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“Then you can do this.” She smiled, rubbing my arms. “You can do this…because she needs you to.”
Releasing a deep breath, I stood back up.
“What did the message say?”
ELEVEN
“Keep your ears pricked. Keep looking behind you. Because one day I'll find you, and then you'll be crowfood.”
~ Erin Hunter
LIAM
She was silent. Her shoulders tensed up and her arms crossed. Her brown eyes focused solely on the series of photos in front of her. The more she lowered, the more she looked like a threatened cat: unsure but ready to strike and claw at anything that moved. Standing up, I placed my hands on her shoulders.
“What's going on? You said maybe two things tonight.”
“I don't like them,” she replied seriously, flipping to the next image of Liling and her soon-to-be husband once again, even though we had seen them all at least twice already.
“Mel, give me a list of people you do like, I'm sure it's much shorter—”
“This isn't my usual disdain for people I'm feeling, Liam. I look at her and I see something similar to me and I don't like it.”
I looked back to the woman again, then to Mel. “Well, she is pretty.”
She glared at me, shrugging me off as she went back to sit in my chair.
“She's pretty, but you’re stunningly beautiful.”
"Liam?" She crossed her legs as I leaned on the desk across from her. "Have I ever been the type of person who needs validation from you or anyone else? I know I’m beautiful; do I enjoy the fact that your eyesight is good enough to notice? Yes. But whether she is pretty or not is none of my concern. What I care about is who she really is."
There were days I forgot I was married to a total bitch and on such days, she made sure to remind me clearly.
“Never mind her for a second. This Emilio, I think he might be the son of an enemy of my father’s. I can tell he's a monster.”
“Said the most dangerous monster of them all,” I reminded her; of course, that was what she smiled about.
“You aren't taking them seriously are you?” Her glare turned to me and all I could do was shrug.
“Liling doesn’t seem to care at all about her family’s business. This Emilio doesn't have the money or the means to get a sniper to shoot at our children, Mel. There is no proof either of them is anyone worth worrying about. For all, we know Liling could actually be in love with him and living her own Hollywood fairytale romance. Other than the fact that she is the daughter of Ju-long Tàiyáng, she is meaningless. He is the head of the family and what really matters are him and his motherfucking sniper. We chose Pennington Academy becauseit was in an Irish neighborhood where we owned all the surrounding buildings and there were no clear lines of sight. Whoever made that shot did so with almost no visibility and poor weather conditions. If I wasn't going to skin him alive, I would hire him.”
“You aren't going to skin him.” She sat up in the chair.
I knew what she was thinking and I wasn't having it. “Melody.”
“Liam, nine kids got shot. I'm the fucking governor. The city needs this guy in.”
“Then he will be brought in dead.”
“Liam, before they declared war, they knew we'd react. The sniper is no better than a dog—a suicidal dog, but a dog nonetheless. We do not concern ourselves with dogs. If you kill him personally, you belittle yourself. Let the city have him. They won't expect it. Besides, you still have people in jail right? Let him be the public enemy."
I leaned in, cupping the sides of her face. “When it comes to anyone who points a gun at my children, I don't care how little I seem, Melody."
“Then what is your plan, husband?”
“I hurt him. He screams. He bleeds. He dies. The end.” Grabbing my jacket from behind the chair, I moved to the door.
“So we aren’t going to have a civilized conversation about this?” she called out when I reached the door. Pausing, I turned back to her. She didn’t bother getting up, she just rested her cheek in the palm of her hand.
