Page 51 of Roma Queen
“I like watching people during a crisis,” he says stiffly. “There’s nothing more riveting than observing people as they try to solve a mystery. It helps me understand how their minds work. I was hoping I’d get to observe you and Zara some more before we had our final show down. She’s quite remarkable, isn’t she? Quite beautiful.”
I follow his gaze, hissing through my teeth. At first glance, I didn’t recognize and other rooms on the other screens. I do, though. One of the rooms isveryfamiliar: Zara’s kitchen. The camera must be hidden on top of her fridge. From its vantage point, you can see the kitchen table quite clearly. “You were so fascinating to watch, the two of you, trying to sleuth out what was going on. I was gonna wait a couple of days before calling, just to see if you came up with any interesting theories. Then Yuri Petrov arrived and ruined the whole damn thing with that recording.”
He sounds genuinely inconvenienced by the turn of events. “Sad times. Yuri ruined your fun? You murdered his son. I’d say you’re out in the lead on this one.”
Lazlo’s eyes narrow into thin slits. “I’m not interested in talking about that with you. That’s a private matter.”
“Did you punish Corey the same way you were going to punish Leo? What did that poor kid ever do to earn a visit from you, huh? What could he have possibly done to earn the violent, terrible death you gave him?”
“I SAID I’M NOT INTERESTED IN TALKING ABOUT THAT!” Lazlo’s enraged yell echoes around the room, deafeningly loud. The arm is stretched out in front of him, held at head height now. His face has turned cherry red, and a rope of spittle is hanging from his twisted mouth. “You don’t fucking listen,” he grinds out. “Youneverfucking listen.”
I’m restless, twitching, desperate to make my move. He’s not that far away, and I’m fucking quick. I could launch myself at him and dash his fucking skull open with the wrench long before Lazlo has a chance to pull the trigger. I need to pick the right moment, though. I need him angry again. I need him so fucking mad that he doesn’t know what the fuck’s going on anymore. Pushing down the urge to throw myself on him this very second, I try and buy myself some time to think. “I listened to that recording Yuri made. It led me right here, didn’t it?”
“Yes. And did you figure out there were two people in that recording? No, you didn’t.Yuridid. He was the one who figured that out. And you came down here without giving a moment’s thought to who I might have down here with me, didn’t you? You didn’t care. You just came barreling down those stairs, head-on, without trying to figure out who you might be up against.”
“It doesn’t matter who he is. I’ll kill him if he shows his face,” I counter. “He was smart enough to keep his mouth shut on that recording. Chances are he’ll be smart enough to stay away now.”
Lazlo grins. “I wouldn’t count on it. He likes to make me happy. I wouldn’t call him exceptionally clever. Like Kezia here, he’s just a very quiet person.”
“I don’t give a shit if he’s the chattiest motherfucker on the planet, or if he’s the silent type—”
Hold up.
Wait…
Oh. No, no, no, no…
There’s no fucking way.
Garrett? It can’t be. Why the fuck would Garrett do…this?
Lazlo’s been waiting for me to put two and two together. The bastard sees the realization on my face and is overwhelmed with excitement. “There we go! There it is! Pasha, I thought you might not figure it out. All that cage fighting, getting knocked in the head, it’s not good for the synapses.”
“Garrett wouldn’t do anything that might hurt Zara,” I snarl. “There’s no fucking way.”
“DON’T BE SO FUCKING NAIVE!” Lazlo roars. “Of course he would. Garrett’s a good boy. He does whatever I fucking tell him to. And that includes hurting Zara.”
There’s such madness in his eyes. I look to Kezia, searching for some clue that he might be lying, but I don’t find it. Instead, I find sorrow and pain in the dark eyes that meet mine. Slowly, Kezia nods. The aunt I never knew I had. It kills me to see her suffering so badly. Iknowshe’s worried about Zara. “Don’t worry. He can’t hurt her if he doesn’t know where she is,” I tell her.
Lazlo chuckles. “Alas,Rom Baro. That’s the thing about redheads. Too clever for their own good.” He reaches up and raps the end of the gun against one of the screens. At first, the scene is nothing out of the ordinary: a room in an apartment, a living room, sparsely furnished. A little grubby, perhaps, though meticulously tidy. Then a door opens, and Garrett enters…
…and in walks Zara.
Twenty-Five
ZARA
The gun’sway heavier than I thought it would be. Seemed prudent to pull the thing as soon as we walked into the Bakersfield, and now my arm’s getting tired of holding it up at a ninety-degree angle.
Fuck, it’s so surreal, being back here, so close to home. We’re not at my place, though; we’re in Garrett’s apartment. How many times have I been here before? Not as many times as I’ve been in Andrew or Waylon’s apartment, but still…I’m the one who bought the peace lily that’s sitting on the kitchen window sill. I’m the one who bought the small print of the black and white mountain range that’s hanging on the wall behind the threadbare sofa.
I could never remember when Garrett moved in here before. For a while now, I’ve thought that he’s lived at the Bakersfield longer than I have, and everyone else has just agreed with me. He didn’t have anything to do with Sarah or the others until we started meeting across the road for our weekly drink on a Tuesday night, but that was never strange becausenoneof them had anything to do with one another before then. It’s like…it’s as if I came along and became the glue that pieced our little gang of friends together.
But I’ve figured it out now. Ididmove in here before Garrett. A couple of weeks before him to be exact. I’d brought that peace lily up here to him because I’d smiled at him in the hallway a few days earlier, and bringing him the plant had seemed official, like a proper way of introducing myself as his new neighbor. I remember seeing a box sitting out on the scuffed, rickety coffee table, and thinking nothing of it at the time.
Now, looking around his bare, empty living quarters, it hits me that the box had been the only thing he’d brought with him when he took up residence here.
All he’d owned in the world.
