by Harley Stone
She stepped aside, gesturing for me to come in. As I passed, I offered her the plate.
“I wasn’t, but this smells really good. It’s making me hungry. Thank you.”
“No problem. I… uh… I stuffed the ravioli.” I sounded like a little kid bragging about coloring in the lines or following a dot-to-dot. It was such a stupid thing to be proud of that I felt my cheeks heat up with embarrassment. I wasn’t five and I had no business trying to impress a woman like Mila by telling her I’d helped in the goddamn kitchen.
“You cook?” she asked. Leaving her door open, she carried the plate to the loveseat and sat.
Her interest only made me feel like more of a poser. “I’m learning,” I corrected, leaning against the wall.
She took a bite. “Mm. Delicious. Thanks again.” She probably expected me to leave, but when I didn’t, she patted the cushion beside her. “You can have a seat if you want.”
Accepting her invitation with a nod, I peeled myself off the wall and closed the distance between us. As I sat, I tried to ignore the welcome heat of her leg against mine. This was the closest we’d been, and it felt… right. I liked it. I wanted to watch her enjoy the meal, but refused to stare at her like a creep and make her uncomfortable. Instead, I scanned the room. Nice, matching luggage was stacked against the wall beside her nightstand and her bed was made.
“Did you get all unpacked?” I asked, trying to make conversation.
Swallowing back a bite, she replied, “Mostly. I need to pick up more coat hangers.”
“I’ll snag some from my room. I have extras.”
“You don’t have to do that, Hound.”
But I wanted to help. I held my hands out, not-so-proudly showing off my adequate yet cheap clothes. “What am I gonna do with a closet full of hangers? You’re lookin’ at like one-fifth of my entire wardrobe, and most of these amazing threads go folded in my dresser.”
Fork in the air, she froze, looking me over. “Not much for clothes, I take it?”
“Nope.” And for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why I kept filling her in on the worst parts of me. It was like I was trying to un-impress her. And judging by the look on her face, I was succeeding. “No reason to be. I don’t get out much. I mean I work in the building so…”
God, just shut up.
I clamped my mouth closed before more stupidity could spill out. She was still watching me like I had a big ol’ slab of loser covering my face, which was pretty accurate.
“That’s…”
“Pathetic.”
She chuckled. “I was gonna say interesting.”
“Only it’s not.”
“Yeah it is. You’re an interesting guy, Hound.”
There were worse things she could have called me, so I decided to probe further. “Why do you say that?”
She seemed to consider me for a few beats before answering, “Most people put on a front for people they don’t know, but you’re really… honest. Kinda brutal to yourself, even. Why?”
I shrugged and took a shot at diagnosing my motivation for putting my worst foot forward. “I like to keep expectations low.”
“You’re funny.”
Not really, but I could be all kinds of self-deprecating if it made her eyes light up like that. “You should see me at a job interview. No qualifications, all sorts of limitations, I’m the employee everyone wants.”
Sadness flooded her eyes, and the entire world seemed to darken as her smile faded. “That must be hard.”
Shit.
Not the response I was going for. I would have done anything to put that sparkle back in her eyes, but I’d effectively snuffed it out. I couldn’t help but wonder if she knew the kind of power she held. If she knew the kind of shit I’d do to put a smile on her face.
“It’s fine. Your cousin took a chance on me. Turns out I’m pretty good at coding.”
A tiny spark of sunshine returned to her eyes, pushing back the darkness once more. Flecks of gold and brown danced in her bright green eyes, taking her beauty to an otherworldly level. She was such a goddamn anomaly, I couldn’t stop staring. There was just one thing I needed to know.
“Why’d you take off on me today?” I blurted out. I hadn’t meant to ask the question aloud, but now that it was out there, I desperately needed the answer. “Are you just naturally avoidant? Or did I say something wrong?”
