“You’d better fucking believe it, sugar.”
I looked over at Mallory, expecting her to protest, but something like respect flickered in her eyes.
She cleared her throat. “I think we should let the girls talk. Why don’t we go check on Mr. Grayson?”
Mallory waved her hand. My friends shot me uneasy looks, but they followed her out of the kitchen and into the salon, leaving me alone with Lorelei. I stared at her, expecting her to make some snarky comment, but instead, her features softened a bit.
“I’m glad that Grayson is okay,” she said. “That you were able to save him.”
I nodded stiffly. “With your help. He would have died if you hadn’t told me what to do. Thank you. I owe you for that. More than you know.”
“It’s not your fault, what happened to him.”
“Of course it is,” I said, slicing up a kiwi and adding the green, jeweled pieces to my fruit salad. “Because you’ve been right all along. Fletcher should have let you kill Raymond that day. It would have saved us all a lot of grief and misery now, wouldn’t it?”
“I’m glad that Fletcher didn’t let me kill Raymond back then,” Lorelei said in a quiet voice.
Startled, I looked up. That was about the last thing I’d expected her to say.
“I was afraid for a long time,” she continued. “Knowing that Raymond was still out there and that he was doing his best to find me . . . knowing that he wanted revenge for our father’s death . . . I was afraid to do anything. I couldn’t even go into the backyard without worrying that Raymond might be watching me from the trees. I had nightmares like you wouldn’t believe.”
Oh, I knew all about nightmares, but I couldn’t help but ask the inevitable question. “So what changed?”
She straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin. “I did. It took a while—it took a long while—but I got sick and tired of being afraid, and I got angry instead, at how stupid I was being for letting Raymond control my life, even though he wasn’t even around anymore. It was like I was still stuck in that house growing up with him, worrying what I would do or say that would set him or our father off. So I decided that if he was coming for me, then I was damn sure going to be ready for him.”
“But you didn’t have to worry so much. Fletcher was always good at hiding people.” Another thought occurred to me. “You were safe as Lorelei Parker for years. How do you think Raymond finally found you?”
She shrugged. “I have no idea. You heard what he said about doing business with someone who knows me.”
“Any idea who that could be?”
She shrugged again. “I’ve smuggled a lot of stuff for a lot of people, from here to Cypress Mountain to Cloudburst Falls, all the way up to Bigtime. It could be anyone.”
So no leads there. I wanted to know who knew so much about the Ashland underworld—and especially Fletcher’s methods—that they could put two and two together regarding Lorelei’s real identity, but that was a question for another day.
“You were ready for Raymond tonight,” I said. “You wanted him to come to your mansion. You set a trap for him, one that I completely messed up. Something that you have every right to be angry about.”
“Absolutely. I told you that I could handle him. You should have trusted me.” She smirked again. “After all, I have a reputation too, you know.”
“Point taken.”
To my surprise, a small smile flickered across her face. “You were wrong at the garden party too. I don’t actually hate you.”
I snorted. “Well, you could have fooled me. I suppose that you sent all those men to the Pork Pit to kill me over the summer because you secretly want to be my new best friend?”
She laughed, the sound lighter than I would have expected, given everything that had happened tonight. “Of course not. The people I sent after you were causing certain . . . problems in my organization. Taking bribes, informing on me to my competitors, skimming from my shipments.”
My eyebrows shot up in my face. “So you sicced them on me, knowing that I would kill them instead? That’s cold, sugar.”
“It was the quickest, easiest way to eliminate threats. Don’t get all pissy about it. I didn’t send anyone your way I knew you couldn’t handle.” Lorelei leaned back against the counter. “If it makes you feel any better, I did the same thing with my guards tonight. Those three giants Raymond killed? They were after Mallory’s diamonds. They thought tonight was finally the night that they were going to rob us.” She let out a small, satisfied chuckle. “They were dead wrong.”
“Three birds, one brother,” I murmured. “Impressive. But what about Corbin? He was there too.”
“Jack called, said that he was worried about me and Mallory, and insisted on coming over,” she replied. “I didn’t mean for Raymond to hurt him too. But your sister has called and said he’s going to be fine.”
Suspicion swirled through my mind at her words, but I decided to focus on one thing at a time. “Well, I’m so very glad that I could help out and be your own private pest exterminator all these months.”
I gave her a disgusted look, then chopped up another kiwi.
“You should consider it a compliment, a testament to your skills,” she countered.
“I’m sensing an and in there.”
“And . . . it also had the added effect of making it look as though I wanted you dead as badly as the other bosses do.”
“Don’t you?”
Her brow furrowed, and she stared at me like I’d suddenly started speaking pig Latin. “Of course not. Why would you think that?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I snarked. “All the snotty glares and cold looks you grace me with whenever our paths cross.”
Lorelei waved her hand, making her diamond rose-and-thorn ring glimmer and looking for a moment just like Mallory. “Just keeping up appearances. I have zero interest in running the Ashland underworld. All the bosses covet the job, but nobody in their right mind would actually want it. They don’t realize that all they’d be doing is managing other people’s problems instead of their own.”
