Page 107 of Lady Killer

His grip pulsed, and his nostrils flared. “Watch your mouth.”

I mimed zipping my lips and pretended to throw away the key.

He narrowed his eyes, as if considering his course of action before he began to speak again.

I was starting to understand why Nixon was such an insufferable pest. Getting a rise out of him was quite the rush.

“As I was saying, pet, the change from absentee mother in a shitty apartment to the Blackwell Estate under Victor’s watch was a big one. One could say I lashed out a bit.” Nixon paused.

“I lit a teensy, little fire”—he held his fingers up to show just how small it was—“and Victor lost his shit. Had one of his men beat the piss out of me, but he wouldn’t let them touch my face.”

He absently ran a hand across his jaw.

“He had plans for me and Alister, you see. Identical twins make for a natural alibi. Can’t prove one of us did anything if you don’t know who is who.”

“Then how did you get the scar?” The question slipped out before I could stop myself, and inwardly, I cursed for showing even the slightest bit of interest.

“My grandfather wouldn’t let anyone else touch my face, but him. The old man slapped the shit out of me. He wears this big old clunky ring with the family crest on it. Split my lip right open.” He thumbed the mark absently.

I knew better than most how much those scars could still sting.

“Told me if I ever gave him a reason to beat me again, he would kill me and Alister too. That we were only useful to him as a package deal, and a dead Blackwell was better than a disobedient one.”

For once, I didn’t know what to say.

Alister had seemed indifferent about their grandfather, and Everest had never mentioned the man. I shouldn’t have been surprised that the patriarch of a family ofprofessional killers was a monster, but still, it caught me off guard.

Alister’s confession came back to me.

“Your tattoos?”

Nixon’s lips thinned, and his hold on me loosened.

“What about them?” he said, shifting.

“Alister said they didn’t matter to him, that they were yours. I didn’t understand what he meant at the time but . . .” I trailed off, suddenly unsure of myself.

A familiar sneer overtook Nixon’s face. “Like I said, my grandfather wanted twins, identical in every way. The only way I was allowed to get a tattoo was if Ali got the exact same one.”

That was . . . sad wasn’t quite the word for.

The twins’ devotion to each other had long been evident, but I had never realized it was literally written on their skin. It was touching, but at the same time, how could someone not yearn to have one thing just for themselves?

Of course, Nixon took the opportunity to ruin his moment of uncharacteristic vulnerability. “Right down to the matching piercings on our cocks, puppy.” He winked, squeezing his cock with one hand and my thigh with the other before stepping away.

I opened my mouth to tell him exactly what I thought of that but was interrupted by the door slamming open.

“Guess who I found?”

Chapter thirty

Everest

“Always gonna groove to a beat that’s right for me . . .”

Clayton Royal was dull as fuck.

“Well, ya stalk a man, stalk a man, stalk a man, oooo yeah!” I sang along to the beat of “Funkytown” by Lipps Inc.

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