Total pages in book: 64
Estimated words: 59146 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 296(@200wpm)___ 237(@250wpm)___ 197(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 59146 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 296(@200wpm)___ 237(@250wpm)___ 197(@300wpm)
I took a position opposite Knuckles, leaning against the wall where I could see the man’s face.
“Start talking,” Knuckles said. “I want to know who sent you to put your hands on a woman and threaten her.”
The man looked up. Though his right eye was swollen nearly shut, the left was clear and scared. “I don’t know who sent me. That’s the God’s honest truth.”
Hawk shifted his weight. The chair creaked. “Last chance. Then I start with your fingernails.”
“All I got was cash in an envelope. Left under the driver’s seat of my car while I was at work. There was five hundred dollars and a note saying there was another five if I convinced her to take the offer on her building. There was also a number to call when it was done. I did what I was told and the guy told me where to find the second envelope. That’s it.”
“Describe the guy,” I said.
“I never met him. He sounded like he was in his thirties or forties. Very well-spoken, like he was smart or something.” The man licked his lips. “He only wanted her scared, not hurt. I was supposed to take her keys, knock her down and deliver the message exactly like he wrote it. That’s all.”
“What was the message?” Knuckles asked.
“There’s an offer coming on the building. You’d be smart to take it. That’s what the note said.”
“The number,” I said. “The one you called.”
He rattled off the number. “But it was dead by morning. The number’s in my phone if you want to check.”
Hawk crouched in front of the chair while Hawk fished through the guy’s pockets until he found the phone. The guy gave up the passcode without a fight. I watched the man’s throat work. “Where’d you learn to take work like this?” Hawk asked, tilting his head to hold the man’s gaze.
The guy gave a nervous smirk. “I was just in it to play with the bitch a little.” He shrugged. “Easy money and I got a memory to jack off to later.”
I felt the back of my neck prickle. Yeah. This wasn’t going to end well. Knuckles pushed off the wall. He crossed to the chair and stood over the man. Without hesitation, he pulled out a knife and stabbed the guy in the side of the neck several times in quick succession. When the bastard stopped moving, Knuckles spat on him.
“Clean this shit up. Then feed this one to the pigs.”
“Prez, we didn’t get his partner.” Hawk spoke quietly. It was hard for me to read the big man but I couldn’t tell if Hawk really cared or not. The guy had been going to die regardless, but it was rare for Knuckles to completely lose his temper.
“Knight will just have to work overtime. The attack happened in a public area, even if it was in the alley, so there’ll be cameras somewhere.” Knuckles turned to me. His voice was quiet and all the more deadly because of it.
I took a shower before I came back to my apartment. I didn’t want tonight to touch Juniper for any reason or in any way anymore than it already had, and I felt dirty. Later, I slung on some gym shorts and made my way to my apartment where I hoped Juniper had stayed after I left her.
I opened the door to my bedroom and satisfaction filled me to see her curled up underneath the covers in the middle of my bed. She had her arms wrapped around my pillow as she slept and I found myself smiling wistfully. I wanted this woman more than I wanted to breathe, but knew there was nothing I could do until she made the choice to come to me. I hoped that by her still being in my room, she might be getting more comfortable with me.
Fuck. I scrubbed a hand over my face, sitting by my bedroom window in the dark with ghosts I’d left scattered across six years of my fucked-up life.
Juniper lay in my bed, hair still damp from the shower, breathing deep and regular, a counterpoint to the chaos still running laps inside my skull. I stared out the window at the empty yard. The camo netting threw weird shadows onto the paths and sections of the yard. In a way, the vision was a reflection of the turmoil in my head.
I flexed my hands. Sometimes, my right one still ached in the mornings from when I broke it on a guy’s face. Which had also been the incident to lead to my prison term and served as the excuse for my divorce.
Until I came here, to Kiss of Death, I thought I’d become nothing but the sum of what I’d done. The bad part was, if I ever found myself in a similar situation, I’d still beat the guy unconscious. That one decision had cost me everything. My wife. My job. My family. My freedom. That was the part that fucked with me the most.