“‘Scuse me…ma’am?” I slowly turned my head as I pressed the vape back to my lips. She’s your typical Karen with the blonde, soccer mom haircut. Figures. “You can’t do that in here.” I took a long hard drag and took my time blowing the haze in her direction. I knew this was the right move. I knew one of them would say something. Bitches like this just can’t help themselves. It’s as much a part of them as their own moisturized skin.
“You can’t do it anywhere,” I smirked. “Gonna tell on me?”
The other three took turns audibly swallowing and found just about anything else to look at. “You must be new.”
I smiled broadly. “You must bebrave.”
“Do you even have a kid in here? Whoareyou?”
I stood and smiled a little wider when all four of them conceded a little. Like my mere presence might infect them. I’m used to it. I spent my entire high school experience like this. College was a ton easier. I stepped over to the screen and pointed at Em, who was cartwheeling circles around these tiny bitches with the grace of a spider spinning a web.
“Oh, I’ve got one. Rightthere. The five-year-old that makes grown women look very much like the typical mean girls that only peaked in fucking high school. I take it this one,” I moved my finger to the little cotton-top bean pole with the perfect french braid that was still giving Emmy the stink eye. “This one must be yours.”
“Whadd’you want?” Karen asked, pinching her lips into a tight line. I could just about taste her nerves. I dropped my hand, gripping the strap on my bag so I wasn’t tempted to wrap it around her scrawny throat instead, and moved closer.
“Lemme tell you something, bitch. Emmaline Grey? I watched her play with a toy before she could sit up by herself, turning it and poking it until she figured out how it worked. Then she set it down and never touched it again. She was counting all the way to fifty and writing her full name by the time she was two years old. She landed her first somersault without a trampoline or a steady hand in the same year. Her third birthday? She asked for a chemistry set, and she’s only five years old and knows more about a respectable trade than most educated professionals do. She’s so fucking smart that kindergartenboresher. She goes out of her way to be compassionate. She never leaves anybody out, and at the end of every day, she says prayers for everybody she knows.”
I shook my head and glanced back at the screen.
“Don’t raise these girls to be like you. Give them a future worthy of the people they’ll become. How miserable do you have to be in your fucking lives to use your own kids to spread thatshit like a disease? Be honest with yourselves. What did this ever do for you? Do you not want better for them than this?”
Karen reallyisbrave. She turned her nose up at me. I’m about to show her why that’s a mistake she won’t make twice.
“I know you. You’re Greg’s sister.”
“His sister I might be, cherub. But you don’t know me.”
They always think they do.
I let my bag drop off my shoulder and clunk to the floor, rushing the bitch until I had her by the throat and pressed her back against the wall. The plastic chairs the other three were sitting in flew in every direction while they scattered, whimpering and gasping like they weren’t counting down the minutes until something like this eventually happened to one of them. I got close enough to Karen’s face that I could taste the fear on her sharp breaths. For a split second, I saw a pair of green eyes and wondered why the hell I could feel some part of Malek in me…and liked it.
“See, I was trying to be nice about it, but since you think you know me, let me clarify everything you think youknow. Then you’ll have a reason to look at me and cringe. When your pathetic life is over? I’ll be the one that gets your cold dead corpse, cuts your chest cavity open with something that looks like a bush whacker, drains your blood with sharp objects, takes out your sorry ass heart, pumps you full of embalming fluid and tries to make you look as pretty on the outside as you look ugly as sin on the inside. Savvy? You better be grateful for people like me, bitch. And I’d think about being a little nicer to a five-year-old little girl learning to do the same thing, because when I decide I just don’t have it in me to give afuckabout you? She’ll be the one that takes the torch. Back your fucking kid off of her, or you won’t like the next visit I pay you. I’ve got spare caskets at my place. They won’t find a hair on yourhead.”
“You’reinsane!”
“I’m actually as level as one gets, I assure you. But I know a few thatareactually insane, pumpkin. This is the only warning you get. Don’t make me come back up here. Understand?”
I forcefully pulled my hand from her neck, and she breathed raggedly, wisely choosing not to say another word and I heard the door open. Looks like the rest of the plastics went and found security.
“It’s fine boys,” I said, grabbing my bag. “I was just leaving.” I shot Karen a mock salute and strolled out with a smile, the two uniforms following me out. “Let Emmy Grey know that I’ll be waiting for her in my car, please.”
It felt good. Finally standing up to one of the people that, once upon a time, I wished I was more like. Now, I felt like a fool for ever having that notion plague my young mind. Back then, I just wanted to be accepted. I just wanted a friend. Somebody I could trust with my secrets, have a sleepover with, or just be a girl. The truth was, and I didn’t know it then, that I never realized I was one of the most rare, mostreal…kind of girls. I refuse to let Em figure that out so much later in life. I love these babies too much. I never had a sister to either learn that from or teach it to. I think that was the moment I decided that I was gonna help Malek. As deranged as he is…I can see how much he loves his sister and how desperate he is to protect her. It’s what I’d do. There’s no length I wouldn’t go to keep Emmy safe. Vivian…hell, even Greg’s big ass, himself. I’ll tell him tomorrow.
After I figure out whether or not I’ll need his infamous ‘tech guy’ to tamper with criminal records. I grinned the entire way back to the car.
Worth it.
CHAPTER 8
The Executioner
My foot tapped against the table I was sharing with about twelve other people, my father at the head, as I reclined in the uncomfortable contraption, staring at Viper’s picture on my phone and toying with my lip ring. I’m not even pretending that I’m listening to whatever this meeting is about, and it shows. All my concentration is tied up in how to convince her to allow me to get her taste stuck on my body jewelry so that I can savor it long after she’s screamed my name. She said something about finding out how well I’d fit in her coffin—she honestly has no idea how much she turned me on. I’d like to find out how well I fit in about four differentotherplaces, but we can certainly bring that unlikely piece of living room furniture into play. I’m very…veryopen to that, actually.
“Malek. Did ‘ye hear what I said?”
I glanced up at Pop and raised my eyebrows. Finn snorted across the table. “Sorry, no.”
“Maulden’s debt puts us about eleven thousand short. What’s ‘yer plan for settlin’ that?”
