by Sybil Bartel
I nodded at Ty.
Shaking his head, he kicked the rims. “Fucking gangbangers,” he whispered. “They got no class.”
“Recon the west side of the house, I’ll take the east. Let’s find out what we’re dealing with.”
“Copy.” Ty took off toward the west side of the house.
Hunched over, I skirted the east side and checked all three of the windows. First room had four men drinking and staring at a TV. Middle window was dark, but I could see enough to tell it was an empty bathroom, and the last window was a kitchen with another guy at the stove.
I made my way back to the SUV.
Ty was already there. “Two bedrooms, one empty, two people fucking in the other.”
Damn it, a female. “Four men in front room. Three are on the couch, one’s on a chair, all facing west. Guns on the coffee table. A fifth man in the kitchen at the stove.”
Ty nodded. “We’ll breach the front door, and you take the first two on the couch. I’ll get the third and the guy on the chair. You cover the kitchen, and I’ll take the bedroom.”
“No.” He’d kill the female. “I’ll cover the bedroom, you take the kitchen.”
Ty smirked. “Just have to see them fucking, huh?”
“Screw you. You’ll kill the female.”
He looked at me like I was an idiot. “Cleaning house means cleaning house, not leaving a witness.”
“I’m not shooting the female.”
“You think women aren’t gangbangers? You’re gonna risk leaving someone alive who saw your woman’s shit? Memorized her address from her ID they stole?” He shook his head. “Fuck, dude. Get real.”
“We don’t know if they know anything, or if her ID is even in there.”
Ty snorted. “First, they’re all gang brothers, they talk. Second, there were two purses in the bedroom and this house doesn’t look a damn thing like a woman lives here. There’s a fucking dude at the stove, bro.”
I didn’t have time to argue.
Shouting erupted from the living room, and we were out of time.
Ty sprinted toward the house, and I followed. He paused for one second outside the front door to glance at me and mouth, three, two, one.
We moved.
Ty breached first, and I was in immediately after.
Except nothing was how it was a few minutes ago. All four men were on their feet grabbing for their guns, and the fifth guy was standing at the door from the kitchen into the living room, with a cell phone to his ear, yelling at the other men.
None of them had a chance.
Two double taps and a single shot later, all five men were dead on the floor.
The sixth man, pulling on shorts, ran from the bedroom, and Ty pulled the trigger.
A woman behind him started screaming.
Ty took aim.
“No!” I warned.
Ty pulled the trigger anyway.
A single shot to her forehead, and just like the others, she hit the floor.
“Goddamn it, Ty!”
He shrugged. “If I’m wrong about that purse, I’ll pay when I meet my maker.” He kicked the front door shut behind him then stepped over the dead couple. “I’m already going to hell.”
Jesus fuck.
“What color’s her purse?” Ty asked over his shoulder as he walked toward the bedroom.
I looked around at the bodies. “Yellow.” God-fucking-damn it.
Ty came back into the living room wearing a smug smile and holding up Genevieve’s purse. “Bingo. What’d I say?” He tossed it at me.
I grabbed it. “That you’re going to hell.” I did a cursory check of her purse. Wallet, ID, girl shit, it seemed to be all there, but no Escalade keys.
“In due time.” Ty scanned the living room.
“No Escalade keys. Was there anything else in the bedroom?”
“Besides a crack pipe and forty-o on the nightstand, not that I saw, but you can check.” He pulled one of the dead guys in the living room closer to the front door. “Give me your gun.”
What the fuck? “Why?”
He stepped over the guy and moved another one opposite of where he’d laid the first one. “C-Y-A.” Wiping his gun down with his shirt, he then put it in the hand of the first guy he’d moved and used the dead guy’s finger to pull the trigger twice before removing the silencer and leaving the gun in his hand.
“Jesus Christ, Ty.” I stared at the two new bullet holes in the second guy’s chest.
“What?” He stepped around me. “Like you’ve never had to cover your tracks before.”