Her eyebrows rose and cocked her head to the side, studying me. I half expected her to shut the conversation down, but instead, she popped a forkful of salad into her mouth and slowly chewed it.
I waited until she swallowed. She took another bite.
“You gonna respond?” I asked.
“I’m being avoidant.”
Ah. The girl had jokes. I barked out a laugh. “Well played.”
“For real, I just needed to be alone for a while.” Her gaze darted to a picture frame on her dresser. “I needed a good cry.”
Standing, I circled the coffee table to get closer so I could see the photo that had snagged her attention. It was Mila with another woman. “Who’s that with you?”
“Has anyone ever told you you’re nosey?”
Chuckling, I nodded. “All the damn time. But here’s the thing, I grew up feeling like I didn’t belong. Now, I ask questions to show my interest in people, so they know someone cares. I don’t want anyone to ever feel unwelcome like I did.”
“Oh.” She took a breath, setting her empty plate aside. “That’s my friend, Polly.”
I focused on Polly’s face. Like Mila, she was gorgeous, but their beauty was different. Where Mila’s hair was the color of caramel with lots of soft tones and highlights, Polly’s was almost jet black. Polly’s eyes were blue to Mila’s green. Mila’s makeup was light and natural-looking, where Polly’s was dark and sultry. They wore identical smirks, though. “You two look like trouble.”
“We were.” Her tone went flat. “Not anymore. She’s the one who was murdered. It happened not long after we took that picture.”
“Shit. I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“I didn’t lose any friends in the service. Hell, I wasn’t even in long enough. I can’t imagine what that must be like.”
“Your injury wasn’t combat related?”
“Nope. They came from accidents.”
“Accidents? As in plural?”
“Yep. The first accident happened when the landing craft air cushion broke down and I was part of the team doing the recovery. When one of the LCACs break down, the team only has a few minutes to recover the air cushion before it sinks, and we lose everything it’s carrying. Gear, people, everything. I mean, when a recovery goes south, the operators usually make it to the boat, but sometimes they don’t. And nobody wants that shit on their conscience, so we bust our asses to recover it in time.”
“Makes sense.”
“Well, we have to use this long, heavy spanwire to reach the LCAC, and the girl behind me dropped her end. It came down on my back just right to fuck up my spine. But it wasn’t like I could just stop what I was doing and go get checked out. We finished the recovery. Then one of the ship’s medics gave me a cortisone shot and I was back on duty twenty-four hours later.”
“Which probably caused long-term damage to your back.”
I nodded. “Bottom disk slipped and fused in the wrong damn spot. Muscles tore and incorrectly healed on the right side of my back, pulling the shit out of my spine. Fractured hip. Minor paralysis in my feet from my sciatica and scoliosis. Whenever I couldn’t function, they’d give me another cortisone shot. There’s an option for more surgery, but it comes with a fifty percent chance I’ll end up worse off than I am right now.” And I didn’t think I could handle worse.
She was staring at me like I’d grown a second head. “And you got hurt again?”
“Yeah. I was one of the few hazmat certified crew members, so I had to handle the acid we used to clean the guns on the side of the craft. I’d just finished cleani
ng and was carrying the five-gallon bucket back to the secured hazmat locker, when a couple of junior sailors slammed an ammo rail down, causing me to fall fifteen feet off the flight deck. I was trying to keep control of the bucket, so the sailors wouldn’t get a face full of acid, and the bucket slammed into my left knee while my right jammed into the floor, destroying the cartilage behind my knee cap.”
She blinked. “I don’t even know what to say right now.”
“You’re probably just stunned by my incredible masculinity. How I took all those lumps and just kept goin’. Like fuckin’ Rambo or something.”
She laughed. “I mean, it does sound kinda badass.”
“Trust me, it wasn’t. I hobbled around the ship best I could, trying to fake like I wasn’t hurt. But when I couldn’t perform the physical tests anymore, they put me on limited light duty and transferred me to shore command. I started physical therapy and took every damn drug they gave me, narcotic or not, to get through that shit. I studied my ass off and took the tests to get a goddamn desk job to stay in the service, but no matter what drugs they gave me I still couldn’t pass the physical exam.”
