“Seth … what’s happened?”
Seth looked sick. “Netta’s dead. Alex killed her and then hanged himself. Jesus, Jesus.” Lisander and Kate looked appalled as Seth began to sob.
Seth hugged Ori and Maceo as they arrived at the funeral home. Both of them were startled by Seth’s gray face, and Ori felt tears pricking her eyes. So much loss.
Netta’s funeral. The medical examiner had finally released her body to be buried; Alex was still being examined. “He stabbed her to death and then hanged himself,” Seth kept saying in an almost disbelieving tone. “Why didn’t he just kill himself? Why take her with him?”
Ori leaned against him. “I’m so sorry, Seth.”
He put his arm around her. “Thank you for coming, Ori. I know you must be exhausted.”
“I’m fine, Seth, really. I’m worried about you.”
Seth looked at Maceo. “Well, at least we can say it’s over now.”
Maceo nodded. “But what a price.”
“What a price.”
Ori and Maceo held hands throughout the funeral service. Despite his rage at Alex and his certainty that he was behind Ori’s attack and Viola’s death, Ori knew Maceo was suffering. Alex had been his brother for so many years. What the hell had set him off? She knew Maceo blamed himself; if he hadn’t slept with Viola, maybe none of this would have happened.
They stayed with Seth at the home he had rented in New York, out of the city. “I think I feel closer to Netta here,” he, said as if in explanation. “And Kate and Lisander are here for a couple more weeks.”
Maceo told him they would stay in New York too for as long as he needed and Seth had grinned ruefully. “I’m surprised your business is still up and running, but I’m grateful.”
It was in the second week that Maceo got the call from the police in Vermont. They had some questions and wanted to ask someone close to Alex Milland; could he come up? Maceo said he could, wondering why they hadn’t asked Seth. The police office had hesitated and asked Maceo to keep his visit a secret.
He told Ori that he needed to go see a client and she nodded. “I’ll go see Seth and keep him company.”
“Good idea.”
He drove Ori to Seth’s house and kissed her goodbye. “I’ll be back this evening, I love you.”
He took his private jet up to Vermont and talked to the policeman in charge of the investigation.
“We’ve found a witness who spotted someone at the Milland house carrying a crossbow. Not this time, but when Viola Redman was murdered. Well-dressed, tall, dark. The witness also claims he saw the same man in the local town the day Alex Milland allegedly killed his sister. We want you to talk to him.”
Maceo nodded. He realized they wanted him to be seen by the witness; he didn’t care, he knew he hadn’t been anywhere near the house when Alex and Netta died or when Viola was murdered. “No problem.”
The police officers exchanged a look. “Let’s do it.”
The witness was an old Chinese man who shook Maceo’s hand somberly. “I don’t know what else to tell you; I haven’t seen the man much.”
“Alex Milland?”
“No, so I don’t know if he is the same man.”
Maceo nodded. “Do you mind if I talk to you for a while?” He turned to the detectives. “Could you find me something? I have an idea.”
Seth had taken her out to lunch, but Ori was uneasy. All morning he had been in a strange mood, almost hyperactive, his eyes darting everywhere. Ori wondered, with a shock, if he was on something. Netta’s death had obviously hit him for six.
“Seth, why don’t we go back home and maybe you can rest a while?”
“No, I’m fine. How’s your crab salad?”
She looked down at her plate; she’d barely touched it. “I guess I’m not hungry.”
Seth reached over to take her hand but Ori, not thinking, jerked it away.
“Are you okay, Princess?”
Princess? Okay, this was getting weirder. Ori tried to smile. “Yes, fine.”
He searched her face. “You don’t seem fine. You seem … afraid.”
With a shock, Ori realized that was just how she felt, and she couldn’t explain it. It was a gnawing feeling in the pit of her stomach. “No, of course not.” Even to her own ears, she sounded fake.
Seth laughed, but it was without humor. He glanced at her, his eyes searching her face. “You can’t possibly consider that I would harm you in any way?”
Ori couldn’t help the thought that slammed into her mind. Yes. She drew in a sharp breath, and as his eyes narrowed, she struggled to keep her face blank.
