Page 8 of Pretty Lethal
I have to hold back tears as I bury my face in his chest and hug him so tightly I’m surprised something doesn’t crack. “I’m here for you. We all are, even Wilder. If there’s anything any of us can do, just say.”
He simply holds me, and when I pull away, he cups my cheek with his hand. With another lingering kiss that assures me everythingwillwork out in the end, he murmurs, “Just knowing you’re here is enough. You’re my Sparrow. My light in the dark. My color in the gray. My birdsong in the silence. All I need is you, and I know I’ll be okay.”
“You have me,” I promise him. “Now and always, no matter what.”
“I love you, Emilia Harrison.”
“I love you, Hawk Davenport.”
“Hey,” Wilder grumbles, interrupting our moment. “Where the fuck is my morning kiss? These two assholes have been hogging you all morning.”
Rolling my eyes at Hawk, I makeanothermental reminder to ask Hadley how the hell she jugglesfourguys at once. I’m struggling with just three. And really, it’s only Hawk and Wilder, because Kai makes it all so easy. Now that he has overcome his past and Mel is gone, he has been the most attentive and caring boyfriend a girl could ask for.
Not waiting for me to come to him, Wilder yanks me out of Hawk’s arms and spins me until he can claim my lips with his own in what can only be described as a show of possession.
The low growl behind me lets me know it’s pissed Hawk off, and I want to hit Wilder, except that his lips are making me think all sorts of dirty and inappropriate thoughts.
Wilder may be trying to mend fences with Hawk, but when it comes to me, he doesn’t give a shit. Now that he’s done with torturing us both and decided he’s all in, he wants all of my time just as badly as the other two do, anddamn,is it difficult. At this rate, I will have to clone myself to keep all three of them happy.
“Morning, Angel,” he purrs when he finally releases me to suck in some much-needed oxygen.
“Morning,” I return far more breathlessly.
“You look absolutely radiant today.”
I blush beneath his compliment, unused to hearing them from him. I keep expecting him to follow it up with something cruel and scathing that will slice a hole in my chest, but it never comes, and I’m starting to truly accept that he has changed.
“Can we get on with business?” Kai drawls as he steps past us to the kitchen table, setting two mugs down on it.
I step away from Wilder, intent on going to sit beside Kai, but Wilder pulls me along with him before tugging me down onto his lap on the opposite side of the table. With a roll of his eyes, Kai pushes my coffee mug across the table to me, and I give him a grateful smile as I wrap my hands around it and inhale the delicious scent before turning to look at Hawk, who appears to be running this meeting.
Hawk sets a laptop down in front of Kai. “West sent over everything he found.” Kai immediately opens the lid and begins typing on the keyboard. “He said there wasn’t much,” Hawk continues, “Except there was an email he thought might contain something useful.”
Leaning back against Wilder, I sip anxiously on my coffee while Kai works, Hawk hovering over his shoulder and watching him closely.
All the while, I mull over the various possibilities of what the email could contain. Still, when it comes to a murdering psychopath, it could be anything from wherever she was staying in Ridgeway to an order for rope and duct tape.
I kind of hoped she’d maybe put her address into her maps, and we’d be able to trace it back to wherever she’s been living. Although, now that I think about it, that was stupidly naive of me, and if we were able to track the various locations she visited since following me here, we’d probably find more than just her house—like her dumping ground for dead bodies. I shudder at that notion, although the thought that we might find Louis’ body and be able to give his family, and Daniel and the others, some closure gives me a little hope.
“Looks like she kept her phone pretty clean,” Kai says. “No identifying information. She kept her GPS off so we can’t see where all she’s been”—Well, there goes that idea—“Not much in her emails either, except for one.” He turns the screen so Wilder and I can see, and I lean forward to read what appears to be a leasing agreement for an apartment here in Ridgeway. It’s not her name on the lease, but we know by now that she was using an alias.
“Sandra Blackpool. Do you think that was her real name?” I ask.
“Doubtful. But, hopefully, we’ll learn more when we go to the address,” Kai answers.
“Where is it?” Hawk asks as Kai pulls the laptop back around and looks up the location.
“About a half mile from here. A few minutes from campus.”
I recoil at the notion that Mel has been so close this entire time. Practically right under our noses. Of course, we figured she was, but actually knowing for definite makes it all more real and terrifying.
“Well, what are we waiting for?” Wilder asks, pushing me out of his lap as he gets to his feet. “Let’s go find out who this bitch really is.”
* * *
“This is where she was living?”I ask as I look up at the shabby apartment building. Based on the few people we’ve seen coming and going, all with backpacks slung over their shoulders and textbooks under their arms, this building is mostly filled with students living off-campus, which makes sense given its close location.
Kai double checks the address on his phone. “Yeah, this is the place.”
