Page 177 of Like Grim Death: Part One
It’s weird.
“What’s up with you and my brother?” Brooklin asks the cold question, staring out the window, and she could be talking to either me or Ella, but since Maverick is my brother too andnothingis up with us, not anymore, I think she’s addressing Ella. I’m kind of surprised, after what went down last night. It seemed like Mayhem and Ella were solid, but I know how easy it is to pick up a fight again in this world.
I shift my foot on the gas as the rain picks up and I flick on my windshield wipers. The nervousness eats at me. Despite what Lucifer said, this feels a lot like running away. I think I’d rather stay and fight.
“What do you mean?” Ella sits up in the back, flipping her phone over on her thigh, her green eyes on the back of Brooklin’s seat.
Brooklin shakes her head and I imagine she’s rolling her eyes. “You acted weird around him back there. Like you’re scared or something.” She says it without flinching, no mercy or beating around the bush. It’s one thing I like about her, despite our jagged past.
“Does he hurt you?” It’s another straightforward question with no indication Brooklin cares either way what the answer is.
I think of Ella and Lucifer after Noctem. I’m clutching the wheel so tightly I’m surprised it doesn’t snap in half. I don’t even know why I’m mad at this moment, except for maybe the fact Ella isn’t answering Brooklin. Dragging this out like Maverick is some kind of abuser. As if he didn’t just defend her with his life last night.
I see in the mirror she lifts her chin and stares at the back of Brooklin’s head as she finally answers.
“What are you really asking me?” There’s no meekness in her tone now.
Brooklin laughs and the eerie part is it sounds genuine. When she was with Jeremiah, she fell under his spell. She seemed more submissive, and I can’t blame her. Jeremiah is always the alpha, any room he’s in. But now, free from everyone, cut off from her family, she’s fierce.
She’s like Maverick.
She twists around in her seat and stares at Ella. I glance once more in the rear view as the rain keeps falling and my wipers automatically speed up while I hold Lucifer’s taillights through the storm.
Ella sits up straighter, narrowing her eyes.
“I’m asking you if hehurtsyou. You flinched around him today when you couldn’t avoid him, and it’s obvious he’s upset with you. So, did you shrink because he hurts you?”
I don’t know where Brooklin is going with this, and I don’t say a word, letting them fight it out.
Silence stretches.
Brooklin speaks again. “Or is it because you’re hiding something from him?”
My pulse picks up in my chest, anxiety over the storm and this line of questioning and Ella’s potential secrets and where we’re headed all crashing around me. I refuse to look at Ella again.
Seconds pass. Brooklin doesn’t turn back around in her seat. Brake lights glow in the haze of the rain, and I slow down as we come to a stop, reaching traffic at Raleigh’s intersections.
When the car is stopped and I’m a safe distance behind my brother and my son and my husband, the A/C still running and eating up the condensation on the windshield, Ella finally answers Brooklin.
“You don’t know him anymore and you never knew me at all.” The leather of my seats creak as she leans forward, inches from Brooklin. “Get the fuck out of my face.”
I expect Brooklin to attack her. Maybe a slap, maybe lunging through the seats. They’re nose-to-nose, and reluctantly impressing me, I see in my rear view Ella doesn’t back down at all. But instead of any of that, slowly, Brooklin straightens in her own seat, turning to stare out the windshield at the brake lights in front of us. Then she says, not looking at anyone so I don’t know who she’s talking to, “I can’t stand him right now, but if anyone fucks over my brother, there’s going to be fucking problems.”
And as softly thou art sleeping
To thee shall I come creeping
And thy life’s blood drain away.
Heinrich August Ossenfelder,Der Vampir
“Where did you get this?”
I smile at her. Sid Malikova is aggressive and her eyes flash as she stares at the folded papers I’m offering her in a darkened corner ofLiber.
Free, in Latin, orbook.They could be the same, I suppose. Monday always lost herself in books when she wasn’t someone our parents—particularly our fathers—wanted to lose themselves in.
I know better though. Lucifer wished to come here for protection. To befreeof Boaz. There is no such thing in our world. Criminals are such for a reason. They cross every line. They shoot through every boundary. And when they have no fear of the law—because they own the law—God help whoever they set in their sights.