Her hesitation was a beat too long. “No, I …”
He let her hand go and sat back, hurt flashing across his face. “You do. My God.”
Guilt flooded through her. “No, of course not. I’m sorry.”
“You think I’m capable of doing those horrific things?” Incredulity, his voice rising.
She shook her head, trying to meet his eyes. A couple on another table was looking at them curiously, and she felt her face burn. “Seth … I, please, let’s talk about something else.”
“But we’re not talking. You’ve barely said a word all morning.” He leaned in, lowered his voice. “Are you worried I’m going to stab you to death, Ori?” It was a growl, his face, contorted. “Are you scared I might eviscerate you? Cut you open like Alex did?”
Icy drops of terror went down her spine. She couldn’t look away from his gaze. The other couple was staring at them, and Seth turned his head and glared at them.
“Something interesting?” His fierce eyes bored into them, unblinking, the pupils so constricted they had almost disappeared.
The couple looked away quickly, clearly disturbed. Seth continued to stare at them until they got up and left, the woman casting anxious glances at Ori.
Ori was mortified. She got up and strode out of the restaurant, away from him, away from the violence of that moment. She walked blindly, automatically, toward the parking lot. She had to get away from him. Her breaths came in short, sharp gasps, fear and embarrassment a churning mass inside her. Seth caught up to her. She wrenched her arm from his grasp, but he stopped her.
“I’m sorry, please, Ori. I’m sorry.” He was breathing hard, his face red. “I’m so sorry. I’m just so … I can’t believe you’d even consider that of me. I’m just … hurt.” He stepped closer to her but didn’t touch her. “I’m hurt because you mean more to me that anyone ever has. I mean it. You are my family. I can’t imagine what it would be like to lose you. Please don’t push me away. Please. Look, let’s go home and talk.”
Without waiting for her answer, he took her arm and led her back to his car.
The detective came in and handed Maceo the photo. Maceo glanced at it. All five of them Every member of the Midnight Club. He felt sadness as he looked at them. Before all of this. Happy. Laughing. Brotherhood. He swallowed the lump in his throat.
“Mr. Wu, when you say you saw a man with a crossbow, is he in this photograph?”
He handed the man the photo and waited. With a sinking heart, he watched the man nod.
“Yes, yes. I do.” He waved a shaking finger towards the photo.
Maceo closed his eyes briefly, then said to the detective. “There you have it. Proof that Alex was the killer. Good riddance to the son of a bitch.”
The detective focused on Mr. Wu. “Mr. Wu, do you mean this man?”
He indicated Alex, standing in the center of the group, flanked by Maceo and Benoit.
“No, no. ” The man pulled on Maceo’s shirt as he turned to him. “Not this man … this man.”
Maceo’s blood turned to ice as he saw who the man was identifying. Everything he knew was wrong. His heart banged against his chest, and he felt lightheaded. Oh god, no …
Because the man Wu identified was the one person he could have sworn would never have done this. The one person who they all relied on. The person that at this very moment was with the love of Maceo’s lif
e. The man who had already tried to kill her.
Seth.
Panting for air, Netta looked up at him, her hatred radiating from her. “No. You are not worthy of anyone’s love. Not Viola’s. Not Ori’s. Not mine.”
Seth smiled. “Viola’s dead. Ori will be dead soon. You will be dead even sooner.”
Netta, despite her fear, smirked. “Poor little lonely boy. You’re pathetic.”
That got him. Seth ripped the bolt from her and used it as a knife, driving it again and again into her. He could hear her moans growing weaker, her life slipping away from her. Collateral damage, he thought. As he pushed the chair over and let her bleed out on the floor, he looked at her coldly. She’d been a good fuck, a beautiful distraction from the nearly overwhelming urge to kill Ori. Nothing could compare to that night in the car, Ori’s gasp of shock as he plunged his knife into her soft belly. He relived it every moment.
Seth coolly watched Netta die, then settled into the armchair to await Alex.
Poor, misunderstood Alex. How he played right into Seth’s hands.
