Page 45 of The Hangman's Rope

“He better pull his head out of his ass,” she said and Synister looked amused.

“Or what?” he asked.

“Or I’ll sit my fat ass on your head and suffocate you!” Valory called out and both Madisyn and Lainey started howling. Lorelai looked amused, but only barely. She had a healthy fear of Synister. That was good – Madisyn, I think, was becoming a little too complacent. A lot of the guys were looking to Syn who had just the barest of evil little smirks on his lips.

“Hate to be you when you get home, sweetie,” Tor called out and for the first time that afternoon, Mads looked just a little bit nervous.

“We’ll talk when you get home,” Synister declared and turned off the intercom or whatever you called it.

I heard and watch Mads heave a sigh as Requiem switched off the sound.

“Note to self,” Specter declared. “Watch what the fuck you say around those bitches.”

“Call my girl that again and we’ll take it outside,” Fear said casually.

Specter gave him the finger.

“Knock it the fuck off!” Syn barked. “Now isn’t the time for jokes or to be at each other’s throats over petty fucking drama! We have a very real, very serious problem sitting in Hangman’sliving room and absolutely zero fucking solutions as to how to go about things.”

“Relax,” Grim said and he took a cleansing breath.

“Killing a victim is a little beneath us,” Reaper said and his gaze was fixed on the tablet in front of him.

“Victimizing a victim twice is more than a little beneath us, too,” Fear said and Reaper lifted one shoulder in a nonchalant shrug.

“I thought she was dead,” he said dismissively, as if somehow that made things better and not worse.

“Jesus Fucking Christ, you’re weird as shit,” Torment muttered, but then shrank a bit under Reaper’s unwavering stare from behind his ever-present colored lenses.

Something about the TBI he sustained in Iraq. Made him get migraines and made him sensitive to light to the point the lenses were just about an everyday everywhere, no matter what kind of weather was going on type of thing.

“What, you never cracked a cold one after a long day at work?” Specter asked.

“Shut it,” I said sharply. “The joke is old and played out already.”

Multiple looks came my direction. I sniffed and cleared my throat.

“She’s not going to be a problem,” I said, and started to sweat just a little under their silent scrutiny.

“You can’t be sure about that—” Grim started, but I cut him off.

“Well, I am,” I said. I shook my head. “She’s not interested in any of us or what we’re up to. She’s just scared, and alone, and can’t remember shit, and wants to know what happened, but she’s cool. Pretty quiet and chill, actually. She wants to go home at some point, but right now she’s got a memory like Swisscheese with so many fuckin’ holes in it she doesn’t even feel like home would be home for her.”

“I’m afraid, at this point, she’s going to be our only hint or lead into how she wound up in the mortuary in the first place,” Synister aid and he didn’t sound happy about it.

“That’s not great news,” Corvus said and he leaned back in his board room chair and took a drink from the bottle of Blue Moon he had in his hand.

“I have a rapport with her,” I said. “She’s telling me pretty much anything and everything that’s coming to her. She hasn’t said anything about the night she disappeared yet. Seems her childhood shit and whatnot are coming back first.”

“Childhood shit like what?” Synister demanded.

“Random shit, like her name and that she likes Jane Austen, and that her granddad used to call her Sweetpea.”

“What else?” Corvus asked.

I shook my head, “It comes at random. I think you give it enough time she’ll remember how she got to us.”

“Why you sound so sure?” I think it was Grim that asked, but my vision was focused on the small screen in front of me as Lorelai drifted back into the frame in yet more fresh clothes that suited her. Jeans and some kind of flowy blouse thing this time.

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