Page 21 of Cruel Love
I nodded. “Thanks, Cleo.”
She made to get out of the car but paused before leaning forwardagain.“Oh, before I go. Congratulations on the marriage. You keptthatquiet.”
“Yeah, it was unexpected,”I replied, ignoring the way Jackson wassmirking at me.
Cleo laughed.“You can saythatagain. Is it true Welch was going tokeep her to himself?”
I glared at Jackson, who quickly started picking at imaginary lint onhis jeans and refusing to meet my stare, telling me what I needed to know. The asshole had filled Cleo in on every little detail about my visit to Peartree House.
“Yeah,”I replied, not willing to discuss any further details aboutWillow.
She whistled.“Poor girl. I’m not sure being married to you is better orworse than being claimed by Welch.Thatfat fuck is such a creep, wereallyought to consider replacing him when we take over Legion. A few years back, he asked me to forge a death certificate for a mother and her kid after the husband was killed in a car crash. Welch said he wanted to help them start a new life, but I’d bet everything I ownthatyour wife wasn’t the first girl Welch has tried to claim. I’m telling you,thatman is the biggest perv going, I’m not sure he can be trusted in a place like Peartree House.”
“No arguments here,”Jackson said at the same time I asked a question of my own.
“A few years back?”I didn’t know why, but something about Cleo’s story piqued my interest.
“Yeah, or maybe longer, I don’t remember. Jobs tend to blur into one.But I remember this kid because she hadthatthing with her eyes. You know, when they’re different colors? Anyway, it set my nerves on edge with the way he spoke about her. The creep almost jizzed in his pants every time he looked at her picture.”
“Here’s to a job well done,”Jackson said, holding his shot glass upfor us to chink.
“To one less asshole in the world,”Zayden said before downing hisshot of tequila, Jackson and I following suit.
The plan had gone smoothly. Newton Phillips was dead. Tomorrow,the world would find out about his sins, and any outpouring of sympathy would be quelled, replaced with fury at why the man was never prosecuted.
After I’d snuck out of his hotel room, having hauled the lump of a manover the balcony and watching as his body crashed to the floor, Jackson and I decided to celebrate by watching Brody beat the living shit out of his opponent in an underground fighting ring.
Brody was undefeated in the circuit.Justlike his twin, Zayden, wasundefeated in illegal street races. They were the youngest of the board members at twenty-two years old, but the two of them had good heads screwed on.
Mostly.
“I’m going to find my brother,”Zayden said, standing from the tablewe’d acquired in the corner of the club following the fight.“He’s fucking a girl who wants a twin sandwich.”
He winked at us before strolling away, earning a chuckle fromJackson and an eye roll from me.
“Maybe we should find a woman who wants a Jackson and Jamessandwich,”Jackson said, pouring us another shot of tequila each.“It’s been a while since we tag-teamed pussy.”
I downed the shot, grimacing at the burn.“Not interested.”
“What the hell is the matter with you? You’ve been a miserable cuntfrom the minute we boarded the plane to come here. Don’t tell me you’re missing your wife?”
A scowl twisted on my face. I wasn’t missing Willow but Icouldn’t get her out of my head, and I’d checked the camera feed in her room more times than I wanted to admit.
But after the meeting with Cleo and her mention of forging documentsfor a girl with heterochromia, a niggling feeling had settled in my gut. I couldn’t say for sure whatthatfeeling was, itseemedlike too much of a coincidence for the girl Cleo mentioned to be Willow. But the more I thought about it, the more my curiosity grew as to what Willow’s story was, and how she ended up at Peartree House.
The girls who wound up in the program were girls who wouldn’t bemissing from society. Runaways who’d turned to a life on the street instead of going home to abusive parents, girls who’d been dumped in care homes after their parents decided they didn’t want them anymore.
It was against Legion rules to accept a girl into the Peartree Houseprogram who would be missed in society, it would bring unnecessary attention to the ongoings in the house, and questions we wouldn’t want to answer.
“Fine, don’t answer me,”Jackson huffed after I poured myself anothershot of tequila.“You carry on being a miserable bastard, I’m going to find me some pussy.”
Withthat, he snatched the bottle off the table, and stormed into thecrowd, leaving me to brood.
Over the next hour, and after I’d ordered myself another bottle oftequila, I did everything I could to distract myself from thoughts of Willow, but the more I tried to shove her out of my head, the more the mouse burrowed her way into my thoughts.
So what was Willow’s story?
Regardless of whether there was the slightest chance she was thegirl Cleo had forged documents for, I couldn’t help but wonder where she had come from, and where her parents were. Did they know or care what had become of her?
