Page 3

THREE

Gabriel

As we walk out of my parents’ house, I turn to Liam. “That went shockingly well. I mean… you made my dad cry when you demolished him at every single game he had you play, but besides that,” I joke.

“You mean he cried and I didn’t get to witness it?” Liam asks.

I laugh, and as I get into the driver’s seat, I see that I have a message from my mom in a group chat with my dad.

Mom: He’s super nice. I very much like him and he’s sexy. I loved that he couldn’t stop looking at you all night. That boy is smitten.

Me: I’m really glad you like him. I was a bit nervous, but everything went so well.

Dad: Ask him when he wants to go fishing.

Me: I will.

“They just texted me a review of you,” I say.

“Oh yeah? If I didn’t get an A, I’m going to let Jesse lock me in a drawer.”

“You like my parents that much?” I tease.

“I like you that much,” he says.

It makes me smile because he definitely knows how to say things that hit just the right way. “They definitely gave you an A and my dad wants to know when he can teach you how to fish.”

Liam stills. “Dear god no.”

“You laid it on thick with the whole ‘dead dad no longer around to teach you’ thing.”

“I was trying the tactic where they feel bad for me so they love me out of pity,” he says. “Hell, do I really have to go fishing with your father now?”

“Sounds like it.”

“At least I’ll get to spend time with you. I can tolerate anything if you’re by my side.”

“Oh hell no, I never agreed to that. I don’t fish. I don’t like the worms. I don’t like the fish. I get seasick on the boat. This is all on you.”

“Gabriel… no… why would you do this to me?” he asks as I begin to drive.

“I’m positive you did it to yourself,” I remind him. “You… You didn’t give my parents all the cookies, right?”

“No, my darling, I left plenty for you,” he assures me.

Pleased, I smile as I anticipate more cookies in my future.

“So we’ve ticked meeting the parents off the list, which means you’re moving in,” Liam declares.

“That’s definitely not what that means.”

Liam whips around to face me. “Gabriel, please… please don’t break my heart like this.”

“I’m not! I never said that once you met my parents, we’d move in together. I said it was a start .”

“Then may I move in with you?”

“Soon. And we’ll decide who is moving in where, but for right now, we’re just dating.”

Liam doesn’t seem overly pleased by this, but he doesn’t say anything about it. I honestly don’t think I’m being unfair.

“Some people date for like a year or two before moving in,” I say.

“It’s because they don’t love their other half as much as I love you.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not it.”

Liam ignores that as I pull into the driveway of my house and turn to him.

“Are you spending the night?”

He stares at me for a moment, like he’s trying to decide. He never has to decide, and I honestly don’t know who he’s trying to fool by being obstinate. “I’ll consider it.”

“Alright, have a good night,” I say as I lean over and kiss him. He’s so flabbergasted that he doesn’t even reciprocate the kiss and is still gawking at me as I get out and hurry into the house. I even lock the door as I would if he wasn’t staying the night.

My long-haired black and white cat Lucille Pawl comes galloping up to see me. She’s all purrs as I scoop her up in my arms and look out to see Liam hurry to the front door and grab the handle. When he finds it locked, his shocked face fills the glass pane in the door.

“Gabriel? I think there’s an issue. The issue is that the door is locked, and I’m outside of it. Do you see my issue?”

“Oh, my bad. I thought you were going home.”

“I would never. I’d live in your closet if you permitted it.”

“And you wonder why I locked the door,” I say.

He’s laughing when I unlock it, but his attention is immediately snapped away when a teenager walks by on the road. He doesn’t have a coat on and has his hands stuffed deep in his pockets. Liam seems strangely fixated on him, making me hesitate.

“He’s just the neighbor’s kid,” I say quietly. “Hey, Cole!”

The teenager jumps and looks over at us, and I can see Liam’s body tense. It’s so odd when Cole isn’t doing anything suspicious. “Oh. Hi.”

“Where’s your coat?”

“Inside. I just was hot and forgot it,” he says. He gives me a wave and hurries off, but Liam stares after him.

“What?” I ask.

“I don’t like that family.”

“What? My neighbors? They’re fine. And Cole is sweet. How do you even know them?”

“It’s my job to know the people in your world.”

“Are you stalking my neighbors?”