A half hour later, he heard Alex’s car on the driveway and got up. Less than two minutes later, Alex’s howl of grief when he found his sister dead … then as Seth, coming at him from behind, looped the rope around his neck, finally the understanding in his eyes.
When Alex was dead, Seth had made it look like he’d hanged himself. More collateral damage. But Maceo needed to be sure Ori was safe, or Seth would never get to her again.
And that wasn’t acceptable. Ori was going to die, one way or another.
They had driven back to Seth’s in silence, Ori increasingly uncomfortable. You should have stayed in the city, stayed in public. Too late now.
At home, as Seth followed her in and shut the door behind them, it sounded to Ori like a prison cell. Why? Why was she feeling like this?
She turned to Seth. “Seth, I’m going to take a nap, okay?”
“Sure.” It was the expression in his eyes, amused, malicious. She’d never seen him like this before.
“Okay, well, I’ll see you later.”
It happened so quickly, but when it did, Ori felt like she’d been hit with a sledgehammer. She had turned her head just as Seth had leaned in to kiss her cheek. Instead, his lips brushed hers, and she gasped, a torrent of memories crashing back. Seth’s head snapped back and their eyes locked. At that moment, he realized she knew.
This is how I show my love …
Ori couldn’t breathe. Seth. Friendly, steady, trustworthy Seth had been the one who had stabbed her, who had killed Viola and Netta and framed Alex.
And she was trapped here, alone, with the killer.
Maceo was beside himself. Seth. The police had jumped into action, working with their New York counterparts, and soon Maceo was in a police helicopter being flown back to Seth’s house. He tried again and again to call Ori’s cellphone, but there was no answer.
Please, please don’t let me be too late …
Ori, please … fight. Fight.
Ori darted for the door, panicked, but he was too quick, too strong for her. “Hush,” he said now, locking his arms around her. “Hush. This needn’t be scary, Ori, honestly, just resign yourself to it.”
Ori looked up at him, fear mixed with anger. “You stabbed me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Seth smiled and kissed her; she spat in his face. He merely laughed, easily holding her with one massive arm while he tugged the tie from his neck and started to bind her hands behind her. “Because I wanted to, Orianthi. Look at you.” He tugged her in front of the mirror and stood behind her. “Look how beautiful you are.” He ripped her dress open and ran his hand over her belly, the livid scars from his knife still bright pink and healing. “Eleven. I liked the symmetry of that.” He put his mouth to her ear. “And soon, my darling, Ori, soon, number twelve, thirteen, fourteen …”
He was going to kill her. Ori almost laughed. Of course he’s going to kill you, you damn fool. Fight … you don’t get to win this one, Seth Cantor. Blindside him.
She turned in his arms and went into survival mode. She smiled up at him. “You don’t know me well enough yet, Seth. Why didn’t you tell me you wanted me?”
Seth wasn’t so easily fooled. “Ori, I know you love Maceo; why else do you think I tried to kill you? I knew you’d never want me.”
She lowered her head but looked up through her eyelashes at him. “Like I said,” she said in a soft whisper, “you don’t know me as well as you should.”
She stood on her toes and nuzzled his nose briefly before brushing her lips against his. “If you’re going to kill me anyway, you’re right. This doesn’t have to be scary. It could be pleasurable …”
Please, please fall for it, please … Ori knew she would do anything to stay alive, even if it meant having sex with this monster; she’d done it before and survived, after all.
Seth, his expression blank, stared down at her, then cupped her breasts in his hands. “If you’re lying to me, Orianthi, I will gut you like a pig.”
“Try me,” she whispered. Seth gave a growl and tumbled her to the floor, tugging at her underwear. Ori slammed hard against the marble but felt the tie binding her hands give. Her still-healing abdominal muscles screamed with pain, but she played her part well, moaning sensually, kissing Seth. It wasn’t until she felt his cock nudge at her sex that she wanted to cry, but she shoved the pain away as he entered her and began to fuck her. Ori screamed her encouragement at him, and Seth seemed to respond, grinning nastily.
“I’m still going to kill you, pretty girl,” he grunted. Ori had no fear left, even at his words, his threats. She felt her hands free themselves as Seth came and she winced at the feeling of his semen shooting into her.