“You have no idea,” I muttered.
I finished with the last of my kiwis, then moved on to the strawberries. Lorelei watched me slice and dice in silence, but she kept tugging on the end of her black braid, crossing and uncrossing her arms, stepping toward me, then easing back up against the counter. Something else was on her mind, but I ignored her pensive movements and kept right on slicing strawberries.
I had no desire to make things easy for her. Not after what she’d just told me. Not after realizing just how effectively she’d used me to get rid of her problems—and for how long she’d been doing it. Anger and a little shame burned through me at being such an idiot and not realizing what she was really up to. Lorelei had always been a little over-the-top in her dislike of me. I should have picked up on that. I should have realized that there was more going on than her just hating my guts.
Then again, I should have done a lot of things differently over the past few days.
But whacking through things while I was cooking almost always soothed me, and tonight was no different. By the time I had all the fruit in a bowl, I felt much calmer and could almost appreciate Lorelei’s slick moves. Almost.
Ignoring Lorelei, I mixed together some sourwood honey and lime juice, then zested the lime and whisked it into my dressing. I tossed the whole thing together, enjoying the bright mix of colors and the citrusy tang of the lime coating all the fruit. If this didn’t make Owen feel better, nothing would.
When I finished, I washed the sticky fruit juice off my hands. Lorelei crept forward, stepping up to the opposite side of the butcher’s block table, her fingers tapping on the smooth surface. I dried off my hands, crossed my arms over my chest, and stared her down.
“You got something else to say, now is the time.”
&nb
sp; She wet her lips. “Appearances aside, I shouldn’t have been quite so nasty to you. I admit that. But I just couldn’t help myself.”
“And why is that?”
She wouldn’t meet my cold gaze. “Because I’ve always been jealous of you, Gin.”
I blinked. Once again, that was just about the last thing I’d expected her to say. “Why in the world would you be jealous of me? I’m the most hunted woman in Ashland. People try to kill me on a monthly, if not weekly, basis. There’s blood on my clothes more often than not, and I’m always waiting for the next attack. Mine is not a healthy, stress-free lifestyle.”
“And all of that just adds to my jealousy.” A bitter laugh escaped her lips. When she spoke again, her voice was whisper-soft. “Because you’ve always been stronger than me.”
I didn’t say anything. After a moment, Lorelei exhaled and raised her eyes to mine.
“That day at the cabin, when my father came after us, I wanted to stand and fight,” she said. “I’d dreamed of doing it so many times. Of standing up for me and my mom. Of finally stopping him. But in the end, I just . . . froze. All I could think about was how he’d already killed my mom and was going to do the same thing to me. But you . . . you didn’t even think about giving up. Not for a second. Not even when it looked like he and Raymond had killed your family.”
I thought of her cryptic words at the garden party. Now I finally understood what they meant. “You wanted it to be you—you wanted to be the one to kill your father.”
She gave me a sharp nod. “And I was ashamed that you did it instead. That you had to do it, since I was so useless that day.”
“You weren’t useless,” I countered. “You saved me from Raymond. He would have killed me if you hadn’t stopped him.”
“It wasn’t enough. Not for me.” She let out another long, tense breath. “So I, of course, have been doing the mature thing and shooting you dirty looks every time I’ve seen you these past few months. Instead of just stepping up and admitting to myself how weak I was that day.”
“I don’t think you’re weak. Not now and not back then either.”
Her mouth twisted with disgust. “Then what am I?”
I stepped forward and placed my hand on top of hers. “A survivor. Just like me.”
Surprise flashed in her eyes, along with gratitude. But her expression slowly darkened with grief and regret for all the things she’d lost. Her mom, her childhood, her innocence. But most of all, there was strength, the strength that had helped her survive her father, the same strength that would help her survive her brother.
Her hand tightened around mine for a moment, and then we both let go. Because we knew what we had to do now: figure out how to kill Pike.
“You should just let me handle this by myself,” Lorelei said. “Raymond’s not your problem. He never was.”
“He almost killed Owen. I would hunt him to the ends of the earth for that alone.”
Lorelei nodded, hearing the venom in my voice. “Raymond is no fool. He’s sure to realize that you’ll be gunning for him now, and he’ll have done his homework on you. He’ll see you coming a mile away.”
“I don’t care whether he knows that I’m coming,” I growled. “All I want is a level playing field. Someplace where his metal magic can be neutralized or at least minimized. And I know just the spot.”
“Where?”
Instead of answering, I opened the refrigerator, then the freezer and a couple of the cabinets, grabbing everything I needed.
“Now what are you making?” she asked in an exasperated tone.
“You’ll see.”
Lorelei watched me put milk, cinnamon sticks, and cocoa powder into a saucepan on the stove. I also filled a blender with some vanilla-bean ice cream and a few ice cubes, and her nose scrunched up in confusion.
A couple of minutes later, I handed her a parfait glass filled with a decadent drink topped with marshmallows, mini chocolate chips, and graham-cracker crumbs.
She let out the first genuine laugh I’d heard all night. “You and your milkshakes. I should have known.”