“They kicked you out of the navy?”
And it still hurt like hell. “They gave me a medical discharge.”
“That’s rough.”
“Yeah. I don’t know what it’s like to lose a friend, but I lost the hell out of myself.”
Mila looked away. I didn’t think she was going to open up to me, but she finally nodded, as if making the decision to share. “It’s weird. I know Polly’s dead, but I keep expecting her to call and ask where the hell I am. We kept tabs on each other. She was my one constant, you know?”
I did know. I had Annie.
“Polly would flip her lid if I ever left without telling her where I was going. We told each other everything.” When Mila looked back at me, her eyes were bright with unshed tears. “Only I have no idea who she was with that night. No clue who the fuck killed her.”
“We’ll figure it out,” I replied, surprised at the conviction in my voice. But I absolutely meant it. I’d do anything in my power to bring Polly’s murderer to justice.
Especially if it meant keeping Mila safe.
11
Mila
I WASN’T LOOKING to make friends, but Hound somehow managed to overstep all my boundaries and take root like an old oak tree that had been in my life for centuries. Yes, I could remove him, but it would take power tools and manpower I didn’t possess.
Besides, I kind of liked having him around.
While Levi obsessed about finding the source of my threatening emails, Hound took it upon himself to make sure my needs were met. If I didn’t join the club for dinner, he brought me a plate. If I didn’t stop by the kitchen for breakfast, he grabbed me something on his way to the office. If I needed someone to vent my frustrations to, he listened with rapt attention.
Hound’s devotion to my personal well-being was both unnerving and… well, really welcome.
The Monday after Levi returned from the wedding, he created a temporary working space for me beside his desk, hooking me up with a spare laptop. While he searched for the sender of my creepy Bible emails, I spent my days internet stalking people Polly and I shared a connection with, trying to find the candidates most likely to morph into religious nut-job murderers so I could turn them over to Levi for further investigation. I was working my way down the list of possible suspects, when Billy the Bastard’s name came up.
“Do you know anything about this guy?” I asked, angling my screen toward Levi.
“William Dean Ortel, III,” he read aloud. “Nope. Sounds pretentious as fuck. I’d remember a name like that for sure.”
“He’s the guy who helped me get away from the compound.”
“Hmm. Where’d you meet him?”
“A school dance in Gallipolis.”
With a population of a little under 4,000, Gallipolis was about ten miles from the compound Levi and I had grown up in, nestled along the Ohio river. It wasn’t uncommon for teens to sneak out and visit the town, but those who got caught, paid for it. Even so, no number of lashings could seem to keep curious teens locked away indefinitely. I was only brave enough to venture out once, and thankfully no one in my small, rebellious group got caught.
“You snuck out?” Levi asked, sounding positively scandalized.
“Sneaked,” I corrected. “Just because we’re from the sticks doesn’t give you a pass on bad grammar. And yes. You left, then Toby left, and I was bored out of my mind. Anyway, Billy’s family is crazy-rich. They come from that old soybean money.”
Levi cocked his head to the side. “Old? Soybeans haven’t been around the US all that long.”
“I know.” Emotion caught in my throat. “Polly used to make that joke.”
His eyes softened.
I dropped my gaze, focusing on the corner of my desk until I got myself under control. “So, Billy…” I cleared my throat and tried again. “I was young and naïve, and he promised me the moon, the stars, and everything in between. He helped me get my GED and enroll in Ohio State. Seriously, he had that whole knight in million-dollar armor thing going. Yeah, he could be a spoon-fed egotistical jackass, but never to me. Well, not until I caught him bumpin’ uglies with a girl who was supposed to be my friend.”
“Bastard,” Levi swore.
