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“You get settled. I’ll turn out the light,” Aaron said, and watched her slip down beneath the covers and shift the pillow beneath her head. “All comfy?” he asked.
“Yes, thank you.”
He pulled a corner of the covers up a little farther over her, then leaned over.
For a fraction of a second, Dani thought he was going to tuck her in and kiss her good night, but he didn’t. He just turned off the lamp, touched her shoulder beneath the covers.
“Sleep well, Dani. I’ve got your back.”
The room was in shadows, but there were still streetlights and night-lights, and she could see him clearly as he walked out of her room. She heard him moving around down the hall and knew he was getting into his sleeping bag. As she closed her eyes, she heard the air-conditioning kick on and a dog barking somewhere outside.
There was a man in her home.
She hadn’t known Aaron Pope a full two weeks, and yet she’d let him into her world. Alex Bing had precipitated something that might never have happened, except for her fear of the Bing twins and the way Aaron Pope made her feel.
She turned over onto her side facing the open door and listened, but the house was quiet. She called out.
“Aaron, are you still there?”
She heard what sounded like a soft chuckle.
“Yes, I’m here.”
“Good night.”
“Good night, honey. Go to sleep.”
She sighed and closed her eyes.
Later, Aaron was up and moving through the house to look out both front and back, then looked in on her before he laid back down.
His eyes narrowed as he saw her in the bed, curledup, knees doubled up, her hands tucked beneath her chin, making herself as small a target as possible. The brutality of what had been done to her hurt his heart. Those brothers had made her this afraid, and for no other reason than because they could.
He went back to his bed, put his gun beneath his pillow, and then laid down again, wishing she was lying in his arms.
It was a little after 1:00 a.m. when Alex left the campgrounds and headed into Jubilee, but the amount of traffic this time of night was startling. How could he reconnoiter with all this going on? He couldn’t figure out what was happening, until he remembered the music venues had matinee and evening performances. At this time of night, this had to be those employees going home. And as luck would have it, a large portion of the vehicles were all going to the apartments and residential area, right where he was headed.
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered.
So, he miscalculated his chance. So what? Next time he’d just come later. He drove by her house, getting a high from being so close, and then left the area and headed back to his cabin, remembering as he drove how this began and where it went wrong.
There had been a time when he and Tony had really enjoyed her company. They always shared their girlfriends. The girls never knew. They thought it was the greatest game.
Tony met her first, but Alex was the first one to date her.
Tony was the first to score sex.
Alex slipped in on the next date and took her to bed, and then the brothers compared notes, laughing all the time because she never knew.
After the breakup, Alex was the first one to get into her apartment, but it was Tony’s idea of how to do it. Alex had been standing at the foot of her bed just watching her sleep and wondering what it would feel like to watch her take her last breath.
But as he was watching her, she began to wake up, and he bolted. By the time she got up to look around, Tony had already pulled him back up into the crawl space. They watched her through the grating, and when she finally went back to bed, they crawled back into the empty apartment, high-fived each other, and snuck away.
Neither of them had seen the danger signs. They’d been too high on revenge. They called the shots in their relationships. Nobody quit them, and they were bent on making her pay.
They’d planned the whole thing so carefully, and the thunderstorm that came on that night was like an omen. All the wind and rain and thunder added to the chaos of murder.
Alex lowered Tony down into her living room, then waited to give him a lift up. The sound of gunshots made him envious.