“Hot chocolate milkshakes,” I corrected her. “The best of both worlds. They’re good for what ails you. Who knows? Maybe they’ll become my official good luck drink. It worked before that day in the woods.”
“Yeah,” Lorelei said in a thoughtful voice. “I suppose it did. Well, cheers.”
“Cheers.
We clinked our glasses together, then sipped the shakes, which were just as good as they looked. Cold and sweet but with a lingering hint of cinnamon warmth from the hot chocolate.
Lorelei slurped down half of hers, then let out a happy sigh. “You know, this doesn’t make us friends.”
“Of course not,” I replied. “I would never presume that. But we don’t have to be friends to kill your brother. Just willing to do whatever it takes to end him.”
“Believe me, I am more than willing, and I will certainly drink to that.”
Lorelei grinned and held her glass up again. I clinked mine against hers and returned her grin with a wider one of my own.
“Good. Now, here’s what we’re going to do.”
26
Once Lorelei and I had hammered out the details of our plan, we went into the salon to fill in the others. By that point, it was after three in the morning. Sophia helped Owen upstairs to one of the spare bedrooms, and the rest of us crashed in other beds and sofas throughout the house for what was left of the night.
I got up at around nine o’clock and made a hearty Southern brunch of fried chicken, fried green tomatoes, bacon, and waffles, along with the fruit salad I’d already put together. One by one, the others plodded into the kitchen, still bleary-eyed from the long night but irresistibly drawn to the scents of sizzling meat and baking batter. Jo-Jo, Sophia, Mallory, and Lorelei ate in the kitchen, while Finn and Silvio fixed their food to go, since they had several things to check on for me this morning. So did Cooper, who had to get back to his blacksmith forge, and Eva, who headed to the community college for her morning classes.
Owen was still resting, so I took a tray up to the spare bedroom where he’d spent the night. Jo-Jo had checked him again and declared that he was fully healed, but I still wanted him to take it easy for as long as possible.
He sat up in bed, and I placed the tray on his lap.
He looked at all the food, then grinned. “It was just a little knife wound, Gin. Hardly worth all this effort. Although if I knew that it would mean breakfast in bed, I would have gotten myself stabbed a long time ago.”
I smoothed his black hair off his face, then kissed him, so he wouldn’t notice how forced my laughter was. “You’re always worth the effort, stab wound or no stab wound.”
I kept my words light and teasing, just like his, but I could still picture him bleeding out from that knife—my knife—sticking out of his chest. It was one of the most horrible things I’d ever seen, and I wouldn’t be able to get the image out of my head anytime soon—if ever. Lorelei had her nightmares about Raymond and her father. Well, now I had another one for my collection too.
Owen scarfed down his food. I wasn’t all that hungry, but I forced myself to swallow bite after bite, knowing that I would need to keep my strength up for the long day ahead.
He finished the last of his orange juice, then eased his head back against the pillows, his violet eyes sliding shut. He was still tired, and his body needed time to recover from all the trauma it had received, both from the stab wound and from the elemental Ice that Lorelei and I had used on him.
I removed the tray and pulled the sheets and blankets back up to his chin.
“Gin?” Owen mumbled in a sleepy voice.
“Yeah?”
“Be careful when you kill that bastard.”
I kissed him again. “Don’t you worry your pretty little head about
a thing now. Because I promise you this—Raymond Pike will be dead by midnight.”
* * *
As much as I wanted to stay with Owen and reassure myself that he was okay, I wasn’t going to find Pike by sitting around the salon. So I went home to Fletcher’s, showered, and threw on some fresh clothes before going downtown and opening up the Pork Pit for the day.
After all, nobody could snitch to the big boss if she wasn’t in her office.
It was almost eleven when I got to the restaurant, and a dozen people were already waiting outside. Some of them just wanted to get their barbecue on, but more than a few had shifty eyes and nervous grins that told me they were here with information they hoped would score them a fat payday.
Silvio handled them in true assistant fashion. While I cooked, cleaned, and went about my chores, the vamp sat in a booth at the back of the restaurant near the restrooms, listening to all the stories the underworld boys and girls urgently whispered to him. Silvio faithfully listened and took copious notes on his tablet. Sometimes he would make a call or two to check on something. But after every person had said his or her piece, he would look over at me and shake his head no, indicating that they didn’t have any valid info on Pike.
Frustration surged through me, but I forced myself to rein in my temper and keep on running my restaurant as though nothing were wrong and I wasn’t itching to kill a man by sundown. This was my home turf, and I was going to use that to my advantage. Raymond Pike couldn’t hide forever. Not in my city.
Finally, at about two o’clock, the front door opened, and Jade Jamison sashayed into the Pork Pit. She looked at the man sitting with Silvio, then over at me. Silvio raised his eyebrows in a silent question, but I waved Jade over, and she plopped down on the stool closest to the cash register.
“Come by for another milkshake? Those have been a real crowd pleaser these past few days.”
“Sure,” she chirped. “With a side of information.”
I groaned. “Wow. That was really bad.”
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