Page 21 of What’s Left of Us (What Left #3)

“I hate voyeurs who don’t ask for permission,” Jo hisses, and she stands and kicks the laptop closed. Her feet are really close to Dante’s face, and he turns his head to peer at her as she speaks. “You work for Massimo?”

Dante peers between us, keeping his arm lifted between me and him. Finally he licks his lips and focuses on me again. “ Lo lavoro per Xeno. Non per Massim o.”

I narrow my eyes, wondering why he wants to go back to Italian now. “ Hai un segreto che vuoi condividere ?”

He hesitates. “ Tuo fratello ci ha detto di sorvegliare la casa. Ho trovato una lettera nella cassetta della posta che diceva di registrare quello che facevi e inviarlo a un file condiviso online. Penso che fosse sua madre .”

My other hand still grips his neck, and I tighten my hold. “You shouldn’t take orders from anyone but Xeno. Chi ti ha dato la lettera ?”

“ Era scritta al computer ,” he whimpers. “ Ma una fan fuori dall’ospedale mi ha detto che stavo facendo un buon lavoro quando mi ha visto .”

“Chi?”

He looks between us. “ Una ragazza. Una di quelle ossessionate dal Citrus Grove Slayer. ”

I groan. That could be far too many people. “ Hai avuto un nome -”

“Non Alastair,” he interrupts, and Jo perks up at the name. “ Ha detto che era così entusiasta che la vera sterminatrice stesse venendo alla luce. Non vedevano l’ora che una donna dominasse i titoli dei giornali. ”

“She’s a Slayer who thinks Porscha is better?” I ask, surprised. Jo straightens, when I speak, and I’m sure it doesn’t make sense.

Dante nods, twisting his face to the side to spit out blood. He’s a mess, red smeared across his face. “They didn’t say where the recordings went. Just that they were due.”

“Due?” Jo asks, looking between us.

“I got paid for sending the recordings,” he explains, tensing when I tighten my grip again. “I no longer had requests for the recordings after Porscha was arrested. Don’t know what to tell you.”

I shove him as I release him, straightening up and stepping back. There’s blood across my knuckles and the more I start to focus on myself, I realize I can taste it in my mouth too. He got at least one good hit in, but his actions weren’t fueled by rage.

“Oh, shit,” Jo says, and I glance at her. “You busted your knuckles.”

Stepping away from Dante, I glance down and study my arm.

There’s still blood on my knuckles, and when I purse my lips I can taste it in my mouth too.

If he even moves wrong right now I’m going to start beating on him again.

The adrenaline makes the blood pound in my ears, and I have to shake my head to will the dark thoughts away.

Dante whines before I can think about anything else. “You busted my tooth!”

Jo hops over the laptop, grabbing my arm.

I’ve always done a good job keeping my violent side away from her.

In high school, I was always controlled and cautious, and our relationship was shaped by that from the moment we moved to Colorado onward.

I haven’t had a lot of reasons to get into fights like this since leaving Florida.

“Did you have to hit him so much?” Jo asks, bending to grab the laptop. Dante’s still groaning on the ground, but he isn’t dead. I didn’t even punch him enough to make him pass out, and I’m kind of disappointed about that, to be honest.

When she straightens I catch her chin, blood be damned, and meet her gaze. “I didn’t give him, or anyone else, permission to watch you. Those tapes have to go.”

She hesitates. “Do you think they’re evidence? Do you think…”

Her voice trails off, and I look down at Dante again. “Did you ever record us with anyone else?”

Dante shakes his head quickly, but I don’t believe him. “No! Never.”

Looking at Jo, I know we need to make a decision. We need to grab the laptop, but if he recorded on his phone -

Her cell goes off, and it derails my thoughts. She pauses long enough to dig out her phone. “It’s Sterling.”

I nod, taking the laptop from her as she picks up the call. I hear her moving away, back across the street as she answers the phone.

Dante shifts and groans, struggling to sit up. He spits blood again, and I glance around to see if anyone is watching.

No one. No one outside anyway. No one who wants to know I can see them.

It doesn’t surprise me. People in Citrus Grove rarely intervene in something that doesn’t have to do with them.

They will gossip afterwards, but I was beating on Dante.

He wasn’t beating on Jo. The civilians who live here haven’t changed in nearly sixteen years, and no one was going to come out here and get in the middle of something when they could be nosy behind closed doors.

“If I find something on this that I don’t like,” I tell Dante as I turn, tucking the laptop beneath my arm to straighten my shirt. “I will find you. And you won’t be able to beg anyone in the family to save you from me.”

He ducks his head and doesn’t say much more. I thought Xeno picked tough guys to keep us safe, but Dante is more of a coward. Sure, pain is pain, but my Papa would probably shoot him if he saw him laid out on the ground like this.

I pause long enough to bend back down, dig through his pockets, and grab his phone.

He hisses at me but doesn’t do anything else.

“I will send this back to you through the care of Xeno when we make sure you don’t have anything else important on your phone.

Maybe something you wouldn’t want to share when you could fantasize about it instead. ”

What little color he has left in his face fades and I turn away so I don’t start laying into him again. Jo is standing outside the house across the street, hip popped out, brows scrunched together as I approach.

“No, no, of course we won’t do anything rash,” she says, brushing back her hair. “No, I understand that we can’t just drop in.”

She hangs up then, eyes meeting mine. I gesture to the laptop but she waves me off. “Alastair is going to the hospital in Tallahassee again. For a check up.”

My eyebrows lift. “And Sterling told you that, because…”

She hesitates. “Well, I’ve been texting him since yesterday. Demanding updates. That type of thing.”

“And he decided to tell you this?” I ask, perplexed.

“Not exactly,” she says, crossing her arms. “He said explicitly to not just show up just to see Alastair.”

“But he still told you?” I say.

She shrugs. “He said… he said if we have a reason to be there, it might be the last time we get to see him for a while. Even in passing.”

Her words settle over me, and I realize what he’s done. He’s not supposed to share intel like that, it could get him in trouble if someone caught on.

But he knows, above all else, we’re dying to see Alastair. Glancing at my hand, I glance at the cut I got from busting Dante’s tooth. The skin is missing on two knuckles but it’s not really all that bad. I flex my fingers, studying the mess. “Maybe I need stitches.”

“Totally,” Jo agrees, reaching for the door. “You hit a tooth? It’s an open wound.”

I snort. “It’s an excuse.”

She’s back seconds later with her purse and my phone, keys in hand. “I’ll drive. We can leave the extras in the car, right?”

Like my gun? Nodding, we pivot and follow her to the car. I’m guessing if she wants to leave right now, we don’t have a lot of time to get there.