7. Chapter Seven Cam #2
The room went quiet. Not silent. Quiet in the way a room goes quiet when something irreversible has been said and everyone in it knows what happens next. Lakey's back went rigid, her fingers curled into fists at her sides, the muscles in her jaw clenched so tight I could see the tendon in her neck.
She was deciding. Not if. How.
Lakey's hand went to her thigh, where her knife sat tight against her, protected in its sheath. Then she pulled it away. "Actually, speaking of your mother. Where is Carmen-dearest?"
His Adam's apple bobbed up and down before he swallowed loudly. "Uh, I'm not sure. She's somewhere with Will. We haven't spoken in years."
"And why's that? I remember you being a momma's boy." She continued probing.
"I don't know! Lakey, I swear to God, I don't know! Cam, help me out here!" Sweat broke out over his brow as she walked closer, stepping up behind him and running her fingertip across his chest before flicking him in the back of his head.
"Now, now, Edward. I know that can't be true. And if it is, I suggest telling me where I can find out."
"Why?" His voice was so Goddamn whiny. "What do you want with me? With them?"
"I told you. We just wanna talk." Her voice was ever so sweet as she leaned in, her hand now resting on his shoulder. "You can be a good boy and tell me, or I can make you talk."
Ah, there it is. The knife was pulled out and trailed lightly across his neck. A thin red line appeared immediately in its wake and Edward, at least, had the decency not to make a damn sound.
Honestly, watching her like this was hot as fuck.
Normally she killed our marks on her own.
I'd only joined her a couple times, but this was different.
This wasn't a stranger who'd earned a spot on the list for hitting a kid in a parking lot.
This was the man who'd crawled into her bed at night.
This was personal, and watching Lakey handle it, watching her hold the knife steady and her voice sweeter, watching her play with him the way he'd played with her when she was too small to stop him, I could get used to this.
Doing it together. A perfect date night.
"Fuck, FINE, fine. Just... Cam, please? Get her away from me!"
I don't know why he thought I'd show mercy, but I did want answers. I sighed, standing up, my feet thumping across the hardwood as I walked to Lakey. "Baby girl, let him talk. We need this info more than we need him dead."
She whirled around to face me and for a minute, I thought she would stab me, until she saw my face and winked. "Yeah, okay. Okay, that sounds good."
She danced on her tip toes towards the windows, looking outside as she asked the question again.
"They're in the next block. Big fancy house. 6470 or something. There will be a black truck and an older style 'Vette in the driveway." He scratched at his stubble. "Wait, no, it's 6471."
Lakey turned towards him. "Are you sure, Eddy? Cuz Cam is gonna go check and if you're lying, I'm gonna peel your face from your body."
I nodded and headed towards the door. Interesting that Skeeter has, once again, given me false info. I was going to seriously have a talk with that guy. He told me they were out of town. Naughty, naughty.
Starting my bike, I drove slowly around the bend and up the next street, parking between 6470 and 6471.
The neighborhood was quiet. The kind of quiet that costs money.
Manicured lawns, trimmed hedges, cars that were washed regularly and parked in garages.
Not a single piece of trash on the curb.
This was where people lived when they wanted to pretend they had clean hands.
I'd grown up a twenty-minute drive from here in a house with six kids and two mattresses and a refrigerator that was padlocked because Carmen didn't trust us not to eat.
By now, people should have been getting up for the day, so it was just a waiting game. 6471 did indeed have the cars Edward said they did, but that didn't mean much. Turns out memories are just as shitty as IT information these days.
I killed the engine and waited. Thought about what Lakes was doing back at Ed's house.
Whether she'd kept her composure or whether the hair going up was the last warning before the knives came out.
Ed wasn't dead yet. I hadn't heard sirens and Lakey wasn't stupid enough to leave a mess in a neighborhood this clean without having a plan for it.
But he was going to be dead soon. The only question was when.
Peering into 6470, the lights flickered on, and a tall, burly man came into view, clutching the hand of a heavily overweight woman before sitting her at the table. Nah. Not them.
Turning my gaze to 6471, my breath caught as none other than good old Billy came strolling down the driveway, hopping into the truck and reversing like a maniac before tearing down the street.
Billy. Bill. The one who'd held me down.
The one who'd sat on my chest and pinned my arms while his brother went to Lakey's room.
The one who'd whispered in my ear that if I screamed, he'd do to me what Ed was doing to her.
I was kid. She was a kid. He was in his thirties.
And now he was backing a black truck out of a driveway in a nice neighborhood, probably heading to a job where people called him 'sir' and shook his hand.
Not for much longer.
Gottem.