“No. The kid’s father clearly dislikes our relationship and showed it when he watched me get out of your car a couple of weeks ago. Since then, I’ve caught him watching us. That right there is a kid who has been kicked out of the house and wasn’t allowed to take his coat.”

“What if he just forgot his coat?” I ask, although I know that Liam is rarely wrong… if ever. Liam slips into the house and shuts the door before going over to the window. Cole looks up at my house and sees that we’re no longer standing in the open door before he starts back toward his house, but he doesn’t go inside. Instead, he walks onto the porch and sinks into the dark corner as he pulls himself up tight.

“What if he’s locked out and too shy to ask to wait over here?” I wonder. “I’ll go ask him.”

Liam shakes his head. “His father’s home; I saw him walk by a minute or two ago.”

“Fuck. I’ll bring him a coat and talk with his father.”

“You don’t think that’ll make it worse?”

“Then what do you expect me to do? Sit back and relax? You’ve literally informed me that my neighbor’s being abusive to his teenager and expect me to think it’s okay?”

“You can call it in, but if the kid won’t admit to it, he’ll be left in a more toxic situation.”

I eye the spot where Cole sits even though I can’t see him any longer. “What would you do?”

Liam stares at the house for a long moment. “Nothing at all.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“It’s not a lie. Tossing your kid out in the cold is a dick move for sure, but it’s not enough to entice me into killing him.”

What he says makes me hesitate. “I didn’t mean… to have you kill him.”

“Put a call in to CPS if you’d like, but he’s going to back up his father because he’s the only person in his life. I looked into him yesterday. A teacher called CPS a few weeks ago after suspecting something but the kid denied everything. He’s nearly an adult; he’s had many years to think that this life is perfectly fine. You need to show him it’s not so when CPS is called again, he doesn’t protect his father.”

“I’m taking him a coat and checking things out. If you think something’s going on, I’m calling CPS.”

“Just be prepared for him to withdraw from you when you try to help him again,” he says a minute before I see the door open and watch as Cole scurries inside.

“Then I’ll make sure nobody lets them know I was the one who called.”

“Keep an eye on him but don’t engage until you know something that’ll help him,” Liam suggests. “If he refuses help again, talk to the kid and make sure he’ll go to your side before you get involved further. The moment he’s willing to rely on you, do more. But first you need to get him to trust you so he runs to your side. Somehow you got that cat to adore you. A human child can’t be as hard.”

I put a call in to someone who works at CPS who we’ve interacted with in the past on a few cases. I explain that we currently don’t have any proof of the situation but will keep an eye on him. Hopefully, something positive will come from it, but Liam’s likely right. I’ll need better proof, as well as getting Cole to trust me.

When I return to the living room with Lucille in my hands, Liam reaches out, but the cat yowls the second he tries to even hold a hand out to her. It’s like she’s disgusted by his very presence, but honestly, I think he’s gotten closer to her than anyone else ever has. She should be sitting on his lap before long.

“She already likes you more than anyone but me,” I assure him.

Liam just laughs like that’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard as Lucille bats at him, but her claws are only partway out, which I would consider a win.

My phone rings before I even have a moment to sit down, and I see that it’s our boss, Sgt. Michaels, calling. “This is Hyde,” I say.

“Paige with you?”

“Sure is.”

“You two able to deal with a case? We’re a little short-staffed and the team on call is dealing with a drive-by.”

“Yeah, we’re at my house and good to go.”

“Great.”

“Ask him why he didn’t call me. I’m the senior detective,” Liam says.

Michaels must hear him since he responds, “Because talking to him is the reason I’m bald.”

Liam beams, obviously proud of this fact. “Good.”

“Of course he thinks that’s good,” Michaels grumbles before hanging up.

I drop Lucille in her cat tree that she looks at in disgust before crying to me, like I’ve ruined her life by leaving her behind again. “I know, baby, I’m so sorry. I hate leaving you again. I’ve already left you all evening.” I kiss her and then notice Liam trying to stuff his head into the space of the cat tree, like it’ll earn him a kiss.

“Does it help if I look overly disgusted and offended like Lucy Fur does?” he asks as he scrunches his face up in his best attempt to recreate her melancholy look. “Is it working?”

I grin as I lean forward and kiss him while Lucille bats the side of his face. It’s not even enough to deter him; he’s just pleased as can be by the attention.

Liam straightens. “Let’s go. If I can figure out the case in under five minutes, we’ll still have time to have sex before bed.”

