Page 35 of Rule the Night (Blackwell Butchers #1)
MAEVE
I was glad for the noise of the bike on the way back to the loft, if not for the fact that I now had Poe’s ass between my thighs.
It was bad enough that I’d let him finger-bang me in the parking lot, but now the vibration of the bike and the proximity of his body just reminded me how close I’d come to fucking him.
How much I still wanted to fuck him.
What had I been thinking?
Thinking is overrated. June again.
You’re in no position to offer advice, I thought.
By the time we pulled behind the gate at the loft it was dark out and my body was humming with a kind of physical need I’d never experienced in my life.
Not good. Not good at all.
We walked to the door in silence.
Poe keyed in the entry code and we stepped into the vestibule.
I was careful not to brush past him as I started up the stairs. “I meant what I said.”
“Don’t worry, little bird,” Poe said behind me. “It’ll be our little secret.”
I didn’t know if I could trust him, but I had to believe it, if only for my own sanity.
The lights were on in the kitchen when we entered the main living area where a small figure with wavy gray hair was in the kitchen, half-buried in the open freezer. Cold vapor drifted like smoke from inside.
“You okay in there, Reva?” Poe asked.
The woman turned around, her mouth turned down in a frown. “Something’s rotten in Denmark.”
She seemed unhappy but Poe took it in stride. “What would that be?”
“You keep telling me not to cook for you, but then I come and find all this food stored up!” The stack of bracelets and bangles on her wrists jangled as she expressed her obvious frustration.
“We have someone else to cook, remember?” Poe looked at me. “See? This is Maeve. She’s doing the cooking now.”
Reva looked at me, then narrowed her eyes at Poe. “That’s not the girl who was here last time.”
“We hired someone new,” he said.
I glared at him. What a liar.
“Hired” wasn’t what I’d call it.
The woman named Reva came around the island.
“You’re a pretty little thing!” I caught the hint of a Southern accent. “You do all that cooking?”
I nodded. “It’s easier to make things in advance.”
“Ain't that the truth!” She grinned. “Well, it sure looks like you know what you’re doing, sweetheart, but if you need any pointers, you let me know. I come to clean but I know my way around a kitchen!”
Poe coughed. When I glanced at him, he looked like he was about to swallow his own tongue. What was wrong with him?
“Thank you,” I said. “I definitely will.”
“And just in case, I left you some of my meatloaf. It’s labeled in the fridge, ready to go.”
“That’s so nice of you,” I said.
“Yeah, super nice,” Poe said. “You’re the best.”
Why did he sound so weird?
“Well, that’s all for me, I guess.” She lifted a jacket off the back of one of the dining room chairs and put it on. “I’ll see ya’ll in a couple days.”
We waved goodbye and she started down the stairs. The door shut behind her and Remy entered the room wearing jeans and no shirt.
Because of course he did.
His blond hair was damp, like he’d just taken a shower, and the ink on his shoulders rippled as he crossed the room. He stubbed his toe on one of the island chairs, swore, hopped for a few seconds on one foot, then continued as if nothing had happened.
“That Reva?” Remy asked.
“Yep,” Poe said. “She left us meatloaf.”
I walked to the fridge.
“What are you doing?” Remy asked.
“Checking out Reva’s meatloaf.” I was always curious about other people’s cooking.
I found the unfamiliar pan, pulled it out of the fridge, and set it on the island.
“You don’t want to do that,” Poe said.
“What are you talking about?” I found a fork and peeled back the foil on the loaf pan. “I’m starving.”
“Um…” Remy started.
I cut off a bite of the meatloaf and popped it in my mouth.
Gagging was a reflex. I leaned over the sink and let the food fall out of my mouth. “What the…?”
Remy winced like he could feel my pain.
“We tried to tell you,” Poe said.
I washed the bite of food into the garbage disposal and took the fork back to inspect the meatloaf. “What is this?” I prodded a gray chunk in the meatloaf. “Is this… salmon?”
“She mixes it in because she says the omega-3s are good for us.” Remy sounded like a sad little boy forced to eat his vegetables.
Except salmon mixed with ground beef was way worse than vegetables, and Remy actually liked vegetables.
I dropped my fork and backed away from the meatloaf like it might come to life. “This is… this is an abomination.”
“We know,” Remy said.
Poe picked up the meatloaf and started scraping it into the disposal. “Now you know why we need you.”
“But… why don’t you just hire someone else?”
Remy looked offended. “It would hurt Reva’s feelings. Besides, she does a good job cleaning the house.”
I shook my head, feeling like I’d landed on another planet, one where it made more sense to engage in an elaborate underground hunt of women just to get a cook rather than firing someone who most definitely could not cook.
Then I remembered what Poe had said in the parking lot: It’s a vice.
It wasn’t just about the cooking. They liked the killing.
And I had no idea how to reconcile that knowledge with the fact that I was starting to actually like them.