Chapter 10 – JINX
JINX
Cyrus's Audi still has that new car smell that screams he paid too damn much for a package of extras that any sane person wouldn't even notice, which pretty much sums up our entire operation these days.
I run my fingers along the dashboard just to watch him twitch.
"Stop touching everything," Cy mutters, batting my hand away from the gear shift. "You're leaving prints."
"Oh no! Fingerprints in your car. The horror." I lean back and prop my shoes up on the dash. "Remember when you said you'd never be one of those assholes with a flashy car? That was cute."
"Get your fucking feet down."
"Make me, four-eyes."
Is the insult juvenile? Yes. But I'm not exactly on my A-game today.
He shoots me a look that's probably supposed to be threatening. To be fair, it would be to anyone but me. The afternoon sun catches his glasses, turning them into mirrors that hide those green eyes I've memorized better than my own face.
Not that I'd ever tell him that. The fucker's ego is already insufferable.
"At least I can afford nice things," he says, taking a corner sharp enough to make my head spin. "Unlike someone who blows his entire cut on weed and designer clothes."
"First of all, it's quality weed. Second, these aren't just clothes, they're investments in my personal brand."
"Your personal brand of being a slutty burnout?"
"Says the guy who bought a seventy-thousand-dollar car he uses for stakeouts." I pull out a joint from my jacket pocket and wiggle it at him. "Speaking of which..."
"Don't you fucking dare smoke in here."
"Relax, I'm not a complete savage." I tuck it behind my ear for later. "Though it would help mask that new car smell."
We pull up across from Adam's building, the same spot we've been haunting for three days now.
The place is even uglier in the daylight, all concrete and glass and metal.
Like Senator Waterson himself tried to gentrify a perfectly good neighborhood by raiding some tech bro's Pinterest boards for inspiration.
It has some stupid name, too, like The Slab.
I don't remember. Or give a shit.
"Movement," Cyrus says, straightening in his seat.
I follow his gaze to the third-floor corner unit. Someone's definitely in Adam's apartment.
"Could be him," I say, though we both know that's bullshit. Adam Chessier ran like his ass was on fire after our little chat. Nothing says 'leave town' like knowing pics of your microdick dripping with piss will end up on every social media platform known to man.
"Wait." Cyrus squints behind his glasses. "That's not him."
"No shit."
The figures in the window come into focus.
It's a middle-aged woman in a blazer and a young couple with bright eyes and even brighter smiles who look like they just discovered what a trust fund is the fun way.
The obvious property manager is gesturing around the apartment while the couple nods enthusiastically like they're already planning where to put their meditation corner and wine fridge.
Cyrus snorts. "They look like the types who'd be on House Hunters as a stay-at-home astronaut and a butterfly massage therapist."
"Nah," I say, stretching out in the seat like a cat. "That's a guy with a beer blog. No way he's an astronaut."
That earns a low and rare chuckle from Cyrus.
"He's really gone," I say, happy for Sophia but disappointed for me. Two things can be true at once. If the fucker had shown up, we'd have an excuse to finish what we started.
Cyrus pulls out his phone and types quickly. "Telling Kade we're clear. Target's definitely relocated."
His phone vibrates a second later.
"What'd he say?" I ask, peeking over.
"Mission accomplished. Wrap it up." Cyrus pockets his phone and starts the engine. "Another satisfied customer."
"We should celebrate," I say, already knowing where this is heading. My cock twitches and I shift in my seat. "Job well done and all that."
"A 'job' that paid exactly zero dollars."
"Not everything's about money, Cy."
He gives me a look that could peel paint. "We risk our lives. We risk prison. Daily. I don't know about you, but I don't do that shit for nothing."
"It wasn't for nothing. The client gave us a muffin basket, remember? Banana nut muffins."
Now the glare he's giving me is downright lethal.
"Come on." I reach over and poke his cheek, just to be an asshole. "I saw your face when Sophia brought us those muffins. You went all soft. Probably got a semi just from the gratitude."
"You're fucking annoying."
"You didn't think I was annoying last night." I grin, remembering the way his hands felt digging into my hair, the weight of him on my tongue. "Pretty sure you called me perfect when your cock was buried in my esophagus."