“That’s the plan?” I tease.

“A very good plan, thank you.”

He pats Lucille who acts like he’d just asked her to brawl, so I pat her to remind her that we are kind and gentle.

“I can drive,” I say as I head out to the car. I feel like I need to be doing something with my hands for the conversation I’m steeling myself to have. Liam puts the address into the GPS and I pull out of the driveway. “So earlier…”

“How much earlier? Like when your mom was telling me how you wanted to be a nudist when you were six?”

“After that. When I asked what you’d do… about the neighbor, and you said he wasn’t bad enough…”

“To kill him? Yeah.”

“You still kill people?”

He looks over at me and cocks his head. “I haven’t since Tobias, but some people deserve to die.”

“Would you stay with me if I forbade you from ever killing someone again?”

Liam watches me closely. “I would do anything for you, Gabriel.”

“You’d do that?”

He’s quiet as the car moves closer to our destination. “I would try… I would really try, but… I don’t know if you’d like the person I’m afraid I’d become if I couldn’t sate the darkness in me. I’ll do whatever you want. I don’t expect you to tell me you’re okay with me killing. But I truly hope you understand why I have to.”

I don’t know how to answer that. He doesn’t have to. No one has to kill. But then I find myself back in that room with Tobias standing over me, the smell of death surrounding me, fear tearing through me.

If I could save people from that, would I choose to?

My hands tighten on the steering wheel, and I can tell Liam’s starting to draw back. He thinks he’s said something that’s upset me. The man is so goddamn confident until it comes to me, and then it’s like a simple look or word from me can make him crash. It’s probably not healthy, but I don’t know what the fuck to do about it.

“Can I know… Can I know what they did wrong before you do it?” I ask.

“You’d want to know when I kill someone? I don’t think you want to know, Gabriel. You just want to be reassured I’m not doing something awful.”

“I want to know,” I say stubbornly. “I’m… I’m capable of knowing. I can handle it.”

Liam hesitates before responding. “I’m afraid that I’m going to push you until you’re unable to handle any more. I’ve already pushed you to your limits more than once.”

“I’m… different than before,” I say. “Tobias made me different.”

“How about you think about it?” Liam suggests. “You think about whether or not you’d truly want to know.”

“There’s nothing to think about. Don’t you think I’ve already thought about it enough? All I do is think and think…”

“I’m afraid I’m going to ruin you,” he says. “I’m not good for someone like you.”

I was about to pull away from a stop sign but end up hitting the brakes as I look over at him. “Why would you say that? Liam, why the fuck do you put me up on this pedestal like I’m this breakable, holy thing, and seem convinced you’re bad for me?”

“Your sweet selflessness is just one of the many things that makes you so special, and I’m afraid the longer you’re around me, the more your innocence will drain away.”

“Don’t piss me off.”

Liam looks surprised. “How am I pissing you off?”

“By saying something so stupid. If I’m capable of loving you through all of this shit, do you not think I’m capable of loving you through anything? Don’t be foolish and annoy me.”

“I’m sorry. Can I buy you something to make up for it?”

“No, I don’t need anything.”

“Anything you want, I’ll buy you. Would you like a diner?”

I glance over at him. “Have you still not checked on your diner?”

“I kind of did. I like peeked in because I was peckish, told them all that they were doing adequate jobs running the whole thing while I was gone, and left.”

“Dear god. What if they’re like… stealing your money and running off with it?”

“I’d say it’d be really fucking risky to steal money from me.”

“They don’t know that!” I sigh, positive that whatever I say really doesn’t matter. This man is going to do his own thing. “Liam, I want to know and that’s that. And dear god, you’re not tainting me. I hope you know me well enough to know that I’m really fucking stubborn. I know how to take care of myself, I promise.”

“Okay.”

“So go back to trying to con me into moving in with you. But my house is in a better location… Yours is nice but it’s so far from some of the stores, you know? Though yours is bigger and roomier.”

“So the house is the issue,” he says.

“No, it’s that we have to decide what’s best. Location or space.”

“So you want a big house in an ideal location?”

“That’s the dream, huh? With a little catio?—”

“What the fuck is a catio? And like… I can use my brain to answer that question, but I really hope my answer is wrong.”

“Cat patio.”

“Dammit,” he says.

“Lucille would love it!”

“Are you going to be in the catio?”

“Well, no. I mean… they’re for cats.”

