“Another fucking popsicle, this is getting out of hand,” Harley mumbles the moment Lucy is gone, and Morrison digs an elbow into his gut in retaliation.
Aodhan glances around the room, for what I’m not sure, and then he strips out of his jacket. “Is the clean-up kit still in the Escalade or am I calling into Illi’s place?”
My eyebrows hit my hairline, but Harley grunts out an affirmative noise and heads back out of the room.
I’d very much like to leave as well.
There’s a tense moment, then Lips turns to Aodhan. “We all agreed to not talk about my brother, but I don’t want Avery to be put in a shitty position of lying to you later.”
He shrugs and rolls up his sleeves, completely ready to help move Holden, and I’ve never been so horrified and impressed with my choice in man before. “I’m good. I’m aware you’re protecting kids from Grimm and, as long as Avery is safe, it’s none of my business who you share DNA with.”
Lips shrugs and says, “I’m not talking about it here, there’s no telling what ears are around, but if you ask me back at the ranch, I’ll tell you.”
Harley arrives with a black plastic tub filled with all sorts of supplies, including a body bag. I’m sure Illi was the one to provide them with that, but when he passes a pair of gloves to Morrison, I watch as the spoiled rich kid in him rears its head.
“Listen, I’m going to need Illi to get thefuckoff of paternity leave right thefucknow, because I’m not doing any rotting corpse disposal.”
Lips huffs at him, but Morrison waves a hand at her dismissively. “Look, Star, you need me to kill someone? I’m in. Theft, racketeering, blackmail, debauchery? Sign me the fuck up, but this? No. I’m not built for this. Who can I write a check to so I don’t have to do this? Aves, let me walk you and Star out of here while the others sort it out.”
Harley cusses him out and Ash has to get between them pretty quickly, but I keep my lips pressed tightly together, because there’s no way that I’m helping with that corpse unless there’s no other options here. I don’t have a leg to stand on.
I would rather it be my rotting corpse, thank you very much.
It doesn’t matter anyway, Aodhan is quick to help out and between the three of them, it’s an easy enough job. Morrison turns green when it becomes clear that Holden isleaking,and Lips grabs an elbow on each of us to march us both out.
I vomit behind a bush.
Lips rubs a hand over my back and finds me a bottle of water to wash my mouth out, but I decide that tonight is fucking cursed. Cursed!
The moment I have my stomach under control again, I tuck myself back into the Rolls Royce, my eyes on my phone so I don’t have to watch them all drag the body bag out and stuff it into the back of the Escalade.
Morrison slides into the front seat, murmuring to me, “O’Cronin thought it was better if he has a bleach bath before he gets within three feet of you again.”
“And that’s why I love him. Next time Ash gets pissy over him again, remind him of this.”
He chuckles under his breath, messing around with the radio station until something he likes comes on. “Lips already did. She’s been quietly waging war with him for months over it, even while we were away. She loves you just as much as you love her, y’know?”
I smile, happy that he noticed, and say, “Illi’s not going to be back at work for a while, by the way. I offered to babysit Johnny, but I don’t think either of them are ready to leave him anywhere yet, not even with us. We’re all going to have to pitch in and get our hands dirty.”
He nods and gets us out onto the highway again, the sky a bright mix of all of the colors of dawn. “I wasn’t lying, I’m not going to back down on anything except leaking fucking corpses. I don’t think that’s a bad thing, one of us has to stay human around here. Besides, are you going to touch him? Nope, didn’t think so. Not unless your life depended on it, and I guess I’m the same, because that shit is fucking rank.”
It is and I don’t blame him, it’s just good to check in sometimes.
We’re quiet the rest of the way home, Morrison humming softly under his breath every now and then. I check over the security footage of Atticus’ hospital room and pray that this isn’t going to blow up in our faces.
Chapter Eleven
Atticus
The beeping is constant.
Even before I have the energy to open my eyes, it’s the first thing I become aware of. The next thing is the constant hum of machines and talking and life around me, everything is still ticking along even though I can’t fucking move. I don’t know how long I’m stuck like that, drifting in and out of awareness, but eventually my eyes actually open when I command them to.
Ash Beaumont is sitting at my bedside.
He isn’t my first choice of people to wake up to, he doesn’t even make it into the top five, but at least I’m not dead.
I have very patchy ideas of where I am and how I got here. I have no sense of how much time has passed, or what has happened since I’ve been out.