I hadn’t.
He took my gun and wiped it down and repeated the same process but with the second guy he’d moved, having him shoot the first guy.
When he was done, Ty shoved the silencers in his cargo pocket and surveyed his handiwork. “That’ll do. Now the kitchen.” Stepping over the guy I’d seen at the stove, Ty headed down the hallway.
I did a sweep through both bedrooms then made my way to the kitchen. “No keys.”
Ty absently looked around the kitchen. “They’re here somewhere.”
Shit. “Probably in a pocket of one of the dead assholes.”
“Check the guy who was in the kitchen first. He’s the oldest, my vote’s on him.” Ty pulled a dishtowel off the oven door and used it to turn the burner back on under a pan of food on the stove.
“What are you doing?”
“Insurance,” he muttered, looking through the cupboards. “Go find the keys.”
I went back to the guy from the kitchen, and in the second pocket I checked, I found the Escalade’s key fob. “Got it,” I called as I walked back to Ty.
“Great.” Pulling a fifth of tequila out of the cupboard, he unscrewed the top and started pouring it all over the counter and floor.
I jumped back to avoid getting that shit on my boots. “What the fuck?”
“Like I said, insurance.” Ty settled the empty bottle on its side on the counter and pulled the dishrag off his shoulder. Placing one end of the towel near the bottle and spilled liquor, he put the other near the open flame of the stove, then he glanced up at me. “Okay, ready?”
“That’s your insurance? Burning the place down?”
“You got a better idea?”
Fuck. “No.”
He smirked. “Hang out with me more and you might learn a few things, pretty boy.”
Asshole. “Just do it. We need to get out of here.” We’d already been here too long. Someone had probably seen us and tipped off the guy in the kitchen, or one of them had spotted us when we’d reconned. Either way, I wasn’t sticking around to find out.
Ty shoved the edge of the cloth just close enough to the flame, and the rag caught fire. “Aaand my work here is done.” He stepped back from the stove and turned toward the back door. Using his shirt like a glove, he opened it. “I love a clean break.”
“Until someone reports us to the police.”
Ty smirked. “In gang central? They hate the pigs more than they hate rival gangs. Trust me, if anyone did see us, no one’s gonna say shit.”
“There could still be trace evidence the cops find that links back to us,” I argued.
Ty stepped outside, holding the door for me to follow, then he closed it using his shirt so his prints weren’t on anything. “If that happens, Luna will cover it up.”
“He doesn’t interfere with police investigations.”
Ty laughed. Quietly, but he still laughed. “First, there won’t be an investigation. Dead gangbangers killing each other, same narrative, different day, end of story. Second, why the fuck do you think Luna keeps half of Miami PD on his Christmas list? Let me clue you in, pretty boy, it ain’t because they’re all bros.” He shook his head. “Shit, man.” He scanned the backyard, same as me. “I’ll wipe the front door down, you get the Escalade back to base. Stay pretty.” He tipped his chin and disappeared around the west side of the house.
I took the east, glancing in the kitchen window
.
The fire was already across the entire floor and had ignited the carpet in the hall.
Keeping to the shadows, I made my way to the SUV and got behind the wheel. The interior smelled like cheap cologne and desperation. Cursing, I put the seat all the way back and glanced around for Ty.
No sign of him, I drove to Luna and Associates.
TALON PULLED UP IN FRONT of my apartment complex. Scanning the parking lot, he threw the Challenger in park. “Need me to come up and get you settled, darlin’?”
“No, thank you.” I spotted my Jeep a few parking spaces over.
“You got keys?”
I shook my head. “Don’t need them.” I’d dropped or lost mine enough times to have a spare hidden. Suddenly more tired than I’d ever been, I pushed the car door open.
“Hey.” Talon stopped me.
I glanced back at him. The streetlights shone on his face, highlighting his angular jaw, and for the first time since I’d met him, he didn’t look like an easygoing surfer. He looked like a hardened Marine. “What?”