I chuckled. “Yes. Billy the Bastard has been his nickname ever since. Turned out there was nothing knight-esque about him. The spoiled little douchebag was used to getting his way and didn’t take confrontation all that well. He thought I’d stay because I had no money and nowhere to go, but he grossly overestimated my ability to put up with his cheating ass. He pitched one hell of a fit when I walked out his door.”
Levi gave the social media profile on my screen his full attention. “He didn’t hurt you or anything did he?”
Not physically. “No. I’m pretty sure he thought I’d come back.”
“You think he’s a suspect?”
Clicking another tab, I showed Levi the latest news on my ex. “I don’t see how he could be. He was arrested for embezzlement right before Polly’s murder. He’s out on bail now, but I don’t think he’s allowed to leave the state, much less the country.”
“Wow. You really can pick ’em, can’t you cuz?”
I shrugged. “What can I say? He had a nice ass.” And he knew all the right words to say to make me fall head over heels for him. Just thinking about Billy still made my chest ache. He promised me forever. Silly me, I thought that meant we were monogamous, but apparently Billy believed he was still free to fuck whomever he wanted.
He taught me a lot about committed relationships, mainly, to avoid them.
“And how’d that nice ass work out for you?” Levi asked.
I flipped him off.
He chuckled before focusing on the screen again. “Entitled assholes rarely do their own dirty work. Billy the Bastard could have hired someone to follow you and take out your friend and client.”
That idea made me squirm. “Billy wouldn’t have gone after Polly or Rishi,” I defended.
Levi eyed me. “Why not?”
“Because.” If Billy was responsible, it would have been retaliation for my leaving him. Their deaths would be on my hands, and I couldn’t handle that. “Polly’s killer was probably one of her clients.”
Levi’s brows drew together. “Her killer has been sending you Bible verses.”
“We don’t know that for sure.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Okay. A week ago, you showed up on my doorstep believing you were in trouble. Now, you doubt the murders are connected? Why are you backpedaling?”
“I’m not. I just… this all seems so crazy. Maybe I read too much into the emails.”
“What kind of la-la-land are you livin’ in right now?”
Irritated by the way he was mocking me without even hearing me out, I said, “The murders aren’t even the same. They were at two different
hotels, and while Polly’s cause of death was blunt force trauma, Rishi had multiple stab wounds.”
“And you received an email after each.”
“But I haven’t even received any new emails since Saturday. Maybe the murderer’s given up?”
“Given up?” He snorted. “Saturday was six days ago. I know your head is not far enough up your ass to actually believe that.”
I wanted to believe it more than anything. “I just want this to be over.”
“Me too, but it won’t be until we find the killer.”
Panic seized my chest as I saw all my plans crumble. “That could take years!”
“Or longer. Forty percent of American homicides are never solved. I’m not sure what the statistics are for Canada, but they can’t be much different.”
“But, I can’t… I have to go back to Ontario next month. I have to get my classroom ready for the new school year.” I still hadn’t turned in my notice, and since I’d never make my goal while hiding out in Washington state, going back to school in the fall was a no-brainer.
“Yeah? Well, I hope you have a contingency plan.”
“No, I...” I thought about the nearly five hundred grand in my bank account, but Levi didn’t need to know about that. Not yet, anyway. “We don’t even know for sure I’m in danger. I mean, yeah, I received a few emails that could be seen as threatening, but is that really a good reason to throw away my career?” I was grasping at straws when what I needed was a life raft. “Nothing has actually been done to me.”
He shook his head, chuckling. “So, you flew all the way here for ‘nothing’?”
“I was scared, but now that I’ve had time to think it all over, I’m not so sure fleeing Canada was necessary. What if I overreacted?”
Levi let out a frustrated breath. “Did Polly ever mention anything about receiving strange emails?”
She hadn’t, but there could be multiple reasons for her keeping them to herself. “They looked like spam. I didn’t tell her about mine, either.”
“I thought you told each other everything.”