Chapter
Twenty
“Owww.” I moan as the door behind me opens quickly and smacks me in the back. The bottom corner of it digs into my spine, making the burnt-out cigarette filter drop on the ground.
I’m lost in the afterglow of the kill, and the lightheadedness of the smoke, and it takes my brain a second to realize that I’m still at the scene of my crime, and now someone is coming out. A witness.
“Shit.” I curse, slamming my back against the door, forcing it closed, keeping whoever is behind it from coming out.
“Zeph?” Phoenix’s voice comes through the metal and glass. “Zeph, is that you?”
I freeze, my body leaning on the door, my ears perked up at the sound of my angel, my voice silent in apprehension of it really being her. She couldn’t have seen me; I was so careful.
Your voice fucker. She knows it.
Shaking my head ‘no’ I ignore him and tell him that he’s wrong without having to say a word. But I know he’s right. She didn’t see me, she couldn’t have, but that one word, ‘shit’ has sold me out.
“Open the door. I know you’re out there.” She calls out, trying to push the door, making it rattle against my back.
Pressing harder against it, I try to buy myself time. Do I let it go and quickly run away, leaving her to find the fire and call 911, or do I stay and own up to what I’m doing, and watch her run away screaming? I don’t know what to do, and I don’t like it. I’ve never been an indecisive person before. Yet one more thing that she’s changed about me.
She’ll call the cops. That is if someone else hasn’t already, you stupid fucker.
“She didn’t call them before.”
Because she was an accomplice. This, idiot, is all you.
“You’re not helping.”
When have I ever?
“Touché.” I chuckle, slamming my back into the door, stopping it from opening up the tiny fraction she’s pushed it.
“Zeph, I smell smoke.” Phoenix calls out from behind the door. “My waitress disappeared, and I need to pay my bill. Is she back there?”
“Oh for fuck’s sake.” I grumble to myself, finally making a decision.
Standing up, I dodge the swinging door as Phoenix bursts through it, stumbling out onto the stoop and right into my arms before she falls on her face from the force of throwing herself against it.
“Easy there baby girl.” I say to her, holding her to me until she gets her bearings, pushing her black hair from her face more gently than I should with how hard she just slammed into me.
“Zeph? What are you doing out here?” She asks, both pushing herself up, and getting closer to me.
“Nothing. Just having a smoke.” I say, setting her on her feet and rocking back and forth on mine, shoving my hands into my pocket, and looking anywhere but in her dark eyes.
“Oh my God, a fire!” She exclaims, looking around me, finally catching on to the inferno brewing in the dumpster. “Call 911.”
“Sorry sweet cheeks, can’t do that.” I say, leaning into her face, staring at her now, letting her see the seriousness in my ice blue eyes.
You trying to scare her? I thought that’s what you didn’t want.
“Again, not helping.”
“Do something.” She cries out, trying to get around me to the trash fire, making me grab her by the elbow to keep her away from the scorching heat and danger of what’s burning.
“I am. I’m making sure it stays put. It’ll burn out soon. Wanna sit with me and watch it? It’s pretty, isn’t it?”
“You’re nuts, aren’t you?”