“Playboy ain’t a bad man. You could do way worse, just sayin’.”
“Whether he’s a good man or not is irrelevant.” I was done with men who didn’t want me, or were only with me out of obligation or worse, pity. I was better than that.
“Fair enough. Take care, darlin’.”
Since it was probably the last time I’d see him, I reached over and gave him a quick hug. “Thank you for saving my life.”
Returning the hug, he chuckled. “Nothin’ doin’, darlin’, nothin’ doin’. All in a day’s work.”
“This is your job?” Making house calls and saving women from peril?
He laughed. The sound, rich and honest, filled the interior of his car, then spilled out into the night as if it couldn’t be contained.
“No, darlin’, I’m retired.” He winked, like it was an inside joke. “But seems as if the man upstairs wants more outta me than just catchin’ waves and livin’ the good life. I get called into action every time one of Patrol’s men, or women, needs medical attention.”
“Patrol?”
“Luna.”
“Why do you call him Patrol?”
Talon’s expression sobered. “Best Marine sniper I ever met. No one died when he was on patrol, me included.”
Wow. Nothing like the reality of war to make your own problems feel insignificant. “Thank you for your service.”
This time his smile was reserved. “You are entirely welcome.”
“So you really are a doctor?”
“Nah, I just play one on TV.” He winked again. “Now get, I gotta get home to my women.”
“Women?” As in plural? Wow. I felt thoroughly out of my element.
Talon chuckled, but his hand went to his heart, and happiness spread across his face. “Yeah, two to call my own.”
Intimidated, my cheeks heated. “Take care, Talon.” I got out of his car.
“You too, darlin’.”
I closed the door, and it wasn’t until I walked in to the foyer that I heard his Challenger pull away.
Exhaling, trying to calm my nerves, I looked over my shoulder and fidgeted as I waited for the elevator. Too soon I was on my floor and retrieving my hide-a-key from a neighbor’s potted plant outside their front door.
I wanted to be home. I wanted it more than anything right now, but I knew before I even inserted the key that it wouldn’t feel like home ever again.
I was a different person the last time I was here. My whole world was different now. I had deaths on my conscience. My soul had taken a beating. My pride was damaged, and my heart was more wounded than when I thought of a mother who’d given up on me.
Everything was different.
But when I pushed my front door open, the smell of home hit me. Incense, the soap on the kitchen sink, the perfume I wore for client meetings, coffee—it all greeted me, and for a single moment, I breathed it in.
Then I stepped inside, shut the door and turned on the lights.
I was right.
Nothing was the same.
For the first time, I was looking at my apartment the way Brian had seen it. It wasn’t my beloved safe space full of nonexistent memories and homey comfort. Dishes in the sink, ratty fabric hanging on the walls, too many scarves thrown all over the lamps, shit all over the bookshelves that wasn’t books—it was a mess.
Everything was a mess.
Me, my apartment, my life, my heart, my mind.
I snapped.
Energy I didn’t know I had surged, and I was rushing into the kitchen to grab trash bags. Amped on frantic adrenaline, anger and guilt, I stormed to my bedroom and began ripping every colorful, ridiculous piece of clothing off hangers and stuffing them in trash bags. Three bags later, I was on to my drawers, pulling out all my stupid flowered, printed, colorful underwear and bright tank tops and T-shirts and shoving them in trash bags.
Dragging the bags to the front door, I didn’t stop there.
I took them all to the elevator, then carried them to the apartment complex dumpster. The bin already full like it usually was, I dumped the bags next to the dumpster and made my way back upstairs.
Two feet inside my place and my gaze landed on the pile of clothes I had on a side chair near the TV that I never sat in. A dumping ground for discarded clothes and laundry I hadn’t yet folded, it gave me the same itch.
Grabbing a fresh bag, I was walking toward the chair when a knock sounded at the front door.
Startled, my entire body froze.
