Page 36

MYRA

“How do they look?” I lean back, trying to get a full view of the floor-to-ceiling velvet drapes Becca helped me hang and I spent a stupid amount of time steaming. “Did I get all the wrinkles out?”

Becca’s brows pinch together, expression thoughtful. “Should I have hung curtains in my house?”

I turn, a little surprised. “You have a house?” I haven’t really thought about Becca’s life outside of what’s going on with her sister, which is probably kind of stupid. Of course she has a life besides what I’m seeing now. One that’s intertwined with Felicity and Shelly’s.

At least it used to be.

“Yeah. But who knows when I’ll ever be able to go back there.” She blows out a long sigh. “It’s probably full of dead guys anyway.”

I open my mouth, but nothing comes out because I don’t know how to respond to that.

Becca gives me a wry little smile. “I was just kidding.” She shrugs. “They already got all the dead guys out.”

Yesterday morning before I had to suddenly leave for the hospital, Becca filled me in on a little bit of what’s really happening, but I didn’t know it included dead guys in her house. “Who pulled the dead guys out of your house?”

She rolls her eyes, lids closing. “It’s a long story and it makes my head hurt.” One hand lifts to rest against her temple. “I’m just glad Butch found somewhere we can lay low for a minute.” She opens her eyes. “Thank you for letting us stay here.”

“Of course.” I back down the stepstool I’ve been using to steam the creases from the deep green fabric, setting the handheld unit down on the top step. “You guys can stay here as long as you want.”

“I don’t want to stay here at all. I want to find my sister and go back to my life.

” Becca slumps a little, looking defeated.

“But I don’t think I’ll have much of a life to go back to at this point.

I’m pretty sure I no longer have a job, and I don’t know how I’ll feel about sleeping in a house where I had to jump out of a window to escape being murdered. ”

Holy cow. There is way more to the story than I realized. “You jumped out of the window?”

Becca snorts. “It’s actually really surprising how easy it is when you’re in danger. It’s shocking the lengths you’ll go to in order to survive.” She stands a little taller. “And how creative you can be when you don’t have any actual weapons.”

The more I learn about Becca, the more I realize she might be a girl after my own heart. “I tried to bash Butch’s head open with my nightstand drawer.”

Becca’s brows lift behind her glasses. “Impressive.” This time her smile is a little more genuine. “I attempted to take out a mercenary with an economy sized jug of laundry detergent.”

I purse my lips. “You win. I’m not sure how I would handle facing down a mercenary.”

Becca flicks her wrist, waving off my comments. “That word makes them sound way scarier than they are.” Her expression turns a little sad. “Actually, some of the guys were really nice. I hate that they ended up being —”

My doorbell rings, cutting our conversation short.

I point at her. “Put a pin in that.” I wiggle my brows. “It sounds like my new sofa is here.” I head for my front door. “Now we’ll have somewhere to sit while we talk.”

I reach the front door and pull it open, smiling out at the two men on my stoop. The bright red box truck emblazoned with the furniture store’s logo is pulled right up to the curb in front of my house. “Hey. I bet you have a couch for me.”

I’m kind of stupidly excited about this. Not just so I’ll have somewhere to sit—and a spot to snuggle with Simon—but because I think furniture will really make my house start to feel like a home.

And I want Simon to feel like he has a home to come back to.

Florida is going to be his last job as an independent contractor, but at this point we don’t know how long that job is going to take. And I’m going to do everything possible to encourage him to get through the process as quickly as he can.

One of the men lifts the clipboard in his hand, looking across the names. “Are you Myra Parks?”

I cringe inwardly at the last name. I didn’t want to keep Matthias’s name, but I’m not sure going back to my father’s was any better.

Hopefully I’ll be able to replace it with a new one—one I choose myself—soon.

“That’s me.” I step back, motioning toward the family room. “Do you want to see where you’re bringing everything?”

The men follow me in and I leave the door open since they’re just going to be headed back out. As I walk down the hall, I open the app for the camera on the front porch and switch it off. Hearing the alarm go off a million times while they bring in my couch will drive me crazy.

When I look up, I nearly bump into one of their backs. I fumble my phone, but manage to regain my grip on it as I lean to see what has them stopping so abruptly.

Unsurprisingly, it’s Becca.

Last night after Simon and I got home from the hospital, he made enough dinner for us to invite Becca and Butch over.

I think it might be the first real meal she’s eaten, and from what she said this morning, the heavy weight of the carbs in the pasta pretty much made her comatose, so she also got a full night’s sleep.

Add-on that she took an extra extended shower upstairs in my bathroom, and she’s looking pretty darn cute.

She’s got this innocent, nerdy vibe that is probably catnip to most men.

My movers included.

Stepping around them, I move into the family room, gesturing to the blank wall in front of me. “I’d like the long end of the sectional right here, with the shorter portion angling over there.” Continuing to flail around, I make a rough L-shaped with my swinging arm.