“Are you going to have it open when you’re not home?”

“No, what if something happened?”

“Then in what world do you think your cat would even use it? When you’re home, she’s literally glued to your ass . I’ve seen you have to hold her while you take a piss!”

“You just love dashing hopes and dreams, don’t you?”

“That’s me, the hopes and dreams dasher. It’s why I carry a roll of duct tape around in my trunk. For when I have to mend someone’s hopes and dreams that I’ve shattered.”

“Ha. Ha.”

He grins, pleased with himself.

I pull up behind a police cruiser and get out. Liam walks beside me as we head up to the front door of a small one-story house. It doesn’t look like anyone else from our team is here yet, so we gear up and walk inside where an officer notices us.

“Got a call about a gunshot… oddly, the victim seems to be gunshot free. We’ve checked the surrounding area and have no information on the attacker.”

“Huh. I wonder if it was an attempted shot,” I say as I head farther inside to see what we’ve been called about. When I step into the living room, I see the back of a chair facing us with someone slumped down in it.

Blood has pooled beneath the chair, like it ran down between the wooden slats that make up the seat. I make my way to the front of the chair where I stop and stare.

“Huh,” Liam says.

“Is this a ‘huh’?” I ask as I study the dead man whose eyes seem to have been torn out of his body. The path the blood takes makes it clear that both of his wrists had been tied to the chair and his ankles taped to the chair legs before the killer stabbed him to death.

“Definitely huh-worthy,” Liam comments as he gets closer and crouches to get a better look at the man’s face since he’s slumped down. “Eyes were removed postmortem.”

I look at the victim’s hands and see that they do show signs of him trying to pull free; the ropes are pulled tight in areas and the tape on his legs has thinned from the pressure. But the eyes don’t show evidence of being taken while the man struggled.

“Interesting,” Liam says. “Why take the eyes after he was dead unless there’s some symbolism here or as a trophy? Definitely not my kind of trophy.”

“Your kind of trophy is the tears from those you’ve made cry,” Matthew says as he walks in.

“My basement full of bottled tears is getting rather crowded, but there’s always room for yours,” Liam retorts.

I’m pretty sure the two of them like each other even if they pretend they don’t. I think there’s the possibility that they could actually become friends, but Liam is convinced I’m the only person in the world that he’ll ever need.

“My tears are sacred,” Matthew says. “What do we have here?”

“A dead man,” Liam responds.

“Oh wow, thank you, I would never have figured that one out on my own.”

“You’re welcome. It makes me feel good to be able to help those who are lesser,” Liam says.

Matthew gapes at him. “Lesser what?”

“Just lesser.”

Matthew’s face scrunches up. “Gabriel, what do you see in him? You’re so sweet, and he’s so… not. There have to be so many men out there and you picked him? Is he blackmailing you? Blink twice if you need me to save you.”

“He sees in me everything you’re not,” Liam tells him.

“Ha. Funny. For real, what do we have?”

“We just arrived,” I say. “The person who called it in heard a gunshot.”

“The victim hasn’t been shot and doesn’t look like he was in a position to do any shooting. Did Liam already figure the whole thing out? And I wasted my time even driving here?”

“I figured out why I don’t enjoy working with you,” Liam says as he meanders into the next room that, like the rest of the house, shows clear signs of someone going through it. They must have been looking for something.

“Because my handsome face puts you in a bad mood?” Matthew calls after him. Liam just sticks a gloved hand out to flip him off and carries on.

I follow Liam as he moves around the kitchen. “Are you looking for signs of a gun?”

“Who just… fires a gun when their victim is already dead? Who draws attention to the scene? Or something more was going on,” Liam muses as he wanders a bit. “Could have been outside… they check the premises?”

“Wait,” I say as I nod toward the window. “There’s blood smeared here. Looks like it might have been from a shoe. But then why aren’t there traces of it as they walked through the house?”

“Maybe they cleaned it up,” Liam says as he examines it. “The window screen is still intact. If they left through the window, they had time to put it back.” He hesitates and then looks up, eyeing the top cupboard above the counter. “No, they used this to step up. They stepped up here to put something up there.”

He slowly walks along the counter, checking it before he looks at me. “Let me boost you.”

“I could just grab something to climb up.”

“We don’t want to mess up the scene in case something is important.”

“You literally just want to boost me for some unknown reason. I can find something to step on that won’t mess up the scene,” I assure Liam.

