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“Why would either one of you assume I had anything to do with the dude’s murder?” I polished off my champagne, placing the empty glass on the bar.
“Because of the bully syndrome,” Creed piped in, a grin forming on his face.
Styx shook his head. “Don’t get caught up in your growing need to be the savior of the world, Easton. The boy who was killed was the son of the superintendent of the police. As you might imagine, every resource will be used to find his killer.”
I turned my head toward him, taking a deep breath. No, I wasn’t in the habit of checking identification prior to selecting my victims. They were random choices based on their entitled and abusive actions. “Well, I haven’t seen the report, but I’ve been far too busy preparing for the last exams as both of you well know.”
When Creed placed his hand on my shoulder, I cringed as usual. The one thing I didn’t like was to be touched in a kind or gentle manner. While sex required it, my controlling needs were based on my hatred of being touched.
That had been something else my father had taken from me, making fun and beating me when I’d wanted to be hugged. I’d been the one who’d suffered the most from my mother’s disappearance. She’d cared for all three of us tremendously but had taken time to try to nurture me out of violent nightmares that had started at a very early age. The loss had pushed me deeper into the kind of abyss few escape from.
“That’s good to know, brother, because the last thing we need is to have the coalition of idiots breathing down our necks.”
“We still have skeletons that could easily be found, you know.” Styx had a worried look on his face.
Neither one of them ever mentioned what had been shifted from the hunting grounds to burial grounds, easily thirty men if not more buried there in one way, shape, or form. Our father had been creative in how he disposed of them.
Creed sighed.
“I thought it’s a bird sanctuary now,” I said, glancing back at the great mafia leader. He’d been the one to add top soil to a good portion, either installing landscaping and waterfalls or wildflowers, which had all but taken over the acreage.
“You forget people’s memories are long and rumors remain in the back of people’s minds,” Styx said under his breath.
Nodding, I did understand we could be sitting on a ticking timebomb, which was one reason the property was required to stay in the family. “That brings me to a question. What can you tell me about Senator James Barker?” The coalition as Creed liked to call it were the people in politics or law enforcement determined to solve the age-old mysteries of where the powerful men in their primes had disappeared to.
We’d been on and off the radar for as long as I could remember.
Styx whistled. “He’s an asshole for one thing. He even attempted to put a squelch on the artistic endeavor we own. When he was a detective long before he was a police chief, he tried over and over again to get something on Pop’s business.”
“The man has attempted to fuck with everything over the years and he’s buddies with Jerry Roxford.” Creed’s brows were lifted. “The father of the kid killed by an unknown assailant?”
“Interesting.” And I meant it.
“Why?” he pushed.
I glanced from one to the other. “Because his daughter has been in my class and wrote a fictional story about a family who hunted their enemies on a wooded piece of land.”
“Fuck,” Styx hissed. “You know what that means.”
We looked from one to the other. Only one time had an enemy managed to escape my father’s clutches, him blaming the man’s disappearance on our inadequacies. We’d been tossed into a hole in the ground for three weeks, barely given food or water as punishment. For me, it had been sheer torture, the time in close, dark quarters defining my manhood. Especially since I’d just turned eighteen.
All three of us looked at each other, our oldest brother doing the talking. “It means someone attached to one of the victims from long ago is finally telling his story to any and all who will listen.”
Creed closed his eyes, his anger causing him to snap the flute into several broken pieces. As blood ran down his hand, neither Styx nor I reacted. We’d seen enough blood in our lives that we were immune to it.
Or in my case, I relished the sight, the scent. I found it soothing.
“It means we need to secure the man who we made the mistake of leaving alive. If we don’t,” Creed stopped mid-sentence for his usual dramatic emphasis, “all this could be lost. And since I just found out I’m going to be a father, that cannot happen.”
As Styx congratulated him while getting a towel, I shifted my attention back to the window and glorious view outside.
No one was going to fuck with my family or the woman I’d claimed as my possession.
And they certainly wouldn’t like it if they dared try.
CHAPTER 9
Sara
