Page 23 of Riot Reunion
Throwing the car into gear, Mason flares his nostrils, glowering at me as he reaches up and hits a button by his window. Next to me, athunking sound lets me know that the fucker has gone and locked us in. “I’m no one’s lackey. Michael said I might need to choke you out in order to get you into the car. That’s the only reason I opened the damn door for you, asshole.”
“Great.”
He shrugs unapologetically. “Not every day you get to put a member of the British aristocracy to sleep. Buckle up, Buttercup.”
Before I can comply, he slams his foot down on the gas, and we’re burning through the rain-soaked city at breakneck speeds.
Mason isn’t a talker. Not until I grow antsy, stewing in the thick silence, and I begin to fiddle with the combination lock on the hard case, purely for something to do with my hands. He huffs out an annoyed breath, glancing over at me. “The fuck you think you’re doing?”
“Preparing,” I reply, my tone cold enough to turn the word to ice. If I’m about to walk into some kind of shit show, I want to be ready. If Wren and Pax were here, I might not be so jittery; my friends are both on the other side of the country, tending to some issue with Pax’s girlfriend, according to Carrie, so I’m shit out of luck. I’ll need to get a handle on my nerves; if that means inspecting the weapon Genesis gave me, feeling the weight of it in my hands, stuffing the fucking thing into my waistband at the small of my back like a common criminal, then that’s exactly what I’m gonna do.
“The hell you are,” Mason growls. “Not inmycar. You even know what’s inside that thing?”
“None of your fucking business.” It was refreshing at first—this guy knowing about my pedigree and still talking to me like I’m a worthless piece of shit. Now, it’s getting pretty annoying.
“If you wanna walk across the city in the middle of the night, in the pouring rain, toting a weapon youdon’tknow how to use in your back pocket, then have at it. If you wanna stay warm and dry, not to mention keep yourself from getting shot in the head for being a moron, then you won’t open that thing up in my fucking car. You read me?”
Something tells me that Mason will have his ass handed to him if he dumps me on the side of the road, miles away from the address Michael gave me, but I don’t feel like taking my chances. I’ve developed quite a sixth sense for people, and this guy hasn’t just had a bad day. He’s had a bad year. Acoupleof bad years. He’s just begging for someone with a shitty attitude to come along so he can take out his frustration on their face with his fists.
I leave the case alone.
Curtains of rain buffet the car; it comes down so thick and fast that the windshield wipers barely keep up with the deluge. Every couple of seconds, Mason gets a clear view of the road ahead, when the rubber blades cut across the glass, flinging the water out of the way, and then the world turns to smudgy, blurry smears of color and light.
I stare ahead, back straight, chin up, refusing to let this guy know that I’m even slightly concerned about the prospect of him turfing me out of his moving vehicle.
After a long old while, Mason sucks down a deep, steady inhalation as we turn onto West Avenue. “Okay. This is you. Take the elevator up to the twelfth floor. They’re expecting you.”
“Shouldn’t we go up together?”
He laughs, the surprised sound bouncing around the front of the car. “Me? Go inthere? You’re crazy. I do not have a death wish, my friend.”
What the fuck doesthatmean? This Mason guy is probably in his late twenties. He’s built like a brick shit house. Covered in tattoos. There’s a hard, cold glint to his eye that says he doesn’t care if the odds are stacked against him—he doesnotlose a fight. And yet this guy thinks that heading up to this apartment is insane? And I still have to go? By myself? I grit my teeth, rolling my shoulders back. I’ve found myself in reckless, dangerous situations more often than I can count. I’m perfectly capable of defending myself.
I’ve never killed anyone before, though. I’ve always suspected it would come down to this someday, but—
“Well? Go on. Grass is gonna start growing on the hood if I sit here any longer.”
I scowl, flinging open the passenger’s side door, climbing out into the rain. Turning back, I stoop down, narrowing my eyes at Mason. “How many guys are up there?” I demand, steeling myself.
“A lot,” he shoots back.
“Are they expecting me?”
He chuckles, his top lip curling a little. “Oh, I doubt anyone’s expectingyou, Little Lordling. Do not open that case before you get inside the apartment, you hear me? Last thing they need is the cops showing up uninvited.” Before I can slam the car door closed, Mason steps on the gas, sending the Charger leaping forward, the door closing of its own accord as he tears off down the road. The rain hammers at me, drenching my jacket and my shirt, sluicing down the channel of my spine in a bitterly cold, persistent river. My hair is plastered to my skull.
The building I face is unremarkable at ground level. Just an average-looking residential apartment building. The lobby is painted a dull, dirty off-white, the walls decorated with the kind of generic, mind-numbingly bad art you’d find at a low-rent Motel 6. I’m alone as I enter the elevator. When it stops at the twelfth floor, I step out into a bland, carpeted hallway that splits into a fork, apartments A through D to the left, apartments E through H to the right. Reluctantly, I exit the elevator and take the left-hand corridor toward apartment 12C, a combination of annoyance and trepidation prodding me angrily in the gut.
Bullshit.
This issuchbullshit.
Michael is a stone-cold killer. I fuckingknowhe is. He’s up to his neck in shady shit. He has to know half of Seattle’s most notorious criminals, so then why the hell does he needmeto do anything for him? This is nothing more than a calculated move to scare me away from Carrie. He wanted her to move back to Seattle after graduating Wolf Hall, but she went and moved halfway across the world to be with me instead. Well, if the bastard thinks he can terrify me into leaving her by landing me in this kind of shit, he’s got another thing coming.
I’m not soft. I do not scare fucking easily. I’m never going to run from Carrie with my tail between my legs. I’ll stand and face whatever horseshit ‘trial’ he’s planned out for me. I’ll prove myself to be a man. I’ll kill whoever I need to kill. I’ll—
Shit.
I’ve reached the apartment.