“Like Matthew’s face?” he asks.

“Definitely not.”

Liam’s not deterred. “Matthew, come here. Don’t forget you owe me your life.”

“Yes, my lord,” Matthew says with much sarcasm as he enters the kitchen. “What would you like, my lord?”

“Get on your hands and knees; I want to step on your back to look up there.”

“Oh, I could never taint your foot by making you step on my foul back,” he says as he grabs Liam’s ass in a bear hug and lifts him up. “Is this good for your royal ass?”

Liam growls, no longer pleased by this scenario. He must get what he needs because he waves to be put down, but Matthew isn’t putting him down.

“Did you say you needed to go higher?”

“I’m going to send you as high as you can go here in a minute.”

“How sweet that you think I’m going to heaven,” Matthew says as he sets Liam down. “So?”

“It’s a bag.”

“What kind of bag?” I ask.

“I’ll lift him back up so he can tell you,” Matthew says, but Liam shoos him off.

“Small messenger bag. It looked pretty empty with how flat it was, but I’m sure there’s something in there. It could easily be a tablet or thin computer. Let’s get it documented so we can get it down and opened up. In the meantime, Matthew, carry me to the next room.”

“Yes, my lord.”

“You’re both going to get fired if you don’t act professional,” I warn them.

“How is this not professional?” Matthew asks as he holds his arms out like Liam is going to leap into them.

Liam heads into the bedroom and looks around before pointing at the pictures that hang on the wall. “I haven’t seen a single photo of the dead guy anywhere in the house. Is this not his home?”

“I’ll look into it,” Matthew says.

Liam continues out the door and into the backyard where he surveys the area for a moment before staring at the house next door. “Huh.”

“What?”

“That house is for sale?”

“Looks like it. Why?”

“I just saw movement.”

I pull out my flashlight, aiming it toward the neighboring house, and spot a clearly broken window, making it quite possible that the killer fled there. But why not just run? If they’d left the premises before we got here, there’s a huge chance no one would have ever seen or noticed them.

I call for Matthew just as Chris, another detective, walks onto the scene.

“I’ll take the back door while you guys check out the window,” Chris says, seeing what we’ve noticed.

“Do we trust him?” Liam asks as he nods toward Chris. “I bet he’s the killer.”

“If Chris was the killer every time you claimed he was, he’d be quite the prolific killer,” I remind Liam. Honestly, we all know it’s because Liam is irritated that after Tobias had taken me, I’d gone to stay with Chris when Liam wanted me to stay with him. At the time, I was still trying my hardest to be annoyed by Liam because of the whole finding him killing Jon Davies in a barn thing. Really, Liam’s so fussy for the most ridiculous reasons.

Chris hammers on the back door where I can hear him calling out to whoever is inside the house to open the door.

Liam reaches through the window and switches off the lock before pushing it open and looking inside at the empty house. There’s not a single piece of furniture to be seen and all the lights are off, so there can’t be too many places to hide. He presses against the exterior wall and listens for a second, but I hear movement all too soon, and it’s moving away from the back door where Chris calls for them to open up again.

Liam pushes himself up and slips through the window with ease. “Stay here and look pretty,” he says, which is absolutely ridiculous for him to assume I’ll do. Ignoring that foolish request, I hoist myself in through the window as he carefully moves in deeper.

“Police, put your hands up and get on the ground,” he yells, but the person dashes through the house just before I hear a door slam shut. Liam kicks it hard, and since the door evidently didn’t have a good lock on it, it flings open as I see the person rush through a window. I can hear them hit something outside as Liam slides out that window with ease. Like how the fuck did he make that look so easy? Instead of following him, I run out through the front door in the hope of cutting the person off.

Luck is with me because the person speeds my way, not expecting someone else. The instant they zip around the porch, I guide them to the ground.

Swiftly, I catch their arms and pull them back so I have control and can confirm that they’re not holding a gun or weapon of any kind.

“Please! No! Please! I didn’t do it!” she says with a sob. “Please. No. Please.”

“Sexy tackle,” Liam comments, which I really don’t think is something that should be said at this moment, but he seems to get away with things that he really shouldn’t.

The woman’s head snaps back as soon she hears Liam’s voice and when her eyes catch his, she goes, “Liam?”

Liam freezes and it looks like he’s seen a ghost.