Page 50 of Like Grim Death: Part One

“Hello?”I whisper it, staring at the side of my house, my pulse thrumming so hard inside my head I can’t hear Maverick anymore, but a voice I recognize slides through the phone.

“Ella.Turn around.”

“Tellme why the fuck you came here.” I take the joint from Cain’s fingers as I speak the words. His dark eyes are bleary, a red-purple bruise blooming over one. He leans back against the couch, tipping his chin as he stares up at the ceiling. I glance at his black sweats, his black T draped over the arm of the couch beside him. He’s wearing all-black sneakers, and I know now when he wheeled into my driveway, it was straight from the ring. From a fight, probably. Now though, his breaths are slow and even.

His arms are sprawled out around the back of my couch, fingers of his right hand an inch from my shoulder.

I don’t care. I just want to know how the fuck he knew to come.

“I got a call.” That’s all he says.

Feeling my temper spike, I inhale from the joint, closing my eyes as I do, trying to relieve some of the tension in my body. I haven’t gone upstairs yet, an hour from when one of the 6’s drivers dropped me off. From when I called Elijah then Sid on my burner phone—the one Ella doesn’t know about because if I got kidnapped, like last night, my attacker would be able to find her number and maybe track her. I can’t risk that with her, so I lie by omission.

It seems it’s what all of us are fucking good at.

Clearly, Cain knew something was going to pop off, but are we supposed to sweep it under the fucking rug like everything else?

I checked in on Ella as soon as I got inside after calling Sid, knowing my sister would probably be up. My girl was sleeping peacefully, and she hasn’t come down yet. I think it’s for the best. I’m grudgingly grateful Cain was “called” here to watch over her, because she thinks I’m invincible, and I don’t want to prove her wrong. These things are so fucking hard to explain for people who don’t get it. I’ve never reallyhad to,but now, talking to Ella about it, I feel like I’m searching for a word in another language I’ve only heard once. How do you explain total devotion? Loyalty to the grave? Constant mistrust?

I don’t think it’s possible.

“Yeah, I’m gonna need a little more than that from you.” I mean, I know Cain hasn’t been sleeping well. He’s always at Nox, the gym we own in downtown Alexandria. It’s not like anyone would’ve woken him up, but it doesn’t make fucking sense.

“Elijah. He told me to get here, and fast, because you had anappointment.”

I think of the blow to the back of my head, then the ones on the side of my temple, the blooming bruise along my abs, the aches still throbbing through my body now. “An appointment.” I want to scream, but the marijuana is doing its job, working through my system, keeping me still. Numb.

“He gave me nothing else. So why don’t you tell me what happened?” Cain asks it quietly, like he says everything.

I just laugh. There’s nothing I can fucking say. Instead, I glance at him, the nasty marks on his face. “You still letting that chick beat you up?”

His eyes flutter behind his closed lids. “It’s my foreplay, fucker.”

A snarl of a laugh leaves my lips. I think about the time he almost got run over by his own car, an older Camaro he had when we were in high school. Loud as shit, just like his new one. We used to push it down the driveway of his parents’ house when we’d sneak out at night, engine off so we didn’t wake them, and once he was behind it instead of to the side. He screamed before he leapt to the grass by the driveway and I couldn’t stop fucking laughing. Maybe the danger gave him a taste for violence, or maybe he’s always had it.

God, we were invincible in high school. Nothing could touch us, and we pretended our demons didn’t exist. Now, they’re all catching up to us. Briefly, I think of the guy who actually hit me a few hours ago. The one I know Lucifer used to be friends with. I can’t quite place him, but I’m not entirely surprised he was there. Everyone around us orbits close to the 6.

My thoughts drift to Rain and I feel like I got sucker punched. What kind of shit is he going to get up to? What kind of danger will he be in? Who will want to hurt him? Who else will threaten him?

Tearing me from my morbid thoughts, Cain says, “You should go sleep with your girl. She’ll want to wake up to you.”

I take another inhale, leaning my head back against the couch like he is.

After I exhale, I reach over and drop the roach in the ashtray on the side table adjacent to the couch. I don’t even have to fucking look, I’ve smoked so many joints in this exact spot.

Could be coke,I think to myself.

“I don’t know about that.”

Surprising me, Cain’s jaw clenches, a long, lean line full of tension. I’m amazed because Cain never lets anything get to him, and if he does, he never shows it. “Why do you say that shit? You two need to be solid while we’re dealing with RC here.” He still doesn’t open his eyes, but his words combined with what happened tonight eat at me.

“Wearefucking solid.” It’s an automatic response and it isn’t true. I was just thinking, before my walk back was interrupted, how Ella is keeping shit from me. How I’m nottherefor her like I should be. “Does she know you’re here?” It suddenly occurs to me she wasalonewith Cain, and he’s a fucking whore. My muscles go tense, spiking pain through my body as I stare at his closed eyes.

But suddenly they open, his gaze dark and inky in the night. A small smile pulls on his lips. “Don’t worry. I didn’t touch her too much.”

Red blurs my vision, but I force myself not to react. “She wouldn’t want you.”

“Why? She doesn’t like Arabic men?”