"Key detail—you weren't talking."
I flip him off and lean out the window, letting my hand ride the wind like I'm conducting an invisible orchestra. Or a bird.
The gesture hits different than it used to. Everything does now. Can't drive down this road without remembering the back of Kade's shitty Thunderbird, Ellie's laugh carried away by the wind as she stuck her whole arm out the window like she was trying to catch clouds.
Four fucking years and I still see her everywhere.
In the pink streaks of sunset. In the laughter of some random girl at a coffee shop. In the mirror when I'm high enough to admit I'm styling my hair the way she used to like it. When she was the most likely to run her fingers through it, her nails scratching my scalp.
"You think she's happy?"
The question slips out before I can stop it. Don't need to specify who. There's only one 'she' that matters. Only one ghost haunting all of us.
Cyrus's knuckles go white on the steering wheel. "Doesn't matter."
"That's not what I asked."
"I said it doesn't matter."
But it does. It matters more than any of us want to admit.
I've stalked her social media enough to have her whole curated life memorized. The charity galas. The campaign events. The senator's perfect stepdaughter in her designer dresses and fake-ass smiles.
She's got everything we couldn't give her. The money, the status, a fucking future that doesn't involve looking over your shoulder for cops.
But her eyes...
Fuck, you can't filter out that kind of sadness. I've tried. Spent hours staring at her photos, looking for some sign that she's actually happy. That leaving us behind was worth it. Like we didn't all die the day she moved into that mansion and left us in the dust.
"I wish that were true," I mumble, more to myself than him.
We're not heading back to the house. I recognize this route, the way Cyrus takes specific turns like he's following a map only we know. My pulse kicks up a notch. We're going to the apartment—our dirty little secret even Kade and Tank don't know about.
I smirk. "Guess you do want to celebrate after all."
"Shut up."
He guns it, and the Audi purrs like it's as eager as we are to get there.
The building's nothing special. Just another forgotten piece of the city that the senator's constant quest for gentrification hasn't touched yet. We keep it off the books, pay cash, use fake names.
It's our sanctuary for all the things too forbidden to do elsewhere, even in our kingdom of sin.
The second we're through the door, Cyrus is on me. His mouth crashes against mine, a whirlwind of teeth and tongue, like he's trying to devour something that isn't really there. His heavy leather jacket hits the floor with a thud that echoes in the sparse apartment.
"Go change," he orders against my mouth, and fuck if that commanding tone doesn't make my dick throb.
"Yes, sir." I give him a mock salute and saunter toward the bedroom with extra sway in my hips.
The bedroom's exactly how we left it. Sparse except for the essentials. A bed, a mirror, and the wardrobe that holds our collection.
The pink plaid skirt. The heels I've learned to walk in without wobbling even if I'm bordering on too tall.
The sweatshirt that still, after all this time, smells like her.
I wish I could say it's from the junk she and her mom left behind when they moved out overnight without a trace, like they were members of a version of the witness protection program that protects you from all the trailer trash you used to know.
But nope. This is the one I stole while she was attending freshman orientation at Saylor University.
I'm about as far from a college boy as you can get, but that didn't stop me from following her there and seizing on the one opportunity I'd had in years to get close to her without anyone noticing.
I climbed in through her dorm room window, thanked my lucky stars her roommate wasn't there, and raided her closet hamper like some obsessed stalker freak.
And I guess that's exactly what I am.
I bring the sweatshirt to my nose and inhale deep.
Vanilla. She probably didn't even notice it was gone.
The closet was stuffed full of shit, most of it designer, so I figured she wouldn't miss a couple of cheap pieces.
So I took a few, along with all the remnants from her old room I've made into a glorified shrine.
Collected every piece like breadcrumbs leading back to a girl who doesn't exist anymore.
I strip mechanically, folding my clothes with more care than I usually bother with. The skirt slides up my legs, soft and foreign. The heels add three inches I don't need. The sweatshirt is snug, but Ellie always liked things oversized, so it works.
The mirror reflects someone caught between two people. Not quite Jinx, not quite her. Something else. Something fucked up but necessary.