Page 52 of The Demons We Hide

“Open it.” He repeats the words in a harder tone. “I want to know that you can stomach what this is before we move forward.”

“Are there actual fucking bodies in this?” I demand. The disgust I felt before rolls through me in heavier waves.

I’ve killed before and I’ll kill again. That is a fact I’ve come to live with. The people I kill, though? They deserve it. I always have a reason. All that bullshit about how murder is wrong and justice is letting the authorities deal with the bad guys was something I’d stopped believing in long ago. There are just some people in this world that are too good at hiding what they are. Those are the people I not only want to kill, but I enjoy killing.

“Open it and find out.” The man shuffles back a step and then reaches behind himself, withdrawing a gun—likely stashed in the same place as mine. He doesn’t mention it, but my mental point is made. The very visual of his weapon is a threat. One I do not appreciate.

“Don’t make a mistake here, man,” I warn him. “You won’t like what happens.” I won’t go down easy, if I ever do. Even then, though, I know that Lex will avenge me. He and Gio will strip this motherfucker’s hide from his bones and string him up by his intestines.

There was a man that raped one of the daughters of Darrio’s friends. He sent us after the fucker and it was perhaps the only job I did for him so gleefully. The three of us had kept him alive for days. Pulled out each of his teeth one by one, then his nails. We’d shoved a taser up his ass and watched him scream, writhe, and piss himself before passing out. Every single cut felt good.

This, though? I really don’t want to open that coffin to find an old man with no connection to the darker side of life or worse, a young girl. My eyes skim over the top of the coffins before moving back to the man.

He smirks at me, amusement clear in the glitter of his eyes as he leans his head back. “Just open it, kid.”

I almost snarl at him at that last word.Almost.Instead, I turn towards the coffin and suck back a breath. Maybe, when this is all over, I can come back and kill this fucker too.

I unlatch the coffin and swing it open. A slow exhalation escapes me. Never thought I’d be so relieved to see so many packs of white powder, but I am. Grabbing one, I heft it in my fist as the man behind me lets loose a chuckle. When I turn back around and drop the bag of cocaine into the coffin’s bed, he’s put his gun away and is grinning my way.

“You should’ve seen your face, kid.” He chortles.

“I expected something more fucked up,” I admit. Like these bags of cocaine either shoved inside the asses of corpses or sewn in their guts instead of just sitting loose.

The man waves a hand, knocking back his cap a bit so that I can see his face more clearly. That initial zap of recognition hits me. I’ve seen him before. I know I have, but I have no cluewhere.

Shaking his head, the man strides forward and shuts the coffin. “We need three drivers minimum,” he says, launching into the demands that I’m actually here for. What his expectations are of the Vargas gang and what the cut will be.

I listen, one hand still lingering over the coffin I’d opened. Death in a coffin, just not in the way people expect. It’s so damn fitting. That sick feeling in my gut clings to me like tar as we finish the meeting and I leave the building.

Before I begin my jog across the street to where Lex’s SUV sits, my phone buzzes in my pocket. Pulling it free, I frown at the unknown number and press the red button, assuming a spam call, and head towards the idling vehicle. The passenger door is unlocked as I hop in. Lex is in much the same position, his eyes full of a cold glittering rage. I sigh.

“It went fine,” I say. “Darrio has the job so long as he can provide the bodies and money.”

“You mean so long as we can,” Lex bites out. He cranks the engine and heat washes into the interior of the cab.

I crank my head back, staring at the ceiling of the SUV as he drives on. Twilight is quickly turning to night. I don’t respond to his words, though we both know the truth. If we don’t figure out how to get out of Darrio’s clutches and get rid of him before we graduate, we might never find our freedom.

* * *

Lex pulls up outside ofHellfireand cuts the engine. The lights are on, the music thumping from inside. Around the front of the flat brick building is a line of scantily clad girls with their hair done up, their makeup painted on, and their skirts nearly up to their pussies.

I linger back as my phone buzzes again—that same damn number. “You good?” Lex pauses and glances back.

I wave him off. “Take the side entrance,” I say, “I’ll be there in a sec. Go check on our girl.”

Our girl. When did Juliet become that?The phone in my hand vibrates for a third time as if reminding me that I have other matters to deal with before I allow myself to think more on the one woman that seems to have all of us up in knots for her.

If only she were just some good pussy, but she’s not. She’s the one Lex has been obsessed with for years. She’s the one we shouldn’t want anything to do with—and that’s the problem. Darrio doesn’t hate her so much as he resents all that she symbolizes. Both he and Savino have been on my ass to cut her loose, but I can’t do that. Not until we know who’s after her and not until whatever thisthingbetween her and us has run its course.

I answer the phone. “I don’t know how you got this number, but if you call me one more time, asshole, you’ll regret it.” The words come out just as sharply as I intend. The pause on the other end is brief and followed by a masculine chuckle.

“I would love to see how you would make me regret my actions, Mr. Pierce.”

Scowling, I try to attach a face to the voice I only dimly recognize. It’s deep, older, and somewhat gruff.

“Who the fuck is this?”

“A friend, Nolan.” This time, the man doesn’t use my last name, but my first. “But let’s not waste time on pleasantries, we’ve already done that.”

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