Acute fear crawled up my back and spread like ice in my veins. There are no gangbangers left, I told myself. No one is after me. I am safe, I am fine, I silently chanted the affirmations as the knock sounded again, crippling me with panic.
Oh God. Oh God, oh God, oh God.
“Genevieve,” Sawyer called through the door. “It’s me. I have your things.”
I sank to the floor in the middle of the living room.
No. No, no, no, I couldn’t see him.
Panicked, not thinking straight, I didn’t tell him to take a hike, and I didn’t tell him to go pick on some other woman he wanted to screw, then treat like shit. I didn’t even reply. I was too busy struggling to pull enough air into my lungs as my heart crushed in on itself.
“Genevieve.” He knocked again. “I see the light. I know you’re in there.”
Oh dear God, please go away.
When I continued my panicked silence, he upped the ante.
“Open the door, Genevieve. Now,” he ordered, putting all the dominance in his voice I knew he was capable of.
Open the door, I told myself. Get your suitcase, then close the door. You don’t have to talk to him. Clean break. Get your shit and move on.
I stood and the plastic trash bag in my hand crinkled, and it hit me.
I didn’t want my stuff.
All that suitcase had was colorful bras and silly little girl T-shirts and ridiculously printed leggings. Happy clothes. For a girl who had been trying to fake it ’til she made it. But I wasn’t her anymore.
So I sucked in a breath.
Then another.
I didn’t have to answer that door.
Not to him. Not ever.
Being as quiet as possible, I opened the trash bag and moved toward the chair.
“All right, fine,” he said through the door. “If you’re not going to open the door, I’m coming in.”
I froze.
A key sounded in the lock.
I unfroze.
At warp speed, I tiptoe-ran all the way down the hall, making it into my bedroom before I heard the front door open, then close.
“Genevieve?”
I spun in panic.
Heavy footsteps sounded across the entry hall, then I heard my keys being dropped on the kitchen counter. “I have your suitcase.” A small thud sounded on the tiled floor.
As silently as possible, I flew into my walk-in, pulled the door halfway shut, and cro
uched down low in the back behind hanging dresses I’d thankfully left alone. Then I did what every self-respecting coward does. I hid.
My heart beat so loudly in my ears, I could barely hear his footsteps as he came down the hall.
The distinctive sound of my bedroom door being pushed open across the carpeting ricocheted around in my head, fighting with the sound of my own quickened breath.
A second later the closet door made its tiny squeak of protest as it was pushed open.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I held my breath.
One heartbeat.
Two…
Three…
Oh God.
Four…
The floor squeaked as his footsteps retreated.
His boots hit the tiled hallway, and I bit my cheek as tears welled.
The front door opened, and everything went still. Then three long seconds later, my front door shut.
Suspended in anxiety, I waited.
One minute.
Two.
Five.
I pushed the dresses aside and got up.
The second I stepped into my bedroom, I smelled him.
Sandalwood. Soap. Musk. So much musk.
My feet moved me toward the entryway.
There sat my flowered suitcase.
But it wasn’t alone.
On top of the printed suitcase I used to think was cheerful and fun, but now only looked pathetic with its broken wheel, sat my bright yellow purse, the one I’d had stolen when the Escalade was carjacked. The night my life changed forever. The night a man told me to have dinner with him at three o’clock in the morning.
I broke down in tears.
Big, ugly, soul-aching tears.
A minute, an hour, a lifetime later, they stopped to make room for a crushing headache.
I took my garbage bags and went after the chair, but I didn’t stop there. The wall hangings, the scarves, the knickknacks on the shelves, the dishes in the sink, all of it went into garbage bags, and when I ran out of bags, I used boxes.
Like a crazy person, I dragged it all to the dumpster in the middle of the night.
Then I fished a tablet I hadn’t bought out of the offensively cheerful flower-patterned suitcase, and I emailed every single current and pending client, giving them a competitor’s contact information.