I’m so wrapped up in laying out the foundation of my family’s future that it takes a second for the strange noise behind me to register.

Even when it does, I don’t immediately recognize where it came from.

So when I turn and find one of the movers gripping Becca, with one hand plastered across her mouth, I’m surprised.

Pretty sure the guys bringing me a sofa shouldn’t be grabbing my friend that way.

Time seems to slow down as I take in the gravity of the situation I’ve found myself in. The full extent of the threat Becca and I are facing. I wasn’t sure who exactly was after her, but I have a feeling I’ve got my eyes on them right now.

And I’ll be damned if I let them take her the same way they took her sister.

My brain quickly falls back onto its anything can be a weapon belief. My eyes dart around in search of an option. It doesn’t have to be anything great, it just has to be capable of inflicting pain.

Luckily, a great option is well within my reach.

The empty-armed mover zeros in on me like a heat seeking missile. He’s about to find what he’s looking for.

As he lunges, I dodge, grabbing the handheld steamer still plugged into the wall.

In a quick movement, I twist the bubbling reservoir free of the flared plastic end and aim the opening right at his face.

Flicking my wrist, I fling every bit of the boiling water through the air.

The second it connects with his skin, I drop the empty tank and rip the cord from the outlet, carrying the rest of the unit with me as I race into the front room.

I know it’s not much, but maybe I can beat him to death with it before the plastic break?—

A large body slams into me as soon as I make the turn into the foyer. The guy who had Becca must have decided his energy was better spent trying to chase me down, because now he’s grabbing me instead of her.

I’ve got a split second to decide how best to use my weapon of choice.

What would Piper do? She would forget about blunt force trauma and go straight to strangulation.

Gripping the cord in both hands, leaving as much length as possible between the two, I fling them over the shoulder closest to his head, planting the cord against the front of his throat.

In a move so quick I can’t believe I manage it, I shove my hands back, cross my wrists, then pull the remaining length of cord over his head and back to my front, effectively wrapping it around his neck.

The twist I added in the back, makes it easy for me to cinch.

And hard for him to loosen.

I drop low, putting all my weight into choking him out. I’m feeling like I might be getting somewhere when suddenly, his whole body lurches forward, taking me to the floor.

“Oh shit.” Becca steps into my line of sight as one of the stools Simon bought for my island clatters to the floor. “I didn’t expect him to go down so fast.” Her head tilts. “Or for his neck to end up at that weird angle.”

I slowly roll my eyes toward the pile of probably-not-a-real-mover pinning me to the floor. He stares back at me.

In a really dead sort of way.

Becca bends at the waist, nose wrinkling as she inspects her handy work. “Do you think I killed him?”

“I mean...” I try to wiggle free. “He sure feels like dead weight.”

“ Myra .” Simon’s bellow carries in through the still open front door.

“He’s not going to be happy.” I shove at the probably dead guy on my back. “Help me get up so Simon doesn’t have a coronary when he walks in.”

Becca squats, grabbing the guy’s shoulder as she leans back, managing to shift him just enough I can slip free. “Pretty sure there’s no walking going on.”

I get to my feet just as Simon races in, Butch hot on his heels. Both men skid to a stop, their eyes dropping to the pile at our feet.

Butch looks from me to Becca. “What the fuck just happened?”

Simon grabs me, pulling me against his chest. He holds me tight as Becca starts explaining.

“We thought these were the movers bringing Myra’s couch, but then this guy grabbed me and the other one tried to get?—”

“There’s another one?” Butch steps over the lump still sporting an extension cord necklace. “Did you kill him too?”

“Well…” Becca’s voice drifts off. “If I did, it wasn’t on purpose. Totally.”

Simon kicks the front door closed before dragging me down the hall behind Butch and Becca.

He stops in the doorway of the family room he worked so hard to finish, eyes caught on the red-faced man sprawled across the floor.

The collapsible step-stool I stood on to hang the curtains lay across him.

Like the guy at the front door, his neck looks a little…

Not right.

“You’re two for two, Bec.” I thought slapping Simon with her shoe was the worst the tiny woman standing next to me had to dish out. Guess I’m not the only one harboring a little extra feminine rage.

“I’m not fucking around.” She crouches down, digging into the pockets of the also probably dead man.

“These pricks have my sister. I meant it when I said I was going to kill them all.” She pulls out his phone, waking it up before holding it in front of his face.

When the facial recognition does its job and the screen unlocks, she shakes her head. “Idiot. Shoulda used a code instead.”

“I’m guessing he wasn’t expecting to be boiled alive before having his neck snapped.” Butch steps in close, looking over her shoulder as she swipes across the screen.

Becca goes still, eyes widening before lifting to me.

“What?” I pull out of Simon’s grip and shove Butch to one side so I can see what she’s looking at.

It’s a picture of me.