats every time.”
Adelaide let out a cackle. “You just hate that he’s better than you.”
She hung up the phone while Jonah volleyed back, his argument going unheard. He crossed his arms over his barrel chest, shaking his head at Ray’s questioning look.
“He wins so much it’s impossible.”
“I see, when it’s you winning, it’s fine, but when it’s someone else?” Ray winked down at him.
“Next time we play, we’ll form an alliance. All of us against Logan. Deal?” Lyra smiled.
I liked seeing her like this, with her walls dropped and joy bubbling out of her.
“What are we going to do about that?” I jerked my head to Lyra’s phone, which had lit up with a stream of messages from Adelaide.
She opened them, sharing the video and coordinates with us. Ashlynn hid in a motel on the side of the Graham freeway. I knew the place. It had no ice machine, and the receptionist chewed gum like it was her job.
“Food first.” Ray went up to collect the delivery left against his mansion’s iron gates, as he insisted.
The guards stood around, not willing to touch it in case they were accused of tampering.
My presence set everyone on edge, and that was how I liked it.
Jonah rustled up soda. I wondered if he was having the same thought as I was.
Did his fingers itch with a certain hunger to get in the car and visit our little friend?
The scent of Thai distracted me, and I tried to fill the hole reserved for murderous behavior with delicious Penang curry. Lyra searched through the bag, looking for one last dumpling. When she came up empty-handed, I shared the one on my plate.
“Have mine, Little Liar. I’ve lost my appetite.”
A quiet settled over us. Not a watchful, tense one where we all waited for the drama to start. But the food-rustling-soft-sigh as bellies filled, and bodies melded into the leather couches.
“I never imagined this.” The words slipped out, thoughts I’d intended to keep to myself.
Lyra tilted her head. “What?”
I clenched my jaw, uncomfortable as everyone fixed their eyes on me.
I’d been thinking about The Unseen, the untied threads, and what that meant for the future.
But with that vision came this, the nights I never expected.
I’d never had a family, but surely it was something like this.
The glow of companionship and warmth that started in your stomach and spread through your muscles.
It coaxed at my sharp edges like a silken river.
I covered my vulnerable slip with a cough. “Us. Together.”
“Oh?” Lyra’s soft puff of surprise held a smile.
“The games, the food, the laughter,” I added with a gruff reluctance. “I never thought there was a place I could exist without having to steal, cage, or threaten a space for me.”
The prickly, sharp sensation inside me sharpened as I expanded my lungs. There was the sensation of hanging from a great height, my stomach falling to the ground, preceding me. Lyra reached over and squeezed my hand. The tunneling in my vision lightened.
“We need you, Beck. You don’t have to carve out your space next to us. It’s waiting for you.”
I remembered how Lyra looked when she burst into The Unseen’s medical wing, and the fierce, unhinged determination on her face. I sacrificed to keep her safe, and she came for me. There were things I never dared to hope, and that was one of them.
At that moment, I knew she had chosen me.
“Although, if we’re being honest.” Ray dabbed his mouth with a stained napkin. “You did kind of barge in and give us no choice.”
My shoulders rose until he winked.
“I enjoy knowing we’ve got one more psycho to protect Lyra,” Jonah said.
Lyra tossed her napkin in his direction. “I don’t need protecting, or saving, big guy.”
She reached out and twisted Jonah’s earlobe until he whined, a noise I’d never heard come out of his mouth. It dragged a laugh from my gut. Rusty, rotten, and rare. But with it, I shed some of the past and breathed in the beauty of the future.
“I don’t know about you,” I said as I stood and stretched. “But I’m thinking Ashlynn might love a visit from her old friends. What do you say?”
I gave them a grin that made grown men wet themselves, and they all returned it, with their own version. Because that was what we were. Four dangerous individuals who were unstoppable. Whatever the future brought, I knew it would be bathed in blood. We’d paid for peace with enough of our own.
“You want to stir up a little trouble?” Lyra hooked her arm through mine.
“Always.” With you.
Ray scrambled over to the wall where all his car keys hung. He unhooked one and clutched it in his hand.
“I’m driving.” His eyes bounced with sudden, manic energy.
I thought about telling him his scar made him look like a top-tier villain, the kind you want the main character to end up with instead of the boring hero. But I didn’t think he needed an ego boost.
“No way,” Jonah chased him over to the Bugatti, hands outstretched. “We won’t get there in one piece.”
“Are you insulting my driving skills?” Ray argued, hopping in the driver’s seat.
Jonah grabbed his thigh, yanking on it until they were both squabbling. Lyra let out a soft laugh, and I admired the way it radiated through her features. She was my world, and I was just happy to bask in it.
“Look what you started.”
“They love it.” I shrugged.
“Can I tell you a secret?” Lyra slid her arms around my neck.
I said nothing, and she continued.
“I wasn’t sure who I was without The Unseen. What was I supposed to do with my life? I realized I was putting so much pressure on a decision that didn’t matter. Why do I need to decide right now? For once, I’m going to enjoy myself.”
I pressed my lips to the corner of her eye, to feel the delicious flutter of her lashes.
“Tracking down the remnants of the council could take years. I think we can find enough to keep our dirty little hands busy, Little Liar.”
She turned her lips up in a wordless invitation.
“We can agree on that.”
I kissed her the way I did everything, demanding and overbearing. Until Ray and Jonah shouted at us to hurry and stop stalling. As we walked to the car, my lips tingled and my blood heated.
This monster had his mistress, and he couldn’t be happier.