Page 134 of Like Grim Death: Part One
But another name spins inside my head.
Mavy.Mayhem.
I narrow my eyes, smiling even as the pain in the back of my head grows.
When this is all over, I am going to break your fucking spine.
“Tell me about last night.”
Atlas lifts his eyes to mine, backward cap pulled over his head as he uncaps his water bottle while we stand on the back deck. Lucifer’s words are ringing in my head, and so is the text from this fucker to my girl the other night.
I hold Rain close, staring down at his wide eyes, his fingers reaching for my face. Lucifer is showering and I’m not sure where Sid is. All I know is I’m glad she isn’t out here. After her bullshit about Ella in Luce’s office a few minutes ago, I’m not feeling too brotherly toward her right now.
We passed my girl on the stairs and I know I should have stayed and talked to her, but it feels like I’ll have to discuss a whole lot of shit I’m not ready to yet. What is it that’s keeping me from reaching out to her?
All the shit Lucifer said to me last night? About not looking in my own backyard? It’s the thing I’m good at, handling everyone else’s problems while I don’t even glance at my own. Except I’m not so great at it, am I? It’s why I have all these fucking scars on my back.
“There’s nothing to tell.” Atlas swallows his water, crinkling the plastic of the bottle as he stares out into Lucifer’s renovated backyard.
“You trying to fuck her?” My heart races in my chest as I ask the question and Rain’s fingers scratch at my chin.
Atlas snorts. “You expect me to say yes? So, what? You can carve me into pieces and feed me to Ella in her cookies?”
I don’t answer that question as he avoids my gaze. Instead, I cradle Rain close and drop my voice to a low whisper, my breath brushing across my nephew’s fuzzy head of hair.
“If you lay a hand on her, I’m not going after you.”
The plastic bottle in his hands crinkles, but he doesn’t look at me.
I stroke the side of Rain’s cheek, staring at Atlas’s. “I’ll come for your mom. I’ll fuck with her head like you’re trying to fuck with Ella’s, because I know your dad treats her like shit. But I’ll be nice to her. I’ll be her goddamn best friend.” I smile as he closes his eyes tight, his jaw flexed. “I’ll pay Natalie a visit too. I’ll get them in the same bed, fuck them back-to-back.” I dip my chin and kiss Rain’s head, covering one of his ears with my hand, pressing the other to my chest so he can’t hear me. “Then I’ll slit both of their throats and watch them bleed out all over each other. I’ll record it, so you can see them take their last breaths, covered in my fucking cum.”
Atlas doesn’t respond. I don’t need him to. I just need him to hear me. For a second, I think about asking him if he saw what went down that last night we were both in the dark on Corpus Ave together, but with the threat between us, I decide I don’t want to know.
The walk back was silent, and as I sink down into my gray leather chair in the office, the house is silent too. In the immediate aftermath, I asked Ella what thefuckshe thought she was doing withSevryn,but I didn’t get a good answer and listening to her try to explain it and blame me only made me want to killhim.
I bury my head in my hands, taking a deep breath as my eyelids feel heavy, even closed. The sweet earthy taste of marijuana lingers on my tongue, and when I inhale, I catch the scent thick in the office. I’ve been trying to smoke outside, since Rain comes here so often, but tonight I just… needed a break.
“Mom?”
She looks up from her book. The one she hasn’t turned a page for in the long minutes I’ve been staring at her. It’s like she’s looking right through me, even as her eyes are locked on mine, shadows beneath them.
“Where’s Brooklin?” I haven’t seen my sister in two days. She’s probably at another camp, but it just seems sudden. Too soon. Malachi was just buried last week, and I didn’t even get to see it and… and no one is speaking about him. The blood stains from the hammer I used on the nanny have been painted over on the staircase. The floors are freshly polished. Everything smells clean.
Too clean.
“She’s away.” Mom’s voice is low. It kind of reminds me of Lucifer’s, because of the rasp. But I haven’t seen Lucifer, either. I’m not supposed to talk about Malachi at all. I’m not supposed to talk about anything that happens inside this house. There are family secrets, then there’s the family vault, and everything here goes in the latter.
“Where?” I clench my teeth as I sit on the couch across from Mom in the sitting room. It’s dark, all the drapes pulled closed despite the fact I know it’s sunny outside.
I went to stand on the balcony earlier.
Where I pushed him.
I pushed him, I pushed him, I pushed him—
“She’s at Shadow Villa.”
I vaguely remember the place. In Virginia, on Snake Street, I’ve never forgotten the name. The property ends with a big house deep in the woods. Dark. I remember me and my brothers running up and down the velvet-lined halls, crashing toward the high window at the end, pressing our noses to the glass and shoving each other aside to get a good view of the forest. The circle.
