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CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
*Lace*
“What in the fresh hell are they doing in this neighborhood?” I mutter under my breath, sneaking behind properties. I might be curious — worried — but I am not a fucking idiot; you lie low when a motorcycle gang is involved. I had frenziedly insisted Remi stop because it looked a lot like Vee and Brodi pulled over into the empty lot across the street from my parents’ house.
I grew up here. In this neighborhood. I have these property lines memorized like the journal entries in my childhood diary. I hid here. Sought refuge. Wrote passages in said diary under the stilted decks of empty homes. Many times.
Those are the many reasons why I was okay with Remi just dropping me off. Anywhere else? Hell no. Even so, I had no intention of running down the middle of the street in plain sight. Not without making sure being seen would be safe.
House by house, my thoughts cycle. Questions. Concerns. Hypotheses. Fears.
The answer to all your questions might be playing out in live action right now. Just how much do you really want to know, Lacinda? Really?
A skitter of dread makes the hairs on my arms rise. Baylor, Coty, and Kal are right; I need to keep my nose out of it. Learning all their secrets doesn’t have to be out of reach, though. I can still sleuth, just not like this. Besides, by now Vee is committed to whatever his task is. I wanted to stop him before he could even start. Too much time has passed, though.
That dread clings to me, despite feeling more confident with my decision. They could be at any house in this neighborhood, and maybe I will hear about which one on the news tomorrow, but I need to check my house. Make sure Reece is okay. Surely there is no reason why HFL would be at my place. It is a coincidence. It must be. It has to be. I stop at the property right beside my childhood one, crouch behind a tall tree, close my eyes, and send out a quiet call to the Universe.
One of these days, all my visualizing and requests will result in something spectacular. With a deep breath, I open my eyes and sneak to the wooden privacy fence my dad and I built together. If he ever noticed — and I highly doubt he didn’t — the two loose boards I turned into a seesaw-like mechanism in order to slip into the gap and escape our property, he never said anything. In fact, I swear he reinforced it and made sure it was extra sturdy. I push the two boards inward, running the pads of my fingers along the smooth edges with a smile. Yeah… Been a while, but pretty sure he sanded the corners, too.
Either I forgot how tight the fit was or I got a little bigger since the last time I took this path, but wiggling through is a bit more challenging this time.
Just as I pull my foot through, hushed conversation has my head jerking up toward the side of the house. Heart rate increasing, I catch the boards on the downswing before they hit and gently lower the slats, closing the gap.
The hushed voices become more rushed and argumentative. I duck walk in the moonlight over to where the sound seems to be coming from.
A sharp hiss hushes the mumbled conversation, and I freeze a few paces around the corner. The squeak of sandy ground as one of them takes a step has me sucking in a breath and holding it, hand covering my mouth. But the sandy sound twists once more, and they begin speaking again. “Listen. You have nothing to prove. We already agreed I would handle it.”
Brodi. And it goes without saying — or hearing — that Vee is here, too. I have half a mind to jump out and ask them what the actual fuck they’re doing. But I have more sense not to.
Sure enough, Vee mutters something in Italian, then follows it up with, “I do. Please, I need this, amico.”
“Shit. Okay. Yeah.” Brodi flexes to the insistent request.
With every word, vivid scenes from the past few days consume my senses:
My fingernails suddenly darken with dried blood;
A sharp prick depresses against my neck;
The metallic scent of the blood overrides the sea breeze and fills my lungs.
Zane.
Kio.
Vee.
Two abstract, yet terrifying words pull me back to the present. “It’s time.”
I listen, stiff from shock, as the squeak of their boots on the sand begins to fade. With shaky hands, I pull my phone out of my bra and shove it back in. Five minutes past ten. The blood drains from my body and buries itself in the ground, and all sensation in my hands and feet go numb. This is just after Dad gets home. Right before he goes back out again.
The blood crashes back to all my extremities. I propel to my feet and dash to the side entrance. No longer of the mind to stay hidden, I yank the sliding glass door open. Before I can push through the rattling vertical blinds, my gaudy belt tightens against my stomach, and I go stumbling backward, a hand curling around my mouth.
“Little siren,” Coty singsongs, whispery, against my ear. But not just whispery — breathy, as if he has run a marathon. “Now, you know better than to be here.”
Chest heaving as he wraps his forearm around it and pulls me quietly farther away from the door while my bare feet drag and scrape for purchase against the concrete ground.
I go limp, relaxing despite every nerve ending in my body firing harder than their bikes do. As soon as I do, sure enough, he loses his hold. I spin on him. I have every damn right to be here. Every right. The fact that it’s my childhood home could be my only saving grace for being curious. “No!” I hiss, gaze flying up to the oozing gash on his forehead before meeting his steel-cold eyes. “You know better than to be here. My family stays out of this mess!”
