Page 17 of Break the Ice

“I should probably get going.”

“We’re not done discussing business, darling. Stay where you are. Let’s get cozy and dim these lights.” Mr. Hawk strolls over to the panel on the wall and dials down the lights. “Tell me more about your time with Abernathy. I want to know it all...”

My neck aches as I sit up and struggle to lift my eyelids. I’m deep in a cloud of drowsiness. It feels like I’ve been asleep for hours, even though when my gaze lands on the wall clock ticking away, it says it’s only minutes after one a.m.

I rub my eyes and shudder out a yawn, then realize I’m not at home. I’m still at the Wolves’ party. I’m still in Mr. Hawk’s penthouse.

This jolts me more than anything. I jump out of my seat on the sofa, questioning how I could lose track of time and fall asleep.

Nothing about the last hour makes sense. What could have happened, and why don’t I remember any of it?

I turn for the door, my heart racing, and then glass cracks under my heel. My eyes drop to the ground and a horrified scream tears from my throat.

I’m standing among shards of a broken whiskey bottle. I’m a few feet away from the large, limp body of Mr. Hawk. His face is ruddy and slack like all life has left him. Blood mats his shock of white hair. He’s been struck hard.

“Oh my god,” I gasp. Panic infects every part of me.

It takes me a second to work up the nerve to do it—check his pulse. It takes me another sobering second to accept the fact that I don’t find one.

He’s dead.

I can’t bring myself to move. I can’t do anything but kneel beside his body, stuck in the deepest level of shock possible.

Bile comes on strong. I spit up the contents of my stomach ’til there’s nothing left.

It doesn’t even register that I’m not alone. The suite door’s opened and a man’s walked in, stopping at the gruesome scene he finds.

Rafe looks from Mr. Hawk’s dead body to me kneeling on the floor and he grins. “Sugar Tits, what did you do?”

6. Marisse

“We can’t. We can’t. We can’t… do… this.”

My head’s so full. I close my eyes and bring my hands to my face. I can’t make it through a thought without feeling myself sink deeper into the haze. It’s like my head’s been invaded by a disorienting cloud.

Nothing’s clear and everything’s confusing.

“We can’t,” I repeat. “What are we doing?”

Rafe speaks from a few feet away. He’s grabbed Mr. Hawk by the ankles and dragged him away from the shattered glass frame of the coffee table. Sweat clings to his temple, his front stained with blood.

Not just any blood—Mr. Hawk’s blood.

Then I glance down and see the blood staining my fingers.

I’m covered in it. On my hands. Drying on the front of my Valentino dress.

If I looked in the mirror, I’d see it smeared across my cheek.

I scream.

My horror makes me incoherent and irrational. I back up against the wall and shake my head profusely. It can’t be what it looks like. It can’t be what I’m seeing. This has to be some horrible nightmare.

Black spots appear before my eyes. My pulse thrashes away. I drop to my knees and scream at the blood on my shoes.

David can’t be dead. He can’t be!

How could he leave me like he has? Is this what he wanted?