Page 3 of Stolen Kisses
“When did you come here?” I asked Maria.
“I followed Christina here.”
“Followed?”
“That was how desperate I became. There was a party here. We had this joke aboutMr. Mystery Man, I was hoping to see who he was. I thought for a while she was just seeing one guy over a long period of time and didn’t want to tell me, but I think I was wrong,” Maria answered. “She came here with one guy I thought was him, but when she got here she met another. They were both tall with dark hair. Looked like the usual rough types from the bar, but loaded. I didn’t get in so I didn’t see much past the door. ”
When the elevator doors opened we stepped out and made our way down the corridor.
The door ahead was slightly ajar. Maria sped up, but on instinct I grabbed her arm to stop her from rushing in. Panic made people careless, and clearly she wasn’t thinking straight.
“Door’s open, who would leave the door open to a penthouse suite?” It was my years of seeing too much shit that put my ass in gear and my mind on high alert for every single little thing.
An open door might have been fine to a normal person, and maybe it was.
Still I erred on the side of caution.Always.
Guns ready and eyes sharp, I pulled her behind me and proceeded with caution. I pushed the door so it was fully open and slowly we stepped in.
I truly pitied any fucker who dared come near us, because my senses were on high alert. Something was definitely off here. I could feel it, the tension in the air twisted my insides.
There was a coffee mug on the table, newspaper open and set on the sofa, and an empty plate on the floor next to the sofa. Those seemed to be the only things out of place.
Those and …rose petals.
Pink rose petals.
I stopped with Maria and she held onto the ends of my jacket. She saw them too.
Rose petals were dashed all over the floor leading down the corridor.
Maria tugged on my jacket.
“Dante, her purse is here.” Maria whispered pointing over to the floor to ceiling glass window.
There was a woman’s purse on the floor. Christina had so many I wouldn’t have known that was hers.
I tightened the grip on my gun, not because I was angry at finding the purse. It was, because she was still here or had been. There were no sounds coming from the inside of this place and the door had been left open. It was suspicious as fuck.
Uncertainty. The not knowing. The speculation. It all built inside me like a volcano ready to erupt.
All that was left to do was go further, down the damn rabbit hole. Follow the rose petals and see where they led.
Or to whom?
I stepped forward again, Maria holding on to me. We moved down the corridor, stepping on petals that lined the hard wood floor.
We rounded the corner and something tickled my nose.
Four years I’d been climbing up that ladder of the business. Working my way in to work for the great Raphael. I was still a grunt, but a grunt with a chance. I’d been in Chicago for twelve years. I had always known I wanted to be part of Raphael’s crew. Anyone who had the chance I’d been given would jump at it, the same way I had. However, it came with the good, the bad, and the worse.
The worse being how I was able to pick up the scent of blood in the air, right off the bat. Like a wild animal sniffing out both predator and prey, I could smell it and knew danger was near.
Or something else.
I didn’t realize my movements had sped up and I was no longer exacting the caution and bravado I displayed when first coming in here. Eager to see where the roses led to, I hurried down the corridor and into the bedroom where I froze.
The sight of Christina lying lifeless on a massive four poster bed hit me first. There was blood all over the bed.All over her.