God, I’m sorry, Maceo, I’m so sorry …
At the moment of Seth’s orgasm, when he was at his most vulnerable, when his eyes were closed, Ori made her move. She whipped his tie around his throat and, kicking him out of her, she braced herself against his chest as she throttled him, using her body weight to tighten the cord. Seth struggled, roaring, and Ori didn’t know if she could hang on but her anger, her fear, her love for Maceo and the desire to live for him, made her strong. She pulled and pulled, using everything inside her until she felt him weaken. She didn’t let up, knowing he could be faking it, until his entire body went slack. She kept pulling even when he collapsed on top of her, his eyes bulging, his tongue protruding from his mouth.
Then, finally satisfied he was dead, Ori kicked him off of her and scrambled to pull her underwear on. Running through the house, she began to sob, not for herself but for everyone who had died because of that monster. Poor Alex … Viola … Netta …
“Ori!’
Maceo’s voice echoed through the empty house, and Ori stumbled towards the sound of his voice. “Maceo …”
“Ori!’
She could hear sirens now, so close to safety, so close to love. Then she heard Seth’s roar and knew—she hadn’t killed him, and now he was coming for her. She heard him storming after her, and when the first crossbow bolt hit the wall beside her, she faltered.
Don’t give up, don’t give up …
“Ori!” This time it was Seth roaring her name, his voice bruised and gravelly. Murderous. If she stalled for one second, she would be dead. She heard Maceo’s desperate shouts for her, and as she reached the front door finally and wrenched it open, she could see her lover running towards her, coming to save her, followed by shouting police officers.
A sudden searing, burning pain hit her right kidney, and she knew she’d been hit, but staggered out of the door, throwing herself down the stone steps into Maceo’s arms.
“He’s coming,” she managed to say to him, seeing the panic in his green eyes. Seconds later, Seth came raging from the building, dropping the crossbow and barreling into the couple. All three were sent sprawling to the gravel. Maceo shoved Ori away before he set upon Seth again.
Ori crawled away, groping around to her back and, giving a scream, wrenched the bolt from her flesh. She could feel sticky blood on her hands but ignored it. She heard shouting, more sirens, but all she could think of was getting to Maceo, helping to fight Seth, saving at least one of them.
Maceo was pounding on Seth, but the other man managed to flip him and plowed his fist into Maceo’s jaw. But Maceo was raging, his adrenaline flooding his system and he once again got the advantage, yelling in Italian, then in English. “Non sarai mai toccare di nuovo il suo. figlio di una cagna! You’ll never touch her again, you son of a bitch!’
Seth kicked him away and staggered to his feet, reaching into his pocket and bringing out the gun, leveling it at Maceo.
Maceo stared at his friend—the friend who was aiming the gun at his chest—and he shook his head. “So, this is the way it ends?”
His friend nodded. “This is the way it ends.”
There was a long silence, as if his friend couldn’t decide whether to pull the trigger or not. He decided to take the chance and ask the question he so desperately needed the answer to.
“Then why all this, old friend? I get framing Alex, but why kill Netta? Why did she have to die? Why stab Ori? She did nothing wrong except love me with her whole heart, and you butchered her.”
Seth smiled. “You don’t get it, do you? She was dead the second you touched her. And now I’m going to kill both of you.”
And he pulled the trigger. Maceo threw himself to the floor as, behind Seth, a furious and desperate Ori tackled him. She leaped onto his back, as lithe as a monkey, and clawed at his face. Seth’s gun went skittering across the ground as Maceo launched an attack from the front. Seth threw Ori to the ground—hard—and Maceo yelled his anger, crashing into Seth with all of his strength.
As Seth fought back, Ori managed to stand up and stagger towards the two men. Seth had Maceo’s throat and was squeezing, his eyes bulging with the effort. Ori saw his fingers digging into Maceo’s windpipe. Maceo choked, and Ori gave a banshee yell and threw herself at Seth, raising the bloody crossbow bolt he had shot her with. She brought it down hard, not caring where it hit him as long as he released Maceo.
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